Too busy to blog...

Hello all.

If you've come around here in the past couple weeks, you may have noticed that I haven't been posting for a long time. I've just been busy... really busy. I have a million phone calls to return and emails to reply to this weekend. I'm going to at least try to get around to most of that this weekend. In the meantime, you can check out the blogs on my blog list to the right or the shared items I've shared as I come across them.

New Beta of Firefox 3.1 Available

The nice folks over at Mozilla just made a beta version of Firefox Version 3.1 available for download. It's pretty neat. Not too much different from the previous version other than some innards that make improvements to the browser's ability to handle some audio and video as well as some java enhancements.
The freshest thing, and the thing most useful to most users, is the ability to press Ctrl+Tab to bring up a preview of your open tabs. This is the same button combination that used to let you toggle between open windows. It's very similar to the windows shortcut of pressing Alt+Tab to flip between open programs.

New music from Slim feat. Fabolous

Slim - Good Lovin feat. Fabolous
Pretty dope.

New Noreaga... I mean N.O.R.E.

Someone once said NORE is like that drunk uncle everybody has. Nobody has any idea what he's going on and on about, but you love him anyway for some reason. He's the shizzy. This new joint with Pharrell is pretty hype. I might be rockin this for a minute.
N.O.R.E. - Watch Me Now feat. Pharrell

Beyonce Single Ladies (Put a Ring On It) Video

She has legs for days... I'm in awe.

G1 Numbers

T-Mobile has been taking pre-sale orders for the new HTC G1 phone which is the first phone to run Google's new Android operating system. It's a pretty neat phone and I'd order one myself if I had the opportunity. I even advised my mother to take T-Mobile up on their pre-sale offer. It seems I'm not the only one who is drooling over this thing. T-Mobile has sold 1.5 MILLION of these handsets. That total is all pre-sales. That means none of those people have even held one in their hands. They expect 2 Million phones to be shipped and sold in brick and mortar stores pretty soon. Those are big numbers. Huge numbers. iPhone numbers.

This is hype....

(Yeah. I've decided to bring back the word "Hype")If you've ever seen me walking down the hallway at work, drumming on my chest, then you can understand why I'd want this. Christmas is not that far away.

I want this...

Saw this on Gizmodo and it's a must have whenever I get that mansion I've been wanting.

Barack & Curtis: Manhood, Power, & Respect (M. Teezy Repost)

My guy posted this on his blog (m-teezy.blogspot.com), and I had to repost it.

FIGHT NIGHT ROUND 4!!!

Yessir!
Fight Night4

Just saw this on Just Blaze's blog. I played Fight Night Round 3 on PS2 and on XBOX 360. It's a great game and a favorite of Just Blaze for good reason.

... for Barack Obama

Lick a Shot for Barack Obama (click to listen)
Whether you're a Jay-Z fan or an Obama supporter or none of the above. It's not a song, it's a portion of an interview in which Jay-Z speaks on why he supports the Obama campaign and the push to get his people to go out and vote. Apparently this is going to be on the Green Lantern Yes We Can Mixtape. That's Hype.

FRESH new music... Been a while, right?

It's most definitely been a long time since I've heard new music that made me say "Well damn... I'm glad I played that." or "Damn... It's good to be a hip hop fan... a fan of music." What makes the discovery of new music even better is when you hear something incredible from someone you've never heard of. It's too easy to say "Oh shit.. that new Lupe joint is dope." You know you love Lupe, and you know whatever he makes is going to be dope." Alternately, it's extremely vexing to hear news of a new Jay-Z jammie or perhaps a recording of a live performance by the Roots, only to play it and be utterly disappointed.

But anyway... Thanks to theExactly.net, I've come upon three songs that I could nod to and had me googling their respective artists immediately.
The first is a song called Escape Earth by Derrick "Drop" Braxton. He was the dude who produced Gold Watch and The Coolest on Lupe's The Cool. So I guess I was already a fan and didn't know it. The drums on this song sound exactly like those on a Lupe joint from a few years ago that featured Mike Shinoda and Ghostface. I think it was called Spray Paint, but I'm not sure.
The second song is a nice smooth joint by Jessica Tonder called Art of War. It's the shizzy. That's all I can say. She's got an album coming out that will be produced by Derrick Braxton called The Little Girl and the Robot. Starting to see a pattern here? haha.
The other joint is by U-N-I. It's the Beautiful Day Remix featuring a gang of folks you've probably never heard of unless you're an underground hip hop blog fiend. In case you are... Thurz & Y-O (UNI) decided to reach out to Big Pooh(of Little Brother), Evidence, Fashawn, Theo, Aloe Blacc, Mickey Factz and Kes Kaos.

Work at "Home"

It's report card time at a little school in Chicago that shall remain unnamed. Shout out to the other Super Scholar Teachers that might be reading this.
We were allowed to work on report cards from home today. Our kids are off this week, so they're not missing any instruction. I got a $10 Starbucks card and figured I'd walk a few blocks to my neighborhood Sbux for a change of pace. I had heard that if you register a starbucks card, you get two hours of free wifi. Free and Wi-Fi are two of my favorite things. Add coffee to the mix and it's a no-brainer. After getting my wireless connection set up and getting some caffeine, I was well on my way to having a very productive work session. This Starbucks location is right by Loyola University, so there were college kids coming in and out, with the occasional student plopping down and cracking a book to study. Overall, I was impressed with my Starbucks office space.

Damn Red Light Cameras

I hate the City of Chicago. I don't mean the actual city of Chicago. I mean the bastards who put these cameras up. They've cost me $200 already in tickets. I'm usually very cautious, really. But somehow they caught me slipping. I guess I must have been in a hurry on my way to work. Or maybe I was blinded by the glare of the early morning sunrise. Whatever it was, I was caught running a red light. I was mad. I didn't believe it until I went to their site and actually WATCHED THE VIDEO OF ME IN MY CAR RUNNING THE RED LIGHT. You can't argue with streaming video. It's pretty damn frustrating, but it's also an amazing piece of technology.

 

Video for Common's Universal Mind Control

Cool video. I remember when I first heard this song in the car. I wondered how many people would hear the similarities between Common's flow and Gil Scott-Heron's flow on No Knock. I picked up a Gil Scott-Heron album last year and realized he is a major contributor to what was to become hip hop.

Compare to Gil Scott Heron's No Knock

SNL VP Debate Parody

Greatness.

Iron Man vs. Ghostface

I can't believe this is my first post in October. I guess I've been slacking for a few days. More like busy with work, but that's neither here nor there.
The wife and I went to Circuit City today to pick up Iron Man on DVD. I LOVE THIS MOVIE. If you haven't seen it, you're killing yourself. When the movie came out in theaters, I was surprised that Ghostface Killah didn't have even a small cameo in the movie. It was really disappointing.
BUT...
Then I watched the DVD today. There's a scene in which Tony Stark is on his private plane with Terrance Howard's character. They start drinking and there's a music video playing in the background. The music you hear is none other than the Wallaby Don himself. You can catch a glimpse of him on the screen behind the actors. It would have been better if he had actually been on screen at some point, but it's still pretty hype if you ask me.