Eazy D - 1, 2, 3. | Eric Deutchman

A dude who blogs about things that affect his life.. sort of

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Jan 9, 2010

Why are we OK with Sucky Cellphone Quality?

Posted by Eric


How is it that we are all O.K. with really crappy cellphone call quality? People don't realize how potentially good the quality could be.


The high-treble, staticy and scratchy sound that gets sent from your cellphone is one of my worst peeves. It is just accepted that cellphones don't sound that great. I do not think it's a lack of technology, it's just a lack of public outcry that makes it okay for cell companies to ignore good quality audio and save on bandwidth costs.

We can send texts, pictures, even video - at decent quality. We complain when it takes more than 10 seconds for a web page to finish loading - but nobody ever talks about the quality of someone's voice over the phone: it's crap! I really don't like talking on the phone. I was trying to think of reasons why.

For one thing, I'm the kind of guy that likes to do lots of things at the same time. Most of those things require two hands: I hate holding phones. Things I do also usually require some kind of thinking: hard to do on a phone. They also usually require sound: TV, guitar, computer - basically can't do anything except sit there on the phone.

The other reason is that it's either rough on my ears as an annoyance, or it's tough to understand what people are saying on the other end due to the bad quality. The lowest plan for an iPhone user costs more than $70 per month -- is that not enough money to pay for some better bandwidth and quality audio??

I don't even think landline phones are where they should be today. It should sound like I'm right next to the person with the amount of available bandwidth and money floating around. Hey AT&T + Verizon - Take a lesson from VoIP and increase that phone quality so it's at least better than cans & string . It could be the best differentiator in cellphone history. Anyone else in agreement, or am I crazy?

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Dec 2, 2009

How to Open Two Excel Windows Side by Side, Multiple Monitors in Windows 7

Posted by Eric


To open a second instance of Excel in
Windows 7, middle click on your Excel taskbar item, and pow - you have opened a second window that is totally separate from the Excel window you have opened already.

Before, you could only have two spreadsheets open within the same parent form. This meant you could only use one monitor, unless you stretched the window out manually and placed things in their spot. If you have two monitors with different resolutions, forget it. (Think laptop and external monitor, like I have at work).

If you have Win Vista or earlier, you can see if this helps.

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Nov 3, 2009

How to Add Twitter Usernames with a .CSV or Excel Spreadsheet

Posted by Eric


If you have a large mailing list or database of people, and you are one of the hip people who uses Twitter, you're in luck. With a bit of magic, Twitter can find out which of those e-mails are on Twitter, and import them to your Follow list.


Here's how:
  1. Save your spreadsheet as a .CSV file - you need to have the following column headers (and only these): First Name, Last Name, Email Address. See this Gmail KB article
  2. Make a new Gmail account. The best way to do this is to have someone send you an invitation through their Gmail account. You can also send yourself an invitation. The reason you want to do it this way is because if you are a random person signing up for the first time from gmail.com, they will ask to send you a SMS message to verify you're a human. You can only do that once, so try the invitation method. You should now have a completely blank Gmail account with only the welcome e-mails in your inbox, and nobody in your contacts list.
  3. Import your .CSV file into your Gmail contacts list. On the left side of Gmail, you'll see the word "Contacts" - go in here and on the upper right is the word "Import". Follow these steps if you get confused. NOTE: You can only hold a few thousand contacts at a time. Break your spreadsheet into multiple chunks if you need to and repeat this step after you upload your first chunk to Twitter.
  4. Log in to Twitter
  5. On the upper-right, click "Find People"
  6. Click the tab called "Find on Other Networks" - Use your newly-made Gmail account to have Twitter pull in those contacts. You're done! Read on for another tip.
  7. I recommend making a note of who these contacts are so you can put them into a Twitter List later for a quick look at your customer or mailing list database tweets. More on these new Twitter Lists can be found on Hubspot's blog post:

    An Inbound Marketer's Introduction to Twitter Lists

  8. If you have more contacts that couldn't fit into your Gmail contact list, go into your Contacts section, delete everyone in there, and Import chunk #2.
  9. Rinse and Repeat if desired.
Well, that wasn't so bad, now was it? Now get out there and interact with your database folks in the way you always wanted to.

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Oct 26, 2009

How to Swiffer without a Swiffer

Posted by Eric

Sick of dragging out a huge mop + bucket of crappy water around, I needed a new solution to a dirty linoleum kitchen floor - without needing to buy a Swiffer.

Here's how I did it:

  1. Sweep the floor as usual, picking up loose dirt and things, put in a dustpan and throw in the trash. Well, don't throw it - it usually ends up back on the floor that way.
  2. Get some of your favorite cleaning wipes. They come in a plastic canister, are moist, and you pull them up as if they were tissues. Soggy Kleenex if you will. Either way, I had some of the Clorox brand wipes from Target.
  3. Pull two of them out.
  4. Place on floor. Don't drop them, you're not good enough to have them land perfectly flat.
  5. Step on them with shoes on. I recommend Saucony running shoes.
  6. Do a little dance. The trick here is to scrub back and forth with your feet staying on the floor. Try to incorporate "The Robot."
And you're done! Depending on how filthy of a pig you are, you may need to use quite a few cleaning wipes, but compared to a Swiffer, it's more fun and less expensive!

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Sep 8, 2009

How to Make Pie and Get Kisses

Posted by Eric

In 60 seconds or less, you TOO can make this quick and delicious pie.

The Story:
My girlfriend wanted some pie the other night. We haven't had dessert in our apartment for some time. Stop & Shop was open (they're open late), but it was late and we had a podcast to finish. Also, pies from the store cost money.

The PIE:
1. Grab a small plate of some sort. Not as small as a saucer, but just a bit bigger.
2. Unwrap 5 granola bars. These should be the Quaker oats chocolate chip granola bars.
3. Lay them out like this: |||| so you basically have 4 bars side-by-side, and one laying lengthwise around them.
4. Squish the hell out of them until you have something that resembles a round granola-y pie crust
5. Slather two Snack-Packs of chocolate pudding on top of your granola mass. Use good care in texturing the surface so it looks totally delicious.
6. Tell your girlfriend you got a really expensive pie and get kisses.
Bonus: it slices pretty well, believe it or not. You get pretty perfect little triangles of fun if you did step 4 right.


IT'S THAT EASY, FOLKS!

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