GIRLS at SXSW

Posted on March 12, 2012

I was super lucky to get to see the first three episodes of GIRLS at sxsw. The trailer released only a few short weeks ago quickly outlines a quirky comedy in the style of sex and the city that replaces the 30 something Gen-Xers  with 20 something Gen-Yers. And being on the cusp of those two generations I think there is a big difference between the 2.


Tiny Furniture, Lena's hit movie, was something I was very excited to see and while it had an amazing voice for women in their 20s I didn't love the movie. I thought the plot was too slow and awkward pauses not used artfully enough to not just become uncomfortable. These were issues of polish but the voice was there and it was exciting.


Judd Apataw is a great combo for Lena to work with. He is a seasoned producer and has the magic ability to not only cultivate great tallent in others (aka Seth Rogan) but take topic that has failed in movies past (aka Kevin Smith movies) and make them enjoyable for a wide audience without removing the unique and quirky spark that made them good.


GIRLS is still slow at moments and some moments are still a bit to awkward to work on screen. But The outcome is everything you could hope for from a collaboration between Lena and Judd. The jokes are amazing and hit often and hard without seeming like sitcom. The characters are all perfectly lovable while still remaining horribly flawed. A balance every show hopes for but few ever achieve.


Zosia Mamet also needs to be called out. In many ways she has the most over the top character to play which can be difficult to pull off. But she glows on screen and makes the ridiculous also believable and the hilarious simultaneously heartbreaking.


This show is not a masterpiece, but it is really really good and super funny. One of the many things I love about television is the iterative process of writing it. Shows change because they get feedback from an audience. And few shows ever have the first few episodes as the best of the series since they lack this interaction. GIRLS is perfect set up to a great series. Every flaw can be fixed and I believe this show is on a path to fix everyone.

New Computer from iBuyPower

Posted on February 11, 2012

My old dell died a rather sudden and upsetting death. Dell said a new motherboard would be 500$ and so this build below was right around 1k. I heard a ton of mixed reviews about iBuyPower. It seems some people had some really bad experiences with them. But 2 things stuck out for me. The first was the price. I really think this is a great build for only a thousand dollars. And 2 is the fact that I could get it with-out Windows. I own windows and I don’t need to buy it again. But sadly no Linux option.

I’ve only had it for a day but everything seems to be in good shape. Here are the specs which are mostly for my future reference:

  • 1 x Case Azza Triton Gaming Case - Black
  • 1 x Processor Intel® Core™ i7 960 Processor (4x 3.20GHz/8MB L3 Cache)
  • 1 x Processor Cooling Certified CPU Fan and Heatsink
  • 1 x Memory 12 GB [2 GB X6] DDR3-1600 - Corsair or Major Brand
  • 1 x Video Card NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560 - 1GB - FREE Upgrade to GTX 560 2GB - Single Card
  • 1 x Video Card Brand Major Brand Powered by AMD or NVIDIA
  • 1 x Free Stuff [Free Game Voucher] - Batman Arkham City - Free with purchase of NVIDIA GeForce 5 series video card
  • 1 x Motherboard ASUS Sabertooth X58
  • 1 x Motherboard USB / SATA Interface Motherboard default USB / SATA Interface
  • 1 x Power Supply 700 Watt - Standard
  • 1 x Primary Hard Drive 1 TB HARD DRIVE – 32M Cache, 7200 RPM, 6.0Gb/s - Single Drive
  • 1 x Optical Drive 24X Dual Format/Double Layer DVD±R/±RW + CD-R/RW Drive - Black
  • 1 x Flash Media Reader / Writer 12-In-1 Internal Flash Media Card Reader/Writer - Black
  • 1 x Sound Card 3D Premium Surround Sound Onboard
  • 1 x Network Card Onboard LAN Network (Gb or 10/100)
  • 1 x Operating System None- Pre-formatted Hard Drive Only

Error 501 (net::ERR_INSECURE_RESPONSE): Unknown error

Posted on June 14, 2011

Error 501 (net::ERR_INSECURE_RESPONSE): Unknown error is an error you get in chrome when you view a page with an iframe that loads a HTTPS page with an invalid SSL certificate. If you find HTTPS page on the same domain that is not in an iframe you will get the standard red page saying the site is unsafe. If you click procceed the page will load as normal. You can now go back to the page with the iframe and browse normally.

If you are not a developer or are not sure why the SSL certificate is invalid then DO NOT CLICK the button to procceed.