2009 in numbers

You know how sometimes you try to be smart and read Harper’s magazine but then just flip to the back and check out the Harper’s Index? Yeah, me neither. Anyone who does that is a real jerk. But worse still would be ripping off that idea and claiming it’s different because in your format the number comes first.

2 – My goal for number of original posts per week I would write for AdamThinks.com in 2009.

122 – Number of posts I wrote this year.

1.85 – Average number of weekly posts, discounting material I had previously created, lazy posts of a single photo, and easy Google search lists.

46,305 – Number of AdamThinks page loads from before August 21th 2009.

197,893 – Number of AdamThinks page loads since I posted my iPhone commercial parody on August 21st.

10329.50Estimated worth in US dollars of AdamThinks by Website Outlook.

111.39 – Actual amount in US dollars made selling stuff on AdamThinks.

94.3 – Percentage of dollars earned that came from this shirt.

58 – Number of people who thought I should only wear boxers as a Halloween costume.

1 – Number of times AdamThinks was linked to by The New York Times.

1 – Number of times AdamThinks was linked to by a beer pong website.

0 – Some people’s ability to understand satire.

581 – Number of Twitter followers I gained this year.

984 – Number of Twitter followers I still trail Congressman George Radanovich in my campaign to beat him at Twitter.

1 – Number of times Shaquille O’Neal indirectly tweeted me when I tried to help him.

2 – Number of posts that reference the NBC sitcom Mad About You.

8 – Number of posts that reference US President Barack Obama.

10000000 – Amount I wish this was about my website.

My thoughts on James Cameron’s Avatar

Since my post about the Avatar trailer was popular, I might as well say something about the movie itself. If you’re afraid of SPOLERS, stop reading.

First off, whoever made the trailer to Avatar deserves a big Christmas bonus. Because I hated the trailer so much, I was surprised how much I enjoyed the movie. One day later though, there’s not much that stands out to me, in stark contrast to my experiences with Terminator 2, Aliens and The Abyss. The best praise I can give Avatar is that the 2.5 hour run time didn’t bother me (which, I’ll be honest, does say a lot for how good James Cameron is at keeping things moving), and that after a while I got over how much the color scheme owed to badly airbrushed vans.

From the trailer I also pointed out how much Avatar looked like Ferngully. It seems a lot of people agree with me. Here’s a list of all search results that brought people to my website over the course of one hour, just two days after Avatar was released.

After seeing the movie though, I think Avatar is really much more like Dances With Wolves.

The Na’Vi, Avatar’s indigenous population, have a lot in common with Native Americans, while the invading, technologically advanced humans bear a striking resemblance to the U.S. government. Because of this, many people claim Avatar is anti-American.

But nothing could be further from the truth. Avatar is actually deeply anti-Native American.

In Avatar, the Na’Vi defeat the humans because their God is real and helps fight against the helicopters and mech-suits. But in American history, the Native Americans lost. Which, by Avatar’s logic, means Native Americans believe in fake Gods or else right now they’d be playing Blackjack against European immigrant run casinos.

That’s a pretty harsh message James Cameron is selling, but I guess that’s what happens when you give your movie an ending as unrealistic as the Titanic sinking an iceberg.

Soda vs Pop vs the War on Christmas

Forget Afghanistan and Iraq, the real never ending war is the War on Christmas. Check out this recent attack.

While I was offended by the jarring song and spastic dancing, the American Family Association was offended that the commercial mentioned any holiday other than Christmas. Despite all of the clearly Christmas related imagery, they felt this commercial was persecuting them.

I can relate 100 percent.

You see, I too am a victim of a war. The War on Soda.

As someone who was raised correctly, I know “soda” is the one true name. Some people may call it “pop,” but they’re wrong. The word soda comes from sodium carbonate which gives soda its distinctive fizz, while “pop” comes from someone bad at onomatopoeia trying to describe soda’s distinctive fizz.

And yet everyday I’m persecuted by the Politically Correct Police who force inclusive terms like “cola,” “soft drink” or “carbonated beverage” down my throat. They’re taking the soda out of soda, and I for one won’t stand for it.

We live in a nation founded by Soda believers. Here’s a map showing where in America soda is the predominant term. (via The Pop vs Soda Page)

And here is that map overlaid with the some of our founding fathers’ birthplaces.

The conclusion is clear. America is a nation of soda drinking white men usually named John.

This is a slippery slope, and it’s time we take a stand or pretty soon we’ll find ourselves drinking pop with our hoagies, putting jimmies on our ice cream, using gumbands to hold stuff together, while our children drink water from bubblers in the park. That’s not the America I know and love.

So this December 25th, show some Christmas cheer and drink a soda.

2010 New Year’s Eve Novelty Glasses

2010 threatens the very existence of New Year’s Eve novelty glasses.

Written, directed and edited by me.

Starring (in speaking order)
Paul Costabile
Dom Manzolillo
Lauren Adams
Kelly Hudson
Benjamin Apple
Adam Bozarth

Producer: Hilda Karadsheh

Camera: Matt Mayer

Lights: Mike Costabile

Music: Kevin MacLeod

If this seems familiar, I originally did this idea as a written piece back in January.

Jackie Chan: Stunt Neck

How exciting does Jackie Chan’s The Spy Next Door look?

jackie-chan-spy-next-door

This has the potential to make Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Kindergarten Cop look like Vin Diesel’s The Pacifier.

kindergarten-cop_the-pacifier

But The Spy Next Door won’t just revolutionize the “action star babysitting” genre. Look at what Jackie Chan’s neck can do.

jackie-chan-spy-next-door-closeup

That’s not Photoshop. Jackie Chan does all his own stunts, which means his neck is made of rubber.

For a spy movie, this changes EVERYTHING. If a villain tied James Bond to a chair, but left a knife dangling directly behind his head, Bond would be powerless to get the knife and cut himself free before the excruciatingly slow moving laser cut him in half. But with Jackie Chan, there is literally no trap he can’t get out of, provided the key to his escape is within his 360 degree biting radius.

Sorry super villians, your plans for world domination are no match against Jackie Chan’s Exorcist neck.

And if you’re still not excited about The Spy Next Door, check this out.

george-lopez-billy-ray-cyrus-spy-next-door-closeup

That’s right, it also features the creators of Miley Cyrus and Lopez Tonight. How they got the man responsible for some of most stupefyingly childish television of all time and Billy Ray Cyrus together, I’ll never know.

January 15th can’t come soon enough.

Flow Charts

I was thinking of becoming an infographic designer, but then realized I can never top this.

flow-chartThey might as well retire the industry.

Beer Pong Success

As you should remember, two weeks ago I took up Mike Ciaccio, master web marketer, on his offer of a reciprocal link exchange with a website that sells beer pong tables.

I was pretty disheartened when I didn’t get linked back immediately, so I began sending Mike a bunch of e-mails. Here’s one example.

From: Adam Sacks <adam.sacks@gmail.com>
To: Mike Ciaccio, master web marketer <linkmanager@mikeciaccio.com>
Date: Mon, Nov 30, 2009 at 6:38 PM

Hi Mike,

How was your Thanksgiving? Good, I hope. I’m e-mailing you because you still haven’t put my link on the EZ Beer Pong table, even after I’ve informed you multiple times of my link here http://adamthinks.com/beer-pong/

Is everything okay? I’m really looking forward to this link exchange. Please let me know as soon as the link is up.

Sincerely,

Adam

And what’s worse, Mike Ciaccio, master web marketer, never responded to me. I couldn’t help but wonder if I had been used. Can you not trust a man who gets paid 400 dollars a month to set up link exchanges with other websites? Are people inherently evil? Was the social contract written on a sheet of lies? When it thunders, is that not God bowling?

But Mike Ciaccio, master web marketer, works in mysterious ways. Just when I had lost all hope, I received the following:

From: Mike Ciaccio, master web marketer <linkmanager@mikeciaccio.com>
To: Adam Sacks <adam.sacks@gmail.com>
Date: Mon, Dec 4, 2009 at 8:38 PM

Dear owner of http://adamthinks.com,

I’m pleased to inform you that your link was added to our site

Rarely does a single electronic correspondence redeem one’s faith in humanity. Let us gaze upon this miracle.

adamthinks-beerpong-link

To you, this may be nothing more than a bunch of unrelated links cynically compiled to increase a website’s Google rank, but to me, it’s more like:

doubting_adam_caravaggio

God bless you Mike Ciaccio, master web marketer. I’m sorry I ever doubted you.

Even More Google Searches

Here are some more interesting Google searches that brought people to my site, and how high Google ranks me in each search.

• 1st collectors plate stupid

• 1st was kathy bates ever attractive?

• 2nd dane cook acting out romeo and juliet

• 2nd find house wife in woodbridge

• 2nd I want to buy a chinook helicopter

• 4th can infertile couples get married in the catholic church

• 4th Is killing unicorns illegal

• 6th 3 character traits for Robert Langdon in The Da Vinci Code

• 6th why can’t people cut off elephants tusks in there sleep

• 8th how to make friends like on the tv show

• 9th illegal immigrants acting in movies

• 13th how write a letter to steven spielberg

• 13th benjamin franklin baby photo

• 15th how to take attractive pictures of yourself

• 36th when you take a picture of yourself how do you edit it so it looks like your meeting someone famous?

And my absolute favorite search (but it should be ranked higher)

• 5th adam sacks is great i love him!!!!!!!

I got your back, Zune.

Did you know Microsoft recently released a new Zune? No, you didn’t. And since I always root for the underdog, I decided to help Microsoft out with their ad campaign.

ipod-zune-ad

I’m not going to lie, this works on a lot of levels, but I think graphic designers will really appreciate my use of the font Arial to represent Zune while keeping the iPhone type in Helvetica. This is because font fanatics, like comic book dorks and Civil War reenactors, dedicate their lives to obscure minutia that doesn’t matter.

Sin Destroyers – Gifts to the World

A few years ago, my friend Andy Kennedy and I directed and animated a music video for the song Gifts to the World by his band Sin Destroyers. A lot of people think they know the story of Christmas, but only Sin Destroyers–the world’s Christianest rock band–know what really went down.

The band has since broken up, but since ’tis the season and all, here’s the video:

If Andy looks familiar, that’s because he was also in my infomercial How To Get An Attractive Girlfriend.

You might also recognize Peter, whose music video I Would Hate Yo Be You I recently directed.

And the bass player Mike, is the co-inventor of Fauxkour.

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