bennettk.com

Miscellaneous pictures taken from my desktop at JibJab

bennett — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 01:37:31 +0000

I’ve gotten quite good at photoshopping punchlines together. Here is crap I found that may be used to blackmail me some day.

hey, I’m moving to LA

bennett — Thu, 20 May 2010 14:14:50 +0000

I have accepted a job as a rails and iPhone engineer at JibJab, who are located a few blocks from the beach in Venice, CA… and I have a one-way plane ticket from JFK->LAX that departs two weeks from today.

Yes, it’s true… I’m finally going to be working in cartoon technology.

(come have a beer with me before I leave if you haven’t already.)

hey, i’m in an iPhone ad

bennett — Mon, 10 May 2010 20:33:05 +0000

well, the app I wrote with the fine chaps at jackson laycock is, at least.

if you’re a dog owner in NYC, check out Hey, Walkies!

fun with ableton & beatles & found sounds

bennett — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 04:13:39 +0000

I finally got around to playing with Ableton Live for more than 10 minutes the other weekend and came up with this. It’s not really mixed, just pieced together… but see if you can recognize the beatles beats that are in there. hint: there are 3 of ‘em, and 2 come from the anthologies (the original recordings I made on my iPhone in various subway stations are also available if you want to mash ‘em up with, say, groove 22).

subway recordings by bennettk

On Hollow Promises and Last-Minute Gifts

bennett — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 02:29:50 +0000

It’s not that I wasn’t thinking about what to get my girlfriend for Christmas far enough in advance- I’ve had quite a few ideas in mind for months. In fact, I’ve been keeping a list of gift ideas for her for probably the past half a year on my iPhone, ranging from the silly (onion goggles) to the ludicrous (she really wants a Vespa). The problem is I am one of the most indecisive people in the world, and my girlfriend… well, she’s a woman of discriminatin’ taste, so I wanted to make sure I picked out the right thing for her. Plus I wanted there to be an element of surprise— I had already blown my hanukkah gift (damn intra-denominational relationships) in a slip-up while talking to my brother in front of her, so I didn’t want to get her one of the gift ideas she had planted in my head. So it’s the day before Christmas Eve, and I am still without gift. What’s a romantic bad planner to do?

Well, here’s a nifty idea for those of you who can’t quite make up your mind or want to put the onus of your next (valentine’s day / memorial day / bar mitzvah) gift in fate’s hands: make a scratch-off lottery ticket.

There are a few places online that’ll sell you premade scratch-off stickers that you can simply stick over any portions of your ticket that you want to obscure (easyscratchoffs.com looks good), but I was too late to order them I really wanted to go the extra mile and actually make the scratch-off stickers myself. I found a couple of tutorials (this one is the one I ended up using), all of which said to put clear contact paper over your printed-out card and then to make your scratch-off solution out of a mixture of 2:1 silver acrylic hobbyist paint to dish soap (like joy). I set to designing a christmas-themed lotto ticket in Inkscape— a free, open-source vector art editor a’la Illustrator (but it’s FREE) that i grew to love quickly (did I mention it’s FREE?). Grab some clipart and a few occasion-specific fonts for extra pizazz— I found this handy Christmas font. After a little bit of tinkering, I came up with the following:

Once you’re admiring your handiwork with the same pride as Ralphie admires his ‘What I Want For Christmas’ essay in A Christmas Story, save your document as a PDF and send it to the nearest Fedex / Kinkos or print shop that will print cheap color copies on card stock. While you’re on your extended lunch break to pick up the printouts, stop by your nearest dick blick / pearl paint and grab some silver acrylic paint (this stuff was pretty cheap) and a cheap brush, and then run to K-Mart to pick up some dish soap and clear contact paper. Then simply apply the contact paper to the printout, summon your best inner fourth grader in arts and crafts and cut out the printout. Then prepare your paint mixture- as I mentioned, 2:1 paint:soap. You’ll most likely need to do a few layers so paint one on, eat some pretzels, get some work done, and repeat.

In the end, you’ll probably end up with something like this:

Now, since you don’t actually have anything to show for your sorry-ass self, you’ll want to put extra care into wrapping the card (hey, even throw in a bow) and make sure you hide it and all evidence of any files you used in designing it & your fedex / kinko’s receipts until the cat’s out of the bag. And keep your fingers crossed that she doesn’t scratch off the all-expenses-paid trip to Austin.

You’re welcome for saving your Valentine’s Day.

Freestyle

bennett — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 13:26:51 +0000

My first iPhone app (a.k.a. ‘how I spent my summer vacation… and the next three months’) has finally been released. Check ‘er out with all the details here (it’s FREE (for now)):

www.freestyleapplication.com

soon, i swears

bennett — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 15:09:39 +0000

okay, it took me a year of pretty severe addiction but I think I can finally say that the novelty of 140 characters is wearing thin. sure, i’m still broadcasting my listening habits to everybody and nobody, but I think I’m ready to start writing things for reals again. in the past year- basically since vice stevens broke u went on indefinite hiatus and I started at my current employer, I’ve been responsible in some way or another for the launch and upkeep of a handful of websites. also i’ll be releasing my first iphone app to the app store any… day… now. and i really need to start playing music again.

tempus fugit

bennett — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 14:56:21 +0000

been a bit distracted lately by the soap opera that is the united states and my band going on hiatus (and my figuring out what to do with my life, musically) and my job search which ultimately led to my starting a new job last monday, so i haven’t really had the time to form thoughts beyond 140 characters. twitter’s more addictive than scrabulous… and tumblr is up there, too. so enjoy those and i reserve this space for when I get the chance to share my thoughts in a manner greater than or equal to 141 characters.

¡el último canción de los señores muy guapos del Vice Stevens!

bennett — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 16:26:17 +0000

¡ay! ¡qué lástima!

So as the two readers of my blog probably already know, Jon, the esteemed bassist and co-founder of vice stevens (and not to mention one of my best friends since second grade) has chosen to pack up shop in riverdale and set sail for Austin,TX. I’m billing this show as more of a going away party for jon; plus it is my understanding that this not only is in the middle of nowhere on the Thursday night before labor day but it also may conflict with Barack’s acceptance speech at the DNC. Still, if you want to be at Jon and Vice Stevens’ last waltz (until jon puts together our reunion tour in a couple months), come up to the end of the 1 train and have some tasty pints with us.

And for those of you that asked- no, we haven’t even thought of looking for another bassist. w/o jon, there is no vice stevens. And, yes, I have meditated quite a bit on the subject of being in aspiring bands after being in a few over the past decade or so of my life (más o menos), so I’ll certainly be sharing some of those thoughts on this interwebs site in the future.

And here’s the invite to the event, as conceived by our also irreplacable drummer, bob.

Polonius is no longer online.

bennett — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 19:32:02 +0000

Hamlet (Facebook News Feed Edition).