scot macdonald

Try Planning with Scrumblr

April 28, 2012 By scot Leave a Comment

I’ve always been a visual learner and often find ways to use visual tools to help me organize my thoughts. A great online tool you can use to do this kind of thing is Scrumblr.

Imagine an online cork board where you can create sticky notes (they actually better resemble recipe cards) and post them into categories that you create. This app is really simple to use and once you spend a few minutes with it I’m certain you’ll see how you can make use of it at both home and work.

A really sharp feature of Scrumblr is the ability for remote collaboration, meaning groups of people can see the cork board and contribute together in realtime. Warning, this can be a little creepy when you first witness it, but once you see the simple yet powerful feature of group collaboration the true beauty of Scrumblr will open up to you.

Filed Under: Web Tagged With: scrumblr

Good for Gagner

February 7, 2012 By scot Leave a Comment

Slapsticks Episode 6

The Edmonton Oilers’ Sam Gagner stunned the NHL hockey world last week when he scored eight points in the team’s lopsided win over the Chicago Blackhawks. The feat was significant since Gagner tied an Oilers record of eight points in one game with Oiler Hall of Famers Paul Coffey and Wayne Gretzky, and came within two points of the league record of 10 points in a single game set by Darryl Sittler.

What’s even more amazing is that Gagner was involved in every Oiler goal on the night and before the hockey world could stop buzzing, followed up that performance with three points in the first period of the Oilers next game – a 5-4 shootout win over the Detroit Red Wings in which Gagner also scored in the shootout.

Heady stuff for the former first round pick who has struggled after a breakout rookie season and whose star has lost much of its luster thanks in large part to the emergence of a handful of new Oiler superstars in the making in Taylor Hall, Jordan Eberle and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins. Prior to this offensive outburst, Gagner was mired in another mediocre season and was constantly popping up in trade rumours around the league.

The Slapsticks crew might be right on this one, since many a young player has been written off by the so-called experts long before they’ve had a chance to prove their worth in the NHL. Let’s hope Gagner can use last week’s heroics to help him find success in the NHL over the longterm.

Filed Under: Slapsticks Tagged With: nhl, slapsticks

Superbowl: It’s About the Commercials

February 4, 2012 By scot Leave a Comment

Superbowl has always been more hype than substance in my opinion. I’m a casual NFL football fan who cheers for the New York Giants but I’m not the sort who gives up every Sunday to watch non-stop NFL. I do like the commercials though, even if we rarely see the best of them on the actual day of the Superbowl when watching feeds from the US here in Canada. Last year served up one of the best Superbowl ads in recent memory. I give you the brilliant spot from VW – The Force.

Filed Under: Advertising

Return of Slapsticks

February 3, 2012 By scot Leave a Comment

Some time ago I came up with a comic strip called Slapsticks that poked fun at goings-on in the NHL and the sub-culture of the game of hockey. The cast on the right features a handful of hockey sticks and other objects typically found on the bench during a hockey game.

After a half-dozen or so strips I found myself too busy to maintain the site at slapsticks.ca so I had to shelve it for a while. I’m hoping to revive Slapsticks here on my personal blog and will begin by posting a few of the original comics. Soon after I’ll try to post one here on a regular basis during the NHL hockey season.

So if you haven’t met the cast yet (I know, hard to believe), starting from the top right we have Sherwood and Ferland (paying homage to two of the original wood stick manufacturers), Easton (the new guy made of composite materials), GT (a Gatorade bottle), Tape and Puck.

Perhaps the most impressive thing, ahem, about Slapsticks is it’s created entirely in Microsoft Paint – and it shows! It’s quite a challenge to get creative in Paint but as long as I keep things confined to the bench I should be fine.

Filed Under: Slapsticks

Minifigu.re

January 31, 2012 By scot Leave a Comment

As a kid I was a big fan of LEGO but in those days it typically meant building square objects in either red or white brick and not much more. With my son now 11 years old I’ve watched him grow up in the new era of LEGO and my interest has been rekindled thanks in large part to the company’s brilliant licensing strategy with major entertainment brands.

In the past ten years or so, LEGO has aligned itself with some of the most memorable media icons of all time, such as Star Wars, Indiana Jones and Harry Potter. LEGO now releases kits, often depicting memorable movie scenes, built around these brands and featuring Minifigures – small LEGO people who populate the kits or who are released independently in themed series.

Minifigures - Aged 5+

As might be expected, the enormous popularity of LEGO Minifigures has spawned a cottage industry around collecting and trading and my son Jacob has quietly started his own impressive collection. I find myself so drawn to the whole thing that we’ve decided to start a new blog together celebrating the LEGO Minifigure and our experiences building our collections (yes I want my own collection too).

We’ll be launching minifigu.re soon so keep an eye out for it if you want to learn a thing or two about the exciting new world of LEGO.

Filed Under: Lego

Classic Albums Live

January 31, 2012 By scot Leave a Comment

If you are a fan of classic rock and haven’t attended a Classic Albums Live event, you really should. I’ve been to four shows now, including Pink Floyd’s The Wall, The Eagle’s Hotel California, Led Zeppelin IV and just this weekend took in Led Zeppelin III at the Confederation Centre in Charlottetown, PEI.

The world’s greatest classic rock albums – live on stage, note for note, cut for cut.

While I routinely carry the entire Led Zeppelin catalogue around on my iPod Touch, it’s been some time since I really sat down and listened to many of the tunes on III. That all changed Saturday night as my 11-year-old (and emerging classic rock aficionado) and I enjoyed over two hours of Zeppelin by the Classic Albums band. The show opened with CAL performing Led Zeppelin III in its entirety while the second half included over an hour of the band’s all-time classics. Yes, they’re a cover band, but they’re as close to the real thing as you’ll find and pride themselves on keeping the show all about the music.

Next month, CAL will be back in Charlottetown with The Door’s LA Woman and I’ll be there. For now though, a tribute to Led Zeppelin III…

Filed Under: Music

IdeaFund

January 27, 2012 By scot Leave a Comment

Here’s a little teaser for a side project I’ve been working on for some time. More to come…

Filed Under: Business

Was that Gauthier or Gotye?

January 27, 2012 By scot 2 Comments

I first heard this song on the excellent CBC Radio 2 Drive and thought they said it was by Gauthier – so of course I thought it must be someone from Rustico, or Rusticoville, or at least North Rustico. But, no, it’s some Aussie guy named Wally De Backer who chose the name Gotye (pronounced go-tyey). It’s a weird little song that’s not typically my style but it gets progressively better until you find yourself singing it out loud. Fair warning, you’ll have this stuck in your head for a day and a half.