Pictures of a refreshed T-Mobile Dash made the rounds on the Internet today. The new look features a royal blue for the number keys instead of silver like the current model. The bezel is also black compared to a reflective metal-look. The refresh looks slick and according to reports features a tougher screen. Unfortunately that is where the updates end as the internals are exactly the same. T-Mobile stores are going to start selling it when they run out of the current Dash model which I’ve had for the past two years!

T-Mobile Dash 2 featuring black trim

The original T-Mobile Dash with a metal bezel.

Come on T-Mobile! All I want is a Dash form factor running the Android OS with 3G support. Is that too much to ask for? According to tmonews.com’s upcoming phone chart, there is nothing in the pipeline. I guess it is too much to ask for.

I got an e-mail from Veer.com, distributes of fine fonts, today celebrating their picks for the top 10 typefaces of 2008. I really like their first pick, Calgary Script, with it’s curvy strokes that create a retro feel that is so popular today.

The 5th typeface, Memoir, has the feel of Papyrus (which is a bad thing) due it’s rough edges. I kind of like it as a regular script typeface.

Guedel Script is kind of freaky. It reminds me of a Halloween dance.

You can see the entire list on Veer’s blog.

A Charlie Brown Christmas was on TV tonight and I noticed the term “Graphic Blandishment” in the credit. Turning to the trusty Internets I found out

“Graphic Blandishment is a term also known as “Animation”. Charles M. Schultz used that term in his Peanuts/Charlie Brown Animation Credits to credit the Animators.” – WikiAnswers

It seems Mr. Schultz wasn’t a fan of hand-drawn motion pictures.

After the 1965 version there was a newer version which was downright-lame. So instead I went to YouTube and found this NSFW remix. And when they say NSFW, they really mean NSFW.

I’ve been doing a lot of reading and not a lot of blog-idea-generating lately. So here are some of the best stories I’ve stumbled across during the last couple of days.

ESPN to De-Clutter With New Redesign – “Instead of inundating visitors with its intense coverage of every major sport from the get-go — something that the company now believes can drive away certain fans — ESPN.com is moving in a less-is-more direction, at least on the home page.”

Consumer Reports identifies the Top 5 Smartphones – The Black Jack II came out on top, followed by the T-Mobile Wing, Motorola Q9C, T-Mobile Shadow, and BlackBerry Pearl Flip. The iPhone 3G and T-Mobile G1 tied. Verizon was ranked the best carrier followed by T-Mobile. Sprint was last in most markets. T-Mobile still doesn’t have any 3G phones worth getting excited about.

Last week was Web Design Week at PSDTuts.com – Two of my favorite articles were Five Looks, One Layout and How a Simple Layout Can Be Mixed ‘n’ Matched with Patterns, Photos and Backgrounds. Both cover how to transform the message of a single layout using different colors and styles. This is a great step by step resource for the design impaired like myself.

Speaking of the design impaired…
Smashing Magazine has put together the Ultimate Collection of Custom Photoshop Shapes – If you can’t draw, custom Photoshop shapes become invaluable.

Matthew Carden has an awesome set of food macro shots on his site 350degrees.com. Using small people figurines, Matt creates imaginative scenes out of food items. The scuba diver on the wine glass is one of my favorites.

There are a lot more on his site including the option to buy prints.

(via The Last People)

Have you ever wanted to get an RSS feed of portable media player ready video files from a specific YouTube user? Yea neither have I. But if I ever did, I now know where to go. YTpodcaster.com makes a podcast feed straight from most YouTube users uploads. You just give it a username and it spits out a feed for iTunes, Zune, or other RSS catchers. The idea is clever and YouTube does all of the encoding on it’s end. YTpodcaster.com transforms the publicly available RSS feed of a YouTube user and modifies the video URLs to get the MP4 version. Then it’s just a matter of forming the RSS feed using the other meta data.

If you ever wanted to start a video podcast you could easily let YouTube host and distribute your files to your viewers now! I just need to find some good YouTube users to follow in order to take advantage of this handy tool.

It’s ok Colonel, Guitar Hero boxed me too.

The show was exciting and the food was filling. Dinner included a tomato bisque, a slice of garlic bread, a whole roasted chicken, a rib, and a herb-bashed potato. The jousters weapons would sometime spark during combat and the sounds of metal on metal were clearly heard. Our yellow night was defeated early on but it was still fun cheering for him. Everyone had a great time and we even got two steins to take home with us.

The roomies and I are waiting to be called in for the show. Kristina and Jaime got magnificent steins as souvenirs. I like my cardboard crown. Apparently we’re rooting for the yellow knight.

Kristina and my friend Pammy decided to camp out at the new Chick-fil-a just off of route 29 on Johns Hopkins Road. Since it is a new store, the restruant chain hosts a campout where the first 100 people in line at 6am get 52 free meal coupons. They certainly picked a cold night to do it as the temperatures are bound to dip below freezing. There were lots of tents setup in the parking lot. One group of people even brought a gas generator which powered a projector and game system. Chick-fil-a would hand out free food to the uber-patrons and I visited at the right time for free nuggets. Hopefully everyone will make it through the night to claim their coupons. The line started forming at 11am Wednesday for the grand opening at 6am on Thursday morning. These people are anything but chicken.