Due to accidental mishap, I was forced to shop for a new lens for my camera. I dropped my 18 – 55mm “kit” lens that came with my Canon XSi. It was a great little lens that met it’s maker too soon. To replace the lens I started on amazon.com and b&h.com but didn’t see anything in my price range. Fortunately, I found a nice lady on Craigslist who was selling her gently used Canon EF 28-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM Standard Zoom Lens for Canon SLR Cameras. This is a super convenient “walking around lens” giving both zoom and wide-angle possibilities.

She also sold me a nice Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II Camera Lens which is great for “available light” photos and very clear shots (it doesn’t zoom so the lens is much simpler).

My wife and I also took advantage of the nice weather to take my my son to the park nearby. Yesterday was one of the first days since mid-december that it has been warm enough to go outside and play. Here are some of the photos from the park. You can see the whole set here.

Parker is very close to walking. Here is him on the track pushing his new car he got for Christmas.

We (me included) crawled all over the field playing soccer and taking pictures

We also got to play with sand. The first time since Parker was very small.

I probably should have known. A 7.5 hour road trip to see a band of 60 year olds is a bad idea. Not to mention it was on the same night as UFC 100, arguably the best UFC card in the history of the sport.

There was no way I could say no – it was on my wife’s bucket list, and she rarely asks for anything.

As I was closing up shop at work, a co-worker who knew I was going to the show pointed out that Aerosmith had canceled several of the last shows because of an “undisclosed injury to a band member.” I surfed the web before we left and found several sites that said, “Aerosmith confirms they will definitely have the Tampa show.”

I left work early, set my new GPS for Tampa, FL and started the 7.5 hour road trip. Of all the trips on the whereisjohnwilson.com Summer Tour, this was one I was looking forward to.

Upon arriving at the Holiday Inn Express in Tampa, the desk attendant guy says, “Hey, you guys going to the Aerosmith Concert? They canceled about two hours ago (insert evil laugh).” Mind you, they said, “we are definitely playing tomorrow night.” After doing a little research from the hotel room, Joe Perry called into some random local radio show and announced the cancellation. Nice. Don’t you think they probably knew early that morning. Wouldn’t you think they’d imagine people would be traveling to see them?

We did get to visit the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino where neither of us gambled a dime (the place was packed and the lowest blackjack table was $25 a hand). We didn’t really find much to do in Tampa, though we didn’t look very hard. We drove back the 7.5 hour trip to Charleston just in time for UFC 100.

Update: Three weeks later and Live Nation still hasn’t refunded our tickets. They state they can’t give us our money back until the band reschedules the show. This makes no sense to me. No service, no pay. The way I see it, Live Nation is sitting on an interest free loan from the Bank of Wilson.

Update: see here for instructions on how to get a refund

Lessons learned:

• Never trust a rock star over 55
• Never travel more than four hours for a concert
• Tampa does a bad job of being appealing on the Internet
• Live Nation will hold your money hostage

This week I learned about two John Wilson’s from two different partners we do business with (one with a similar job function as me), not to mention the other John Wilson at a partner of ours, who once a month or so, I accidentally get emails intended for him. So, in my relatively small work world, I’m aware of at least three additional John Wilsons.

• The idea – create a central location for “John Wilson.”
• The plan – find and interview each John Wilson I can find (most likely not related to my work)
• The site – add an index to the site that lists interviews and websites for each John Wilson I find (or finds me)
• The goal – meet a ton of John Wilsons and get the index listed on Wikipedia

Someone added me and this site to Wikipedia once, but then someone else took me off, probably because there was no accompanying article about me. I’m fine with that, but it seems like a moderately elite list. This list will be for every John Wilson out there, no “elite status” needed. There are only a few guidelines:

1. Your name must be John Wilson (no Jonathan’s, sorry)
2. You must contact me at whereisjohnwilson@yahoo.com
3. You must be willing to answer a few interview questions
4. Optional but preferred: You should have a reference to you somewhere on the Internet. Even if it is just a reference to you or a quote by you in a newspaper
5. Optional: Submit a picture

I’ll take this information, and once a week or more, I’ll add John Wilsons to the new page on this site and post an interview about being John Wilson. Looking forward to hearing from you!

I’m a big MMA/UFC fan. For me, it’s a very “pure” sport. Man-on-man, limited rules, very entertaining.

One of my favorite parts of the fight occurs immediately after the fight is over. Drenched in blood and sweat an assigned member of the posse’s job is to make sure that the fighter gets the sponsor’s t-shirt on and designated beverage in hand.

In a classic piece of marketing gone wrong, the sponsors were having the fighters drink their beverage on camera, during the post-fight interview in the octagon. Great idea, except they forgot to tell the above listed posse member to open the can. On cue, however, the fighters would pretend to drink out of the can. Poorly. Several times they just tipped the can up around the general shoulder/ear area.

So, How do I get sponsored to go to work? I really want to finish a big client deliverable, throw on my Charmin (yes, the toilet paper) T-shirt, pretend to drink an unopened Coke, and thank my sponsors for helping me get to work and do my best. I wouldn’t charge much, and I promise to wear the gear and recite the taglines when appropriate. I think I’d want my work sponsors to be:

• Sugar-Free Red Bull (I’m not a morning person)
• Donald Trump Brand (so I could borrow his catch phrase “You’re Fired” when I kill a project)
• Wilson Footballs (I’ve always dreamed of turning in a document, spiking a football and doing the Ickey Shuffle)
• Xbox 360 (free games!)
• Condom Depot (because I laugh EVERY SINGLE TIME a fighter has that printed on the back of their fighting shorts)

Do you think maybe I could get Condom Depot on the back of my charcoal pin stripe suit?

Here’s the proof:

The next goal will be a little tougher; be the very first link when searching for John Wilson. It will be tough, going against the likes of Wikipedia and such…

About nine months ago this blog was the first link on page two, and then for some unexpected reason I moved all the way down to page six. That was incredibly disheartening, and it actually led to me slowing down on posts and attention to the blog. Now that I have switched it over to WordPress and away from GoDaddy (thank God) I have been picked back up somehow by the Google spiders.

I’m certainly glad to be back, here is some proof:

• Before I was listed on Google there were 109,000,000 posts in front of me
• (I still need a logo)
• Seth Godin said I wouldn’t last (btw… I outlasted his Dip Blog)
• I was inspired by people who use domain finders to name their children
• I explained how to use Google Analytics, Technorati
• Peter Morville author of Ambient FIndability links to me (and said Seth is silly)
• I get a first victory by making it to the front page if you type “john wilson blog”
• Blogger Mike Sansone has 530,000 hits, John Wilson goes to 123,000,000
• “John Wilson” goes to page 6 on Google
• 9rules snubs me
• “John Wilson” moves to page 2 on Google
• Richard Florida and the Creative Class and the importance of SEO
• John Wilson Fishing – Phone attacks trying to steal my cc number
• I stumble on Jim Killeen
• I get listed on Freakonomics
• I blabber about Celebrity Apprentice
• Deal or No Deal Strategy (which gets tons of random hits)
• I start MBAforRent
• I get promoted at work

All of this, and I’m tearing down the site to start here fresh. I was only averaging about 10 hits a day. Hopefully this new design will help me get things more focused.