So, there’s this band called Green Day, right? They release an album in 2004 entitled American Idiot, and that’s it.

They release this epic album, and we don’t hear any news albums for five whole years.

Why the wait? Did we start to think that maybe they were coming to an end? Or, maybe they became a little lazy? Maybe they were just hard at work on an album that will take a long time to make absolutely perfect?

I think it was that last one, because what these guys came up with is absolutely amazing.

10 days ago, March 15th, they released a new album entitled 21st Century Breakdown. This is their first album to be released after American idiot, five years ago!

I’m really impressed with this album. I honestly thought that after American Idiot, that would be the last I heard from them. Now, I really don’t follow Green Day, so my statement about thinking they were over was just a complete guess, but I was obviously wrong. I’m so happy I was too.

You May Have Already Heard Them — “Know Your Enemy”

I’ll bet that if you watch TV, you have already hard Green Day! The Digital Music Giant, Rhapsody featured “Know Your Enemy” in their latest commercial. Does it look and sound familiar?

They have already released the music video for “Know Your Enemy,” but I’m not sure about them having out any other videos for any of their other amazing new songs.

What the Album is About

This album has a consistent style throughout each song. Their last album, “American Idiot” was a story about a lot of things focusing on a character the lead singer, Billie Joe Armstrong created. Throughout the different songs, some new characters were introduced, and the lyrics went on to describe the actions of those characters. I thought that was pretty damn cool. But what is 21st Century Breakdown about?

A quote from Billie would sum it up quite nicely I think:

A snapshot of the era in which we live as we question and try to make sense of the selfish manipulation going on around us, whether it be the government, religion, media or frankly any form of authority.

Really, any bands I listen to all have something to do with a meaning just as 21st Century Breakdown does. Those bands are usually punk rock, so obviously Green Day would fit in really nicely to my play lists.

Check This Album Out, I’m Serious

For real, if you have some extra money in iTunes or something — buy this album. If you’re into music like this, or weren’t aware that Green Day made a new album, then get on it and BUY IT!

For those of you who already have it — what do you think? What’s your favorite song from it. Mine would either have to be “See The Light” or “21 Guns.”

So that was my little review of this album. I think it is absolutely fantastic, and I know what I will be listening to all week.

Everyone loves a little link love now and then. You never know what kind of stuff you may find in these kinds of posts, which makes them all of the more kick ass.

All of these links I collected from my Twitter stream, because I follow some people who share some really cool links.

1. Why I Unfollowed Everyone on Twitter and Why You Should Too

After reading this post, I have seriously started considering doing the same. Every point he makes in the post makes sense to me. This idea has many trade-offs, but I seriously think it is worth it. I may be implementing this on my personal account in the next few days, because I do kind of miss a lot of tweets that I probably should have gotten.

Read this post →

2. 12 Questions with Alex Fraiser of Blogussion.com

I got interviewed at a pretty cool blog. Definitely check it out! For me?

Read this post →

3. The 5 Worst Tweets Ever

Twitter is a crazy service, and you should set a limit for yourself on what you freakin’ say on it. In this post, it shows 5 tweets that absolutely killed the idiots who posted them. Have a little censorship people!

Read this post →

4. iPhone Applications Gone Too Far

This one is really weird. I won’t ruin the surprise as to what it is, but I will tell you that it is 1) drug related, and 2) I don’t support it, but I think it’s kind of funny. At least the dude in the video is.

Read this post →

5. Absurd Photoshop Disasters

I love these kind of posts. This post showcases 15 Photoshop mistakes on anything from magazine covers to product placements. I think some of these things are hilarious, and this post was the followup post to “20 Biggest Photoshop Disasters of 2008,” which is also very hilarious.

Read this post →

That was fun wasn’t it? Stick around, tomorrow is Thesis Thursday, and I have some cool stuff planned for tomorrow.

I bought my Apple iMac 5 months ago. I have never used a Mac before my current one. It has always been some variation of crappy old Windows (2000, XP, Vista).

The reasoning for including “5 Months Later” in the title (and the fancy image to your right →) is because no computer I’ve ever owned has lasted me longer than 5 months, until my Mac. I usually run like a lot of programs at once sometimes (Photoshop, iTunes, IM, Text Editor, FTP etc.) when I am working, and obviously crap like that will put a lo of stress on your computer (especially if it’s a crappy XP laptop).

The death of my 2 old laptops

In 1 year, I’ve had 2 different computers (both laptops). One running XP, the other running Vista.

Early days on XP

When I had my XP laptop, that was when I first started getting interested in the whole web designing stuff (not blogging). I ran an outdated copy of Photoshop from my step dad on it, and I remember staying up until like 5AM once just messing with it because I was pretty fascinated with it. Coda is the most expensive app I bought with my own money, but it’s worth every dollar I spent on it.

That computer didn’t last me very long because it burned out or something like that. One day I tried to turn it on, and it wouldn’t go. It was pronounced dead at the scene basically is what I’m getting at here.

Vista laptop; the heartbreaker

My other laptop running Vista (loved it to death) burned out as well. I don’t even remember what the computer model it was, but it was awesome.

This was the laptop where I basically learned more web design and what the heck blogging was too. I started my first real attempt at a blog (a blog about blogging. Noticed a trend?) and really got a great idea of the whole blogging thing. But, like my last laptop — it couldn’t handle what I was doing on it and didn’t turn on one day.

I actually found a picture of the desktop somewhere on the Internet if you want to see (click on the thumbnail):

Yep, that had all of my stuff on it. It had design work, writings, and most important of all (this is why it’s the heart breaker) — pictures of someone I was very close to. All of it was gone, and I had none of it backed up for some reason beyond me. Learned my lesson.

I get my Mac. Computer problems solved?

So obviously I am not very lucky with computers as you can see from the above paragraphs.

Once my Vista laptop broke, I was without a computer of my own for about 2–3 months. Luckily it was around summer time, so I took a bit of a “hiatus” if you will from all this web design/blogging stuff and just enjoyed my summer vacation. Sure, I missed blogging and designing — but it gave me time to save up (as in get a job in my dads restaurant) for the perfect computer.

I realized that most bloggers/designers all have Macs, and I had been eyeballing the Apple website on my old laptop looking for the Mac I wanted. I decided I was going to get a Mac and hope that it would be the last computer I needed for a very long time.

Today, I still have my Mac. I have spent some money on buying the right apps to make it even better, and now I cannot imagine working on any other computer unless a Mac. So, are my computer problems solved? For now, yes. I doubt my computer will be going anywhere since it’s a desktop, and it’s got a spark plug so power outages don’t mess it up.

Why I love my Mac

To be more specific than “I cannot imagine working on any other computer unless a Mac”: Why do I love this Mac?

• It’s going to last me a long time.
• All of the apps I have to design/develop with are 100 times better than the ones I worked with on my Windows computer.
• The graphics are phenomenal.
• OS X is easy to use. The simplicity of the computer’s operating system made the transition from Windows to OS X a lot easier.
• Um…apparently your sex appeal goes up when you have a Mac?
• Macs look so damn pretty on your desk, making your room look pretty too.

This is a bit of an old picture of my desk with my Mac on it, but it still looks fine (again, click the thumbnail for full view):

Wouldn’t you want one of those bad boys sitting on your desk? I know I would (ah wait, I think I do).

My favorite Mac apps

Kind of an extension to “Why I love my Mac”. I have a few apps that I use just about every time I turn on my machine.

Coda

Coda is my most used app besides my web browser because it is just about any web development tool you need in one application. An FTP, Text Editor, a Finder type navigator, web browser for previewing your work, and plenty of other goodies.

AppStorm did a really good review of Coda here.

TextMate

TextMate is a really good (probably the best) text editor for Mac. It is much more powerful than the text editor in Coda, and has a bunch more options to help make the coding experience a lot more organized and seamless. TextMate also costs money (about $50 USD), but it’s worth it if you’re serious about getting a GOOD text editor.

Adobe Photoshop CS4

Costs an absolute fortune, but Photoshop is something a serious web designer cannot work without. It has got to be one of the most powerful image editing softwares around (that’s not another Adobe product). I was extremely lucky and fortunate to always have a copy of Photoshop to work with in my “web adventures”. Check it out if you can afford it, seriously.

Wonderful Mac resources

With such a great computer comes a lot of great resources. Here are a few mac resource sites I follow and get Mac stuff from.

• MacHeist
  An amazing website, a lot of apps that are usually paid are given out for free. Join a team, earn more free apps and all this other stuff. A really cool site, got a lot of free apps there.
• The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)
  A blog for all things Apple, but if you’re a Mac user then you will want to follow their Mac 101 guide. A lot of useful information on this blog like rumors, tutorials, sneak peaks and more.
• AppStorm
  A new blog from Envato, this blog does a lot of reviews of Mac apps, and other Apple related things.

Might have gotten ahead of myself…

Wrote a lot more information than I planned! No worries though, everything I just wrote is why I love my Mac. Maybe I helped you find some cool resources for your Mac.

So let me know — what’s your favorite thing about your Mac? How long have you had yours? Has it been your favorite computer you have ever had?