My 251st Post

Posted on October 2, 2007
Filed Under boredom, autopublished-americans | Leave a Comment

I missed the fact that the last one was my 250th - that is, if you ignore the 150 or so that I accidentally wiped out in the lamentable circumflex incident.

Quite a milestone - uh-huh - a quarter of the way to a thousand. In less than a year. While holding down a real (well…paying) job. And building my business empire-lite. And not quitting smoking (again (yet)).

I do believe that deserves a snifter of cognac. Ooohhh…and maybe a Cuban (or maybe just a cigar).

Working for a Living is Unnatural Torture

Posted on September 28, 2007
Filed Under ego, identity, laziness, Work, nausea, business, employment, global culture, general misanthropy, narcissism | 2 Comments

Is there really any doubt?

Salaried employment interferes with our natural sleep cycles - where’s my goddamned afternoon nap? It forces us to spend our day among strangers, which naturally induces anxiety among humans. It forces us to be answerable to a near-stranger, who is quite likely to be stupider, less qualified and, now that I’m a bit older, younger and less-experienced. Sometimes we wind up being answerable to a complete fucking dipshit (been there, done that).

Inevitably, we wind up spending a significant portion of every day associating with people whom we would rather never have met. Occasionally, we wind up spending it with people we would much prefer dead and yet, again contrary to our natural instincts, we must let them live - even be nice to them.

Sorry, I can’t go on - it’s far too depressing…

How Could I Have Missed This?

Posted on September 21, 2007
Filed Under paranoia | Leave a Comment

Apparently, MC Hawking has been around for several years and nobody told me? Find him here.

Trying to Keep Up

Posted on September 21, 2007
Filed Under confusion, autopublished-americans, Aging, Blogroll | Leave a Comment

Nothing stays the same. Everything changes. But, you protest, the more things change, the more they stay the same. Well, sure, but how does that help me to maintain my blogroll?

People moving back and forth, deleting blogs, hiding blogs, renaming blogs, moving to quiblit (my own damned fault, that one), not moving (which is even more confusing), restarting dead blogs, changing the name back again, and so forth. It’s too damned much.

Part of the problem is that I haven’t had time to keep up with reading everybody on my blogroll, or even to keep up my own blog (that would be this one), or even to read my own blog (had I actually written anything, that is), for that matter.

Sorry…where was I?

Plug for a Friend

Posted on September 18, 2007
Filed Under paranoia | Leave a Comment

Any of you who read Bob Harris’s Prisoner of Trebekistan will know what a warm, funny guy he is (and he really is just like that).

Bob has a new book coming out - Who Hates Whom. I don’t have an advance copy of this one, but it looks like it’s going to be more of his political viewpoints. While I disagree with him about much of that, I certainly respect his sincerity and thoughtfulness on the subject.

One thing I can promise is that you won’t be disappointed.

Talking Tech

Posted on September 17, 2007
Filed Under Wile E. Coyote, weirdness, web 1.0 | Leave a Comment

Since I took up building websites about six months ago or so, I’ve had a lot of conversations with programmers. They tend not to go well:

Me: Hi. I have a little problem that I don’t know how to solve. Please keep in mind that I have no programming knowledge. Here’s what I want to do…

Programmer: Why would you want to do that? All you have to do is to bebangle the dingus and don’t forget the dongle (this last is an actual word!).

Me: (after reading Bebangling for Dummies) Ok. Now I broke it. The screen just says General Terminal Fatal and Irrevocable Error.

Programmer: (silence)

Me: OK. I’ve deleted my old site, and I’m starting from scratch. How do I do this? I bebangled and everything and it still won’t work.

Another programmer: Why would you bebangle anything? You can just run a squirrel (I swear to God that’s what he said) and problem solved.

The fundamental problem, of course, is that programmers don’t speak English (not even the ones who do). They may be perfectly fluent while talking baseball or cars but, as soon as the conversation turns to their area of expertise, it’s like they were born hard-wired and have no memory of ever having to learn this stuff themselves. They have lost the ability to communicate with those who don’t already know the answers to the questions being asked.

Damn! Creationists are Everywhere

Posted on September 5, 2007
Filed Under politics, paranoia, stupidity, laziness, nausea, Revulsion, jesus, religion, general misanthropy, Science, clusterfuck | 1 Comment

And I was going to vote for this guy, too. Yet another politician gets caught trying to make everybody happy and winds up upsetting everybody.

Why, John Tory, why?

Actually, I know why. If you’re a complete ignoramus on the subject, then “teach the controversy” sounds quite sensible. Both sides of the story and all that.

Except, in this case, there is no other side. There is only blind, wilfully ignorant superstition.

I guess I go back to my firm policy of voting for nobody.

Fuck ‘em. fuck ‘em all.

How To Tell If You’re a Geek

Posted on September 4, 2007
Filed Under Science, 42 | 2 Comments

You’re running SETI@Home on your computer right now.Seriously, though, you get:

An ultracool screensaver that searches for aliens while you nap on the couch.
The knowledge that you are engaging in a legitimate scientific pursuit while you nap on the couch.
To tell your kids, when they wake you up while napping on the couch, “Quiet, kids, I’m searching for aliens.”

I think I just might be a geek.

Disappointment

Posted on August 31, 2007
Filed Under barf, better than sex, Ending confusion | 4 Comments

So there I was. I placed my order for a nice hot pile of steamed crap, only to discover that I had inadvertently ordered some kind of fish dish. I’ll never eat at that restaurant again.

It’s sad, really. One of the few good reasons to visit third world countries is to enjoy their garbled English. Now, I’ll probably never go to China.