Money that lights up!

There is nothing about this commercial that makes the remotest amount of sense. (The video is small, and the quality isn't great, but it's the script that matters - so listen carefully.)

Poll results

Q:
...Do you appreciate dead baby jokes?
A:
...Yes, they isbe hilarious. 2/3
...Yes, in the proper context. 0/3
...Yes, if I'm drunk and/or high. 0/3
...No, but just because most of them aren't funny. 1/3
...No, that's disgusting, sick, and wrong! 0/3

It's funny because it's true (update!)

I think this applies to me.

[edit]
Part of the reason that I thought this was so funny is that over the course of the past couple of weeks I've determined that I am, in fact, a dilettante in the general sense of the word. A dabbler. One who has a "broad but shallow attachment to any field." I know the word generally is taken in a negative sense nowadays, but it is, for better or worse, an accurate description of me based on my history. My next question is, what do I do with that realization?
[/edit]

It's not a get-rich-quick scheme, but guess what? I did!

Anyone else think I should set up an eGRQ system?

SIR! Merry Xmas, SIR!

Nutcrackers - of the old fashioned variety - are ugly and semi-creepy as it is, but at least they have some cultural significance. Then again, traditions change up with the times, right? With that in mind, I give you, courtesy of Target Corp:



Merry Xmas!

Poll results

Yes, I know it's been a while, but I have an excuse. I think... anyhoo - to the business at hand:

Q: Which of these is NOT a tongue twister in Irish?

A:
(a) There is a chicken standing in the snow on a frosty day. (2/8, 25%)
(b) A black ox ate a raw egg in heaven. (2/8, 25%)
(c) The skunk rolled down the hill and ruptured its larynx. (4/8, 50%)
(d) Mary laughed shamelessly at the wake in Derry last year. (0/8, 0%)

The correct answer is (c), which, I'm told, is a tongue twister in a different language (though at present I don't remember which one).

Snickers marketing staff fails linguistics

If you've had a Snickers(R) bar lately, you've noticed stupid words on the bottom of the wrapper. Words like peanutopolis, snicktastic, and satisfactionable. I may have made up two of those, but I found one with peanutopolis the other day. The inside of the wrapper includes a definition of the term, and this one revealed that peanutopolis means "a state of mind making you fell very strong and powerful, almost mayor-like." As a side-bar, this presumes that mayors are always strong and powerful. This assumption is false, but let's address the more glaring issue. "Peanutopolis" incorporates the suffix -opolis, meaning "city." So, "City of Peanuts" seems like a more appropriate definition. I can only assume that the word "snicktastic" might mean "tights worn by strippers in Hanoi."

The answer is "No."

Here's the question.

False alarm - there is no god!

Or, "I'm borderline retarded."

Cars don't start when they are in D. The short version of the story is: I was apparently so flustered by the not-rolling-down window thing that I put the car into the parking space, futzed a little more with the window, then turned the car off. The part I missed is shifting from D to P. So when I came back out and the car didn't start, it was my own fault.

I noticed when I was going to put the car into N for the tow guy that it was in D.

Yeah, I'm an idiot.

I was wrong - there apparently is a god

There's at least one supernatural entity that can exert control over events in the world. There might be more than one, but I know with certainty that there's at least one. For the sake of convenience, I'll call it "god" and use the pronoun "he." Let me tell you a little bit about him.

He's an asshole, and he hates me. Actually, neither of those descriptors is adequate in degree to convey his level of assholery and his hatred for me. But, being supernatural and beyond our understanding, it stands to reason that he would exceed our understanding in every possible way.

It's been a shitty semester. Granted, much of the difficulty I've had is self-inflicted. I won't bore you with the details. Suffice it to say, I'm an idiot. So I've got four projects that are due by Wednesday. One of them I'm pretty well done with - I'll need to do a bit of a redraft, but it won't be more than an hour or two's work. The other three will require a lot more effort. I'm so far behind on my studio project that I'm not even sure I should bother trying to finish it. My capstone proposal book? I have a draft of the text, but no images ready, and nothing resembling a layout. I haven't even started reading the sources for my GIS paper - 8-10 pages, due next Tuesday. (Yeah, I know - I could be doing that right now, while I wait for the tow truck. Fuck off.)

So what happens tonight? Let's recap: I left the studio around 10:20, waited for a bus, and then got to my car, & started it. I was starving, so figured I'd grab a burger at the Dinkytown McDonalds. The first problem was the window - my drivers-side window wouldn't open. Must be frozen shut. Other windows open, just not that one. Well, that's annoying. I'll just park and go in to grab my food. Which I do. When I get back to the car, I turn the key. Fan starts blowing, radio comes on, lights light up, but the engine doesn't start. It doesn't even try. Looks like my starter is shot. Never mind that it worked just fine 5 minutes earlier. So there goes a couple hundred bucks. Nice.

Do I need this shit right now? I guess so. Apparently my life is too carefree. Fucking kill me.

This comes on the heels of a number of frustrations with technology. Long story short, Adobe can lick my shit-stained asscrack. Apparently they don't figure compatibility between versions of their products is an issue they need to worry about. I fucking hate those fuckwads, and their fucking shitfucking software.

Did I mention that god hates me? I'm not willing to accept that all of this shit happening to me is the result of random consequence. Fuck you, god. Eat shit and die.

Orientatatation

When it comes to vernacular speech, I try to be pretty forgiving, but I still have some pet peeves - those things that really grind my gears for no good reason.

"Orientate" is one of those. Now have it come out of a loud-mouthed know-it-all grad student who likes to make sure the entire room knows how smart he is about transit development, and the grinding goes into high gear. "It's all automobile-orientated development." Blah blah blah shut up. Now cue the non-trad-grad who has loud conversations on her cell phone two seats away. I'm waiting for Mr. "That's an invasion of my privacy! I'm a single-issue voter!" to add his buck and a half. At least I've commandeered both of these outlets so that annoying kid who can't sort his digital photo collection during the lecture. Try as I might, it's really hard to focus on the professor when theres a constant flickering motion at the corner of my vision.

Least appropriate use of departmental email

The nominees are .... yeah, I wish I had the time to come up with a shortlist, but it's a no-brainer: the winner is one of our department's admin personnel, who today emailed to the entire listserv a 7.5MB PDF advertising a house for rent in Roseville. Built in 1976, the 2,044 sf split-level home has been remodeled from top to bottom, and features "a HUGE eat-in kitchen," 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, 2 fireplaces, and "a sunroom overlooking the in-ground pool." Every grad student should seriously consider paying $2,400 a month (plus utilities) for housing. Cuz, y'know, they have all that money and free time to entertain friends in their spacious back yard and pool.

MySpace Exec: "Facebook sucks, but we're going to copy them"

Really.

Let them eat lead (paint)!

Apparently, charities are having a tough time sorting through donated toys to find out which ones have been recalled. Why bother? They're just giving them to poor kids, and when it comes to measuring the value of a person to society, poor kids are in the low end. Why not just let them choke on small loose parts coated with lead?

But don't name your sports team after us!

I totally appreciate the idea of a beauty pageant that involves meat. I love that the Miss Navajo Nation pageant embraces a broader range of skills than a typical pageant, where rubbing Vaseline on your teeth, talking about the Iraq, and dodging pepper spray are de rigueur. What I don't get is how this fits into the "don't use us as an icon of strength and physical prowess" attitude that pervades the anti-mascot crowd. I get that "they" don't want to be reduced to a one-dimensional caricature, but can't a mascot represent a particular dimension of your culture? I don't hear this much fuss about mascots based on European characters. The Fighting Irish are a classic example - and the concept of the drunken, pugilistic Irishman is pervasive with or without the mascot.

Here's a little test: write down everything, positive and negative, that comes to mind when you hear "Sioux," and again when you hear "Irish." I'm willing to bet that both terms are loaded with connotations both positive and negative. And I also bet that what comes to mind is unaffected by mascots.

Food Network has officially crossed the line

Lately, Food Network has been getting on my nerves. For the longest time I enjoyed a number of their programs. Examples: on Good Eats, Alton Brown is brilliant - he makes every aspect of cooking entertaining and educational. Rachel Ray was cool when she was limited to 30-Minute Meals and $40 A Day. But then there was Paula Deen, whose accent alone is proof that evil incarnate can be embodied in sound. But hey, I don't need to watch what I don't like, right? Then they brought me the joy of Iron Chef America - corny, reasonably entertaining, and not too annoying (at first). If you're familiar with the program at all, you'll no doubt realize it's rapidly getting out of control, like a nuclear reactor sans inanimate carbon control rods. It's taking itself far too seriously. (And don't get me started on the new Iron Chef's Hibbertesque giggle.) And Rachel Ray appears to have been injected with huge quantities of "Yummo" (by Nabisco). I think she's trying to be like Martha Stewart, minus the stick up her ass.

One of their more recent "personalities" is this guy, whose appearance alone makes me change the channel. Seriously, step away from the peroxide, and no one gets hurt. During a commercial break, he helped out some poor schmuck whose cranberry sauce is apparently too tart. His prescription included the use of a Food Network skillet, available now at Kohl's. Did I mention that this "help the dork on the street" piece was interrupted by an ad for Food Network brand cookware, available only at Kohl's?

Where are you from?

When someone asks you to name your "hometown," what is your answer? What about your "birthplace"? Assuming they are geographically different, do you differentiate the two semantically, and if so, how?

My Xmas wish list

It would be nice if people would take seriously the issue of consumption. Adbusters has been trying to publicize the issue for years, and one of their classic anti-events is coming up this Friday. Yes, it's Buy Nothing Day, the day you avoid crowded malls and hyped-up bullshit. Another proposed activity is Buy Nothing Christmas. The site tells us: "Buy Nothing Christmas is not really about refusing to spend a dime over the holiday season. It’s about taking a deep breath and deciding to opt out of the hype‚ the overcrowded malls‚ and the stressful to–do lists. It’s about reminding ourselves to really think about what we are buying‚ why we are buying it‚ and whether we really need it at all."

This is an idea that I completely support, for a couple of reasons. First, I hate the shopping. Second, I hate trying to come up with ideas for what other people should by for me. Third, I have so much stuff already. A lot of the stuff I have - whether received as a gift or purchased by myself, sits around and never is used. Yet at the time, I "needed" it. Hell, I still find myself "needing" stuff, or just wanting things enough to say, "Fuckit, I'm buyin' that."

Simultaneously, I'm a huge fan of the bounty that capitalism has produced in this country. Apparently, I contain multitudes.

Now, a lot of people out there will argue that anti-consumerism is akin to communism, or is illogical (if I literally consume nothing, I'll die, for example), or is it's own form of hyped-up bullshit and or hypocrisy. And I'm not going to engage that, because it would be pointless. I think the biggest argument I can make is that it's not about anti-consumerism, but rather mindful consumerism. Think about your consumption and its consequences. It's not easy, but if we start paying attention, and teaching our kids to pay attention, maybe in a couple of generations people will find it easier to consume less. Assuming they aren't too busy fighting each other over puddles of filthy water.

Things inside of things, comics edition

Ben pointed out that yesterday's Sally Forth addressed the phenomenon of engastration.

For the man (or post-op FTM) who has everything....

The perfect gift idea. I guess the hand crocheted condoms didn't go over as well. I don't own anything that is "balck and white," so it would be a real rarity - in my wardrobe, at least. I've snagged a screenshot for those of you who aren't part of the Facebook, and for posterity - cuz I'm sure this will be snapped up by some savvy shopper before too long.

"You got peanut butter in my blog!" or "We're all one happy incestuous e-family!"

Mel offers this post on words and identity, which brings me to an interesting related tangerine (a repurposing of the word by Mary's classmate Wes, meaning "a small tangent"):

Next semester, I'll be working on my capstone project (think "thesis" with 20% more pretension) on the future of the Ford assembly plant in St. Paul. I was thinking of asking James Lileks to drop by as a guest critic at some point during the semester. He's a former columnist at the Star Tribune, and now oversees their buzz.mn blog. (He's also, by birth at least, a fellow Nodakian.) His "regular" site has several pages on the topic of Urban Studies, and it might be interesting to get a perspective from someone who doesn't work in a so-called "design profession." So my question is, would doing so constitute an act of blogwhoring?

Greetings second-class citizen! Welcome to America!

Ben will be posting more about this shortly (and I'll include a link when he does), but he found out today that his company decided that they'd make a tiny change to their benefits offerings this year. They no longer pay ANY of the premium for domestic partner coverage, leaving the entire cost (around $5K for the year) to the employee. Lucky for us, I can get coverage through the U for a lot less than that, and it looks like it'll be as good as what I'm getting now. Isn't it great that we live in a country where everyone is treated as equal, except for those of us who aren't?

Things inside of things

Discussions in our studio often take odd turns, and today there was talk of fake meat (including the wonderfully named "Not Dog") and holiday traditions involving meat (or not, as the case may be). One classmate mentioned the turducken, a phenomenon some were not familiar with. If you're not aware of this, it's basically a chicken stuffed into a duck stuffed into a turkey. I can only assume it is delicious. After a brief search for images on the interwebs, I found a web site that actually provides a name for the process of cramming birds into each other: engastration. I am hard pressed to believe that this word actually represents the process of stuffing only birds into birds (though all of my searches reveal that to be the only definition offered), and I wonder about other possible applications. For example, could you cram other animals into each other? Could you engastrate veal into a regular cow? What about interspecies engastration? One site described a sausage-stuffed turducken. Another described how to build an "Easter turducken" using items from the Refined Sugar food group. Could a stuffed pepper be considered engastrated? What about Russian dolls? Would they be an example of non-edible hierarchical engastration?

Remind me again why I hate Windows

No thanks, my lappy is doing so on a regular basis.

Monday, shitty Monday

U2 could have made a different song with that name, but I guess it wouldn't have been as political or whatever, and Bono might never have had the chance to use starving/diseased people in Africa to illustrate what a great human being he is.

Anyway, just a brief couple of notes, for the fun.
Saw a guy on the bus this morning who dressed like he was trying to be ALL of Run DMC - the hat, the coat, far more jewelry than any one person should own, let alone wear at once. He was on the one side of the back seat of the bus, and I was on the other. I had my phone out to check messages (Ben had called & left a message mere moments earlier) and find out about rescheduling my dental appointments. Dude looks at me and makes some comment about "knockin' [me] out" (perhaps at the suggestion of his mother) if I point my camera at him. WTF? If you dress like a carnival sideshow, you ought be be less self-conscious about it.

Earlier this a.m., one of my dental crowns came off. This is the same one that came off earlier this year, and then was re-attached by the dentist, who later (at my semi-annual checkup) noticed in the x-ray picture that the crown wasn't sitting properly, and would need to be removed and reset. Well, I've saved them the trouble of removing it, I guess.

Today in studio we have an "intermediate review" of our progress thus far. I haven't made any progress in the past couple of weeks, and I'm officially a fruitbasketcase right now, so I'm not looking forward to this. I guess on the plus side, I'm not going to go into the review with any delusions that I've done a good job. So when they tear me a new one, it won't catch me by surprise.

Speaking of which, I guess I'd better get to work on that.

Blogwhore?

Mel and I wonder if there's a word for "one who attempts to get mentioned in others' blogs so that they can mention those references in their own blog." Any suggestions?

UPDATE: I just realized that I forgot to include the link that makes the whole thing pointful. Cuz that was me, with the question and stuff.

Long time no post (again)

Anyone who would like to offer congrats on me ending this 11-day gap in posts, here's a suggested method. It's been a while (school does that to ya). What's new with me, then? Mostly school - hell, what am I saying? I've done nothing but school. Spent a weekend in Seattle recently, which was fun. Got some photos, saw some stuff. I found that it's a really easy city to navigate, and has a radically different feel from New York. In many ways I like NYC better, but Seattle is a much younger city, more open, more "hip." I could live in either one, but I don't know that I'd make it in NYC longer than 3 or 4 years. I could see myself in the Seattle area for the long term. Ben has applied for a job in Kent, which is a bit south of the SeaTac airport. Fortunately, I already know which bus route runs between Kent and downtown Seattle.

Postcard from Bizarro World

Hi all, having a great time. Installed MS Office 2007, and am loving it! The new interface is quite a bit different, but pretty intuitive and (gasp!) easy to use. If Vista is this much better than XP, they may give Apple a run for their money. Word to your mother!
XOXO
B

First blog with the new lappy

My first entry from the new lappy, whom I've dubbed "Smurfette."

Time for a rant: So I'm looking at maybe upgrading from Adobe Creative Suite 2 (hereafter referred to as "CS2") to CS3. CS3 has some spiffy new featureness and functionality, but of course it's pricey. There are actually a variety of CS3 packages available that combine different programs for different user groups. There's a "Design" package, a "Web" package, and a "Production" package, and each is available in both "Standard" and "Premium" editions. The Premium edition adds a couple extra bells/whistles. If you want to go whole hog, you can also splurge for the "Master Collection," which bundles pretty much everything. After looking through the options, I determined that my needs are perfectly met by the Design Standard package. It's got precisely what I need - nothing more, nothing less.

So, I should upgrade, rather than pay for the whole package, right? Of course! Saves money, etc etc. Hmm. According to the site, regular retail for the full version is $1200, and the upgrade is $400. Ahh, but I'm a student, and can get the education pricing. Let's see... full version, $400, and upgrade ... huh. I don't see a price for the upgrade. I look around some more, and find nothing, so I decide to call customer service and find out if they have an education discount for the upgrade.

Note: The following transcript is paraphrased, and heavily expurgated in the interest of me not typing 14 minutes worth of boring crap.

*RING* Thank you for calling Adobe blah blah words. Your call will be answered something something. *RING* *RING*
Customer Service Rep [with strong Indian accent]: Hello, thank you for calling Adobe Customer Service, my name is Victor, may I have your customer number?
Me: I don't have a customer number, I'm just calling to ask a question about pricing.
Victor: Okay, and how can I help you?
Me: Right now I have the education version of Creative Suite 2, and I'm interested in upgrading to CS3. I'm wondering if there's an education discount for the upgrade.
Victor: Okay, before I can answer this, I need to create a record for you, so I will be creating a record now, okay?
[I give him my name, address, email address, DOB, SSN, TLA, IBM, LOL, and most recent sperm count. This requires me repeating a lot of things, and spelling out "3rd". Seriously. Then he gives me a customer number. I've been numerated! At last!]
Victor: Okay, and what can I help you with today sir?
Me: [repeats request, provides additional info such as: operating system, exact product I'm looking at (CS3 Design Standard), mother's maiden name, and US citizenship status.]
Victor: Okay, I am understanding that you have Creative Suite 2 Premium on Windows XP ... (he basically repeats back to me everything that I told him - I've noticed these Indian customer service reps do that - which is probably a good thing, because it verifies that he got the information right, but it's kind of annoying after the 2nd time.)
Me: Yes, and I want to know if there's a discount for educational purchases on the upgrade.
Victor: Okay, while I do research for this, I will put you on hold, okay? Please be on the line.
Me: (holding)
Victor: Okay, sir, I can give you good news, you want to upgrade [blah blah], and you can do that. So, is there anything else I can help you with today?
Me: I was wondering about the pricing --
Victor: Okay, the pricing for the upgrade is dollar three hundred ninety-nine, and for the full version it is dollar one thousand one hundred ninety-nine.
Me: Right, but is there an education discount on the upgrade?
Victor: I do not know that information, but I can transfer you to the sales where they would be the best place to give you that information. So please be on the line.
Me: (holding)
Sales guy (obviously American): Thank you for calling Adobe Sales, my name is Noah. Do you have a customer number?
Me: Yes I do. (tells him number)
Noah: And what can I do for you today?
Me: I currently have Creative Suite 2, which I bought through the university where I'm a student right now, and I am thinking about upgrading to CS3. And I see that the regular price for the upgrade is $399, and the educational pricing for the full product is also $399.
Noah with a bit of a chuckle: (says something about how silly that seems)
Me: I was wondering if there's an educational discount for the upgrade.
Noah: Unfortunately, we don't offer education pricing for the upgrade.
Me: Okay, that's all I needed to know. Thanks.
Noah: Thank you for calling Adobe, have a nice day.

So basically, in four seconds, the American guy was able to answer the question I couldn't get resolved in 14 minutes with the other guy.

My experience with Lenovo customer service was pretty much the same: Talk to someone in India for several minutes, get nowhere, get transferred to someone in the U.S., problems solved almost immediately. Also, there is a pattern of customer service being based in India, and sales being in the U.S. I guess this is because once they've got your money, you're screwed, and have to take whatever crappy service they dish out. But when you're a prospective customer, they want to give you an actual good experience with the company, so they have you deal with Americans. Jerks.

Bureaucratic asshattery, part XIV

So peeved right now, just HAVE to post or brain will a splode.

I came in this a.m. to work in the computer lab, cuz I have a review this afternoon and need to get stuff finished. Lab should open at 8. Not for the first time, it didn't. I waited. About 8:05, I asked the other kid standing around if he was waiting for the lab too, & he said yes, so I went to the office of our Director of Technology to tell him.

His reaction: "Jenny must be running late." (I almost thought he was going to tell me to just go wait for her, but then he got out of his chair.)
Me: "This has happened before..."
Him: "Yes, but the lab has also opened early before. People have lives." (I don't remember his exact phrasing, but his overall tone was pretty dismissive.
Me: "Well, I have a life too, and work that needs to get done."

What annoyed me so much about this was his dismissive tone, and the apparent attitude that when they say the lab opens at 8 am, what they really mean is an average of 8 am. They need to clarify that, I think. Also, I'm pretty sure that if you worked in a real job, Jenny, "having a life" wouldn't cut it as a reason for repeated tardiness.

Worst. Directions. Ever. (Graphics edition!)

In preparation for my new lappy, I'm checking out the bargain-priced Micro$~1 software available through the U. On the main page of the University Computer Services web site, I noticed the link "Where can I park at UCS?" The graphic they've put together to point out their parking spaces is hilarious. (I'll post it here, since who knows if it'll disappear after word gets around that the Lady with a Hat, Arbiter of eQuality, has dissed them.)

All your web sites are belong to us

Way back in the day, when I was a surly, unmannered LVS at One BM, our documentation had to be translated into multiple foreign languages. We sent it off to the translation centers (one of which may or may not have had herpes), and waited for them to send the foreign-language versions back. (Sidebar: how would you outsource that? Would you have India do all the translations, or would you have the work done by college students studying the corresponding language?)

My understanding is that the bulk of the translation was done by computer programs that would flag problem areas for a real person to examine. This was a big reason we needed to be careful about word choices ("Execute the command," for example, might transl(iter)ate in unusual ways.)

Anyway, it looks like machine translation has not progressed much in the intervening years, as evidenced here. The Duisburg-Nord Landschaftspark is built on an old industrial site in Duisburg Nord, Germany. The designer (Peter Latz) took a unique approach to recycling filthy industrial urban land, and this park is one of my precedent studies for my capstone project. (Fun side note: The translated version of the park's official web site indicates that its size is 200 acres. In actual fact, it's 230 hectares, or just under 570 acres.)

Powerful new functionality in Adobe Acrobat

Hey! Are you listening to me?

Ever wonder if you're a boring/annoying person? Friend Mary points out this new technology targeted at autistic folk, but sure to be a boon for those of us suffering our own personal insecurities &c. I know one of my classmates could definitely do with some kind of feedback regarding her annoyance factor. On the other hand, about 80% of the time that I'm boring or irritating, I'm aware of it and ignore it, so this might not help me.

My fave line is: "When presented with fresh video clips, the software gets people's emotions right 90 per cent of the time when the clips are of actors, and 64 per cent of the time on footage of ordinary people."

What this tells me is that ordinary people are not adequately expressing their emotions, and that we need more training in how to do so in standardized ways.

At long, long last

I got an email from the Lenovo indicating that my new lappy is in transit. It has left Shenzen, China. However, after viewing the shipment history for the jump drive that I received in reverse temporal order, I am hesitant to claim victory yet.

9/27 Billing info received
9/27 Departure scan; Shenzen, CN
9/27 Hub scan; Guangzhou, CN
9/27 "THE SHIPMENT IS BEING HELD BY BROKERAGE FOR REASONS BEYOND UPS' CONTROL"; Louisville, KY, US
9/28 Departure scan; Guangzhou, CN
9/28 Arrival/Departure scans; Incheon, KR
9/28 Arrival scan; Anchorage, AK, US
9/29 Departure scan; Anchorage, AK, US
10/2 "THE SHIPMENT IS BEING HELD BY BROKERAGE FOR REASONS BEYOND UPS' CONTROL / BROKERAGE RELEASED SHIPMENT. SHIPMENT IS SUBMITTED TO CLEARING AGENCY FOR FURTHER CLEARANCE," then: Import and Departure scans; Louisville, KY, US
10/2 Arrival/Departure scans; Minneapolis, MN, US
10/2 Arrival scan; Eagan, MN, US
10/3 Departure scan; Eagan, MN, US
10/3 Arrival, attempted delivery; Rochester, MN, US
10/4 2nd attempt; Rochester, MN, US
10/5 Successful delivery; Rochester, MN, US

I wonder if I should have specified something like, "Deliver after 4pm to avoid those annoying failed attempts." Ah well. I've waited this long, I can wait an extra couple days.

Poll results

Q: Which of these most reliably conveys real events through audio-visual media?

A:
...Based on a true story: 2/13 (15%)
...Inspired by actual events: 1/13 (7%)
...Ripped from the headlines: 4/13 (30%)
...As seen on TV!: 1/13 (7%)
...BILLY MAYS!: 5/13 (38%)

TOTAL: 13/13 (97%)

I'm very disappointed to see that BILLY MAYS! had such a small margin of victory. I had fully expected BILLY MAYS! to take no less than 3/4 of the votes. I want you all to go to your room and think about what you've done, and we'll discuss this when your father gets home.

New poll will be out in the relatively near future. (Let's shoot for early next week, yes?)

New words I learn

I this morning wanted to see if the term "plus one" is defined anywhere in its nounular form, as used in Doctor Who (series 1, ep 2) when the Doctor says, "See, it says right here: 'The Doctor Plus One.' I'm the Doctor, and this is Rose Tyler. She's my Plus One." For the CDes Halloween party, good friend M. will be my Plus One, hence the relevance of the topic.

I went to UrbanDictionary.com - not necessarily a scholarly resource, but fun to peruse on occasion, and saw the term "fives" in a use I'd not previously known. Definition 3 is my fave, because it illustrates growth in the meaning of the term:

Defines a claim or ownership of a certain item. Originally used to define such a claim for 5 minutes, but is now commonly interchanged with the word dibs.

The one bit lacking from this is the bit about how it originated as a way of claiming rights to a seat so that one can go use the loo, refresh one's drinky, or the that.

Oh, and I never did find a prior use of "plus one" as a noun phrase.

Tech update update

Bizarre news on the wireless network in our studio. The hub they installed has improved signal strength and connectivity on the whole, but only when it isn't plugged in.

Reader response

The unidentified lurker I mentioned in yesterday's post expressed displeasure with that appellation, and requested/demanded an apology/retraction. So, Jessica, here it is. With deepest regrets, you are offered provisional non-lurker status. To verify your status as a non-lurker, please click the comments link below and indicate your desire to be reclassified as not a lurker.

Time-displacement shipping

I just got a note from Lenovo, the horrible company that I will never again order a product from, regarding my order. I ordered a laptop and, since the discount was good, a 2GB jump drive as well. I received the jump drive about two weeks ago, but last week noticed that its estimated shipping date was bumped back to 10/25 or something like that. The laptop, meanwhile, was pushed back to 10/29. There's been no update to the invoice since then.

The subject line of this morning's email is "Electronic Receipt for Invoice 6371498 -- shipped on 10/17/2007." I'm thinking, "Sweet! Finally they shipped the damn laptop."

Upon opening the note, however, I found that no, the item that was shipped yesterday was my jump drive. The one that is currently plugged in to this computer. Yeah, that one. It'll arrive in roughly 4 days via UPS. Well, 4 days or negative 2 weeks. Whichever.

Oh, wait:

It looks like it was delivered on the 5th. It's nice that Lenovo finally got me a tracking number for something I've had in my possession for two weeks. I wonder what happens if I click that "Quantum View" tab, and if that has anything to do with the temporal discrepancy.

I'm feeling a strong urge to cancel the order now just out of spite. At the very least I should call and bitch at them some more. But then I might get stuck on another committee.

New instructor characterizes student perfectly

Okay, okay - Has anyone yet coined the term "blogorrhea"? If not, I hereby do. But this I just HAD to share.

===
EDIT: Apparently, "yes": this page provides a much more satisfactory definition than Urban Dictionary
===

My metro design seminar is being taught by a relatively recent graduate of the MLA/MURP program here at the U, although he's roughly my age or maybe a little older. He's pretty cool, and the coolometer just spiked when I received a note about the projects we're presenting starting tomorrow.

We will be presenting to a mock planning commission, acting the role of planning staff. We review a project against subdivision and zoning ordinances, and then make a recommendation (approve, approve with conditions, deny).

So the instructor sent a note about the presentations, and added:

In order to make the mock planning commission meetings a little more interesting and hopefully fun, I created a character or role for each of you to play.

Here's mine:

Brain Fewell – local realtor known for pushing “affordable” housing, but has a second home in the penthouse on the top floor of the Carlisle in downtown Minneapolis. His penchant for living high is legendary and there have been rumors that his life style has exceeded his earnings due to the on-going housing slump. As any new development represents new sales commissions, Brian has never seen any project he doesn’t like and is ready to approve anything regardless of planning staff concerns. No apparent criminal record, at least as far as anyone knows.

I can't freakin' wait!

===
EDIT: One of my classmate's descriptions starts with "Drawn to the city for the watersports, ..."
===

Tech update

We have a wireless hub in our studio! WOOT!
Also, a few minutes ago the "mean girl" who's in charge of the computer lab came down here & replaced the 4 missing mice in this lab! WOOT!

It dawned on me ...

Oh, that was my ponderable: This "Age of Aquarius" thing. If the Piscean Age correlates strongly with the rise of Christianity, which is symbolized by the fish, what characteristics might one expect in an age characterized by the water-bearer? What does water "mean"? Rising seas, environmental issues, lots of urination? While I don't believe in the legitimacy of astrology as a "way of knowing" - I am, after all, a product of my culture and environment, and we are still living in a society dominated by Enlightenment principles that value human reason and our ability to know the world through empirical means. But cultural phenomena based in superstition fascinate me. While the mythologies of the Greeks and Romans are mere stories to us now, they left a rich literary and artistic legacy that we can still appreciate. The mythology of Christianity still clings, unfortunately, and disgusts me in its application, but I love the architectural heritage, and just last night I listened to Mozart's Requiem again. Simply amazing, yes. So umm... I don't remember where I was going - oh yeah - So, I wonder about that whole Aquarian thing. Ya know. As I do.

Randomness

The "blog" of "unnecessary" quotation marks made the Blogs of Note list today! This is far more exciting to me than it ought to be. Or rather, it is "far" more "exciting" to me than it "ought" to "be." iscanbe. Money.

I was contemplating something on the way over here this morning, something that was a "ponderable" or a "musing," (not to be confused with "amusing," though the two characteristics might intersect at times, and share ancestry), and it's completely gone now. One imagines it was something about school, or cities, or something else that's been on my mind a lot of late.

One of my classmates has passed out blank CDs to the rest of us with the request that we burn her a disc of our favorite music. While I presently lack the technology, I've started a list (every time I hear a song that I want to include, I write it down), and after the first few days, I had to get a 2nd disc from her. I might need to snag a couple more before this little side project is finished - which might not even happen until Christmas break.

I saw that billboard again this morning that says "Embryos are just tiny babies!" All I can think when I see that is "and you can sprinkle them on salads or breakfast cereal, just like Bacon Bits(TM)!"

I was thinking the other day about making a bumper sticker that says "Jesus Loves You - Unless You're Black or Gay." I don't think I'd put it on my car though....

Long time no post

I've gotten razzed by a lurker recently about not posting for nearly 2 weeks, so I figured it's time to drop a quick update.

In the past couple of weeks, I've changed my capstone project twice (and then changed it back). I've also bitched to administration at the departmental, college, and university levels, as well as to a handful of related organizations (the Council of Graduate Students (COGS), the Graduate and Professional Student Association (GAPSA), the Board of Regents) about unresolved issues in my department and the College of Design (CDes). The Dean of the college tried to cow me by invoking the abstraction of "the profession," and it was insinuated that I was "not going to be anyone's favorite person." Those responses, I think, are rooted in a misapprehension of my intentions. I'm not interested in these people being my friends - I'm interested in them doing their jobs.

Yesterday (Tues) I had a meeting with the Dean and the Director of Technology for CDes. My Director of Graduate Studies (DGS) was also there, as was one other LA student. The outcome? Well, the wireless situation in our studio will be resolved by the College at its own expense, since the organization that manages the campus network doesn't give a flying shit about students, and isn't interested in doing anything to provide service prior to upgrading the entire campus network. Nice, that. I wish I could just defer my coursework for several months too. I believe the word "assclowns" is appropriate here.

A huge issue in our department (and somewhat at the college level as well) is the poor dissemination of information from administration to students. Obviously, it's a two-way street - they need to make info available, and we need to take responsibility for accessing the info. The problem is that there is no clearly defined route for information dispersal. Amongst their methods are such elements as: a blog that I can't find, dozens of emails about everything from internships in Florida to guest speakers, signs posted in the computer lab indicating which printers are currently unavailable, the CDes lab web site, bulletin boards, and student mailboxes. My proposal was that each studio have a "studio rep" who meets with their department head on a regular basis (LA already has this - can guess who the rep is for my studio?), and that that person not only brings up concerns from studio ("the trash doesn't get emptied," and "mice ate my project") but also receives information from the department head and disperses it to their studio-mates. It gives that person more responsibility, but I think it's a good compromise.

And as a person who loves responsibility, I am happy to take on that in addition to now being our department's rep to the COGS and our newly-appointed student rep to the University's technology committee. Yeah, I got that one too. The COGS thing shouldn't be too bad - a couple hours once a month for a meeting that includes free food. The technology committee thing? Who knows - but looks good on a resume, right? "Please give me a job. I like to bitch about stuff and then get put on committees."

Is there a word that describes the experience or sensation of becoming what you most despise, or for the fear of becoming that thing?

REALLLY offensive jokes.

Seriously. I refuse, categorically RE-FYOOOZ to accept any bitching from anyone who highlights the punchlines and doesn't like what they see.

Why did Hellen Keller's dog run away?
Because if your name was "NNNGGAAAAAAAH," you'd run away too.

What's better than winning the gold medal at Special Olympics?
Not being retarded.

College newspapers are (still) funny

In the "Oxymoronic Idealism" section today, "600 fast for hunger relief." I never thought of not-eating as an effective means of relieving hunger, but I guess I'm not a college student who enjoys pointless acts intended to raise awareness. I'm more the type who'd like to DO something about my hunger, so I typically just pop down to the vend-o-mat and grab a candy bar & a soda.

In the "You tattooed your WHAT!?" department: "Students getting tattooed on the rise." I can only assume that the word "rise" is a newfangled slang reference to a body part, since I don't know of any areas of campus referred to by that term - though I imagine The Knoll comes close. Then too, I've never seen any tattooing going on there.

If I had more time, I'd actually open the paper and find more craziness to document. Regretfully, I have to get this report written for my 9:05 class tomorrow morning. (Yes, they offer a semester-long class on the subject of 9:05. Really!)

Oh great, now all the supervillains know his weakness

How a breast becomes a law ...

bill becomes a nipple... legislation.

The Strib has a little "Have you heard?" box on the front of each day's paper, with snippets of recent news items. Today, the 2nd one reads, "Ohio state Rep. Matthew Barrett was giving a high school civics lesson when his memory stick revealed the image of a topless woman instead of his presentation on how a bill becomes law." Maybe he was going to be giving a presentation in Ms. Gymcoach's health class later that day, and just got them mixed up?

It doesn't tell us whether he's a Rebulitard or a Dummycrap - any guesses? The way these things usually go, I'm inclined to guess his name is followed by an (R), but really, it could go either way.... let's find out!

[Muzak version of the Rolling Stones' It's Only Rock 'N' Roll (But I Like It) plays while I search for more info]

The AP has a story that indicates (1) he's a Democrat and (2) (here's the real surprise) he has "no idea where these [images] came from." Of course he doesn't. How could he know what's on a portable memory device that contains a presentation he's going to give to a class of high school kids?

The obvious lesson here is that you should never accept gifts from legislative liaison from the state Library of Ohio.

Het honey, let's go hu---ummm...

I just need the headboard, thanks. (A classmate found this while looking for a bed.)

Poll results (at last!)

Previous poll:

Q: I have lost all respect for:
A:
... Midgets (1/10, 10%)
... Superman (2/10, 20%)
... Authority figures in general (1/10, 10%)
... The Bayeux Tapestry (2/10, 20%)
... Something that I used to respect (5/10, 50%)
... Vertebrates (2/10, 20%)
... Your mom (3/10, 30%)

Total: 16/10, 160%

Check out the new poll!

Hey honey, let's go hunting!

Camouflage Lingerie & Swimwear. Yes, really.

Random silliness and other updates

My lappy died last week. It's still under warranty for a few more months, but blah blah words, I'm replacing it. We'll ship it in & see if they can fix it, & if so, then Ben has a lappy too. Yay! The sad part is that despite my vehement exhortations that I would never buy another Windows box, I can't afford right now to (a) buy a Mac and (b) buy Mac versions of the software I need for school. So I'm trapped in Windows land again. This makes me grrr. But so what? How does this affect you, the reader? I'll have limited access to the Internets until my new lappy arrives, and so will not post as often. The result is that you will need to find another way to spend your hard-earned Internets time.

Random fun notes:
An issue of the Minnesota Daily last week included a story about a first-year student (18 or 19 yrs old) who last spring (1) went to a party, (2) was served alcohol by a 20-year-old student, (3) become very intoxicated (0.31% blood-alcohol level), (4) left the party, and (5) fell to his death from a parking structure. All tragic & shit, but my favorite part is the end of the story, where the UMPD's chief is quoted as saying, "A death like this can have life-changing effects."

In today's Daily, a front page story about sports injuries includes this gem from Jennifer Kearns, associate director of NCAA public relations: "It could be a temporary condition or it could be, in some cases, a permanent condition." Really. It could be either one of those. So, y'know.

odds 'ñ' ends, cont.

(here's that thing i remembered)

... Ad heard on the radio: "Attention piano buyers: If you're thinking of buying a piano...."

Also, remember that thing I said a few days ago about undergrads? High school girls are worse by several orders of magnitude.

Bizarro world

I just looked at Lady With A Hat in Internet Exploder. It hurts me to say this, but I actually like the appearance better in IE than in Firefox. There's just something about the way the font is rendered that is nicer. Here's a visual, to save you the trouble of loading the page in both browsers.

Firefox:


Interxploder:

Call Alanis

One of my classmates has a tendency to talk. And talk. And to keep talking, and talking, and talking. And she doesn't really have anything to say, but just has to keep talking. She can tell you about how she had trouble parking her car, and that will lead her to talk about her boyfriend, and then she'll talk about a random medical procedure, and her drawing class, and a pair of shoes that's really uncomfortable.

Today, she came into our studio and said she'd called to get cable installed at her apartment. And the cable guy wouldn't stop talking. It took her 20 minutes to get off the phone, because he just kept talking.

Fortunately, I didn't have to leave the room, since everyone else was laughing too.

odds 'ñ' ends

...Today on the campus shuttle I saw something that I'm still trying to process. A fairly heavy person of indeterminate sex (probably female, so I'll use the feminine pronouns, but I'm not certain) stepped onto the bus. Her hair was buzzed on the sides, and the top was short - between 1 & 2 inches - and bleached to a yellower shade of blond. She might have been pierced, but if so it was only moderate. Maybe a nose ring or something - nothing outrageous. To complete this picture, dress her in standard college student garb - jeans, t-shirts in layers, sneakers. Make the t-shirt Coke-red with the words "Chick magnet" in black, accompanied by a cartoon drawing of a bespectacled, scrawny nerd, shirtless and flexing. I still don't know what it means. It may well keep me awake for a night or two.

...[I can't remember this item... if I do, I'll write it down so I can share it later.]

...From Heloise, she of the Helpful Hint, two tidbits (from the Strib, 9/17/07):

Plastic Grocery Bags
Dear Heloise: Please let your readers know that plastic grocery bags can be used at inner-city churches that have food pantries and clothing for the needy. I also take my bags to area nursing-home residents. SUE, via e-mail
For what? So they can tie one over their head and end their suffering? Or maybe the eccentric ones like to store things like their toenail clippings and feces.

Sound off
Dear Heloise: I refuse to use the "self checkouts" in grocery stores! Why should I pay the same price for my groceries, doing all the work myself, as the next person, who gets service? Give me at least 10 percent off my total grocery bill, and I might think about doing it myself. I know I am not the only one who thinks this way. BOB in Texas
Well, Bob, I'm not sure what to do with your helpful hint, but here's a couple of other things that might get you riled up: The newspaper used to cost a penny, and you still had change to buy a phosphate at the local malt shop! Plus, young people use curse words! And the whippersnappers have the gall to congregate in public places! When I was your age, computers used punch cards! You don't even know what those are!

Technology is starting to piss me off

First, it's shitty wireless access in the studio, which is not going to be repaired, apparently. Or, if it is, it's being repaired at the speed of administration (rather than the speed of business). In other words, it might be fixed by the time I die.

Then I lose my effing phone. It's been found, but it's still a pain in the ass.

Today, I scanned several maps over at the map library, and stored the images on my USB jump drive. I came to studio, and tried to (1) copy them to my laptop and (2) move some files to the jump drive so I could walk down three flights of stairs and print them.

I get a message that says, "This drive is full" or some shit. I hit OK. It's the last I see of my jump drive. The thing couldn't be found by any computer I tried it on. I had hoped that smashing it would bring some small satisfaction, but it turned out to be much harder than expected, and the effort involved negated any enjoyment I might have gotten from it.

I now need to go spend another hour at the map library, relocating the maps and scanning them again. I also had a bunch of other stuff on the drive, but I'm not sure what. I can only hope that it was all duplicated elsewhere. If not - well, as evidenced earlier this summer, 2007 is the year of irrecoverably lost information.

Rock, paper, scissors, dynamite, tornado, cockroach, quicksand, law, peace, snake, ...

Ahh, the old game of Rock-Paper-Scissors... perfect for making those tough life decisions: Who's going to make dinner? Whose turn is it to ask for an abortion? Which person gets a new desk? But what if we threw a couple more choices in there?

RPS-25 was created to provide a more complex game with more possible outcomes. Each item is dominant over 12 others, and the result is 300 possible outcomes. But why stop there? The inventor of RPS-25 took things 76 steps further & gave us RPS-101. Each gesture defeats 50 of the remaining 100, the result being a total of 5,050 possible outcomes.

Some of my favorites:
DYNAMITE explodes BABY (actually, DYNAMITE explodes a lot of stuff....)
SPIDER in your BEER
BEER diffracts LASER
MATH confuses PRINCESS
MATH enrages MONKEY
SCISSORS alert AIRPLANE security
and any of the BRAIN ones....
BRAIN invents BUTTER
....... foils VAMPIRE
....... performs MATH

Climate change

I know that it's happening, but some of these manifestations are odd, to say the least. Thursday's Strib offered this forecast for the morning: "53° Light jackets, a few clouds."

Screw the world - Jeebus is coming back soon!

"End Times" Theology Endangers Us All

I've believed this for a long time, but haven't taken the time to express it so clearly.

HoTT T33n GurrrlZ 4 SALE!!!111

By way of Julie: Marry Our Daughter, a site for people interested in selling their teenage daughters into arranged marriages, per the Biblical tradition of treating women as property.

**ADULT LANGUAGE WARNING**

I have trouble believing this this is real. It's got to be a joke. Then again, they seem pretty serious about it, and are quick to point out that the concept of a "Bride Price" is in the bible, and therefore protected as a religious thing. I have to ask, do Americans have any inalienable rights that trump religious beliefs? I mean, if my religion tells me to go out and slaughter 2 children on every full moon, then collect all the corpses in a giant freezer, and have a festival of necrophiliac sodomy on the Winter Solstice, does that make it okay?

On the other hand, this makes me reconsider my opposition to having kids.

***UPDATED: It is, in fact, a hoax.***

Suck it Jesus

SuckItJesus.com was set up as a petition to prevent the censorship of Kathy Griffin's Emmy acceptance speech.

In her speech, Griffin said that "a lot of people come up here and thank Jesus for this award. I want you to know that no one had less to do with this award than Jesus." She went on to hold up her Emmy, make an off-color remark about Christ and proclaim, "Suck It, Jesus. This award is my god now!"

Needless to say, idiot Christians, unable to cope with the fact that not everyone agrees with them, are flipping out. This is the same type of bullshit that the Muslims pulled back when that Dutch newspaper printed cartoons they didn't like. While this event is unlikely to spark physical violence the way the cartoons did (face it, Islam, as practiced and as represented, is a more violent religion than Christianity - abortion clinic murders notwithstanding), the same sense of entitlement to respect drives both of these misguided systems (as they are currently practiced). Here's some advice for all you religious nutbags out there: GET THE FUCK OVER YOURSELVES. First, "you" never seem to have trouble saying things that you know will annoy/frustrate/offend other people, and are eager to protect your freedom of religion and speech to say whatever you want about those people (the gays, for example - who, incidentally, constitute a large segment of Ms. Griffin's fanbase, and whom God hates, according to some). Second, your cows are "mighty good on a bun," and I'll eat them if I want to.

Poll no. 27: Results

Q: You gonna eat that stapler?
A:
......Yes: 4/7 (57%) (You selfish bastards.)
......No: 2/7 (28%) (Why not? Has it gone bad?)
......Wanna split it?: 1/7 (14%) (Learn to share!)

New question imminent...

Only slightly more useful than a minor in Basketweaving

I saw in today's Minnesota Daily that we have a Center for Interdisciplinary Applications in Magnetic Resonance.

School = blog

When the semester started, I'd expected my rate of posting to drop to nearly unity less itself. Oddly, I'm still posting as often or more so than during my vacation time. How odd, I said to myself.

College newspapers are fun

The Minnesota Daily, our university newspaper, has a "question of the week" in today's edition. The question is something about YouTube, blah blah words, but the fun part is at the end.

[Student name] said, however, that too many people are posting videos for recognition rather than to get a valid point across.

"I feel like people aren't (posting videos on YouTube) to get things across, but just to get recognition," she said.

Google Earth is dead to me

I was looking for Millennium Park (in Chicago, near Navy Pier) on Google Earth. I know where it is (just north of the Art Institute), but I couldn't find it. I looked at Microsoft's Live Search - their response to Google Maps/Google Earth, and it's right there. Pritzker Pavilion is so clearly identifiable, that I could tell at once what I was looking at. What does Google Earth have in that spot? A pasty beige rectangle dotted with construction equipment. WTF? Surely it isn't that hard to update your satellite imagery, Google Earth. Surely it isn't that hard to update your satellite imagery.

Comp 1001: Writing to convey information

Let me regale you with another example (is that really something one can be "regaled" with?) of poor textbook writing from my GIS text. The authors are discussing maps, and the issue of map scale - that is, the ratio that tells how much of real life distance is represented by a specified unit of measure on the map. One common way to show the scale is with a representative fraction (RF)....

This is a simple ratio in the form of 1:1,000,000 or 1/1,000,000. In an RF, the number on the left side is the map distance, and its value is always unity.

Unity. Not 1 (or one). Presumably that would be too.... pedestrian? I mean after all, we're academics. We're supposed to be smarter than other people, and we ought to express ourselves in such a way as to make clear how smart we are. Am I right? By using the term unity in its mathematical sense as a reference to the numerical value of 1, we show the reader, who has never met us, that the tops of all our hats have worn thin in the center.

Then, just for giggles, let's look at the brief mention of temporal scale as it applies to maps: "The unit of measurement of a temporal scale can be years, months, days, hours, minutes, or seconds." But nothing else, apparently. Decades, centuries, and larger units are not to be used (it would seem).

Culturally inappropriate!

Fran and I are talking about world issues, and we briefly mentioned Chinese population growth policies. The following phrase popped into my head: "This is Bob Barker reminding you to spay or neuter your Asian."

Pretense and affectation

Is there some point at which pretense and affectation will reach a critical mass that will cause an event to collapse under its own weight, tearing a hole in the fabric of time and space and creating a singularity from which no attention whore can escape? I certainly hope so, but the fact that it didn't happen at this event makes me wonder how high that threshold is.

Darwin Award, Emmy, or both?

While we're on the subject of " 'reality' 'programming' ".....

Every once in a while I hear about a new reality program and think, "Surely, this is the bottom of the barrel." I am always wrong. I would be this time too, I assume, so I'm not going to say it.

Ben told me about this new show on CBS called Kid Nation. (Apparently it's been all over the news lately, but I've completely missed out on it.)

The premise is simple: 40 kids, aged 8-15, are left to fend for themselves in a "New Mexico ghost town" for a month and a half. You know, so they can "creat[e] and [sustain] a (sic) 'idealized' society free from interference by meddling adults. Show creator Tom Forman said the goal is for 'kids to succeed where adults have failed.'" (I'm curious what Mr. Forman means by "success" and "failure," but I would be shocked if those terms were ever defined in even the vaguest sense.)

Are these people even remotely capable of anything resembling a thought? The 'noble savage' is not a new idea, but these children are hardly 'pure' - the real experiment would be to take them from their parents as infants - before they absorb any cultural programming - drop them in the Amazon with a box of Pampers and a paring knife, and see what happens.

Somehow, this experiment "went wrong" - several kids (allegedly) "accidentally" drank bleach (though not enough to kill them - I'll take "Carefully Placed Household Cleaners and Camera Crews" for $10 million, Alex), a girl was badly burned (allegedly), -- gosh, who could have foreseen such a thing!?

The waiver that parents had to sign is available for your perusal. I suppose one could make all manner of assumptions about the type of parent who would sign such a thing. Who leaves their kid in the care of a corporation, and agrees to "[waive] the network’s liability for emotional distress, HIV, pregnancy and death, among others" - all in exchange for $5,000 (the up-front compensation for participants)? Should such a person be considered responsible? With parents like that, who needs pedophiles? If these are the value systems those parents intend to pass on to their children, maybe the kids would be better off as part of an innovative solution to a potato famine.

Ever been dumped?

Friend and classmate Jessica pointed out this BBC realitye programme where 11 strangers have to spend 21 days living in a landfill. They have to build shelter, figure out how to stay clean and where to poop, and maybe find some salvageable scrap to sell so they can get some "luxuries" for themselves. Fortunately, they don't have to acquire their food from the landfill - for the first week, the show's producers provided them with 424 pounds (the money kind, not the weight kind) worth of food - the amount the average Brit throws away in a year.

I wonder how long it'll take for an American network to replicate this show. And I wonder how many people you could feed for a week on the amount of food an average American throws away each year. Probably more than 11.

Okay, okay - you don't have to shoot me now

Whew - I found a backup copy of my browser bookmarks. So that's nice.

Just fucking shoot me now

As a very disorganized person, I thought it would be nice to try out the Sunbird calendar application from Mozilla. I can't say for sure if that was my mistake, or if it was trying to access the increasingly shitty U of M wireless network, but I found myself with a fucked up network adapter, so I decided to reboot my laptop. When I tried to restart Firefox, I had the joy of finding that it had been reset to 0. All of my bookmarks are gone. Every fucking one. Backup? Well, I thought Firefox kept a backup copy, but either I'm wrong, or it was also erased. I imagine there's some chance a backup is stashed somewhere, but I'm not optimistic.

Seen on a bus this a.m.

This morning I saw this image on the side of a city bus. I giggled because I saw it as a figurative representation of one method to prevent fetal alcohol syndrome: don't get pregnant. Then I realized they didn't intend it that way. Oops!

*I didn't have time time snap a photo, but pulled the imaged from the Minnesota Organization on Fetal Alcohol Syndrome web site.

If it wasn't for red tape, we'd have no tape at all

The wireless signal in our new (and awsom!!!11) studio is pretty weak, and cuts out occasionally. I sent an email to the department head to see if it would be possible for the IT folks to add an access point so that we'd have a better signal. Here is the response he received:

I'm afraid I can't offer an immediate fix. The university's NTS department runs the networks (wired and wireless). They are proposing a campus-wide upgrade for the wireless network on campus which they hope to get approval from the regents in October for the necessary funding. Until then, I don't think that they will be willing to add any additional wireless access points. I'll check, though.

Why am I not surprised?

Irrelevant and obfuscatory

If I ever write a text book, I'm going to try really hard to make it actually useful. And provide relevant content. And make sure it's clear - or at least reasonably so.

Within the first 3 days of classes, I've been frustrated by both of my textbooks.

In one of them, the author(s) is/are discussing the difference between deductive and inductive reasoning. Deductive reasoning, we're told, is informally called "top-down" - it starts at the higher level of theory and works down to details and observations. Induction, in contrast, works from specific observations up to general theories. For this reason, it is sometimes called a "bottom-up" approach to research. Then we get this little gem, inserted parenthetically:

(Please note that it's bottom up and not bottoms up, which is the kind of thing the bartender says to customers when he's trying to close for the night!)

Yes, they include an exclamation point, presumably to emphasize the importance of this clarification between the two phrases. And thank goodness for that, because if I'm in a discussion with someone and they mention inductive reasoning, I don't want to embarrass myself by looking around for a glass or bottle to drain before grabbing my coat, slapping a fiver on the counter, and dashing out the door! Not only was the information irrelevant, but it completely derailed my train of thought. Now every time I see an opening parenthesis, I don't know if I should be paying attention or not.

In my GIS textbook, the first sentence of the first chapter is:

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) are also commonly known as Geographical Information Systems outside North America.

I had to read it four times to figure out what they hell they were telling me. I wrote technical documentation for 5 years, and I'm pretty sure that sentence would never have made it past my reviewers (and they weren't writers).

Obviously, expertise in a field of study does not translate into an ability to communicate one's expertise. Sadly, it seems that most textbooks are chosen by others who, while experts in that field, frequently share that lack of understanding good communication. I guess it's the college textbook version of the circle of life.

Undergrads are so annoying?

I'm sitting at a table in the union, blah blah words. There's this kid behind me (not sure what he looks like) but he's talking like this? With every sentence ending like a question? And I don't really know the context of the conversation? but he's saying things like, "You know, I don't really um want to close any doors, you know?, I really want to keep my options open, like?" and "Yeah, like, that's the only way I'd go to grad school is, like, if it was abroad, cuz I spent 12 weeks in France, you know, something something?" 50% of the vocalizations in that conversation are superfluous.

He's talking to someone who apparently represents some group? and she's saying, "So um we've been around for like 17 years (almost longer than either of them has been alive)?" Oh, I think it must be the Peace Corps or some similar organization?

New poll question

New question is up! Inspired by Mary & Shari, with help from Family Guy on the execution.

Poll results

Results of the most recent poll:

Q: The most exciting thing(s) about Fall semester is:
A:
....Learning new stuff! 4/6 (67%)
....Seeing classmates! 2/6 (33%)
....Commuting! 1/6 (17%)
....Living away from home! 0/6 (0%)
....The excessive workload! 3/6 (50%)
....Borrowing thousands of dollars! 5/6 (83%)
....Fast food and sodie pop! 5/6 (83%)
....Did I mention the commuting!? 1/6 (17%)

....Total! 21/6 (350%)

New poll up as soon as I think of a question.

Does art matter?

Yes, according to this article that I found via Arts & Letters Daily. The gist of the story is that the current obsession with standardized test scores, and the tendency to teach with a focus on improving those scores, has undermined the perceived value of the less quantifiable skills students learn through art (and music):

As schools increasingly shape their classes to produce high test scores, many life skills not measured by tests just don't get taught.

[...]

While students in art classes learn techniques specific to art, such as how to draw, how to mix paint, or how to center a pot, they're also taught a remarkable array of mental habits not emphasized elsewhere in school.

Such skills include visual-spatial abilities, reflection, self-criticism, and the willingness to experiment and learn from mistakes. All are important to numerous careers, but are widely ignored by today's standardized tests.

Day 1

So far, this first day is going okay. I haven't been to a class yet - my first one starts at 12:45, but after that I'm in class almost straight through till 9:45. Picked up my buss pass, a notebook, and now I've got a couple hours to kill. If you have any innovative ideas for how to kill time, please let me know. Strangulation and stabbing are fine, but they get old after a while.

Who talks like that? [Clarification]

Am I the only person who thinks it's ridiculous when a character in a book or movie or tv show says, "Blah de blah, [name]. Blah de blah." Nobody talks like that in real life. Nobody says something, then says the name of the person they're talking to, then says the thing again. I've never heard that in real life, reader. I've never heard that in real life.

**Clarification**
Ben suggested I post an example to explicate what I mean here. The best example I have is from Futurama, where they've just watched an episode of All My Circuits. (I can't remember the dialogue exactly, but I'll paraphrase as accurately as I can.)

Amy (crying): Will Calculon's evil twin ever come out of his coma?
Hermes: I don't know, Amy. I just don't know.

Hermes's line is an example of what I'm talking about. Another might be, after a trip to the grocery, "I'll bring in the milk, Jane. I'll bring in the milk."

Anti-gay Republican something something

Seriously? Another one? (Adult language warning). Vocally anti-gay Republican senator Larry Craig of Idaho was arrested in the Minneapolis airport back in June for - you guessed it - soliciting sex in the men's room.

** UPDATE **
I'm bringing this one back to the top of the queue after reading a couple of great posts that need to be shared.

Buy stuff. DO IT!

"Product placement" - a nice little euphemism for "advertising disguised as something else" - has gotten so pervasive, and it's really starting to annoy me. I suppose it's inevitable in a society of the money, by the money, and for the money, but at what point do people say "ENOUGH!"? (I am intrigued by Adbusters, but what impact have they had?) I doubt I can just stop buying everything that annoys me with its marketing. (Although A-1 steak sauce is off the list, and I won't really miss it. I actually don't even like the idea of subjecting you, dear reader, to that ad, but I must share the annoyance!)

I've bitched about this before - ads in menus, 3 minutes of ads ahead of the trailers at a movie, name dropping on TV programs (e.g., T-Mobile (regularly) and Home Depot (recently) on The Closer - otherwise one of the best shows that's ever been on TV), designed into clothes, ads being transmitted into our dreams - oh, wait - that one's not real...yet.

I'm surfing the internets and the TV is tuned to the Science Channel. And there's this show about building stuff - they're talking about roller coasters tonight. The show starts out with the host doing a voice over about how after he graduated from college, he wanted to "learn the stuff you don't find in books" or some such. During this voice over, wherein he uses words that connote rugged masculinity, they show him walking across a desert landscape backed by towering mountains, toward his black Toyota Tundra. Then he takes off, leaving a trail of dust, and the camera zooms in on the Toyota emblem on the grille.

Ben pointed out: Hey, at least Toyota's sponsoring a program about science/engineering, rather than some "reality" tripe. Which is a valid point, yes. But why can't they say "This program is sponsored in part by Toyota blah blah blah"? Why the conceit of an ad, with all its psychological bs? (Is it ironic that Toyota is also listed as a sponsor for The Closer?)

Oh, then, just to piss me off a little bit more, he comes to Minnesota, to look at some bigass roller coaster at Valley Fair... IN A SNOWSTORM. WTF?!? COME ON!

I can do science me!

The Science Channel is looking for people to be on TV. They want "regular people" who know science and can explain it and make it fun. Reality TV strikes again!

Better living through chemistry

I just saw this ad for Requip, which is supposed to relieve restless leg syndrome. I've experienced RLS, but not a severe case - a bit of walking keeps it under control. I'd hate to be one of the poor bastards who has to resort to this crap, after hearing that list of side effects.

Here's a hilarious spoof (adult language).

The law of averages

I just got back from the grocery store & noticed this on the bottom of the paper bag:


So if I put 34 items in one bag, and 2 in another, and then give the customer one empty bag, that still counts, right?

Books I've read

Latest poll results:

Q: Hey, I read that book!
A: True: 6/7 (85%)
...False: 1/7 (15%)
Total: 7/7 (100%)

Don't fail to miss the new poll!

Date night = marketer's dream

I mentioned that we saw Stardust over the weekend (by the way - if you are thinking about seeing it, do!). I forgot to say that we arrived about one minute after showtime, during an ad for Dell computers. Then we sat through three more ads, including one for Verizon and a REALLY annoying one for gum. Why are ticket prices still so high (6$ for a matinee) if I'm having to watch all these ads too? It makes me think of this scene from Futurama. Fry doesn't mention "menus" though. "Dinner and a movie" is apparently the perfect time to try selling people stuff.

Operation Impending Doom III

I have about a week before classes start. I'm not looking forward to it. Don't have much else to say about it.... just not excited about going back.

Stardust

This weekend, Ben & I went to see Stardust, the movie based on a Neil Gaiman novel. As Ben said, it was the best film we've seen in quite a while. Good story, well-acted, no dull patches. Robert De Niro & Michelle Pfeiffer played great supporting roles.

Today I was looking at the reviews on Rotten Tomatoes, and came across a really bizarre comment by Jules Brenner at Cinema Signals. He said, "They might have saved something for a sequel but the sorcery of the enterprise is the three-ring fun of the showy inventions and Pfeiffer's merry milking of the villainy cow." WTF!? A sequel? Why are people so obsessed with sequels? Why can't the movie stand on its own?

Girl fashion

One of the writers over at Slate took her 11-year-old daughter shopping for clothes for the new school year. Read the hilarity! It reminds me of this scene from Family Guy (a bit risqué - turn speakers down if you're at work).

Choice quotes:
It's a comfort to know that if your child can't come up with her own insolent remarks, clothing manufacturers are there to help.

Down the corridor was Abercrombie itself, whose guiding fashion principle seemed to be to print or appliqué the word Abercrombie in the largest letters possible on as much of the clothing as possible.

On our way to our next destination, I tried to avert her eyes from the Victoria's Secret window, where their clothing was emblazoned with the words "University of Pink." (I don't want to know that school's most popular major.)

If I have to choose between Baby Phat and Juicy Couture, I choose mandatory school uniforms.

But when I tried to push some [Old Navy t-shirts] on my daughter, she shook her head. "How can they make a plain T-shirt look bad?"

(At Talbot's (WASP couture), looking for pants): My daughter shook her head. "They're like nautical pants. They're so ugly." Then I held up a pair of beige polyester pants that looked reasonable to me. "Mom, I'm 11!" she said. "I'm not Harriet Miers!"

Time, apparently, is relative

In today's mail we received this item from a local furniture store. It's a standard flyer of the sort businesses mail out to solicit business. But this one has a curious instruction printed at along the top of the envelope.



It's a good thing it got here today! But if it hadn't, no biggie. Y'know - within a day or so is fine.

Well I didn't know that

According to Robert Bowie Johnson, Jr., "If you know a bit about language, you know it's the consonants that matter, not the vowels."

Really? I had no idea. Tell me more! Let me guess: It's the nouns that matter, not the verbs. Et cetera. What about math? "If you know a bit about arithmetic, you know it's the numbers that matter, not the operations you perform on them." Or geography: "If you know a bit about geography, you know it's the states that matter, not the lakes." Ooh, or politics: "If you know a bit about politics, you know it's the executive branch that matters, not the legislative or judicial branches."

Mr. Johnson is a creationist who insists that Greek art proves the veracity of Biblical stories. He also rails against "name-calling" by those who accept the scientific validity of evolutionary theory. He dubs them "Slime-Snake-Monkey-People" and "mutant randomites."