Snozberry
because blogging ain't such a bad idea
Flying out of Austin this morning, the TSA decided to exercise its pathetic powers to steal a little cup of yogurt and a cup of fruit from me. Prior to the screening, I decided that there wouldn't be any trouble with a little breakfast making it through a screening at 6:45 in the morning. So I did the upright thing and put the little fruit and yogurt in the tray with my laptop (the alternate plan would have been to conceal it inside my bag and take the good gample that operator overload/fatigue/inexperience would allow it through unmolested).
After passing through the x-ray, the operator called over a second screener and whispered in low tones that the food looked clean, but were both probably larger than 3 ounces. The screener then approached me an informed me that he was going to let my little fruit cup through (only 3.4 oz), but had to confiscate my yogurt (a whopping 4 oz). I protested a little and was closing up my bag in haste (yes, I was pissed) and the screener said "Wait a second" and then snatched (yes, literally SNATCHED!) the fruit out of my bag citing that it was above the 3 ounce minimum. I asked him why he was now taking the fruit, after telling me that it was okay and he said "I was going to be nice and let it through, but you annoyed me and technically it's too big" or something similar.
Anyhow, now I'm sitting here without any breakfast. Poopers.
The TSA stole my breakfast and absolutely no good came out of it. The passengers of flight 1786 are no safer, a perfectly good yogurt and fruit cup have been thrown away, I made some TSA lackey's day marginally worse, and I have no breakfast.
Why the fuck do we have to abide by stupid rules and regulations that have no bearing on security. Why have we trained our TSA agents to look for harmless shampoo, mouthwash, toenail clippers, and pen knives? Humans can realistically only look for several items at once... shouldn't we be training them to look for real weapons, like guns and knives? Or maybe we go one step further and train them to look for anything unusual, whatever that may be?
Either way, the TSA is nothing more than a stupid organization of ineffectiveness, contributing nothing of value to our nation (but managing to cost us a great deal). It seems like they were created for the sole purpose of instilling fear in a populace that appears to have lost the ability to think for itself.
Back when I was at RAND I had the privilege of hearing Donald Shoup talk about parking. It was a truly fascinating talk about a seemingly minor thing -- free parking. At first somewhat surprising, logically considering the ramifications of free parking reveals massive environmental costs, increased traffic congestion, and wasted time.
Recently, the Montreal Apple store made a move to promote free parking downtown. This is a preposterous position to take given Apple's stated environmental goals and a consideration of Dr. Shoup's research.
Check out articles on the subject in the SFGate, NYTimes, and Slate, or take a look right in the horse's mouth.
A unified theory of learning and expertise in humans. Professor Klatzky had an interesting critique of my paper, suggesting that Simon was trying to figure out how the stimulation of chunks directly affects a response. No decision-making process acting on a perceptual representation, nada - the stimulation results in a response. I don't know whether I'm buying, but it's not something I'd interpreted. There seem to be so many parallels in all of my psych readings, I'm very tempted to say that the brain learns in one way. That would mean that many of the disciplinary boundaries, sensory/modality distinctions, et cetera are just academic overhead and basically contrived. I fully realize that the senses have different neurological pathways and structures, but I'd be willing to put some money that the core functionality of perception is the same across sensory modalities.
A wish to be out of the city for a bit, where it's more quiet. The street noise and incessant high-pitched squeak (for months I've been listening to that damn sound!) in our apartment is really quite loud. I wear earplugs some days to stay sane; this is something I've never done before. Regarding the squeaky noise, I'd just like to say that people should take more personal responsibility and show respect for their neighbors and surrounding environment. The restaurant Little Nippers 2, adjacent to my apartment at 216 North Craig Street, has a refrigeration unit that squeaks very loudly (a passing bus or helicopter will not completely obscure it). While I've put up with it for the past four months, it's really fucking annoying. So, a couple weeks ago I called the restaurant to see if they were aware of the fact that their unit was causing others discomfort. On that call, I was told that the restaurant was only renting the space and that the landlord was responsible for the unit. I didn't mind being bounced over to the landlord; I called and left a detailed message. Nothing happened. So, today, I called again. This time I spoke with two courteous-challenged employees at Little Nippers 2. The second person I spoke with kindly informed me that the unit had been making the horrible squeaking noise for a couple of years and that the unit actually worked fine (I mean, the walk-in is cold, right?) and I should pay for it to be serviced! Realizing that I wasn't getting anywhere quickly, I hung up. Then, a surprise. Someone with an ounce more tact called (I think it was the manager, who I was told earlier arrives at 1700) and asked for my information. This person is supposedly going to relay my message to the owner, who will contact me to see what can be done about the problem. I'm not holding my breath, but I already have the number for Allegheny Refrigeration handy and know that they charge ($65/hour plus parts with a $28 travel fee). I'm somewhat amazed (really? no, but it's a good rhetorical tool) that no one over there noticed that for less than $100 they could fix their noisy unit, be better citizens, and improve the quality of the space around their store. Will they do it? I'm guessing not, but at least I'm trying. That's good, too, since the favored backup plan is to drop a large rock from our roof (10 stories) on that damn unit.
Tired. Slept in the yesterday after a long Monday night (everything is always due on Tuesday!) and fucked up my "up at 0800" schedule. Well, I arose just after 0800 this morning after going to bed all entirely too late and today I'm pooped! I need to lift at the gym tomorrow.
Why the hell does our land management company (i.e. landlord) need two god-damn checks - one for the parking and one for the rent? They even went so far as to send us hatemail telling us that this is our "second warning" to send two checks. First of all, I don't recall any first warning. Second of all, money is money. In the comment section I put a memo with our apartment number, parking space number, and the month the rent's for. Fucking lazy assholes with a broken accounting system, if you ask me. Oh, and they flat out lied about the availability of packages when we were showed the apartment; you can't get them "anytime", you can get them from 4-6pm weekdays -- if you're lucky. Sometimes no one is even in the office!
School's winding down, leaving more time for my dynamic decision-making work with Coty and Brring.
Jenny just returned after a night away on a work retreat. I'm looking forward to hearing the new master plan she's cooked up for saving the Pittsburgh Public School system.
(click for eBay auction)
I really need to sell this thing, so I'm going to post it here. I have a fast 64-bit computer in an very nice case that would look great on a desk, under your TV, or next to a stereo. The machine has only been turned on for only a matter of hours. The hard drive is brand new and was installed recently (6/4). I am taking a big loss on a brand new computer!
Check the gallery for more pictures or head on over to the eBay auction!
The system comes as pictured and consists of:
| Processor: | AMD Athlon 64 2800+ - $130 |
| Memory: | 512MB of DDR PC-2700 - $45 |
| Hard drive: | Fujitsu 80GB 7200RPM IDE - $60 |
| DVD drive: | Lite-On DVD DVD+RW Drive (SOHW-812S) - $35 |
| Video: | eVGA nVIDIA GeForce FX5200 Video Card, 128MB DDR, 64-bit, DVI/TV-Out, 8X AGP - $55 |
| Motherboard: | MSI "K8T NEO-FSR" with K8T800 Chipset for AMD Socket 754 CPU - $65 |
| Infrared: | Internal Tira USB IR
Transmitter/Receiver - $45 IR Blaster - $15 |
| Case: | Silverstone SST-LC04 Lascala Series HTPC Case - $170 |
| Extras: | PCI riser card, extra IDE cable, Nexus Real Silent Case Fan - $70 |
Reviewing the blog, I've noticed the hint of a commercial flavor settling in (illustrated by subsequent posts about searching for a job and selling my computer case). Although this reflects my current state of being, it does little to satiate you, the reader, on your quest for reading relatively trivial anecdotes on my blog. So, without further adieu, I present you with my decision to begin the routine use of the serial comma.
If you're not aware of the serial comma, it is the comma that is used prior to the last 'and' in a sentence's list. An example of its use would be: "Before I can successfully move up to Boston I need to find a job, find an apartment, and sell my mahogany computer case" (Oh, the irony of that example). The last comma in that sentence is called the "serial comma," because it is used to delimit elements in a series. Before a turn of events last night, I only used the comma when I thought it would clarify the sentence (which, in retrospect, doesn't really do much to encourage consistency, which is known for helping breed mutual understanding).
While driving home with Tim, Jenny, Chris & Sophie last night, the topic of the serial comma arose. The other Chris commented how the lack of serial comma use was one of his large grammatical pet peeves. I explained my position, but quickly realized the inconsistency of my method upon saying it aloud (this was also immediately brought to my attention by others in the car). Being a rational man who generally favors order over disorder, I pledged to change my usage of the mark. And so ends the story of how Chris #1 started the regular use of the serial comma.
The Vast Left Wing Conspiracy; a well done comic.
(click for larger image)
I recently had a post where Frank Rich used "the world's dirtiest joke" as jumping off place to talk about censorship in the media. Curious, I blithely assumed that I wasn't going to be able to find the joke (Rich noted that it was censored right out of Comedy Central's video of "The New York Friars Club Roast of Hugh Hefner") and therefore didn't even bother to go looking. That was a mistake.
Talking over some good Chinese food with Edmund, Sophie and Chris, Edmund raised the subject of The Aristocrats joke. He hadn't seen the Frank Rich op-ed, but he had seen a Southpark cover of the joke online. My interest was piqued. Searching around this afternoon, I was able to first find a Mikarrhea post that had a copy of the Southpark version of The Aristocrats. Watch it; I think it's quite funny. NOTE: On second thought, only watch this if you're willing to hear some very disturbing imagery. This joke is not for everyone and you will very likely be offended. One of the reasons the joke is funny is that it exceeds all boundaries of propriety.
This whetted my appetite - and my continued searching turned me upon a film by Paul Provenza and Penn Jillette (Penn being the big talking half of the Penn & Teller magic act). Not to be confused with the 1999 film Aristocrats (notice the missing article), The Aristocrats is a 2005 movie that was recently shown at the Sundance Film Festival. The fim received rave reviews and, according to this Washington Post article, not only includes Gilbert Gottfried's performance from the Friars roast of Hugh Hefner, but will also likely be shown in theaters and released on DVD - with the DVD to include several hours of edited-out footage. Awesome-o! Now all we have to do is sit around for its release.
Here's an good article that describes how even 'educated' professionals can't write for shit. I'm glad that I don't personally know anyone who writes like this, but DAMN! I've gotten my share of ellipse-laden emails... if you know what I mean... heh, yeah... - but not capitalizing words, not making even a meager to spell words correctly and not even forming sentences is too much!
Read on for coverage from the front line of our nation's slip into junk status.
Ed Black of the Computer and Communications Industry Association takes $9.75m of Microsoft's hush money.
Here's a good story about some shady doin's in Chicago. No time to comment, but this is a racket.
I never thought I'd find myself reading and agreeing with a fashion article, but times they are a changin'. This NYTimes article discusses the difficulty of designing and engineering shirt collars that are supposed to be worn without a tie. You see, collars have evolved to showcase the tie, so taking away the tie has caused some serious problems with the appearance of a collar after being worn for a couple of hours.
The problem is namely the crumpling and "falling down" of the collar. In my experience, it's a flimsy placket that causes the appearance of the collar to flag the most. Some of my shirts have wimpy plackets which wind up amost folding flat into an 'S' curve. This realy looks pretty crappy, as what you want is the collar to stand up a bit and create an airy sort of look - off your neck and chest.
The articles suggests a few obscenely expensive shirts that aren't as suceptible to the problem, but I suspect that the odds of me purchasing any of them anytime soon are close to zero.
From an email making its rounds:
The European Union Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the European Union rather than German, which was the other possibility.
As part of the negotiations, the EU council conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a 5-year phase-in plan that would become known as "Euro-English."
In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c." ....... Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy. The hard "c" will be dropped in favour of "k." ..... This should klear up konfusion, and keyboards kan have one less letter.
There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f." This will make words like "fotograf" 20% shorter.
In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters.... which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horibl mes of the silent "e" in the languag is disgrasful and it should go away.
By the 4th yer peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with "z" and "w" with "v". During ze fifz yer, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and after ziz fifz yer, ve vil hav a reil sensibl riten styl.
Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evri vun vil find it ezi tu understand ech oza. Ze drem of a united urop vil finali kum tru. Zen ve vil rul ze vorld !!!
Chris (the other one) found this link to the video of Jon Stewart's Crossfire appearance and sent it out. I was out of town and don't watch Crossfire anyway, so I'm glad I could see it here. All I have to say is "damn." Stewart went on the show to have a serious discussion and was met with anger and disrespect, primarily from Tucker Carlson. Stewart's primary point, that Crossfire isn't real debate but rather theatrical, partisan bickering, really rang true for me. It's petty, shallow, rapid-fire approach to discussion is the primary reason I don't bother watching it.
It was pretty funny when Carlson accused Stewart of not being funny (a particularly weak ad-hominem that ignored Stewart's critique of the show) and Stewart responded by saying "I'm not going to be your monkey." Oh, and I thought Stewart was definitely being pretty funny - just at the expense of Crossfire & company.
Jon Stewart's Brutal Exchange with CNN Host (1,565,075 views)
Jon Stewart Spins His Crossfire Appearance (411,222 views)
Here's some New York Times anlaysis of the incident that gets better toward the end.
Sasha Baron Cohen of Ali G fame was recently interviewed by Robert Siegel on NPR. Diggity check - Respek.
On behalf of thousands of people, I would like to make a REQUEST for a phone that has:
In other words, just a phone that does the job of being a phone well. It seems everyone except those selling wireless equipment just want a basic phone that works well and talks with other devices.
A little old, but holy cow! For those who aren't going to read the article, a woman beat her boyfriend to death with her iPod after he erased about 2,000 songs from it. She had had illegally downloaded the tunes over the course of about 3 months and deleting them was too much to bear!
Here's a little piece about an urban planner. I haven't read her book (but may buy & read it), but I have to say it looks like I agree with her synopsis of the state of Western society.
As seen at M@Blog is this fabulous mastercard spoof. This is a local copy, so if you going to share it with friends, please give them this URL.
I think I'll stop after this one (okay, I'm getting them from my brother and he hasn't sent any more), but yet some more unbelievable animal observation. This young lady managed to inhale a condom during oral sex and not figure it out until four months later when doctors believed she had TB. I can understand the doctors not thinking to look in there first, but how could you possibly a) manage to inhale a condom whilst giving head and b) NOT NOTICE!?!
The wonderful world of animal observation yields this little gem: The first case of homosexual necrophilia in the mallard Anas platyrhynchos. I'll wait while you go read the little blurb.
Okay, HOLY SHIT! That is rather disturbing stuff. 75 minutes is a long time! That puny little mallard brain must have just been saying to itself "I'm winning, I'm winning!" and kept raping away. Man.
One of the teams Sundays has a healthy rivalry with is called Free Range. They're originally a bunch of friends from the D.C. Free Range Graphics firm, but I think most of the team members have since moved on. On a tangent, it's funny that I wound up here in D.C. playing Free Range because back in college I somehow learned about the Free Range Graphics house enough to recognize their logo when we played them for the first time. Anyhow, FRG seems to do work for socially liberal causes, such as Amnesty International. Along these lines, there's a well done political awareness Flash presentation about corporate farming (hog farming, in particular) called The Meatrix. Go watch it.
Just a quickie, because I'm at work, but this is a fantasitic story about a guy in gold and blue over in London: Angle-Grinder Man.
It looks as if this judge had enogh sleep to make light of a tedious motion by Hyperphrase to exclude some documents submitted a little late by Microsoft in a patent battle. See this kind soul's PDF of the motion.
I was cleaning out my inbox and happed upon an email to myself. It's for a site devoted to finding out how much is inside. It's a highly amusing way to fritter away some of your precious life.
In other news, I've been looking at grad programs and not turning up a whole lot. Time to go play some ultimate and clear my mind.
Talk like a pirate day is nary a furlong off. If ye haven't brushed up on your pirate prose, now be thy chance. The translator is pretty weak, y'aaar, but it'll get ye started. Arrr!
I was reading the discussion about model planes flying across the Atlantic when I stumbled upon this link to
paper balloons that the Japanese used during WWII to send us incindiary devices. The article is well written, somewhat funny and damn interesting! I recommend your check it out.
I was poking around this Plastic thread when I came across a link to fuckedworld.com. Who can turn down a URL promising Martha Stewart's erotic side? I read the whole page, but the top bit is definitely the funniest.
Having a taste of some wry humor, I clicked on over to Alan Greenspan's secret diary! Like Martha, it gets kinda old in the middle (he goes to Afghanistan to hunt down bin Laden) - but there are a few gems in there. For example, the first line; " OK, now I'm confused. I thought when I cut rates, the stock market was supposed go UP!" and the entry dated 12/23/2002. Enjoy.
