6 - 2002 | ***Dave Does the Blog

Wednesday …

… is Hump Day. (1) What’s the theme song of your life? Explain & include lyrics. Hmmm. Some sort of an echo in here … I chose “Moviola” (by John…

… is Hump Day.

(1) What’s the theme song of your life? Explain & include lyrics.

Hmmm. Some sort of an echo in here …

I chose “Moviola” (by John Barry) for a couple of reasons. It’s lush and lyric, swelling to almost the melodramatic while not quite reaching that over-the-top point. And we used it as the concluding music in our wedding video.

No lyrics. I think I’ve used up all the words I need to.

(2) When you were a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up & why?

Hmmm. Some sort of an echo in here …

(3) What do you think was the turning point in your life?

The turning point? Yeesh. I can think of several that would have led me to very different places than I am today.

I’d have to say, off the top of my head, my divorce from Cheryl. While it wasn’t entirely my idea, it represented a major break from the direction my life had been going since high school — or, arguably, even before that. It was the most sudden, wrenching departure from my expectations of where my life was going that I have experienced (or hope to).

(4) Do you think life is run by destiny or by your own will? Explain.

I believe that we all have a course in our life that is known in advance by the Deity (and therefore, given the Deity’s omniscience and omnipotence, dictated thereby). I believe we all have free will to choose that course, and are held responsible for it. I believe that the inherent contradiction in those two beliefs constitutes a Mystery, possibly due to a lack of perspective, but certainly not within our current abilities to understand.

If that strikes some as a cop-out, so be it. Too much scratching at the underlying metaphysics of the universe tends to lead to a lot of those sorts of apparent blind alleys.

Knobs & Sticks

We watched Bedknobs & Broomsticks last night. With all due respect to my wife’s cherished childhood memories … … boy, was that a bad movie. While based on a book…

We watched Bedknobs & Broomsticks last night. With all due respect to my wife’s cherished childhood memories …

… boy, was that a bad movie.

While based on a book by a different writer, this 1971 Disney production tries to remake the 1964 Mary Poppins (both films share the same director, songwriting team, and adapters from the original books). A magical woman, unloved kids, a ne’er-do-well semi-romantic interest, a father figure who learns an important lesson about love (played in both films by David Tomlinson), a big dance number of street people, an extended animation/live-action sequence in the middle, all the elements are there, bigger and bolder than before.

But while Julie Andrews’ Mary is calm and wise (while still fun-loving), Angela Lansbury’s Eglantine Price is an absent-minded bumbler, an apprentice witch who, having done her duty, dismisses any thought of further magic with the same silly aplomb that Samantha Stevens did. The dance numbers are bigger, the animation more outrageous, the magical stuff more finely crafted, but any sense of heart, let alone plot, gets lost in the mish-mash. Songs and musical numbers (“Greatest Dance Hits of the British Empire!”) seem to flow out the need to insert them hither and thither, rather than being driven by the story.

Oh, and Nazis. We get to fight mildly menacing Nazis.

The only bright spot is that I can only think of the unholy furor that would happen today amongst some more conservative religious groups if Disney created a movie about an apprentice witch who takes in some homeless children …

Kids will probably enjoy this movie. Adults remembering their childhood viewing of it might, too. I … uh, didn’t. Though Margie seemed to like it, and since I got it as a gift to her, that makes me happy.

The most disturbing thing I saw all day

While at the eyeglasses shop at the Southwest Kaiser Clinic, buying a new set of glasses: A little stuffed doll on a shelf whose shoulders and head had been replaced…

While at the eyeglasses shop at the Southwest Kaiser Clinic, buying a new set of glasses: A little stuffed doll on a shelf whose shoulders and head had been replaced by a GIANT EYEBALL. With lashes.

Eep!

“Everybody repeat the Non-Conformists Oath!”

STEVE MARTIN: Let’s repeat the Non-Conformist Oath. I promise to be different. AUDIENCE: I promise to be different. STEVE MARTIN: I promise to be unique. AUDIENCE: I promise to be…

STEVE MARTIN: Let’s repeat the Non-Conformist Oath. I promise to be different.

AUDIENCE: I promise to be different.
STEVE MARTIN: I promise to be unique.
AUDIENCE: I promise to be unique.
STEVE MARTIN: I promise not to repeat things other people say.
AUDIENCE: I promise … [Dissolves into nervous laughter.]

We all think of ourselves as unique. So why, sometimes, for no apparent reason, do we each come up with the same answer?

When is a minority not a minority?

USS Clueless discusses how population shifts are rendering politically correct terminology factually incorrect….

USS Clueless discusses how population shifts are rendering politically correct terminology factually incorrect.

And now for today’s satire …

Humming is theft, record bosses claim. “For years people have gone about humming their favourite songs whenever it took their fancy. Normally this would be a source of pleasure. But…

Humming is theft, record bosses claim.

“For years people have gone about humming their favourite songs whenever it took their fancy. Normally this would be a source of pleasure. But this pleasure came at the expense of lots of hard work from the musicians who are clearly not getting any compensation for this,” screamed an indignant Rilary Hosen of the Recording Industry Association of America.

To further prove that the RIAA’s motivation is not selfish, she flourished statistics which prove that artists only get about 2.3 per cent of all money that their work generates. “So they really need every penny they can get,” sniffled Ms. Hosen through a cascade of tears.

(Via BoingBoing)

Just when you thought it was safe to get back on airplanes again …

It’s been a while since we’ve heard goofy stories about airport security. They’re still going on, though. Meet Lt. Greg Miller, US Army, special forces medic. Lt. Miller was shot…

It’s been a while since we’ve heard goofy stories about airport security. They’re still going on, though.

Meet Lt. Greg Miller, US Army, special forces medic.

Lt. Miller was shot in the jaw in Kandahar, Afghanistan. His jaw was wired shut. He was put on leave and returned to the States.

Because he could potentially strangle if he become airsick, the military doctors gave him a small set of wire clippers, with rounded blades under an inch long, so that he could unwire his jaw in an emergency so that he wouldn’t die, choked on his own vomit.

Flying from his home in Texas to visit his mother in San Francisco, the airport security folks, reasonably, allowed him to board with the wire clippers. They even put a security clearance sticker on them.

Flying back from San Francisco, the airport security folks would not let him board with the wire clippers. The security sticker made no difference. The airline refused to get involved (and then bleated after the fact that he didn’t have a note from his doctor).

Consistent standards? Reasonable judgment? Sheer sanity?

Oh, yeah. I feel much safer.

(Via Jimformation)

I’m getting unhealthy just thinking about it

Deep-fried batter-dipped Twinkies. The fried Twinkie’s origins, however, are fittingly humble. Shortly after opening his shop some 14 months ago, Sell and his cohorts did what any red-blooded Brit would…

Deep-fried batter-dipped Twinkies.

The fried Twinkie’s origins, however, are fittingly humble. Shortly after opening his shop some 14 months ago, Sell and his cohorts did what any red-blooded Brit would do with an industrial deep fryer: They began frying everything they could get their hands on. And then ate it.

It’s just wrong.

(Via NextDraft)

Maybe they’ve finally figured it out

The proposed plan by the US Conference of Catholic Bishops looks like it might actually reasonably address the problem of abusive priests and the hierarchy that enables them. The plans…

The proposed plan by the US Conference of Catholic Bishops looks like it might actually reasonably address the problem of abusive priests and the hierarchy that enables them.

The plans seem to involve much more lay influence, much more public openness of the process, and much less tolerance of sexual abuse by priests.

The main problem is, the policies (to be debated and voted upon at the next bishops meeting in Dallas, next month) must be agreed-upon and enforced by the Vatican, since it is to the Pope that the individual bishops (hence their dioceses) answer.

Various officials in the Vatican has expressed a lot of resistance to things like automatically reporting allegations to the civil authorities. And the current slow, bureaucratic process in the Vatican to laicize (defrock) priests has also hampered efforts to get past abusers out of the clergy.

Instead, various conservatives in the Vatican Curia (the bureaucracy that runs things for the Pope) have lashed out at the American media for their reporting on the whole affair. Scholarly papers have been published in the Vatican media about how bishops are not responsible for what their priests do (tell that to dissident priests), and editorials have been written about how the US has a “morbid and scandalistic curiosity” about the matter.

But amidst defense of the priesthood by claiming that fewer priests molest than laity, or that more women molest than is commonly reported, is the same myopia that for so long blinded the US bishops (and, in some cases, still does).

The American public — including the Catholic laity — is not condemning the priesthood as a whole. It’s certainly disgusted and furious over the abuse that has occured. But what really has it in a froth is the systematic hiding of priestly abuse, the slaps on the wrist and quiet shuffling of abusers to different parishes or even dioceses, the covert payoffs, the system that let abusers get away with it, and get away with it over and over and over.

That is what has people so angry. And that is what has interest high enough that camera crews were camped out at the Vatican when the American cardinals were there.

That’s not morbidity. That’s anger, and an anger that’s waiting to pounce if the Church doesn’t clean up its act.

The US bishops — many of them, at least — seem to be coming to that realization.

The Curia does not. Instead, like some scamster caught by Morley Safer and the 60 Minutes camera crew, they’re shouting, “Get that out of my face!” and “You’ll have to leave, this is private property!”

They know not what they do.

Tuesday. Things. Any questions?

Time for the Tuesday Things: 1. What song would you say is your “theme song”? “Moviola” by John Barry. 2. What song do you want people to play whenever you…

Time for the Tuesday Things:

1. What song would you say is your “theme song”?

“Moviola” by John Barry.

2. What song do you want people to play whenever you walk into a room (like a wrestler)?

Hmmm. I was thinking more of like royalty …

The temptation is to answer “The Imperial March” (Darth Vader’s Theme). I’ll go for the obscure answer and choose the “Space Fleet” theme from “Silent Running” (truncated version available here)

3. If you could tour with any band still active today, what band would that be?

Barenaked Ladies. Looks like fun.

4. Do you play an instrument? If you don’t (or, even if you do) what instruments do you wish you could play?

I used to be able to play the viola, but never kept it up (laziness). I wish I could play the piano, or the guitar. It would be useful as an entertainment skill.

5. Ever dance with the devil by the pale moonlight?

Nope. And I try to avoid rubbing another man’s rhubarb, too.

A friend in need

Vote for JillMatrix as Queen of the Blogwhores. And vote for Sekimori as Sexiest Female Blogger. That is all….

Vote for JillMatrix as Queen of the Blogwhores.

And vote for Sekimori as Sexiest Female Blogger.

That is all.

A blogger survey

I look on my Blog as a number of things: A way of communicating to my friends and family how things are in my life. A way of communicating to…

I look on my Blog as a number of things:

A way of communicating to my friends and family how things are in my life.
A way of communicating to the world stuff I find interesting or meaningful (in good or bad ways).
An historic document about who I am, right now, and what I believe, and what’s going on. One of these days the hardcopy of these pages (heh) will (I hope) be interesting reading for Katherine, or her kids, or their kids.

To that end, I do a lot of these little daily Q&As. It beats nattering on and on about the Middle East or the RC Church Scandal.

So, Doyce found this rather lengthy one on Blogger Pride:

Ethics/Personal Life

Has a blog post ever got you into trouble? Not per se. I do try to remain conscious of who is (or may be) reading this. Sometimes Margie has gotten annoyed (justifiably) when I’ve blogged important stuff going on in my life before I’ve told her about it.

How many people do you know face-to-face who read your weblog? I would guess 7-10.

Have you met any of your regional (or even remote) bloggers? I’ve not had face time with anyone I “met” through blogging.

Do you modify or delete posts? How often? Why? I have never gone back and deleted a post. I have sometimes started a post, left it, come back to it, and not posted it because I didn’t feel the need to. I lot of what I post I post because it rings an emotional chord in me, and those sorts of things are fleeting. I do modify posts occasionally, but only to add an update or correct a spelling error.

How much is your weblog a part of your personal identity? Do you feel like people who don’t know about your blog don’t really know you? Interesting question. I think it’s an additional channel of information, not essential but important (it damned well better be, for all the time I put into it). Because I know that my friends and some family read it, I do let it relieve me of the need to update them on all the trivia in my world.

I do let people who I want to know about me know about my blog. It’s certainly their prerogative.

How has blogging changed your life?

UPDATE: (Not sure how I missed answering this question when I first posted, but …)

Well, it certainly takes up a lot of time.

It’s helped me keep in better touch with my parents, rather than a weekly phone call (since we all know how I love talking on the phone), as well as some other distant friends.

My blogging is somewhat interactive. I read a lot more news on-line now than I used to, and consider myself better informed about a number of current events.

I have the mixed advantage of having extra conversational bits (from the stuff I read), but often not having anything new to share (with folks who read my blog).

It has, nonetheless, given me a chance to chronicle some things in my life that would otherwise, even after several months, be lost to the vagueries of my gestaltic memory.

Technical/Design

Do you know how to code at all? Did you learn how to code by blogging? I’d done some “raw” HTML work in the past, as well as using FrontPage, so it wasn’t a complete black box to me. I’ve learned quite a bit more by working on my page (including CSS), so I’d rate myself as 4th or 5th level web page coder, from a D&D perspective — competent enough to get myself into trouble.

What weblogging tool do you use and why? Movable Type. I originally started with Blogger, but the number of folks bailing from that platform (due to its reliability issues) makes me glad I changed to something I can host and tweak myself. MT is very easy to maintain, the developers are very supportive, and there’s a growing community to provide assistance and ideas for its use.

MT does the job, and more.

Does the design seem like something that is just something that has to be dispensed with in order to be able to write publicly, or is your design an integral part of your writing and presentation? I like form. But the function of this site is largely divorced from it. This page could be in 14 pt. green Courier text on black, no logos, buttons, graphics, boxes or anything, and I like to think that 90% of the purpose here would be fulfilled. But I don’t think anyone would want to read it, because it would be ugly.

I’m not quite the design monkey that some bloggers are. Part of it is skill set, part of it is laziness, part of it is time. But I like to think that I provide at least some design goodness here, and tweak things frequently enough to keep folks visually interested.

How many times have you changed your weblog design entirely (or nearly so)?

1. Original Blogger “Partridge Family” design.
2. Green, green, green
3. Disneyworld colors.
4. Disneyworld Two
5. Banana Cream
6. Sibyl
7. Venus in Blue

I think that more or less covers it.

Readership/Motivation

How many people would you guess (educated guess based on hit counts/logfiles) read your weblog on a weekly basis at least? According to Extreme Tracking, I get around 800 unique visitors per week. I’m guessing that’s probably 200 people (figuring some folks are weekly, most folks are every few days, some people are more frequent).

What have you done to get more people to look at your site? Who? Moi? Stats Whore? Perish the thought.

Ahem.

I do belong to a number of blog rings, including the inimitable Blog Snob. I do a ping to weblogs.com and to movabletype.org when I update (and I get quite a number of hits from those sites). I include my blog URL in comments. That’s about it.

What one or two characteristics make a blog really popular? Are there things that you could do to have more people read your weblog that you conciously do not do? Why? I think it’s a lot like real life. You can be popular by hanging out and chatting up popular people. Being part of the In crowd. I could do that. But I don’t do it in real life, so I don’t do it in my virtual life, either.

What really popular weblog do you think most deserves it…and/or least deserves it? I don’t hang out at popular weblogs I don’t like, so I really couldn’t say. The ones I think deserve it are listed in the Link List o’ Deservedness to the left. The ones there that are really popular are probably InstaPundit and BoingBoing. (I don’t think any of the “person” blogs I go to are A-list super-popular types. I don’t read folks’ hit logs. And most folks I know don’t talk about their stats — hmmmm, that’s interesting, since it’s something that I post about.)

How do you feel about your readership? What makes for a quality readership to you? The only way I know about my readership is (a) if they post comments (and I have some fine readers, based on that), or (b) if they blog about me or include me in their link lists (ditto). I do get a frisson of pleasure when I see that someone thinks enough of this blog to actually create a link to it.

Influence of Other Bloggers

What other blogger is most responsible for you starting your own weblog. Doyce. It’s all his fault. Blame him.

Who was the first other blogger (that you know of) who put you on thier sidebar, and how did you feel? How did it influence your blogging? Actually, that would have been Doyce, too. He even pointed it out en blog and encouraged folks to visit. Very nice of him. Made me feel like folks could find me, and that what I was doing was worthwhile.

What other blogger do you most admire for her writing skills? James Lileks. He doesn’t write snippy little blog entries. He writes articles. Essays. Great stuff.

What other blogger do you most admire for her design skills? Gotta be Stacy. She does this stuff professionally. Woo-hoo. Lileks does a good job, too, as does Senshineko (now that he’s on MT).

Who is a blogger that you think is really good but doesn’t get nearly the attention they are worthy of? {Blush}

No, but seriously, Doyce deserves many more hits than he gets, especially when he’s able to devote himself to the blog thing more than he’s been able to the past few. Actually, by and large, anyone on the Link List o’ Worthies to the left deserves plenty of hits. That’s why they’re there.

Do you feel obligated to have people on your link lists/sidebars that you never read? That way madness lies. I try not to make it a popularity contest, and there are a number of folks who link to me to whom I do not (have not ever or no longer) link to. That’s because my link list is not actually a recommendation to cool sites, my statement above notwithstanding. It’s a convenient place for me to click to go to the places I read.

Of course, it’s all a matter of taste — there are authors that are generally considered to be most excellent whom I do not read for a wide variety of reasons. One of the signs of maturity, I believe, is recognizing the difference between personal aesthetics and morality, and the same is true for the difference between personal aesthetics and global value. Just because I don’t read something doesn’t mean you shouldn’t, or even that I think you shouldn’t. It means that I don’t think I should (or that I don’t care to), and that’s all.

And part of the equation for me is minutes per day divided by things I have to do. I could easily have some hundreds of sites there. I don’t have time to visit them all, so I have to make some hard decisions.

If I run across a site I like, I put it in a favorites folder. Once every month or so, I revisit all of them. If I still like it (i.e., if I found something I enjoyed reading or found interesting and which makes me want to come back), then I put it in the link list. At the same time, if I’m finding my attention waning on any pages I’m visiting, I lower them in category, or drop them off altogether (though I keep a record of all the sites that have been there).

What one or two characteristics define a really quality blog (in your humble opinion, of course)? (1) Frequency of posting. I tend to visit the blogs on my list at least weekly, and (toward the top of the list) daily. If the content isn’t changing in that interval, my interest in returning will wane. (2) Content. Tell me what you think. Interest me with your words. If you just put links, even if they are to the world’s most interesting places, I won’t be interested in your page. (3) A sense of humor. (4) A decent, readable, functional design. (5) Not answering with five points when only one or two are asked for.

Let ’em eat neutrons!

No wonder the weather is a bit cooler today. It must be a cold day somewhere when I find myself agreeing with Wayne Allard (one of our Republican Senators) and…

No wonder the weather is a bit cooler today. It must be a cold day somewhere when I find myself agreeing with Wayne Allard (one of our Republican Senators) and against Tom Strickland on a policy issue.

In question is the US Dept. of Energy plans to use Yucca Mountain, Nevada, as a permanent nuclear waste repository.

I will confess that I don’t relish the thought of trucks of nuclear waste rolling along I-70, even if the canisters are designed to take anything up to and including being broadsided by a freight train.

But, damn, folks, there isn’t a lot of choice in the matter. A quarter-century ago, when I was debating energy policy in high school, it was already blindingly obvious that leaving nuclear waste in rotting barrels in temporary cooling ponds around the nation was bad public policy. It’s unsafe, both from an environmental and from a security standpoint.

Problem is, the whole issue has been framed as one giant, national NIMBY game. Those that don’t have waste in their states don’t want it to pass through (let alone be stored there). Those who have it, are crying in the wilderness that something has to be done before the inevitable disaster.

For Strickland to take this tack in against his Senate race rival is particularly irresponsible, given that Colorado is on the sending end when it comes to getting plutonium shipped from Rocky Flats (right next to Strickland’s congressional district) to Savannah River in South Carolina.

Pretending it can just all stay where it is and that, somehow, the magical nuclear fairy will solve the problem is the height of irresponsibility.

There will be accidents (or deliberate sabotage), sooner or later. Better we take some reasonable action now, than do a lot of hand-wringing later.

Book ’em

A federal appeals court has thrown out the Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA), which would have mandated that libraries use Internet filter software or lose their federal funding. I’m certainly…

A federal appeals court has thrown out the Children’s Internet Protection Act (CIPA), which would have mandated that libraries use Internet filter software or lose their federal funding.

I’m certainly a believer in making it difficult for kids to get hold of porn (anyone who thinks it can be made impossible is living in cloud-cuckoo land).

But these sorts of laws are not the way to do it, as long as the principle expounded by the US Supreme Court holds true — you can’t restrict access to adults to the same level you restrict it to kids, just because you don’t want kids to see something.

Until filtering software gets a hell of a lot better, and personal identification on-line becomes a hell of a lot more definitive (and no bets as to which, if either, will happen first), these sorts of schemes will continue to (and should be) struck down.

(Via Anadandy)

Global warming? Just crank up the a/c

The Bush Administration has published a report acknowledging climate changes and global warming, but not recommending any policy changes. Um, yeah. Right. The document was issued by the EPA as…

The Bush Administration has published a report acknowledging climate changes and global warming, but not recommending any policy changes.

Um, yeah. Right.

The document was issued by the EPA as part of climate talked sponsored by the UN. No publicity was issued regarding it, but the press has picked up on it anyway.

The report predicts that over this century the United States will lose coastal wetlands to rising sea levels and experience more heat waves. Water supplies are forecast to shrink due to less snowpack, and some Rocky Mountain meadows will disappear.
Other possibilities include:
– Average temperatures in the contiguous United States rising between 5 and 9 degrees Fahrenheit during this century.
– Forest regions in the Southeastern United States that see “major species shifts” or major changes in growth patterns.
– Drought conditions and changing snowfall patterns in the West, Pacific Northwest and Alaska.
– Average sea levels rising 19 inches. “With higher sea level, coastal regions could be subject to increased wind and flood damage, even if tropical storms do not change in intensity,” the report says.

While the report doesn’t suggest any governmental policy changes, it does state that humans can adapt to global warming without much problem.

Humans can more easily adapt to warming, for example by changing how, what and where they farm and even by how they deal with heat waves, the report adds. “Health impacts” of the latter, it says, “can be ameliorated through such measures as the increased availability of air conditioning.”

The report goes on to suggest that living in crime-infested neighborhoods can be dealt with by simply placing armor plate over the windows …

No, it didn’t, but that’s kind of the same thing. The Bush Administration says it has a policy, basically relying on voluntary reductions and crossing of one’s technological fingers that CO2 emissions can be reduced without actually having to do anything to do so.

While I agree to some extent with the Bush position that environmental policy must be “economically sustainable,” it’s not clear that the world or the nation’s industries would collapse would end of CAFE standards were increased across the board, if retrofitting of emissions controls on older power plants were mandated (or more strongly incented), or if the Administration took a leadership role in trying to address the problem.

How Jedi am I?

How Jedi are You? (Via TranceGemini)…

How Jedi are You?

(Via TranceGemini)

Temple of Gloom

Coincident today to finding the site of the guy who designed all the Indiana Jones posters, James Lileks articulates why Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom was a bad…

Coincident today to finding the site of the guy who designed all the Indiana Jones posters, James Lileks articulates why Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom was a bad movie.

I remember how I felt after I saw this the first time. I felt almost soiled. It wasn’t the quantity of violence, but the nature of it – at some point you stop fearing for Indy and start fearing for Spielberg, because something must have gone wrong in his head when he put this one together.

Amen. The first one was great, the third one was almost-as, but the second one is only on my self because wanted the full set, and need to remind myself now and again how bad (opening scene aside) it is.

It’s still Monday …

… so it’s the most appropriate day for the Monday Mission. (The author of the Monday Mission asks, if you borrow the questions from this page, you include a link…

… so it’s the most appropriate day for the Monday Mission.

(The author of the Monday Mission asks, if you borrow the questions from this page, you include a link back to the original. Seems reasonable.)

1. Who or where do you go to when you need help for web-related problems?

Depends on the nature of the problem. Assuming we’re talking about “web page coding” (which is the only web-related problem I have not caused by flaky connectivity), I’ll usually hit various web pages via Google. I have a whole slew of links in my favorites, but unless I know specifically what I’m looking for, it’s often faster just to search. If that fails, I’ll usually hit Doyce up first, since he’s a much more nuts-n-bolts webby guy than I am. After that, if it’s keeping me off my blog, I’ll hit the MT site; otherwise, I’ll blog a question about it.

2. There is a big mess of gossip going on in Blogland due to revelations about a very popular Blogger. I got very caught up in reading all the links to links about it until I stopped myself realizing it was none of my buisiness. Do you ever get caught up in gossip, either speading it or listening to it? How does it make you feel? Or have you ever been the subject of gossip?

I’ve had a modest interest in Who and What and Why on this, but not enough to dig or ask questions. I probably gossip more than I should, but I try to keep it within bounds — nothing malicious (nothing that will lower the opinion the person I’m telling has of the person I’m telling about), nothing that’s likely (let alone intended) to get back to the subject, etc.

When it comes to bitter, nasty gossip, I usually listen with morbid fascination for a minute or two, then try to duck out of the conversation, or shift it around. That sort of stuff stains pretty badly.

3. In a relationship, when your other takes a dig at you (read: a fight), do you go for the jugular and get “in their face” or try to peacefully smooth things out and have a calm discussion?

I used to be a serious push-over, taking the blame for any dispute or argument or bad situation that I was accused of. I’ve tried to break that habit, but I tend now to oscillate wildly between accepting all blame and accepting no blame, neither of which is a good attitude to have. But while I try not to take the blame for something that I don’t feel I’ve done, I usually am looking for a way to smooth things out (if not over), since I abhor confrontation.

4. A friend once told me “You can tell when someone is bored with what you are saying to them when they reply with ‘That’s interesting.'” And I have found this to be pretty dang true. How do you know when someone has lost interest in what you are saying?

Hmmm. That’s interesting.

I usually discover it when someone starts to move the conversation into something else, often a personal anecdote, sometimes right in the middle of what I’m saying.

Since I sometimes do the same thing, I try not to take it too personally, unless it’s something I feel really strongly about.

5. Ever get jealous of the popularity other Blogs?

On the one hand, of course not. It’s all virtual attention, and I know that I will never have a hit list as long as a lot of the folks I read, so there’s no point in being jealous of them, any more than there’s a point of being jealous of Robert Heinlein or Abraham Lincoln.

Oh the other hand, I crave attention, so, yeah, sometime, a bit.

6. What is your favorite dirty word? (those who don’t curse can pick your favorite happy word)

Margie has gotten me into the habit of saying “frell.” That probably qualifies as my favorite dirty word, though there are plenty of others I use more frequently, especially when I’m reacting more emotionally than intellectually.

7. (the continuing story…) OK, we are definitely doing that again. But seeing as it is nearly 6am now, how about breakfast? Anywhere you’d like to go or should we fix our own? What do you like? Or is there something else we need to do first?

Buckwheat pancakes? I love pancakes. Or waffles. Let me get some batter whipped up. Real maple syrup in the pantry, real butter atop the fridge. French toast, instead, if you want something fancier. Mmmmmmm.

BONUS: What have I done to deserve this?

Reply Hazy. Try Again Later.

Fun and Games

If this were satire, it would be considered horribly racist, anti-Islam, and probably a hate crime. Instead, since it’s real, it passes with nary a murmur. A British company is…

If this were satire, it would be considered horribly racist, anti-Islam, and probably a hate crime. Instead, since it’s real, it passes with nary a murmur. A British company is publishing a CD-ROM game for kids called “Islamic Fun!”, where players in one game get to join “The Resistance!”

You are a farmer in South Lebanon who has joined the Islamic Resistance to defend your land and family from the invading zionists.

Said game involves answering multiple choice questions (“What was the crime of the Jews of Khayber?”) in order to get ammunition to shoot Israeli tanks that trundle across the screen.

Abbas Panjwani, the director of the company Innovative Minds, which produces Islamic Fun! said: “The game does not target any human beings including soldiers, it targets Israeli tanks. From that point of view it’s no different from any other war game. It does not target any religious or racial group including the Jewish community. In fact its educational content teaches children the difference between Judaism and Zionism.”

The game is designed for three age ranges of children, starting at 5.

(Via InstaPundit, who notes, If it were made up as a parody by Americans it would be called a viciously bigoted slur on a religion of peace.)

The VCR Apocalypse

Some excerpts from the 1982 congressional testimony of Jack Valenti, MPAA President, on the evils of the VCR: But now we are facing a very new and a very troubling…

Some excerpts from the 1982 congressional testimony of Jack Valenti, MPAA President, on the evils of the VCR:

But now we are facing a very new and a very troubling assault on our fiscal security, on our very economic life and we are facing it from a thing called the video cassette recorder and its necessary companion called the blank tape. And it is like a great tidal wave just off the shore. This video cassette recorder and the blank tape threaten profoundly the life-sustaining protection, I guess you would call it, on which copyright owners depend, on which film people depend, on which television people depend and it is called copyright.

Of course it turned out to be no such a threat. Indeed, the studios make huge amounts of money from videotapes, TV companies track “time shifting” of their shows on video, and copyright holders monitor the (small but real) bootleg industry of material out of print in order to determine what the public might like to see.

Because unless the Congress recognizes the rights of creative property owners as owners of private property, that this property that we exhibit in theaters, once it leaves the post-theatrical markets, it is going to be so eroded in value by the use of these unlicensed machines, that the whole valuable asset is going to be blighted. In the opinion of many of the people in this room and outside of this room, blighted, beyond all recognition. It is a piece of sardonic irony that this asset, which unlike steel or silicon chips or motor cars or electronics of all kinds — a piece of sardonic irony that while the Japanese are unable to duplicate the American films by a flank assault, they can destroy it by this video cassette recorder.

Valenti repeatedly brings up the specter of the Yellow Peril during his testimony, painting the issue as one of patriotic Americans (exemplified by Clint Eastwood, the one star he keeps naming over and over) vs. those sinister (yet uncreative) Japanese types. The testimony was in regards to a court decision against Sony, of course.

Now, I don’t have to tell anybody in politics — I have spent most of my adult life in politics and you learn one thing. Nothing of value is free. It is very easy, Mr. Chairman, to convince people that it is in their best interest to give away somebody else’s property for nothing, but even the most guileless among us know that this is a cave of illusion where commonsense is lured and then quietly strangled. That is what it is all about.

Well, I guess this puts this free blog (as well as most of the Internet) into its place. “Free” = “worthless.” Huh.

Now, the question comes, well, all right, what is wrong with the VCR. One of the Japanese lobbyists, Mr. Ferris, has said that the VCR — well, if I am saying something wrong, forgive me. I don’t know. He certainly is not MGM’s lobbyist. That is for sure. He has said that the VCR is the greatest friend that the American film producer ever had.

I say to you that the VCR is to the American film producer and the American public as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone.

Which is why, of course, we need Clint Eastwood to protect the helpless-woman-who-is-the-American-public-and-Hollywood from the sinister Japanese rapist-murderer.

But, and here is an explosive political fact, Mr. Chairman, two-thirds of U.S. households will not own VCR’s, Mr. Chairman. One-third of VCR households will not be on cable or won’t have access to cable. Now, if there is a scarcity of film and television entertainment, it won’t be the well-groomed and the well-heeled that will suffer. It is going to be, as always it is, Mr. Chairman, the less-affluent, the disadvantaged people pressed against the wall, out of work, who can’t afford these expensive machines, and free television to the sick and the old and the poor will remain the primary source of home entertainment.

See? It isn’t about the profits of the fabulously wealthy film and music industries. Jack’s just interested in the poor, working slob who couldn’t afford cable or a VCR.

Now, when a producer takes in less from these other markets, he is going to invest less. When your profit potential shrinks, you pull back. You produce less and you stay as long as you can in markets where you think you can make some money without having a VCR lay waste to your profit.

The loser will be your public because they don’t have these expensive machines. And that is what I am saying, sir. The public is the loser when creative property is taken and here is the reason why. The investment of hundreds of millions of dollars each year to produce quality programs to theaters and television will surely decline.

Right. We’ve seen investments in movies and TV drop precipitously since 1982, right?

Now, read those bits again, and read the testimony in full. Now read the things that Mr Valenti and the movie/music industries are saying about digital rights management and the Evils of the Internet (the Home of Hackers and Terrorist and Godless, Un-American Pirates).

Like all good Hollywood types, Mr Valenti knows when it’s cost-effective to recycle a script.

(Via BoingBoing)