Tek Support

Don't you hate when you call tech support, spend a half hour on the phone checking every possible problem, then realize that the router doesn't work because you forgot to plug the network cable in?

I do.

In related news, I'd like to welcome Zack back to Atlanta; and remind him that I had sexual relations with his mother. Let Zack know if you happen to see him.

Short Post, More to Follow

Avacados are awesome, but not unripened avacados.

Join us....

I've recently been exploring the cult of Pastafarianism. The cult was began by Bobby Henderson, a concerned citizen, as a response to the Kansas School Board's decision to advocate teaching Intelligent Design along with the theory of evolution. For those who haven't been following the debate, a quick definition from wikipedia.org:

Intelligent Design was born out of opposition to the theory of evolution. Its putative main purpose is to investigate whether or not the empirical evidence necessarily implies that life on Earth must have been designed by an intelligent agent or agents. For example, William Dembski, one of ID's leading proponents, has stated that the "fundamental claim" of ID is that "there are natural systems that cannot be adequately explained in terms of undirected natural forces and that exhibit features which in any other circumstance we would attribute to intelligence."

It seems to me that ID is an ok idea to teach in Sunday School, but unrealistic to teach in actual science classes. Intelligent Design's main flaw is in its lack of detail. The theory merely states that some higher power created the universe and all life in it, without explaining what the power was or why there are so many mistakes inherent in nature and living things (humans' knees are very inefficient, breaking relatively often, whales and many other swimming mammals have unnecessary additions to their bone structures, like hips, the earth's climate is unstable, causing an ice age every few thousand years). Bobby Henderson provides a much more entertaining criticism of Intelligent Design here.

If Intelligent Design must be taught in schools, lets at least make the "intelligent designer" interesting. Hence Pastafarianism, the belief that the universe was created by the Flying Spaghetti Monster, and all evidence pointing towards evolution (dinosaur bones, extinct species, observable evolution in virii and other little bugs) were intentionally planted by Him.



In other news, I've been trying out Google's new instant messaging service. It's pretty awesome, like most google stuff. If you haven't gotten an invitation in your email from me, you can follow this link to download it.

Correction

My brother may actually be turning 19. I'm not too sure about the whole age issue.

If I ever get around to publishing a list of stuff I'm no good at, remembering dates and names would be at the top.


PS - It's not that I'm bad at much, but I'm pretty awesome at everything except the few things I'm no good at. Therefore, a list is necessary so people don't observe my amazing skillz and get depressed.

Ding!

Two friends of mine have dinged or will be dinging soon. Anna reached level 60 in World of Warcraft, and my brother's turning 20 on Wednesday!



Note for the non-geeks in the crowd: The word "ding" is another word for level up. A player in the popular online game World of Warcraft may announce a level up in chat by saying "I dinged!", or "Ding!". The phrase comes from the sound played when a character levels up, a ding.

Drrrrrrrrrunk...

Shit, my second post involving booze. Note to self: booze = poisonous brain candy. So, a quick discussion of why people drink, perhaps types of drinker.

Second note: I just realized that I will not be writing that thing about types of drinker.

So. I personally enjoy drinking because it gives me a bit of a vacation from the ol' brain pan. Not that I always need a vacation, but I tend to worry about certain things, like talking to people, the impression I give - all that confidence bullshit. It's not that drinking changes my personality, just that it keeps my mind too confused to worry about what I'm doing, I'm generally just watching what I do, and laughing about it half-a-second later.

Now, a certain short friend of mine, Stu, tends to spin the emotional wheel when he drinks. If he's lucky, he'll get jolly and enjoy himself. However, he generally hits the bankrupt triangle of the emotional wheel, gets a bit depressed, clams up, and ends up regretting things in the morning.

I don't know why he drinks. It might make more sense when I'm sober.

That's it for my little discussion, I don't really have the experience to catalogue other types, but if you pour some whiskey down my throat, there's a good chance I'll talk your head off with crazy socio-alcoholic theories.

Weird Science

Oooghh... Woke up with hair like a mad scientist, and it feels like something is clawing the back of my throat. A question for my faithful readers: Is it wrong to alleviate boredom by posting personal ads online saying you're looking for a toaster? Shit, all I want is some nicely browned toast, is that too much to ask for in a woman?

In other news, I'm supposed to be writing an adventure for a big game I have coming up. The system is Unknown Armies, and I'm going to be setting it in a yuppie enclave type apartment complex. Some themes I'm thinking of messing with: isolation even while living in an apartment building with 50 other people, false sense of security, emptiness of the daily grind, and scary shit that wants to kill you. Even though I've thought about the game a lot, I'm probably not going to write an adventure, just let the game kind of flow, with the players determining the progression of the adventure, like a "choose your own adventure" movie on acid.

Oh yeah, I've been reading this comic called Y: The Last Man. The premise is that some kind of plague kills every male on earth (including animals) except this kid called Yorrick and a mischievous helper monkey. It's pretty awesome.

A few final notes: I was riding the train north on Monday, watching a con artist run a shell game. The guy playing the shell game kept guessing correctly, which was really pissing the con artist off. So when the train reached Lennox station, and the player got the correct shell for the third time, the con artist made a quick business decision and stabbed the guy, took his money, and ran. In conclusion: Don't Play Shell Games.

Call Me Geek

I was looking through the newspaper a few days ago, and I saw an article about open casting calls for The WB's "Beauty and the Geek". I don't really watch TV anymore, ever since I realized I spent more time avoiding commercials than I did enjoying quality television, so I had never heard of this show. The premise is that a beautiful extrovert is paired with a brainy introvert. The beauty then teaches the geek social skills, the geek teaches the beauty to be smart. The pair compete in a contest against other teams at the end of the show, and the winning team recieves a few hundred thousand dollars.

The show seemed simple, and I assumed that the casting call would be just as simple to "win". And it was, at least the first two calls. Now, for the third casting call, I have to submit a video of my daily life, something that showcases my geekiness. More on that in The Future.

The main problem with the casting call was my interviewer, a stereotypical southern Californian. He was probably about thirty, but wore the "antique" t-shirt and distressed jeans of a man in his early 20's, combined with a fake tan, whitened teeth, and bleached hair. I know I'm being a bit overcritical of this guy, but if you had wasted an hour of your life with him, you'd be just as angry. Remember my earlier description of his physical features? His personality was just as fake. He asked questions without comprehending the answers, and had a baby's understanding of irony and sarcasm. This interview gives a good example of the process.

To conclude: talking to people from California - avoid it.

Boxen

My mother works as an interior designer for a large multinational firm. She spends a few hours each week looking at color and carpet samples, and each of these samples is encased in a clever little box or tube, created to draw the designer's attention to that company's product. My mother's gotten in the habit of bringing an especially interesting case home every week or two, and giving it to my brother or I to store stuff in.

I'll take a second to discuss my brother, then we'll go back to the subject of my first paragraph.

My brother is 18 years old, 3 years younger than me. He has one of those late summer birthdays, which probably caused trouble for him when he was younger, because all of the freinds he might want to invite to a party were away on vacation. He's charismatic and personable, but he has a pretty crippling social anxiety. His social anxiety creates an interesting paradox - he is perfectly suited for being what con movies call a "face man", talking to people and convincing groups to do what he wants. However, because he must be forced to talk to people, I am usually put in the "face man" position. More about my brother: tall, handsome, good smile, almost never cuts his hair or washes his clothes, great in a crisis, good swimming instructor, stubborn, staying out of college for a semester, didn't go to class his second semester of college, works out all the time, alternates between never cleaning and almost phanatical "everything in its place" type neatness.

So, given this information, which only relates to the first paragraph in its last 13 words, lets try to tie this post together, maybe come up with a theme. We shall discuss fancy containers.

The latest object my mother brought home was a long plastic tube. It has a plastic cap at both ends, and could probably be used for keeping scrolls of paper dry. I'm looking at it now, and debating giving it to my brother, who would probably find something cool to do with it, or at least use it to store some the crap flooding his room. However, just a few minutes before I began this post I started messing with the tube, opening one end then trying to force the top down, compressing the air in the tube. My experiment worked, and the bottom cap flew off as I pressed the top one down.

This tube is too cool for my brother. I'm keeping it.

L5P

I spent most of my day in Little Five Points, and enjoyed it tremendously. A few pictures:


^Little Five Points, front of Junkman's Daughter, a store selling random goods, the definition of "an eclectic selection"

^Little Five Points, this street forms one of the five points mentioned in this neighborhood's name



^Little Five Points, parking lot across the street from my dentist, behind Junkman's Daughter

Visiting the Dentist

Fuck. Tragedy has struck, and robbed me of my meager linguistic skills. Earlier today, I learned that I had three cavities. I was understandably shocked to learn that I was imperfect, and spent the rest of the day sleeping in a hammock under the trees of some park near Little Five Points. Too sleepy to form coherent sentences, may post more details later.