HALLOWEEN IDEA

ok.. I have a really sick and evil idea for next halloween.. to make up for the fact I did next to no decorating for this year. I want to make a scary section of my yard...block it off with temporary fencing... so kids have a choice of seeing it or not, I don't want to terrorize really little kids.

Then do something like find a way to make it look like I am roasting a trick or treater... you know... stump with imbeded axe.. and a bit of red paint splashed arround...then turn arround another corner.. and you are faced with a fire and kid on a spit.... not a real one obviously.. make a core of something non flamable put it in flame proof kiddie PJs.. little sneakers..mask...maybe roast some meat in the fire to give it that cooking smell....

I would have to start days early... building the blinds and the maze in...should attract lots of attention.. and draw in buckets of kids.

Good idea? Bad idea? let me know.

Phone Interviews

Does anybody like them? I personally rather dislike talking to strangers on the telephone, probably because I can't tell if they are getting my sarcasm or not, and unlike on text based communications they don't expect some level of misunderstanding or a need for clarification. Not that one should be sarcastic in a phone interview anyhow. That would be a serious case of personality leakage, which is usually bad in an interview, but that is a whole different topic.

I understand why phone interviews are cool to interviewers after all they can interview dozens of people in a single afternoon for the cost of a dozen phone calls. This is very unlike real interviews, where you may be expected to pay for people to travel to interview, and you get stuck spending half a day with someone you knew after 10 minutes didn't have the stuff for the job you wanted. But to the interviewee they are torture. You can't tell if the person on the other end is busily surfing the web and ignoring everything you have to say, or if they are really interested. You can't tell if you just glazed them over with some bit of technical info, which really did answer their question, but not in the way they wanted it answered. So much of making a good impression relies on good communication, which is nearly impossible over the phone with a stranger. I find phone interviews to be a subtle form of torture, not that I ever turn them down, and I do try to make a good impression but it is so darned hard. I suppose everyone suffers the same though.

Weird but true. It appears that Wil Wheaton manages his own website. Here it is. Currently it is slashdotted...so I would wait a day or three.

Ok..here we go.. I want to know if anyone else sees the irony in this.

Fact 1: I am a notary public for the state of Iowa. I did it because I got tired of people whining they didn't know where to get stuff notarized and it only cost me $30.
Fact 2: Right after I became a notary public one of my co-workers who works in HR here, became one..because she thought it was so cool that I was one.
Fact 3: Right now, you do not need a stamp or seal or any other cool stuff to notarize something in Iowa, this is changing in January.

My co-worker has the little embosser seal with her commission number and the works on it right? Well after she gets that and is all set up.. she sends out an e-mail to the all@ lists for both Iowa sites telling everyone she is a Notary Public, and how most places charge $20 to notarize something. But since we are all co-workers she only charges $10 for us.

I laughed when I saw this. I told a few choice people (the office gossip mongers) that I too am a Notary Public and I notarize for free. When people aren't beating down her door to get things notarized (I think in the year I have been a Notary Public I have notarized like 6 things.) she sends out an e-mail reminding people that she notarizes for $10. The next week two people come down to my cube and I notarize stuff for them. A few weeks after that she tells me she will notarize stuff for me for $5 because we are friends. (Still trying to pay off her fancy embosser I guess.)

Well here a week or three ago.. comes the other office Notary Public in to my closet, where she says "I have some stuff I need you to notarize, living will, that sort of thing." I responded "OK... whenever." Flash a few days forward, Here comes my co-worker with her stuff. I read and notarize it, she is irritated that it is taking so long (because I am actually reading what she has me signing Heaven forbid). I sign the stuff she leaves.

Flash forward to today. It suddenly occurs to me like these things so often do.. she neither paid me nor offered to pay me for my services. A bit hypocritical to not pay, nor even offer to pay for a service you would charge the individual providing the service for no?

What follows is a very long quote, heck actually the whole article from the NY Times. This scares me more than you know.. ever read 1984? There is something wrong with leaving words out of a dictionary just because you don't like them. After all who's to say that it isn't a good word. I don't care for a word therefore you shouldn't use it. While I am sure there is a time and a place for certain words, and places where they don't belong. That decision should be made by the person using the word. Not categorically by a corporation.

This is really just one of my issues with Microsoft. Their grammar checker, seems innocuous enough..but it makes you write in their preferred style or it throws errors all over creation. You can't write fiction and have it turned on... you just can't it throws errors on almost every sentence.

Bowdlerized by Microsoft

October 23, 2001

By MARK GOLDBLATT



I was hard at the grindstone, crusading against hypocrisy
and chaos, armed with my laptop and Microsoft Word 2000.
I'd just typed: "Only a fool would believe." But "fool" did
not seem right. So I hit Shift-F7 to call up the thesaurus.
The lone synonym that Word provided was a verb: trick.

Where were the nouns? Where was idiot? I typed "idiot," hit
Shift-F7, and got the message "not found." Then I tried
goon. Again, not found. No luck with ninny, nincompoop or
numbskull. Or with nitwit, halfwit, dimwit or twit. Or
dullard, dunce or dolt.

"Jerk" called up yank, jolt, tug and twitch. "Dummy"
produced mannequin and copy - still not what I was looking
for.

So I phoned a friend who also uses Word and asked him to
test the phenomenon. He typed "fool," hit Shift-F7 - and
was provided a hearty menu of synonyms that included not
just idiot and ninny, but such exotics as dunderhead and
ignoramus. We realized the difference: He was working with
Word 97, not the Word 2000 I was using.

Concluding that I had found a glitch in the updated version
of Microsoft Word, I decided to inform Microsoft. I called
and asked to speak to Bill Gates, but was directed to a
cheerful person named Tim.

Tim transferred me to Kate, also cheerful, who promised to
look into the matter. Several days later, Kate sent me an
e-mail message with an explanation: "Microsoft's approach
regarding the spell checker dictionary and thesaurus is to
not suggest words that may have offensive uses or provide
offensive definitions for any words. The dictionary and
spell checker is updated with each release of Office to
ensure that the tools reflect current social and cultural
environments."

Was the world's foremost software designer worried about
offending dullards, dunces and dolts? Are there actually
people out there who identify themselves that way? Even if
so, you wouldn't think they'd represent Microsoft's target
demographic. More troubling, if an acute sensitivity to
people's feelings had winnowed down Word 2000's thesaurus
options, what changes loomed in the future? Word 2000
already changes "thier" to "their" as I type. Would the
next generation evaporate "moron" from the screen the
moment it appeared?

But maybe this isn't oversensitivity. Maybe it is what
postmodernists call erasure: since language creates
reality, if we erase every noun connoting below-average
intelligence, the world instantly becomes a smarter place.

Now, if only Microsoft would erase "hypocrisy" and "chaos"
. . . .


Mark Goldblatt, who teaches writing at the Fashion
Institute of Technology, writes frequently about politics.
He is the author of the forthcoming "Africa Speaks," a
novel.

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/10/23/opinion/23GOLD.html?ex=1005112041&ei=1&en=62698c9b5e00d294

I spent the weekend at home doing quiet things. I discovered something. House dogs have the perfect life. I was watching them. I think I can learn a lot from them. After all the most exciting thing that happens to them is they get fed. They live for a few simple joys. Their life is just flitting from one happy thing to another. Oh look! A WALK!!! then a nap... then DINNER! how joyous to get excited over $.60 of brown kibble. I think they are the ultimate argument for simplifying your life.

Just got back from ICON. Had a good time. Spent lots of time with Betsy. Was fun... didn't get back to the office on Monday. Now I need another day and a half off and don't quite know about how to get it. Since I haven't been in the office in quite a while. Hmm...we shall see I guess. I hate listening to radio personalities trying to figure out technology on the air... it is so dumb. Why not run some song or something instead of just puttering along trying to complain about how screwed up things are. I need a good web radio source.

http://www.lindqvist.com/bert.php

Bert and Bin Laden.. a conspiracy...

Boy I have been really negative lately. It isn't as though things are that bad. There are new pictures of my nephew on the web. Icon is this weekend. There is a new Star Trek series. Now if only I could find a great job. In the mean time I suppose I can be happy about little things like when I tripped earlier today I may have skinned my knee..but my pants survived as did all the electrical hardware I was carrying at the time.

Anybody know any good 2nd Ed AD&D modules for 4 characters...about 5th level? Looking for modules specifically because it lets us run over the internet better. Doesn't matter much how well known it is... most of the people aren't too experienced, or have very little module experience anyhow.

Anybody juggle 4 balls? I am working on it and not getting very far... I am missing something simple I am sure.

Manners
Main Entry: man·ner
Pronunciation: 'ma-n&r
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle English manere, from Old French maniere way of acting, from (assumed) Vulgar Latin manuaria, from Latin, feminine of manuarius of the hand, from manus hand -- more at MANUAL
Date: 12th century
1 a : KIND, SORT b : KINDS, SORTS
2 a (1) : a characteristic or customary mode of acting : CUSTOM (2) : a mode of procedure or way of acting : FASHION (3) : method of artistic execution or mode of presentation : STYLE b plural : social conduct or rules of conduct as shown in the prevalent customs c : characteristic or distinctive bearing, air, or deportment d plural (1) : habitual conduct or deportment : BEHAVIOR (2) : good manners e : a distinguished or stylish air


I would like to propose a more functional definition. Manners are the lubricant of social interaction, without manners there is way too much friction for anything useful to get done. I often wonder what has caused such a decline in manners, no longer do people wait for others to finish sentances or thoughts, impolite prying questions are the normal mode of operations. Heck most people cannot even manage a simple conversation without doing something that could be construed as offensive. Where were these people's parents? or their parent's parents in some cases.

Scientists Make Animal Sex Selection Breakthrough

OK.. speaking of Asia, how long until the Chineese are doing this to make sure their allowable births are primarily male?

'Explosive' AIDS Epidemics Hit Asian Sex Workers

Can somebody PLEASE tell me why this is major breaking news? Let's think about this here... AIDS spredding amongst sex workers and drug users? Ok.. sure this is in Asia... are people in Asia somehow biologically different from people in North America or Africa? DUH... you got sex workers not using protection, and drug users with dirty needles. Of course you have an AIDS problem.