Sophistacat

Yo Ho! How the Entertainment Industry Forced Me into a Life of Piracy

2012-01-28T15:35:00.002-05:00

I don’t watch a great deal of television, but I am devoted to the shows I do watch. I read articles on them, watch promos and behind-the-scenes footage, trade trivia with my friends, and generally mine them for every scrap of entertainment value I can get out of them. The problem is that I very rarely get to watch them as they are broadcast due to wrangling Cub and Kitten into bed, a process that eats up damn near all of Prime Time. “Well,” I think, looking at the clock, “they’re finally asleep, but The Mentalist is half-over already. Oh well, I’ll catch it online later.”

A day or three later, I open the laptop and browse over to CBS’s site. Oh look…they have full episodes for almost every show available for viewing online. Notice that I said “almost” every show? Yeah…they only have short clips of The Mentalist. So off I go to the torrent sites or link farms, where dozens of hosts provide the content I want to watch.

Even if the networks are posting episodes, some of them are adding hoops and hurdles to get to them. TNT has this bizarre partnership thing going on where you have to log in with your cable provider information. The problem is that they don’t list my provider, which is the second-largest cable provider in the country. I sent them an e-mail explaining that I am perfectly willing to sit through commercials in an online episode, therefore contributing to their advertising revenue, but no one ever responded. Oh well. Guess I’ll use one of the streaming sites I have bookmarked to watch Leverage without the commercials.

Contrast all of this with ABC, which posts the last five episodes of Grimm on their site. That gives me a month or more to catch up, which I happily do.

Then there are the shows from other countries. Apparently, no one at any cable company, network, or studio has caught on to the fact that the first two Ws in “www” stand for “World-Wide.” For example, a friend just turned me on to the show Lost Girl. The show is about a girl who discovers she is a succubus, and is introduced to the world of the Light and Dark Fae. Very much up my alley. It’s an original series from Canadian cable channel Showcase, but SyFy just started airing it in the US. Here’s the thing, though…why would I wait for SyFy to air the episodes when I know there are almost two complete seasons of the show already out there? I went to Showcase’s site, where they have most of the episodes posted, but I get a notice that I can’t access them since I’m in the US. Hellooooo, torrents. Once SyFy got distribution rights, they could have posted all of the episodes and added in their own commercials, but they aren’t even posting the episodes they’ve already aired.

And then the industry has the balls to complain about lost revenue? Hey, pals, you’re the ones with the outdated distribution method. If given the opportunity, I have no problems watching a show on your site, even with commercials. It allows you to keep your ad revenue (funding the shows I like), and gives you a more accurate count of viewers – rather than relying solely on the steam-powered Nielsen Rating system – which keeps my favorite shows on the air. I’d even pay to access an archive of past episodes if I’m a latecomer to a show that’s been on for multiple seasons, or you can keep licensing those to Netflix and I’ll catch them there. Just please, please realize that once a show has aired, it’s going to be available somewhere online within a couple of hours. You’re not going to be able to get that particular episode of I Dream of Jeannie back into the bottle, so you may as well put it on your site and retain some control. I think most folks are like me, and would watch it there as a way of supporting it. Stop relying on false data to support overreaching bills like SOPA and PIPA and change your business model. Of course, that would also mean you’d have to revamp your accounting system to reflect reality, and…wait…I think we may have found the problem.

As a consumer, here’s what I would go for: keep the current season of your shows available on your site. Either retain the commercials throughout each episode, or have one long one at the beginning as a special sponsorship. Archive past seasons, and ask viewers to pay a small fee to access them by season. It might be a good idea to widely distribute the pilot episode to try and draw in new viewers. Post it on YouTube or allow Netflix to stream it. And of course, keep it available on your site. Requiring a sign-up is pretty much expected anymore, but stop the weird third-party partnerships. If you want global distribution, make deals with channels in other countries to simultaneously host your content on their site with local commercials inserted. Enough with the “The US will get it first, Canada three months later, Europe nine weeks after that, etc.” Is there any rational reason for staggering distribution anymore? By the time BBC America or PBS get the new Sherlock episodes, I’ve already watched them online and have no incentive to tune into those channels (or their advertisers).

Yes, I’m selfish. Yes, I demand instant gratification. But I’m also willing to allow you to advertise to me, because I know that’s how these shows are funded. If I really like the show, I’ll even buy the DVD boxed set when the show wraps for all of the extras I mentioned in the first paragraph. Honestly, just make it easy to watch the show on my schedule.

Or I can buckle on my swash, don my parrot, and plunder it.

Your call.

Ad Nauseum

2011-12-13T11:21:00.003-05:00

The following is a summation of the types of Help Wanted ads I've been seeing. It's hard out here for a cat.

- Copywriter needed for large ad agency. Must have agency experience. (Repeat for every agency ad.)

- Technical writer wanted for local CMS provider. We’re not actually going to hire anyone; our CTO just wants to display a stack of résumés on his desk when our current writer comes in to ask for a raise.

- Marketing position available. Prospective candidates must complete an assignment for evaluation. This assignment is an actual order from one of our customers, and we will use your work without compensation or acknowledgement. In fact, our entire output is supplied by potential candidates, as we’ve been running this same ad since we opened and still haven’t hired anyone.

- IMMEDIATE OPENING! Ideal candidate will have 17 years’ experience in Marketing/Sales, a Masters degree in Graphic Design and/or Global Macroeconomics, know the function of every button in the entire Adobe product line, and be fluent in Spanish, Chinese, and Basque. Programming experience must include COBOL, C++, CSS, FORTRAN, UNIX, and SQL. Position entails meeting with clients, developing global campaigns utilizing Print, Radio, Television, and Social Media platforms, copywriting, layouts and coding for each, stuffing envelopes for Direct Mail campaigns, server maintenance (“Zero Downtime” is our motto!), as well as providing efficient and friendly 24/7 technical support on our phone bank and internet Help Desk.

This is an entry-level position. Minimum salary, with benefits to be awarded after one year of employment.

- We’re hiring! International Telecommunications company has immediate positions! We provide connectivity services and products to a world-wide client base, leveraging Cloud technology and telecom infrastructure to allow our clients to remotely connect all over the world! Our software enables Web conferencing, FTP data transfers, remote desktops/whiteboards allowing multiple inputs, easy file sharing, redundant backup, and onboard scheduling. Our customers can work from anywhere in the world without missing deadlines, meetings, or crucial project updates. Apply today! NO TELECOMMUTING.

In Defense of Starship

2011-10-10T09:33:00.004-05:00

Rolling Stone recently released a list of the ten worst hits of the 80s, and, once again, “We Built this City” took the top spot.

This annoys me.

Not because it’s the best song ever – it’s a fluffy little Pop tune, c’mon – but because it’s just another rehash of a 2004 list that defunct Blender Magazine threw together with no real criteria. It basically amounted to an editor asking folks “What songs annoy you?”, and then sorting the list based on how much he agreed with the answers.

A fun thing to do is to go through someone’s iPod and try and figure out what songs are on there ironically (unless it’s a Hipster’s mix tape, then they all are). I have “We Built this City” on my player, and it’s not ironic at all. I like the thing. It’s the typical lament of teenagers about being misunderstood and marginalized by the older generations, set to a catchy rhythm. To me, the whole thing is a complaint that the creative energy that fuels the younger generations is also the source of the innovation and advancement which “built this city”, but that it has been co-opted and exploited by the more conservative, faceless corporate community. And I think that no line – in this or any other song – better illustrates that than:

“Marconi plays the mambo”

I remember when I first heard the song; I was absolutely stunned by that implications of that line. That this 21-year-old Italian kid created a revolutionary, world-changing technology – just so he could dance.

I was fifteen, smack in the middle of my formative years, and that idea sparked a lifelong fascination with the intersection of Pop Culture and technology. I chased down bands that were integrating electronics into their styles (very easy to find in the 80s), sought out cutting edge fiction (leading to Cyberpunk, naturally), and read magazines like MONDO 2000 (when I could find them). Now, sites like Acceler8or, ThinkGeek, BoingBoing, and Wired are the windows through which we can watch the integration of technology and humanity. The question is: Are we, as people, becoming more machinelike? Or is the tech becoming more organic?

Both.

Scientists are even now experimenting with a fungus that changes colors as the basis of a memory-storage system, and thousands upon thousands of people are walking around with pacemakers or artificial limbs. I refer to my smart phone as my external brain – and I’m only half-kidding. You can get your pets (or your kids!) chipped so you can GPS them if they get lost, and Japan has built robots that acquire knowledge like children, learning from mistakes. Then there's this bit from today: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11283/1181062-53.stm

Conventional wisdom holds that porn is the driving force behind all technological leaps. As a species, we really like it, and are constantly looking for ways to deliver it faster and more realistically. The first fully-functional neural net/Waldo suit will be a sex toy, delivering perfect partners in perfect environments with perfect results every time.

The second one will be for dancing.

Prep School

2011-09-21T17:30:00.004-05:00

Well hello, world; long time no blog. I wish I could say I’ve been ignoring you because I’ve been doing all kinds of fantastically cool stuff, but that’d be a lie. If I had been doing all kinds of fantastically cool stuff, the blog wouldn’t have lay (laid? lain? fuck it) fallow lo these many months.

I am, however, doing some moderately neat stuff, so may as well share.

Everybody has their thing; that certain something that just trips their trigger. For me, it’s camping gadgets. If you’ve read my stuff before, you know I like thinking about survival situations. Psychologists would say that it’s a reaction to the somewhat adverse situation I am now in, but they’d be wrong. I’ve been fascinated by tiny useful things ever since I saw my first combination salt & pepper shaker in the Boy Scout section of my local Sears.

Oh yeah…I was a Scout. I took the “Be Prepared” motto to heart. I carry a Swiss Army knife, and have used it for something every day since I got it, no exaggeration. I like reading blogs, sites, and Instructables concerning gear and prep supplies, and I’m constantly tinkering with my kits. Hence, today’s blog.

September is National Preparedness Month, and I’m in the process of putting together the Winter supplies to supplement the usual kit I keep in the car. I’m also going camping in October, so I had to start gathering stuff for that. I found that I was duplicating items with each group I created, making them all bulkier than they needed to be. Redundancy is all well and good, but you don’t really need five knives. At least, that’s what I have to keep telling myself.

So I sat down and really gave some thought as to what survival-type situations we were likely to encounter, and to what severity. Our main threat is a power outage brought on by severe weather. Secondly, a stuck car – whether by weather or accident. A distant third is my getting lost on a day hike, and fourth is being in a public or business setting and need some quick repair.

Once I had these identified, I listed the supplies I would want for each situation, then categorized them as essential or as nice-to-have-if-it-fits. I leaned heavily on the Rule of Threes and the Ten Essentials, plus guides such as FEMA’s Emergency Kit Checklist. Once those lists were complete, I removed duplicate items, keeping them on the lowest tier I could (more on the tiers below).

With my lists in hand, I began assembling kits. I conceptualized them as part of a tier system, where the smallest kit fit into the next larger, which fit into the next larger, etc. The somewhat crappy photos below illustrate this concept.

So, first tier, the Urban Survival Kit. Small enough to fit into a suit coat pocket, with those odds and ends useful for temporary repairs to prevent permanent embarrassment.

In this kit, I have (left to right): rubber bands and two sizes of cord, matches, post-its and pencil, sewing kit, a pouch with single doses of common OTC medications, safety pins and buttons, sticks for collar stays or splints, toothpicks, nail clippers, several sizes of band-aids, and alcohol wipes. In the unlikely event this was the only kit available to me in an emergency, I could use the safety pins and cord as a fishing rig, light a fire using the alcohol wipes and toothpicks as tinder, and cook in the Altoids tin. Ridiculous? Sure. But I wouldn’t just give up, either.

The next kit I consider a bare-minimum “crap-I’m-going-to-have-to-spend-the-night-out-here” kit.

Here’s the case:

Here’s everything in it:

That may be a little hard to make out, so here’s the breakdown:

Leatherman multi-tool with bit-driver and precision screwdrivers.

Light carabiner, snaplock ring, 12” airplane cable keyring, small measuring tape.

Thermal blanket.

My favorite ring o’ gear: 6” airplane cable ring, mini LED light, tweezers, P-51 can opener, mini pry bar, magnesium fire striker, pocket scalpel, pocket saw, pea-less rescue whistle.

Flexible key ring, magnifying glass, knife sharpener, signal mirror, OTC meds & sucrose tablets, compass.

The Altoids tin from above fits in the front pocket with the compass and mirror.

And that case can, in turn, be tossed into:

which contains:

No individual pics on this one, so, from left to right:

Tarp, work gloves, towel, poncho, LED flashlight, change of clothes, tent stakes, rope, food pouch with tuna, breakfast mix, hot chocolate, oatmeal and a few other odds and ends, emergency candles, canteen, cook kit with spork, various plastic bags, Velcro strips, crank-powered flashlight, Boy Scout handbook for reference, bag of dryer lint for tinder, pack of cards, pencils and notecards (one pencil has several yards of duct tape wrapped around it). Not shown is the first aid kit and cleanup supplies that stay in the car full-time, which will also fit in the bag if they need to be carried out.

The tier beyond this one includes all of the standard camping gear – tents, gas cookers, sleeping bags, etc – which we could either use inside if we lost power, or throw in the car if we had to evacuate. I’m in the process of making personal backpack kits for each of the pride, so everyone has what they need for a few days, and we won’t have to worry about forgetting anything if we have to boogie out fast.

So there we are. I like being prepared and having cool gadgets. Obviously, I hope I’m carrying all this stuff around for no reason, but it’s one less thing we have to worry about in case something does happen. At the very least, it keeps me in the garage and out of Mrs. Cat’s hair, and that’s good, too.

Raptured

2011-05-23T22:57:00.003-05:00

Well, looks like we're both still here. Guess we're meant to be together or something.

Happy 19, Mrs. Cat.

Instructa-bull

2011-02-15T08:52:00.004-05:00

I’ve been reading a lot of How-To and DIY sites lately, like Lifehacker and Instructables. I’ve always had a natural tendency toward being organized – approaching OCD levels in some circumstances – and I like finding new tips and tricks and gadgets to help streamline daily life.

The economy being the way it is, a lot of these articles involve repurposing things to solve specific problems without having to lay out a lot of cash. The folks at Lifehacker have a real fetish for binder clips, for example, using them for everything from cable management and cell phone holders to cuff links and tripod mounts. Occasionally, they even use them to hold sheets of paper together.

Generally, Instructables articles have titles like “How to turn an antique pipe organ into a Beowulf Cluster for $7” On reading that, I’ll think “Hey! I’d really like a Beowulf Cluster, and I can afford $7. I’ll check it out.” Then I find that the instructions run something like this:

Materials Required
Antique Pipe Organ
17 identical CPUs
Touch-Screen Monitor
3 spools, 12-gague wire (600’ ea)
6 large cooling fans
Uninterruptible Power Supply
2 power strips

Assembly
My uncle is a preacher, and when he renovated his church, he gave me the old pipe organ. I took it to my father’s custom carpentry shop and used his tools to gut it. Some of the burled walnut panels were damaged, but I stumbled across an exact match in my dad’s scrap pile and was able to replace them. Since I work at a Dell assembly plant, I had access to a bunch of CPUs that were going to be trashed. While my brother the professional electrician wired everything together, I asked a friend to write a custom UNIX program to cluster the CPUs. I mounted a small touch-screen monitor I found at the bus stop onto the sheet music shelf and it fit perfectly! My brother made a bunch of switches out of some parts he already had, and wired these into the existing keys and foot pedals so I don’t even need a keyboard! One of the keys was sticking and needed to be replaced. Luckily, my grandfather was a big game hunter and had a ton of trophies in his basement. I used a Dremel to cut down an African elephant tusk into a replacement key. Once everything was wired up, we built a custom bench out of the backseat of a ’57 Plymouth Fury, which I found behind my refrigerator when we moved into our new house. We didn’t have quite enough outlets, so I ran down to my local hardware store and bought 2 new power strips.

Total cost: $7!!!!!!!omg!!!

Asshole.

Suddenly, bedtime!

2011-01-07T12:09:00.001-05:00

I recently had a block of free time all to myself.

WHAT I PLANNED ON DOING
Finish the laundry
Fix the latch on the attic window
Wash the dishes
Pick up the toys
Go out for a good lunch and read
Change the water in the fishbowl
Get a haircut
See a movie
Catch up on writing projects

WHAT I ACTUALLY DID
Ate an entire bag of Doritos while surfing YouTube

I could rationalize it and say that everyone deserves some “brain-in-neutral” downtime, but I really feel like an unproductive slug. I also have to add CLEAN DORITO SLUDGE OFF OF KEYBOARD/MOUSE to my list now.

Two-oh-double hockey sticks

2011-01-01T18:42:00.002-05:00

There’s something cathartic about taking down the old calendar – overflowing with schedules, appointments, grocery lists, reminders and other scribbles – and putting up a new, blank one. The months stretch away, unfilled. There are no demands on our time yet, no urgent appointments circled in red, no bill due dates highlighted in yellow. The days are empty of everything but promise.

I’m looking forward to this year. To filling up that calendar not only with the minutia of daily life, but new opportunities and interesting projects. Because the Cats don’t make resolutions…we make schemes, plots, and machinations.

Happy New Year, y’all.

Techno (Hallo)Weenie

2010-10-31T22:16:00.004-05:00

Carved the punkins for the litter today. Despite my complete lack of dexterity with the knife (no opposable thumbs, remember), they turned out okay:

And here is our forward-thinking, environmentally-concious, high-tech, high-output, 21st-century, multi-hyphenated lighting system:

And the result:

Boo, y'all.

Give them a Hand

2010-10-22T13:06:00.009-05:00

"You never take me dancing," Mrs. Cat says.

"Who would you like to permanently alienate by asking them to watch the litter for a few hours?"

"Good point. Hmmm...we could dance here."

We look around at the swath of assorted kitty gear lurking on the floor, and envision crushed toys, twisted ankles, and broken furniture. "No," we say in unison.

"I have an idea," I offer.

Write This Down

2010-10-21T21:56:00.001-05:00

Well here it is, as promised: the collected wisdom of a marginally grouchy cat. I hope that you find it useful, and appreciate the hard-won nature of some of this advice.

NOTE: The following list has been edited for content, censored to protect the children, politically corrected to avoid hurting anyone’s feelings, redacted for security purposes, trimmed to remove pirated copies, and formatted to fit your screen.

72. Sometimes it rains.

A Feline Looks at Forty

2010-10-20T22:50:00.002-05:00

Tomorrow, gentle readers, I will hit the four decade milestone. Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve been wondering what of my accumulated wisdom I would share.

Stop scoffing, Julie.

It seems to me that I should take the opportunity to offer the readers of my blog some sort of advice, as quite a few are younger, and may benefit from my experience.

Hush up, Linda.

It’s the least I can do, really. Rather than serve up whatever happens to be on my mind at the time, I should present a well-thought-out post towards a specific end.

Et tu, Mrs. Cat?

Here’s the deal:

In my 1,040 fortnights on this rock, I have lived in eleven cities (including an Indian Reservation) across four states. I’ve traveled through most of the US and visited six other countries, besides. I’ve been reading for 37 years – science fiction and fantasy, history and architecture, scholarly journals and entertainment rags, art and mythology, poetry and military strategy, classics and pulps. I have a huge music library and a Doctorate in pop culture. I’m educated – both formally and on my own. I’ve interviewed WW2 veterans and hung out with neo-hippies. I’ve worked for bootstrappy entrepreneurs and self-described Corporate animals. I am friends with people of opposite persuasions from me, and ask for their input. I’ve broken bones and come through without a scratch. I’ve gotten lucky and fallen on my face. I’ve won and lost, lost and found. I’ve blown the curve and blown the game. I’ve made people laugh, cry, pissed off, and horrified, and they have done it to me. I’ve lost fights. I’ve won fights. I’ve been tongue-tied and glib, reticent and prolix, brilliant and oh-so-stupid. I’ve broken laws. I’ve been published. I love technology and am afraid of spiders. I like to travel and stay at home. I’ve been a Boy Scout and a misanthrope. I write limericks, advertising copy, short stories, and collaborative fiction, but I can’t touch-type. I’m a father, husband, step-brother, brother-in-law, and an only child.

In short…I’ve been places, done things, and know stuff. Some of it I think is worth passing on. Stay tuned tomorrow for the accumulated wisdom of Sophistacat.

Our Kitchen is more Goth than Your Kitchen

2010-10-03T15:58:00.004-05:00

When we moved back to North Carolina, we moved into my grandmother’s house since it was sitting empty – a target for Vandals and other Germanic tribes.

The house was built in 1947 – the first one on this street – and my family has been the only owner since it was built. Besides the architectural quirks you find in older houses, it was also decorated in Early Elderly. Not bad if you were born in 1913, as my grandmother was, but it’s a little staid for our wacky clowder o’ cats. With every room painted in shades of sage, butter, and white, we were craving some visual stimulation.

Hence our weekend project.

We started with our butter-colored metal pantry.

Mrs. Cat picked Cheerwine Red for the cabinet because hey…Cheerwine rocks. We also decided to do the doors in chalkboard paint so we could keep a running grocery list right there on the pantry. So…red cabinet and black doors.

We were originally going to leave the interior alone, but that was quickly abandoned when we saw what it looked like. So another paint run later and:

The handles really set the whole piece off. Great call, Mrs. Cat.

Here it is lurking in the kitchen.

We’re going to repaint the kitchen as soon as we can find a color scheme that works with the cabinet and won’t horrify potential buyers. I do know I want to do all the hardware in that same red. Maybe a 50s black and white scheme with the red as the accent color.

In the meantime, I’m off to get a case of TruBlood.

Read It or Beat It

2010-08-19T18:14:00.004-05:00

I was driving home from work today when I was passed by one of our state’s mobile breathalyzer vehicles. I’d heard about them, but this was the first time I’d actually laid eyes on one. There are several that cruise around the state, assisting in checkpoints and high-profile operations around the holidays.

Of course, it was festooned with all manner of vinyl wraps and decals exhorting various highway safety campaign mottos: “Click It or Ticket”, “Booze It and Lose It”, “Cuff ‘Em and Stuff ‘Em”… uh… sorry, that last one was actually from “Dukes of Hazzard”.

As the bus passed me, I noted that the vehicle was officially known as the “Breath Alcohol Testing Mobile Unit." Of course I knew right away that everyone called them BATmobiles.

Here’s the logo:

Now, they’re obviously tapping into the whole Batman motif here, but I immediately thought of this logo:

Don’t recognize it? Here’s another version:

I chortled.

Just for fun, here’s a promotional piece/news story on the BATmobiles.

iSoul

2010-08-10T15:14:00.003-05:00

I turned on my MP3 player the other day and asked it to Shuffle the playlist. The first nine songs it returned were:

Hell - Squirrel Nut Zippers
Devils & Angels - Toby Lightman
Christian Woman - Type O Negative
Devil Woman - Cliff Richard
Kyrie - Mr. Mister
Son of a Preacher Man - Dusty Springfield
If You Wanna get to Heaven - Ozark Mountain Daredevils
Sympathy for the Devil - The Rolling Stones
Rock and Roll Heaven - Alan O'Day

That can't be random.

Now I'm frightened of the AI that controls my player, and I can't decide if it believes in Free Will or Predestination.

I'm just relieved that Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven" didn't show up on the list, because I don't have a copy of that.

Maybe I shouldn't have bought the stupid thing at a crossroads.

intersted

2010-07-24T19:22:00.002-05:00

The following e-mail was received in our office. All of the original formatting has been preserved.

From: [name redacted]

Sent: [date redacted]

To: [name redacted]

Subject: intersted

Hello im [name redacted] and i seen you were looking for help.I am going to colloge with [name redacted] for web desing.I whould like the experince in your field you can reach me at [number redacted] thank you

We are fucking doomed.

Talk Nerdy to Me

2010-07-13T17:08:00.004-05:00

I love technology.

Yesterday I went through my vast music collection, comprised of songs I'd pulled from Napster or other torrents, copied from YouTube using a freeware program called Audacity, downloaded from friends' iPods, and ripped from CDs I purchased from various online retailers. I dumped all the songs I wanted onto a 1" long thumb drive that has sixty-four times the storage capacity of my first desktop.

Today, I placed a micro SD card into an adapter sleeve and inserted the rig into a reader connected to my work computer through one of six free USB ports. I transferred all the song files from the flash drive onto the card. I now have eight hours of music taking up only 1/16th of the storage space on a card that's smaller than my pinky nail. The card went into my cell phone, thus obviating the need for a separate mp3 player.

What I really geek out about in all of this is the fact that it's no big deal. Everybody is familiar with this sort of file exchanging, and everyone expects storage capacity to at least double every year. My phone is smarter and more powerful than the computers that put men on the moon, and I consider it a cheapie not-quite-a-throwaway-but-close.

I can't wait to buy a terabyte thumb drive.

Wanted: Animator

2010-06-16T20:22:00.002-05:00

I have no artistic skills, but if I did, I'd do a cartoon short of this scene:

EXTERIOR: Early evening, just after sunset

WIDE SHOT - A jet flies low over the town, its lights flashing brightly in a sky where the stars are just starting to appear.

A FIREFLY enters the scene from the right, following the path of the jet. His tail is flashing in sync with the jet's lights. He is panting, but determined.

Firefly: You're mine, bitch!

How Urban Legends Get Started

2010-06-16T19:34:00.003-05:00

The pride was on its way back from stuffing Cub and Kitten insensible on cheap buffet pizza, cruising down the back roads in Mrs. Cat’s homeschool bus. I don’t usually drive the battle wagon because it’s a pain in the tail to adjust the seats and mirrors ~~from Midget to Normal~~ ~~from Diminutive to Ordinary~~ ~~from Wee to Regular~~ ~~from Hobbit to Human~~ to fit me (sorry, dear; please stop smacking my head).

Since I didn’t have to steer, and as the tactical situation required no evasive maneuvers or manning of the cannon, I got to look at the scenery as we drove around. I noticed a box truck parked in front of a house about a mile from our local hospital. The truck had obviously seen a lot of use, as evidenced by the sun-cracked upholstery and the rust-streaked side panels. A heavy lock was hanging from the roll door at the back, much newer and shinier than anything else on the truck. On the door of the cab, a magnetic sign was placed almost as an afterthought. It read:

National Kidney Foundation

And in much smaller letters:

Pick-Up Service

I don’t even want to know what jingle that thing plays as it cruises through the neighborhoods.

Grocery Storm

2010-06-01T14:59:00.003-05:00

One thing nobody’s mentioned about this whole “My kid is autistic” deal: shopping lists are determined by the current fixation.

Examples:

- We’ve bought Chef Boy-R-Dee minis and instant Mac-n-cheese every week for about a year now, because they’re about the only thing Cub will eat for supper. We can usually get something healthy in him for lunch, thank goodness.

- Mama Cat was recently forced to purchase an unneeded bottle of Surf detergent, because Cub wanted a beach party. I’m thrilled that he makes the connection between the two, but damn, that’s $3.78 that could have gone towards my Little Debbies and BBQ chips. What? I never said I eat healthy at lunch.

- We’ve had to abort some trips because Cub insisted that everything we buy be the same color. Do you have any idea how few blue foods there are? And how hard it is to make a decent meal out of the ones that do exist? Is a freezer pop considered a salad or a side dish?

If nothing else, having Cub around has given us lightning-fast reflexes when it comes to adapting to new situations. And we still laugh about it. You have to, because otherwise you’d go batshit insane.

Don't mess with the Mrs.

2010-05-23T14:19:00.011-05:00

Eighteen years and counting, Mrs. Cat.

You keep the pride healthy, fed, clothed, mostly clean and reasonably happy, and sacrifice so much of yourself in doing so.

Even with our cumulative loss of sleep, solitude, and sanity, I'd do it all over again, because there's also been a hell of a lot of laughter, wonder, and fun.

Kitten and Cub get so much from you, and they will be a force to be reckoned with when they enter the world. (And not just because we weaponized them, either.)

You're my favoritest wife ever. You're an awesome partner and the perfect balance to my goofiness. You fucking rock.

We make a good team, and I can't wait to find out what the next eighteen years hold for us. Because we'll still be together, taking care of business.

And looking good while we're doing it.

Yes, readers. We ARE this cool.

Truth is Stranger than Fiction

2010-05-19T17:37:00.002-05:00

And sometimes, it's more noir than fiction, too.

Woman's Body Found In Suitcase On SF Waterfront

SAN FRANCISCO -- A tourist walking along San Francisco’s scenic waterfront with his niece Tuesday made a shocking discovery on the rocks – a suitcase containing a young woman's body.

Lt. Mike Stasko, head of the San Francisco Police Department's homicide division, confirmed the discovery was being treated as a homicide or a questionable death.

“We have a body in a suitcase,” he told KTVU. “Right now, what we are doing is the body is being transported back to the medical examiner’s office....You never get used to something like this. Someone went ahead and … put the body in a suitcase and hoped that it was going to go down in the Bay.”

http://www.ktvu.com/news/23595753/detail.html

I'm kind of hesitant to admit it, but I'm more intrigued by this story than horrified. I really want to know the backstory and chain of events that led to this woman being stuffed in a samsonite and tossed off a bridge.

What I really want to do is write a series of detective novels and include this incident. You know how the more successful series are titled to revolve around a particular theme? I'd use airline travel terms as my hook: Early Departure, Terminal, Black Box, Missed Connection, etc.

This one would be called Carrion Luggage.

En garde

2010-05-06T14:08:00.002-05:00

We recently had part of the yard fenced in so Kitten and Cub could play outside without wandering into the road. From the casual experiments I’ve run, we have a vehicle pass our house approximately every twelve seconds, so keeping them from becoming speed bumps has been a priority ever since we moved here.

They now have about a quarter-acre surrounded by shiny, five-foot chain-link, and it took all of one day for it to start filling up with toys, sports equipment, and other assorted childhood support mechanisms. We’re also planning to put out a grill, picnic table, hammock for Mrs. Cat, and just generally turn it into an outdoor room.

It’s nice to be able to let the kids run around and flame out without having to stay on their heels every step of the way so they don’t dash out in front of the city bus, and I’m glad we were able to do it. What I hadn’t counted on was the perturbed reaction from our neighbors, whose property abuts the fence. Seems that when our installer was laying out the stakes, he was questioned intently about whether he was sure that’s where the property line was. When this was conveyed to me, I was kind of surprised, because the property line had never been an issue when I went ahead and mowed all the way up to the edge of their house instead of stopping at the line, which would have left a two-foot strip of lawn untouched. There was also never a question about where the property line fell when they trimmed their bushes and left the pile of limbs on the corner of our lot instead of theirs. But now that there’s a physical barrier, there’s an issue all of a sudden?

The cause of the concern became clear a couple of days ago when they came home in the new van. Seems there’s not quite enough space for them to pull in beside the other car and still be able to open the doors.

Ah…I get it now. You were counting on being able to hang your Caravan over the property line a little bit, and now you can’t. This annoys you; I understand. I don’t care, but I understand. Hey, I’ve been there. You have to decide which vehicle you’re going to put at risk by parking it in the street. It’s not an easy question: Do we risk someone smashing into the vehicle we use the most, or the one that’s worth more?

Of course, you could scoot over and park on your own yard for a change. Just a thought.

And I thought installing a fence was supposed to make for good neighbors. Until then, we’ll just have to find a way to cope with all the sidelong glances and pursed lips. Maybe I can distract myself by grilling some burgers while the kids play on the swingset.

You want one? I have pickles.

Jen, You Ignorant Slut

2010-02-26T21:56:00.002-05:00

After years of speaking out about her son’s autism — and against childhood immunizations — Jenny McCarthy is reversing her position.

After years of speaking publicly about her belief that MMR shots (immunization for measles, mumps, and rubella) caused her son to suffer from autism, Jenny McCarthy now faces the reality that her 7-year-old son Evan — who no longer shows any signs of autism — may likely have lived with completely different illness.

A new article in Time Magazine — which Jenny was interviewed for — suggests Evan suffers from Landau-Kleffner syndrome, “a rare childhood neurological disorder that can also result in speech impairment and possible long-term neurological damage.”...

And though her son may never have had autism, Jenny insists, “I’ll continue to be the voice” of the disease.

(http://www.hollywoodlife.com/2010/02/26/jenny-mccarthy-says-her-son-evan-never-had-autism/)

I cannot adequately express how much this whore pisses me off.

How many children have suffered or died because their parents listened to this piece of ass instead of their doctors? Oh yeah, there's a website for that:

http://www.jennymccarthybodycount.com/Jenny_McCarthy_Body_Count/Home.html

The parents share the blame, of course, as do Jen's publishers, Oprah, the tabloids, and anyone else who gave her a platform to vomit up her ignorance. But Jen, who knew that she only had an opinion, and went forth as if she alone had figured it all out, bears the lyin' share of responsibility.

And what's this bullshit about "I'll continue to be the voice" of Autism? What makes you think for one goddamned minute that we - the parents of children who actually have Autism - want you to be our self-appointed spokeslut? You have already proven that you are completely unqualified to spout off about anything medical, unless it's the treatment of various STDs. What makes you think you are even remotely relevant to this issue? Your kid suffered from Landau-Kleffner syndrome and having a self-important bitch for a mother. And even when you were under the impression that he did have Autism, you chose to spout propaganda from a discredited, scientifically-unsound study, against all statistical evidence, with no medical training.

I only hope that you put forth as much effort in getting the news out about your change of heart as you did in your original swath of destruction. Try this: spread the word as much as you spread your legs; that should do it.

And for all you celebrity-worshippers: Having your vagina photographed only makes you an expert at having your vagina photographed. If you don't believe me, I refer you to the definitive study published by that Nobel-winning dream team: Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, and Paris Hilton.

I AM the law

2009-12-30T21:28:00.003-05:00

I embodied an Internet Law today. No…not Rule 34, Poe’s Law.

Poe’s Law states: “Without a winking smiley or other blatant display of humor, it is impossible to create a parody of fundamentalism that someone won't mistake for the real thing.”

While the use of the term ‘fundamentalism’ usually implies the far Right (Poe originally formulated this law while trolling Christian usenet boards), an older and somewhat broader definition of the term is: “strict adherence to any set of basic ideas or principles,” which covers all ideologies.

And it’s true. The availability and anonymity of the internet has allowed every crazy bastard who thinks he knows THE TRUTH to hose down comment sections with his overheated brain drippings.

When Swift published A Modest Proposal in 1729, many readers failed to recognize the satirical intent because – one could argue – they did not have access to vast amounts of information with which to compare ideas, paper and books being too expensive for the common man until the Industrial Revolution a century later. I find it ironic that in today’s “Information Age,” where you can find links to most libraries, any number of magazines and newspapers, museums, encyclopedias, all kinds of video, as well as scientific and governmental data, you still cannot recognize satire, because for every idea you think is just way-out-there wacky, someone’s turned it into a .com and is plastering up huge walls of text and links.

The Letters to the Editor in my local paper is actually what got me started on all this today. This was one of them:

Free to breathe

Hallelujah!! I have never been so happy as to see that North Carolina will be enacting a smoking ban as of Jan. 1! It will be so refreshing to not have to breathe polluted air and see innocent children subjected to the noxious second hand smoke of irresponsible parents or caregivers in restaurants. The next law I would like to see would be one that charges adults with child abuse for smoking around their children.I am so proud of our state government for protecting its citizens from this disgusting habit!

— Robin

This was my comment:

I'm with you, Robin! My child has asthma, which is exacerbated by strong odors, so I'm lobbying Governor Perdue to enact a ban on people wearing perfume or aftershave in public. If people want to use a completely legal product like Old Spice, they are free to do it within their own home where I don't have to smell it. I'm especially looking forward to forcing department stores to dismantle their perfume counters, because we're too stupid to avoid them when we go out. Besides, perfume contains benzyl acetate, which is a known cancer-causing agent, and as it volatizes off the wearer's skin, it can affect everybody nearby. I think you're limiting yourself with the child abuse law, though; violators of my Perfume Law will be charged with attempted murder.

I thought it was a pretty obvious parody, but I apparently overestimated the comprehension skills of the local townsfolk. This is what I got back:

· you are one freakin idiot!

· there are lots of Socialist countries in the world that might be more to your liking. Please don't let the door hit you on your way out of the U.S of A. Let Freedom Ring!

· Wow....I am all for smoke free restaurants. If you must smoke, you can smoke outside and not indoors for the rest of us to sit through. However, a ban on perfume and cologne?? Are you kidding??? I would die without my perfume!

· I think you're a whack job.

I can’t decide whether to feel superior or sad, so I’ll leave you with the words of The Waco Kid:

“You've got to remember that these are just simple farmers. These are people of the land. The common clay of the new West. You know... morons.”

All I want for Christmas

2009-12-24T21:17:00.003-05:00

In October the Marketing groups gathered ‘round.
They all needed to nail down their holiday sound
For the ads they’d be running o’er my radio
(‘cause they wanted my money to help their cash flow).

“We want all of the people to sit up and hear
All about the great offers we’re making this year.
We will need something catchy, unique, a surprise
So we’ll tempt them to enter our store for our buys.”

And they pondered and thought and they brainstormed and then
From the back came a voice (it was probably Ben).
He said “Let’s do an ad no one else has before.
We’ll just rip off that poem by Clement Clark Moore.”

Said the boss: “So creative! I love it! I do!
We will turn that old poem into something new!
We will use it to sell all the widgets in stock.
I can pay the store mortgage and get out of hock!”

But unfortunately the group wasn’t the first
To adapt the old chestnut of holiday verse.
They weren’t even the only to do it this year
Because everyone thinks that to spread the good cheer

They should hammer the listeners with holiday tropes
Irrespective of whether they all sound like dopes.
They think people will listen if they mention snow
In their ad, or have elves or a loud “Ho, ho, ho!”

It is not very clever; I hate it a lot.
And they all should be taken outside to be shot.
They contribute to cheapening these special days
And to giving we shoppers December malaise.

But they’re not only guilty of Christmas abuse.
They have also dishonored the fine work of Seuss.
Anapestic tetrameter his métier,
Which blows them out the water on all their best days.

So to all of you clever new writers for hire
If you want to be heard; if you want to inspire,
Do not meddle with carols, and Santa eschew
Or you’ll find that you get a collective “Fuck you!”

Happy holidays, everyone!

A Little of This; A Little of That

2009-12-18T21:57:00.004-05:00

Arby’s is running one of the lamest promotions ever. Their combo meals are priced at $5.01, and they’re distributing coupons good for 1¢ off. The accompanying tagline is “Worth Every Cent!” So…your food is worth the one penny the coupon covers? The coupon that’s not redeemable for cash? Doesn’t that technically make the food worthless? Too often the 2 A.M. brilliant marketing hook shrivels and dies in the harsh light of an 8 A.M. management meeting. This should have been one of those times.

I’d like to meet the person in charge of programming the music for our “Local on the 8s” Weather Channel segments. While most go for muted, stately orchestral pieces, our guy (it has to be a guy) chooses tracks from Steve Vai, Eric Johnson, and Joe Satriani. Not only am I sure it’s a dude picking these out, he has to be a Gen X-er, because those are all 80s guitar gods. I keep hoping for some Queensryche to underscore our Doppler.

I’m in the process of paying off the debt incurred during eighteen months of unemployment, and it’s kind of nerve-wracking, especially when dealing with credit card companies. Their license to anally rape their customers expires next February, so calling them is like sticking a finger in the piranha tank to test the water temperature. You barely get your account number out before they’re peppering you with questions about current contact information, place of employment, next of kin, aliases you might be using, message boards you read, and your Twitter handle. I dutifully gave over all of that at first, but then I realized Hey…why do they need all this? We have one relationship – fiduciary – and that’s coming to an end with this call (I’m paying them, not declaring bankruptcy, just to make that clear). With that insight, I’ve decided to totally fuck with them. I’m hoping the conversation will go like this:

“Thank you for calling Ben Dover & Smyle. How can I help you?”
“Hi. I’m calling to pay off my balance. My account number is [digits here].”
“Okay. And is your address still [blah blah blah]?”
“Well, sort of. I’m living in a rusted-out Mini-Winnie in the field behind the place. But Dave, the owner, throws my mail in the recycle bin instead of the garbage, so I can still read any letters you send me since they’re not covered in his secret sauce. That’s not a euphemism, by the way; Dave makes his living by entering barbecue chicken contests across the South.”
“Oooooo…kay. And how about a phone number?”
“I’m using Dave’s phone right now. He’s in Tuscaloosa until Thursday, so I forced my way into his wife’s back door. That’s not a euphemism, by the way; she has her own room off the deck, and the sliding door doesn’t latch right ever since the trailer slipped off the masonry block and threw the whole frame off plumb.”
“Where are you currently employed?”
“I’m in a band called Chuck U. Farley and the Horse He Rode in on. That is a euphemism, by the way. We do techno remixes of Barry Manilow songs. I play the banjo.”
[stunned silence]
“It’s a niche market.”
“Uh…anything steadier? Maybe with an address?”
“There’s the clinic where I sign up for all the drug trials. I try to stick to ones for new pills because a doctor examines you for those, and that’s like having insurance, you know? Sometimes I sign up for three or four at the same time because it’s an easy hundred bucks a month. I used to sell blood, too, but I can’t anymore because my liver’s failing from all the pills. On the other hand, my sperm count is way up. Doesn’t really help me, though. Since I stopped drinking, I‘ve noticed that there aren’t any pretty women at the bar anymore.”
“Uh…”
“Can we hurry this up? I’ve got a Bat Mitzvah in an hour and still need to tune my banjo for I Write the Songs. Did you know Barry didn’t write that? That’s what college folk and Alanis Morissette would call “irony.” I used to not know that. I think these pills are making me smarter.”

I KNOW I’m funny; I’m just underappreciated

2009-11-28T14:36:00.001-05:00

There’s a running joke in the office about the large amounts of scotch consumed by “Bob”. Last week, another employee was trying to use Bob’s computer, which kept crashing. I pointed out that there was biometric identification built into the mouse: It measured Blood/Alcohol levels.

In a conversation between manly men, the inevitable “I like my (beverage) like I like my women” discussion came around. I opined that “I like my coffee like I like my women.” “Hot and black?” came the question. “Ground down and bitter,” I clarified.

On a message board a few years ago, it was pointed out that the National Organization for Women had turned 40. I suggested we trade it in for two 20-year-old women’s’ organizations.

When an article in our local newspaper tried to blame Grand Theft Auto for a shooting, I asked “Since I’m usually wandering around with no clue as to what I should be doing, can I blame Myst?”.

A story online mentioned that a big rig carrying vacuums had been hijacked, with no clue as to the identity of the perpetrator(s). My suggestion was that authorities should be on the lookout for Nature.

Don’t cook bacon naked, and other Thanksgiving observations

2009-11-27T20:40:00.002-05:00

Remember: it’s one stick of butter per person per course. Otherwise why bother?

Why is it that every other day of the year, we’re content to have a sandwich or burger for lunch, but during the holidays, nothing less than a 10-pound bird, stuffing, potatoes, green beans, hot buttered rolls, and some sort of pie (or two) satisfies us? I think it started with the Pilgrims, but they at least had the excuse that they’d previously been starving to death.

Cops are out in force patrolling traffic. I was caught up in a slow stretch of road the day before Thanksgiving, and saw the most appropriate vanity plate ever. A State Trooper had pulled over a bright yellow Mustang, whose plate read: YSOFICER

Don’t put the towel you used to clean up the herbed butter/olive oil spill in the wash with the other towels, unless you want the linen closet to smell like your meal for the next six months. Either waste the water and power to wash it by itself, or throw it away.

While it’s not unusual for a radio station to change formats for the holiday, our local harder-rock station had programmed 80s soundtrack songs. While preferable to the all-Christmas playlists most stations adopt, it was a little time-warping to be hearing OMD’s “If You Leave” (Pretty in Pink) and Peter Gabriel’s ”In Your Eyes” (Say Anything) while we cooked, particularly because we were expecting System of a Down or Seether.

The Atomic Shuffle

2009-11-23T15:51:00.002-05:00

One of the big geek fantasies is teleportation. Invariably, whenever the subject comes up, the discussion turns to the revolution it would be for the shipping industry – instant delivery, no transportation overhead, reduction in storage space, etc. Then the focus turns to the personal travel possibilities, where you can dispense with long plane/car trips to get to that business meeting or head down to Disney World. It always follows this pattern because even in our flights of fancy, we want to test it on non-living matter before we start hurling people between dimensions.

Like a lot of nerds, I’ve thought about possible applications for commercial teleportation: pizza delivery, Amazon orders, landfill removal, the collapse of the Hotel and Airline industries, etc. But very few people talk about how it will change some of the more questionable ventures, like crime, porn and spam mail.

For instance:

Prostitution will get a lot more discreet if you can beam them straight to the bedroom.
Your local crack dealer won’t draw attention to himself by having cars coming and going all day.
Pop-Ins will replace pop-ups as alternative medicine samples, Nigerian checks, and suspect software will be physically sent to you.
Nuclear bombs transported to any location just as the countdown clicks to 0.
Kidnapping and burglary will get a whole lot easier.

And on the punishment side of the “Crime &” equation:

Run from the cops? Instead of giving chase, they’ll zap you directly into the jailhouse.
Illegal alien? One word: teledeported. (Of course, they’ll pop right back in, but I had to use that.)
The SWAT team appears directly at the scene, grabs the bad guy and disappears.
Prisons won’t need doors in the outer walls.
Capital sentences will be carried out by setting the destination coordinates to “The Sun.”

And that’s not even touching on the massive changes in social etiquette that will take place when anyone can be anywhere at a moment’s notice. You think it’s annoying now when someone you’re talking to answers their cell phone? What about when they just pop out in the middle of a conver

Except for a mouse

2009-11-22T12:17:00.004-05:00

A dominant theme in the blogs lately has been people complaining (yet again) about retailers moving Christmas promotions up to Hallowe'en, and even before 10/31 in some cases.

I don't know what they're complaining about. We've been seeing Yuletide references ever since Subway rolled out their commercial with Michael Phelps back in the early summer.

I think I've mentioned before that we watch all our television with the Closed Captioning on. Not only does it help Cub with his reading, we don't wake anybody up at night by blasting the gunfire, explosions, or cursing that make up the majority of the movies we like.

In any case, I've become aware that, just like in any editing field, there are varying levels of competence when it comes to transcription services. Live feeds get a pass because that's very fast-paced. However, when it comes to filmed entertainment, where a script has already been nailed down, there are no excuses.

So Subway brings Phelps out, presumably to make the "munchies" connection, and the background music is Sly & the Family Stone's Thank You for Letting Me Be Myself Again. Subway splurged to include the lyrics of the song in the transcription, but evidently skimped on a proofreader. The lyrics on our screen were "Thank you/for lettin' me/ be mice elf/ again."

Who needs drugs?

2009-11-17T15:51:00.001-05:00

The comments on Fark make me laugh.
The comments on Yahoo Answers make me sad.
The comments on YouTube make me psychotic.

Through careful internet browsing, I can regulate my mood to exact degrees.

This is how my brain works

2009-11-14T15:10:00.004-05:00

Whenever I see this:

I think of this:

That One Looks Like A Spoiler -OR- Out! Out! Damned Spot

2009-11-12T21:02:00.015-05:00

I found out recently that psychiatrists who still employ the Rorschach blots as a diagnostic tool jealously guard them, so potential patients can't study them beforehand. If the test had any merit at all, I could understand that, but since it fails every criterion as to what constitutes a valid, scientifically sound, and legally admissable diagnostic tool, I don't feel too bad about posting all of them in my blog.

It was interesting, too, to read the "rules" that guide the scoring of the test. They're so broad, every administrator is pretty much free to interpret them how they wish. Some will score against you if you rotate the card; others will score against you if you don't. You might get a "bad grade" if you answer too quickly, or if you take too long to answer. Some psychiatrists will drop your score if you don't confine your answer to the ink marks (seeing an image in the negative space, for example), or if you see too many things. Some will mark your score down if you say "That's a (whatever)" instead of "That looks like a (whatever)", as if the patient really believes that a drip of ink on cardstock has transformed into the (whatever).

I actually think Rorschach was testing the psychiatrists' reactions rather than the patients'.

One fairly consistent reaction across the board, apparently, is that all of the psychiatrists will react negatively if you tell them you see "an inkblot." But really, isn't that the literal truth? Wouldn't that indicate that the patient has a solid grip on the real world, not given to hallucinations or manias?

I have to offer this P.S.A. in connection with this post: If you are ever in a position where your state of mind is to be determined by a Rorschach test (like whether you're mentally competent enough to stand trial, for instance), you are supposed to let them know you have seen the cards, and request an alternate diagnostic tool. Use your own judgement as to whether or not you think holding that information back will give you an advantage.

Here are the cards, and my interpretations.

Plate 1

Evil bunny grinning at me, or two chihuahuas gnawing on one of those cat clocks.

Plate 2

Two Chinese peasants in DEVO hats high-fiving one another.

Plate 3

Okay, this one requires some backstory: when I was little, my grandparents went on a trip to Africa. They picked up a pair of carved wooden staues of "typical" village women. This image looks like those statues putting a tuxedo together.

Plate 4

Roadkill. Specifically, a rabbit run over by a motorcycle. (And he had four of 'em!)

Plate 5

Moth/butterfly/alligators hiding behind bushes/Martian angel/Icarus

Plate 6

Dragonfly towing a raccon skin, or a diver hitting a dry pool.

Plate 7

Two "Thumbs Up!" made out of paper, or Siamese ants joined at the abdomen.

Plate 8

Two chameleons perched on baboons and tearing apart a brick of frozen shredded wheat.

Plate 9

Two deer, heads cocked in a "Oh no you din't" attitude, stand behind bushes while four plucked hens await on the other side.

Plate 10

Seafood platter with calamari, crab claws, salmon, fried clams, and scallops.

In the negative space, I see a woman wearing (top to bottom): a tall headdress, an amber necklace, a pink cape, a blue bra, yellow garters, and green hose.

So...what have we learned?

Freedom of Choice

2009-11-10T19:16:00.003-05:00

I'm confused. Aren't two of the Liberal mantras "Freedom to Choose" and "Keep your laws off my body"?

Then why do the Democrats in the House feel it necessary to enforce compliance with their health care bill by criminalizing those that elect not to participate? That's right, citizens, if you do not purchase health insurance, you can be fined up to $250,000 and/or spend five years in Federal prison.

And another thing: if this health care bill is so wonderful, can we expect the Congressfolk to drop their existing plans and sign up for it?

I'm thinking...no.

What Drives Volvo?

2009-11-10T18:33:00.005-05:00

Have you seen Volvo's latest ad campaign? It's a tie-in to the Twilight series and it's called "What Drives Edward?" or "What Would Edward Drive?" or "Why Hasn't Anyone Driven A Stake Through Edward?" or something like that.

Two questions arise from seeing their commercials, the first being: Why have they added the male circle/arrow symbol to their logo? Am I supposed to get an erection upon seeing the car or, more disturbingly, Edward?

Second, and a little more fundamental: Who the hell is this campaign aimed at? The primary market for the Twilight dreck is tween girls. Last I checked, tweens aren't old enough to have a driver's license. And the primary market for Volvos is middle-aged white guys that don't feel safe on the highway. The viewers of the movie don't care about the car, and the potential car buyers aren't seeing the movie. What did they think would happen to their sales figures?

The other terrible tie-in is the game on their web site. It involves answering trivia questions over a period of successive days. Again, the stodgy old white guys won't know the trivia, and the tweens won't invest the dedicated time.

One of the reasons tween girls fantasize about a vampire boyfriend is because tween boys are boring, bland, and unoriginal. Vampires are exciting and dangerous. Now, hasn't Volvo spent the last several decades extolling their safety record? Isn't that the complete opposite of why a girl might date a vampire? And if they're wanting to tap into the idea that Bella feels safe with Edward, then the campaign should have been "What Drives Bella?".

Was any rational thought put into this multi-million dollar campaign at all? Do the car giveaway, of course, but beyond that, there are plenty of other ways to promote the brand that make more sense: Passes to the premiere with a chauffeured Volvo dropping the winners off at the red carpet; a drive around the filming locations in a new Volvo with members of the cast; a remote-controlled Volvo for the Barbie editions of the characters. If you wanted to try and get really "wacky" and "hip", you could even do a commercial along the lines of "Why Edward sucks. A: He's a vampire; that's what they do. Why Volvo doesn't suck. A: (the list)." Needs polishing, sure, but that's off the top of my head, and I still think it establishes a better tie-in to the material.

I've been in meetings where everyone's all excited about landing the big account, but surely someone must have had a moment of clarity at some point. I'm all for extending the brand into new markets, but not at the expense of your central positioning statement.

Election Dysfunction

2009-11-04T09:30:00.002-05:00

I can't believe I haven't used that title until now.

All kinds of elections and votes last night. Caught a newscast from CNN on my way in to work this morning about various races, and noted two things.

One, their tagline now is “America’s most trusted news source.” Really? Every time the numbers come out, FOX has anywhere between three and five times the number of viewers as CNN. FOX also claims at least thirteen of the top fifteen news show slots every quarter. And according to advertising revenue, CNN is dead last in the primary 18-49 market. If they’re defining “America” as “people we employ,” maybe CNN has a claim, but otherwise…

The other thing was the newscaster using the term “controversial.” The lead-in to the story was “Maine voters passed two controversial referendums yesterday.”

One referendum was to allow the use of medical marijuana in the state. When approximately 80% of the respondents to an informal poll are in favor of legalizing pot, Liberals and Conservatives are telling the Feds they’re missing out on a huge revenue stream by ignoring it, and everyone is focused on medical care right now, this vote isn’t even a surprise, much less controversial.

The other was voting against legally recognizing gay marriage, previously passed by the Maine legislature. I’m not sure what’s so controversial about this, either. Gay marriage has been voted on thirty-one separate times, all across the country, and has been defeated every time. To me, that seems pretty clear that it’s a mainstream position. Maybe CNN is astounded by the fact that The People went against the mandates handed down by their legislators and exercised their right to smack them down with a big ol’ veto.

On another network, the Maine ban on gay marriage was mentioned briefly, and the commentator (from Politico.com, I believe) was asked if that reflected the opinions of the rest of the country. His dismissive reply was that Maine has always been “kind of odd, and fiercely independent.”

It’s been voted down thirty-one times, dink. That’s neither odd nor independent.

The newscaster asked another leading question: “Do you think this vote means the issue has been laid to rest?” My immediate reaction was: Fuck, no. The gay lobby will keep forcing vote after vote after vote until they get the results they want. They’re like that little kid who keeps shouting “Do over! Do over!” when they lose. I understand the dangers of the Tyranny of the Majority, but neither can 3% of the population force the remaining 97% into a mindset they don’t hold already.

Unless you get them stoned, first.

Exhausting Meals and Shady Talent

2009-11-03T14:10:00.003-05:00

Apparently our newest employee is a hummingbird. He’s one of these people that won’t (or can’t) look you in the eyes when he’s talking to you, and is constantly twitching around to look at other stuff. As we conversed over lunch, he appeared to be offering his observations to the table next to us, the plant in the corner, the television on the wall…anywhere but the guy across from him who’d asked the original question. Damn, dude…my autistic Cub makes more eye contact than you.

Now, I tend to focus on people’s mouths when they’re speaking, like I’m reading the words as they’re spoken. I’m sure it’s discomfiting, so I make an specific effort to meet their eyes often. Can’t do that if they’re not meeting yours, though. I put a damn crick in my neck trying to keep a sightline established. I’m surprised I didn’t choke on my cheeseburger.

Don’t think I’ll be having lunch with Spaz the Bobblehead again anytime soon; it was exhausting, and I don’t want to work that hard over a casual meal.

In other Business news, my boss and I were discussing Dubious Abilities, like being the best assassin, or the fastest thief. You can take pride in it because you’re the best, but you can’t really brag about it because it’s “not polite” or “illegal.” I’m sure there are certain circles in which you’d receive your due acknowledgement, but it kind of kills the chit-chat before the church service starts. “Oh me? I perfected a method of cheating the house in Roulette. What’d you do this week?”

Someone doesn't watch the Discovery Channel

2009-11-01T10:45:00.003-05:00

Now that I'm working at a sign company, I've become hyperaware of the signage different businesses use, particularly on their vehicles. I saw a truck the other day that had a zebra stripe pattern printed down the sides. On the back was their company motto: We Stand Out.

Nevermind the fact that the stripes on zebras help them blend together into one amorphous mass to confuse predators, which is the diametrical opposite of "standing out."

In a perfect world, I could go to these people and tell them exactly where they went wrong between concept and execution, at which point they'd smack their forehead comically, say "Oh my gosh you're right!", and give me a big check.

I don't expect that to happen anytime soon.

Fear Not

2009-08-10T16:00:00.002-05:00

I am still alive, dear readers. The heat and the economy have conspired to dampen my enthusiasm for keeping the blog updated, but I've got stuff percolating.

To be continued...

The Dead Pool

2009-06-28T17:45:00.003-05:00

Ed McMahon

Farrah Fawcett

Michael Jackson

Billy Mays

Yet Amy Winehouse still lives.

I think the whole "shuffling off this mortal coil" system is broken, but I don't know who to complain to.

Competing Statistics

2009-06-28T17:41:00.004-05:00

The majority of Americans are overweight.

The majority of Americans are unhappy.

Shouldn't we be getting jollier?

Too much effort

2009-06-28T17:38:00.002-05:00

It's absolutely amazing how much garbage six people generate every day. I'm glad we don't recycle; it'd be a pain in the ass to sort through all that.

Just a nitpick, because I have the time

2009-06-28T17:36:00.003-05:00

When shows portray characters manually blowing up balloons, which then proceed to float (the balloons, not the characters).

My Dad can...

2009-06-28T17:33:00.001-05:00

Is there anything more tiring/terrifying than trying to live up to the absolute faith of your children?

Uh...yeah.

2009-06-28T17:29:00.003-05:00

I need to make better notes. I jotted down some ideas for stories a couple of weeks ago, and recently looked over the list again. Some of them are absolutely opaque to me now. They're like that dream you absolutely know you won't forget that's gone before you get into the shower.

Spell Cheque

2009-06-28T17:24:00.003-05:00

More editorial lapses on the popular fiction front. I saw several instances of "then" being used instead of "than," as in "I get paid more then you." I also ran into the verb "lightening" in a description of a thunderstorm - "jagged bolts of lightening."

Sigh.

No Stomach for It

2009-06-28T17:21:00.004-05:00

I caught a sliver of "Yo Gabba Gabba" the other day. The creatures were eating breakfast, and the camera had shots of the healthy food singing happily about joining the "party in the tummy." One of the characters was shown to have three stomachs. Good attention to detail, but kind of creepy.

Driver's License to Kill

2009-06-28T17:17:00.003-05:00

I'm now one up on Ted Kennedy, in that I've killed two living creatures with my car. The first was a frog that just chose the wrong moment to leave the creek. The other was a crow, which was unusual for a couple of reasons. Firstly, the crows in the mountains are very used to tourist traffic, and usually fly off long before you get to them. Secondly, they're always warning each other Cah! Cah!

#2 pencils

2009-06-28T17:15:00.002-05:00

We gave Kitten her end-of-year test, and she knocked it out of the park. We feel both justified and relieved in our decision to homeschool.

Judging by covers

2009-06-28T17:14:00.002-05:00

There's a book out called Norse Code, apparently involving the search for the scions of Odin by tracing their genetic markers. While there is great potential for silliness, that is an awesome title.

They just melt away!

2009-06-28T17:12:00.004-05:00

I found a diet that really works: Take a 3 1/2-year-old autistic kid to the mountains (make sure you have permission, first); turn him loose among the ridges and valleys for six to eight hours a day; follow him wherever he goes.

Don't Even Blink

2009-06-28T17:03:00.003-05:00

Speaking of the Disney Channel, "Phineas & Ferb" is an awesome little cartoon. Great premise, solid characters, and just the right amount of silliness. Plus, every episode has a nifty musical number, like the one below.

The setup: P&F always build some wild contraption in their yard, and their sister keeps trying to bust them. But something always happens to the thing before she can get their parents to see it. In this episode, she's ordered everyone to keep an eye on it until the parents get home so it can't just disappear.

The House of Mouse

2009-06-28T17:00:00.003-05:00

Thanks to Kitten, I've been subjected to so much Disney Channel programming, I can not only identify the individual Jonas brothers, I've formed opinions about them.

Kevin: Nice guy, but will always be a supporting player (either on screen or on stage).

Nick: The talented one. Should go solo at the earliest opportunity.

Joe: Will probably come out of the closet soon after their Disney contract expires.

Idle Irritation

2009-06-28T16:58:00.002-05:00

I always know when I've been idle too long, because the weirdest things start getting on my nerves.

Stupid letter "X."

My Brain Hurts

2009-06-28T16:56:00.004-05:00

The Urban Mythology/Chick-Lit crossover genre must be stopped. Seriously. Failing that, can we get a list of standards or something?

The affinity for dirt

2009-06-28T16:54:00.003-05:00

Cub proved once again that he's all boy. After four straight days of 90-degree weather, he found the one remaining mud puddle and promptly wallowed in it.

I redial, therefore I am.

2009-06-28T16:52:00.002-05:00

Nothing makes you feel like a non-entity faster than people who won't return your voice mails.

All aboard. But is it all above board?

2009-06-28T16:50:00.002-05:00

If you run a kiddie coaster in a traveling carnival, don't encourage the stereotypes by naming it the "Lolita Express."

Just when you thought it was safe to go back online

2009-06-28T16:46:00.002-05:00

Did you miss me?

Sorry for the extended absence, Gentle Readers, but we were computerless for a while. What follows will be a series of mini posts so I can catch up on my average.

Even though these will be short blurbs about whatever crosses my mind, I still have no desire to Twitter. Take that, new media!

A very cool word of the day

2009-06-08T22:02:00.002-05:00

tergiversation \tuhr-jiv-uhr-SAY-shuhn\, noun
1. The act of practicing evasion or of being deliberately ambiguous.
2. The act of abandoning a party or cause.

Tergiversation comes from Latin tergiversatus, past participle of tergiversari, "to turn one's back, to shift," from tergum, "back" + versare, frequentative of vertere, "to turn." The verb form is tergiversate.

I really can’t wait to use this word in a casual conversation; it has wonderful prosody. I know it’s a soft “G” sound in the second syllable, but when I look at it, I hear Gene Wilder saying “Sed-a-give?!”, and that makes me happy.

Words like this make me glad we're making Kitten study Latin.

Press 1P

2009-06-07T21:52:00.002-05:00

We were out the other day, and I saw a woman texting. Nothing too special about that, except this woman was texting faster than most people type, and she didn’t have a QWERTY keyboard, either.

Watching her, I flashed back to my formative years in the 80s, particularly the time spent in the local arcade, where we would gather around someone who had memorized all the Gauntlet patterns, or had achieved communion with Galaga. It was our generation’s version of Pinball Wizard.

We had an awesome arcade at our mall. They always had the latest games, and gave you plenty of warning when a game was about to be retired, so if it was your favorite you could make your peace. In fact, they would usually place a card on the console announcing that if you could beat a certain score, you would win the game. It was brilliant marketing. We would play those games for hours, hoping we’d soon have it loaded up on a truck to take home. I had no doubt that if I had Tron:Deadly Discs or Joust in my bedroom, I’d’ve been real popular with the ladies. Nevermind that the male/female ratio in the arcade was always 99/whoops-this-isn’t-Claire’s. It was all the flashing lights; I wasn’t thinking clearly.

And of course, that was always the complaint of the parents and school marms. “These kids today…spending all their time hypnotized in the game room instead of studying at the library.” They were just jealous that no one ever placed a quarter on a copy of Moby Dick to “call” it after the current reader finished. Our arcade also ran specials where you could bring in your report cards and get free games for every A and B you earned. Straight As got you $20 in games, if I recall correctly.

Remember the Dragon’s Lair bubble gum cards? Each set had scenes from the different parts of the game, and on the back it would tell you how to get through that scene. Those were cool. I probably spent $400 trying to get the Dragon card. That’s in addition to the $400 I probably spent playing the actual game. I held on to my first Mac computer long after it became useless for anything else solely because I had a copy of Dragon’s Lair that was formatted for it.

Having a personal game system is nice (Atari 2600 represent!), as is being able to MMORPG from anywhere in the world, but it’s a shame that it seems the time of the standalone arcade has passed. Anytime you see them nowadays, they’re tucked away in the corner of some pizza buffet place. It's weird going back to that mall now, because they remodeled it some years back, and the section that held the arcade isn't there anymore.

Anyone have change for a dollar? And a time machine?

You know you’re a parent when

2009-06-07T21:51:00.001-05:00

you can identify which piece of furniture is being abused just from the sound the boy’s plastic “carrot” bat makes when it hits.

Dear France

2009-06-05T22:06:00.003-05:00

We are very interested in speaking with you about the following quote:

"Maître Damien Celice, a lawyer for TF1, had warned the supreme court during the hearing that 'there would be no more reality TV in France' if the contestants were given work contracts."

Specifically, we wish to solicit your advice on how we might achieve the same results.

Sincerely,

American Television Audiences

http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/tv_and_radio/article6424331.ece

Cheers & Jeers

2009-06-05T21:56:00.002-05:00

Cheers to: Verizon
for their excellent customer service in transitioning from old phones to new (much more powerful) ones.

Jeers to: Verizon
for making me repurchase my favorite ringtones when I know they have the ability to transfer them.

Why Does Disney Hate Breasts?

2009-06-05T00:28:00.002-05:00

Poor Disney. All they want to do is take sweet, innocent girls, make them famous, and wring every last drop of marketing out of them until they’re too old – around 16 or so. Their latest creations are Demi Lovato and Selena Gomez (oh, and Miley…somebody or other). Having a Kitten smack-dab in the middle of the targeted demographic for the Disney parabolic mirror means that we see more than our fair share of these tween queens.

So Kitten was watching Wizards of Waverly Place the other day, and there was a scene where the parents were attending a school function. I noticed in passing what I thought was a smear on the television screen (not uncommon in our household), and started to clean it off. Turns out, they had pixilated Mom’s cleavage.

Now, you’d think that a Disney wardrobe designer working on a Disney show produced at a Disney studio for the Disney Channel might have thought at some point: Hmmm…the actress playing Mom is fairly well-developed; maybe I should eschew the V-necked sweater. But no. They go with the more expensive technical fix. Funny thing is, they just made it more obvious by doing that. You think that was their plan all along?

Speaking of expensive technical fixes, before releasing Herbie Fully Loaded, someone at Disney noticed that Lindsay Lohan had boobs, so they decided to digitally reduce her bust size throughout the movie. This wasn’t apparent during shooting?

I think this is one reason the former Disney princesses go into full tart mode once they’re out from under their contracts. Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera are prime examples (along with Miss Lohan). Anne Hathaway went from Princess Diaries to nude scenes in Havoc and Brokeback Mountain (of course, her costar, Julie Andrews, did the same in S.O.B.), even Hilary Duff started going out dressed entirely in black leather after Lizzie McGuire wrapped.

I’m really surprised this is the same company that allowed Jessica Rabbit to appear on screen, but on the other hand, Disney’s animated princesses are usually pushing the décolletage.

In Fantasia’s “Pastoral Symphony” segment, the centaurs’ breasts are always obscured or covered, but If you look quickly during the “Night on Bald Mountain” sequence, you’ll notice that the harpies are bare-breasted (they don’t have nipples, though). So…breasts are evil? Is that Disney’s message?

Too much weirdness for me to puzzle out. I’ll stick to Phineas and Ferb. Not only is it really funny, but Richard O’Brien does the voice of the dad.

So let’s do the Time Warp again.

My Self-Serving Law

2009-06-04T23:13:00.002-05:00

I think our governor, being a good little Democrat, would want to deliver on her party’s promises to improve the economy. With that in mind, I humbly suggest the following legislation:

Any business advertising an open position MUST FILL THAT POSITION, or be fined the equivalent of a year’s salary for that position.

I’m getting heartily sick of sending in résumés, only to be told during the follow-up call “Oh, we decided to hold off on hiring anyone right now; we’re just collecting applications.” What a fucking waste of time and energy. I can understand if someone else got the job; it’s an employer’s market right now. But to jerk everybody around? I hope your industry is the next domino to fall.

I’m also getting irritated by the lack of return calls. That’s not just basic business protocol, that’s good etiquette in general.

A buddy of mine got called in for two interviews at one company, and when the phone call came in, he was told they’d eliminated the slot entirely. What the fuck? You obviously have a need for someone, or you wouldn’t have started the whole process. And then you change your mind? Not only are you not going to hire anyone, you’re eliminating that space on the Org chart completely?

I’m fervently hoping that this recession will trim out a lot of the dead (read that: complacent) wood that’s been cluttering up our economic infrastructure. Maybe we’ll see a return to something resembling good customer service.

And maybe there’ll be a unicorn in my garage tomorrow morning, too.

Boys and their toys

2009-06-04T22:51:00.002-05:00

Every so often, I see a complaint from an administrative-type person – usually in a school setting – about how children should be treated equally. On the surface, that seems fine, but then they usually blow it by trying to create curriculums or play activities that don’t differentiate between boys and girls, and that’s stupid.

I always wonder how these people could forget their own childhoods. I’m fairly certain that administrative types aren’t hatched out of some big pod farm in Iowa (though that would explain a lot), so you’d assume they’d remember that between 6th grade and graduating from high school, they developed at a different rate than everybody else. It’s called puberty.

With so many physical differences becoming evident during those turbulent years, is it really that much of a stretch to think that perhaps boys and girls are different mentally, as well? Girls are more nurturing, while boys are more destructive; girls are more patient, while boys are more destructive; girls are more engaging, while boys are…you get the idea.

This occurred to me recently when we went to the store. I distracted Cub by taking him over to the toy aisles so Mrs. Cat could shop in peace, and he headed straight for the weapons. Usually he goes for the toy cars and trucks (which is pretty standard for autistic kids), but this time, he wanted to be armed. I guess he read my last few posts.

See, none of his favorite shows are military in nature; everybody gets along and talks out their problems, so it can only be some deep-seated brainstem function tied into the Y-chromosome that drove him to take a weapon to hand. It satisfied some primal urge.

We ended up getting him a small foam sword, and he’s had a hell of a good time assaulting us all with it. He’s even got a pretty decent technique – at least a +2 for attack and +1 for defense. I’m currently trying to teach him Conan’s mantra:

“To defeat your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentations of their women.”

Should make preschool more interesting.

We got the tools; we got the talent

2009-06-04T00:05:00.001-05:00

You can spend thousands of dollars in acquiring hundreds of pounds of gear for every conceivable situation. Good luck carrying it all. As I’ve stated before, the trick is to make your gear as multi-functional as possible. It’s not just a hammock; it’s also a fishing net and a source for lengths of rope. It’s not just a garbage bag; it’s a tarp, ground cloth, rain slicker, wound sealer and water heater.

The way to build a good kit is to take it in stages, from bare minimum survival to all the comforts of home. You’re shooting for something in between, but closer to the “bare minimum” end of the spectrum.

The Rule of Threes
A handy rule of thumb is the rule of threes. You can survive:

· three minutes without air
· three hours (in severe weather) without shelter
· three days without water
· three weeks without food

This list should guide you in building your kit. A ballpoint pen case, for example, could serve as an emergency tracheotomy tube (you probably ought to read up on it first, though).

So, shelter, water and food. Off the top of my head, you should have, at minimum:

· a sturdy tarp and/or a few large trash bags
· a couple of those metallic “heat blankets” (not the cheap ones; they disintegrate too easily)
· 550 cord (parachute cord). Many suppliers weave them into bracelets or belts for easy carrying.
· compass
· fire-making supplies
· a Sierra cup
· whistle and unbreakable mirror (for signaling)
· fishing line and hooks
· duct tape (flatten it)
· Swiss Army knife or Leatherman tool
· small first-aid kit (including a suture kit)

All of that will fit into a gallon-sized Ziploc bag. Once you’ve got those, you can start adding to it as you like. I’d throw in a few carabiners, a fixed-blade knife, maps, a hand-towel, a sturdy liter-size water bottle, small-gauge wire, surgical-grade rubber tubing, a pencil, a hand-cranked LED flashlight, a small tin pot, a small wire rack, a plastic trowel, a tube tent, and a survival handbook. All of that will still fit into a daypack. Adding too much more starts trading off between creature comforts and maneuverability.

How do you get to Carnegie Hall?
Don’t wait until the bombs drop or the plague sweeps the country before you use any of this stuff. Camp with it. Pack everything you think you might want to have along “In Case Of” and hit the trails. A couple of season’s worth of campouts, and you’ll narrow your selection down automatically. You’ll find what’s worthwhile and what’s useless extra weight. If camping isn’t feasible for you, play in your back yard. A bow drill is simple, but it still takes practice to get it to work.

Well, I can’t think of anything else at the moment, so maybe that has cleared out enough space in my head for some other topics. Hope you found it useful, or at least entertaining. Have fun building your kit.

I’ll see you in the aftermath.

The “Oops” Diet

2009-06-03T21:50:00.002-05:00

So you got lost, and your weekend campout is now on its second weekend, or panicked looters cleaned out the local Piggly Wiggly, and you didn’t get any of those canned peaches you were counting on. Fear not. Fortunately, you can go without food for about three weeks. It won’t be pleasant, and it will affect your energy and judgment, but it won’t kill you outright until then, so you have some time to forage.

Teach a man to fish
It always amuses me to see fly fishermen with their two-hundred dollar reels and massive collections of hand-tied flies. They get all dressed up in their catalog gear and lug the forty-pound tackle box to the nearest river. To do battle with fish. Sorry, guys, but a survival situation doesn’t lend itself to your romantic recreation of A River Runs Through It.

If you’re lucky enough to have a body of water nearby, you can catch fish all day long with a minimum of effort at the beginning. If you didn’t think to pack fish hooks in your kit (why not?), small twigs can be woven into a fish basket (or if you’re scrabbling through the wreckage of civilization, try to find some chicken wire). Anything that will let water pass through but trap fish can be sunk into a river to collect food as you tend to other needs. You can even build a series of small fences to guide fish into a shallow pool. You can also string a fishing line (or dental floss!) from bank to bank, with a number of different lines pointed downstream. The water flowing past will make the bait bounce convincingly. Check the lines occasionally and replace bait as needed. There’s a nifty little gadget called a Yo Yo fishing reel that you mount on an overhanging branch. When a fish takes the bait, it has a spring-powered action that sets the hook for you.

Waiter! I made a soup out of flies.
If you don’t have a body of water nearby, you can always eat the bait yourself. Insects are nothing but protein on legs. Anything with six legs is safe to eat (though not necessarily easier). The best way to overcome the squirm-factor is to kill the bugs and let them dry a bit, then grind them into a powder and mix it into your water. Not pleasant, but it beats starving to death.

Kentucky Fried Squirrel
Do you have your dental floss or small-gauge wire? Good. Learn how to set a few simple snares. If it walks or flies it can feed you and, like the fishing, it’s something you can set and forget while you do other things like fix your shelter or find more firewood. If you want to duct-tape your big hunting knife to a limb and attempt to bring down a deer, by all means go for it. Make sure you have plenty of other food sources, though…just in case the deer manages to outrun you in the woods. The simplest way to field dress any mammal is: remove the head and limbs; cut straight down from the neck to the crotch (being careful not to nick the intestines); pull the skin off; spread the rib cage and scoop out the organs (unless you enjoy organ meat); stoke up the fire.

Vegetarians be damned
Unless you are absolutely, positively, 200% sure about plant identification, don’t even attempt to forage for greens as a food source. Most wild plants either have no nutritional content at all, contain dangerous symbiotes, or are outright poisonous to humans. Seriously. Don’t do it.

You keep mentioning all this gear, 'Cat; what should I carry?

Good question.

Not a drop to drink

2009-06-03T01:27:00.003-05:00

How much water should you carry with you on the trail or on the run? It depends. If you’re moderately to highly active, you need between 1.5 and 2.5 liters of water per day. That’s just drinking water, too, not including what you’ll want for cooking, cleaning, etc. Now, water’s heavy, weighing almost 8 ½ pounds per gallon. Carrying that weight gets real old real fast on a hike, trust me. It’s much better to carry just a liter bottle, hike near water sources and have treatment methods to hand.

Toil and Trouble
These days, you can get all kinds of fancy filtration systems – UV wands, straws with filters, pumps with filters, drip-filter bottles, etc. The problem with all those, though, is that they either have a ton of parts, or don’t give you any indication as to when they’ve stopped working. Chlorine droplets are another method people like to use, and it’s very effective. Personally, I never could get the dosage right and always ended up throwing it out because it tasted terrible. I’ve since learned that you can add chlorine a few drops at a time to filtered water (cloth-filtered, not charcoal, though there are instructions for making your own charcoal filters if you want to be really hardcore), shake it, let it sit a while, and give it a sniff test. If you can’t smell chlorine, it’s still hazardous. The reason being that there were more microbes than chlorine molecules in the water, so the chlorine was completely used up. You want the opposite, so if there’s a faint chlorine odor to the water, the microbes are all dead and it’s safe to drink (and probably tastes a lot better, too). I think I’ll stick to boiling, though. Some people complain about the flat taste of boiled water, but all you have to do is shake it up to take care of that.

It’s not like water just falls from the sky
So it hasn’t rained in a while, and you’re thirsty. Find a stick with three prongs, like the letter Y. The short prongs should be about six to eight inches long, while the long one should be about two feet long. Hold the stick by the short prongs and turn in a circle. While you’re turning in the circle, look for a waterfall, garden hose, or car wash, because you have a better chance of finding water that way than relying on the dowsing bullshit. If you’re serious about finding water, walk downhill; you’ll find it eventually. Know why? Because water flows downhill (unless you’re in a Doc Savage novel).

Another neat way of collecting water is called a solar still, and there are several variations. Look it up, I’m not going to explain it all here. Not only does it generate water, but as the name implies, the water you get from it is pure.

Basically, if you’re not in the desert, you have no excuse for not having enough water. And if you are in the desert, you can still find water. Run across a dry riverbed? Dig down at the outside bank for a better chance to find damp soil or even pockets of water. See a tree or animals in the distance? Chances are, there’s water nearby. You might even have dew on the ground in the morning. To quote Heathers: "Lick it up, baby." Darker patches on a sandstone cliff may indicate water. Lava and limestone are porous, and may contain hidden pools. It’s not easy, but it’s not impossible, either.

Oh, and if it’s winter, or you’re above a snowline, remember that it’s about a ten-to-one ratio of snow to water. So if you plan to melt snow down to fill your liter bottle, you’ll need ten bottle’s worth of snow.

So after a hard day’s work of finding a clear route, building a shelter, starting a fire, and collecting water, you’ve probably worked up an appetite. What’s for dinner?

Man’s Red Flower

2009-06-03T00:07:00.003-05:00

You a fan of Disney’s Jungle Book?

You can’t survive without fire (and if I hope I don’t have to explain why), so you need several methods of starting one. One of America’s pre-eminent survivalists, Tom Brown, Jr., teaches seventeen different ways of starting fires in his classes. His books are interesting reading, and you can find a bunch of his articles online. Those water-proof, wind-proof, strike-anywhere matches sure are nifty, but you can buy a five-pack of Bic lighters for a dollar. That’ll give you between 5,000 and 7,500 fires, or a fire per day up to twenty years. Keep them wrapped up in a Ziploc bag, and you’re golden. Even if they do get wet, just wait until the flint dries out and they’ll work just fine. Again, though, that shouldn’t be your only method of starting a fire. Pack a small plastic magnifying glass, too, and/or a flint & steel striker. You can also buy small blocks of magnesium to use in wet weather. (You scrape flakes onto your pile of tinder; don’t throw the whole thing in there.) You might want to bone up on the old “rubbing two sticks together” method as well.

When Mrs. Cat and I watched Cast Away, I impressed her by critiquing Hanks’ method of fire-starting. My suggestion was to tie one of the laces from an ice skate to each end of the skate, and twist a stick into the loop once. Using half a coconut shell to provide a pivot at the top of the stick (and protect your hand as you apply pressure), you could then draw the ice skate back and forth (like bowing a stand-up bass), which would spin the piece of wood much faster than by hand, and produce an ember more quickly. As you can imagine, this contraption is called a bow drill. It’s relatively untested technology, having been used for only about 7,000 years, but you may find it worthwhile to know how to make one.

Tinder-hearted
Having an ember is like carrying a soap bubble. It’s pretty, but it ain’t gonna be around for long. You need to get it onto some tinder. Small wood fibers or bits of bark are good. Cotton balls are excellent. The fuzzy parts of cat-tail plants work well, as do dead grasses and leaves. You can collect them as you travel (except for maybe the cotton balls, unless you’re in the South) and carry them in a shirt pocket; your body heat will dry them out nicely. The way to build a fire is small to large. Tinder first, then twigs, small branches, large branches, and finally, logs.

Home is where the hearth is
You’ll want to keep the fire from spreading, so make a fire ring out of stones. You can also place a flat stone upright on the side of the fire away from you in order to reflect heat back towards you. If you’re lucky enough to shelter against a stone wall (natural or artificial), sleep between the fire and the wall, as it acts as a reflector as well.

Note: Do NOT use rocks from a river or wet ground to build your fire ring. The moisture in them can flash into steam, causing them to explode. You don’t want to take shrapnel because you had a hankering for s’mores.

My favorite kind of campfire is the “lazy man’s fire.” Once you’ve got a blaze going, you place just the ends of your bigger pieces of wood in the flames. As they’re consumed, push them in further. It stays small, is easily controlled, and can be doused quickly if necessary.

Should I advertise?
If you want to be found (when lost in the wilderness, for example), build a fire and use greenery to make it smoke. If it’s a humid day and the smoke’s not rising, three fires in a triangle is the international distress sign. If you don’t want to be found (by mutant cannibals, for example), there are ways to build hidden fires not easily seen at night. In a cave is the first choice, as long as it’s not already occupied by an angry bear, pissed-off rattlesnakes, or mutant cannibals. If you don’t have a cave handy, you can try this Air Force-recommended method: dig two holes about elbow deep, approximately a foot or so apart. Diameter is up to you, but I’d estimate no larger than a two-liter bottle or small coffee can. Dig a tunnel that connects these two holes. Build your fire in one hole and light it by reaching through the tunnel. Keep it small, and you should go undetected. Be careful, though, mutant cannibals have a keen sense of smell.

Bile
This is how people in the Appalachian Mountains say “boil.” You may have heard that you should boil your water for five or ten minutes to make sure it’s sterile. You’re just wasting time if you do that. Think about this, your body starts killing off invaders (viruses and bacteria) by raising your temperature to around 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Water boils at 212 degrees Fahrenheit (at sea level). If it hits a boil, you’re good to go. And don't worry if you're not at sea level. Water boils in Denver (the mile-high city) at approximately 202 degrees. If your water boils at less than 100 degrees, you're almost in the stratosphere, and viruses are certainly the least of your worries.

So where are we getting all this water, anyway? Stay tuned.

Getting there is half the fun

2009-06-02T22:08:00.002-05:00

I’m still in an apocalyptic frame of mind since that last post, so bear with me as I exorcise. I’m going to break this out into discrete categories to try and impose some sort of order on the swirling mass of tidbits I’ve accumulated over the years. The legal department requires me to state that this is by no means a complete survival guide. People way more paranoid than this cat have put together much more complete sites, so find one of those.

Location, location, location
Whether you’re hiking in the backcountry or fleeing the zombie horde, the most important part of any plan is to know where you want to end up. For instance, we know that if we ever have to make a run for it, we’re heading to Mama Cat’s place in the mountains. It’s ideal for a number of reasons:

· everyone there is family
· well water, with a spring-fed reservoir as a…well…a reserve
· gas heat, with wood-burning stoves and timber for when the gas runs out
· only one road in – dynamite two bridges and you’re cut off from vehicular traffic
· woods full of game and a river full of fish
· several large gardens, with a smattering of chicken coops
· one family member has a full machine shop beside his house
· a water-powered grist mill nearby

So you see, it’s a pretty good place to hunker down (and no, I won’t tell you where it is). But as I stated, you have to have a plan for getting there. Usually, whenever I picture “The End Of Civilization As We Know It,” I imagine my car will be useless due to the massive gridlock on our highways and byways, so what would ordinarily be a few hours’ drive turns into a month-long trek (or more).

Get the right maps
Your Rand-McNally isn’t going to help if you have to trailblaze, so pick up a backcountry map that covers the area you’ll be travelling through. Personally, I’d add a railway map, too, because you may want to follow the tracks as a compromise between joining the throngs on I-95 and pulling a Lewis & Clark 2.0.

Get a good compass
Your maps are useless if you don’t know how to orient them, so buy a good compass and learn how to use it. This is coming from a Cat with the directional sense of your average piece of drywall. I like the ones that have a built-in scale, while friends of mine prefer those with the pop-up sight. Learn how to find the North Star, but don’t plan on being able to see the sun or stars on any given day. And certainly don’t rely on that “moss on a tree” nonsense. Just for fun, I checked five trees at random: two had no moss, one had moss facing southeast, one had moss facing due west, and one had moss completely encircling the trunk, so…not that handy.

But ‘Cat, I hear you say, I have a brand new GPS accurate to within ten feet. Why can’t I just use that? You can, of course. I have one, too, but I’m not going to rely on just that. Plus, if it’s an emergency situation, I don’t want to be lugging fourteen pounds of batteries. Since my Doomsday Scenarios generally involve total Grid loss, I tend to overlook things like cell phones and other electrical devices. It’s halfway intentional. You’ll find that the two most common themes in the survival genre are redundancy and flexibility. The gear you carry should have multiple uses, and you should think creatively in using it. More on that later.

It ain’t the Ritz, but it’ll do
While you’re travelling, you’ll need shelter. If you’re sticking close to the remains of civilization, you’ll have your pick of abandoned vehicles, outbuildings and homes to choose from. If you’re out in the wilderness, you may want to blend in with your surroundings. Sure…a tent’s nice. So’s a 35-foot Pace Arrow motor home. Lacking either, you should have a few more tricks up your sleeve. If you don’t know how to build a lean-to at the very least, be sure to carry really good gear. That way, the next person to happen along the same way will find some useful stuff on your corpse. The secret to a natural shelter is to think small. There should be just enough room for you to crawl into it. That way, your body heat will be sufficient to keep it warm. And forget what the environmentally-minded say about only using dead wood. You don’t want your shelter to be made out of the same stuff you’re burning nearby, understand? One shift in the wind, and the next person to happen along the same way will find only slag.

Whether the weather is cold
You can get a small thermometer that attaches to a zipper, but why? You know if you’re too cold or too hot. Dress in layers to easily regulate your core temperature. Know what the signs of hypothermia and heat stroke are. Don’t worry about getting rained on unless you’re already cold. Easy ways to forecast the weather: look at the smoke from your campfire - hugging the ground, there’s a lot of moisture in the air; rising easily, it’s not likely to rain. If the deciduous trees are turning their leaves over, rain’s on the way. A ring around the sun or the moon means rain or snow is on the way. If you get caught out in a deluge or blizzard, the fastest way to warm up if you’re dangerously cold is to drink heated water. The fastest way to cool off (if there’s no handy stream or pond) is to pour water on yourself. You’re going to want to use clean water, though, and that means fire.

We’ll play with that next.

Apocalypso

2009-05-26T22:56:00.002-05:00

Apocalyptic stories are always popular. I think the reason for their popularity is that people want to think they’d be a survivor. Talking about the purely fictional stories, here. The religious ones are usually more depressing – whether it’s the Hell on Earth immediately following the Christian Rapture, or the total destruction of everything as foretold by the Norse Ragnarok. I’d like to note the whole 2012 thing from the Mayans, but researchers (and crackpots) disagree as to whether it will be a good or bad thing.

I’ve noticed that a lot of post-apocalypse stories have a very industrial feel to them, which is kind of ironic considering we’d lose our industrial base immediately. It always annoys me when a writer sets the story far enough in the future that modern-day technologies are puzzled over when the remnants are found (It says ”Pan…a…son…ic.” What does it mean?), but people are still driving around in gasoline-powered automobiles.

Another cliché is that we’d return to a feudal/agrarian society. The agrarian I’ll grant, but I have doubts about the feudal system taking root in America, even after everything falls over and goes squick. I figure cities will become No Man’s lands – the refuge of scattered groups protecting their rooftop gardens and rain barrels, while small rural towns will dynamite their bridges or otherwise barricade themselves in. Bartering will become the norm, and xenophobia will be seen as a rational worldview.

The Postman, The Stand, The Road Warrior, Jericho – they all use the end of civilization as their starting point, and they all approach it differently. Brin’s Postman brings hope to suspicious, insular townspeople, while King allowed his survivors to restore the power grids before Good fought Evil. The Road Warrior didn’t even try to be anything other than a popcorn romp. I enjoyed Jericho because the writers did a good job exploring the problems (technical, social, and otherwise) involved with a town suddenly cut off from their entire support structure (i.e. everyone else).

One of my favorite books on the subject is Lucifer’s Hammer, by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle. Two scenes that stand out in my mind: the diabetic scientist who collects (and hides) engineering books and Chilton manuals to increase his worth, so he can convince a township to let him have a valuable pig or goat every month in order to make the insulin he needs; the Boy Scouts that become guerrilla fighters who prefer to stay in the mountains rather than join any of the towns.

Sometimes, when I’m mowing the lawn or washing dishes or doing some other repetitive, brain-neutral task, I think of the different types of people you might run into in a post-apocalyptic world. The military would probably be the only governmental agency to come through fairly intact, because they already have the infrastructure in place to function in other-than-first-world conditions.

Then you’d have the paranoid survivalists who have been preparing for just such an occasion, and have stockpiled food, water, medicine and toilet paper. I think we’d probably lose about 5% of them in the first week because they’d be picked off while they were gloating.

If, for whatever reason, we did end up as a feudal society, expect the D&D and SCA nerds to rise to the top, because they’re already used to working within that framework. The Scadians in particular have studied the Dark Ages closely, and have developed skills that aren’t dependent on electricity.

Similar to the diabetic scientist mentioned above, I imagine reference librarians would be in demand, just for their knowledge base. Similarly, chemists and medical personnel would be sought after. On the opposite end of the spectrum, gossip columnists and American Idol “celebrities” would become food.

Farmers would find themselves targeted by desperate, short-sighted people, and we’d probably lose most of them to mob action.

That’s all just off the top of my head. It would take a much larger canvas than this blog to explore all of the ramifications.

Of course, you have to wonder how you would fare in “Year Zero.” A friend who read my comment a few days ago about snaring birds and rabbits called to chortle at me, because she thought I had no skills in that area. I assured her that I had plenty of dental floss.

If you understand that last comment, you’ll probably be among the survivors. For the rest of you, I’ll explain.

Dental floss is one of the most useful filaments in the world because of its high tensile strength. It can replace a shoelace, slice cheese, serve as heavy-duty thread, and replace Teflon plumbing tape. You can braid it into an extremely strong rope (a few years ago, a Washington prisoner escaped by scaling the prison wall on a dental floss rope), hang pictures with it, replace a broken zipper pull, or even clean your teeth with it.

In addition to all of the everyday uses, dental floss is also a vital part to any post-apocalyptic survival kit, as it makes a great fishing line, suture thread, tripwire, garrote, or small animal snare.

My Scout troop once went on a “Shoebox Campout.” As the name implies, all of the gear we carried (apart from food) had to fit inside one shoebox. That will prioritize you in a hurry, and force you to think creatively. It also serves as a pretty good model for an emergency kit in case the bombs go off or the zombies arise.

There are a metric buttload of sites that offer survival packs, ranging from the outdoor enthusiast sites to the oh-my-god-we’re-all-doomed-dig-a-bunker sites. They’re all fun to browse through, though. This site

http://www.survival-gear.com/

is pretty good because they offer pre-made kits, as well as the individual pieces to build your own custom kit.

Whether it’s nukular war, alien invasion, zombie uprising, plague, or you’re just hiking in the backcountry, these kits don’t do a bit of good if you don’t know how to use them. Throw a Boy Scout manual in there, too.

Or you can just come get me.

Not What, but Who

2009-05-25T17:21:00.004-05:00

A big shout out to my peep T, who's hooking me up with a professional editor for my fiction. Instead of having to wait four months for an acknowledgement of receipt, it'll be on the guy's desk tomorrow.

Verily, T, thou dost rock.

Another Million-Dollar Idea

2009-05-25T17:16:00.005-05:00

It's one of those doggie-door or paper clip ideas; the kind that seems so obvious once someone has put it out there.

Wouldn't it be handy if your cooking pots had liquid measurements inscribed on their interior? That way, you could fill it directly at the sink, or pour your milk into the pot without having to mess up a separate measuring cup.

If anyone is already doing this, don't tell me. I'd like to think I was first.

Thanks.

Unfortunately, there's no rule against stupidity.

2009-05-24T19:43:00.004-05:00

Mama Cat is visiting, and I was dispatched to a pharmacy today in order to pick up a supply of needles for her. She's diabetic, and had forgotten to grab her pack from home while she was loading the car.

Imagine my surprise when I was told I couldn't buy them.

Me: Hi. I need a pack of this type of needle, please. *displays the needle supplied by Mama Cat* My mother-in-law forgot to pack hers.

Drone: Sure. Do you know her birth date?

Me: Not the year. Why?

Drone: So I can look up her insulin prescription.

Me: She lives in another part of the state. She's never filled a prescription here.

Drone: Oh. Hmmm. See...we have new rules that prevent us from selling needles unless accompanied by an insulin prescription. All the pharmacies here are doing it.

Me: So she's out of luck?

Drone: I think so, yeah.

Me: That's not the best thing to say to a diabetic, you know. Any other options?

Manager Drone: If you can tell us what brand of insulin she uses, and how many units she administers per dose, we can make an exception.

Me, translating in my head: If you can prove to us that you know something about treating diabetes, we'll assume you're not going to shoot heroin into your eyeballs behind our store.

*a quick cell conversation ensues, and I get the information*

Manager Drone: Thank you. If you could just sign this register, I'll get the needles.

Me: Sure.

Manager Drone, handing me the bag: I'm sorry for the hassle, but we're trying to cut down on illegal drug use.

Me: I understand. Thank you.

Now, here's the thing: I was asked to sign a register, but at no point did anyone ask to see any ID from me. I could have written the address for Wrigley Field, and they'd been none the wiser. That's some fine security work, Lou.

Furthermore, they claim that their policy is to cut down on substance abuse, yet on my way out of the store, I passed displays full of:

· lighters and matches (used to ignite joints, pipes and bongs, and melt powdered drugs)
· spray paint and glue (huffed for a high)
· rolling papers (duh)
· spoons (used to cook powdered drugs)
· pipes (used to smoke pot and crack)
· plastic bottles (used to make water bongs)

The point is that we should spend our energy trying to prevent people from acquiring the illegal drugs to begin with, not the paraphernalia. When I was in school, one of the earrings I wore was a coke spoon attached to a French hook. Have I ever done coke? No. Besides, if heroin users can't get nice new clean needles, they'll just reuse old ones. They're not going to kick their habit because a pharmacy's board of directors makes a new rule.

Put that in your hookah and smoke it.

The Secret

2009-05-23T10:45:00.002-05:00

The reason we've defied the odds and stayed together seventeen years is that I know - without a shadow of a doubt - when civilaztion collapses, you'll be right there beside me on the porch, picking off zombies (and probably cooking up something delicious from whatever birds and rabbits I manage to snare, with a side dish cobbled together from looting forgotten gardens).

And really...what more could you ask from a partner?

Happy anniversary, Mrs. Cat.

Coming in Fall, 2010: The Honda Irony

2009-05-22T21:41:00.002-05:00

Today I saw a fat man driving a Fit. I was amused.

Wipe Out

2009-05-21T19:13:00.004-05:00

Our local grocery store has a dispenser stand next to the carts. On the stand is a tub and this sign:

Complimentary Sanitizing Wipes

Wipe down the handle of your cart to kill germs, which may cause disease.

May cause disease? Pasteur pretty much put that one to rest in the 50s. The 1850s.

We must attack someone…anyone…right now. Preferably the French.

2009-05-20T09:20:00.002-05:00

“Mr Sarkozy is pouring cold water on President Obama's efforts to recast American leadership on the world stage, depicting them as unoriginal, unsubstantial and overrated.”

"The American President's call 'to free the world of the menace of a nuclear nightmare' was hot air...It was rhetoric – not a speech on American security policy but an export model aimed at improving the image of the United States...Most of Mr Obama's proposals had already been made by the Bush administration..."

Sounds like President Sarkozy might be a Limbaugh listener.

When the French think you’re weak and meek, you have an image problem.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/world_agenda/article6098836.ece

The Write Attitude

2009-05-18T21:28:00.004-05:00

If I didn't know it would cost me customers, this would be my business logo:

This post is now done.

2009-05-17T23:26:00.002-05:00

The Finding of the Snark

2009-05-16T21:31:00.004-05:00

The internet is awesome. While there are vast hordes of single-minded, ideologically-driven morons out there, there are those who take great delight in sniping at them. Since everybody knows that arguing online is futile, your only option is to highlight idiocy, hypocrisy, and just plain annoying-as-shit behavior with the spotlight of sarcasm. It's even better if you can work in a pop culture reference or two. This is so much faster than trying to present well-reasoned arguments, list copious links, or just automatically gainsaying whatever the other person posts.

Like most internet junkies, I've been taken in by trolls. I've even been a troll once or twice (but the novelty of that soon wears off). I've learned to hold off on hitting the "Reply" button until I've seen several posts by the same person carrying their ideas further. Then I look for the weak or inconsistent spot and retrieve one of my carefully-horded LOLcats or mocking pics and let it do all the work.

I've been known to bemoan the fact that the Left in general is better at rapidly coming up with mocking or demeaning nicknames that undercut an opponent's position or gravitas. I guess when that's your only style of argument you tend to get good at it. (Ha!) However, I did see this humorous post today from someone on the Right, addressing the "torture" at Gitmo:

You can't argue with Blazing Saddles. You just can't.

Geeks bearing gifts.

2009-05-15T23:45:00.001-05:00

Mrs. Cat, being all girly and stuff, gets a number of frou-frou catalogs for things like Bath & Body elixirs and potions, pretty stationery sets, and various clothing and collectibles. She got one recently from a company that offers Victorian reproductions of all of the above, and whiled away an hour or so sitting on the couch, marking those items she’d like to have at such a time as I start treating her in the style to which she’d like to become accustomed.

I picked up the catalog earlier today to sneak a peek at the things she’d noted, thinking that maybe I’d find something with which to surprise her for our upcoming anniversary. I was browsing through it, looking for her distinctive check-marks, and kind of keeping a mental inventory of the types of things she’d picked out.

The Victorian poison ring was checked twice, so this may be the last anniversary I have to worry about it.

In amongst the furnishings and decorative pieces was a table clock. It was done in a sort of caryatid style, where the female figure was holding up the clockworks. It was labeled “Cassandra’s Clock,” which tickled me, because I could picture someone looking at it and commenting “I can’t believe the time!” I can just see the blurb on the ads for it, too:

“Perfectly accurate!”

I shared these observations with a friend who is just as much a Classical reference nerd as I am, and he pointed out that while useful, the Cassandra clock would only be able to be consulted once, and then you’d be compelled to destroy it.

So I’m not getting her that. Seems like a waste of money.

Naturally

2009-05-14T22:09:00.002-05:00

From time to time, I run across someone – usually a flavor of environmentalist – that, for whatever reason, places native people and third-world tribes on a pedestal. Usually, the reason has something to do with those people living closer to the land or in some sort of idyllic “balance” with Nature. Nevermind the fact that Native Americans practiced land-management techniques consisting of clear-cutting, massive burning, and aggressive animal culling. And let’s forget that for the most part, third-world denizens are trying like hell to grab hold of whatever amenities they can to drag themselves out of their situation. Little things like clean water, reliable power grids, and food for the day. Stuff we take for granted.

When I lived on the Cherokee reservation, I convinced the owner of the shop I worked at to stock an herbal collection, because I knew that we’d sell out every month (we did). It’s the same romanticized utopian vision at work in that case. Granted, there are herbal medicines that have been used for thousands of years, but people in clean white lab coats have studied those roots and leaves, determined which compounds were the effective ones, then extracted, purified, and synthesized them. If you have a headache, what would you rather do: chew on a willow branch (which will most likely make your headache worse), or take an aspirin? Despite what the rabid vegetarians claim, neither our dentition nor our digestive system is suited for processing raw cellulose. We are perfectly adapted, however, to working a child-safety cap (it’s the opposable thumbs that make the difference!).

See…I’m an unrepentant first-worlder, because I know that without the great strides we’ve made (particularly in the medical fields), Kitten would be a flat-footed, cross-eyed mouth-breather who, when not falling over while standing still, would be walking into walls. That’s the difference between living in a mud shack somewhere “in natural harmony,” and living in a country where you can take your child into a doctor’s office to get orthotics, eye surgery, allergy treatments, tubes in their ears, and glasses. Now, instead of knocking down the thatched roof every time she misses the door, she’ll be able to be a productive member of society.

Maybe even the one that finds that perfect balance between industrialization and Nature.

Everything’s Better with Muppets

2009-05-13T21:51:00.001-05:00

The management accepts no responsibility for the loss of childhood innocence from hearing Kermit drop the F-bomb.

***

This is a remake I would wholly support.

***

I think Rob Zombie would actually do this if asked.

Holy Hell

2009-05-12T21:03:00.005-05:00

The following picture is (choose all that apply):

1. A nudist family on Winter vacation.

2. People's Exhibit A in an upcoming court case.

3. Green Day's next album cover

4. A taxpayer-funded "art" piece.

5. Proof that people are damn fools and the Internet is forever.

6. Featuring in my nightmares for the next several weeks.

Our Sitcom Moment

2009-05-12T15:28:00.004-05:00

There was a military funeral next door this afternoon and, as is usual, they offered a 21-gun salute before playing "Taps." We knew it was coming because we'd seen the men in formation, but it still made us jump when it happened.

As the echoes of the last fusillade died out, our neighbor came crashing out onto her porch, shouting "BOYS!"

"Remind me to be extra vigilant when the neighbor's kids are outdoors," I asked Mrs. Cat.

"Take your crowbar," she suggested.

Seriously, if you hear a cascade of gunfire in the neighborhood and your first thought is that it's your kids, you may be doing something wrong.

I'd like to thank me for being here.

2009-05-10T23:06:00.001-05:00

So what are you reading now, ‘Cat?
State of Fear by Michael Crichton

What’s it about?
The Global Warming “crisis.”

I take it from your use of quote marks that you don’t believe the hype.
You would be correct.

Is it compelling to someone already inclined towards disbelief?
That it is.

Would it be as compelling to someone who believes in Global Warming?
Doubtful.

But doesn’t it contain actual objective scientific data proving that it’s all bullshit?
As a matter of fact, it does.

Shouldn’t that be considered proof?
You’d think so, wouldn’t you?

This subject is one of your major button-pushing issues, isn’t it?
Why yes…yes it is.

Are you taking notes in preparation for the next time the subject comes up?
You bet your ass.

One last question: Do you often interview yourself in this manner?
Apparently I do.

The Nature of an Opinion

2009-05-09T23:28:00.001-05:00

It’s based on my experiences, my travels, my studies, my readings, my experiments.

I listen and weigh and measure.

I place things in context historically, geographically, and linguistically.

I study all sides.

I follow the money.

I watch what people do instead of taking them at their word.

I footnote.

I make allowances for variables.

I don’t adhere blindly to any particular school of thought.

It means that I know what I’m talking about and you are just. Fucking. Wrong.

My New Catchphrase

2009-05-09T00:09:00.003-05:00

You know those movies where the autistic kid is babbling, or making odd pictures, or otherwise communicating in a weird way, and once it’s been deciphered it turns out to be the vital clue that the hero needs to save the day?

Cub has a set of magnetic letters that he uses to practice the words he’s become familiar with, and we’ve gotten used to seeing them stuck to random appliances or filing cabinets. Today, I went to the fridge (my Happy Place, remember) and found this phrase:

FLAY THE PIG

No one else in the house has copped to putting it up there, and I’m not really sure what Cub is ordering us to do. Does he want bacon? Has he cracked the swine flu vaccine? Did he convert to Islam?

I’m keeping an eye out for any random boars in the neighborhood, just in case.

That reminds me of one of my most favoritest cartoons ever...

Anon! A mouse!

2009-05-07T22:33:00.002-05:00

Anonymous left an instructional Wikipedia link on my “All Smug in their Beds” post from March 28. Anonymous thinks that by providing a single example of a pebble bed reactor going bad, s/he has demonstrated the futility of using them for any purpose, anywhere, ever again.

I sure hope Anonymous doesn’t travel by car, train, bus, surfboard, ship, plane, horse, truck, skateboard, roller skates, snowmobile, dogsled, skis, or on his/her feet, because I’ve seen at least one fatal accident involving each of those.

I also hope Anonymous doesn’t sleep in a bed, because 400 people die each year falling out of them.

I really hope Anonymous stays away from all liquids, because people drown every day.

And I also hope s/he doesn’t try to eat anything, because the morgues are full of choking victims.

Need I go further?

There’s a wonderful scene in one of Steven Brust’s books - The Phoenix Guards, I think - where a character speaks about getting too caught up in “What if?”. His elegant and succinct point is that they would become completely immobile, afraid to throw a stick into a stream on the chance that it had somehow become poisoned.

Life is risky. Are you a man or a mouse?

You know what cats do to mice.

Unreal Estate

2009-05-07T22:18:00.002-05:00

We did some traveling over the past couple of days, and I got tickled going through one of the cities. Evidently, the City Planners have a sense of humor because at one end of town, I saw a Chinese restaurant with a big wall on one side of the lot. On the other side of the wall was a business called Hun Equipment. Further on, there was a tiny strip mall containing the following businesses (I am not making this up):

· Lucky’s Laundromat
· Providence Realtors
· Divine Intervention Counseling Services
· Serendipity Studios (a hair salon)

There’s one space left for lease in the mall, so I’m in the early stages of opening the Predestination Travel Agency.

Red Tape and Bandwidth

2009-05-05T18:54:00.005-05:00

One of the current debates in our community is whether the state should deny a license renewal to a hydroelectric company in favor of the state taking it over. I am amazed at the number of people that think this is a good idea. Their reasons for approving the theft of a private business by the state seem to distill into one of two arguments: 1. The company has polluted the water (the hard Left), and 2. They might sell it to foreigners (the hard Right).

My stance is that if pollution is your concern, enforce the laws already on the books and make the company pay for cleaning up their mess. And if you’re concerned about “Johnny Foreigner” controlling your water access, make it a condition of the relicensing that the state gets first option on any resale of the license, whereupon they can offer it to another local company.

My primary worry is not that a governmental group wants to steal a private business – hell…that doesn’t even blip on my radar anymore; I assume that’s a matter of course lately – my concern is that these folks that think it’s a good idea aren’t really considering the ramifications of the group that taxes us having total control over a truly necessary commodity. What do they think will happen the next time the state hits a budget shortfall? Our Governor has already diverted funds from our “Education” lottery to prop up their deficits, I can’t imagine she’d hesitate for one damned minute on raising fees for the water the state supplies.

On another stage, our city is planning to start a new fiber-optic service to every resident, and the big cable monopoly here in the area (Time Warner) is spending a hellacious amount of our subscription fees to lobby against it. At the same time, TW is trying to institute bandwidth “caps” because so many people are using the internet to watch shows when they want to, not when cable broadcasts them.

I’m squarely on the side of the city in this one because they’re not taking over anybody’s existing business, and it’s about time someone challenged the cable monopoly. With the amount of streaming data I consume, I’d be thrilled with fiber-optic. One of the very few things government does effectively is projects that involve dense infrastructure, and running lines to everyone’s house and business falls under that definition.

I’ve had people who know I lean Right question how I could be pleased with the city government offering internet service and be against the state offering water service. The answer is threefold: 1. The internet is not a necessity. As much as I joke about it, I don’t have to have it to live. Water, I do. 2. If I don’t like the city’s services, prices, etc., I can go back to TW. Competition is a good thing. If I don’t like the prices of my water bill (or the taxes attached to it, more likely), what do I do, invest in rain barrels and a home filtration system? Sure, there’s a monopoly with the private company, too, but they don’t raise their rates every time another division loses a few million dollars, and the state would. 3. State bureaucracy versus city bureaucracy. The larger the agency, the more complicated the labyrinthine warren of petty power players. Obviously, the Feds are the champions of this, but it’s plenty bad at the state level. At their best, they are merely competent. At their worst, they are colossal fuckups insulated behind thick tomes of regulations and phone trees whose maps resemble illustrations of the more complex ganglial structures. You can ask three different people in the same department the same question, and get three different answers. And if you call them back the next day, each answer has changed, and none of the six answers agree.

I think this is how, four years later, there are still Katrina refugees living off governmental assistance. They just keep calling FEMA employees until they get the answer they want, then cling to it as if it were holy writ.

Try that with Time Warner and see how far you get.

Can I Go To Bed Now?

2009-05-04T20:44:00.002-05:00

Ever have one of those days?

Yeah...me, too.

I was at least secure in the knowledge that I would mow my lawn before my neighbor mowed his. Since he hadn't mowed at all this year, it seemed a sure bet, until the bastard showed up with a brand new Briggs & Stratton this afternoon. My mower's in the shop until later this week, so our yard is officially the most overgrown in the neighborhood. And since we're supposed to get rain the next couple of days, it looks like we'll hold on to that title for a little while.

Sigh.

This program has been sponsored by Hooters and Victoria's Secret

2009-05-04T20:41:00.003-05:00

I saw a commercial tonight promoting the new Lingerie Football Games. I know I must be getting old because my first thought wasn't "Smokin'!" but "Ridiculous!"

My second thought was: I wonder if the cheerleaders will be wearing chadors.

Behind the Mask

2009-05-02T15:40:00.002-05:00

We got up early-for-a-Saturday today to hit the 25¢ paperback sale at the library, and came home with a couple dozen books (so much for that equilibrium thing I mentioned last post). I also misled Mrs. Cat about where I wanted to get lunch so I could pilot the Catmobile over to the local Comic store to check out the Free Comic Book Day selections. Didn’t pick up anything off the free table, but I did get the next issue of “Preacher” on sale, which I’d been idly meaning to pick up for a while.

I was wandering through the shop (sideways, because every comic shop I’ve ever visited is small, crammed with shelving, and is overflowing with both merchandise and the fanboys that love it), looking at the panorama of titles available. The covers were near-universally somber in color and dramatic in tone, promising thrills, action, titillation, and escape. I stood there, looking at the panoply of heroes and villains, each with their own quest, their own drive, their own powers and flaws, and something resonated within me. See…I understand why the more popular characters adopt alter egos and include masks with their costumes, because I once dressed up as a chicken for a local trade show.

I’m so tempted to just leave it at that.

I was a freshman in high school. I don’t even remember what the trade show was for, but one of our church members was going to be there selling his fried chicken, and asked the Youth Pastor if any of our group would wear the suit and bring people in to the booth. $10 an hour? Under the table? Sign me up.

I got to the Civic Center early, and retrieved a surprisingly heavy box from the restaurant’s booth. The costume was freshly cleaned, which I didn’t really appreciate at the time. Having done costume work on two other occasions since then, I know now how much of a treat that was. Costumes get funky after a couple hours, and if you don’t at least air them out before you pack them away, you edge into biohazard territory.

I was in one of the dressing rooms in the back of the Center, trying to figure out how to attach everything so the weight of the costume would be evenly distributed and both my heads would stay on straight. It was a full-body costume that stood about seven feet tall, and the head was attached to a frame that rested on my shoulders. It had a stiff piece of cloth – similar to that in a fencing mask – built in behind the open mouth so I could see out. While I adjusted and fidgeted, I was wondering if $10 an hour was a good price for pride and self-image.

The last zipper closed, and I examined the result in the mirrors.

I was invisible. The costume covered me completely, and even the visual port in the mouth was woven so that you couldn’t see through to the real face inside.

I stood there for a few moments, awash in the realization that, apart from the owner of the restaurant, no one at the show would know who I was. All hesitation and self-doubt disappeared. I was free to act however I chose – within the boundaries of good taste, of course – and there would be no reprisals.

I cavorted; I mocked; I postured. I acted silly with children. I pantomimed increasingly bizarre situations with the merchandise on display (it was a boat and RV/camper show, I just recalled), and flirted with the booth bunnies. I had a grand ol’ time.

I remember seeing some guys from my school come in. They were part of the “cool kids” clique and while not really bullies, didn’t make life any easier for me and the other nerds. I hesitated at first out of habit, but then remembered my power of invisibility, and proceeded to harass them for a good ten minutes, pulling old Harpo Marx slapstick moves, “biting” the tops of their heads, and stealing their hats. It was liberating. I remember a change in their attitude towards me in school after that, because mine had changed towards them, but I may be looking backwards through John Hughes-colored glasses.

I forget which author said in reference to the Peter Parker/Spiderman dichotomy (I’m paraphrasing): Do the relatively few moments I get to kick ass as Spiderman make up for all the crap I have to take as the nebbish, Peter?

The answer is yes.

There are myriad reasons to put on a mask – protect your social standing or your loved ones, confuse your enemies or illustrate a theme. But the underlying reason is that it frees you from constraint and increases the sphere in which you can act. For good or ill is up to you.

Because with great chicken costumes comes great responsibility.

A Balance of Knowing

2009-05-02T13:53:00.002-05:00

Like every other family, especially those with small kids, we lose things. Game pieces, school papers, parts for toys…stuff like that.

Something I’ve noticed recently is that we seem to maintain a consistent number of lost things, though the things themselves change from day to day.

A couple of nights ago, I found one of Cub’s toys that had disappeared last week, but yesterday, I couldn’t find one of his shoes. The shoe turned up, but now one of Mrs. Cat’s handbags is off on its own recognizance. I’d misplaced the first book in a series I wanted to reread, and in searching for it, found another book I’d lost track of during our move.

It makes me wonder: if we reduced the amount of stuff we have, would we hit some ideal point of equilibrium where nothing else would get lost?

The whole situation reminds me of this great quote from The Zero Effect:

“When you go looking for something specific, your chances of finding it are very bad. Because of all the things in the world, you're only looking for one of them. When you go looking for anything at all, your chances of finding it are very good. Because of all the things in the world, you're sure to find some of them.”

Mrs. Cat: 1; Sophistacat: 0

2009-04-30T20:16:00.002-05:00

“Where are you?” came the cat call from the living room.
“I’m in my Happy Place!” I responded. My usual smartass answer when I pretend to be irritated.
“He’s at the fridge!” Kitten, sucking up to her mom.
“Yeah,” I admit, “It’s my happy place.”
From the living room: “You can tell.”

Grrrrrr.

:)

On a related note, I saw an article today that indicated overweight people seem to have better memories. I guess that’s evolved so they can remember what their feet look like.