31 December 2005
Well, jeez, goldfish are supposed to be hardy. But
Fat Man and Little Boy
lasted just about as long as their namesakes. At least they were gone by
the morning - Patrick flushed the poor buggers last night when they went
belly-up. I definitely feel bad now. And Sweetie has no one to play
with.
Posted at 1237.
30 December 2005
Since Poopy so loves our humidifier and how much the thing bubbles, we
decided to splurge and buy him a late Christmas present: an aquarium.
Originally, we had planned to just get the aquarium components, which were
about $12 total, and run the thing with just water so the cat could have
continuous bubbles. But we were at PetSmart, and one thing led to
another... and suddenly we had faux Greek column ruins, gravel to match,
and two 12-cent fish. We had to carry the damned things around Kroger,
since we stupidly went to PetSmart before we bought groceries. But the
fish prompted our cashier to regale us with a story about a very buxom woman who once came in with
three snakes in her cleavage. But anyway... we named the fishes: Lunch
(the smaller one) and Dinner (the larger one). But you have to say it
with a funny eastern European accent: Lanch und Deener. Or, Patrick
suggested Fat Man and Little Boy (to be horribly un-PC). At any rate,
pics to come once Poopy is not scared of the critters and Sweetie stops
trying to eat their food.
So the web tells me that goldfish will last anywhere from 3 weeks to 30
years. Huh. The PetSmart cashier said, "You realize these things won't
live very long, right?" We didn't really expect a long-term commitment
from two living creatures that together cost less than a shiny quarter.
So if we kill the critters tonight because of our collective lack of fish
knowledge, I suppose we can get more tomorrow. And I'll feel
distinctively karmicly bad because I'm a Pisces.
Posted at 2140.
28 December 2005
In the vein of strange Xmas presents... Patrick got a stuffed creature
from his mom that looks
a
lot like this. It's a plush snowman with an embroidered saying on his
stomach: "Jesus Warms My Heart." Lynn got it at a yard sale and thought
it was super hilarious because Jesus is, in effect, killing Frosty. I
protested that perhaps beneath the "snow" was a man, and that having Jesus
in his heart caused his sins (the metaphorical snow) to melt away. That
doesn't explain the gloves, scarf, hat, or carrot nose, however, so I
guess I'd have to strain my metaphor even further. At any
rate, the little plush thing makes no sense whatsoever. But it's a
pretty
popular theme. I'm just glad that there are so many options at our
favorite college decor supply store, the
Oriental Trading Company.
Posted at 1840.
27 December 2005
Among the best of my Christmas presents this year was a book entitled
The
Women's Computer Literacy Handbook, which was written in 1985. My
brother-in-law picked this gem up at a used bookstore in NYC a few weeks
ago and was quite proud of his find. We all had a good time reading
excerpts from the book, particularly the introduction. To wit:
- p. 5-6 - "What about the feeling you have when you try to take a
telephone message for your co-worker and feel like the person on the other
end is speaking Greek? I once got a phone message from my secretary about
someone wanting to borrow my '300 Bog Odem.'" I realize this was 1985,
but someone wanted to borrow a 300 baud modem? Yikes.
- p. 11 - "Unless women enter the technology fields now, while the new
age is still young and the doors are still open, the electronic age will
fail to reflect women's sensibilities, just as the industrial age did
before it." Heh, whoops. Ms. Brecher was a total Cassandra.
- But my all-time favorite quotation from this book is on p. 14 -
"Although this book is written to encourage women, there is a fine line
between choosing familiar analogies and condescending to the woman reader.
Many of my examples refer to cooking and baking. Those examples were
selected because they bear such an amazing resemblance to computer
functions. That is quite different from suggesting that you use a
computer to store your recipes. It is the latter proposal that smacks of
condescension."
I nearly peed myself laughing at this last one, especially considering
such graphics as
Figure 1.1 (mmmmmm, pie!) and
Figure 1.14 (if you understand why
standing/sitting creepy Pillsbury-looking babydolls represent 1s and 0s,
please let me know).
At any rate, it's a charmingly dated book (a high-speed daisy-wheel
printer - 60 CPS, and, yes, that's
characters per second - cost
$3,000 in 1985; COBOL was a popular programming language; and there is a
screen shot from Windows 1.0 on page 208), and the author has her heart in
the right place. But it's still incredibly hilarious and offensive at the
same time.
Posted at 1309.
23 December 2005
Ankur made me start playing this pseudo-mud called
Kings of Chaos. It's kind of fun,
since he tells me whom to kill, and I get to buy more weapons and amass an
army. All under the name of... wait for it... Porsena, of course. The
Etruscans
will fucking rise again. So if you want to help me out,
click
on
my
recruiting link. Don't worry, it'll just give me another soldier, not
conscript you or send you spam. Click it every day, and I'll get more
soldiers! Come on... you know you want to! Click me, click me, click me,
no whammies, stop!
Anyway, it's very much like banking online. "Let's see how much money I
have left. Enough in this account to pay the mortgage? No? Then let's
check this other account..." Direct deposit is awesome because I can
never remember when our paychecks come in, so it's, like, "Holy shit!
Where did
that money come from? I can buy blackpowder missiles now!" No, wait,
that's the online game.
What's even funner is "diversifying" your retirement account. To me, it
means moving money I won't see for 40 years ("fake money") from
one place to another to see if I can make more money in one
place than in another. Like Vegas. If the machine isn't paying out, you
switch. That's basic gambling philosophy. Anyway, my retirement account is
now waging war on Patrick's because he "diversified" without telling me
and was beginning to out-perform me. That's not cool. I just need
some orcs to go
attack him and steal his gold. And a dragon! Whichever I can find.
Wait, that's the game too.
Posted at 1052.
18 December 2005
My mother-in-law sent me a piece from the New York Times on
the
*insertletterhere*-word. Apparently every letter of the alphabet can be used as a euphemism; some not
as obvious as you would have thought. I guess we need to start with the Greek alphabet next. Ooooh, even
better! Linear B!
Posted at 1345.
17 December 2005
I have nothing better to post, since today was Giant Hangover Day, so I'll
pass along another of Paul's links to a Norwegian (?) band's cover of
Total
Eclipse of the Heart. And supposedly they
played in
Chapel Hill.
Posted at 2138.
15 December 2005
An ANTH 10 student who doesn't hate me e-mailed me a joke today:
Q: How many Bush Administration officials does it take to screw in a
light bulb?
A: None. There is nothing wrong with the light bulb; its conditions are
improving every day. Any reports of its lack of incandescence are a
delusional spin from the liberal media. That light bulb has served
honorably, and anything you say undermines the lighting effect. Why do you
hate freedom?
Posted at 0104.
14 December 2005
Man, I have to grade ANTH 10 exams
all day today. I think Sweetie has the right
idea, though. A nap on top of all those Blue Books might help.
Posted at 1038.
13 December 2005
A colleague of mine told me and Clay yesterday that she and her girlfriend
just got engaged. Clay asked if one of them was changing her name. She
replied, "Yeah, she is. We think it'll be easier if we have the same last
name." Clay said, "But won't people think you're sisters?" And she said,
"At least they'll assume that we're family." Heterosexual couples can
make a statement about family by having two or more last names, and gay
couples can make the point that they are a family by having the same last
name. I don't know if that makes me happy to be living in such a
postmodern world or sad that the concept of family in our society is so
rigid that many of us feel the need to challenge it.
Posted at 2138.
10 December 2005
This is why you don't give students your IM handle. I set an away message
of, "Duke versus Texas at 1:30 on CBS. I know it's terrible that I'm a
Tarheel and like Duke so much. But did you see the game-winning 3-pointer
from Dockery against Virginia Tech? Maybe it's just that as a UVa alum, I
really hate Tech. No... it's that I really like Redick." And one of my
students IM'ed me just to say, "okay, you used to be my ta. i hope you
know any respect i had for you is now gone. i can't tell you the hate i
have for duke and the animosity i have towards jj. this is extremely
disappointing. and to think, i actually liked you as a ta. ah that's
unfortunate."
Man, they crack me up.
Posted at 1557.
9 December 2005
I solicited online TA evaluations from my ANTH 10 recitation sections
yesterday and have gotten a few responses. Honestly, I have no clue why
the kiddies seem to think I'm so smart. At any rate, my favorite answer
by far to one of the questions was, "What could you really change to make
an introductory anthropology recitation more interesting and likeable?
Candy. Lots of candy." Awww, kids say the darndest things.
Posted at 1018.
