Social networks (3) Mar 31, 2006
I [somewhat] recently signed up for a bunch of social networks like Myspace, Friendster, Facebook, Orkut, Flickr, del.icio.us, and others, and then I realized something:  I'm not a social person.  I don't like to meet new people.  I don't like to share things.  I don't like to find out what other people think and do.  I'm not all that interested in these things.  There's always a question on these sites that asks something like, "What are you looking for:  Dating, relationships, networking, friends".  I'm not really looking for any of that.  I'm not really looking for anything at all.  Most times, I sign up for these sites to see what all the hype is about.  Or in the case of Myspace, I look for people I went to high school with and how many of them have become adult film stars.  I'm not looking for someone that plays guitar so that I can say, "Ooh you play guitar?  Me too.  That's cool."  I'm not looking for a place to learn new things or find interesting websites.  I'm just not into the whole social networking scene. #technology
Urinalysis Mar 30, 2006
There's nothing quite like walking down the hallway of your doctor's office at 8am on a Thursday morning, carrying a warm cup of your own urine and walking by people who are staring at you in amazement/disgust.  As if it isn't degrading enough to be told, "Go pee in a cup", you're forced to walk past a bunch of strangers and navigate through difficult obstacles to drop off your "sample".  I wonder how many times accidents have happened.  A person is walking down the hall and ... whoops ... they trip on their own foot, fall flat on their face, and pour their cup of urine all over the floor/bystanders.  That's a life-changing event, both for the spiller and spillee.  You don't just go living your life like normal after you get somebody else's urine on you. 

I went to one doctor who asked patients to bring the cup up to the desk and place it on the desk.  This desk, for clarification, was at chest level.  Chest level, for further clarification, is pretty close to face level.  As if it isn't weird enough to hold a cup of someone else's urine, these people held cups of other people's urine close to their faces.  That's just disgusting.  Also, since we don't live in a perfect world, I'm sure there had to be at least one person who put their cup down on the desk and accidentally knocked it over.  And urine is the kind of thing that's not easily forgotten.  It's not like spilling your cup of coffee.  Urine has bacteria and disease and other not-so-positive things.  Not to mention the fact that it's urine.  How do you tell people, "You might not want to put your candy bar down on this desk.  Some idiot just spilled his own pee."?  Or, "Hey honey.  My day went pretty well.  Except for that whole urine-all-over-my-shirt deal.  That wasn't too cool." 

Side note:  I think it's funny that they have cups labeled "Urine Collection Container".  This person thinks it's funny too. #entertainment
Full fat Mar 29, 2006
I grew up with a dad who worked for Nabisco, so I got all kinds of cookies and such when I was a kid.  But I also got all the experimental stuff, which usually meant "Low-Fat" this or "Sugar-Free" that ("Now with Olestra!").  Over time, I came to realize that none of these foods are good.  Every once in a while, they (not just Nabisco) came out with something bearable, like low-fat ice cream or sugar-free gum.  But whenever I eat stuff like that, I'm thinking, "Hey ok this is bearable.  It's not like the original, but it's bearable."  My dad worked in the food industry for a while, so he figured a few things out.  One of the things he picked up on was that fat is what makes unhealthy foods taste good.  To take the fat out means you're taking the good taste out.  So that means other stuff is added to try to make it taste like the original.  Other stuff like cocaine and kitten fur.  Ok not really that stuff, but the general idea is true. 

Based on these thoughts and my life experiences, I've decided that I won't eat things that try to be good for me.  I'll eat my fruit and vegetables and my 6 servings of carbohydrates (oh wait, that's not good anymore).  And I won't sit around eating buckets of lard and turkey grease.  But I refuse to skimp on things that are designed to bring pleasure to my mouth.  Low-fat Oreos?  Nope.  Diet soda?  Heck no.  Sugar-free Klondike bars?  I don't think so.  If I'm gonna be eating something that's meant to be relatively unhealthy, I'm gonna go all the way with it and not stop at some healthy attempt at snacking.  And now that Wendy works for M&M Mars, I get all kids of candy.  But they try to do the same stuff Nabisco did:  Healthy snacking.  I think it's an unobtainable goal.  Yeah sure they'll please a few people here and there, but people like me are still gonna want to gobble up a few full-fat Twix bars.  And maybe a few Milky Way Midnights.  And maybe a few hundred yellow M&Ms. #food
Standalone episodes Mar 29, 2006
I'm a big fan of standalone episodes on TV, which I would define as episodes of a TV show that can exist by themselves without relying on [much] information from previous episodes or outside sources.  This is why I'm a big fan of CSI.  I don't think I've ever seen a new CSI episode; I've only seen reruns.  But it doesn't matter what order I watch them in because they're all standalone episodes.  Occasionally there's a reference to something personal in the lives of the characters, but it's mostly just solving crimes and playing with luminol.  I would say the Simpsons is an example of this kind of show because most episodes don't build off the same plot line developed in previous episodes.  But I might disagree with myself because they constantly refer to strange little facts and unrelated occurrences in previous episodes.  Shows like American Idol, 24, and Survivor are examples of shows that don't have standalone episodes.  You can't really just watch an episode from the middle of the season because it fits in with the episodes before and after it. 

This brings up another somewhat related idea:  I like shows that don't have much character development.  Stated another way:  I don't like shows with a lot of character development.  Most of the crime dramas focus on solving crimes and interrogating [innocent] witnesses.  They don't spend much time on the personal lives of Gil Grissom or Detective Robert Goren.  And when they do, I want to stop watching.  I don't care who these people are dating, what they do in their free time, or where they walk their dogs.  I don't watch these shows to learn about fictional people or how to go about dating like TV stars do.  I watch to be entertained. #entertainment
Foot time Mar 28, 2006
I just spent several hours on my feet at work, which made me realize something:  I don't like spending time on my feet at work.  I'm fortunate to have a job where I can sit around all day and not even think about getting physically tired.  I used to have jobs where I was on my feet all day.  Not doing hard physical labor, but screwing parts together while listening to large women talk about dirty things.  Or counting how many of the original 35,000 tiny little ball bearings were still where they were supposed to be.  No matter how stupid it was, I was on my feet, and this caused me to be tired.  It was through experiences like this that I realized I wanted to go to college and major in something that would keep me off my feet.  Engineering to the rescue!  I'm so lazy. #business
WordPress 2.0.2 Mar 28, 2006
I just upgraded to WordPress 2.0.2, mainly to try to fix my commenting problems.  It turns out that the new version did nothing to help the problem, but oh well.  I'm still upgraded. #technology
Comments problem (2) Mar 28, 2006
I've having some problems with the commenting functionality on my site.  I'm getting an error that says, "WordPress database error: [Duplicate entry '0' for key 1]".  I'm not sure what it means or how to fix it, so I'm looking into things. #technology
Left-handed Mar 27, 2006
I read a cool thing in the Bible this morning:  There was a guy named Ehud (Judges 3:15) from the Benjamite tribe of Israel, and he was left-handed, as were many people from the tribe of Benjamin (Judges 20:16).  In those days (around 1300 B.C.), being left-handed was considered a handicap or a deformity.  But Ehud used this to his advantage:  He reached for his weapon on his right thigh with his left hand.  If he had been right-handed, he would have reached for his weapon on his left thigh with his right hand, and his actions would have been easily detected.  But he was able to get a hold of his weapon without being suspicious.  The reason this is cool is because God used an abnormal person to do a big thing which brought about Israel's freedom.  The lesson is that God doesn't use normal people; he uses weird people. #religion
Guitar stores Mar 27, 2006
I play the guitar.  I like to go to guitar stores.  Actually, no I don't.  I would like to go to guitar stores if there were no people in them.  But the fact is that guitar stores have people, and people are dumb and annoying.  The guitar happens to be a very versatile instrument, so all kinds of different music can be played with one:  Punk, rock, blues, metal, jazz, classical, etc.  The problem with this is that every person that plays guitar thinks they need to be heard.  So some stupid punk kid will go to a guitar store, pick up a beautiful work of art like a Fender Strat and pound out some stupid punk song.  And then some stupid Dave Matthews fan will pick up a $1500 Taylor acoustic and play it like he owns it.  And then some stupid metal head will turn up the volume on a Marshall amp so that he overpowers everyone else.  So what you have in any given guitar store is a bunch of idiots trying to play over a bunch of other idiots.  Cacophony. #entertainment
Happy Birthday song Mar 26, 2006
The Happy Birthday song could quite possibly be the worst song ever written in the history of mankind.  Never has a song been so poorly oversung than in the case of this song.  Never has a work of art been so viciously butchered than when this song is sung at birthday parties and other events.  Although I hate those TGI Friday's-esque birthday songs that waiters sing, at least those songs can actually be sung.  The traditional Happy Birthday jumps a whole entire octave in the middle of the song, which makes it virtually unsingable for the average person.  Singing the span of an octave is an uncomfortable thing to do, especially when the song is started in the middle of a person's vocal range.  So it all comes down to that jerk who first starts out with the "Happy Birthday to you..."  It's all up to that person.  And more often than not, that person starts the song on an arbitrary note that's comfortable for them.  Then when they get to the octave part, no one is able to hit it, and the song goes wildly out of control.  Crash and burn. 

Boycott the Happy Birthday song. #entertainment