I was about to chomp down on some tasty little pink Peep bunnies, when I noticed how incredibly mean one of them looked.  Check out the one of the right.  Look at its little mean eyes compared to the nice eyes of the one to the left.  I wonder what made him so mad?  I had my grubby little paws on him, and I was about to rip him off and eat him, when I noticed his mad little face and just couldn't go any further.  I put him back in the box. 

#food

Most times when people ask me how I'm doing, I reply with any of several variations of "good".  Even if it's the worst day of my life, I don't really want to take the time and burden someone else with all my problems.  Plus, these feelings are usually temporary.  If I just sat in 2 hours of traffic, I'm usually as mad as I can possibly get.  But it goes away.  If I voiced my feelings on it, some people would probably recommend me for psychiatric evaluation.  And it's also difficult to quantify how I am at any given point in time.  At 3:45pm, I might be doing great because I just found a quarter in the parking lot.  But at 3:47pm, I might be doing awful because I accidentally inhaled and swallowed a bug.  So if an answer is even given, it's usually based on the most recent experience.  Taking the average of my feelings over a certain period of time doesn't really work either.  I couldn't realistically say, "I'm doing terrible because I just stubbed my toe on that rock over there.  But last month I bought a new digital camera, so I'm doing pretty well on average."  I think the real answer should depend on how you are at the exact moment the question is posed, regardless of what happened in the past hour, day, or week.  So if you're alive, well, breathing, and remotely healthy, the answer should be any of several variations of "good". 

It's funny when people say how they really feel.  I treat the question like a greeting.  It's normally preceded by a "hey" or a "hello".  Some people treat it like an invitation to tell their life story.  So the conversation goes something like this: 

Them:  "Hey, how's it going?" 
Me:  "Not bad.  How are you?" 
Them:  "Terrible.  Today is the worst day of my life.  I just sat through the longest day of meetings in my life.  I hate my job.  I don't even know why I go.  Then I sat in 2 hours of traffic on Route 80, where people were cutting me off and beeping at me.  Sometimes I just want to carry a gun with me.  Ya know what I mean?  When I finally got home, my dog and cat got in a terrible fight and killed each other.  I got in a car accident on my way to meet you.  And then I accidentally sat on my last Butterscotch Krimpet.  I wish I was never born." 

This is frighteningly similar to a conversation I had last night.  I don't mean to seem like a uncaring jerk, but I guess I just didn't expect to get a real answer to my question.  The question was more of a greeting than an actual question.  I guess I should be careful what I ask. #psychology

I started using another one of Il Filosofo's plugins last week, but it only affects the WordPress admin area.  It's his Old-Style Upload plugin.  It adds the upload functionality that older versions of WordPress had.  There are configurable options, including where to upload the files and what types to accept.  The cool thing is that these options have no effect on the upload capabilities that already exist within post-writing.  The reason this is cool is because I can use the in-line upload tool to upload pictures or other files to my posts, and I can use the Old-Style Upload plugin to upload plugins to the /wp-content/plugins/ directory.  And that's exactly what I'm doing!  It's great!  I can't believe this functionality isn't already there.  I used to have to use FTP to upload new files.  What a waste of time and security! 

One change I would make to the plugin is to comment out line 146, which says $img1_name = preg_replace('/[^a-z0-9_.]/i', '', $img1_name);.  This line renames the uploaded file by taking out certain characters and symbols.  I think this is stupid, and commenting it out solves the problem. #technology

Garbage water is that mysterious liquid found in the bottom of garbage bags that leaks onto the floor when you take the bag out of the can.  Where does this stuff come from?  I don't throw out entire containers of liquid!  I don't dump out cups of coffee into the trashcan!  So how does it get there?  The explanation to this mystery continues to elude scientists and researchers around the globe. 

One time when I was about 11, I was riding my bike along the side of a road (not on the sidewalk because there was none).  As a garbage truck drove past me, I felt a drop of liquid hit my face.  Then all my skin melted off and spawned new little Daves, like the movie Gremlins.  Actually, it wasn't that big of a deal except that it was really gross.  I haven't ridden a bike or touched the side of a road since. 

I used to work at a McDonald's, where garbage water was king.  I used to have to take the big bags of garbage out to the dumpster.  Those bags had so much disgusting garbage water in them, they left a 50-foot trail of mystery liquid all the way from the can to the dumpster.  Disgusting. 

So the next time you think about throwing your drink in the garbage, think of that poor jerk who has to clean up after you.  You're ruining his day, his weekend, and his entire life.  Say no to garbage water! #science

Some dude made a list (via Cynical-C) of the "top 10 books about the darker side of adolescence".  I've read Lord of the Flies (his #1) and maybe Catcher in the Rye, as well as several others that didn't make the list. 

The problem with adolescent books is that schools force kids to read them.  And I don't think an adolescent can fully appreciate a book written about him/her until he/she is no longer an adolescent.  Maybe it's just me, but I developed a hatred of reading by being forced to read books I didn't understand (granted, I have a documented reading comprehension deficiency).  But when I look back on it and re-read some of the "classics", I'm amazed at how much truth and wisdom is contained in their pages.  I compared an incident in high school with the Lord of the Flies after realizing (again) that human nature has a tendency towards evil.  Some of the books I read in high school had such an amazingly clear message in them, yet their meaning and applicability were lost in the heyday of high school life, memorizing chemistry formulas, playing stupid sports, joining clubs that would "look good on my transcript", and (very infrequently) dating bimbo girls.  I wish somebody told me, "Grow up first, then read about what was happening while you were growing up.  It'll make so much more sense later.  Plus, you can't do anything to change what's bound to happen anyway." 

In conclusion, fake your way through high school, go to a big state college, and learn everything about life when you're ready and able.  My childhood was corrupted by a forceful compression of perceived knowledge. #entertainment

Ever since I was turned on to Pearls Before Swine (thanks, Shara), I can't get enough.  I can't stop laughing at today's: 
The message:  Deer Zeeba, You is valued neighba!  Thanks for being you! 

The "sublibabal" message:  Run outside!  Pour steak sauce on head!  Kill self! #entertainment

There's a sign on Route 10 in Ledgewood (actually there's one on each side of the road) near Towne Toyota and Cliff's Dairy Maid that says something so cryptic and misleading, I (and Wendy) can't for the life of me figure out what it means.  The picture below states, "Insist on visiting nurses in their 90s."  It shows a picture of a woman in her 30s-40s with a green band around her neck (signifying that she's a visiting nurse) visiting an elderly woman (supposedly in her 90s).  Does it mean I should "insist on visiting nurses [who are] in their 90s"?  Or does it mean that "[People who are in their 90s should] insist on visiting nurses"?  Whatever it means, the people in the organization sure spent a lot of money advertising a message that doesn't make sense.  I'm so confused by this sign, I sent an email to the organization.  I'll post the reply if I get one. 

#entertainment

This is a new topic for me, and it's slightly above my current level of understanding.  But despite that, I'll try to throw some information out there. 

Some web hosts have the option of executing PHP as CGI or executing it as an Apache module.  DreamHost has PHP-CGI enabled by default.  Despite this being "more secure", it causes some pretty major problems.  The biggest problem is that scripts keep making calls to something called "/dh/cgi-system/php.cgi".  I don't know what that is, but I know it's been mentioned on forums for WordPress, Zenphoto, Drupal, and many others.  And I've experienced this same problem when I've tried to install and setup several PHP scripts. 

I know how to "fix" it:  In the DreamHost control panel, go to Manage Domains, and edit the domain in question.  Change the PHP version from 4.4.2 to 5.1.2 (these values will probably change as DreamHost upgrades to newer versions).  As this WordPress support page says, DreamHost runs PHP 4 as CGI and PHP 5 as an Apache module.  For whatever reason, PHP running as CGI makes certain things not work.  And all I know is that running PHP as Apache makes everything work like it used to. #technology

One of the most annoying things about WordPress is that the default category is always checked when writing a post, so you have to manually uncheck it when you don't want to post in that category.  I never post anything to my default category, so this is especially annoying.  I looked for a solution a while ago, but I couldn't find anything.  Enter Il Filosofo's Uncheck Default Category plugin.  It does exactly what it says by running a little JavaScript on the post-writing screen.  Brilliant, yet simple. #technology

Prompted by Shara's comment, I'd like to catalog my thoughts on diet foods. 

Diet soda is the work of the devil.  I hate it.  I can't understand how anyone can possibly like it.  It's disgusting, degrading, has a terrible aftertaste, and is healthy in no way, shape, or form.  Everyone laughs at the jokes about fat people ordering a Supersized Big Mac combo meal and a Diet Coke.  But it's not just fat people who are mislead by this vile substance.  It's skinny people too.  Smart people.  Health-conscious people.  People treat it like a sports drink; like they're doing themselves a favor by not drinking regular soda.  I don't know too much about artificial sweeteners, but I can't imagine they're any healthier than regular sugar.  And for that matter, I would imagine that regular soda isn't exactly healthy to begin with.  So if you're gonna put some artificially-flavored, black-colored, cocaine-derived solvent into your body, you might as well go with the Real Thing™. 

As for other diet foods, I usually stay away from things that try to be healthy.  There's no such thing as a good-tasting fat-free snack food.  Fat is what makes food taste good in the first place.  And most times when something is fat-free, it means the fat was replaced by something else, and it's usually sugar.  So which would I rather put in my body:  Fat or sugar?  It depends on how much of each.  And it depends if the fat is good fat (unsaturated) or bad fat (saturated).  What real health problem am I saving myself from when I eat Lite Cool Whip instead of regular?  A half a gram of fat?  That's not worth it.  But when it comes to something like potato chips, I'll go with Baked Lay's instead of regular Lay's any day.  But that's because they're baked instead of fried, not made with less fat. #food