Cell phone noises (4) Apr 2, 2006
C'mon, people.  I'm noticing that there are still a few people out there who don't quite get it.  Here's the deal:  When you're in a room/building/place where having your cell phone ring would be a rude interruption, turn the volume down.  I understand if you forgot to turn it down before you entered the room.  Not a big deal.  We all forget some things.  But if you didn't turn it down beforehand, put in a good effort at silencing it when someone calls.  Yeah sure you disrupted the meeting and made everyone stare at you.  Sure you broke everyone's concentration as you rifled through your pockets or your purse.  The least you could do is silence it or turn it off as fast as you can.  Put in a little effort. 

Now, for those people that didn't know about this before, cell phones have a startup and shutdown noise.  Usually they play a stupid little song or make some weird noises.  Every cell phone on earth does this.  It's nothing new, and it's nothing out of the ordinary.  Since we all know this, maybe you could also put a little effort into turning your phone's volume off before you shut it town in said room/building/place.  As if the phone call wasn't a big enough interruption, now everyone has to listen to your stupid shutdown noise. #technology
Cats relieve stress Apr 1, 2006
I've heard many times that cats (and perhaps other pets, though I can't stand dogs) have the ability to relieve or reduce stress in people's lives.  I think I know why:  Cats are easy to please and amuse, and they always show you they like you (as long as you're nice and you feed them regularly).  When you pet a cat, it "smiles" and purrs to let you know that it's happy.  Unlike a human, it won't reach an age where being pet becomes "weird".  It won't want to spend more time with its friends or feel like you're too bossy.  Cats don't become much more mature than when you first get them.  They appreciate what you do for them and they show it.  I think the appreciation they show and the ways they show you they like you are an immediate reward for a service you're performing.  They don't ask for anything in return.  They don't dump all their problems on you.  They don't tell all your secrets to your neighbors.  You pet them; they like you.  So simple. #nature
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