Category: FWIW

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Wannabe (Usually 20-Something) Writers Are almost Cute, Sometimes

It’s almost cute how some wannabe writers try to emulate literacy. It usually shows up in more than a few misused words that are homophones (or close homophones) with whatever word they are groping for or other word misuses indicating a lack of familiarity with well-written text. . . or a dictionary, for that matter. Oh, here’re a couple: using “appraise” for “apprise” or “reign” for “rein” (usually in “free rein” or some such). Kiddy writers who have heard (or THINK they have) a word but have apparently never read the correct word used in a proper context.

One can also just head on over to any list of misused words on the Internet and count on seeing them misused in some self-pub books written (and “edited”) by subliterate kids who’ve been awarded participation trophies all their lives (most likely including their attendance certificates called “diplomas”).

Oh, and comma splices and apostrophe abuses seem to be particular favs of 20-something subliterate kiddy “writers.”

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“Net Neutrality” Advocates Are Either Morons or Liars

Is it wrong to experience a sort of “zloradstvo”1 when evil experiences a setback, no matter how small? Let me introduce the “poster children” for so-called “Net Neutrality.”

Top 10 Internet-censored countries

And if you think that’s an extreme argument, then let me remind you of Lord Acton’s pithy adage, Parkinson’s Law, Pournelle’s Iron Law of Bureaucracy, and the Eight Most Dreaded Words in the English Language:

“I’m from the government. I’m here to help.”

I don’t really want to crack a smile at the puling whines of “net neutrality” advocates, but I just can’t help myself. . . (OK, I could suppress it, but I don’t. 😉 )

[“Net Neutrality” is nothing more than a “bureaucrappic” scheme to place a 5,000-pound government thumb on the scale to determine market winners/losers, thus improving the market for. . . graft, and worse. h.t. to Perri Nelson for the clarification that genuine net neutrality is different to the bureaucrappic scheme Title II enabled.]

1Russian. An order of magnitude beyond the German “schadenfreude,” as only Russians can do. . .

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Just One of Those Things

Completely unrelated. . .

Shoelaces are something of a “thing” for me. I had searched for years for just the right way to tie them that would

a. prevent them coming untied and yet
b. was quick and easy to tie and untie.

For the past seven years, I have used a method that has accomplished that for me, and have added lacing techniques that allow me to also “custom fit” shoes when foot problems of various kinds temporarily arise, as well.

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TOO MUCH STUFF!!!

*sigh*

Purging. And not just household items. Data.

Several years after my first computer, I went “big” for a 5MB hard drive on a 486. I ended up, in the long run, “purging” (well, discarding) most of the data I had on 5.25 floppies, tape (even audio cassette tapes *heh*), etc. I may never get around to sorting and purging the boxes (and boxes) of CDRs that are slowly decaying, although I do have quite a bit of original work I saved to 3.5” floppies transferred to other media/stored in several different archives. *shrugs* Useful mainly for review of how my views have changed/remained the same after dealing with new information. Apart from that? Destined for destruction when I’m gone.

The other day, I actually found an external 500GB drive I thought I had scrubbed; it’d been stuck in a (wrong) box during some house changes. Never missed it, since the data was all elsewhere, anyway.

I have way too much stuff, including just junk sitting around on various drives. Some of it is the result of a habit of saving web pages/sites for offline reading or even reference archiving, something I do for things that are more interesting/immediate than would fit in my 1,000s of bookmarks (also need purging, though I do that now and then with an app).

The flood back on the last day of April was good for purging stuff, but we need to go much, much farther, and are doing so. It just seems to go so slowly. . . *sigh*

It’s a daunting task, but must it be done.

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Fav Things

It’s funny, but of all the cutting boards I have, the two I use almost every day (one for meats and another for veggies–that one IS every day) are a couple I made in shop class 53 years ago (or was it 54? *heh*).

One (the solid mahogany board) was a Xmas gift to my paternal grandmother, and family “put it in my pile” when she passed away 37(?) years ago. The other (walnut and maple) was a Xmas gift to my mom, and she left it with me about 28 years ago when she was paring things down for a move.

While I have–and have had over the years–others, these serve almost all my needs quite handily, and have worn very very well over the years.

simple things, but real favs.

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Is Your “Smartphone” Spying On You?

Maybe.

Well, no: probably. If you use it to access social media sites (FarceBook, et al) or any Google service, almost certainly. Heck, there are growing claims that smartphones “listen in” to conversations happening within access of the phone’s mic, like so-called “smart” TVs do.

So?

I’ve worked with computers/networking, etc., for ~30 years and am certainly no Luddite, but my phone stays OFF (and usually in another room) when I am not making calls. I check it now and again for messages from any whitelisted folks, and (very rarely, and only when I’m away from a desktop/notebook/large format tablet–which is very, very rarely, since I almost always have one of the three at hand) I might use it to check something on the web, but only when locked down fairly well and using a strong VPN, while on a local network I trust to be well locked down, as well. I see no reason to let a phone run my life or be connected to any old whomever who might want to contact me.

Other phone “tracking” things?

I don’t need GPS. I’m not helpless or “directionally challenged.” I know how to read a map, can navigate with or without (usually) a compass, and check my routes before heading out anywhere I’ve not been before.

Yes, I got lost once (on an overcast day, on a system of rural gravel roads and two-tracks in rough terrain, off my projected area of travel for that day–no excuse, since I simply left my compass and map for the area behind that day). I stopped and asked directions (because I’m also not completely stupid).

I like the convenience of having computers, tablets, cell phones, etc., but unlike many I know nowadays who would probably be pleased as punch to have their dumb “smart” phone embedded in their body, wired to display in their field of vision, etc., I think I can handle a lil disconnection now and then.

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I Think This Was Part of EA Poe’s Problem with “Life As We Know It”

Frequent readers (OK, the frequent reader *heh*) here have seen me refer to “the voices in my head.” They’re not really there, at least not as delusional thoughts. But I do “overhear” arguments with myself, and I imagine that’s something Kierkegaard, at least, could have related to. But I do hear strange, distracting, annoying, and sometimes painful sounds.

Tinnitus is a real PITA.

One of the most irritating things about tinnitus is the way it seems to effect a distraction to certain frequencies, at least as I experience it, in effect covering over certain pitches. Other freqs, higher and lower? Nope.

So, I can be sitting quietly playing a game of “Zen Freecell”1 with all the “tintinnabulation of the bells, the bells, the bells” ringing and roaring in my head, and yet a clock ticking in the next room impinges on my subconscious and I find myself CLICKing and making moves with a steady one second rhythm. Once I realize I’ve been caught again, I can then not do so, but that “tick-tick-tick. . . ” in the other room still hounds me.

1“Zen Freecell” is just regular old everyday Windows Freecell played as near as possibly in a mindless state. My current scores on each computer where I do that for relaxation (in place of “meditation”) are each above 8,800 games played with no losses. It’s just patterns. It’s a bit like seeing the solution to an equation without performing the intervening steps, only with “Zen Freecell” the steps have to be taken even though the solution’s a foregone conclusion.

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No, It’s “Warm Kitty, Soft Kitty”

My only problem with the shirt is that it’s based on the “Big Bang Theory” corruption of the copyrighted song by Edith Newlin, which is an adaptation of a Polish folk song, “Wlaz kotek na plotek.” Some not-so-smart writer, writing characters supposed to be smarter than he is (or some stupid lawyer thinking to avoid paying royalties?) screwed up the lyrics and mis-taught a generation of the less-than-literate.

And, of course, Newlin’s lyrics ordering the adjectives as first “warm” then “soft” follow the adjective order “rule” that any literate person simply knows from having read a lot of text written by literate writers:

Quantity, Value/opinion, Size, Temperature [warm], Age, Shape, Colour, Origin, Material [soft]

Hence, to any moderately well-read person (or person who is simply fluent in well-spoken English), Newlin’s “Warm kitty, soft kitty does not grate the way the “Big Bang Theory’s” corruption of her lyrics do. . . in a way that makes the characters who use the BBT’s corruption sound “Dumber than the average 5th grader.”

But apart from that I like the shirt. Oh, and Big Bang Theory’s not a bad show, apart from its laughable depiction of “smarter than the writers” characters. In fact, that alone sometimes makes it worth viewing for laughs.

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I Don’t Really Care That it’s Your Money, but. . .

. . .since it’s mine, too. . .

Some folks from a state government agency dropped by today as a part of state efforts to check up on people who may have been impacted by the April 30 floods and the aftermath. I suppose that’s a legitimate state concern (though I’d bridle at the effort were it a fedgov dealio), but a followup six mpnths after the event seems a bit laggardly, if it’sto be done at all.

When I had adequately perssuaded them that though we had experienced some flood damage, I had been able to do mold erradication and repairs myself, they simply gave me a bundle of handouts all dealing with basic emergency preparedness. We were outside on the front stoop, so I walked over and popped the hatch on my lil car to display my EDC bag, mentioned the bugout bags stored at the front door (including a “pet go bag”), and the well-packed pantry (including stored potable and wash water).

They then asked me to give the materials to someone who might benefit from them.

Pretty simple stuff: checklists for med info (not needed: have the med info we might need emergency personnel to have tied to scannable bracelets and on USB flash drives connected to our EDC bags, along with scans/pdfs of our essential docs on the same flash drives), pet supply preparedness, and personal “go bags,” etc. Very basic stuff.

Nice that the info is getting out, but I have to wonder at the delivery mechanism, both in effectiveness and in cost. Apparently, they’ve been going around trying to make contact during normal working hours. . . when most folks are at work, leaving Olde Phartes as their most likely contacts,and Olde Phartes, by and large, are better-equipped than young folks to deal with emergencies, in my experience (well, up to an age of disability, I suppose). *shrugs*

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Wondrous Advances in Tools

Finally! After many years of using paper clips to release optical media from powerless optical drives, I’ve acquired a new lil a mini-tool set that has a special tool just for that. WhatEVer did I do before this was available? Oh, right. USED A PAPER CLIP.

Oh, well.When I mislay this special lil tool, I’ll still have paper clips to use (cos I stocked up on those years ago. *heh*)