Jeremy Is In The Office

Vote Washington!

2012-02-20T14:45:00.001-05:00

I doubt George Washington could have gotten himself electedin 2012

Well, he has been dead for 213 years. Pretty well limits his campaign speeches.

More importantly, I'm referring to the amount that the political landscape has changed since Washington was elected unanimously. Sure, he was a respected military leader and businessman, not to mention one of America's greatest presidents, but Washington has some flaws that would have been relentlessly attacked by today's media, making enough people hate him so that he would be unelectable.

First, there's the fact that he wasn't a member of a politcal party. You can be as popular and whimsical and rich as you want (Just ask Ross Perot), but if you don't have the full backing of one of two groups of people (Democrats or Republicans), you have no chance of getting elected. The best ever performance of a third-party candidate in a presidential election? Theodore Roosevelt, running under the "Bull Moose Party" in 1912, to a whopping 27.4% of the popular vote. That's just not getting it done, folks.

One of the biggest issues in this year's election is how rich politicians are out of touch with the rest of the people in the country. (The whole 99% debate) This is one of the sticking points in Mitt Romney's campaign...the fact that he's not worried about the poor, and thinks that handing somebody 50 bucks out of his wallet at a photo op somehow cures all of a person's financial woes. I'm not making that up. Well, should Romney secure himself the White House, at a net worth somewhere in the neighborhood of $200Million, he would be only the second richest president in US history. Who was the first, you may ask? None other than George Washington, who owned over 8000 acres of prime farmland (back when farming was profitable) and had a net worth of well over $500Million.

Oh yeah...George Washington owned slaves. Sure, that was socially acceptable back then, but today's political action committees sure aren't going to let that ruin a perfectly good attack ad slamming Washington for something that would certainly be a human rights violations today. (Remember the Clinton didn't inhale thing?)

Washington proclaimed the United States to be neutral in times of European wars, something which would be branded as weakness today. Washington raised taxes...in the sense that there really was no government to collect taxes before Washington created it. That's a cardinal sin in today's government. Those taxes went to support bigger government in the form of infrastructure improvements, commerce improvements, military spending, you name it. If people had health insurance back then, you can bet Washington would have supported that, too.

So you see...even though we all remember George Washington as a great president, it's important to note that if he had been alive today, he wouldn't have even gotten the chance to become president. The election system would have done away with him too quickly, leaving only a hollow shell of a party windbag for the voters to pick. It's a little sad. Think about that during the next presidential debate.

Really Sorry

2012-02-17T14:44:00.003-05:00

Once again, we allow Nicolas Cage to befoul cinema. This really should stop

Sounds like Jeremy's all set to review "Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance" without having actually bothered to watch the film. This should be helpful and informative.

I'm not the only one who sees it. Multiple websites exist that deal with the tragedy that is Nicolas Cage Acting. There are also rumors that he's a vampire, but that's entirely beside the point.

Today's Sametime Status deals with today's release of the latest deuce dropped on moviegoers everywhere by Nic, "Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance." Normally, one expects a sequel to be made when a movie is good and deserves more. Such is obviously not the case lately, with just about every movie that makes money earning its way back to the silver screen. The original Ghost Rider film took in around $115M at the box office despite pulling in a whopping 26% Tomatometer, allowing some jerk of a movie executive somewhere to unleash more Cage. You'll be pleased to know that the sequel did almost as well, currently riding a wave of positive reviews to a crowd-pleasing 12% Tomatometer. Here are what some critics are saying about this mess:

"A movie made by morons for morons and the only thing it will leave viewers with is a desperate need for an aspirin"
- Peter Sobczynski
"Shattering ineptitude"
Devin Faraci
"'Let's just say good judgment's not my forte,' quips Cage at one point, although the line can also be applied in a broader sense."
Robbie Collin

Sounds like a great time at the flickershows to me! Ugh.

Also...seriously, people? The guy is devil's bounty hunter, riding around on a motorcycle...fine. When he's really putting his thing down, he's entirely on fire , okay. Buy a guy who spends his afterlife on fire whose name in regular life is Johnny Blaze?! Come on!

I'm begging you, Hollywood. Stop this! Whatever we did to offend you, we're sorry.

This has been another edition of Jeremy Is In The Theatre.

Refreshing, Either Way

2012-02-16T15:34:00.002-05:00

ArnoldPalmer: Better as a Golfer or aBeverage? Discuss

Beverage?

Is that a question or a tentative answer?

Some of both, I'm sure.

Alright then. Arnold Palmer is a professional golfer who has amassed 62 PGA tour wins over his lengthy career....a mere 20 PGA wins behind record-holder Sam Snead. Everyone knows this.

Arnold Palmer is also a refreshing beverage, as some of you may be aware. It's quite tasty, if not imaginative. An official Arnold Palmer consists of 1/2 iced tea and 1/2 lemonade. Not much of a creative stretch there, considering a substantial amount of iced tea found in the United States includes lemon, be in in the form of juice, lemonade, or actual pieces of lemon. As a golfer, I imagine Arnold Palmer was more creative than this.

While nobody knows the real story of how the drink came to be widely known by that name, the refreshing beverage will live on long after Arnold's golf career. Which is more important in a legacy? History or longevity? It's an interesting dilemma.

This Chick Is Toast

2012-02-14T11:12:00.000-05:00

I’m more amused than I should be about making a “Ghostbusters”reference to someone who probably didn’t get it

You have dogs and cats living together?

Nope. As sad as it is, we live in an era where there are a lot of new movies coming out and not enough people are aware of the classics, nor are able to devote enough time to viewing them. This is a problem, because fine cinematic masterpieces that are endlessly quotable are recognized less and less, and the countless pop-culture references you can make to the movie basically cease being pop-culture.

Back in the 1940's, I imagine a world where hundreds upon hundreds of people would utter the phrase "Here's lookin' at you, kid." Now, the phrase not only seems like a mere old-timey phrase, but most people will recognize that it merely came from an old movie, but will have no chance of coming up with "Casablanca." Bogey is sad. Bogey is even more sad because not enough people know who "Bogey" was, even in a paragraph about "Casablanca."

I had the experience not long ago where an intern where I work had never seen the movie "Ghostbusters." This is little short of a criminal offense to society, punishable by a screening marathon of the Twilight series, followed by a good 12 hours of Nicolas Cage films. I firmly believe I had a similar experience at a restaurant not long ago.

I was out with some friends after an evening of volleyball, towards the end of a late meal/snack. The waitress, who I'm assuming was a student at one of the local colleges comes around and asks me if I would like another beverage. Not entirely sure how much longer everyone was going to stick around, I glance around the table and ask to nobody in particular, "Do I?" The response quickly came, "Yes, have some." Without a second thought, I turned back to the waitress and echoed, "Yes, have some." Everyone should instantly recognize this as the exchange between Egon, Louis (Vince), and Janine in the Ghostbusters headquarters, after Louis had become possessed by the Keymaster of Gozer. I'm pretty sure the amusement of the more recent exchange was completely and hopelessly lost on the poor waitress.

Whose fault is it that college students in this day and age haven't seen Ghostbusters? I blame society. So straighten up, people! Pop culture is in danger, and we can only save it if we cross the streams.

Scary Times Ahoy

2012-02-09T15:46:00.003-05:00

Nobody worry. Mycomputer is okay

Oh good...we were all concerned. Is there a more sarcastic font I can use on the Blag here?

Believe it or not, there was real concern for me this morning when my computer wouldn't start up. I plugged it in like always, pressed the power button, and it started to boot up...

Losing interest in your story, Jeremy.

...but then it just shut down. The whole process lasted about 3 seconds in between start-up and cold, dark nothingness. The more frightening part was that it would immediately try to start up again, having a mind of its own, powering up by force of sheer will, only to collapse in on itself once again.

Fortunately for us all, I'm something of a decent user of computers. It ended up being one of those situations where I unplugged the laptop, pulled the battery out, held the power button for a while to kill any remains of power the thing once had, then reassemble and try again. As you've probably guessed by now, I fixed it, and the day was saved. You may thank me at your convenience.

It's A Really Long Time

2012-02-08T15:41:00.001-05:00

If it kills germs on contact, why do I have to rinse for 60seconds?

Because that's what the instructions say you need to do. Don't question antiseptic authority!

So how do I maintain good dental hygiene without selling out to The Man? It really seems hypocritical of them to tell me that something works on contact if I have to use it for more than one second. Maybe they're assuming I'm an idiot who doesn't know how to swish something around my mouth so it contacts all surfaces. But that's the problem...I'm not an idiot, and I actually have awareness of my surroundings as well as my mouth. I believe I'm fully capable of determining when antiseptic has come into contact with all of my teeth and gums. I believe I'm fully capable of determining when to spit the stuff out rather than relying on some arbitrarily defined time that's printed on the bottle. The alternative is just scary...where they've lied to us and it actually takes antiseptic 60 seconds to kill germs and those of us who don't rigidly adhere to that time have effectively been doing nothing this whole time. Which is it, antiseptic company?!

I Occasionally Read "Art Of Trolling"

2012-02-07T11:43:00.001-05:00

Today’s Sametime Status is hidden. Press Alt+F4 to read

It's a good one, too. Totally worth it.

Maybe A SUPER JerK?

2012-02-06T13:43:00.002-05:00

Ahmad Bradshaw is a jerk. He owes me $2.50

I'm sure he didn't mean anything. He was only...wait...what did he do anyway?

He scored a touchdown in the Super Bowl.

Wow...yeah. I can see how you'd be upset about a football player trying his best to win a football game. You want to call out your garbage collector for actually emptying the can every week?

More specifically...the way in which he scored the touchdown effectively cost me a prop bet at the Super Bowl party I went to. Here's how things went downhill:

Instead of doing the usual "Boxes" thing, the organizers of the party I attended put forth a series of proposition bets that we could wager on. Selections included the number of passing yards for a particular quarterback, the number of commercials that include an animal (I called Bunk on this one repeatedly, as it was announced that Muppets did not count as animals, but the Coca-Cola polar bears did...but I lost this bet by such a wide margin, it stopped being worth it) and the total number of quarterback sacks in the game. With less than 2 minutes left in the game, the teams were sitting on a collective 4 sacks, which was exactly what I picked in the pool, so stood to win that share of the kitty. That share being $5, but somebody else also had 4, so I would have had to split it. With exactly 57 seconds left in the game, Ahmad Bradshaw realizes he can score an easy touchdown, but in the interest of he team, he wisely decides to stop at the 1-yard line to run out the clock. This was the right thing to do...run out the clock, kick the game-winning field goal with 1 second left and hit the Gatorade showers. Except for the fact that he forgot how to fall down and ended up falling buttocks over tea kettle into the endzone...accidentally scoring a touchdown, and leaving almost a minute left on the clock for an attempted miraculous comeback by one of like three quarterbacks in the league capable of doing just that. By selfishly scoring a touchdown, he allowed New England one last kick at the can.

On that ensuing drive (which we all know by now ended fruitlessly) Tom Brady was sacked by the Giants defense, resulting in a game total 5 sacks, and more importantly, no prop bet win for Jeremy. The money went to another party guest. New England never should have gotten the ball again, so there never should have been the opportunity for that last sack. Ahmad Bradshaw caused that sack by not falling down properly. The way I see it, he cost me my winnings. I anxiously await remittance.

Take That, "The Man"!

2012-02-03T14:42:00.000-05:00

I like when things cost $3.59. I pay with a 20

Interesting...how often does that happen?

Not very often. I get the 59 cents portion of it, but sadly, not so much the full $3.59.

So why is $3.59 so special?

Because it allows me to get full value from my cashier experience.

Lately, cashiers have it easy. Most of the time, the customer is doing all the work themselves, what with swiping their own credit card, typing in their own pin number, and picking up their own receipt. In some places (particularly grocery stores and large, autonomous home improvement stores) they've done away with the cashier entirely, and I have to scan all my own stuff and bag it, then pay and collect my receipt. Of course, this process goes perfectly about 17% of the time. The remainder of the times, and I don't feel like doing the math, somebody has to come over and fix the machine before I can continue. This is annoying.

So, I like to make sure that cashiers are doing as much as possible while they're working. Everybody wins. They don't get bored, and I get to have my fun.

What's so fun about that?

Simple! If I pay for a $3.59 tab with a 20-dollar bill, I get $16.41 in change. This is most commonly manifested as one 10-dollar bill, one 5-dollar bill, one 1-dollar bill, one quarter, one dime, one nickel, and one penny. The cashier will have to go through every compartment of their drawer to give me the minimum amount of change. It's a minor victory, but a victory nonetheless.

We're Getting Hosed

2012-02-02T12:00:00.000-05:00

How many fixin’s are there?

Probably quite a few. Why?

Well, I've recently become concerned with (read: happened to notice a sign) making sure I'm getting proper value for my money when presented with a food item that claims to have "All the fixin's." Before you start emailing me, I believe that is the proper spelling and punctuation, given that "fixin'" is an abbreviated form of "fixing," so therefore the apostrophe should stay.

I find it very difficult to believe that any one place can indeed provide "all the fixin's" for that partcular item, be it a hot dog, hamburger, pizza, what have you. The sheer variety of things I can come up with just off the top of my head make it nearly impossible, given the space constraints that come along with providing that service. I can also think of some extraordinary items that may be considered fixin's that are only included in isolated places...such as pineapple or mango chutney (actually things I've seen). The instant you don't offer one of those items, your claim of "All the fixin's" goes out the window. You've lied to me! Jerk.

This Sounds Wholesome

2012-01-31T15:36:00.001-05:00

Shhh. I think thepregame show is starting

But the NHL All-Star game was last weekend. What are you talking about?

I guess there's some kind of football game going on this weekend where people watch the commercials and make fun of the halftime show. Incidentally, after the whole Janet Jackson debacle a few years back, I'll be interested to see how the NBC censors take to Cee Lo Green coming out and singing "F You" in front of a couple million people. Does Las Vegas have a prop bet on bleeps during the show? I'll take "Over."

Incidentally, while I'm being a little hyperbolous (If that's not a word, it is now) about the length of the Super Bowl pre-game show (which I believe actually starts around 6 hours before kickoff), when I wrote this status this morning, I was actually unaware that today is "Media Day" for the teams, players, and coaches...so in a sense, I was entirely accurate about the pre-game stupidity starting today. I'm not sure if I love it or hate it when life imitates my art.

No Label For Sporks

2012-01-30T15:11:00.000-05:00

Oh good. The spoonsare labeled now. Glad that confusion isover

I can see where that would be an issue. People get spoons confused all the time. It can either be a small instrument for eating, or a Batttle Cry.

Indeed. I've often been confused about which silverware (or plasticware as the case may be) should be used in any given breakfast situation, and even more stumped when it came to locating them. I mean, really...the Adorably Tiny Cafeteria Thing In My Building has like 4 different bins for the stuff. There's forks, spoons, soup spoons, and knives. Who can keep all that stuff straight?

Well, hopefully the knives are straight. Spoons tend to be curved.

So, it was with great joy not long ago that I made my way into the caf and found out that the label maker was busy once again coming up with professional cardboard nametags for the silverware trays. Soup Spoons, Tea Spoons, Forks, and Knives are now clearly labelled. Never again will I be eating my oatmeal with the end of a knife! No more stirring coffee with a fork! Salad will no longer be stabbed with a spoon! Can I get a hallelujah?!?!

Probably not.

Well, at least I can get a spoon now.

Nobody Plays C Flat...Ever

2012-01-27T14:48:00.000-05:00

I’m pretty sure I’ll never apologize for notsight-reading well with 6 flats

Oh goodie. Jeremy's speaking nonsense again. Pretty typical for a Friday.

Today's Sametime Status deals more with one of my hobbies. So, all you loyal readers may or may not know that in some of my spare time, I fancy myself something of a musician. I doubt Kanye will be interrupting my Grammy acceptance speech anytime soon, but it's an amusing thing that I do when I can. Not long ago, I was forced to sight-read a new piece of music in a key signature that involved six flats. This isn't funny. It does, however, make a nice segue into a new Blag Feature I like to call "Introduction To Music Theory For Non-Musicians by Somebody Who's Not Especially Good At Music Theory."

You forgot to add "101."

Your first lesson is key signature. The key signature is a little code at the beginning of a section of music that tells you what key the piece is in, as indicated by a number of sharps or flats.

Sharps and flats, generally speaking, are the black notes on a piano. "Sharp" means you play the next black key higher than the designated note, "Flat" means one below. As you start to play, pretty much all of the notes you'll be using fall into a single scale, or "Key." If you're only playing the white notes, you're in the key of "C." If you want to move up a note to play in "D" you would need to add an F Sharp and a C Sharp to maintain the same intervals between notes in the scale (You're probably familiar with Do-Re-Mi, etc...), so a section of music written in the key of D would have those two sharps indicated in the key signature. That way, you know anytime you come across a C or an F, you're actually supposed to play the note above that. It takes some getting used to, but you get the hang of it. The image above, for the record, shows three sharps (Those little "#" thingies) and is therefore in the key of "A."

When playing new music, any key with more than 3 sharps or flats elicits cursing from the musicians and a question as to why the composer was so hung up on playing in this key rather than changing it by one note to make everyone's life easier. This is because when sight-reading (playing a piece of music while seeing it for the first time), there are a number of things to get right on the first try. You have to not only play the right notes, but play them for the proper length of time with the right volume, accents, styles, balance, while trying to look ahead to the next note you're going to play. There's often not a lot of time for thoughts of "Oh yeah...while the music says play a B, I'm actually supposed to play a B-Flat because it told me so once at the very top of the page." Generally speaking, the more sharps and flats are in the key signature, the more wrong notes will be played.

Which brings me to this new piece...one section had 6 flats. For those keeping score at home, there are only 7 notes in existence, (A through G) so every note printed on the page save one (F) were to be played as a different note. While one one hand, this makes things a little easier in that you don't have to think about what notes are Flatted and which aren't, since they basically all are, this lends itself to playing notes in ways you normally don't see them written. G-Flat is not a very common way of describing that particular note, nor is C-Flat. The end result is that I played some wrong notes during this particular section. I'm okay with that.

I Could Probaby Eat Just One

2012-01-26T14:36:00.001-05:00

Salsa is good portion control for tortilla chips

But then, of course, you just get more salsa.

That's where willpower comes in. Also, the salsa is upstairs, so getting more involves exercise, in a way, so it's okay.

Whatever helps you sleep.

So anyway, today's Sametime Status deals with both health and the hierarchy of snacks. It's different for everybody, but there exist a couple general consistencies. Among them, candy is better than broccoli, chocolate is better than Necco Wafers, and Doritoes are better than plain tortilla chips. Why the last one, you say? Because of flavor. Doritoes have it, tortillas don't. In order to make tortilla chips into a viable snacking alternative, they have to be dipped in something, be it cheese, guacamole, or most commonly, salsa. This makes the dipping portion of your snack the limiting factor.

Picture if you will a bag of Doritoes in front of you. Once you start eating them, there's really no incentive to stop, other than willpower or guilt over eating the whole silly thing. They're pretty darn tasty. Now, picture that same bag, but with plain tortilla chips. You wouldn't just start eating from the bag unless you had dip to go with them. So, you procure yourself a little cup of salsa and go to town on the tortillas. Once your salsa runs out, you can quite easily put away the bag of chips because you have no reason to go on eating.

So what is the lifetime differential in your house between a bag of Doritoes and a bag of tortillas?

The bag of tortillas lasts 83% longer than Doritoes do, which makes it not only a healthier alternative, but also more financially prudent.

And how long does the jar of salsa last?

Well that's a different story entirely.

But Then He Punched Me

2012-01-24T14:19:00.001-05:00

I got to watch a GordieHowe Hat Trick last night! Very exciting

I can only hope it wasn't while you were in line at the grocery store. That could have been tragic.

Nope...it was on TV last night. LA Kings winger Kyle Clifford became the latest in the 2011-2012 NHL season to pull off the feat. It was rather amusing to watch, though I don't believe I ever heard the commentators make note of it. Oh well.

Speaking of NHL news...Tim Thomas is a jerk. There, I said it. As is often the case in major sporting events, the 2011 Stanley Cup Champion Boston Bruins were invited to the White House to be personally congratulated on their victory by the president of the United Freakin' States. Say what you want about his policies, the man is the "leader of the free world," and he invited you to his house. This is an opportunity that very few people get in their lifetimes, so to throw it away for even the best of reasons would be stupid and ultimately regretful, right? Well..tell that to Tim Thomas, goaltender of the aforementioned Bruins team, who boycotted the trip to the White House because he thinks that "government has grown out of control."

This, of course, makes the headlines over top of actual hockey achievements like Clifford's Gordie Howe job against the Senators last night, and provides another black eye that the NHL doesn't really need at the moment. Sure, it's your right to not chill with the President of the United States when he asks you to, but just like playing hockey in the first place, shouldn't you put your team, league, and even sport ahead of your own selfish personal beliefs? Idiot.

Zeros. See What I Mean?

2012-01-23T14:09:00.000-05:00

Leading zeros arestill important, people!

I don't think those people appreciate being called Zeros. Maybe "Numerically Challenged?"

Wait, what?

Playful twist using the verb form of the word "Leading." You've been grammared.

Terrific. So, today I decided to share with all of you one of my newer hobbies. I've discovered audio books. These things are wonderful because they combine learning and sitting on my duff while doing something completely unrelated. Two of my favorite pastimes. I'm often multitasking. I have at least 10 tasks open at any given time at work (including a little Sametime Status Blag I run), when I'm watching TV at home, I'll have a laptop next to me and probably at least one other project going on at the time, and I've worked on perfecting the art of making two different types of cookies at the same time. That one's really only helpful around Christmas time, so I don't get a lot of practice.

Anyway, audio books. I don't read enough, if you don't count news and current events on the internetz. I've never read "War and Peace" or any of the Lord of the Rings series, or 90% of the other "Classics" that are out there that everyone says people should read. I don't do this mostly because I can't acclimate to doing just one thing, and reading a book takes up too much of my system's resources to allow for multitasking. The times that I have decided that I will start reading more, the end result is that my brain realizes I'm only doing one thing and decides that's the time to shut off for the night, and I fall asleep. Progress is limited.

My car has a USB port for connecting MP3 players and memory sticks through which stuff can play through the car's stereo. I discovered this early on, and have a memory stick with most of my music collection tucked away in the car. I expanded this concept just before a long road trip to include a supplemental memory stick on which I put an audio book. The way I figured it, time would seem to pass more quickly, I wouldn't get bored with the same songs, and I would "read" one of those books I'm always told I should read. 23 hours later, I had read "Moby Dick," finally understood that bit in the middle of "Major League," and had a new hobby.

Since then, I've gone on to "read" four other books, and my "reading" is no longer confined to extended road trips...it's pretty much a constant in the car now, and I catch up on important books 20 minutes or so at a time on my way to and from work. Not long ago, I started on the second book in a short series soon to be a major motion picture. Anyway...rather than being one big file, the book is broken into each individual track from the original CDs. This is largely irrelevant to me, but when whoever it was created the files, they simply numbered them 1-16 (in the case of disc 1). This is all well and good for Windows 7-based computers that understand that 2 comes before 10, but in the case of most other consumer electronics (such as the stereo in my car), 2 comes after 1, so the tracks end up playing in the order: 1,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9. This is annoying and flipping through the tracks to find the one that's supposed to be playing during one of the awkward transitions distracts me from whatever it is I'm supposed to be doing...which I guess is driving. The more annoying part is that there is a significant story gap between tracks 1 and 10, so when it jumps ahead to track 10, I get a big ol' spoiler before I realize that it jumped ahead and rectify it. All of this nonsense could have been easily avoided by simply numbering the tracks with leading zeros. Just making them 01, 02, 03 etc, and no computer system would get confused. So let this be a lesson, people. Leading Zeros! Use them! Love them! Make the roads safer.

Shortest Holiday Ever

2012-01-19T15:22:00.003-05:00

3...2...1...HappyLeap Second! Oh wait, there it goes

I didn't even have time to put on my party hat.

Well, today's Sametime Status is kinda two-fold. In one sense, I find it amusing to celebrate Leap Second, because...well...it lasts a second. On the other hand, I'm also serving to inform everybody that some scientists believe that Leap Second may no longer be necessary, so the entire concept may be going away.

Here's the deal. The most accurate clocks known are atomic clocks, which use the electronic transition frequency of a substance (typically Cesium) to measure the passage of time. Since the frequency is remarkably consistent, a shade under 9.2 billion radiation cycles is one second, and that is the international standard. The problem is that the earth has certain natural clocks...being the rotation of the earth and the orbit around the sun...that more fundamentally dictate larger time intervals. As such, we often have to add little compensation factors to out atomic clocks to re-synch them with Mother Nature. This is most noticeable every 4th February when we have to add a day to account for the fact that it takes 365.25 day to orbit the sun, rather than a simple 365. There's also the rotation which causes us to add one second to clocks every so often. Since 1972, there have been 25 such instances, so realistically, you're that much older.

The important thing to note here is that in the last couple decades, the earth has started spinning faster, so the addition of this second may no longer be required. Important sciency-type people are looking into it. I'm sure they'll keep us posted. That said, the next Leap Second is scheduled for June 30. I hope there will be a party.

U Can Haz Work Nao

2012-01-18T14:55:00.002-05:00

With Wikipedia andthe Cheezburger Network down today, I predict global productivity will be up83%

So, being a creator of internetz content, such as it is, you should be in favor of SOPA, right?

Actually, no. I'm a supporter of a lack of government censorship of my internets, and oppose the SOPA and PIPA bills currently in congress. While the intent of the bills is perfectly reasonable, the way they're constructed and written makes them completely unrealistic and would basically eliminate a remarkable amount of content on the internet based on the whim of maybe a dozen faceless, automatonic entities. (Half a dozen major movie studios, a handful of international record labels, and a few publishers)

The best explanation for why this is a very slippery slope to tread down can be found on the whimsical webcomic The Oatmeal. He asked me to pirate his custom animated gif, but I'd rather just link to his site. Click that link for the kittens!!! (It'll make sense once you see the picture)

So, my primary gripe isn't the fact that this sort of legislation exists, or has received millions of dollars worth of lobbying by the aforementioned entities in support, or the fact that few people from the overriding technical community were consulted in the writing of the bill, or even the fact that up until a mass internet blackout protest was staged by the likes of Wikipedia, the entire Cheezburger network (No LOLCats for you today...go ahead and look), Google, Dinsaur Comics, xkcd, Reddit, and Mozilla, (See the list HERE) that the majority of congress thought this was a good idea. No, my rage is directed at the fact that this is what congress is talking about right now.

How many times in the last year has congress played out the stupidity of party politics, and brinksmanship, bringing the global economy to the edge of collapse in the quest for political power? At least 3, and there's another one coming, because the last one was merely a 2-month extension on something that they still haven't figured out. So what are they doing instead of figuring out how to pay for the payroll tax cut? Catering to the whims of a dozen uber-rich corporations whose profits might be a bit lower than they should be because of internet piracy. And they're catering to them with a poory-written bill that is unsound from a technical point of view without getting the proper inputs.

As of the latest poll, a record low 11% of Americans approve of how congress is doing its job. I'm starting to wonder who those 11% are. I don't approve of how congress made me hijack my own blag to rant about what idiots they are again. They'll probably even shut down this whole site now because I used the word hijack. Oh well....sorry, internets.

What The Puck?

2012-01-16T13:49:00.000-05:00

The commodity priceof vulcanized rubber has gone up…apparently

That actually makes a lot of sense. Investing in that makes you live long and prosper.

Exactly, and...wait, what?

Star Trek joke. It was funny.

I guess we're going to have to agree to disagree there. Anyway, recently, I made a small investment in the vulcanized rubber industry, as I am wont to do.

You should invest in gold instead...safer place to put your money these days.

It's more of a hobby than an investment, really. I generally don't succumb to the whole "souvenir" thing when I go on vacations. I don't like the novelty kitsch items that say a foreign city's name while being remarkably overpriced and worthless within 2 weeks of the vacation's end. One area where I do fall for this act is the gift shop at hockey rinks. I go to hockey games on occasion, and whenever I watch a game in a new rink, I like to pick up a puck from the home team as a keepsake. I have the majority of them stacked up in a giant precarious pyramid in my office. The number is somewhere around 40 right now, counting the ones I have at home. Well, I added to the collection this weekend, having visited sunny Bridgeport CT and treating myself to both a Bridgeport Sound Tigers game and a new puck. That's the good news. The bad news is that some local elementary school provided a children's choir for the singing of the national anthem as well as the entertainment during both intermissions. Also in the "bad news" category was that the price of souvenir hockey pucks has gone up. That was annoying, but still a price that had to be paid for the benefit of my collection.

Speaking of bad news...there was some TV news last week.

Yeah...this was actually my Sametime Status on Friday, but that whole work thing got in the way again, so I couldn't share it with you here, but the CW network has announced a new game show set to premier this season. The show, which I promise you I Am Not Making Up is called "Oh Sit" and is, for all intents and purposes, musical chairs. Just astonishing.

Don't Ask Where Klingons Come From

2012-01-12T14:38:00.001-05:00

Star Trek villains “TheCardassians” seem to be direct descendants of Kim Kardashian

That seems to make the most sense of anything, really. Gene Roddenberry was a true visionary.

What's even more impressive is that Gene Roddenberry was dead long before anybody named Kardashian even became relevant. Why anybody named Kardashian is relevant is entirely beyond me, but it's also beyond the scope of my musings here. I'm actually a little offended at myself for writing about them here because it only adds credence to their notoriety. I should just stop.

Before you do...just answer one question for me. How many lights do you see?

THERE ARE....FOUR LIGHTS!!!!

Most non-nerds reading this won't get that.

I'm okay with that.

Times, They Are A Changin'

2012-01-11T15:05:00.001-05:00

It’s a dark day. Themaker of Twinkies has gone bankrupt

It's sad but true. Hostess Has Filed For Bankruptcy.

While they've come out and said that during the bankruptcy proceedings, the company will continue to produce the little yellow tubey snacks we all know and love, it seems reasonable to start pondering a world where Twinkies no longer exist. It's a troubling thought.

What would Egon compare the psychokinetic energy in the New York area to?

How will people make Twinkie Wiener Sandwiches?

What will Woody Harrelson look for while hunting zombies?

Have you noticed that all of our Twinkie-related concerns are based on movies?

I don't think that makes them any less valid.

Agreed. But the fact remains, that it's unclear how much longer Twinkies will exist, and that legitimately makes me sad. Sure, they're atrocious nutritionally, and I'm reasonably certain that I've eaten only one Twinkie in the last 5 years (The day after watching Zombieland, in case you're wondering), but it's nice to know that they're there. So, to the fine folks at Hostess, chin up! Hopefully you'll get through this mess and continue to provide us all with the delicious treats we've loved for years. As for me...I have to go stock up so I can sell Twinkies on the Black Market.

WHAT?!

2012-01-10T10:21:00.001-05:00

Going to the gym ruins your hearing...apparently

There's not much about a gym that's all that damaging to hearing. I mean...you do go to that one that prohibits making excess noise and clanking stuff around.

Ah, but that's merely a small reason people go to that particular gym. People are mostly there to get free bagels and watch TV. There's also "That Guy" who's there mostly to walk around and talk to people while they go through their workouts and tell them what a great workout he's going to have, but never seems to do anything. But back to the TV watching bit...

Cardio sucks. You're largely stationary while pretending to run, bike, climb stairs, or do whatever goofy motion an elliptical trainer is supposed to resemble. You never actually get anywhere, the scenery never changes, and you have to do this for at least 20 minutes. If you're like me, anything more than about three minutes of doing this kind of stuff and accomplishing nothing is roughly intolerable. To fix this, gyms have installed tvs all over the place so you can at least watch something changing while your immediate surroundings are fixed. When the local sports channel would show the condensed replays of the previous night's hockey game, this was about the best thing ever, but they've stopped doing that in favor of (and I'm not making this up) a TV show showing 2 guys in a radio studio doing a radio show where they talk about sports. This is a disgrace. Here I am, moving while not moving watching two guys on TV who are actually on the radio not moving talking about other people moving. It's maddening. There's precious little else worth watching at that hour of the morning, but I digress.

Once you've decided on a channel to watch, you plug in your headphones and allow the world to disappear. The problem here is one of three things:

Either my $10 gym headphones from Walmart are far superior to everyone else's
People at the gym no longer have any sense of hearing
The gym is full of people trolling the next innocent schmuck who happens to use that particular piece of cardio equipment

Almost invariably, when I plug in my headphones, the volume is set to earth-shattering levels, most times at the highest possible setting of the TV. I used to make the mistake of putting on my headphones, then plugging them in, then turning the volume down, but this subjects me to excess noise for a longer time than I'm sanely able to cope with first thing in the morning. My routine now has been solidified. I start doing whatever exercise the equipment has in mind, then turn on the TV, immediately hold down the "Volume Down" button until the output is in a less "Stadium Concert" level, then plug in the headphones. It's better for me, but it leaves me to wonder exactly why I have to turn the volume down from max nearly every time. I've decided it's because everybody in the gym can no longer hear.

I Can Hypothesize, Too

2012-01-05T13:59:00.001-05:00

The “Proof Of Purchase” is on stuff before I buy it

Well, when else did you expect them to put it on?

I find it hard to believe that this doesn't bother anyone besides me. I believe the word "Proof" is overused, much in the same way people grossly misuse the word "Literally." So when somebody prints a "Proof of Purchase" on a package that's still in the store, it's not proof of anything other than the fact that somebody can print a barcode on stuff.

Sometimes, I feel like going through the store and cutting off all the proofs of purchase, just so the people who actually end up buying it would be screwed. I can get all their stuff because, hey....I can prove that I purchased it.

I Really Hope There's No Step Two

2012-01-04T13:32:00.001-05:00

My new doorstop came with instructions

I just...wow. Did you need the assistance?

Well, if by "assistance" you mean "something to stop the door from closing," then yes. Much beyond that, I'm pretty sure I had a handle on the situation.

Most of you know that I moved to a new office not long ago, and the new office actually has a door, making my new office the envy of many of my coworkers. Most times, of course, I prefer to just leave the door open to have a feeling of freedom, but close it when privacy is required. The issue that arises with this system is that the door on my office naturally closes. In order to keep it open during the normal course of business, I needed a doorstop. For the interim, I had used a box with assorted crap in it that was in the office when I moved in. It's bigger than necessary, and is not stuff that I need to keep around, so while I was at a local department store recently (Let's call it "Bull's-Eye"), I picked up a genuine doorstop. It was not exciting.

Then, I brought it to work, at which point, it became instant entertainment. While taking the thing out of the package, I actually started reading the package...something which an engineer rarely does...and was deeply amused by what it had to say.

First of all, this particular doorstop is described as "Heavy Duty" which means it will stand up to your harshest door-holding-open needs.

Next, the package goes on to pigeonhole the target market for this item, saying that it's "Ideal for: all doors..." I have no idea where the ellipses are leading. There is nothing after them.

And finally, there is a fully separate section of the packaging that contains "Directions" for use. It includes a diagram and everything that shows the doorstop wedged under a door. Fancy that. Here are the instructions for use, in their entirety: "Directions: Slide doorstop under door."

Is that how it works? Amazing! Now you can stop your doors with the doorstop the professionals use!

I know...so I figured I'd share this with all of you as a public service. Nobody who reads this will ever be confused about how to use a doorstop again.

Old Leg Sign...or Something Like That

2012-01-03T14:47:00.000-05:00

Happy New Year, fromJeremy’s Sametime Status!

Welcome back, Jeremy...and all the loyal readers. I trust you enjoyed your vacation?

It was pleasant, and a nice break from work. Though, technically, I did come to work two days last week. But there are very few people around, so there's little point in posting an amusing Sametime Status...nobody will read it. I'm pretty sure only three people pinged me in those two days, and none of them were regarding work.

So, now that we're back, what're the big New Year's Resolutions?

I firmly resolve to have fewer crappy Sametime Statuses this year than I did last year.

So, you have to write...like...one good one? You're not off to a good start. Personally, I resolve to be more snarky and sarcastic this year.

Looks like at least one of us will meet our goals.

Theme Week, Part Plastic Rings With Gold-Colored Paint

2011-12-16T15:09:00.000-05:00

Tips For The Holidays Week! Things that "Make A Great Gift" usually don't

That's unfortunate. Now I don't know what to get you.

That's okay. It's the thought that counts.

I'm imaginary. I'm nothing but a thought.

I can see how that would make things more difficult. Anyway...around this time of year, every commercial on every type of medium is advertizing things that "Make A Great Gift." From "The Clapper" to Chia Pets, anything ever made by Ronco, Lottery Tickets, funeral pre-arrangements (sadly, I'm not making that one up), or a good old-fashioned iPod-Compatible Toilet Paper Dispenser. As a general rule of thumb around the holiday season, if a commercial tells you that something makes a great gift, it's lying.

And that concludes our holiday fun-filled Theme Week. We hope you've enjoyed this silliness enough to want a whole new year of it, starting in 2012. Jeremy will be on vacation until the New Year, so go ahead and set your reminders to come back Tuesday January 3rd for more of this...well...whatever it is we do here.

Theme Week, Part Bird With An iPhone That Has Bad Reception So He's Not Calling Anybody

2011-12-15T15:22:00.000-05:00

Tips For The Holidays Week! Bing Crosby can go ahead and clam up

It just wouldn't be Christmas if it wasn't white. Or were you referring to Silver Bells?

Nope...all about the White Christmas thing. Snow sucks. It's pretty much the worst thing ever. It's cold, slippery, forces you to go out into the cold and snow to shovel it, makes driving a pain, makes dealing with other people's stupid driving a bigger pain, and makes everything a completely white monotone. It's boring! The mind boggles when I think that there are actually people out there who say they love snow.

So here's my idea for Christmas every year...and for some reason it never seems to work out quite the way I'd hoped. It can snow once on Dec 23 or 24th...after everybody has traveled to wherever it is they're going to spend Christmas and has purchased a week's supply of ham, then stay cold enough for the snow to remain on the ground (but be plowed off the roads) until after Christmas, then it's time for Spring. All that flaky white crap can just disappear and make way for summer. Who's with me?

Theme Week, Part La Poule

2011-12-14T14:34:00.002-05:00

Tips For The Holidays Week! Nobody actually likes Egg Nog. Nobody

I think you're mistaken there, Jeremy. Lots of people drink egg nog this time of year.

Then perhaps you'd like to explain why the spell checker on the Blag here doesn't like the word "Nog." It thinks that's a misspelling...but that's entirely beside the point and something I just made up while typing this.

The more important thing to note here is that if I were to offer you a beverage consisting of warm milk, raw eggs and sugar, you'd look at me like I had two heads, politely decline, and possibly become a little squeamish. I wouldn't blame you. But apparently, if you make a 50/50 mixture of this mixture and rum, you have a fun holiday-themed party favorite.

Why?

Because the true spirit of the holiday season, like most other Americanized holidays, is to get drunk. It also includes cinnamon, which we also like during holidays...although that's entirely more confusing. Whenever Americans take over celebration of a holiday, be it Christmas, New Year's, 4th of July (Though admittedly, we didn't exactly borrow that holiday from another country), St. Patrick's Day, Cinco de Mayo (We have absolutely no reason to be celebrating that), Labor day, Haloween (After you turn 18), Thanksgiving...we change the spirit of the holiday from whatever it was intended to be into an excuse to get faced. It's what we do. Egg nog is no different. There is no reason in creation why anybody would drink this stuff...and without booze, nobody would...but once you spike it, everyone drinks up.

Theme Week, Part Turtle Dove

2011-12-13T15:06:00.001-05:00

Tips For The Holidays Week! Set expectations: Despite whatthe commercials say, nobody is getting a Lexus from me

But I think I really deserve one.

Well, that's your opinion. The simple fact of the matter is, I'm not going to be buying a Lexus for myself or anybody I know, so don't get your hopes too far up. This goes for just about everything in the Holiday season...don't expect absolute perfection out of the entire ordeal.

It's a mess.

Presents are tough to find, and there's only so many of them out there, so you may double-up on a present with somebody else and the giftee will end up with two of them. Oh well. The tree may lose a couple needles and your carpet won't be perfect. These things happen. The family cat is all but guaranteed to take a dump right around the time the entire family has gathered around to sing Christmas Carols. Oops. The aforementioned carols are going to be horrifically off-key. Deal with it. One of the stockings hung by the chimney with care may catch fire. What are you going to do? The place mats on the dining room table may be a little wrinkled. Nobody will actually be bothered by this.

That whole water off a duck's back thing applies very much to the Christmas season, so go ahead and relax. Things will go right, and things will go wrong...just like any other time of year. The important thing is to set your expectations properly so that two of you don't buy the same person the same color Lexus.

One other thing that Jeremy would like to note. In case you're wondering (and he always has), Turtle Doves are not only not indigenous to North America (so good luck getting them for your true love), but they have absolutely nothing to do with turtles...ninja or otherwise. The name is derived from the Latin "Turtur," meaning "Dove."

Theme Week, Part Partridge (Tree Sold Separately)

2011-12-12T17:02:00.000-05:00

Tips For The Holidays Week! Walk slowly when stringing lights on a tree, lest you will get dizzy andfall over

Happy Holidays from Jeremy Is In The Office! This week, we present a variety of helpful tips for surviving and maybe even enjoying the upcoming holiday season.

First of all, I'd like to get this out of the way. Despite Rick Perry's nonsensical war on non-religion, I like saying "Happy Holidays" around this time of year not because it's more inclusive of religions, but because it's inclusive of more holidays. There's more going on around this time than Christmas, so instead of only hoping people enjoy a merry Christmas, they should enjoy New Years, and Kwanzaa, and Chanukah, and Saturnalia, and the Winter Solstice, and whatever the heck else they want. Have at it, everybody! Celebrate it all. According to the Mayans, we only have about one year left, so grab all the gusto you can. So don't get all offended if I say "Happy Holidays"...especially if you're one of the people at work who I won't see until at least 2 of these holidays have passed.

Now, on to the festivities!

One of the most iconic symbols of the Christmas season is the Christmas Tree. They're bright and festive, the real ones smell like Pine Sol, the fake ones smell like the attic, and they all drop enough needles and junk in your living room to last the whole year. Seriously...I found a pine cone off of mine in August this year.

They're also ridiculous.

Based on a pagan ritual, Christmas trees are pointy, had to get just right, messy, and great for exercising the family pet. Because of all these factors, they can be a source of stress around an otherwise joyous season. So, one helpful tip to help yourself along is to go slowly when stringing up the lights. If you're like me, you've never in your life seen a tree and said, "That thing has too many lights." My current tree has 700 lights. That's over 90 lights per foot of tree, and that doesn't even factor in that there's no tree in the first foot off the ground. Needless to say, you can just about see this thing from the moon, and I'm okay with this. The problem that is caused by this "More Power" lighting system is the need to walk around the tree many many times in order to string up this ludicrous quantity of lights. It's akin to putting your head on the end of a baseball bat and spinning around. You get dizzy...and should you go too quickly, you could very well trip over a poorly-placed piano or box or bookshelf or all of the above and fall over. Gravity hurts sometimes, so go ahead and take my advice. Pace yourself...Christmas comes but once a year, so you should have plenty of time.

ECHO!!!

2011-12-09T13:37:00.001-05:00

A clean office is a weird office

I understand it's also the sign of a sick mind. Why your desk is usually a bit of a wreck is beyond me.

My office is an orderly form of chaos. It all makes sense in a Jeremy sort of way.

So why is it so different now?

Well, in today's Tale Of Whimsy, today is the big Office Move. It's really quite exciting. Everybody packs up all their crap into boxes and/or dumpsters then starts milling about the building while jaunty calliope music plays over the P.A. system. When the music stops, whatever office you're standing in becomes yours and anyone left without one gets fired.

At least that's how I think it should work.

In reality, somebody decided that everyone needed to be completely rearranged and that as a company, we hadn't throw out enough trash in the last 5 years, so they orchestrated a grand plan to move every last person who works here to move to a new office. So, 250,000 boxes and one weekend later, everyone's in a new home and only 3 days of productivity are lost. In my personal case, my carreer boils down to 3 boxes, a laptop bag, and a coffee mug. But, I get a shiny new office, and get to throw out about 50 pounds of crap from my desk drawers.

In the meantime, my office now feels very empty and strangely uncluttered. I'll get to start making my new mess on monday.

Speaking of making messes on monday, Jeremy's starting a Holiday Theme Week, so be sure to join us for a whole week's worth of nonsense!

When Does Hunting Season Start?

2011-12-07T14:21:00.001-05:00

I don’t need one of those fake light-up deer in my frontyard. I have plenty of the real ones

Yay! Little Bambis!

Yeah, they're a real treat. They eat my grass and my bird food, almost get hit crossing the road on a near daily basis, set off the motion detector over the garage so my light stays on all night, and crap in my yard. They're a real treat.

But they pull Santa's sleigh.

Holiday theme week is next week.

Sorry...jumped the gun a little.

So yeah...deer. Specifically those light-up ones that make their way to people's yards around the holiday season as people's lighting decorations get bigger, more elaborate, and in nearly all cases, kitschier. You can't throw an elf without hitting somebody's inflatable Santa, snow globe, snowman (I actually saw an 18-foot inflatable snowman not long ago...dear God) or some other stupid thing. But the light-up deer are a different sort of strange, especially in my neighborhood. We have deer all over the place, and yet people feel the need to go out and buy deer that they have to plug in. Here's a fun fact...I have more deer in my front yard than you do, and come Spring, I don't have to figure out how to store mine...they run off into the woods. Mine also use significantly less electricity.

Stringy Goodness

2011-12-05T15:22:00.001-05:00

Why does the type of plastic wrap depend on the flavor ofstring cheese?

I don't think anyone else has ever realized this.

Well, I have and I'm curious.

I don't think I even realized there were different flavors of string cheese. What's up with that?

It was a pretty new revelation to me, too. Recently, I was in the grocery store and happened upon the cheese section. Thinking that I haven't had string cheese in a long time, I located that section of the display, and found a whimsical variety of packages I'd never seen before. String cheese now apparently comes in Colby-Jack, Cheddar, and the classic Mozzarella. Yes, that's totally an Oxford comma.

I picked up a package of Mozzarella as well as a Cheddar, partially because I was curious, and partially because Cheddar is basically awesome. Over the time since then, I've been happily enjoying my string cheese. Incidentally, this is poorly named (and maybe I should check the packaging, but I can't be bothered) because the Cheddar string cheese does not come apart in strings whatsoever. The mozzarella does exactly as expected, but the Cheddar only comes in clumps.

Anyway, what's important to note is the ease in which the cheese is obtained. They both come in nearly identical packages, in which tubes of cheese are individually wrapped. The wrappers are designed to come apart by pulling two flaps at the top in opposite directions, at which point the top sheet of plastic is removed, and the tube of cheese is freed from its form-fitting back wrapper. This is great in theory, but in reality, the cheddar wrapper sucks. It starts to split down the middle, and comes apart in pieces to the point where you have to maneuver the cheese to get it out. I have had precisely zero structural failures with the mozzarella wrappers, but every last cheddar wrapper I've tried to open has ended in cheesey disaster, and not in a Michael Bay kind of way. So my question to the scientific community is as follows: What's up with that?

It's Usually Slippery...Which Is Kinda Gross

2011-12-01T15:51:00.001-05:00

Does anybody keep the little garbage bags they hang on yourturn signal at the oil change place?

I wouldn't know. I change my own oil.

Can you change the oil in my car? Cheap?

Sure can't.

Then what good are you?

I'm a pro at making snarky comments on a Blag. Perhaps the best alternate persona in the business.

I guess you have a point there.

So anyway, not long ago, my car was due for an oil change, so I took it to one of those places that does that sort of thing. They do a good job at changing the oil and topping off all the fluids and a remarkably good job of trying to talk me into unnecessary maintenance work, such as filling the tires with nitrogen instead of crummy air. I've written about that here before, but I can't be bothered to look it up. While they do a great job of talking to me about these extraneous services, they do a lousy job of actually getting me to pay them to do any extra work. I want the oil changed, and that's about it.

One other service they perform is piling a bunch of crap into my car while they change the oil. They put a sticker on the window, 2 copies of my receipt, a comment card so I can tell them how they did in exchange for a 1 in 50,000 chance at a free oil change, a couple valuable coupons for the attached convenience store, and a little plastic garbage bag that they hang on my turn signal. After I get back into my car, the first thing I do is gather all of this junk up and dump it into the little garbage bag, which immediately gets taken off the turn signal and thrown out.

My question to you is...does anybody actually keep a little plastic garbage bag on the turn signal in their car?

Why Would They Do This?

2011-11-30T13:57:00.001-05:00

Scientists have created a new, more transmissible strain ofBird Flu. I’m not making this up

Wait, what? They actually created exactly the virus we've been hoping to avoid?

It may not be the super-weapon form of H5N1 that we've all feared for so long, but it's at least one step closer.

As you all know, the saving grace of H5N1, and pretty much the only thing that's prevented the world-decimating pandemic has been the fact that transmission of the virus is at least fairly difficult. The fact that Bird Flu has a ~60% mortality rate (58.5% to be more exact) hasn't changed. But now, scientists studying Avian Influenza, and perhaps how to weaponize it (but I'll leave that to the conspiracy theorists), have succeeded in creating a new mutated strain of the virus that is as easily transmissible between mammals as your average run-of-the-mill seasonal influenza.

Simply put, THIS IS TERRIFYING NEWS!

The even more terrifying part of this story is just how easy it was to create this super virus. A mere 5 mutations to the genetics of the virus is all that it takes to wipe out 60% of the planet. The MOST terrifying part of this story is that all five of these mutations have already been seen in separate samples of Bird Flu. THEY ALL ALREADY EXIST! Once they find a way to exist together, it's all over.

I don't feel that I can stress enough that I'M NOT MAKING THIS UP.

I Had To Write A Title, Too

2011-11-28T14:14:00.001-05:00

I’ve been on vacation so long, I forgot how to writeSametime Statuses

Does that mean you're finally going to stop this nonsense?

Absolutely not. My public loves me.

Wishful thinking, I guess.

So today's Sametime Status is brought to you courtesy of the fact that I remembered on my way in to work this morning that I had to write a Sametime Status. Sure, I have a couple sitting around in the queue waiting to be used, but I figured it was more important to edutain you with the thought process involved in this sort of falderal.

Also of note today, whatever spell-checker is on the blag or my browser here is not familiar with the word "falderal" so there's that.

F, That's Cold

2011-11-18T14:09:00.001-05:00

It’s Geography Awareness Week! The warmest temperature ever recorded on Antarctica was 3 degrees F

Ooo..toasty warm.

Yeah, not so much. I don't really have any other interesting facts about Antarctica, so this is about all you're going to get today. I hope you've enjoyed Geography Awareness Week. To cap it all off, I think I'll leave you with monday's edition of the whimsical webcomic xkcd, which deals with geography and maps. See you after Thanksgiving!

This is the part where I tell you that Jeremy Is In The Office will be out of the office next week, returning November 28th. Enjoy the holiday, stuff yourself with Turducken or Tofurkey, or old-skool Turkey...whatever floats your boat. We'll be back in a week with all sorts of frivolity.

Theme Week, Part Asia

2011-11-17T14:15:00.001-05:00

It’s Geography Awareness Week! The Dallas/Fort Worth Airport is larger than Manhattan

That can't be true, can it?

As a matter of fact, it is. And not based on one of my 83% statistics, either. In terms of land area, the entire island of Manhattan covers 22.96 square miles, but whoever designed the Dallas/Fort Worth Airport figured he needed 28.24 square miles to fit an airport.

Yes, the Dallas/Fort Worth airport is the second largest airport in the country (behind only Denver), the fourth busiest in the world (by aircraft movements) and has its own Zip code. It's primary function is to help people get the heck out of Dallas.

Theme Week, Part Europe

2011-11-16T17:47:00.001-05:00

It’s Geography Awareness Week! The Atlantic Ocean is saltier than the Pacific Ocean

Please don't do this, Jeremy. We've talked about it, and it's just not magically becoming a good idea.

But I really want to!

I know you do, but you owe it to everyone not to say it.

I'm going to anyway.

Fine...but I just want to be on the record as being against this.

So the main reason for the Atlantic Ocean being saltier is a greater number of pirates.

Everybody hates you now. I hope you're happy.

See you tomorrow!

Theme Week, Part South America

2011-11-15T14:11:00.001-05:00

It’s Geography Awareness Week! Mexico City is sinking at a rate of 6 to 8 inches a year

I've always had a sinking feeling when I went there. This pretty well explains that.

What's not really well explained is the reason for this fun geography fact. It's pretty well documented that the city is sinking due to water being pumped out of the underground lake bed on which the city is built. But what startles me is that the reason the water has been pumped faster in recent years is because more people live in the city and are using it as drinking water.

And we've always been told not to drink the water. Confusing.

Theme Week, Part North America

2011-11-14T13:51:00.001-05:00

It’s Geography Awareness Week! Hawaii isthe only USstate that grows coffee

Ooo! Theme Week! We haven't had one of those around here in a while.

I know! I started to feel bad that I haven't had a Theme Week for quite some time, and this week, Geography Awareness Week just kinda fell into my lap. So all this week, we'll be presenting fun geography facts!

We'll also be using this Theme Week as a flimsy excuse to watch the video of Miss South Carolina again. That never seems to get old.

Well, if there's ever been a reason to be more aware of geography, that is it.

So today, we get to learn about coffee. It's pretty fitting for a monday that we learn that there is a only a select set of latitudes at which coffee beans can grow (Ideally, 0-10deg) , and that all of the coffee produced in the world comes from that region. The only part of the United States that is inside this climate zone is Hawaii. Hawaii is known for producing the Kona variety of coffee.

I Have As Much Chance As Perry

2011-11-11T13:49:00.001-05:00

Three reasons to celebrate today: It’s 11/11/11, It’s Veterans Day, and uhm…Iforget. Oops

Once again, it's time to celebrate another cute little pattern in a date that's only there if you write it in once specific arbitrary way. This time, we conveniently leave out the "20" in 2011 to create 11/11/11. It's better than some of the ones we've had recently.

And Happy Veterans Day to all the veterans out there and all the people who get to skip a day of work and school because of them. I don't get to skip work, but I can still appreciate the Vets.

I can also appreciate good political comedy when I see it, and candidate Rick Perry supplied us all with some comedic gold at the most recent presidential debate when he not only suffered a bout of complete mental flatulence, but looked absolutely terrible trying to cover it up. Many Of You Have Probably Seen It Already.

Unfortunately for me, by the time I had realized how to turn this into satire (in jaunty Sametime Status form...see above), Jon Stewart Had Already Figued It Out, so I sound a little unoriginal, but I'm okay with that. Jon's a professional, so I'll give credit where credit is due. He jumped all over it in the same way I decided to...and probably did a better job.

It's just a little sad that in this era of politics, where the 8-second sound byte is more important than knowledge, integrity, or anything of substance to a candidate, that certain politicians can't even remember to get their sound bytes right. What's worse is that this episode pretty much seals the fact that Perry can't even think on his feet well enough to hold the highest office in the country. Yet, he's still going to run, people are still going to funnel money to him, and yes...people are still even going to vote for him.

A Long Way To Go For A Rant

2011-11-10T13:35:00.001-05:00

I wonder what kind of statistical analysis the cafeteriaworkers run on toaster casualties

Has there been another Toaster fatality?

In the most immediate sense, I'm not aware of any this week, but there have been plenty in recent memory. So, you all remember the Famed Toaster of Hades, right? Well, I ponder it every now and again, often when I'm waiting for a bagel to toast, waiting with anxious anticipation to see what will emerge. See, the Toaster has claimed so many victims that it prompts various actions by the folks who run the Adorably Tiny Cafeteria Thing In My Building. You certainly remember some of them. There's the "Use Your Head When Toasting Bread" sign, the knob removal, the scotch-tape-a-piece-of-metal-over-the-missing-knobs ploy to restrict access to the controls, and (I'm assuming) a change in the PM frequency to reduce the crumb contamination levels.

As an aside, it seems like you're not the only one With These Types Of Problems

What concerns me is the success criteria of these various actions. I'm an engineer...so everything I do has to have a problem statement, an action plan, owners, target dates, and success criteria. For example, if tool availability is low, I implement a fix then track how the availability changes as a result of that action. Sometimes, it seems like overkill (or over-management, but that's splitting hairs) but it gives people a single number by which to judge me...and that just makes sense. I'm curious if the cafeteria workers are subject to the same scrutiny that I am. I'm guessing not, but it's fun to think about.

Here's a small office and a computer with statistical analysis software installed. One of the cashiers pores over a trend chart of toaster fires per week, tirelessly coming up with mean and sigma charts, determining the frequency of fires and creating a pareto of the points of cause. Croissants are #1, followed by buttered items, flaky pastries, donuts, muffins, bagels etc. The #1 root cause is determined to be people deciding to toast things that shouldn't be toasted, and that operator education is the corrective action. The "Use Your Head When Toasting Bread" sign is born! A couple weeks later, the entire process is recreated, and the incidents of croissants and buttered toast igniting into fiery orbs of death are reduced, and the cashier can present the improvement to management. The frequency of product ignition is still higher than the purchase spec of the toaster, so the cashier is sent back to re-do all of the analysis and begin the process again.

I choose to believe this is why I end up standing in line at the empty cash register for a couple minutes every morning before one of the cashier comes out of the office to ring up my iced tea.

Like A Saw

2011-11-09T13:08:00.001-05:00

Nicolas Cage is the 6th most overpaid actor in Hollywood. I’m surprised at this

Where did you get this data? It's suspect.

As usual, I'm Not Making This Up. It's from the official Forbes list of Hollywood's most overpaid celebrities.

So what about this surprises you?

The fact that there are 5 people in Hollywood that are actually worse. But, I guess statistics are statistics, and Forbes actually backs up their claims with data, so I guess I can't argue. What I can point out is that it may just be a blip on the radar, and my boy Cage will be right up on top of next year's list.

This assumes people keep paying him to be in crappy movies.

Sadly, that seems to be the trend. They should stop.

I'll Shuffle, Too

2011-11-04T14:15:00.001-04:00

I can’t tell if LMFAO’s “Party Rock Anthem” is supposed tobe a real song or not

The creepy giant hamsters in the car commercial seemed to be pretty okay with it.

So I'm guessing most of you out there have heard this song and may just not recognize it by name, so I'll start by helping you out.

Here's A Link To The Video

A well-known car company used it in a recent commercial featuring dancing robots and a mechanized soldier that bore a resemblance to Master Chief from Halo.

Very true...now when you say "well-known car company"...which one was it?

I'm not at liberty to say.

And that's because...?

It's because I forget which one. Moving right along...

So this song is a strange blend of catchiness, banality, and lunacy that seriously makes me wonder if the song is supposed to be for real or not. It very well could be a novelty song akin to anything Wierd Al Yankovic puts out, or it could just be the kind of popular tripe that in no way is supposed to be good music but ends up being ubiquitous and money-making.

Somebody help me out, here!

Bobby Fuller Probably Said It Better

2011-11-03T11:11:00.000-04:00

I passively avoided the law and the law may or may not winthis afternoon…not great lyrics

Ladies and gentlemen, this will be the final edition of Jeremy Is In The Office, since it seems Jeremy will be off to the slammer for the next 6-18 months. What did you do anyway?

Uhm...nothing quite like that.

First of all, the Blag isn't going anywhere...we'll keep on posting stuff here for you to enjoy.

There really is no justice in the world...

Secondly, today may or may not be the day of reckoning for the aforementioned Jury Duty I'm on this week. I thought I dodged a bullet the other day when the juror numbers that were required to report ended 4 before mine, and it was getting later in the week. I figured by Thursday, they'd have everyone they needed for the week and I might be off the hook.

Well, now I have to re-check the status message at 11:15AM (about 7 minutes from this typing) to see if I have to report this afternoon or not. Hopefully not...I have stuff to do.

With Pictures and Exposure Levels

2011-11-01T14:28:00.001-04:00

“It’s like Facebook, but for the nuclear plant”

Jeremy...what are you talking about?

I pretty honestly wish I knew. This is one of those things that happens in a dream of mine that makes perfect sense at the time, but seen in the light of day makes me seem all bat-crap crazy.

So I was explaining to somebody about the website I was viewing (I'm assuming it was wholesome) and felt obligated to explain that it was just like Facebook, but for the people who worked at the nuclear power plant. I don't live especially near a nuclear power plant, nor do I know anybody who works for one. I'm also pretty sure that workers at nuclear plants don't have their own social networking website, and they're allowed on Facebook and The Google Plus like the rest of us.

Does anybody actually use Google Plus?

I have no idea. You just don't hear much about them anymore, do you?

Culinary Crime

2011-10-31T14:21:00.000-04:00

I need to buy eggs, but I don’t want to look suspicious

You always look suspicious. I don't trust you around my goldfish.

You have a goldfish?

Of course. I'm allergic to cats.

So anyway, today's Sametime Status is brought to you by my breakfast. I made french toast recently because I wanted to make a nice breakfast, but only had one egg in the house. Then there was that whole snowstorm thing you may have heard about which prevented me from going to the store. Long story short, my house is entirely devoid of eggs, so there will be no french toast, omelets or Eggs Benedict until further notice.

You make Eggs Benedict?

Just because I haven't doesn't mean I can't.

So here we are today, the roads are clear and most of the stores around are open again (Word is that the local WalMart was even closed when they lost power) and I should hit the grocery store. I didn't lose power long enough to have all of my food spoil...I just need a couple things. One of those things would be the aforementioned eggs. Problem is, I live in a constant state of fear that cashiers at the grocery store (or any other store, for that mater) and today is Halloween. I'm pretty sure that every grocery cashier who scans a carton of eggs today will just assume that those eggs are destined for somebody's front door. I don't want them to assume I'm going to be vandalizing somebody's house when all I want is a scrambled egg.

I'll just have to wait and buy groceries tomorrow.

Wherein We Make Friends With Klingons

2011-10-28T14:06:00.002-04:00

Training Day IV: The Undiscovered Country

Again with the movies? Shouldn't you be learning something?

Well, at the moment, no. We get occasional breaks from the deluge of information provided by the training course, so we're taking a pause at the moment.

So you decided to regale us with nerdiness?

It's what I do. Today is the last day of training, which just happens to be Day 6. Not many film series of note have gone to a 5th sequel, so even though I did Sci Fi yesterday, I felt obligated to go with Star Trek for Day 6. I'm sure you all enjoy it.

Speaking of weird work schedules, Jeremy Is In The Office may or may not be in the office any given day next week. The court system finally caught up with Jeremy.

Fortunately, I'm not the defendant...I drew jury duty.

So, next week...we'll see if Jeremy Is In The Office or not. We'll also see how he feels about capital punishment.

It's just a small town court...I sincerely doubt I'll have a noteworthy trial. And even if I did, I don't think I'm supposed to talk about it anyway, so anything you hear about a trial will be complete made-up bunk. It's more fun that way!

Freezing Fury

2011-10-27T13:21:00.001-04:00

Training Day, Episode 5: Mother Nature Strikes Back

Geeze, Jeremy. Another day of training? Once this is over, you're going to be a genius or something.

First of all, as evidenced on this Blag, I already am a genius.

Second of all, there's only one more day of this stuff..so it's not so bad.

Thirdly, it would seem as if Mother Nature has won another round in the war of attrition between me and my heating bill. I actually turned the heat on in my house yesterday, signaling the unofficially official end of summer. Something about the forecast showing solid-form precipitation and low temperatures that start with a 2 meant that I should probably break down and start paying for warmth again.

The concept of "sleeping weather" is an interesting one that I hear about. Toward the end of summer, I start hearing people talk about how they had "good sleeping weather" the night before. The idea being that when it's cold, it's not too hot in your house to be comfortable while sleeping, without the use of a fan or aid conditioner. The problem with this is that you're unconscious, and unable to actually pay attention to, let alone enjoy, the weather. The concept seems to only apply to temperature, but as far as I'm concerned, the only kind of "sleeping weather" I need to concern myself with is anything that's quiet. So, hurricanes and tornadoes are out, regardless of the thermometer.

However, when it's cold, we have good sleeping weather. I'm okay with that...I just get out the big blanket, burrito myself in the bed, and wait for morning. My problem has started to arise with me in the morning, where the room temperature has been dropping steadily since the summer months. In the last couple weeks, that temperature has made its way into the lower 60s in the morning. While this would still qualify as perfectly good "sleeping weather" it's not particularly good "getting out of the shower" weather.

These Rarely Go Well

2011-10-26T13:54:00.002-04:00

Training Day 4…not starring Denzel Washington

Ooo...did they Darrenize Denzel's character for the sequel?

Thankfully, no. Today's Sametime Status is simply pointing out that I'm back in that training class I had a couple weeks ago.

Jeremy failed miserably.

Actually, Jeremy passed with a 97.06%...only missed part of one multiple-answer question which was bunk anyway. This particular course is divided into two parts, and now we're in Part II. Therefore, it's Training Day...and the 4th one. Pretty simple.

Speaking of lousy sequels and reboots...I got a chance to see the new remake of "Footloose" not long ago. Regrettably, I did not turn down that chance.

Even with lousy movies, the director will often get something right, often by sheer happenstance. In the case of Craig Brewer's remake of the 1984...well...I hesitate to use the word "classic" but whatever...the only thing he managed to get right was to use Kenny Loggins' original song as the opening theme. This is pretty sad, since all he had to do was directly copy the movie he was copying, but he pulled it off admirably! After that, it was pretty much downhill.

Let's ignore the completely implausible and dated plot (dancing is outlawed by an over-reactively conservative city council until a reckless youth leads a spirited rebellion in order to free himself and nail the preacher's daughter), lousy script, and atrocious acting for the time being and focus on the car. A car that's been sitting in a barn for an undetermined amount of time, but long enough to have a thick layer of dust won't simply start right up by putting in a battery. Usually there's some kind of gas involved...maybe some oil...and it often helps if the car is less than 40 years old. Even if we ignore that, the car stereo which barely has enough power to drive the speakers built into the car will apparently become an ear-shattering, disturbing-the-peace-ticket-inducing pinnacle of mobile audio simply by connecting it via a single wire to a carnival loudspeaker. Remarkable!

I'm also not sure how many people out there who take out their frustrations with the world by dancing around an abandoned factory, swinging on rusty chains and breaking windows before falling on the ground laughing, but apparently, this is a perfectly viable means of escape. And if you find you're having trouble agreeing with somebody, by all means, settle your differences by driving old school buses around a figure-8 demolition derby. That will show everyone who's boss. Just don't ask where you're supposed to procure a fleet of customized used school buses.

Oh yeah...I would be completely and thoroughly remiss if I failed to mention the horrifyingly awful cover of Bonnie Tyler's "Holding Out For A Hero" that was spewed upon the world by Ella Mae Bowen. Sweet merciful crap, that was terrible.

Before we went to see this shameless, lousy, money-grab masquerading as a movie, we were alerted to a critical review that suggested the film would be a better experience if you were intoxicated upon entering the theatre (I Am Not Making This Up). Unfortunately for that author, all I can offer is that it doesn't help enough. Footloose (2011) is pure junk.

This has been another edition of Jeremy Is In The Theatre

Either Way, His Name is Jonathan

2011-10-25T15:31:00.001-04:00

Three straight shutouts apparently isn’t good enough to makethe next start

Yep...it's hockey season. Jeremy's going to be busy for a while now.

Well, it seemed that way. Today started off with me wanting to amuse everyone with the tale of LA Kings goaltender Jonathan Quick, who set a franchise record in his last game, recording a third consecutive shutout and now hasn't been scored upon in his last 188+ minutes of play. All that said, he won't be starting tonight's game against New Jersey because...uhm...well...because.

What ended up happening today though was too much fun to pass up. I set a new record for futility at work today. We get new computers every so often because they become obsolete and start having trouble, and all the usual reasons. Well, today was my day to get a new computer...which for me is usually very exciting. I get to play with new electronics and configure a new desktop and see what capabilities my new machine has. It's great fun. Of course, to get to that point, I have to go through the standard configuration wizard which includes the installation of all the required programs for network access and passwords and security and whatnot. My new laptop choked on this wizard no fewer than three ways.

A hard drive security program didn't install properly, the network access program won't run at all, and the software installation program won't update. It was a whole new type of pathetic that I had my computer for 45 minutes before I found myself on the phone with the help desk. That has GOT to be a new low. Who's got a better story?

So Did Both Fans

2011-10-21T16:04:00.002-04:00

Based on the commentary, I expected the Coyotes to win by 5or 6 goals

Sports Commentary sucks.

Oh boy! It's time for another horrifyingly misguided Rant from Jeremy! Dust off your soapboxes, everybody! We're about to get sued!

As hard as it may be to believe, on occasion, I will watch a hockey game on TV. Shocking, I know...but it's true. One important aspect of watching sports on TV is the play-by-play and color commentary provided by the game's announcers. Once you become accustomed to a certain announcing team, be they Doc and Chico, Bob and Jim, Dan and "Moose," it actually gets a little uncomfortable to watch a game announced by a different crew. Not long ago, I was treated to a Los Angeles vs Phoenix game, with commentary provided by Dave Strader and Tyson Nash. Since one of the teams involved was LA, I expected to hear Bob Miller and Jim Fox, but it was the Phoenix broadcast, so it was a little unusual. What followed was a travesty of announcing.

Dave and Tyson are what are referred to in the industry as "Homers." That is, they firmly believe that the team that employs them (in this case, the woeful Coyotes) can do no wrong. If you weren't actually paying attention to the game, you would come away firmly convinced that the Coyotes were playing the better game. They were skating faster, fore-checking better, winning more individual battles, getting the better scoring chances, deserving of more power plays, getting the better of the 4th line play, fighting better, checking harder, and goaltending better than LA. It seemed from the audio of the broadcast that the Coyotes were running absolutely roughshod over the Kings.

Strange, then that the game ended 2-0 in favor of Los Angeles.

Comedy Returns Tomorrow, Hopefully

2011-10-20T16:28:00.000-04:00

If Wall Street wanted to occupy my wallet with 1% of theirmoney, I’d be okay with that

What would you do with all that money?

What are the people who have it doing with it?

Fair point.

So today's Sametime Status is in reference to the Occupy Wall Street protests that are still going on in New York and various other places around the world...and nobody really knows why. I get that there is a lot of unhappiness among them, but I just don't understand what they expect to happen out of the whole thing.

The corporate world is built around growth of profit in order to increase stock prices. There is no corporation in the world that will willingly sacrifice a couple years' worth of profits and risk the wrath of the stockholders, mainly because the heads of the companies will be replaced by people who will go back to the singular focus of increasing the stock price. The issue right now is that corporations have forgotten how to make money. Most sales aren't growing by the desired pace (mostly because nobody has any money left) and all that's left is to increase profits by lowering costs...which amounts to little more than taking money away from the people who already don't have it. Ostensibly, it seems like a pretty self-destructive spiral that's been going on for the last 30 years or so and shows no signs of stopping before it crashes. I don't know what the answer is, and neither do the protesters, or the 1% of the people they're protesting against.

False Sense of Security

2011-10-19T14:17:00.000-04:00

Getting a Flu shot today, even though it onlyimmunizes against H1N1

Well, as you know, there is no vaccine against Bird Flu. Never has been.

And unless people wake up, there won't be until it's too late.

Anyway...it's probably important to mention that I am now vaccinated against the seasonal influenza, which means if I get sick, it's likely your fault. A little pinch on my arm is a small price to pay for the knowledge that the weaksauce H1N1 won't get me.

The Cost Of Sanity

2011-10-18T14:14:00.000-04:00

The Satellite Radio company should use Election Season as anadvertisement

We'd like to say that it's that time of year again, but since it'll be going on for the next year non-stop, we don't really know what to call it. It's a little unfortunate.

That's right, everyone...it's election time again! Sure, we've never really stopped seeing election signs from the last election in November, then the special election in February, the other election in April and whatever the frig else people splatter campaign signs all over the world for. As much as we all wish they'd stop, everyone knows they won't. One method they use of destroying our quality of life is the radio commercial. For about a month and a half before every election, 83% of the commercials you hear on the radio will be negative mud-slinging political advertisements against one candidate, which leave you a little unclear who exactly you're supposed to be voting FOR.

Not long ago, I had a free trial of satellite radio. It was enjoyable hearing songs that I hadn't heard on the radio in some time (or ever) and being able to do so without hearing commercials. That said, I decided pretty early on that these positives were not worth the cost of a regular subscription, so as soon as the free trial expired, so would my involvement with satellite radio. Of course, the satellite radio company disagreed and have proceeded to call me ever other week asking if I want a subscription. It recently occurred to me (while listening to an interview with some political candidate I won't be voting for) that their best sales pitch would be right around this time of year. All they have to do is call me and say, "If you pay for satellite radio, you won't have to listen to political commercials anymore," and I'll be reaching for my wallet.

Rhetorical Friday Strikes Back

2011-10-14T14:43:00.000-04:00

Who decided what order to put the alphabet in?

I hate you.

You're choosing to hate the player, and not the game?

Well, I chose to hate Rhetorical Friday quite some time ago. You're responsible for this, so therefore, I hate you as well.

I pay your salary.

I love Rhetorical Friday!

That's better.

Now anyway, the concept of Alphabetical Order has been around for as long as the alphabet, but unlike numbers and counting and that sort of thing, the order of letters in the alphabet seems more than a little arbitrary. Why did they choose to put Q before S? S is clearly the more important letter as evidenced by every episode of Wheel of Fortune ever made. We're taught alphabetical order from a young age, and we never question it. A comes before B and B comes before C...and that's just how it is. I don't know how much sense this makes, and I would like the English-speaking world to do a full review of the alphabet so we can make sure we have the most efficient alphabet possible. Just because we'd have to re-organize the dictionary is no reason to stick with an old, failed system.

Jeremy's old Statistics professor used to say, "Most parts of the world speak broken English, except the United States. There, it's been ground into a fine powder."

Happy Rhetorical Friday, everybody!

Then Launch It Out Of A Cannon

2011-10-13T11:43:00.001-04:00

Dunkin Donuts is missing a big opportunity by calling it a “Pumpkin”

Well, just so you know, I checked on Webster this morning, and the official term for a pumpkin is, in fact, "pumpkin." Also, are you feeling okay? You actually used the real name of a large, faceless, automatonic corporation. Usually, you obscure those pretty transparently.

Well, in this case, I thought it was necessary. Also, I'm not calling them out for being lousy or screwing something up. They just used the wrong word in an advertisement for something that I may or may not buy. I'm pretty impartial to pumpkin muffins and pumpkin donuts and pumpkin coffee and whatever else Dunkin' has decided to pumpkinify.

It's surprisingly difficult to type the word pumpkin that many times in one sentence...in case you were wondering.

We weren't.

So anyway, since Dunkin Donuts's advertising department has dropped the ball, I've decided to help them out in the form of a quick Blag post explaining how they should have done it in a manner that would have added whimsy. The official tag line they're using is "Nobody Does Pumpkin Like Dunkin'". What they should have done is take advantage of the shortened, folksy version of the word "Pumpkin" and made the catch phrase "Nobody Does Punkin' Like Dunkin'". Of course, then Ashton Kutcher's lawyers would probably have something to say about that, but it makes the commercials sound better.

You are welcome.

Almost Soothing

2011-10-11T15:40:00.002-04:00

It’s just not the same unless my car is yelling at me

Jeremy is a bad driver. Do yourself a favor and stay off the sidewalks.

This has nothing to do with my driving abilities, which are perfectly acceptable, by the way. This has to do with the pretty established notion that I am a creature of habit. I settle into routines, arrange the bills in my wallet a very specific way, have some mild compulsive tendencies, and expect certain things to happen in a very certain way.

One of those things is starting my car. I have a routine. I settle into the seat, start the car, put the seat belt on, then proceed merrily on my way. One important part of this is the order of operations...start the car before seat belt. I don't know why it goes this way, but I don't question it. It has an unfortunate side effect, though. Pretty much every car in creation nowadays has an alarm that starts to go off if you start the car without having the seat belt connected. It's usually a pretty mild beeping that goes on while the car is going through its start-up cycle. That noise has become so ingrained in my routine that if for some reason, I have my seat belt on before I start the car, I get concerned that there isn't an alarm going off. The car's not supposed to not make a beeping sound at this stage of the game.

Nerdiest Post in a While

2011-10-10T14:13:00.000-04:00

Star Trek united the world in pronunciation of the word“Data”

Ah, that nutty Star Trek. Is there anything it can't do?

I'm sure there is, but we haven't found it yet.

A while ago, before Star Trek: The Next Generation was on TV, there were two very distinct pronunciations of the word "Data." There were those in the DAH-ta camp (with the AH as in "HAT", and those who went with DAY-ta. Well, Star Trek changed all of that. Brent Spiner portrayed the character of the lovable scamp of an android hoping to be a real boy named "Data."

Well, the whole ToMAYto ToMAHto debate with Data was put to bed early on in the series in a whimsical exchange with Dr. Pulaski, as shown at the 20-second mark of THIS VIDEO.

Whether you like Stat Trek or not, you have to admit that you really haven't heard anyone pronounce the word "DAH-ta" since.

Blistery Memories

2011-10-03T13:44:00.000-04:00

I haven't had a case of "Nintendo Thumb" this bad sincebefore I actually owned a Nintendo

Today's post is to inform all of you loyal readers that Jeremy will be taking the rest of the week off for medical leave. The soreness on his left thumb is too much to bear, and he is not able to press the space bar anymore. The doctors have prescribed bed rest for 4 days.

Okay, well...part of that is true. Jeremy Is In The Office will be Out Of The Office for the rest of the week, but for entirely different reasons. I'll actually be spending the rest of the week in an off-site training course, and I won't have access to my instant messenger, so there's really no sense in making new messages to use as a Status. Which is a shame, because I had a really good one for tomorrow...I'll give you a hint: It had something to do with Fire.

Anyway, to truly appreciate today's Sametime Status, the concept of "Nintendo Thumb" must be understood. When playing an old-school Nintendo (Os the subsequent Playstation or X-Box), the left thumb manipulates a control pad or joystick. While this can be done with a very light and simple motion, most video games are more engaging, and thus the pressure applied can become, albeit unknowingly, pretty substantial. Extended periods of time applying this force can cause quite a bit of soreness in the left thumb, possibly even blisters, until the hand becomes accustomed to this type of action. This soreness is known as "Nintendo Thumb."

It must also be understood that I never had a Nintendo when I was growing up. I'm not sure how much this bothers me. You have to factor in the fact that Nintendos were the only socially acceptable video game to have. There's also the fact that I am made of suck at Nintendo-based video games. It doesn't matter which ones...from Mario to Duck Hunt, Tetris to Contra...

Pause inserted here on account of you're all thinking "Up Up Down Down Left Right Left Right B A Start"

I am terrible at all of them. Now, give me a rousing game of "NHL Hitz" on my X-Box, and I'll beat the computer by 30 goals while ringing up 20 minutes in penalties and checking the goalie through the glass at least once. (Yes, it's possible...and even legal in certain instances) But that's beside the point. The point is that because my thumb never got accustomed to Nintendo games, whenever I play my X-Box, I get Nintendo Thumb. This is especially ironic considering I actually own a Nintendo now...a Wii, which does not have the Thumb affliction.

So why were you playing video games so much that you caused this?

I was doing drywall work, which everyone knows is an iterative process. You splatter on some joint compound, and play video games while you wait for it to dry. Then you sand, apply more compound, and play video games while you wait for it to dry. It's really pretty tedious, and damaging to your left thumb. Anyway...see you all next week!

The Stock Will Tank

2011-09-30T15:18:00.000-04:00

Starting in October, I’ll be charging a $5 per monthsubscription fee to read my Sametime Status

Jeremy's Sametime Status, as well as Jeremy Is In The Office is on schedule to post record profits this year. But, sadly, due to increased government regulation on text-based internet inanity, we have little choice but to pass the increased costs on to you, the Loyal Reader.

Sorry, everybody...you know....it's the government that's doing it to us. You see, the way the financials work on the Blag here, and on the Instant Messaging program at work, we collect $0.00 for every view we get. It doesn't seem like a lot, but it adds up, and that's how we're able to bring you this type of entertainment on a daily basis. Sure, the comedy already exists, but it's all inside my head. In order for you to enjoy it, I have to maintain employment and log into a website. That's not free.

Well, the website is free, but that's entirely beside the point.

So, now the government has decided to limit the amount of money I'm allowed to collect from these views to a measly $0.00, which is a change of almost or over 25%, depending on what you feel like making it. In order to continue posting my record profits, I have to make up the difference somehow. Also, LIR is demanding a 130% increase in his bonus package for this year, so in order to keep him around, I have no choice but to pay it.

I have to eat, you know.

Unfortunately, this means that this Blag here will become a subscription-based website starting next month. The charge is only $5 a month, which really isn't much of a sacrifice at all, when you consider that your Netflix bill just went up by more than that, and they didn't increase their services, either. Sure, you may point out that it would take over 84 visits per month* to ring up $5 in visiting fees (at $0.00 per hit), and that we may be over-charging you for this valuable service...but $5 is a nice round number, so we're going to go with that. See you all (and your checkbooks) next week!

For the record, NO we are not going to start charging you to visit the website. We're making light of Bank of America's recent decision to charge $5 per month to customers for using their debit cards to pay for things with their own money that the bank is already profiting on.

*The 84 visits per month is an actual calculation of how many debit card transactions you'd have to make with a Bank of America debit card to equal the $5 fee based on the 6 cents less the government is allowing the bank to charge per transaction. So unless you're using your debit card more than that, you're getting hosed. If you're a current Bank of America customer, switch to a local credit union.

This Doesn't Say Much For Me

2011-09-28T15:40:00.002-04:00

Mints are great for your breath, but sometimesplay games with your mind

Here is where we get a little insight into the vast empty abyss that is Jeremy's mind. Careful...it can get slippery.

I'm not particularly proud of this story, but I can see the entertainment value, so I'm willing to put my pride on the line for you, the Loyal Readers.

I have a car. It's actually relatively new, so I don't really expect things to go wrong with it. I know the horn is pretty lame, and there's a maintenance bulletin out about the gas cap, but for the most part things are still in pretty good shape. I was a little concerned recently when I heard a rattling sound coming from the passenger side door whenever I'd hit a bump in the road (which given the road conditions in the Greater Jeremy Area, is pretty often), and this troubled me. I shouldn't be having clunks or rattles with my car. When I got to the parking lot at work, I opened up the passenger door and had a look around to try to find anything that might be loose or tucked into the cup holder or something that would be making a rattling noise. I went around wiggling and shaking and bumping things trying to recreate the noise to no avail, the thing was solid as a rock.

This process lasted at least a minute and a half before I gave up and started planning my rattle strategy. But, of course, this strategy planning would have to occur inside, so I grabbed my laptop bag out of the passenger seat, where it always sits on my way to work. Pulling the bag out caused a rattling noise inside the bag, where the little box of breath mints is tucked away inside the front zipper pocket. It sounded strangely like the rattle I'd heard coming from the door on my commute.

I felt a little like an idiot, but nothing out of the ordinary for me at that hour of the morning.

That Will Leave A Mark

2011-09-27T13:29:00.002-04:00

Biting the inside ofyour cheek: The ultimate and ultimatelyannoying self-fulfilling prophecy

Go ahead and punch yourself in the face for a while, too. It'll feel great when you stop.

So not long ago, I decided that I wasn't in enough pain, so I bit the inside of my cheek. I did a terrific job on it, too, such that it left a mark and some swelling. And yes, it hurt a little, but I'm manly, so I can't let it show.

Now you did it...we're going to get letters...

The problem with doing this sort of damage to yourself is not that it hurts...it's that it leaves you in a position where it will continue to be annoying and hurt for the foreseeable future. Approximately every 10 minutes since I originally went ahead and bit myself, the fact that the inside of my cheek is swollen causes me to bite on it again. Now, I don't bite on it quite as hard as before, but it still hurts and is still remarkably annoying. The only way to stop doing this is to stop doing this and let it heal, which I can't do, because I keep doing it. GAH!

Figured Out How To Make Titles Again!

2011-09-26T14:47:00.000-04:00

One person’s “Deep Appreciation” is another person’s“Apathy”

Yeah, I don't really care.

Your support means a lot, thanks!

I see what you did there.

So today's Sametime Status is brought to you by the workers at the Adorably Tiny Cafeteria Thing In My Building, who are given full creative license over the signs posted around the place. The same people that brought you Use Your Head When Toasting Bread post random signs throughout the ATCTIMB, some of which are useful, and some of which are borderline passive-aggressive. They tell us what the price is for a hard-boiled egg (which I never see anybody buying, so I'm a little concerned about these things), and when a beverage fountain is out of order.

Once in a while, when the cash registers are running low on change, a sign gets carted out which implores people to use smaller-denomination bills when paying for your goodies. The sign says, and as near as I can remember, I'm quoting: "Ones And Fives Would Be Deeply Appreciated." It seems excessive to me that they add the word "Deeply" when describing the appreciation for ones and fives, so maybe I expect too much. Not long ago, I was in line to buy about 3 bucks worth of stuff, and I had exactly $24 in my wallet (a $20 bill, and 4 $1s). I could have easily paid with the 20-spot, but since the sign was out and I felt like I could have used some deep appreciation, I decided to go with paying in singles.

I wasn't sure what was in store for me. As much as I knew there would be no parade or fanfare for using small bills, I thought there may have actually been some sort of acknowledgment on their part for the fact that I saw the sign and actively chose to help them out. I mean..."Deeply Appreciated" implies something more than simple appreciation, so I didn't think it was out of the realm to expect some sort of recognition. Such was not the case...I got the same vacant stare off into space and mumbled "thanks" that I always get at that hour of the morning. Probably the same reaction the next guy got when paying for his coffee with a 20.

2011-09-23T13:50:00.000-04:00

It might be time to invest in a mattress, and I don’t meanbuy a new mattress

Oh dear. Jeremy's putting on his foil helmet again.

There's a fine line between paranoia and being knowledgeable. Woody Allen once said, "Just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean they're not after me." Of course, Woody Allen was a bit of a nut job, but that's hardly worth mentioning.

If anyone has noticed, the economy kinda sucks lately. Blame whoever you want, it doesn't change the fact that you're not going to fix it, you can really only figure out for yourself how to manage until it blows over. Therein lies the rub. Right now, there aren't any good investments. Stocks, Bonds, Commodities, Currencies..everything is headed right down the pan. Even gold has dropped almost $100 an ounce today (accurate as of this writing...that'll change in like 5 minutes).

The best thing to do, I think, is to stuff all of your money underneath your mattress, and buy a nice, trusty shotgun to protect your valuables. I've linked to this before, but you can also nab yourself One Of These Gems for a little extra security.

2011-09-22T14:16:00.001-04:00

Apparently, it’s “Drive Really Really Really Really ReallySlowly Day”

Maybe you're like Neo, and the world just seems slower to you today for some completely unknown reason. I mean...you're not that smart.

First of all, as I've shown on Numerous Occasions, I am a genius. Secondly, there are very simple and straight-forward tools I can use to quantify just how fast somebody is going on the road when I feel they're going too slow for my taste. Two of those tools being a clock and a speedometer.

Granted, the speedometer in my car seems to be off by about 2MPH. It tells me I'm going faster than I really am. It's a conspiracy to get people to speed less and/or to artificially inflate the car's calculation for fuel economy. Look it up.

You haven't looked it up.

That's entirely beside the point. The point is that my commute to work involves three somewhat long stretches of road, a few miles each, that are a little twisty and two-laned. This means if I find myself behind somebody who's driving too slow, I'm pretty much stuck there whining to myself about why they've chosen to drive a full 10MPH below the posted speed limit. Since not everybody drives the exact same commute that I do, most times this happens, the offending driver will turn off onto a side road or turn a different direction at the next major interchange. This morning, this happened twice, only to be followed by me immediately finding myself behind another moron driver going too slow. All three longish stretches of commute were contaminated by losers driving at least 10MPH too slow. This not only slows down my commute, but also decreases everybody's gas mileage, thereby making this type of driving practice anti-environmental. It's bad enough that these pinheads decide to be an inconvenience, but do they have to take the world with it?

Folding Tables are doing well, too

2011-09-21T15:12:00.001-04:00

Pro Wrestling is the only thing keeping the Steel Chair industry afloat

That's what you think, Jeremy. But this Sunday, at the New York Nuisance, I'm gonna show you what pain is all about!

Uhmm....yeah. So not long ago, the morning radio show was talking about Pro Wrestling, which is a perfectly reasonable thing to discuss amongst civilized adults.

Wait until you see just how uncivilized I can be! I'm going to end your career in the ring!

It got me thinking about how often I end up sitting on a steel chair. The answer, of course, is not very often. I have folding chairs in my house, sure...but they're made of plastic or have some kind of padding on them and some kind of powder coat on the structural pieces. They're not the same brown steel chairs that you see in the wrestling ring. For that matter, you don't even see those kinds of steel chairs in the audience immediately surrounding the wrestling ring either. The only place they're ever used is in the ring.

I'm gonna use whatever I can find to take you down, Jeremy!

As you may know, the world economy isn't the greatest these days. Many industries are feeling the crunch of people not having any money, and I can't help but think that the Steel Chair industry is no exception. I don't know about you, but I've bought fewer folding chairs this year than I have in the past. Based on a study in which I thought about it for a while and said, "Yep, that seems about right," sales of folding Steel Chairs are down 19% since 2007. The saving grace, of course, is that the bulk of the market share is taken up by sales to Pro Wrestling organizations, which are staying strong. Even in a down economy, people need to get hit with steel chairs.

As opposed to?

2011-09-20T13:52:00.000-04:00

Unfortunately for you, I can't think of anything today

Yeah, I'm not sure how unfortunate that is, really.

Well, I find it just a little sad. I was on a big field trip for work yesterday, so I didn't get to post anything or have an interesting Sametime Status. This morning, it felt like monday, and my mind was a total blank. Nothing amusing, entertaining, or even mildly informative came to me. It was depressing.

Well, you know. They can't all be gold. Based on your prior history, about 98% of them can't be gold...so you're really in pretty good shape this week.

Wheeeeeeee!

2011-09-16T14:26:00.000-04:00

The post office is going to solve their problems by making the mail slower. I'm not making this up

You should take your cue from them, Jeremy. You can solve your Blag problems by writing crappier Sametime Statuses.

I don't have any Blag problems.

That's what you think...

So today's Sametime Status is all about the US Postal Service and their plans to cut services and mail sorting facilities in an effort to save on costs. The net result of this is that the number of one-day mail deliveries for standard first-class mail will be reduced to 0% from the current level of 41.5%.

We know you're not making that up because it's not 83%

It's in the Wall Street Journal if you want to look it up.

Here's the problem. The Postal Service is rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic by moving them to the part of the ship that's sinking, thereby only serving to make things worse. You know why people are sending less mail than they used to? It's slow and expensive. At first, the Postal Service was a magnificent thing, delivering a letter anywhere you wanted it to go for the price of a stamp. This was nothing short of an amazing bargain when the alternative would be paying through the nose for a courier or hopping in the car to deliver it yourself. Times have changed, and the world is smaller. 40 cents (or whatever the frig a stamp costs these days) is no longer a reasonable price to pay to communicate with somebody just because they're far away. I have email, instant messengers, social networking, Blags, and a phone with free long-distance. On top of all that, the one thing all of those have in common that the Post Office doesn't? They're roughly instant.

So, for free I can send letters, documents, personal missives, and bill payments (Forget you, Strunk and White, I'm keeping the Oxford Comma!) with no delays at all with equipment I'm going to be using almost constantly anyway...or I can buy envelopes, write stuff (or print it out), assemble it, buy a stamp to stick on the envelope, drop it in the mailbox and wait a couple days hoping it gets there. Seems pretty clear who the winner is in this one.

It's a little sad that the US Postal Service has become antiquated, but it's the reality we face. When coming up with ways to "fix" the postal service so that it makes itself viable again, one must not overlook the reasons for its downfall in the first place.

West Nile, Here I Come!

2011-09-15T13:51:00.000-04:00

Eat a gyro outside, get 300 mosquito bites FREE!

How do you pronounce Gyro anyway?

Well, I've always called it "JAI ro" and think of people who pronounce it "HE ro" or "YEE ro" as overly pretentious snobs who just want to say it that way so they'll think they're better than you. Plus, every time I've been to one of the Gyro restaurants nearby (There were two before the one burned down), the people working in the place called it "JAI ro" so I'm going to go with that.

Anyway...not long ago, I decided to stop by the remaining Gyro place on my way to an event. I figured I could get my food, spend 5 minutes on a park bench eating my food, then be on my way. This was a great idea...it was a nice night, the gyro was tasty, it was quiet and scenic. You know who else thought it was a great idea? Every mosquito in a 10 mile radius.

You're probably aware (because of the wealth of weather-related posts here) that we've had an excess of rain up here in the Greater Jeremy Area. All of this rain has made the entire northeast into swampland replete with millions upon millions of extra mosquitoes. Whatever it is that eats mosquitoes hasn't been able to keep up, so I'm getting bitten a lot more than normal, or reasonable. Sitting on a park bench for 5 minutes makes me an even more vulnerable target, and however mosquitoes communicate, word apparently got out. I ended up wolfing down the second half of my gyro just to get out of the cloud of friggin insects. It was pretty obnoxious. I wanted to enjoy that gyro.

More of a Guideline than a Rule

2011-09-14T14:59:00.000-04:00

Guidelines For Harmonious Living #10: If there are 14 empty treadmills, go ahead and leave at least one between you and me

This is just basic common sense here, Jeremy. The same rules apply in the bathroom. Everyone knows this.

Apparently not. I'm pretty sure I've ranted about this sort of thing before, but I can't be bothered to look it up. Either way, it apparently needs to be said, because some people just don't get it.

Here's the thing, Gym People. It's nothing personal...I just don't like you. One of the main reasons I go to the gym in the morning is that it's significantly less crowded than it is after work. This means I can go upstairs to the little cardio balcony, do my treadmill thing and have done with it. I'm not interested in standing around talking about treadmills or whose diet plan you're following, or where Jimmy is today, or what you plan on doing at the gym that day. Leave me alone. You go do your thing, I'll do mine, and we'll be happy. I'm not interested in finding out if we have things in common other than the fact that we both put up with treadmills at some unseemly hour of the morning. It's not you...it's me. Strictly speaking, it's probably you, but I'm willing to take the fall for it this time.

To this end, if it's at all possible, I like to take a treadmill (or other piece of equipment, but you get the idea) that's at least slightly removed from other Gym People. Since I don't want you standing around while I'm doing my little gerbil run, I'm going to assume you don't want me standing around while you do your little gerbil run. Given the fact that there are no fewer than 17 treadmills on the upper deck, this usually isn't much of an issue. But apparently, other people don't see things my way.

Not long ago, I head upstairs, and ONLY stations 15 and 16 are occupied, so I head all the way down to the other end and hop on the 5th treadmill from the left. I don't want to be on the end, and I still leave people plenty of room on both sides if they wish...and there are currently 14 empty treadmills. Four to my left and NINE consecutive slots to the right. Some other person comes up the stairs, surveys the situation and plops herself directly on door #4. Seriously? Even if you leave a gap of one treadmill around anyone, there are still ten non-obnoxious options you could have chosen, but instead you do this. This is why I don't like you.

Chicken and egg, really. You don't want them there because you don't like them, and you don't like them because they're there.

Whatever my reasons, they're perfectly valid, and the world should adjust to them. Especially in the morning, when I'm cranky.

They're Fun!

2011-09-12T14:08:00.001-04:00

Here's a Fun Fact! All 3 major candidates in the 1992 presidential election were left-handed

Ross Perot did like to hold his pointer in his left hand, didn't he?

Indeed he did, during all those flipchart presentations on national TV that he bought the airtime for. It really was mind-numbing. If only politics today were so boring.

Anyway, we all know the three candidates from that particular election. George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and Ross Perot were all left-handed. This is especially amusing when you consider that despite the fact that 90% of the world is right-handed, all of the presidents of the US since Jimmy Carter have been southpaws. Granted, there is a little bit of debate about Reagan, but Both Presidents Bush are left-handed, as are Clinton and Obama. To make things even crazier, Obama beat out John McCain in the 2008 election. McCain? You guessed it! Another lefty.

I'm starting to feel left out now...

Jump On The Trolley

2011-09-09T14:17:00.001-04:00

Nobody knows why fists are known as "Dukes." This disappoints me.

There are three completely different explanations out there, none of which is especially plausible. One is about Dukes being rhyming British slang, where "Duke of York" refers to forks, which is a slang for fingers (pretty weaksauce connection). Another says that "Dookin" is Romany for fortune telling using the palm of the hand, but has nothing to do with fists, and the third is about Marquis of Queensbury who developed a set of rules for boxing...which would be the best explanation if the 9th Marquis of Queensbury (for whom the rules are named) was actually a Duke. He was not.

Regardless of the lack of proper explanation, the phrase "put up your dukes" is roughly never used anymore. While that is a darn shame, when it does pop up in modern culture, it serves to amuse as well as to harken back to a different era.

This happens in music most notably (and probably only) when the Pat Benatar song "Hit Me With Your Best Shot" comes on the radio, as it did not long ago when I started thinking about the etymology of the phrase "put up your dukes." There are only 2 other known songs that use the phrase, based on a Google search I looked at the first page of just now.

I'm amused when things like this happen, but I also stop to think about things that I create as well. When songwriters use modern slang in their lyrics, they are catering to the modern audience of the day, but they're also limiting the lifetime of their work. That song will only be fashionable as long as that particular piece of slang is popular. Once the lingo changes, your song instantly becomes outdated and passe. Pat Benatar did this to herself, as did Grand Funk Railroad, whose song "American Band" is the last known song to include the phrase "Party Down" before people realized what a stupid phrase that is and never used it again. Heck, even The Great W.A. Mozart managed to do this in his works. (I'm not making that piece up, by the way)

Many of you know that I'm a writer of sorts. Most of my personal writing (we'll leave alone the technical writing I do for work) is in jaunty Blag form, as witnessed here. That said, some of you are aware that I have written a short story and various pieces of a sitcom which will likely never see the light of day, but that's beside the point. I hear things like "put up your dukes" and wonder how much of that type of thing I've already incorporated into my writing. What words or phrases did I use in my short story that will be archaic in the nearish future that will brand my work as a relic from the 2010s? How can I avoid that in the future, or do I just tell the future to Eat My Shorts?

It's somehow related to a cubit

2011-09-08T15:10:00.000-04:00

Right. What’s an ark?

It's a big gold box that makes Nazis melt, right?

Different ark. Today's Sametime Status refers to the famous Bill Cosby routine regarding Noah's Ark.

Oh, so this is another weather-related Status? I thought you said you were done with those.

I did say I was taking a break from them, but that was going with the assumption that Mother Nature would be taking a break from being a pain in the buns. It's been raining basically for the last 4 straight days, causing more widespread flooding (fortunately, not in my house) and even myriad school closures around the area. It's really quite exciting...no wait...that's not the right word...annoying.

And my user name is "Admin"

2011-09-07T15:58:00.000-04:00

It's Password Day! My email password is no longer "password"

But that's still the password to your bank account, right?

Oh absolutely. That one doesn't have to be changed as often as the one for my email. That's just annoying.

Jeremy would like to point out here that like all of the "Password Day" Sametime Statuses, neither this nor any of the displayed passwords have ever been used as his email password.

Very true. I would like to use "Correct Horse Battery Staple" as my password, but that wouldn't be allowed with our current system. Also, that might be easily decoded by any other xkcd fan.

On a more serious note, you might actually be surprised to know just how many people's routers you can hack into using "admin" and "password" as the login credentials. It's a little scary.

If I put out deer food, the Squirrels will eat it

2011-09-06T15:25:00.000-04:00

Silly deer, bird seed is for birds!

What a coincidence. This Sametime Status is for the birds, too.

Why so grumpy today?

Well, it's one of those mondays cleverly disguised as a Tuesday, and there was a long weekend, and I didn't feel like going back to work.

You're entirely fictional. You don't have a job, or a regular sleep pattern.

Entirely beside the point.

Anyway, so one of the many projects I completed this Laborious weekend was solving the mystery of the bird feeder.

Surely one of the great mysteries of our time. Right up there with 'Where is Jimmy Hoffa?' and 'Who shot J.R.?'

So, I have a bird feeder, since birds entertain me. Recently, I started to notice the seed being consumed at a faster than usual pace. Since there is usually a pretty steady stream of customers at the feeder, I just thought that I maybe got a few more birds interested or they were getting hungrier or something. Turns out, that's not the case at all. Recently, in the middle of the night, I awoke to some noises in my back yard that sounded like the local wildlife. I'm no stranger to turkeys, deer, foxes, neighborhood cats, and the occasional raccoon, so I wasn't overly concerned. I decided to check it out, so I looked out the window to see two of the local deer standing around eating the bird seed out of the feeder.

Stupid deer. Bird seed is for birds...don't they realize that? Now, I need to come up with some way of still feeding the birds without also feeding the deer.

I'm Out There With Scissors Now

2011-09-01T10:43:00.000-04:00

The part of my lawnmower that broke is actually pretty impressive

Awe geeze, Jeremy. Why you gotta go breaking stuff all the time?

I didn't do it...I think.

Alright...so what happened this time?

Well, not long ago, I decided it was time to mow the lawn again. Stupid lawn keeps growing. Anyway, just as I get going, I see a piece of metal shoot out from under the deck and spin to the ground smoking. Fortunately for me, it came out the front, since it was a pretty substantial piece and would have pretty easily embedded itself in my leg had it come out the back. Anyway, I shut off the mower, thinking that this might be a somewhat important piece. A cursory glance under the deck revealed nothing, but since I'm an engineer, I needed to find out the problem.

I ended up removing the blade of the mower and found that the metal piece that connects the blade to the motor's drive shaft had broken completely in half. Mind you, this is not some little flimsy little component. This thing is at least 1/4" of solid aluminum (aluminium for the British among our readership) as evidenced by THIS PICTURE HERE. Without this piece, which is customarily called a doohickey, but I guess the technical term is "Blade Adapter," the blade is simply on a bolt at the end of the shaft and will only spin if it darn well feels like it. Since a spinning blade is one of the hallmarks of a properly-working lawnmower, my mower is currently out of commission.

As it turns out, despite being a pretty beefy component, it's not entirely out of the ordinary to break this piece. Most people junk theirs by hitting a rock or a tree stump or something that causes the blade to come to a near-instant halt. Therein lies my problem...I didn't do that. I had just started the mower maybe 15 seconds before the piece of this thing came out, and haven't hit anything other than grass (more specifically, weeds, but that's entirely beside the point) with the blade in quite some time. So when it comes to figuring out why this happened, I'm at a total loss.

At least I'm not at a total loss when it comes to repairing my mower (We can go ahead and preemptively add "Lawnmower Repair" to my list of Skillz) since I can easily order this piece from the company's website. Ostensibly, they're sold at the local "High's Home Improvement Store" also, but the jury is out if they carry the correct size. Either way, by the time I need to mow the lawn again, I should be back in mowing form...until the next thing breaks.

Where did I go just now?

2011-08-30T10:49:00.000-04:00

I'm invisible!

That's a distinct possibility. Either that, or the motion detector above your garage door is broken.

Yeah. Definitely one or the other.

Something Out of a Charlton Heston Movie

2011-08-29T16:30:00.000-04:00

What are all these locusts doing here?

Another weather-related Sametime Status? You're better than this, Jeremy.

I'm sure that's true, but it seemed important today. All of the loyal readers were concerned that The Blag You Know And Love made it through Hurricane Irene safely. Incidentally, Irene is a terrible name for a hurricane.

So fortunately, the Tubes that host this website were not flooded over the weekend, and you're back to writing crummy statuses. We can all rejoice.

Indeed! So with today's message about locusts filling in the end of the world gaps, I think this should round out my weather-related writings for the near future. Once winter comes around, I reserve the right to whine about shoveling and cold, though.

More goodies tomorrow!

You Have Been Trolled!

2011-08-25T11:06:00.000-04:00

The weather lately is like something out of an Elmer Fudd cartoon

You're getting a haircut?

Well, I was more referring to the great cartoon "What's Opera Doc" in which Elmer Fudd (As the demigod Siegfried) uses his Spear and Magic Helmet to summon various natural elements. They are, in order: North Winds, South Winds, Typhoons, Hurricanes, Earthquakes, and Smog. Here's a fun fact! Aside from the word "Smog," Elmer Fudd's voice in this cartoon is one of very few in Merrie Melodies' shorts NOT voiced by Mel Blanc. The uncredited voice acting for Elmer was performed by Arthur Q. Bryan.

Anyway...in the past week, we have experienced North Winds, South Winds, probably some Smog, and an earthquake. Sunday, we're told to expect a hurricane. Naturally, my thoughts immediately turn to cartoons.

You may now go about the rest of your day with "Kill the wabbit" stuck in your head. You are welcome!

My Martini Was Perfect

2011-08-24T14:11:00.000-04:00

Still trying to deal with the aftermath of yesterday's terrifying earthquake

Aftermath? The epicenter was like 400 miles away from you.

That's hardly the point. We still felt the effects of the tremor in New York.

You felt your desk wiggling.

In fairness, my office is on the third floor of a slightly mushroom-shaped building. The consequences could have been disastrous.

If there was an earthquake larger than the tiny little tremor that happened this far away.

Okay, so the effects at work weren't especially substantial. What about the damage caused at home?

The sand in your mini zen garden was out of place?

I actually didn't think to check there.

What I did think to check out was Facebook, which immediately exploded with comments from people about the earthquake. This, of course, is a flimsy pretext to link you all to This Edition of the whimsical webcomic XKCD. It seemed to be quite appropriate during and immediately after yesterday's events. Hope everyone made it through okay.

This Is Going To Cost Me

2011-08-23T14:52:00.002-04:00

Awe man, I missed Southern Hemisphere Hoodie Hoo Day

Is that why there was just an earthquake? You're responsible for this?

Strangely, no. Everyone knows that "Hoodie Hoo" day is the day everyone is supposed to run outside and yell "HOODIE HOO!" at the sky in order to scare off winter. Since it's getting toward the end of winter in the Southern Hemisphere, it's their turn to scare the crappy weather up our way. This is lousy.

We up here in the north should take this opportunity to sabotage the southerners' attempts at Hoodie Hooey and do our own Hoodie Hooing in order to keep winter in the other hemisphere where it belongs.

Some Loyal Readers Hate Clowns

2011-08-22T15:50:00.001-04:00

I feel like Charlie Brown from that old "Coasters" song

You got a new pet Beagle?

I sure didn't.

So back in 1958, a group called "The Coasters" put out a song called "Charlie Brown." According to Reliable Sources, the song has nothing to do with the Charlie Brown of "Peanuts" fame, but instead refers to a purely fictitious class clown who's apparently routinely throwing spitballs and gambling in gym class. He may or may not be a giant.

Anyway, today's Sametime Status is actually about Volleyball. My Facebook Friend Danny Kinda teaches us that in beach volleyball, your team gets three hits, two of which are ALWAYS yours. This means that you make the pass, your partner sets, and you hit, rather than you doing the setting, leaving the hitting up to your partner. That involves a level of trust that you shouldn't have. While this is at least partially true, when looked at from the other side of the net, when serving the ball, you always serve the ball to the person you want to have hit at you, since that person will then make the first and third hits. As such, you generally end up serving the weaker hitter. For this entire weekend's tournament, ever team I played against served me almost exclusively. This makes me sad.

At the same time, there's an ages-old beach volleyball adage that if you're getting all the serves, it's not because you can't hit, it's because your partner can't set. Therefore, I've decided to go with that as the explanation for this series of events. Also, for both days of the tournament, I had partnered up with players who can hit like freight trains, so there's also that. Regardless, all of the other teams serving at me all day made me start to think, in a rhythmic baritone voice, "Why's everybody always pickin' on me?"

So this strategy of serving the tall guy...how did this work out for the other teams?

Not especially well. I made it to the finals on the first day of the tournament, and was about to play the semi-finals for the second when Mother Nature decided to cancel the rest of the festivities. We totally would have won, though.

Hopefully, It's Not On Fire

2011-08-19T10:27:00.001-04:00

Jeremy's Sametime Status is a proud supporter of Rooftime!

So, Rooftime is an annual charity volleyball tournament held in the Poughkeepsie, NY area and run by Loyal Reader, Steve. The tournament is a fund raiser for the Dutchess County Coalition for the Homeless. This will be the 19th year for the tournament, and a good time is sure to be had by all...especially those playing against Jeremy, because he's terrible.

Hey now!

Sorry...went off book there for a second. Please continue.

For more information, or to register to play (All ages and skillz levelz are welcome) please visit Steve at Rooftime.net.

It's quite the...uhmm...Quandry

2011-08-18T15:52:00.000-04:00

I almost want to buy stuff from Abercrombie and Fitch now...almost

You want to spend ridiculous amounts of money on overpriced clothing that instantly makes you a walking billboard for a company? They really should be paying you for that.

Well, that's part of the "almost" in today's Sametime Status. There's also the fact that I really don't care for most of the clothes they put out.

What's important to know (and really, it's been all over the news, so I'm not sure how you wouldn't know about this by now) is that Abercrombie and Fitch recently offered money to the cast of "Jersey Shore" to stop wearing their products. That's right...a company actually looked at this group of ne'er-do-anything's and thought they were a detriment to their image. My hat is very much off to this company. Of course, the end result is that they just add fuel to the fire of having the cast think they're actually valid for some reason. If I knew how to solve that little problem, I'm certain I'd be rich.

Stupid Turkey

2011-08-17T13:24:00.000-04:00

Why did the turkey cross the road? To try to get run over by my car

That's not all that funny, actually. Definitely not as good as The Skeleton Joke.

No. It's not very funny at all. Stupid turkey.

Did the turkey succeed?

Thankfully, no. We were able to avoid catastrophe. And by "We," I mostly mean me and the truck behind me. The turkey didn't do much to prevent a mishap. Should have been Thanksgiving a little early. Would have gone great with the ready-to-be-venison in my back yard this morning.

Yakko Agrees With Me

2011-08-16T14:20:00.000-04:00

As sad as it is to think about, one of these days, Elvis really is going to die

You mean all those Elvis impersonators in Las Vegas, right?

Tyler Durden once said, "On a long enough time line, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero." Sure, he was a figment of the imagination of a fictional character, but you have to admit that he had a point.

Wow. Old-school intro. Most of your loyal readers won't recognize that call-back.

The point is that at some point, Elvis really is going to die. We may not know when that is, since he's been out of the public eye for so long, but it's going to happen. Kind of a sad and sobering thought for your Tuesday, but it's been raining here for the last 3 days, so I'm grumpy.

Also, I heard mention somewhere that today is the 34th anniversary of Elvis faking his own death in a Memphis motel room. He's gone on to release no fewer than 20 hit singles since, been mentioned countless times in cartoons and crackpot conspiracy theories, single-handedly resurrected the velvet industry, and is currently ranked second behind Jesus on the list of celebrities with the most commemorative dinner plates.

In case you're wondering, Jeremy's actually not making up the 20 "posthumous" hit singles. That's entirely accurate. It also leaves out the 79 compilation albums that have also been released featuring Elvis's songs.

Lesser Names Are Already Taken

2011-08-15T15:04:00.000-04:00

I want to buy a horse and name it "Basketball"

Owning a horse is a substantial commitment. Are you sure you have the dedication?

Okay, so by saying "I want to," what I'm really saying is, "It would be amusing if I were to..." I have no intention of buying a horse.

Well, you did go to Taco Bell recently...

Wait, what?

Anyway. I thought of this recently while at the race track betting the life savings on the ponies.

If your life savings amounts to two bucks, you have some issues going on.

Okay, fine...I'm not a big better on horsies, and the most I ever put down on one race (before the rest of my whimsical story takes place) was four dollars. Not exactly "life savings" range, but that's hardly worth mentioning. What is worth mentioning is what happened on the last race of the day.

Over the course of all the races at the track, I found myself in the black by a whopping $11. Woohoo! There was a horse in the final race that was the favorite to win and went by the name "Calgary Enforcer." How could I not bet on this horse? It seemed like destiny that I was to walk away from the track ahead by at least 20 bucks, and I'd be sitting pretty eating lunch all week. Since it was the final race, (known in the industry as "Nut Up Or Shut Up Time") I laid down all of my 11 dollars on Calgary Enforcer to show. Meaning that if he came in anywhere in the top 3 in the race, I would win money. I did mention he was the favorite to win, didn't I? Seems like a mildly safe bet that he's at least be among the leaders at the end. Long story short, a 66-1 underdog won the race, and 5 other horses finished between that horse and my boy Calgary Enforcer. I lost my entire day's earnings and went home with exactly what I showed up with.

And everyone lived happily ever after.

Indeed. Also, I thought of a great Sametime Status. Since lots of people play a basketball game called "Horse" I thought it would be an amazingly genius idea to have a horse and name it "Basketball." It's a thought that entertained me.

Won't Be The Last Time

2011-08-12T14:44:00.000-04:00

My car smells like gas

What have I told you about the Taco Bell drive-thru?

You asked for an order of the cinnamon thingies.

...uhm....

Anyway, not even talking about that kind of gas, but thank you for dragging another entry in my Blag right down the pan.

You're welcome. It's what I do.

So today's Sametime Status is another in the long line of Sametime Statuses devoted to me doing something stupid.

This Blag will be around for years and years...

Yesterday, I mowed the lawn. I'm sure you were all concerned about that, so there you go. I did so with the mower running on fumes, because I had very little gas left in the can. On my way out for the evening, I threw the can in the trunk so I could fill it up at the gas station on the way home. (A station that, for strictly Blag Purposes, let's call "CrapsWinner")

Anyway, the working theory was that I'd fill the can, drive it home, and unload it into the garage next to the lawnmower...a darn good arrangement, if you ask me. Well, in pretty standard fare, I forgot to take it out of the trunk once I got home, so the thing sat in the trunk, stinking up my car with gas fumes all night. Today, while driving in to work, my car smelled like gas. It's a temporary condition that's probably already gone, but it makes for a fun Sametime Status. Happy weekend, everybody!

Lather...Rinse...OBEY!

2011-08-11T13:41:00.001-04:00

Alright, Cable Company. It's on!

Again with the cable company? Haven't they figured out how this works yet?

Apparently not. So, you may remember A While Ago, I used a brilliant negotiating technique to score a sweet deal from the cable company (which, for strictly Blag purposes, we'll call "CordSight") in which they gave me an extra year of an "Introductory Price" for their services. One of their services, I still really don't need.

Anyway, so that year has come and gone, so they sent me their annual letter informing me that my introductory price is going away, so my cable costs are about to be jacked up. I got this letter the day after I scheduled a service appointment because their internet service has been a pretty wonky lately. Bad timing on their part.

I call up the company to disconnect the phone service in order to save money once the rates go up (This process has become old hat for me at this point). The customer service person acted like their company was about to run over my dog (I don't have a dog), and started apologizing and looking for ways to help me save money that didn't involve disconnecting the phone. Why they really really want me to have this service, I'm not entirely sure, but since it works out in my favor, I'm not going to argue. She quickly realizes that I've been a customer for some time, and that I have this special introductory rate. In past years, the solution has been to simply extend the introductory price again, but in this case, apparently, that wasn't going far enough. This time, she offered to extend my introductory price for another year, and throw in a free year of a premium movie channel that for strictly Blag purposes, let's call "PresentationChronology." There are at least 2 shows on that channel that I'm familiar with and/or make otherwise perfectly legal attempts to watch, so I'll go along for the ride.

Next year, around this time, I'll be calling up to disconnect the phone and "PresentationChronology" so maybe they'll be forced to cough up a year of "DomicileTicketBooth" as well.

And back to the original point of today's Sametime Status?

Oh yeah...today was the day I had scheduled my service appointment. For the second time in as many attempts, they called in the morning to say there was a service problem in the entire neighborhood, and they didn't need to have a technician come to my house. I was at least amused when the guy showed up outside my house to check the wiring at the pole, and then immediately proceed to my neighbor's driveway to check in on their service appointment.

Good Policy, Sure

2011-08-10T15:46:00.001-04:00

"Neatness" isn't a very good motto

Doesn't quite have the same ring as "Semper Fidelis" does it?

Nope...that's a pretty good one. The Boy Scouts go with "Be Prepared," while the United States likes "In God We Trust." "qo'mey poSmoH Hol" of course belongs to the Klingon Language Institute (It means "Language opens worlds"...don't bother looking it up), and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police "Maintain The Right."

All of these are great and famous mottos...possible exception of the Klingon one...but what's your point?

My point is that mottos are catchy little phrases that embody what a group is all about. Mottos should be memorable and at least a little profound. As such, not everything can be called a Motto.

Every summer, I get solicitations from a few different "companies" who are offering their services to me for driveway top-coating. I really should do that, so I'm going to be taking one of them up on their offer, but it's a matter of deciding which one from the mountain of fliers, pamphlets, web pages, and radio spots. (The one for "Billy The Biker" is actually really funny, so that may be as good a decider as any. And no, I'm not making that up.) So one of them showed up wedged on my mailbox that contained very little information, a slew of grammatical errors, a phone number, a petition from God to call this company, and the company's motto. Well...sort of. It contained, buried in the flurry of half-information, the sentence "Neatness Is Our Motto". This is terrible. Not only is it not an especially catchy motto, but I can't figure out how it's even unique to this particular paving "company" which is really some guy who lives in his mother's basement. (I know this because I've met the guy when his mom dropped him off to deliver a flier last summer.) When I hear the motto "Neatness" I'm not going to think of this particular guy splattering tar on the ground. As much as I'm glad he's conscious of neatness when sealing driveways, I really think he needs a new motto...or to learn what the word motto means. One or the other...I'm not picky.

Well, That Sucked

2011-08-09T14:45:00.000-04:00

IT'S ALIVE!!!

Welcome back, Jeremy. Hopefully you had a good vacation.

Wish I could say my computer had a good vacation, too. However, I really can't. But, what I can do is tell some Tales Of Whimsy from Tech Support.

First, I'll introduce you to my newest catch phrase. This came about as the first of my several tech support friends was trying to get me to type "rto" into the command prompt. This is not a difficult thing to do, but when it's explained in the manner that was used, it becomes horrifyingly frustrating. The actual phrase is as follows...and I swear, I am not making this up:

"Type 'R' as in 'Drawbridge', 'T' as in 'Thomas,' and 'O' as in 'Orange.'"

Some of you see where the lines of communication may have broken down right there. I'm all for using your own customized phonetic alphabet, since "Lima" is a little weird for L and I can never seem to remember that K is "Kilo" but whatever. What's important to remember is that when creating your own phonetic alphabet is to make sure that the words you're using actually start with the letter you're trying to convey. When you deviate from this important premise, the whole dang opera just falls apart into "F as in Dogfood" territory.

So what I had to work with was the phrase "R as in Drawbridge" and I went into one of my standard Nerd Sniping shutdowns where I had to figure out what in the blue crap she was trying to tell me. This was not an isolated event either, since I had to have her repeat the request 3 times before I deciphered it. In what seemed like an eternity, dozens of thoughts flashed through my head as to what "R as in Drawbridge" meant, or what she was actually trying to say. I had originally typed "Draw" into the command line, since she didn't explain what it was she was trying to have me do, instead relying on mere letters to get me through. I thought, "There is an R in Drawbridge...two of them in fact," but that just make me wonder why the R was an important letter, because it's a compound word and neither part starts with R. Maybe she meant another word that's like Drawbridge, but starts with R...like...uhm...Rawfridge...Rarbage? This just got me thinking that drawbridges aren't especially common, and why would anybody think to use this word in a phonetic alphabet even if they wanted you to think "D"?

Long story short, my brain shut down for the rest of the afternoon, which was good, because I was only a couple days away from vacation.

Anyway...you may have noticed that my away message said that I'd be on vacation, and returning yesterday. Well, as of yesterday, I still had no computer since the fine folks at tech support still weren't done fixing it. That all changed about 4:00 yesterday afternoon, when I finally (mercifully) got my computer back, with a brand new operating system install, and everything completely deconfigured away from how I can actually use it. So, I'll be spending the next day or so reconfiguring everything back to a workable PC.

And the best part of this whole story...when my computer came back, it was running the old version of Sametime.

Day 3 and no end in sight

2011-07-29T16:49:00.001-04:00

It's probably a bad thing when the tech support person is impressed by how slow your computer is

Wow...really late post today, Jeremy. Get with the program!

I have a perfectly valid excuse. My PC is in the shop. I mentioned yesterday how Sametime was on the fritz...well it still is, and nobody seems entirely sure how to fix it. As such, the first tech support person sent the problem to a second tech support person who sent the problem to an actual local "Deskside support" person. Apparently, "Deskside support" means I bring my computer to them while they fix it, but whatever. After an hour and a half of trying to fix the silly thing, she told me she would need to keep it since it would take a long time to fix.

Because of this (and some other reasons, I guess) I've decided to go on vacation. See you all in a week!

Jeremy Is In The Office will be out of the office next week. We'll return August 8th with more of this sort of junk.

Or Have You?

2011-07-28T11:28:00.000-04:00

If you can read this, I've fixed my computer

Well, then I guess congratulations are in order.

Maybe not. This is one of those few Sametime Statuses that's not quite my Sametime Status yet. You're actually getting a preview on the Blag here.

I actually don't think I get it.

So, the whole point of this website is to share with the Loyal Readers some of the thought process behind my daily Sametime Status changes. To take a quick step back, Sametime is the name of the instant messaging program we use at work. Most people leave their status as "I am available" or something equally dull. Long ago, I decided this was insufficient, so I would change mine randomly, and it blossomed into a daily thing with loyal readers and entertained guests. Often, one of the messages would be a little too obscure for most people to get, so I would spend considerable time explaining it to people...that's where this website comes in.

Anyway, this all centers around one very simple concept...actually having a Sametime Status. Well, as of yesterday, the program will not run on my computer anymore. I made the mistake of trying to upgrade to the new version since I got an angry email saying that the version I use won't work soon. As you might expect, the install choked, but only after deleting the old version. So the new version won't install, the old one is gone...I went back and re-installed the old version, and it says it's installed, but it won't run.

Long story short, I have no Instant Messenger program at work now, a couple new friends at the tech support desk who have suggested re-installing the program (thanks for that), and only one way to share my Status with the world. So, on the off chance that my computer gets fixed today, and I can once again have a Sametime Status...well...this will be it.

Times, They Should A-Change Right Back

2011-07-26T14:27:00.001-04:00

83% of rap lyrics consist of explaining why the song's artist is better than every other rapper

In a poorly kept secret, this Sametime Status is a thinly veiled facade for letting Jeremy link to This Clip from an old Comedy Central show.

Well...maybe.

But really? Two consecutive messages involving a made-up 83 stat? People are going to catch on.

Well, that's beside the point anyway, since everyone knows I don't listen to rap music.

Aside from the Tupac song you have...and the copy of "Fear of a Black Hat" in your DVD collection...and Erasure's cover of "Rapture"...and didn't you once download an NWA song...something about Police?

Hardly worth mentioning. What is important today is that everyone knows that Bob Dylan's grandson, Pablo, released his own rap CD this week.

Dear God. I hope this is as made up as your statistics.

Sadly, it's not. Pablo Dylan is, in fact, an aspiring rapper, and his song "Top Of The World" not only violates Jeremy's Big Rule #1 in the first 5 seconds, but performs a whimsical bout of musical nepotism in the first minute, capitalizing on Bob Dylan's musical success to try to push his own. So, yes...I feel your pain, Pablo...growing up among both "scrutiny" and "mutiny" with your graddaddy's money. Feel free to release more songs that just happen to link your career with that of an actual musician.

By the way, I'm not even a connoisseur of hip-hop, but I'm pretty sure that this song is pretty terrible by those standards.

I will stink until further notice

2011-07-25T15:05:00.000-04:00

My soap is sponsored by NASCAR. I need new soap

You'd stop using soap because of a shameless corporate partnership with a sport you don't watch?

It's the principle of the thing.

There are other principles about showering, you know.

Entirely beside the point. Today's Post is a mild rant about silly partnerships and sponsorships of sporting events in general.

I don't watch NASCAR, or any sort of racing. I'm 100% certain that every NASCAR driver is a better driver than I am, and we'll leave alone the argument about whether or not car racing is a sport, and I'll just point out that I don't want to watch racing. Step 1, you drive until you have to turn left. Step 2...there's no step 2. Why do I want to watch people do this for 2 hours? Sure, they're driving faster than I would in my car, but that doesn't make me want to spend the time to watch them do it.

One of the main attractions of NASCAR is that the cars, the drivers, the pits, the pit crew, and even the post-race speeches are slathered in non-stop corporate sponsorships. Each car contains 83 separate corporate sponsor ad placements, based on a Google picture I just looked at. All of these logos are subsequently repeated on everything associated with the car, including the uniforms, and the truck used to carry the car from one race to another. (The point of this always escaped me...seems to me they could save time by just driving the cars themselves instead of loading them onto a truck...the cars are much faster.)

Anyway, the product placements tend to reverse themselves, with NASCAR logos showing up on various products that I may or may not want to buy. The fact that NASCAR wants me to buy these particular products, in lieu of other brands of the same type of thing, really has no positive impact on whether I choose that or not. If anything, I tend to steer myself away from things that are the "Official Nonsensical Product of NASCAR." Case in point, my new bottle of soap. For some unknown reason, I didn't notice this in the store, but it's got a picture of some NASCAR driver on it who wants me to buy this soap because he's got the same logo on the rear inside fender of his car. I don't really care if NASCAR boy wants me to use this particular soap. I choose it because it leaves me clean and fresh-smelling, without drying my skin like most other soaps. Now that I have to wake up every morning and see NASCAR while I'm in the shower, I may have to reconsider my association with this particular product.

As a bit of an aside, for your amusement, I've compiled a list of pretty nonsensical NASCAR sponsors (ie: Things that have little if anything to do with driving a car in circles). Enjoy!

Coca-Cola - Official Non-Alcoholic Beverage
Coors Light - Official Beer
Freescale - Official Automotive Semiconductor
Gillette - Official Shaving Product
Mars - Official Chocolate Bar, Official Cheese-Filled Snack, AND Official Pet food
Nabisco - Official Cookie
Old Spice - Official Deodorant
Sirius XM Radio - Official Satellite Radio (Seriously? There's only one Satellite radio company in existence)
Sunoco - Official Convenience Store

He shouldn't have been there

2011-07-22T14:13:00.000-04:00

Squashing a lightning bug is as interesting as it is sad

You killed a defenseless lightning bug? What a jerk!

In my defense, this particular lampyridum had invaded my bedroom right around bedtime. All I saw at first was a medium-sized insect flying around my room. Not wanting to stand for this sort of intrusion, I grabbed a slipper and went into combat mode. The main overhead light was turned off, so all the light in the room was from a small bedside table lamp. I moved into attack position, slipper at the ready, and when the little sucker landed on the ceiling, I wound up and gave him what for.

Just before impact, the bug decided to light up, as lightning bugs are wont to do, but there was no stopping the slipper. The bug subsequently got splattered all over the ceiling, but to my amazement, he stayed lit. This is the interesting part.

So now, I have glowing bug remnants stuck to the ceiling of my bedroom. This is arguably worse than having a flying insect in there in the first place. So at this point, I took the slipper and again flicked his carcass off the ceiling, sending him about 10 feet (glowing the entire way) to the floor where I could scoop him up and give him a proper burial at sea (read: flush). It was easy to locate the bug once it reached the floor, because whatever makes lightning bugs light up was still going. The more interesting part is that there was still glowing bug goop embedded in the paint on the ceiling. I had to reach up to the ceiling with a paper towel to scrub away whatever it was that was glowing.

I'm still not sure what exact kind of reaction is causing a lightning bug's glow, but we can all rest easy knowing that not only does it not stop after the bug's death by blunt force trauma, but it is also contained within whatever goo the bug leaves on the surface. There's your science lesson for the day.

It's warm?

2011-07-21T14:50:00.001-04:00

Look around, Leaves are brown, And the sky is a hazy shade of winter.

Employing a little mind over matter today?

Indeed. If you don't mind, it don't matter.

So even though it's a brisk 98 degrees today, you'll sing songs about winter and snow, and nobody will notice.

Well, I also figured that since everybody is out there whining about the heat today, hearing somebody sing about snow would be a welcome change of pace.

It's hot. Deal with it.

It doesn't look a day over 10

2011-07-20T15:23:00.005-04:00

Happy 75th Birthday, Wienermobile!

Does it have a first name?

No. That's only Bologna.

Pretty much the same concept as hot dogs.

True, but only one of them comes in giant, mechanical, rolling versions. That would be, of course, the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile!

Brief pause for rowdy cheers...and go.

Well, this week marks the 75th anniversary of the Wienermobile. It's really quite exciting. Here are some fun facts about the iconic automobile:

There have been 10 different incarnations of the Wienermobile, including one based on a Mini Cooper.
There are currently 7 Wienermobiles on the road.
The drivers of the Wienermobile, who are all college seniors selected from thousands of applications, are called "Hotdoggers."
US Congressman Paul Ryan is a Hotdogger alumnus.
The Wienermobile has been pulled over twice for speeding in the town of Henderson, TX.
The Wienermobile's horn can play the Oscar Mayer jingle in 21 different musical genres.

Now you know the facts about hot dogs...

Except what's in them...

So go on out and enjoy your barbecue!