You think what now?

Religion Definition
are you mono or polytheistic?	i am plastic and electric
do you subscribe to a major religion?	no, but they send me their newsletters anyway
how do you feel about Jesus?	using my feelings
what holy book do you feel is most accurate (Bible, Koran, etc)	Leonard Maltins Movie Guide
do you believe in reincarnation?	yes
do you believe in the traditional heaven and hell?	no
do you believe in ANY heaven and/or hell?	mental
do you think the god(s) are vengeful or nice?	dont believe in gods
do you believe in angels?	no
do you believe in miracles?	no
do you believe in predestination?	no
do you believe in original sin?	no
do you believe in freedom of will?	yes
do you believe in souls?	yes
what do you think will happen to you when you die?	change
do you think there will be an armageddon?	i liked the original, but I dont think theyll make a sequel although a have a great idea for one
why do you think we exist?	to enjoy existing
do you believe in life on other planets?	yes
do you believe in evolution?	yes
do you think religion and science will always oppose the other?	science is a religion
what would you say to God if you met him/her/them today?	This is BULLshit.
anything else we should know?	from the ignorance inherent in the questions, Id say there is ALOT you should know
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Ganked from A Violently Executed Blog. Is ganked the right word? If so, I feel bloggy.

Verbosity

I was remarking to someone recently about why business jargon is destructive. The phrase in question was "We are targeting AB & CD demographics". Now, I am no marketing stooge, so I don’t actually know what kind of person fits into either the AB or CD demographic. Thus, in order to understand that sentence, I would need to do some research. The rationale behind such a concept as labelling human beings with shorthands like that is that it makes it quicker to read, so long as you know what the short hand labels are. That is complete crap. What WOULD make it easier to read is if it was written out. Even those who know what an AB person is would benefit from having the full description, as the writing does the mental processing for you. When you use acronyms, jargon and short hand, you are taxing the mental processing of the reader. It is similar to a principle in user interface design whereby if you make an interface useable for those with disabilities, you make it more usable for those without. If you take the time to use redundant cues, for example colours and shading and font choice to indicate different functions, it makes the mental processing easier for all, not just those that are colour blind.

Now, consider this phrase from an email I just received, Microsoft’s Executive Circle Newsletter:

“This will allow you or your developers and administrators to increase efficiency during software testing and development, server consolidation scenarios and legacy line-of-business application re-hosting.”

Legacy line-of-business application re-hosting!!!! I have some idea of what that means. It means the allies are about to start D-Day. Surely, though, if you find yourself having to write such a sentence you shouldn’t have, “We hope you will find these useful when you’re thinking about improving communication in your own business.”, three sentences later.

It is the same issue a lot of us have with the txting crap that flies around everywhere these days. If you are too lazy to write proper English, all you are doing is putting the work on the reader. And why would anyone want to read something that is mentally taxing? I used to come across this bad English when I ran a chat room for a youth magazine years ago. I once pointed out that I didn’t think it was cool to use crap like ASL and n00b as you can’t be cool if you can’t create respect in others. How was I to respect a computer user who couldn’t type proper English fast enough that they had to abbreviate everything? It made a mark on a couple of the regulars and they made an effort to increase their typing speed or risk being labelled n00bs of the k3brd.

Torpid Nostaligia - Must Be Spring

"The first question I ask myself when something doesn't seem to be beautiful is why do I think it's not beautiful. And very shortly you discover that there is no reason." - John Cage

Awww, isn't that mind-numbingly sappy? True though. I once told a friend, who is so picky about what his perfect woman is that he has reached mid 30s without, how to say this tactfully, needing to lie on his application for the Young Liberals for Abstinence Party, that I see beauty in all women. Sure, this was partly arrogance on my part, coupled with a strong desire to argue that comes from my French heritage, but it was (is) also in part true. We are all human, we all breathe and think and feel pain and pleasure and laugh and cry and sing and dance and, while we all try desperately during our teen years and sometimes even beyond them to prove how different we are, we are all essentially the same. Short, tall, thin, fat, symmetrical, wonky, scruffy or coiffured. And there is beauty in that. Why? Because, I know there is beauty in ME, I can see it. It may not show itself in the mirror, or in many of my actions, or in some of my beliefs but somewhere, sometimes I’ll do something, or feel something or think something that is not ugly but beautiful. As do we all. And, if you look for it, you can see it in everyone else.

That is not to say that I am attracted to fat, ugly women as a rule, despite their inner beauty, I am not. But it is not for the social and peer pressure reasons of my friend. It is because society does not treat those it considers un-beautiful well, and a lot of inner beauty is destroyed by the nasty experiences that non-Pretty People are subjected to. Lack of self-esteem is not beautiful and the scars inflicted on social skills by ostracism can be insurmountable. I know people that ignorance would call un-attractive that have not let their esteem be crushed. They live happy lives and their partners live happy lives too. I have also met people who have become bitter for not being born a super model, who have it in for the rest of us for treating them badly. I can see bits that are worth seeing, but there does need to be a certainly base level of beauty, both physical and psychological, more the latter, for me to be interested. I suppose the truth of being outwardly beautiful is inescapable. Those that look good, will be treated better by others, make more friends and certainly being fawned upon is better for the psyche than being shunned. So, it doesn’t matter how hard one tries to be a better person by not judging books by their covers, the fact is society’s psychology makes it possible to do so.

However, consider this: Incredibly beautiful people, especially if they are both physically and intellectually gorgeous, have many of the same problems as the other extreme. If someone has extremely attractive features, most people are reluctant to socialise with them out of fear of inadequacy. This is compounded if they are extremely bright, as most people are intimidated by intelligence.

Like all things, beauty falls into the category of “Best in moderation”. The middle path.

The Greatest Guiltiest Pleasuring News Of All

The Last Starfighter, the guiltiest of the guiltiest guilty pleasures there is, the 1984 movie about how important it is to be good at playing video games has been made into a musical.

Now, if they would only release it on DVD (if they haven't already) along with Electric Dreams and Popeye, my childhood, my ENTIRE childhood nostalgia DVD collection will be complete.

And for the incredibly embarrassing record, here are the movies that I LOVED when I was a wee todger, that I guarantee there are few who would admit to:

1) Electric Dreams
2) Popeye
3) Last Starfighter
4) The Pirate Movie
5) Tron

Only the last two do I have on DVD. I need the others for my life to be complete. Just to go against my post below about expectations and contentment, I WILL NOT BE CONTENT or whole until I have the other three on my shelf.

Cup of Tea

An old friend and his family once told me they had a family tradition of believing (somewhat tongue in cheek) that the whole universe was contained inside a tea pot, a tea pot similar to the one they used to boil tea. Each tea pot contained a universe that contained a family like theirs with a tea pot that contained a universe and so on. They took guilty pleasure in boiling a cup of tea in the knowledge they had destroyed another universe. They looked forward to the eventual end of our universe when the beings who owned the tea pot with our universe felt they needed a nice camomile or perhaps an Earl Grey.

Of course, most of us have a version of the infinite universes in every atom theory. But, now that scientists have shown that there is sugar in the middle of the Milky Way, I think my old friend and his family may have been spot on.

The Science of Art

Via Boing Boing, a link to the Gravity Lamp: A lamp that is happy to see you.

And something to keep an eye on: 365 days of verse about Sydney in Sonnet form, called Equinox.

Happy Spring Equinox. Try not to let the pheremones make you sneeze.

Statistical Symphonies

Here is an interesting article from the SMH. It is firmly in the "well, duh" category but that is no reason not to read it. Aussies in their 20s want to be married but are too picky or too cautious to make it happen. Either category fits any number of friends I know who are desperate to marry and settle down, but are looking for the "perfect woman" or "perfect man". "Tosh", I say to them, "stop being so picky'. But I fit in the other category. I try not to have too many expectations about a partner, other than them being interesting in some way, but I am not out there looking for one as I am quite enjoying not being in a relationship, or at least I'm at a certain threshold of contentment that precludes me rocking the boat.

The real problem seems to be that my generation has never been told that a relationship requires building, building that requires work. Most sad singles I know think that the Perfect Being will bump into them at the laundromat any time now and marriage, a mortgage, a puppy and some kids will be here by Christmas. Not gunna happen. Why would you want it that way, anyway? Where's the fun? Where's the hard work that makes the rewards feel like rewards and not hedonism? I suppose it is part of this strange mental disorder that afflicts people my age that some older, wiser, know-it-alls are calling status anxiety. Reaching certain goals like having a super-model, Nobel-prize winning partner seated on an Italian leather couch in front of a 180cm plasma flat screen digital TV watching ads for the $400,000 BMW you just bought for your youngest child is the only way of feeling worth. Crap. It's the journey that is important and it doesn't matter how far away the goal is, you can enjoy every second of the way there, be it pleasurable or painful. And if you don't make it to the goal you had in mind, so what? You may not have gotten to where you wanted to be, but you will have arrived at where you needed to be (thank you Douglas Adams for that bit of genius).

And even if it is possible to achieve everything you have ever wanted, why be in a hurry to get there? Why not enjoy every mini-goal along the way? Remember the first time you could tie your shoelaces? I don't, but I bet it was the greatest moment in my life up to that point. Every next step along the way could be that same way, so long as we are content to have achieved what we have and not disappointed at not having achieved what we will in time.

If life is a race, I am in no hurry to get to the finish line.

Something to say.

Is it possible to be a muse for psychological musings? Whenever I read a post at Gempires I seem to end up spilling my emotional ramblings into a comment box on her site. Well, this time I wrote it all down, then didn't post it to her blog. The problem is I clearly have something to get off my chest that reading her post has triggered, but I am unable to latch on to what it is. So, here is the full comment I would have posted, had it been an actual comment rather than a dump of some broken part of my psyche, some unformed truth of existence I am struggling to grasp:

Nice to see you back. You never know how good something is until it is gone.

Now to a most difficult comment. Difficult because I have always been one to put up with the discomfort of seeing someone in pain rather than lending a helping hand, empathising but not wanting the reckless insertion of opinions to make matters worse. Events have occurred in my life that have made me realise it is better to try to help and make matters worse than it is to stand by and watch. It is also difficult, as I shun seriousness. Difficult, because I am not sure if it is something I need to say or something you would want to hear.

So, if I may, here is some reckless insertion of opinion. Everything you say is absolutely spot on. Much of what you say about men, while painted with a broad brush, is true. But I am not sure you should get jaded about motives.

Consider what it is like to be someone who is not loved by all they encounter. Someone who isn't immediately attractive to the opposite sex in a world where such a thing is considered abnormal. Someone who has those same incorrect preconceptions about what is attractive and loveable. Preconceptions that you, and many women, do not seem to have or can put aside. Imagine then what it must feel like when someone like that is confronted by the blinding, brute force that is being loved, or even liked! The sheer un-nerving truth of it. That it is nothing like it is in the movies. That it is a responsibility. It carries a heavy burden. You are suddenly responsible for the well being of another person's emotions. That emotion isn't black and white but every shade of grey there is.

The closest thing to this is being suddenly confronted with someone who is angry with you and you don't know why. Or, better yet, it is like agreeing to a friendly tennis game and realising after the first serve that you are playing against a pro. And, when it comes to love, the potential responses are similar: you can shy away from the barrage, unclear on how to continue or you can try and give as good as you get. The first response will appear to be insensitive, when it isn't. Unfortunately for the struggle for peace amongst the sexes, it is more often than not the response we males offer.

There is hope, however. In case you haven't guessed, I have been through a similar set of problems. Men are not equipped mentally to deal with emotion, except in small packets. It is actually a function of brain design, not a decision made. But, we can learn to give as good as we get. It takes practice, and a forgiving mentor. It seems to me, Gem, that you have a lot of feelings (good and bad) in this situation, but that is better than not having feelings at all. Whether you think there is a way forward or not, whether there is hope of teaching a slow student or not, my opinion (just to make that clear) is you shouldn't be jaded about it. In fact, you should take some solace in the fact that you are not only a better master of your own emotions than most, but you are better at putting them in words. Keep it up.

What a mess. The tragedy is I touched what I wanted to say briefly with the very end of my finger before it fell into the abyss. Sometimes I think I might be more fucked up than I give myself credit for.

But, fear not, apart from a post I have brewing in my subconscious about how I feel about an impending 10 year high school reunion, there shouldn't be too many of these diary style emotional dump blog entries to bore the crap out everybody. It just aint my style.

I have a cure for all disease - who wants to touch me?

Inspiritation and scientific discovery can come at the most surprising times. There I was, sitting on the royal throne, having a bowel movement that Robin Williams in Fisher King would describe as Enlightening when the solution to the problem of disease and famine came to me. It was a spark of informational inspiration that took the form of a magnificent star burst style burning bush. It may have been a shrub, or some grass...I don't want to overstate it.

And you, dear reader, are going to hear it here first. Before the wordy verbose padding required of Nature and Science Journals. Before the polish and quick news bites needed for the world's talk show circuits. Before the free life time health care given to every member of Oprah's audience on the day that i* appear.

The solution is one of terminology. The reason we can't solve the problem of worldly diseases and famine and poverty and bad stuff is we have too many names for it all. Influenza, The Common Cold, Turberculosis, Chicken Flu, Mad Cow Disease, Hunger, Famine, Starvation, Poverty, The Poor, Hicks, Yokels, Trailer Trash, Cancer, AIDS, Specific non-specific coronary flow amnesia, Spontaneous Human Combustion, Aliens, Bloggers. Too many names. In order to properly target and remove such evils in this world, an axis of evil if you like, we need to give all problems faced by the human race a common name. A name that can be weeded out in all its ugly forms, hunted down and destroyed. Wherever it strikes, wherever it takes hold. That name is:

Saddamonella alquidacoccus

Now that the beast has been named, it can be located, detected, classified, quarantined, tortured and obliterated. It is the duty of all mankind to seek out saddamonella alquidacoccus where it is found, where it lives and deprive it of its precious bodily fluids until it is no more.

Go forth, precious readers, fellow humans, bastions of the light and the right and remove this blight from our sight.

* seeing as I, pertaining to me, is already capitalised, and I would need to be capitalised for an appearance on Oprah, the only solution afforded to me is to put it in lower case.

Dost mine eyes decieve me.

I think Neo already said this, but do you ever feel like you are in a dream? Ever since I had a nasty glandular fever 4 years ago that lasted 2 weeks when it should have lasted 6, whenever I get a sore throat I wonder if I am still in a fever induced delusion. Maybe it's still 2000, maybe I have the Olympics to look forward to again. Maybe S-11 and Iraq never happened. Maybe I won't have loved and lost. Maybe I am not writing this.

Of course, reality is too mundane to be a dream. My dreams are very rarely mundane. Of course WHEN I READ SHIT LIKE THIS, I can only assume it IS all a bad dream. I wrote a post ages ago (and now can't be bothered finding it for the all too convenient link) lamenting that some scientists seem hell bent on making a mistake that will wipe out humanity. That time they were trying to mutate a monkey virus so that it would kill humans, to see how long it would take. This time, they are resurrecting the 1918 flu that killed 40 million people (YES, 40 MILLION!!!!) and injecting it into monkeys. I've got a better idea. Let's bring back dinosaurs using blood from biting insects trapped in amber. Or better yet, let's design some nano-machines that break down any matter around them and reform it into nano-machines that break down any matter around them and reform it into nano-machines that....OR, I know, an orbiting laser that can kill people based on sophisticated detection software that can be programmed using wildcards like "*yokel ENTER" or "*hick ENTER" or "*metrosexual ENTER" or "*scientists ENTER" or "* , huh, what was that, yep, I'll do that in a second, now where was I, um, I'll just clear the screen using this ENTER key here ENTER"...Ack.

...............................................................................................

An amazing test.

A test that is, in the words of a good friend I am about to plaguirise, "Bigger than Ben-Hurder, the sequel to Ben Hur".

Here is the test:



I can add images directly to Blogger now I am not using their server. Mwa. Mwahaha. Mwahahahahahahahahah. Mwe. Mwehippi. Mwehippiscum. Mwerightwinghatinghippiscum.

For your information, "T" starts my blog post titles more than any other letter and I have never had a title starting with K, J, X, Y or Z. So there. Mwa. Mwahaha. Mwe. Mwi. Mwo. Mwu.

Business as usual

Sick, tired, depressed, torn, anxious, weak, sore, annoyed, beaten, bruised and down.

Must be Monday.

Can't complain though. It is times like these that I realise how good life is.

A true vote

Is there some kind of law that forbids voting in the nude? I feel it would be prudent to strip down to the bare essentials whilst casting my vote (in the voting booth, of course). I think this would enable a full and free vote, unencumbered by any preconceptions, prejudices or clothes. The added advantage would be not needing to use the supplied pencil to cast my vote, which could have been tampered with.

Plus, a vote cast with precious bodily fluids is surely the most democratic of votes. A vote that could even be verified as mine, should the circumstances require it. A vote that contains part of my very being. A vote that could be framed, sent to the elected and treasured as Chas' Vote.

Is it just me?

I have noticed for the first time in my life that tear (from the eye) is spelt the same as tear (rip).

Although it could be the combination of ibuprofen, codine and pseudo-ephedrine I have coursing through what's left of my circulation system.

Meanwhile, idleprocess is no longer...awwww, but out of the ashes comes a new beast: Digital Retrograde (to be shouted through a megaphone for optimal appreciation). You Blogged it, you can't Unblog it.

There is no B3 bomber.

Blogs, news agencies and crazy guys with signs patrolling the streets are all reporting that an explosion in North Korea is nothing to be concerned about. Right on. I see how this works now. Where there is smoke, there is no fire. Where there is NO smoke, there is the potential for wanting to develop smoke programs that could destroy the civilised world.

However, all is not lost. Mother nature owns the Korean DMZ. Which is the most uplifting bit of news I have read all hour. Sure, the odd tiger and robotic bunny rabbit (gratitous Full Throttle homage) are going boom, which is bad, but consider 40 or 50 genereations from now when nature itself has disarmed the DMZ and Man can move back in. All the trees we will have at our disposal for creating paper and chairs and weird wooden masks to put on our walls and the tiger rugs and the robotic bunny rabbit door stops. A new age for mankind will begin. A new leaf will be turned over to expose the un-Australia pure underbelly ready to be set alight for the good of all mankind.

Thank God, for He created Nature for Us.

Comments

The teething problems continue here at the home of SNT. Comments should be working now. So all my fan (sic!) can comment now.

To be fair.

Reasons to vote for John Howard:

1) He sells a mean Jeep.
2) He was the father of prison reform.
3) He can get you fit.
4) He is very accomodating.
5) He is one of Australia's best character actors.
6) He had an excellent acting career in the late 30s
7) He wrote the underrated and completely unheard of 80s TV show "Jayce and The Wheeled Warriors"
8) He has been involved in American politics for a long time.
9) Mark Latham has done nothing of interest in the television or movie spheres.

All good reasons in my book.

Lies, damned lies, statistics and Foxtel Digital Polls

Sky News, a channel on Foxtel Digital here in Aus, has an Active mode where one can select different news feeds to watch (weather, sports, politics etc). They have also added recently a poll feature where viewers can voice their opinion on whatever topic the producers feel is worthy of polling. Here is the procedure to vote in a poll:

1) Press RED button on remote
2) Press one of four colour buttons (including the RED button, which corresponds to the first item in the poll) to indicate your vote.
3) Get a message saying it will cost you 55c to vote.
4) To continue: you press the RED button.

Now, can we all see the inherent flaw in this system? From a user interface perspective, when a user is confronted with the SUDDEN realisation they are going to have to pay for their vote, they will want to opt out. The LOGICAL button to press to go back is the RED button as it is the button that got them into the active mode in the first place. Also, the RED button is a BACK button in other active channels, eg Fox Sports.

Thus, the number of votes for the RED item (always the first item in the list) is going to be un-naturally biased, as people incorrectly press the RED button, desperately trying to avoid paying for a meaningless vote.

Surely the producers of Sky News Active have realised this? Surely, they are surprised that EVERY vote they have had on the show has had the first (RED) item register votes of 60%+? Every time. I have seen 4 polls now, and they are all skewed towards the first item. i can accept that the producers may simply not realise what is going on, that their knowledge of user interface issues is non-existant. However, I question why the poll items are not randomised per person, and why it is only once you attempt to register your vote that you are informed of its cost. The former looks to me like they WANT to be able to sway the vote to the first item and the latter shows me they WANT to dupe people into not realising they are paying. If either is true, it's disgusting.

I feel an email to media watch is in order.

The battle for compassion

The Oz Blog world is rampant with "I'm more compassionate than you". The left wing template resembles my stupid post below by targeting the coalition and naively trying to pin the embassy bombing on Howard THEN clumsily adding compassion for those who died. The right wing template gets free brownie points for pointing this hypocrisy out and claiming the compassionate high ground THEN clumsily adding compassion for those who died. Amongst all this are the idiots thanking every God there is that Aussies were generally spared and the pseudo-compassionate who manage to treat this as the tragedy it is and don't bring politics into it. However, I have yet to come across actual compassion, a sign of which would be the lack of religious blame. J.I, who have claimed responsibility are not Islamists. They are terrorists. Their target is innocence and the world (myself included) simply does not learn from history and allows innocence to be the victim.

The world is under the thumb of those that use violence as an answer to violence. The terrorists once asked the question. Now, pre-emptive questions are the preferred answer.

The true beauty of the blogging world

The one thing I really enjoy about reading other blogs and discovering new voices, is how often I come across posts that get it "spot on". This post on blogging, satan and spirituality at the wonderfully named BezzelbuBlog contains roughly 87.5% of my own thoughts about blogging, life and stuff.

Now, instead of being all "I coulda written that, gagnabit", I am all "She(?) has said it, so I don't have to". Marvellous. Blogging is the mental and literary version of open source code reuse. Truly marvellous.