Heh heh...
I'm at the dining room table right now. A woman pulled up in front of the house and parked on the wrong side of the street. For the most part that's none of my business. But when people park where she did, it makes it next to impossible for any vehicle larger than a Mini Cooper to get around the traffic circle there. So if a car stays parked there, I end up hearing horns honking off and on all day -- itself an amusing thing, because why would you honk at a car with nobody in it? Anyway, it screws up traffic and bugs me.
Plus it's just stupid.
I walked outside and said, "excuse me, ma'am... there's no parking on this side of the street."
Boy, was she pissed.
"There's no sign!" she retorted.
"There's a sign right there, ma'am. Sorry." And why am I saying 'sorry'? Anyway, the sign was less than five feet from where she was standing.
She looked at the sign, said, "Oh, f**k" loud enough for me to hear. She was maybe 40 years old. She barked at me with a cross look, "then where the hell am I supposed to park?!"
Oh, the things I could have said and didn't.
I said, "Yeah, I know... it's tough."
Har. Hopefully she went away wondering if I was mocking her.
I was.
Friday, October 19, 2007
Thursday, October 18, 2007
Funny Headline
From the Huffington Post... I think this is two different stories, but maybe not, eh?
Prepping to Vote
Last night I read the two ballot measures that are before us Oregonians. Measure 49 is a reworking of Measure 37, and all that land use stuff is a pretty dull, confusing read. I did NOT read the entire measure (49), which is pages and pages and pages, but I did read the important parts of it, and that took about 25 minutes. Then I read the arguments in favor and the arguments opposed. The measure itself sounds like an imperfect fix to an imperfect law already on the books. I'm inclined to vote for it, simply because Measure 37 was a big mistake. But I feel uncomfortable being completely ignorant, so I devoted some time to prepping for the vote.
In the end, though, it's human emotions that carry the day, not Reason. Arguments in Favor were less insane than Arguments Opposed. The latter included several that stated outright untruths, so it was easy to dismiss them. The opposition also included some krazy folks, the kind who put "everything" in quotes so as to "show" that it "really really" means something. That's the kind of thing that tips the scales for me.
As for Measure 50, which would put a cigarette tax into the Oregon Constitution... there again, Reason tells me it's a bad idea to put a tax into the Constitution. But I listen to the radio and have the TV on with the sound down, and all day every day I see/hear commercials against Measure 50, all of them paid for by the cigarette company. I hear-tell they've already spent $10 million in Oregon to defeat the measure. That in itself is enough for me to want to stick it to them, whether the law is good or not.
I suppose that makes me one of those idiot voters who vote with their gut, but the way I see it, that's no less valid. If someone asks, I'll gladly say "I voted for Measure 50 simply because I resent the tobacco industry spending a fortune to tell me not to." Maybe from that the world will learn something. From me!
Another reason to vote for Measure 50 is that in the Arguments in Opposition, there were several repeat-opiners. You pay $500 and you can have your argument printed in the Voter's Pamphlet. Some folks against 50 had two or three *different* $500 ads in there. One guy had seven ads opposed to the measure. Dude spent $3500 to say the same thing seven times! That's just plain suspicious.
Now I'm off to the bank, to report that I accidentally left my bank card in the Automatic Teller Machine (or, as we like to call it, the Automatic Teller Machine machine).
In the end, though, it's human emotions that carry the day, not Reason. Arguments in Favor were less insane than Arguments Opposed. The latter included several that stated outright untruths, so it was easy to dismiss them. The opposition also included some krazy folks, the kind who put "everything" in quotes so as to "show" that it "really really" means something. That's the kind of thing that tips the scales for me.
As for Measure 50, which would put a cigarette tax into the Oregon Constitution... there again, Reason tells me it's a bad idea to put a tax into the Constitution. But I listen to the radio and have the TV on with the sound down, and all day every day I see/hear commercials against Measure 50, all of them paid for by the cigarette company. I hear-tell they've already spent $10 million in Oregon to defeat the measure. That in itself is enough for me to want to stick it to them, whether the law is good or not.
I suppose that makes me one of those idiot voters who vote with their gut, but the way I see it, that's no less valid. If someone asks, I'll gladly say "I voted for Measure 50 simply because I resent the tobacco industry spending a fortune to tell me not to." Maybe from that the world will learn something. From me!
Another reason to vote for Measure 50 is that in the Arguments in Opposition, there were several repeat-opiners. You pay $500 and you can have your argument printed in the Voter's Pamphlet. Some folks against 50 had two or three *different* $500 ads in there. One guy had seven ads opposed to the measure. Dude spent $3500 to say the same thing seven times! That's just plain suspicious.
Now I'm off to the bank, to report that I accidentally left my bank card in the Automatic Teller Machine (or, as we like to call it, the Automatic Teller Machine machine).
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
The Telecon
I was on the phone for quite a while today, talking Who2 business with my partner Fritz/Ryan and our new contact guy from Ask.com, a guy named Scott who has been with Ask/Jeeves for eight years. Before that he worked on character development for Warner Brothers animation, he told us.
He was a nice guy, but the objectives of his company are a bit different from ours. We want to keep them paying us as our partners, so we try to be open to new ideas. But his world is central California cubicle and the fast-paced, competitive world of search engines, and ours is researching and writing. He tossed around a fair amount of biz jargon, which had me feeling almost like I worked in a real office (and glad I don't). We got some ideas out of it, and it was good to get to know Scott beyond an e-mail address. Here's my photo-illustration of the event. I have no idea what Scott looks like, but I kept picturing him as the character Ryan from The Office.
He was a nice guy, but the objectives of his company are a bit different from ours. We want to keep them paying us as our partners, so we try to be open to new ideas. But his world is central California cubicle and the fast-paced, competitive world of search engines, and ours is researching and writing. He tossed around a fair amount of biz jargon, which had me feeling almost like I worked in a real office (and glad I don't). We got some ideas out of it, and it was good to get to know Scott beyond an e-mail address. Here's my photo-illustration of the event. I have no idea what Scott looks like, but I kept picturing him as the character Ryan from The Office.
Monday, October 15, 2007
Summer with Paris
My friend Matt Osborn, with Paris Hilton in the back of John and Claudia McBarron's house.
New Toy
I bought myself this iPod Nano yesterday. Right now it has about 300 songs and 5 episodes of The Office. It's a pretty cool toy.
Sunday, October 14, 2007
No Infringement Here!
Yesterday we went to the "Halloween Store" in the mall, the former home of Toys R Us and now a catch-all seasonal retail space.
Lots of full-on costumes and elaborate decorations, not much in the way of regular-ol' masks. Cleo found this nice "costume" for fans of a comedy hit movie from the last year... but you'll notice it's not called Borat. No, it's "Eurasian Traveler" wink wink.
Lots of full-on costumes and elaborate decorations, not much in the way of regular-ol' masks. Cleo found this nice "costume" for fans of a comedy hit movie from the last year... but you'll notice it's not called Borat. No, it's "Eurasian Traveler" wink wink.
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