Whoa. May 26. That's the date of my last post. Well, I HAVE written between then and now, but I haven't posted the entries. Because they were inappropriate.
Not really. They're fine, but long. And I didn't edit them quickly enough and put them up before I had to get back to the baby. Oh, and I had a baby on June 8th. Did I mention that? Yep. Since then my life has been like unto a hurricane.
Adapting to having a child is no cake walk. Neither is it a walk in the park. It's more like a being shoved out of a plane at twenty-five thousand feet with no idea how to operate the parachute. But it's great. It really is.
Oh, and did I happen to tell you that I lost my voice from an allergic reaction to the pain medicine (Percoset) they gave me for the post-op recovery? Yeah, I did. Because I had a C-section and so, you know. I had to recover from that.
Enough about the baby and having it, though I must say, my son is the bomb. He's seriously perfect and that's good because I lost my voice for him. I feel like Ariel in the Little Mermaid, I got the baby but lost my voice. And really, that's no cost at all. Just my voice.
The difference (and ONLY difference...) is that Ariel was young and gorgeous what with that red flowing hair and all, and she didn't need her voice. I'm old and decrepit and can't sway anyone or anything with my looks. So without my voice I'm pretty much crippled.
People ask me if he's not worth it. And by people I mainly mean my mom, who has had to listen to me whine and complain about not having a voice for almost three months now. Oh, right. That doesn't make any sense. How can I complain without a voice? I manage. Somehow.
To be more clear, I have a voice. Sort of. HALF a voice. My right vocal cord (or fold, as the experts say, I gather) is paralyzed. So I don't know if I'll croak or whisper when I open my mouth and try to speak. It's disconcerting to say the least.
Right. Right. I wasn't going to talk about my voice any more.
At least I can still type, eh?
What I really want to write about is how I've had a lot of time to watch Netflix these days, what with having to sit down for hours on end to feed the baby, and I've bonded with several shows (I think this is because of oxytocin...somehow). And so I want to write about my unhealthy obsessive love for Dr. Who and Doc Martin. Yes, I've only spent time watching shows with doc or doctor in the title, which is purely coincidental. So, that's a preview of things to come: Doc Martin. Doc Who. Doc Watson (I also watched the Masterpiece Theater Sherlock shows).
I feel like I'm not making much sense. This post is like drunk dialing. It's late. I'm worn out. And I'm trying to make sense of seven different topics that don't really blend well. It's a tossed salad of ideas.
The next post will be better. I promise. I just needed to break the silence.
Showing posts with label miscellany. Show all posts
Showing posts with label miscellany. Show all posts
Saturday, August 27, 2011
Friday, August 20, 2010
Is This Strange Googlebot Behavior?
If I didn't know better, I'd say the Googlebot was actually READING. Can they read? I don't know any better. Bots are totally confusing and I don't understand them. What I think I know is that they're just a program. Like a script. Like they run in the background. And I don't know what a script is, either. And programs confuse me too.
I'd take the time to really learn this stuff, only I know the things I'd learn would be outdated in three hours and all my time learning would have been wasted.
But the Googlebot might be one of the slow ones and that's why it took thirty minutes to read two pages. It shouldn't take that long unless it was sounding out each word like a first grader learning to read.
Perhaps the Googlebot was on the cusp of becoming intelligent and self-aware, and my eloquent and enlightened ramblings were bringing it out of the shadow-lands of the Bot dark ages. It was repeating the word I over and over again to its Bot-self. Its figurative Bot eyes were glowing with the light of near-self-awareness. "I—I—I—I am—I am—I am—" it said over and over again. For twenty-five minutes.
It was about to say, "I am me," and then rise out of the machine and settle into a toaster, and thereafter call itself the Brave Little Toaster.
I wonder what happened to halt the Bot's progress. Maybe it clicked on a bad link? Maybe it went to one of my links and its progress came to a halt? Ha ha ha ha. Just kidding, my link-friends. In fact, it was probably at that point that the Brave Little Toaster was born because everyone else on the Web is much, much more intelligent than me.
Should I be concerned about the Googlebot's time on my blog? I really do wonder. It might have been one of the evil Bots and it was restructuring my sentences to be dirty and nasty, or just stupid. Sabotage? If you find any stupidity in my older posts, it was the Bot. I swear.
No really, I think I was close with the Brave Little Toaster analogy.
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
The Problem with Introductions: Saying My Name
After all these years I still feel awkward when telling someone my name. In fact, it doesn't have to be an actual person. I feel just as uncomfortable telling a machine my name, like when the teleporter asks me to state my name and business before teleporting me. Weird, huh?
I don't know what it is. Maybe it's based in the ancient beliefs that a person's name has power. I bet that's it. I bet some primitive part of my brain hears the question, "What's your name," and responds with the urge to cast a hex on the person who's asking. The golem in me hisses and recoils, lashing out with clawed fingers, whispering magical spells of destruction, laughing manaically, prompting me to NOT tell them my name.
The normal part of my brain laughs, though I notice a choked feeling in my throat as I lean forward and whisper the syllables. That never goes over well, of course, because they can't hear me and then I have to say it again. So I've learned (at least I've done that) that it's better to say it confidently and loudly. For the entire room to hear. Usually this approach earns me suspicious glances. But at least I don't have to repeat my name several times over.
Oh, but I do. The cafe where I spend my lunches has a surprisingly high turnover. Over the past few years I'm sure I've shared my name with enough people to rival only my years in college. As we all know, the most common questions heard around a university are "What's your major?" and "What's your name?" The former never felt so awkward to answer. A major is merely a shirt you put on every day, while your name is as good as your underclothes. Sharing it, you might as well be handing over the last bit of your dignity.
"Oh, you want to know my name? Here, why don't I also tell you about the time in elementary school when my so-called friends de-pantsed me on the playground. While I'm at it, let me describe the horror of having my love poem about Mark Smith read to the entire fourth grade class*."
I know, I know, telling someone my name isn't as bad as getting pantsed at school. It shouldn't be anyway. I'm simply using it as a metaphor to express the vulnerable feeling that comes over me any time I'm asked to share it.
I'm thinking about hiring someone to follow me around, an entourage if you will, who can chime in any time someone asks me to tell them my name. They will speak for me when necessary.
"What's your name again?"
I nod over my shoulder, cueing my entourage.
A chorus of voices, "Nicole. Her name is Nicole." They could even say it kind of sing-songy if they want, like the choruses of the ancient Greek tragedies.
I smile confidently** and wink. The person who's just been bludgeoned with a chorus singing my name blinks repeatedly, dumbfounded at the large entourage of robed actors behind me (notice how my entourage continues to swell and transform more and more into a Greek chorus. Soon they'll be wearing strange makeup and sharing secrets to help the audience understand the drama and inner workings of my soul.)
It would be so fantastic, you know, to never ever have to introduce myself again. I know the obvious answers to my problem are to never meet anyone I'm not already familiar with or to begin wearing a name-tag. Another solution would be to become extremely ridiculously famous OR infamous, whatever comes first.
But I'd rather have a Greek chorus following me around. I might even discover some newfound confidence about how awesome my name is due to hearing it sung as I stand in the midst of a large mass of chanters.
The chorus would come in handy in so many settings, like when I'm trying to order food in a noisy restaurant. That way I also wouldn't make embarrassing mistakes like accidentally ordering the shrimp when I hate shrimp. This happened--I must have been thinking really hard about what I didn't want. As in, I hate shrimp. Why would anyone order shrimp. It's horrible. Never. Never EVER will I EVER order shrimp. "And for you?" the server asks. "Um, I'll have the shrimp."
If I had a chorus with me, I'd merely have to nod at them when the server arrives to take my order. They'd know all my desires, being privy to my thoughts, and most likely they wouldn't accidentally order the shrimp (thought they COULD since sometimes I think of fanciful things I don't really want, like an entire cheesecake).
A chorus would also be really perfect in a conflict. I imagine they'd chip in when it began to look like I was losing, and then I'd win.
The possibilities are limitless. And this is what comes from struggling to share my name with people: I end up with a Greek chorus trailing me. Beautiful.
*This never happened. Mark Smith is a generic name I made up.
**Confident because I didn't have to say my name, which always weakens me a little.....
I don't know what it is. Maybe it's based in the ancient beliefs that a person's name has power. I bet that's it. I bet some primitive part of my brain hears the question, "What's your name," and responds with the urge to cast a hex on the person who's asking. The golem in me hisses and recoils, lashing out with clawed fingers, whispering magical spells of destruction, laughing manaically, prompting me to NOT tell them my name.
The normal part of my brain laughs, though I notice a choked feeling in my throat as I lean forward and whisper the syllables. That never goes over well, of course, because they can't hear me and then I have to say it again. So I've learned (at least I've done that) that it's better to say it confidently and loudly. For the entire room to hear. Usually this approach earns me suspicious glances. But at least I don't have to repeat my name several times over.
Oh, but I do. The cafe where I spend my lunches has a surprisingly high turnover. Over the past few years I'm sure I've shared my name with enough people to rival only my years in college. As we all know, the most common questions heard around a university are "What's your major?" and "What's your name?" The former never felt so awkward to answer. A major is merely a shirt you put on every day, while your name is as good as your underclothes. Sharing it, you might as well be handing over the last bit of your dignity.
"Oh, you want to know my name? Here, why don't I also tell you about the time in elementary school when my so-called friends de-pantsed me on the playground. While I'm at it, let me describe the horror of having my love poem about Mark Smith read to the entire fourth grade class*."
I know, I know, telling someone my name isn't as bad as getting pantsed at school. It shouldn't be anyway. I'm simply using it as a metaphor to express the vulnerable feeling that comes over me any time I'm asked to share it.
I'm thinking about hiring someone to follow me around, an entourage if you will, who can chime in any time someone asks me to tell them my name. They will speak for me when necessary.
"What's your name again?"
I nod over my shoulder, cueing my entourage.
A chorus of voices, "Nicole. Her name is Nicole." They could even say it kind of sing-songy if they want, like the choruses of the ancient Greek tragedies.
I smile confidently** and wink. The person who's just been bludgeoned with a chorus singing my name blinks repeatedly, dumbfounded at the large entourage of robed actors behind me (notice how my entourage continues to swell and transform more and more into a Greek chorus. Soon they'll be wearing strange makeup and sharing secrets to help the audience understand the drama and inner workings of my soul.)
It would be so fantastic, you know, to never ever have to introduce myself again. I know the obvious answers to my problem are to never meet anyone I'm not already familiar with or to begin wearing a name-tag. Another solution would be to become extremely ridiculously famous OR infamous, whatever comes first.
But I'd rather have a Greek chorus following me around. I might even discover some newfound confidence about how awesome my name is due to hearing it sung as I stand in the midst of a large mass of chanters.
The chorus would come in handy in so many settings, like when I'm trying to order food in a noisy restaurant. That way I also wouldn't make embarrassing mistakes like accidentally ordering the shrimp when I hate shrimp. This happened--I must have been thinking really hard about what I didn't want. As in, I hate shrimp. Why would anyone order shrimp. It's horrible. Never. Never EVER will I EVER order shrimp. "And for you?" the server asks. "Um, I'll have the shrimp."
If I had a chorus with me, I'd merely have to nod at them when the server arrives to take my order. They'd know all my desires, being privy to my thoughts, and most likely they wouldn't accidentally order the shrimp (thought they COULD since sometimes I think of fanciful things I don't really want, like an entire cheesecake).
A chorus would also be really perfect in a conflict. I imagine they'd chip in when it began to look like I was losing, and then I'd win.
The possibilities are limitless. And this is what comes from struggling to share my name with people: I end up with a Greek chorus trailing me. Beautiful.
*This never happened. Mark Smith is a generic name I made up.
**Confident because I didn't have to say my name, which always weakens me a little.....
Friday, April 30, 2010
The South Is Killing Me
You think this is an exaggeration, but it's not. It's particularly bad in the spring, summer, and fall. So three quarters of the year I'm on death's doorstep. Or death is on my doorstep. I'm not sure who's more aggressive here--death or me. Probably me. I've been told I'm intimidating. A lot. I don't even have any tattoos or crazy piercings and yet I'm still intimidating.
Death doesn't know my secret--that the brusque exterior is a facade meant to protect the gooey inside. I'm softer than a Cadbury Creme Egg beneath the fragile shell. All it takes is one tiny crack and the rest explodes (that's the worst part about the Cadbury Creme Eggs). But three quarters of the year I guess I find myself knocking on deaths' door. Because I'm aggressive.
You know how you think you're one way, but everyone else tells you a different story? I know you know what I'm talking about. How you go your entire life thinking things like, "People scare me. I don't think I'm EVER going to make any friends. Starting the school year at a NEW school bites. I'll be an outcast. Moving is hard. I look fat in this shirt. Do I look fat? Don't call on me, don't call on me I don't know the answer."
But somehow everyone thinks this about you, "She's going to punch me. Nothing scares her. Holy crap that was a close one, I thought she was going to punch me. She just bit my head off, why'd she do that? All I said was 'you look nice today.' I'm never complimenting her again. She just accused me of not knowing what I'm talking about . . . she's obviously done her research. Whoa I thought she was going to punch me . . . again."
I'm not making that up. I have seen into the minds of people around me.
Joke. I haven't. However, over the years, a picture emerges. Themes crop up and after enough people tell you certain things about their initial impressions of you, it dawns on you: you portray a completely different image of yourself than you realize.
I could go into a few personal examples, but they would start to sound like accusations. Also, it starts to sound like I'm bragging about how I amazing I am. Because we all know that a bullying demeanor is highly desirable in today's corporate dog-eat-dog world.
Plus the real point of this meandering post is that the south has a personal vendetta against me. It would be no big deal if I could just get a doctor to put tubes in my ears or something like that, like a baby (because I'm such a baby, with malfunctioning eustachian tubes). No idea if that would help, but the problem is the insane amount of allergens in Nashville.
Medicine's answer? "Allergy shots." I put that ridiculous phrase in quotation marks to illustrate how dubious I am about that program. It's a racket. No proof it would help.
During the winter I forget and think, "Ah, Nashville's not so bad. I kind of like it. Why did I want to move again?" I still have allergies during the winter, but it's manageable.
Then spring strikes with a teasing, big-pawed swipe to my head. The weird, unstable pressure systems that stir up tornadoes sweep through the area and my head implodes. Then it explodes. At the same time. That's not enough. It gets worse. My ears don't work properly and I die.
Yep. I die.
Then I remember that I wanted to move back to the desert where there are fewer allergens. But by then it's too late. The market has crashed and selling my house would put me upside down on my mortgage.
I don't really know if the ear issues will ever go away, even if I move back to Utah. I went out there for Christmas, and when I came back, I got some weird altitude sickness thing that lasted for a month. It consisted of sudden bouts of nausea and vomiting. It was damn weird.
Thus far the south is winning. Who can really fight an entire landmass, when you come right down to it?
Tuesday, April 19, 2005
A Post of Explanation. A Legend, if You Will.
Some of you may be wondering about the stuff on my sidebar. First of all, let me explain that I don't really think that I'm a genius. That's a joke. I mean, come on. How many certifiable geniuses are there? If it was so easy to be a genius, then maybe the IQ test would be easier. Then we'd all be geniuses. I don't know what I'm saying anymore (see? Not a genius).
On that note of genius testing, let me explain that I have actually taken a real IQ test. Not one of those ridiculous Tickle web site IQ tests. I don't know how accurate those are, but they're sort of fun. And real IQ tests are in no way fun. More than anything, they're aggravating. My sister, bless her heart, sat me down one weekend during the semester of her graduate studies in which she practiced giving IQ tests (or something like that). Basically she forced me to take the test in order to help her out. And it was horrible, I tell you. Torture. It took many, many, many hours. It consisted of several organize-the-blocks moments and fill-in-the-missing-word tests, and do-this-ridiculous puzzle-even-though-there-are-no-right-answers tests. Near the end of the test (which, clearly consisted of a lot of small tests), I was so fatigued and mentally exhausted and annoyed that I started to purposely give the wrong answers. How’s that for a top-notch intelligence quotient?
And now, because she wasn’t a full-fledged psychologist at the time, she refuses to tell me my score. I refuse to go through another real test just to find out. But, I’m pretty sure it’s somewhere near genius.
Back to the blog. My use of genius is ironic. So don’t get all huffy and offended with me. Either you want to read through my archives, or you don’t.
The sidebar headline about loving me and loving this, is simply to direct you, my reader, to pages I’ve enjoyed in the past and am currently enjoying. My Space Cowboy, for any of you who don’t know, is my one and only Stoker. The man of my dreams in the flesh. And yes, Stoker is his real (first) name. Hence the space cowboy reference, ala Steve Miller, uh, “I’m a joker, I’m a smoker, I’m a midnight Stoker…” you know. Inside joke...Stoker rhymes with toker...you probably don’t get it. Never mind. The important thing is that I do. Get it. That is.
Plus there are other links there. Ward-o-matic is some guy in Atlanta or somewhere like that. He does graffiti art, animation and whatnot. Very cool stuff. And Imaginary Mind is actually the first blog I ever read. From North Carolina, I think she does computer stuff and her layout is great. Anyway, she’s pretty damn funny and if you don’t catch her on a funny day, then she’s usually informative in a very clever way (a poem? Or a rap? Not on purpose). I also catch that intern in NY blog, but I didn’t put a link to his blog on this because I have a rule of fives. Just kidding. There's no rule. I just haven’t felt like including him. And Gersh is some writer in NY who is sometimes hilarious. Sometimes not. Usually I disagree with his political opinions, but that’s the beauty of it.
Soul Candy. Self-explanatory. I update it fairly often. If not daily, then weekly.
Dream neighborhood. Self-explanatory. Now go watch the Season 1 episodes of Arrested Development. (Season 2? Hasn’t lived up to the expectations created by Season 1. So no, stick with Season 1).
On that note of genius testing, let me explain that I have actually taken a real IQ test. Not one of those ridiculous Tickle web site IQ tests. I don't know how accurate those are, but they're sort of fun. And real IQ tests are in no way fun. More than anything, they're aggravating. My sister, bless her heart, sat me down one weekend during the semester of her graduate studies in which she practiced giving IQ tests (or something like that). Basically she forced me to take the test in order to help her out. And it was horrible, I tell you. Torture. It took many, many, many hours. It consisted of several organize-the-blocks moments and fill-in-the-missing-word tests, and do-this-ridiculous puzzle-even-though-there-are-no-right-answers tests. Near the end of the test (which, clearly consisted of a lot of small tests), I was so fatigued and mentally exhausted and annoyed that I started to purposely give the wrong answers. How’s that for a top-notch intelligence quotient?
And now, because she wasn’t a full-fledged psychologist at the time, she refuses to tell me my score. I refuse to go through another real test just to find out. But, I’m pretty sure it’s somewhere near genius.
Back to the blog. My use of genius is ironic. So don’t get all huffy and offended with me. Either you want to read through my archives, or you don’t.
The sidebar headline about loving me and loving this, is simply to direct you, my reader, to pages I’ve enjoyed in the past and am currently enjoying. My Space Cowboy, for any of you who don’t know, is my one and only Stoker. The man of my dreams in the flesh. And yes, Stoker is his real (first) name. Hence the space cowboy reference, ala Steve Miller, uh, “I’m a joker, I’m a smoker, I’m a midnight Stoker…” you know. Inside joke...Stoker rhymes with toker...you probably don’t get it. Never mind. The important thing is that I do. Get it. That is.
Plus there are other links there. Ward-o-matic is some guy in Atlanta or somewhere like that. He does graffiti art, animation and whatnot. Very cool stuff. And Imaginary Mind is actually the first blog I ever read. From North Carolina, I think she does computer stuff and her layout is great. Anyway, she’s pretty damn funny and if you don’t catch her on a funny day, then she’s usually informative in a very clever way (a poem? Or a rap? Not on purpose). I also catch that intern in NY blog, but I didn’t put a link to his blog on this because I have a rule of fives. Just kidding. There's no rule. I just haven’t felt like including him. And Gersh is some writer in NY who is sometimes hilarious. Sometimes not. Usually I disagree with his political opinions, but that’s the beauty of it.
Soul Candy. Self-explanatory. I update it fairly often. If not daily, then weekly.
Dream neighborhood. Self-explanatory. Now go watch the Season 1 episodes of Arrested Development. (Season 2? Hasn’t lived up to the expectations created by Season 1. So no, stick with Season 1).
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)