30th March, 2004
Fists in the Air
Seems like every week, there’s mention of yet another study showing that file sharing isn’t hurting record sales. How long before the revolution?
Posted at 8:50 pm | Comment (0)
30th March, 2004
Does Anyone Really Buy These?
These aren’t as bad as those body pillows you can get, but geez. Nothing screams “loser” more than a mouse pad with breasts.
Posted at 8:49 pm | Comment (0)
30th March, 2004
XBox Now LessBux
I see that the XBox is now selling for $149. I’d probably buy one if I weren’t still pissed about the whole Bungie/Halo thing.
Posted at 8:48 pm | Comment (0)
27th March, 2004
Rebirth
Spring is in the air and with spring comes life. In celebration of another winter survived, I thought I’d republish one of my favorite entries from a different incarnation of mine. I give you: the story of the unisex bathroom. As a preface to this story, I’d like to say that another one of the “perks” of working with 95% women is that there isn’t even a men’s restroom at my workplace. Instead, we menfolk are forced to share a unisex restroom with the rest of the staff, even though there is a female-only one right down the hall. Thank god the unisex is a single-seater.
With its elongated bowl and 1.6 gallon water saving flush, the toilet in the unisex restroom is not only clean in design but also environmentally friendly. I like to call it “Uni”, partly because I find it necessary to amuse myself while in between such life-saving matters as clearing printer jams and asking if the Caps Lock key is on and partly because I find that giving a cutesy name to a device that threatens to suck my waif-like body into its cavernous depths with its high pressure flush somehow makes it less scary. (Although I shudder to think of what sort of mental state I’d be in if we had the Instanto 3.5 gpf version of this toilet installed instead. The Instanto 3.5 model features something called a “blowout flush action” – a colorful description, to say the least, and something that scares the bejeezus out of me to just think about).
But I digress. Since it’s a single-seater, a great deal of your anonymity is taken away simply because you run the risk of finishing your business then opening the door only to find someone’s mother standing outside. I’m sure Freud had a clever word for the chaotic rush of feelings you get when this first happens to you, but I’ll just call it “unsettling” and leave it at that. Lucky for me, I’m a fairly tidy person so my daily activities have not been all that affected – until now, that is. You see, we now have a new delivery truck driver, let’s call him Shakes, who likes to visit Uni when he stops by to do his delivery truck thing. Shakes, who evidently takes a lot of B vitamins, has a problem with his aim and tends to miss the bowl. A lot. This means that, on those occasions when I am fortunate enough to be the next person to visit Uni after Shakes has done his deed, I’m faced with the dilemma of cleaning up after him or leaving his offerings where they lay and taking the risk of walking out of a disgustingly dirty restroom only to find someone’s mother standing outside. Such is my life.
Posted at 9:05 pm | Comment (0)
27th March, 2004
Well Said
This is slightly old, but I thought it deserved mention. Rant.
Posted at 8:47 pm | Comment (0)
27th March, 2004
Never Forget
I see that this photojournal of the current state of Chernobyl, site of one of the worst man-made disasters in history, has been updated. Sobering, indeed.
Posted at 8:46 pm | Comment (0)
25th March, 2004
Stupid Bear Tricks
This looks almost as fun as those “magic capsule” things that would grow a sponge animal out of a capsule when you immersed it in water. Wonder if it works with vodka? Good thing the weekend is here. [via BoingBoing]
Posted at 8:43 pm | Comment (0)
25th March, 2004
Overheard at the Kwikimart
Stopped into a convenience store on my way home from work this evening and was treated to a staggering example of the American educational system at work – a conversation between two college-aged cashiers regarding the location of an Irish pub:
Cashier A: It’s at location X, right?
Cashier B: No, that’s an English pub, the Irish one is at location Y.
Cashier A: Are you sure? ‘Cuz I don’t wanna end up at the wrong one. I hear that the food at the English place is nasty.
Cashier B: What does it matter? Isn’t all that food the same?
Cashier A: (exasperated and rolling her eyes) Like, duh, England and Ireland are different states, of course the food is different.
Right. Fortunate for me, I was finished signing my credit card receipt at this point and was able to flee the building before I caught something stupid.
Posted at 8:38 pm | Comment (0)
25th March, 2004
Drinking Water
Wandered into the break room at work today to refill my water bottle at the cooler. Usually, I’m pretty zoned out and don’t notice much about the water cooler bottle (except on occasions when some scurvy bastard has – once again – drained the last of the water and left the empty bottle on the cooler*) but today, I noticed that if you look at the top of the bottle (when it’s on the cooler), one can see a dire warning, written in all caps: FOR DRINKING WATER ONLY. NOT TO BE USED FOR ANY OTHER LIQUID. Visions of my tobacco chewing high school friends who used to carry around Mountain Dew bottles, known as “spitters”, as a holding vessel for their nasty tobacco-tinted spit entered my head when I started wondering just what the hell kind of liquid was stored in one of these bottles to prompt such a warning. Ignorance, as they say, is bliss.
*As a side note, we keep the spare (full) water cooler bottles in the boiler room. This not only keeps the bottles out of the way but also ensures that all newly replaced bottles will only dispense piss warm water for at least an hour following replacement. Yum.
Posted at 8:37 pm | Comment (0)
24th March, 2004
First Post!
Salutations. Call me Gog. Briefly, I’m a CS degree holding male who is currently employed as network/sysadmin. Hardly a rare thing these days, I admit, and perhaps not even worth mentioning but I thought I’d bring it up since my current place of employment happens to be *gasp* a public library. Yes, that’s right. Not only do I work for The Man, but 95% of the people I work with are female. Now, at first glance, this may seem like a fantastic opportunity for a young, single guy such as myself – and it probably would be – if most of the women I work with weren’t A) old enough to be my mother (and act like they are), B) stark raving mad or C) both. My therapist simply adores me.
I’ve been blogging off and on for the past 6 years or so, perhaps even before it was known as blogging (I’m too lazy to check), and there are a small number of you out there who may find parts of this post a bit familiar… such is life. I’ve found it amusing at times, yet in the past, I was always working with a group of people for reasons or goals that weren’t necessarily mine. This time it’s different. It’s just me and the keyboard. I’m in control and this is my story.
Posted at 8:33 pm | Comment (0)
