2003.10.24
Support GFD (go fork a donkey)... i pooed in woods!I'm happy to note that as of this writing, my guestbook is the #1 Google match for go fork a donkey, with or without quotes. (On the other hand, without the quotes, if you put a + sign before the a, it is only the second match. Google is a harsh mistress.)
Comments Followup of the Moment
Another nearly forgotten mascot character is Mr. Zip, advocate for those new fangled sets of five digits that help our mail get delivered in a timely fashion. Here's a page about his background that mentions he was phased out when they started to use Zip+4...you would think they could give him 4 little helper kids or something. At least one webpage wants him back. (Thanks to LAN3 who wrote mentioning him the other week (after the Floyd D. Duck incident,) and then Mr. Zip came up in yesterday's comments. I guess he does bear a passing resemblance to Reddy Kilowatt.)
Essays of the Moment
I've posted this Star Wars vs Star Trek site before, but yesterday I got into its essays page. The one called Brain Bugs was my favorite, pointing out idiocies in Star Trek writing that I hadn't thought much about. (He also gets into some of the cultural issues, not just sticking to the 'science', and makes some good points.) The guy is kind of funny, he's such a "hard" sci-fi guy (ala the old school rockets and metal kind) and he makes very logical arguments, but they tend to miss the point that they argue the nature of entire fictional universes based on what the tv or moviemakers assume would look cool on film for one scene or another. (Also, though he would probably deny this, there is an implicit "this sci-fi is better because its technology is more powerful" factor. I mean, I could put forward a sci-fi universe with technology so powerful that it uses Death Stars energy beams like we use AA batteries, but that doesn't mean it's an interesting universe. This guy would argue that no, it's just an academic "which tech is more powerful" argument, and that my universe is pointless without describing the technologies that would make it happen, but still.)
Heh. Between these essays pointing out how the Trek universe is a jingoistic, communistic nightmare, and some other essays about Star Wars (not to mention my latest video gaming disappointment, Rogue Squadron 3: Rebel Strike where Luke slashes his way through dozens of Daogobah indigineous critters as 'training', and uses machine-gun like emplacements to mow down literally hundreds of stormtroopers in what can only be called a massacre), I'm thinking the sci-fi universes I loved so much as a kid were much darker than I realized, that maybe the shows and movies are just propaganda for the Federation or Rebel Alliance, respectively.
News of the Moment
Neurotics, start your engines--Solar Flare on its Way to Earth! (If it's Saturday night when you're reading this, then we're fine. Well, we're probably fine anyway.
Day of the Moment
I remember the Car Talk guys mentioning today is "National Slack-Off Day". I wonder if that ties into it also being Take Back Your Time Day? Which seems to be semiserious in some of its goals. (I think in both cases, the choice of date reflects the fact that American workers (on average I assume) work 9 more weeks per year than their European counterparts.