Archive for December, 2005

Simple Gift or Hidden Message?

Ulterior Motives?

Erika wonders why she always receives oral hygiene type gifts from her Grandmother, “Why did she send me an electric toothbrush, Listerine Pocket Paks, and a tongue scraper? Does my breath stink?” I am sure my mom is not trying to send Erika a message. But if she were, I wonder what my mom was trying to tell me.

Ulterior Motives: Presents from Mom.

Slipper Socks: Rubber stoppers on the soles? Shaped like a tube? Are they to be worn around the house? I have no idea WTF slipper socks are.

Message: Walk. Don’t Run!

The overriding theme in all email contact with mom is, “Stay healthy and enjoy life.” Maybe the Slipper Sock was sent to minimize my in-house travel speeds. I really don’t know.

Listerine Pocket Paks and Licorice Flavored Altoids: Maybe *covers mouth*, Erika and I have something in common.

Message: Your breath is offensive.

Is it? *Haaaaa…Sniff…Haaaa…Sniff* I don’t smell anything. To be safe, I’ll munch on one of these Altoids. Okay, maybe one more for good measure. A third for backup.

Licorice: “I know how much you like licorice.” Life without licorice is like an empty 60 Gig Video iPod.

Message:

Maybe this is her way of making sure I stay regular. Doesn’t she know it gives me rusty water?

Ulterior Motives: Gift from Spouse.
Aftershave Lotion: Big bottle!

Message:

Hopefully, the message here is, “u r teh s3xx0rz when you are clean shaven. Wear this to amplify your sexiness.” Yeah, that is what she is trying to tell me - No comments from the peanut gallery!

The rest of my gifts (a container of Jalapeño Pringles, a Mystery Theater CD, and some more munches) basically said, “Eat and be merry!” *Pats belly*

I hope your gifts brought good messages.

Huh?

Moist? Special?

Ah-ha sung by weeble like creatures on paper: Take On Me?

When Dreams Go Bad.

The Man with No Upper Lip:

Before the X-Files and Chris Carter, there was Rod Serling and his creations The Twilight Zone and Night Gallery. Mr. Serling (1924-1975):

Rod Serling, one of television’s most prolific writers, is best known for his science fiction television series, The Twilight Zone. He believed that the role of the writer was to “menace the public conscience.” Throughout his life Serling used radio, television, and film as “vehicles of social criticism.”

Hikaru’s Nightmare Guide. Pilot: Hashimoto’s Rats.

Genre: Horror.

Tagline: The kind of voyeurism you want to avoid. Especially, in a dream.

Plot Outline: The Hashimotos are evil fifty-something neighbors
to a young housewife. Mr. and Mrs. Hashimoto allow pigeons to
procreate on their balcony, but verbally assault the young
housewife when four of her parakeet's feathers find their way onto
the Hashimoto balcony. <-- This bit is true.

Unfortunately, rats build a tunnel between the two units giving
the young housewife a first hand look into the Hashimoto living
room. <-- This is the dream bit.

CAST:

D.L.A.          ... Disinterested Husband < -- The role I always play.
Hikaru          ... Young Housewife.
The Hashimotos  ... Themselves.
Rats            ... Rats.

Hikaru’s first words upon waking, “怖かった! That was scary!” She claims the image is “seared” into her brain.

Lost & Found.

Why, oh, why didn’t I take the train home?

A D.L.A ADVENTURE STORY ©
crossroads |ˈkrôsˌrōdz|
noun: a point at which a crucial decision must be made
that will have far-reaching consequences.

Ah, a night out on the town with friends has come
to an end. Time to head home. Hmm, public transportation
or foot-power?

OUTSIDE STATION: 11:30 PM               SCORE: 0
%: Walk home.

ROAD:                                   SCORE: 1
Time passes.
%: Walk.

INTERSECTION:                           SCORE: 1
Left takes you down a road with no
sidewalks. Right leads to a dark road
paralleling a park.
%: Go right.

DARK ROAD: 12:00 PM                     SCORE: 2
Foot, bicycle, and car traffic is light.
%: Walk.

ROAD: 12: 10                            SCORE: 3
The logic behind having more street lights on this section
of road remains a mystery to you. In the light, you spy
what seems to be a wallet in the middle of the street.
%: Get wallet.

MIDDLE OF STREET:                       SCORE: 8
Taken.
%: Examine wallet.

MIDDLE OF STREET:                       SCORE: 5
Money! 91,000 yen ( USD 784.42 ).
%: Put wallet in pocket.

Kouban (Police box):                    SCORE: ??
You return the wallet and its contents to the cop on duty.
%: Kiss money goodbye.

Lost Purchasing Power.

The gadgets I could have had!

  1. Combined with 30,000 in savings = G4 iBook for Hikaru. (this was my first and only thought at the time of discovery.)
  2. iPod Video
  3. New digital camera
  4. iPod Nano for youngest child.
  5. 1 Gig memory stick for PSP.
  6. Wireless NAS.
  7. etc…

What would you have done?

Frameworks and Unified Theories.

Processes.

If I were to run top on myself the output would look like this:

PID UID COMMAND
10006 501 approval
10005 501 speculator
10004 501 consequencesOfFailure
10003 501 compare
10000 501 appraiser
5 501 Saboteur™

For as long as I can remember, Saboteur™ and compare have been thwarting me at almost every task. Saboteur™ and compare made their first appearance at around age 5 or 6. It was on the way from my house to my Grandparent’s house. My uncles were naming all the cars that went by, so I tried to memorize the make and model of a few cars. Saboteur™ launched and spawned compare. Compare said, “Hey, they are older and cooler than you. You will never be able to remember ALL THOSE CAR NAMES.” I fell for it, “Yeah, you are probably right. I won’t even try.”

Saboteur’s first major victory. Bastard.

Thirty something years later, and he, Saboteur™, is still riding roughshod over me. Well, at least he was two months ago. Saboteur reared his ugly head one time too often. (Got cocky.) So, I decided that Saboteur™ had to go. The question was, how?

The Plan. Phase I: Identify Saboteur™ and His Cronies.

Questions had to be answered:

  • How does one go about identifying a certain set of thoughts that have been become second nature?
  • There are so many of them. How am I going to keep track?
  • What am I going to do once I have identified these rogues?

Saboteur™ took one look at what I had in mind for him - Yes, you bitch, you realized your days were numbered, didn’t you! - and immediately launched everything at his disposal. This was a mistake, as it exposed THE VOICE™.

THE VOICE™

See, to get the job done, Saboteur™ needed an interface that would allow him to influence my behavior. The simplest way was via questions and simple statements presented by a voice. A voice that sounded as if it originated from ME. Sneaky, yes? Once or twice, Saboteur™ tried to make my body sick to avoid a task, but my parents weren’t having it. Saboteur™ gave up and stuck with THE VOICE™.

So, there I was under attack from Saboteur™.

“You can’t do it.”

“What will you do without me?”

“No one can do that.”

“What, you think you can do things? Ha.”

I shouted, “SHUT UP. SHUT UP. SHUT UP.” Silence. During the silence, I grabbed a piece of paper and a pen, ran the tape back, and then wrote down and assigned a name for each voice and associated phrase. Once I was done with that, I launched my own program: TheFilter™.

The Plan. Phase II: TheFilter™

TheFilter’s™ main job is to identify any processes launched by Saboteur™, track all messages from the launched processes, delete them, and shut down Saboteur™. TheFilter™ also logs all attempts made by Saboteur™. This was the beginning of a working framework, that I hope to use in the future.

This Post.

Saboteur™ has been trying his damnedest to keep me from writing this entry. “No one wants to hear that. You are the only one who is worried about their self-confidence,” he said. Well, initially, he had some success. I put off writing this particular entry for about two weeks. The solution was to talk to someone else about my new app and framework. I presented my framework/unified theory to vmarks. He said, “that’s an interesting model. I hadn’t formed a unified theory or framework like that. I suppose mine is more the air traffic controller model: thousands of inputs demanding response and guidance, and occasionally a plane crashes.”

ATC framework? Interesting. I wonder how he works that.

Anyway, we had a good chat afterwards and then I presented the results to Saboteur™ and said, “Umm, see, you were wrong. Again. Goodbye.” And here we are with this entry.

top:
 PID     UID     COMMAND
10200    501     TheFilter

Thanks for reading.

Now Hear This. Now Hear This.

Something Evil This Way Comes

Over the past few weeks, three school children have been murdered. One by a Peruvian, who has a rap sheet that includes rape. One by a preparatory school teacher. The teacher’s motive, “I just didn’t get along with him her, so I brought a knife from home and killed him her.” (How nice.) And there is one unsolved murder. Parents are concerned.

Announcements: Takao, Hachioji-shi.

Takao’s plan to help protect school kids is an announcement over the city-wide PA system. The announcement basically tells residents of Takao that school is out and kids are on their way home. Then it asks for Takaoians to keep a watchful eye over students as they make the trek home. Why? Because dangerous things can happen. I like the use of he word dangerous, it includes the perverts that like to feel up or ejaculate on young school girls. yes, real life bukkake.

So, all you evil-doers in Takao, beware; We are watching you.

NEWS FLASH

The statute of limitations for murder in Japan is 15 years. Nagata Ryouji, wanted for a murder he committed almost 15 years ago, has 4 days until the statute of limitations runs out. He will probably not be caught. Suckage.

What’s on Santa’s Hard Drive?

Christmas Stockings.

Our conversation:

ME:  So, anyway, the kid had no idea what a xmas
     stocking was and kept calling it a 'sock'.
HER: I think it looks like a boot.
ME:  *SIGHS*
HER: Why does it look like a boot, if it is a stocking?
ME:  (EXASPERATED) I don't know. Maybe they wanted to spruce it up?
HER: Why a stocking?
ME:  I don't know.
HER: (SERIOUS) Maybe Santa has a stocking fetish. He comes down the
     chimney, feels up the stocking, and then leaves a gift.
ME:  LOL.

Santa pR0n

Maybe Santa spends the summer searching for hot stocking sites and phots: Pantyhose penetration stories :: come in my nylon panties :: indulging foot fetishes

Sorry, I am Married.

The Direct Approach.

What’s the last thing you would expect to hear on your way home from work as you listen to a podcast? Whatever it is, it probably falls far short of my reality.

Tonight, the words, “Do you want to have sex,” snuck their way in to my ear. The owner of the question was a young twenty-something male. My response? Read the title of this post.

He said, “Okay, maybe next time.” Next time? What is this, Sears? JC Penny’s? Wait, was he offering to have sex with me? God, I hope not.

Now, go read this blog: What Not to Crochet.

UPDATE

The event above took place as I walked past one of the sex clubs in Hachioji.

Dexter.

Intelligent Design? No, the Universe 0.2a.

Put away your bible, spaghetti, or biology book because I know the origins of the universe and the human race. That’s right, I KNOW.

Birthplace.

Dexter, from Dexter’s Lab on Cartoon Network, has a secret laboratory under his bedroom. It is your standard boy-genius lab with cabinets lined with blinking lights, multicolored liquids in flasks and tubes of varying sizes, a computerized female voice, robot servants, incomplete projects, and flying machines. - Garden variety secret lab stuff. For most of the series, we are led to believe that this is THE LAB, but that is not exactly true.

In one episode, Dexter loses control of his flying sled and ends up in what looks like a junkyard. Scattered about are the remains of unfinished or failed experiments, dark cabinets with missing or burntout LEDs, wrecked equipment, and shadows. (It’s not a pretty sight.) Dexter comments, “I must be in the old part of the lab.” Partially functioning robots and experiments emerge from the shadows. “We were your greatest experiments,” they squeak and take off after Dexter, in an attempt to exterminate him. (They fail, but you have to admire their effort.)

We, humans, are in the “old part of the lab,” and if God or the Flying Spaghetti Monster ever shows His/Her/Its face in the “old part of the lab”, He/She/It had better be prepared for a chilly reception.

Smart?

Cool? Dangerous? Harmless Fun?

  • Little Tina learns how to drive a car. Quote: Say, ‘thank you’, Tina.
  • Only a Lad! Society made him: Driving in Istanbul.