Archive for January, 2008

Woe and Tell

Saturday, January 26th, 2008

Apologies for the two-week hiatus. In the interim I moved to a bloody nice apartment and got a cell phone. Owning a cell phone is like being shackled to a wall that displays pretty blinking lights and keeps track of everyone you’ve ever known, and then charges you for the novelty.

It was also a rocky couple of weeks, especially with women. The morning after learning what I already knew was not cheerful, which was why I was very thankful to have accidentally discovered medicine in the form of Mortified: Woe and Tell. A combination of FOUND Magazine and Teen Angst Poetry, people send in the love letters and anecdotes they would otherwise prefer no one knew about. Simultaneously hilarious and curative.

In Soviet Japan…

Thursday, January 10th, 2008

Nikita Khrushchev dissolved most of the Gulag Archipelago in the late 1950s, but what of the Soviet prison system after that time? Japanese animators would love to fill you in: living in a 1961 cell involved bunnies. And 5-o’clock shadow chickens. And possessed doors. What’s that whiner Solzhenitsyn complaining about?

Cutthroat Business

Wednesday, January 9th, 2008

I hate shaving. It’s socially encouraged facial mutilation for the 99% of people that don’t put time, money, and labourious effort into a proper shave. I taught myself how to do it rather than accept my father’s offer to teach me—confessing that I had gone through puberty was too much for me to bear at the time, perhaps. Given a sharp piece of metal and no prior knowledge of the craft, I wasn’t very good at it then and I’m still not now.

When I started looking into improving my tactics, I realised shaving and my sophomore math teacher had a common trait: I don’t just hate it, I love hating it. By investing in a razor that is 30+ years old and studying ways not to gouge my face, I was making the game of defying defeat enjoyable. And, as with sophomore math, the process worked.

Soon, for the ultimate high, I plan to shave my math teacher and not fail with respect to both parties. That may not be a good idea so soon after seeing Sweeney Todd, though…

Anti-Federalist Virtual Tanjore Painting Environments

Wednesday, January 2nd, 2008

January 1st also marks the anniversary of my dabbling in Wikipedia. My interest fluctuates periodically. This summer I’ve been exceptionally active whenever I’ve had occasional downtime at work. Just don’t do what my predecessor did and produce a trail of IP-logged anonymous edits pointing to her/my computer. Had she half a brain, she would’ve spent thirty seconds registering an account, thereby hiding her edits’ IP from public view. ((Had I half a brain, I wouldn’t be blogging about wiki-ing at work!))

Another New Year’s blogging tradition of mine is supplying my Wikipedia watchlist [.txt, 12K] as a personality zeitgeist. This year it’s grown to 274 articles, and it’s fascinating to browse the list and see my very soul summarised as a bulleted list. I hold a personal interest in most content I maintain, though some are just too out there to understand.

Happy 23 • 251

Tuesday, January 1st, 2008

Adhering again to unwavering tradition, I’ve factored 2008 for you. Savour the high exponent featured this year. You won’t get to see another moderately interesting factorisation for…awhile. Hell, you think I’m going to sit up all night with a calculator and notepaper? See you in 2048 (211)!