05.09.08
Posted in Essay Week, Rants
at 9:05 am
Essay Week Spring 2008 runs from May 5th to May 9th, 2008. Each day Iíll present a short essay on a topic of concern to me; I have the option of including a pre-essay post giving updates on ongoing life events if necessary. All the essays this week will be here; the LiveJournal is on hiatus while I concentrate here. Some of the elements in these essays may be controversial; I hope, however, that most will be well-regarded and at least read with an open mind. If you have anything to say about them, please feel free to leave a comment; I read them all, even if I may not respond due to time or other concerns. We wrap up this long, strange trip with a recounting of the equally lengthy and far stranger journey John’s undertaken to get where he is today, and helpful tips for avoiding that fate.
Eight parts carbon. Ten parts hydrogen. Four parts nitrogen. Two parts oxygen. Arrange them in a figure-eight pattern with two three hydrocarbon outcroppings and two oxygen spines. Ingest, and allow it to block your adenosine receptors. Feel the increased levels of epinephrine and serotonin coursing through your brain. Do this every day for four years, staring at a computer screen for eight hours each of those days and typing at the keyboard for the majority of that.
That’s nowhere near what it’s really like to be a programmer, but at least you’ll be chemically equivalent to one after that much caffeine.
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05.08.08
Posted in Essay Week, Rants
at 9:04 am
Essay Week Spring 2008 runs from May 5th to May 9th, 2008. Each day Iíll present a short essay on a topic of concern to me; I have the option of including a pre-essay post giving updates on ongoing life events if necessary. All the essays this week will be here; the LiveJournal is on hiatus while I concentrate here. Some of the elements in these essays may be controversial; I hope, however, that most will be well-regarded and at least read with an open mind. If you have anything to say about them, please feel free to leave a comment; I read them all, even if I may not respond due to time or other concerns. We continue our look at the world with a bit more introspection on the process of personal revolutions, their causes, and most importantly, the end results.
It’s one of the most obvious and banal remarks one could ever make to a friend you haven’t seen in a very long time. “Oh my, you’ve changed so much!” I personally try not to say it, but it still comes out. Change is, in our world, inevitable– and there we go, another insipid and useless platitude. The fact that it’s been told many times before, however, does not make it any less true– just painfully obvious. People change, and there’s nothing that can be done about it. But, the reasons for change are varied, wide, and in my opinion, often quite interesting.
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05.07.08
Posted in Essay Week, Rants
at 9:03 am
Essay Week Spring 2008 runs from May 5th to May 9th, 2008. Each day Iíll present a short essay on a topic of concern to me; I have the option of including a pre-essay post giving updates on ongoing life events if necessary. All the essays this week will be here; the LiveJournal is on hiatus while I concentrate here. Some of the elements in these essays may be controversial; I hope, however, that most will be well-regarded and at least read with an open mind. If you have anything to say about them, please feel free to leave a comment; I read them all, even if I may not respond due to time or other concerns. Today we’re taking a step back from the grave matters of the past couple days and talking about being a scatterbrained slob, and why it’s not as bad as one might suspect.
Longtime readers of this site will probably note that, around the end of 2006 and the beginning of 2007, I started going on a little bit of a productivity and organization kick. For a few months there, I was almost overzealously devoted to David Allen’s book Getting Things Done, and for a while there I felt more productive. Then I kinda fell off the wagon and started chasing it, heedless of my own path. The metaphorical crash into the lamppost came when my good friend Mike said on the topic, “I read it, and then I realized– I already do all that stuff.”
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05.06.08
Posted in Essay Week, Rants
at 9:02 am
Essay Week Spring 2008 runs from May 5th to May 9th, 2008. Each day Iíll present a short essay on a topic of concern to me; I have the option of including a pre-essay post giving updates on ongoing life events if necessary. All the essays this week will be here; the LiveJournal is on hiatus while I concentrate here. Some of the elements in these essays may be controversial; I hope, however, that most will be well-regarded and at least read with an open mind. If you have anything to say about them, please feel free to leave a comment; I read them all, even if I may not respond due to time or other concerns. Today, we take a page from Green Day and explore just why someone would want to be in a minority, given that doing so isn’t always beneficial.
“Hi, I’m a Mac.” Justin Long starts off each installment Apple’s long-running and wildly popular television advertising campaign with those words, and in response John Hodgman typically responds with, “And I’m a PC.” My old friend the false dichotomy rears his ugly head in those commercials, but despite the many, many logical errors and flawed arguments they make– come on, they’re commercials– I still love them, and try to catch them on YouTube when the new ones come out. My enjoyment of them comes mostly from the fact that I think Hodgman and Long are good actors, and the spots are cleverly written. But at the same time, well, I’d be remiss if I said that I wasn’t rooting for Long’s “Mac” character each and every time I see him on the screen of my MacBook.
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05.05.08
Posted in Essay Week, Rants
at 9:01 am
Essay Week Spring 2008 runs from May 5th to May 9th, 2008. Each day Iíll present a short essay on a topic of concern to me; I have the option of including a pre-essay post giving updates on ongoing life events if necessary. All the essays this week will be here; the LiveJournal is on hiatus while I concentrate here. Some of the elements in these essays may be controversial; I hope, however, that most will be well-regarded and at least read with an open mind. If you have anything to say about them, please feel free to leave a comment; I read them all, even if I may not respond due to time or other concerns. To kick off this year’s first festival of words, I’ll discuss the impact of the so-called Web 2.0 and the associated lifestyle.
Just about a year ago, former Vice President of the United States Al Gore released The Assault On Reason, a lengthy discussion of the metamorphosis of American politics from a two-way participatory discussion to a “read-only” medium being distributed to the populace for recourseless consumption. Near the end of his book– most of which is a thinly-veiled j’accuse to the Bush Administration– Mr. Gore presents what he feels is the optimal solution to the malaise of discourse: the internet. Mr. Gore raises some interesting, and on the surface, valid points about the way American politics is increasingly ruled by statistics, strategic virtual gerrymandering, and the proper application of subtle or overt demagoguery. But, in its current state, I have to respectfully disagree that the internet is the panacea to America’s sickly cyclical political biosphere.
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08.24.07
Posted in Essay Week, Rants, Writing
at 8:14 am
Essay Week 2007 runs from August 20 to August 24, 2007. Each day I’ll present a short essay on a topic of concern to me; as you may already have noticed, though, I have the option of including a pre-essay post giving updates on ongoing life events if necessary. Some of the elements in these essays may be controversial; I hope, however, that most will be well-regarded and at least read with an open mind. If you have anything to say about them, please feel free to leave a comment; I read them all, even if I may not respond due to time or other concerns. We wrap up the inaugural week of verbosity with a somewhat more light-hearted missive on verbiage itself.
The other day, I was talking with a friend who seemed quite upset at my recent blog posts. “You’re on crack, man,” he said; he was, of course, referring to my fixation on my ’speed-run’ through Pokemon LeafGreen and the satellite discussions I’ve been holding on the forums and elsewhere. “You say stuff and I have no idea what it means.” At the time I felt a little abashed at this, as I try to keep things pretty accessible; however, I later realized, this isn’t really all that different from other times that his insider lingo on the games he plays has confounded and befuddled me.
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08.23.07
Posted in Essay Week, Rants, Writing
at 8:39 am
Essay Week 2007 runs from August 20 to August 24, 2007. Each day I’ll present a short essay on a topic of concern to me; as you may already have noticed, though, I have the option of including a pre-essay post giving updates on ongoing life events if necessary. Some of the elements in these essays may be controversial; I hope, however, that most will be well-regarded and at least read with an open mind. If you have anything to say about them, please feel free to leave a comment; I read them all, even if I may not respond due to time or other concerns. Today’s essay is a deeply personal one, as it deals with responsibility in giving or receiving advice on individual decisions.
As most of you know, in June, I chose to remove red meat and chicken from my diet. Since then, I’ve found myself in an odd position of having to defend my choice. I honestly don’t see why exactly my dietary concerns or the supposed motives behind them are of anyone else’s interest. Still, that’s not an acceptable answer to the people who question me. In the absence of an answer, people tend to project a motive upon me, a motive which may or may not be correct. I don’t mind so much, but it is particularly irritating when people project this motive on me before asking me and getting the non-committal answer.
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08.22.07
Posted in Appleology, Essay Week, Rants, Writing
at 7:51 am
Essay Week 2007 runs from August 20 to August 24, 2007. Each day I’ll present a short essay on a topic of concern to me; as you may already have noticed, though, I have the option of including a pre-essay post giving updates on ongoing life events if necessary. Some of the elements in these essays may be controversial; I hope, however, that most will be well-regarded and at least read with an open mind. If you have anything to say about them, please feel free to leave a comment; I read them all, even if I may not respond due to time or other concerns. Shifting focus a little bit, today’s essay concerns the perils of iTunes and having a little too much of the music in your soul, or hard drive.
I have a pretty big iTunes library, and unfortunately for me, it gets stashed on an external drive (but it’s FireWire, so that’s a help). More unfortunately, I use a pretty extensive set of Smart Playlists to get everything organized for use on my iPod. What this means is that, in general, iTunes is devastatingly slow to load and use. It plays with no problems, and syncing is nice too, but it’s a pain in the ass when I’m ripping new songs or adjusting the SPLs to clear out stuff I don’t care to hear.
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08.21.07
Posted in Essay Week, Gaming, Writing
at 7:03 am
Essay Week 2007 runs from August 20 to August 24, 2007. Each day I’ll present a short essay on a topic of concern to me; as you may already have noticed, though, I have the option of including a pre-essay post giving updates on ongoing life events if necessary. Some of the elements in these essays may be controversial; I hope, however, that most will be well-regarded and at least read with an open mind. If you have anything to say about them, please feel free to leave a comment; I read them all, even if I may not respond due to time or other concerns. We’re staying in a gaming mood today, talking a little bit about game reviews and how they can or should be improved.
Last week, a friend of mine was a bit disappointed and quite discouraged by some reviews he’d seen about a particular DS title. The criticism in question focused around what was perceived as weak writing and a generally overcliched storyline. Now, it’s perfectly reasonable to assume that my friend was upset because he was a fanboy and had some unnatural and improper attachment to the game; but, of course, you’d be completely and totally wrong in this case… Read the rest of this entry »
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08.20.07
Posted in Essay Week, Gaming, Rants, Writing
at 7:21 am
Essay Week 2007 runs from August 20 to August 24, 2007. Each day I’ll present a short essay on a topic of concern to me; as you may already have noticed, though, I have the option of including a pre-essay post giving updates on ongoing life events if necessary. Some of the elements in these essays may be controversial; I hope, however, that most will be well-regarded and at least read with an open mind. If you have anything to say about them, please feel free to leave a comment; I read them all, even if I may not respond due to time or other concerns. I start off, then, with a somewhat lighter in tone essay on the recent announcement of D&D Fourth Edition.
Last week, Wizards of the Coast announced the May 2008 release of the D&D Player’s Handbook, Fourth Edition. As has been stated in numerous other sources, this is the first new reboot of the core rules in eight years, but WotC is emphasizing that it’s an “evolutionary, not revolutionary” change. While it’s not exactly been something I do often or talk about terribly frequently, I have been known to get polyhedral on occasion; as such, I’m still kind of conflicted about this.
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