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Showing posts from April, 2009
Day 60 , Recovering from Warcraft
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Ok, so its not like I'm recovering from heroin. Still, for a company with 2 million subscribers paying 15.00 a month ... jumping into Warcraft (and out of SL) was , for me, as a software guy - pretty educational. How do you make .. millions.. per month? Is it just management, and a good concept and product line? This company will near the billion dollar mark in revenue this year - because it knows how to listen to customers and deliver what they need and want. But what if I need the perfect drug? Warcraft is a social environment. Its basis and underpinning rests completely in its interaction with other people - an interaction that, unlike SL, is guided, and stripped down - to facilitate the view that the goals that are set out are socially - higher priority than the trivial goals of a video game. Warcraft owes its large base due in part to the fact that those who play it really buy into the idea that being a raider is some kind of personal accomplishment. For me, speaking i
FlaccidMan
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In Tybee Island, South Carolina - home of the famous "coney winds" , a new marathon/ run/ bike/ swim called 'Flaccidman' is born. Its a rigorous event that tests the very nature of a man to turn soft at just the right time. Here's how the three part event will run. First, a rigorous dunk in the bathtub. Using all of your swimming and aquatic skill, you have to be able to move the rubber ducky in the tub from the south end of a regulation sized tub, to the north, using only your upper arm strength. Its a great workout for that one handed bath so many guys love to take. A team of observers along the route makes sure no one cheats. Once the 'duck has crossed the line' - as the elite refer - you'll make your way into 'transition'. There, you'll clip into your high speed tricycle with carbon frame - and go around the parking lot 25 times. No drafting will be allowed. If your competitor is in front of you, you have to either pass hi
A Saturday Morning, In Watercolor
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I laid back down my little boy playing outside on the trampoline the summer coming the leaves on the trees a light green The pillow smelled good to me cool fresh fun to hold bigger than my arms around I felt small I fell into a deep sleep and dreamed of straight lines before we went out to play I sat at my desk and wrote a poem a simple one just to catch who I am and remember the better part of me little boy thinks we should sell the house probably may or june is a good time he says if just for a while I laugh they tore this house down they tore the road signs down everything and in its place mother nature comes home turning edifice breaking walls letting flowers grow up through the foundation bees hanging heavily in the air you're from the south so I can't hide much you've seen the milkweed in the afternoon sun the kudzu and dandelion and the carpenter bee the afternoon wears on I roar my terrible roar and gnash my terrible
Perseopolis
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Ok. I have a weakness for females who like Iron Maiden, play Air Guitar and expose dark untruths about evil regimes. My uncle's film 'Blue Crush' played in Afghanistan a few years ago.. It was so cool to hear about a group of girls who weren't even allowed to go to school, make their way to see this grrl power chick flick. Perseopolis is worth it. Go see it. Its a simple film, revolving around symmetries of the human condition, pain, and pleasure. Always balancing the dark moment with a lighter one. Its a story about a young girl growing up in the years following the fall of the Shah. She ends up heading off to boarding school, only to return and find the country a kind of hollow place. My friends from Iran refer to the country they come from as 'Persia'. So I know the game she plays when she is afraid to admit that she was from there. But it is a beautiful place and one day - who knows. Maybe it will be a modern country again. For now. It is cloaked
Warcraft, Recovering
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He identifies himself to his friends, by saying, first his name and then, that he admits he is an addict. He does this without mention of the substance or the form of addiction. He then states he has been clean for 35 days. The room is dark and the chairs are arranged in a circle. The people in the meeting hall, at a local church - hear this missive and applaud him. He goes up to get a cup of coffee and sits back down. In the bookstore, he is buying Dan Simmons 'Fall of Hyperion'. He overhears a conversation between a slightly overweight and pleasantly attractive storekeeper and her sales colleague, but only in brief fragments as he comes up to the counter. They speak to each other in conspiratorial, hushed tones. He recognizes a word. "Did you say.. Blade's Edge".. he asks her colleague. The sales attendant nods his head dismissively. You're not part of the warcraft club he seems to say. "She's talking about Warcraft." ... Yes ... I
Fixing Craigslist: A Study in Micropayment
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Craigslist is an environment where people can post for free - classified ads, personals, or participate in forums (my fave). And as of this week, its also a place where the public perception is now centering on whether or not Craigslist is going to be a place where murderers hang out so they can find a way to come to your door and kill you in your sleep. But the part of of Craigslist that is broken has nothing to do with whether or not its a good place to meet people - the personals ad side of CL is and always will be a place where people should be careful - just as people should be careful meeting others in real life. And for all the press CL has been getting about this killer up north (damn yankee) that murdered a fairly attractive young lady who was posting an add for 'full body service massage'.. the truth is, its a fairly safe place to hang out. But for the wrong reasons. Craigslist personals are being spammed to the deep nines. Almost all of the personals ads t
For Tina Dico
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Tina I wanted to talk to you About nice chairs and things to eat Then I wanted to talk to you About what a young woman likes to feel But First I wanted to say You are Zero Seven And They are You Confucius say The point of the journey is not to arrive But he never heard you sing Your words and their sound For me are the beginning and ending A way to the dark blue night between the stars A way to get my feet back on the ground. Can you hear warm sound of a million people singing along? Take them home Tina There are a million ways to laugh All a different path When you're not with them they are gone Its the singer not the song That makes it move along I want you to Join Zero Seven When You Can I don't care if you don't trust me when I say you look seventeen I'm only saying you have your thing and thats ok you call it almost alone and detour and a beginning in the waiting line
Blackballed
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I sort of wasted a Friday night watching blackballed. I consider it kind of a breathing exercise, it made me laugh and cough. There was this scene at the end that was pretty good. These three guys go down into the basement and this guy introduces them to this sort of bomb shelter where he has this big banner called NOSO - National Organization for Statewide Offensive . And then the guy proceeds to tell them about the organization.. how, if there was ever a nuclear war , NOSO would go out and 'be the first ones out there, to help the militias, real guns and everything'. The first guy turns to the second and says.. hey I kind of smell meat. And the NOSO guy says, "I like to come down here and eat Wendy's Cheeseburgers and Jack Off. You know, just power jack that pole"... He's got these pictures of pinup girls in his cave there, and so he asks one of them to pick his favorite one. So the guy picks this girl..Miss February.. and he says , see... she's
Three things to do if the economy turns around
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Three things to do if Obama has really pullled the rabbit out of the hat, and we've found the bottom of the market a month and a half ago or so. First, the real estate market is really gapped between what banks will finance, and what buyers will sell for - the banks are boxing everything they see and that box is not very big - and the banks are also, just like in 1929 , undergoing a cashflow problem so they're going to sell from their inventory of properties fairly reasonably - and they are motivated to sell. Buyer's market. So, if you can - you might want to sell your home (get a good price on the thing) and then jump into one of these bank-owned homes. Do not finance it through the bank, but set your financing up and arrive at their door with cash in hand, and walk away with a really great deal. Second. Buy stock. Ok - you didn't get in at the very bottom. Thats ok. That type of investment or statistical analysis is really just for people who are crazy enough
Put the pin back in the Grenade
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Full on, he hits the floorboard Tuner perfection slides across smooth top floor traveller of both time and space The import pulls four wheel drift all will be revealed yeah The car slides to a stop, adrenaline , burned rubber and him A fast counterclockwise turn to kill the engine the door opens , city stretching out below the brown haze of morning leaving a trace on the wall midway up by dawn like a yellow desert sandstorm pollution moving into his lungs happiness... makes you cry.. Once when he was young he saw someone go out in the desert with dynamite and flowers and metal they set it all off blowing the image of the flower into solid steel He laughs and looks out across the city The theme from linus and lucy an old beatles tune classical music the sun doesn't go down its just an illusion its freedom at zero flying Welcome to Entropy airlines If you'll turn your attention to the front of the cabin the flight attendant will now demonstr
Same Sex Marriage
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Ok, so I write a post about how I'm not beating my kids up in their face, and I get Google Advertisments about "Displine Your Kids". Hmm.... I wrote a piece for another blog on the issue Same Sex Marriage today. I wonder sometimes, when I write about something - how the Google Advertisements generated. I guess I'm just mentioning it here to see what happens. .I met someone last week that was getting prosecuted on an anti-sodomy charge and I just got miffed at the byzantine laws that would turn someone with a near perfect 4.0 GPA, an 18 yr old kid - into a felon because he was queer. The guy was fucking his playmate in a car, and the cop just shines a light in on them and arrests them. Then, he gets threatened by the police that if he does not plead guilty on the charge ( this is one of those laws that the GLBT like to fight in court ) - that they would register him as a sex offender and make it available online. So, if laws like that exist, are they the same
Abuse
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There was this little girl that used to come do sleepovers with my daughter. She was a single child, and horribly spoiled. So I tried to counterbalance that. She was rude to my son, so I would hold her feet to the fire when she did that. It was seemingly resolved. I never hurt her, but I wouldn't put up with her insulting my son and she had to apologize, and that was that. She would flash me mean looks and proceed to whisper in my daughters ear afterward - but I thought that would be the end of that. Nothing major, put your dishes in the sink, be polite to others - that kind of thing. But obviously something she wasn't getting at home. Her father is a milquetoast and her mother is this big, buff girl scout troop leader whose best friend was a former woman bodybuilder. The little girl was very bright, and I was glad she was my daughters friend but I always considered her fairly spoiled and whenever possible I tried to draw her out. Its just my way, I guess.. nothing harmful a
Of Mice and Men
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Illegitimate son of man Living alone Two cats playing downstairs Its morning Wolfquest Breakfast table is set for one He notices she is pregnant not more than 9 months old How many in human years? He pulls her close On his desk A faded copy of a magazine called Heavy Metal Pencil and ink drawings seem to come to life The nike of samothrace Two views from the group of laocoon showing the horror of being eaten alive the texture of stone and skin the frozen expressions of horror in black and white slowly he brings the cat up stroking the soft fur his weathered face gently forcefully deliberately buries itself in the kitten Last night she killed a shrew for him her drive to live goes beyond herself but for her simple companionship he cares for her all the days of her life and she will kill again for him