(from a daily thought e-mail I get)
When you re-read a classic you do not see in the book more than you did before. You see more in you than there was before.
~ Clifton Fadiman

It’s 9pm, and I’m actually thinking about just going to bed. How freakin’ lame is that?

It has been a crazy week, though… or couple of weeks… geez, a month? the summer? Suffice it to say, the craziness abounds.

Chad’s schedule has been crazy, doing ISTs and other cool acronyms… which has given me a couple of evenings to chill, and have the house to myself. This is in theory pretty cool, but I have yet to figure out how to make it work. For instance, Monday night I reviewed a list of things that Manda suggested doing the last time she had the house to herself… and ended up doing none of the listed things, and instead watching City Confidential, followed by crappy reality TV (WifeSwap), followed by a really odd documentary type show about a family that has 13 kids and only spend $150 a week at the grocery store. I got some cleaning done in there, too, but mostly just watched crappy TV.

Tonight I watched City Confidential, and then got sucked into a documentary about a serial killer who eventually got caught and put on death row, but they never found half the people he killed… yeah. Really healthy TV habits. But I got some other cleaning stuff done, read the first couple of chapters of a book someone lent me, and now I’m ready to call it a night I guess…

In other news, starting September 1 I’ll be a real full time employee at Landmark, doing usability and like, getting paid and stuff. And benefits. Like a real person. Isn’t that amazing?

In other other news, apparently my brother tore his rotator cuff at work… so now instead of stocking produce, he’s greeting people at the door. So if you happne through the Sparkman Drive Wal-mart between 4am and noon (no clue what days), you should wave at him and stuff.

And for the record, I’m not terribly fond of hurricanes. Phenomenal cosmic (destructive) power aside, the build up is annoying. And people freak out, and panic, thus causing other people to panic, and it’s not fun. I like tornadoes better. They destroy smaller areas, they don’t tend to come with floods, and you only have a few minutes to panic and freak out.

That being said, we have an evacuation plan, and I have now put my finger on everything we would need to take with us (a surprisingly small list, really, which makes me wonder… why do we have so much other stuff?).

Anyway. I’m falling asleep whilst typing, which is always bad. I’m going to quit fighting it, and go to bed, which is pretty sad, actually).

Ok, so I’m a member of an online community of female IT & computing professionals. Which is fine, but occasionally they go of on a tangent that I find entirely not worthwhile. Or just plain stupid.

For instance, the current campaign is to boycott a given company because of an ad they had printed somewhere… The ad has a picture of a fairly attractive woman, and said something like “Don’t worry, our servers won’t go down on you either”. [I'll look for a link to it later, I know someone Digged it Edit: link.]. Now, I thought this was pretty funny when I saw it several days ago. The online community? not so much. People are selling stock, writing letters, complaining to NASA (who buys from this company), etc.

Exactly what is the deal? I understand why some people would be offended by the sexual reference, but why are women taking this as a dig on women in computing? What about it is offensive to women, in general?

Umm…. so this sounds like the worst idea ever. Who would sign up for this? If someone ever said to me, hey, let me take the worst most terrifying moments of your life and recreate them in virtual reality so you can relive them… I would run, far far away. I have no idea of the therapeutic value of such things… but yeah, it seems like a really bad idea.

I’m in a really odd, kind of rant-y mood today. No idea why. Really.
These are (a few) of the random things that have bothered me today:

1. The word data is plural. Data is literally a bunch of “things”
   not just one. So why do we say “the data is on the server” as opposedto “the data are on the server”? You would never say “The dogs is onthe porch” (unless you were from some geographic regions, in which case you probably aren’t concerned with whether data is singular or plural.
2. Why is the world so concerned with having “stuff”? You know, things, stuff, toys, items that you don’t need that cost extra money and then you may or may not use them… I’m fast becoming less of a “stuff” person (we’ll assume books don’t count, here). I’m really tired of the materialism, the “how much do you make?” implying that making more money makes you more valuable as a person. And when did living within your means go out of style?
3. I think the pop-up previews that outlook puts up when you get a new message are the worst invention ever. Not because I don’t use them…. I do, all the time. But because too many people overuse them. Read the whole e-mail before you respond, not just the one line that displays. I try to keep it short, but really, you could take the time to read it.
4. Scrum uses the most bizarre terminology ever. I dislike being dubbed a “chicken” (although the alternative title, “pig”, wasn’t much better). And what are “sprints”, anyway? Why can’t they call them “iterations”, like everyone else?
5. I’m annoyed by “news” that isn’t newsworthy (imho). Bridges collapsing = news. Pregnant celebs choosing county lockup over city lockup != news. Especially when the story ran yesterday, and was rewritten (with no new information) for today’s news. Stuff like this is what clogs up the tubes of the intarweb. Srsly.
6. I really hate the term “starting a family”. Um, I already have a family started, yo. Chad + Deedee = family. If someone asked me, “do you have any family?” I would say, “yes, I’m married, my parents/siblings live in Alabama, and my in-laws live in Mississippi”. Not “no, I haven’t got around to starting one yet”.

And since that rounds out six points, I will stop ranting.