Wednesday, October 04, 2006

We Are The American Medical Association

Just So You KnowPerfidy

Robert Anton Wilson (no introduction needed, I’m sure) is dying, and is facing eviction from his apartment. Boingboing has the details.

I don’t know about you lot, but even though I read the Illuminatus! trilogy while drifting in and out of a flu coma, and even though I didn’t “get” half of what the hell was going on (thanks, again, to the fever-pain), in the ten years since I read it, things keep bubbling up that could only have originated in the wild mind of Robert Anton Wilson. At least half of what I come up with for this very website is deeply influenced by his madness, and I owe him a huge debt of gratitude. I wouldn’t be the same dude without him.

The Boingboing link has information on where to send checks or paypal payments. According to friends, Wilson as of a couple days ago only has enough money to cover one month’s rent, after which he spends his dying days homeless. Not cool.

All the best to RAW, and here’s hoping things go his way for a change.

[Wik] [Update] There is a later post, also on Boing Boing, that tells us that the donations were coming in, so much so that

Anyway, this morning Bob’s daughter showed up at his house in tears because she had checked his PayPal account and found money for next month’s rent plus more. Bob called me to say that he couldn’t believe people would care so much about him and as we talked (which isn’t easy for him at this point) he was overcome with emotion more than once. He is so touched and RELIEVED at the possibility of staying in his home. He kept repeating to me his deep felt appreciation and disbelief that people would care so much about him. What a humble and sweet man.

Which is all to the good.  I am sure that continuing medical expenses and everyday bills will quickly deplete that, so continued giving is indicated.  For those who can’t stomach giving without receiving, there is this, a place where you can buy a nifty tshirt, and for each one, $10 will go to RAW. [- buckethead]

[Alsø wik] I just noted that the tshirt link above is to, of all things, Giant Robot Printing.  Everyone must buy a tshirt to help RAW.  I am frankly stunned, though, that they have no tshirts featuring giant robots. 


Posted by Johno on 10/04/06 at 10:47 PM
Just So You Know • Perfidy • Permalink

Oh, The Humanity!!

Lead Pipe Cruelty

In a development that will have thousands nationwide tearing their garments and gnashing their teeth in despair, the Yakima (WA) Herald Republic reports that fully 4% of the US hop harvest this year went up in smoke when the warehouse they were being stored in burned to the ground.

There’s just one thing for it, of course; drink more vodka until the shortage is alleviated. Stiff upper lip, all that.


Posted by Johno on 10/04/06 at 08:34 PM
Lead Pipe Cruelty • Permalink

A Simple Business Tip

Perfidy Attacks

I’m sure you’ve heard the old saw about not starting fights with people who buy ink by the barrel?

Addendum: Don’t ever piss off Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers’ Tom Perkins.

Quick chronology (sans copious and specific links, since anyone who cares already knows, anyone who doesn’t know probably doesn’t care, and really, this is all about the juvenile punch line):

  • HP’s board was considering changing leadership
  • Not all members were on board with doing so
  • The board got leaky with the press
  • George Keyworth was fingered & drummed out as a board member
  • Tom Perkins didn’t like seeing his friend pilloried (even though his friend {ahem} was the source of the leaks)
  • Perkins pitched a bitch, raised holy-hell, and got a Congressional hearing scheduled
  • Now Patricia Dunn, the former chairman of HP’s board, stands a chance, however slight, of a career change into the “license plate stamping industry”

Coincidence?  You decide.  I guess it could be.

But, dig this little-known fact - he also caused her to lose some of her good looks and most of her hair, as evidenced by this pictorial chronology:

image image image

Coincidence? I’d like you to believe I think that’s stretching it.

[Wik] Speaking of “stretching it”, I mashed all those pictures so they’d fit. The last one is distorted such that it’s worse looking than the one in the WaPo story, and that’s unintentional.  So I added a link to the pop-up, full size picture, which is unfortunately, like the mashed version, less than flattering. Also unintentional - she was quite the looker at one time, anti-glamour shots notwithstanding, and Congressional hearings are surely a complete pain in the ass. I blame Tom Perkins.


Posted by Patton on 10/04/06 at 07:17 PM
Perfidy Attacks • Permalink

Tuesday, October 03, 2006

Just Creepy

Partisan PoliticsUnmitigated Gall

I could go on and on about the political and electoral ramifications of the small tactical nuclear explosion that is the decline and fall of Representative Foley (R-Fla).  But I won’t.  Instead, let me make a simple comment on the transcript of one of his IMs, the which can be read here.  Just creepy.  Creepy.


Posted by Buckethead on 10/03/06 at 06:11 PM
Partisan Politics • Unmitigated Gall • Permalink

Fox, Henhouse.

Crazy ForeignersDarwin Award Contender

I know that I will sleep soundly at night if the French were overseeing the Iranian nuclear enrichment program.  I mean, seriously, what are the chances that the French would allow anything bad to happen?


Posted by Buckethead on 10/03/06 at 04:23 PM
Crazy Foreigners • Darwin Award Contender • Permalink

News you can’t necessarily use

The Miracle of Science

While I doubt this will cause a significant change of direction among automotive safety engineers, it seems that Silicone Breast Implants Save Lives.

image

Who knew?

[Wik] Lucky for her, she hit the dash tits-first

[Alsø wik] Either that, or she had silicone implants inserted in a non-traditional manner


Posted by Patton on 10/03/06 at 02:48 PM
The Miracle of Science • Permalink

Precognitive Dog

The Miracle of Science

My grandmother used to say that everyone had a special purpose.  In our family, this has come to mean that everyone has a superpower.  Not necessarily a really cool special power like regeneration or flying or being bulletproof, but rather an odd or uncanny ability that can only be explained by reference to Grandma’s saying.  I have finally figured out what my dog’s special power is. 

He has the amazing ability to see a short distance into the future to determine what I or my wife will be doing, so that he can go there and lay down to sleep.


Posted by Buckethead on 10/03/06 at 02:19 PM
The Miracle of Science • Permalink

The Queen’s English as a Second Language

Crazy ForeignersFilthy Lucre

About 2 months ago I had a phone interview with an organization in the UK.  More precisely the interview was with an HR firm that organization had hired to conduct this particular search.  I didn’t believe anything would come of it- a belief that was borne out as it happens- and that’s not really my point.  My point is that it was funny getting past the language barrier.

The woman running the search was supposed to call at 11 local on the designated day.  Her assistant called instead, and explained that the boss was running late with other calls and, if it was quite alright, she would like to call back in 20 minutes.  That’s the translated version. 

At that moment though I was having trouble:

“Yes?” [Me, in standard by-God Amurrican English.  Since I was expecting this call, I wasn’t as abrupt as I usually am.  But I still answered like I had just eaten a rare steak.  I’m not sure why, but that was an important image to convey telephonically.]

“Hello, is this Geeklethal?” [Him, with the Queen’s diction, polite and helpful with just a wisp of priss.]

“Yes.”

“Geeklethal, this is Mott Hooply with Frothingsham Limited.  I gribniff the eltra docalax for katy in the hibell and foralently.”

“...?” [The ellipsis, here, means near total incomprehension: face pinched; eyes shut tight; lips frowning with grim tension like I was a mathematician working on fucking Enigma and the outcome of the Battle of the Atlantic hung on whether I could just get the damned key and I knew I was close, but I couldn’t get my mind working on the problem because all I had going on in my skull was my own voice yelling ‘FUCKING *WHAT* did he just say!?’ So, that’s what those three dots meant there.  Moving on.]

“If that’s alright...?”

“Ah, ok...” [As I slowly worked on a general sketch of comprehension, with growing awareness of an awkwardly long pause over what was probably a very routine and undemanding question.]

“And shall she criff at this number, or friddle theraflu alta?”

“....Ahhh, this number’s............ffffine?” [Near-total guess, there.]

“Splendid!”

Phew, this is going to be harder than I thought, um, I thought.

When she did call 20 minutes later, it again took a few minutes to shift my eargears into British but more surely and with less grinding than with her assistant.  At first it was like I was speaking to her on the Moon, with a gap between her question and my answer.  But the gap was due not to distance but me “translating” what she’d asked me.  I had to listen carefully, wait for my on-board translation matrices to filter it, re-understand it in American, and go from there.  Later I realized that my brain does precisely the same thing, in the same way, when trying to navigate a conversation in German- starts out ok, readily grasping the first few words in the sentence, then falls off a cliff, then comes many seconds, sometimes minutes, to recreate in my mind what that was all supposed to have meant- if I ever even get an answer.  Funny it was the same in unfamiliar English too.  It smoothed out after a bit, and by the end was cruising right along, but never quite got the ease of comprehension we all have with each other as native American speakers.

So I basically had to blather about how dynamite I am, which if you’ve never done it on the phone in this manner is hugely awkward.  It is in such a situation that we realize how much we rely on body language, eye contact, and a dozen other physical cues from our audience that we use in turn to modify our speech.  Such body language is probably not so very culturally distinct as speech. 

Compounding that awkwardness was the distinct sensation that the more I spoke, the more I felt that what she heard on the other end was not my disciplined, thoughtful responses to her questions- themselves the result of careful reflection on a brief but respectable career - but more like “UUU HUH HEEILK YES’M I SHO’ NUFF AM DA MAN FO’ DA JOB”.  I felt as if I was from the deepest piney woods of Fuckbuckle, Arkansas, was applying for the presidency of Harvard, and any second would ask the women on the hiring committee who was keeping the house all day if they were here?

Well, since I wasn’t subsequently invited to England for a real interview, I didn’t have to figure out how I was going to communicate with them on their home turf in their own language.  But after that call I could see some QESL (Queen’s English as a Second Language) coursework in my future. 


Posted by GeekLethal on 10/03/06 at 11:04 AM
Crazy Foreigners • Filthy Lucre • Permalink
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