Fan of the band or no, here's something entertaining:Plans to set up an on-site municipal court at the PNC Bank Arts Center to process misbehaving fans of the alternative rock band Phish have been scrapped. How surreal would it be to go to a concert and find a makeshift courtroom in the parking lot? Where do you suppose it would be located? Do you suppose they would advertise themselves in the same way that, I don't know, an unlicensed beer vendor or someone selling hemp jewlery would?

What if the judge got nailed trying to buy a bong?
posted 8:10 AM | link

So much for trying to do the right thing.
posted 9:16 AM | link

Now here's a Web page worth talking about: Shut Up, Little Man! The Official Web Page. I remember how a bootleg of Pete and Ray made for many a slurred and drunken laugh while in college. Dangerous to read now that I work in a cubicle.

Another dangerous thing to read in a cubicle.
posted 3:20 PM | link

I really should update my about page to reflect some of the additions and changes on this site.
posted 11:02 PM | link

Yick. Mistakes are everywhere.
posted 9:42 AM | link

So what, you may ask, is the funniest thing you could put into a form field when you are testing a simple contact form on a Web site you're developing?

I really don't know. However, this afternoon I sent the following to myself:

"Too much soda and coffee and iced tea makes me edgy. Especially when I haven't had lunch!"

When I found it just now it made me laugh so much I had to put it here.

Do you have any idea how important it is to be entertained with yourself?
posted 12:27 AM | link

Man, guess what I just heard on the radio.

[...]

Give up? On the radio, just now, as I waited in line at this little shop in the office building next door, I heard the song that plays in the background on the hampsterdance2 site.

The girl behind the counter was visibly perplexed at how thoroughly entertained I was.
posted 9:10 AM | link

You know, what-do-you-want-for-dinner i-don't-know-what-do-you-want? dialog generator at onfocus is a whole lot of fun when you claim things like "steel belted radials" and "gutter sludge" as your favorite (or least favorite) foods.

Anyway...

(Thanks, Jeremy.)
posted 10:46 AM | link

Guys:

What is it about this thing we live in? I don't want to call it "this life," because it sounds so ambiguous and, I don't know, Norman Rockwellesque. So let's call it "this aquarium." Or "this petri dish." Or how about "this microchip of a universe."

That's a good one.

But anyway, so what's with it? I mean seriously. As soon as I'm sure I have it figured out, as soon as I'm sure that it's the most routine, uneventful, and painfully boring dimension ever conceived by any higher power that might possibly exist anywhere -- in other words, as soon as my pessimistic leanings begin running at Full Tilt -- I'm suddenly diverted, and my pattern of thought is literally shifted 1,000 degrees, and it's I'm not only spiritually righted, but I come back more positive than ever. A bit dizzy, but definitely positive. With that I come to the realization of how complicated everything is. Not in the sense that I cannot understand it, but complicated in the sense that it takes more than a swooping, cynical observation to explain it all away.

What causes this Moment of Clarity might be something relatively tangible, like a conversation or a look from someone in an elevator or an expectation of the future or a memory of the past, however vague, that shows without a doubt how unquantifiably cool life can and might very well might continue to be. It might be that, or it might just happen. Like giving out, only the exact opposite.

Those moments, those ones are the best.
posted 8:28 PM | link

Neal Stephenson speaks with Time Digital:

"I've been programming computers since I was 14. During the time I could have gotten a job doing it and become a millionaire, I was already giving up on it and writing novels instead, and becoming a thousandaire. Which is fine. I'm very happy with the way it worked out."

Yay!
posted 4:08 PM | link

I can post things.
posted 12:58 PM | link

Using Eminem as an example, here's a piece on the maddening interconnectedness between us and the artists we love, or hate, or love to hate. From Salon:

"By defending and celebrating the likes of Eminem while willingly turning a blind eye to his catchy message of hate, music critics continue to cheapen their profession. They're also lowering the bar to such depths that artists will soon have to crawl to get under it. Don't think Eminem won't try."

Now, supposing that music critics put into words what a given culture is collectively thinking, I think it fair to replace "music critics" with "fans" or "consumers of music products," and "their profession" with "their lives" or "their culture," thus expanding the meaning a bit. The resulting statement is really depressing. As much as I would like to tell you that we're better than this, apparently, we are not.

Here's the full text.
posted 10:17 AM | link

Sometimes, if the conversation is really good, I'll eavsdrop on what other people are saying.

What type of horrible person does that make me?
posted 2:43 PM | link

Am I a loser because I like this?
posted 11:20 AM | link

Lately, I've been reading like a college student, and loving it.

This weekend, I finished Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. Considering how long it took me to finish my last book, I was very proud when I found I read it in a week and a half.

I found Zen uplifting and frustrating and saddening all at once, and found it more than a bit eerie and disheartening that I identified with the narrator's description of his bouts of insanity as much as I did. I was also kind of sad when I finally finished, which is pretty awesome. It's been a long time since last I remember really becoming emotionally engrossed in a story like that.

Now I'm reading this, and my zeal for the written word is progressing unabated. Yes.
posted 11:09 AM | link

Damn stupid editing mistakes.
posted 12:37 PM | link

Crap. Last week, it was Memorial Day. I made a promise I would somehow make note of it, to somehow work it into the amorphous, incessant, and for the most part meaningless collection of banter that is the Web site. But failed to do it. Call it a lack of inspiration. Whatever. Also last week, someone was reading Vonnegut and quoting him on her Web site. I love Kurt Vonnegut's work, so I became interested in posting a quote from him myself. But I didn't do that, either. Call it a lack of resources.

So lets say, in a belated effort to make up for two incidences of laziness, I will post a Vonnegut quote. I'm probably trying to accomplish a bit too much with this double shot, but I think this is pretty damn meaningful.

Here it is:

American planes, full of holes and wounded men and corpses, took off backward from an airfield in England. Over France, a few German fighters flew at them backwards, sucked bullets and shell fragments from some of the planes and crewmen... The formation flew backwards over a German city that was in flames. The bombers opened their bombay doors, exerted a miraculous magnetism which shrunk the fires, gathered them into cylindrical steel containers, and lifted the containers into the bellies of the planes... When the bombers got back to their base, the steel cylinders were taken from the racks and shipped back to the United States where factories were operating day and night, dismantling the cylinders, separating the dangerous contents into minerals. Touchingly, it was mainly women that did this work. The minerals were then shipped to specialists in remote areas. It was their business to put them in the ground, to hide them cleverly, so they would never hurt anybody ever again.

The prospect of a terse commentary on that feels, I don't know, kind of anti-climactic.
posted 12:12 PM | link

I'm not very graphically minded. As someone whose job it is to work with graphics, that's probably not a very good thing to say, but there it is.

I'll say it again, only this time in a way that's a bit bolder and harsher: I suck at working with graphics. Don't ever ask me to try to find a picture that means something, especially if that something is abstract, like an emotion or a professional service.

Do you have any idea how ecstatic it would make me if I found that image, which I'm sure exists, that would make someone say "hey that picture makes me think of 'Outsourcing!' Good Work!?"

I would probably be so happy I would have to retire.

At Twenty-four.

Oh, the other evening, I forced out another installment of what is becoming a very sparse practice: a journal entry. In the event you want to read it, go here.
posted 8:38 AM | link