Words for the wise from the mouth of a fool.
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The weblog of Seth Johnson -------------- INKSLINGER.ORG -------------- OD ARCHIVES -------------- FEEDS Posts:  Shared Items:
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Saturday, February 02, 2002
A new month, new book and CD reccommendations to the left. No time to expound, but you should enjoy them immediately.
In case you were wondering, here's a list of who the U.S. State Department considers Foreign Terrorist Organizations. Read it, along with The World's Most Dangerous Places (and the DP message boards, full of all sorts of brave and scary loons), then begin planning your next trip abroad.
Not that things are any better here.
Unless you are a new reader of this page or have Memento-like memory problems, you probably remember my post of a few days ago establishing the Let's Roll America Store. Now I read that the family of Todd Beamer is going after anyone using the "Let's Roll" phrase.
First, allow me to clarify: Beamer is a hero, no doubt about it. And "Let's roll" were terrific last words, on par with "Avengers Assemble."
My problem, again, is the presentation of the words in the State of the Union address by President Bush and his speechwriters: Now America is embracing a new ethic and a new creed: ``Let's roll.'' I'm sorry, but while "Let's roll" is a great battle cry, it's a shitty ethic and creed for an entire nation. There are plenty of better quotes out there--"We must all hang together or we shall surely hang seperately," for one. "Be excellent to each other," is another, if I might steal wisdom from Wyld Stallyns**.
But I want the Beamer family (who no doubt are clicking "Refresh" constantly for the latest posts on OD*) to know that I mean no insult to the memory or heroism of Todd Beamer. So in respect of them, all profits of the now cost-increased products of the Let's Roll America Store will go directly to the Todd M. Beamer Foundation.
There. Bullet dodged. I hope.
* But whose expensive lawyers' underpaid legal assistants might stumble across page this via Google--hence the clarification.
** While at that site, might I suggest reading the trippy script for the Bill & Ted-themed Halloween show at Universal Studios?
Game developers inserting product placements into their games for "increased realism". I provide a link to this story mainly because I want to hear JP rant about--er, comment on it later.
Thanks to Metafilter for pointing me in this direction: rather than linking to the articles piecemeal as I read them over the next few days, I'll just provide you with a link to Business Week's Game Report and we can read it together.
Like we all should be, Michael Moore is a bit unhappy with President Bush about the collapse of Enron. Treat Moore's screed as infotainment, but read the articles he links to carefully. There's a lot of good backup there.
(If you prefer a more humorous appraoch, check out Slate.com's Blame Game take on the scandal.)
Oh, and usually when a file is labelled "best_picture_ever.jpg", it's wrong. Not this time.
I know I'm late to this particular party, but holy bejeezus is Bridge Builder a hell of a lot more fun than I expected. Those of you who haven't tried it should do so--it's a tiny download and big fun.
Friday, February 01, 2002
The Guardian's story on Blogger and Blogger Pro is particularly interesting when you read the last section regarding blogs trumping newspapers and traditional publishing--and then follow the nearby link to the Guardian's own blog, in my opinion just as useful as (and certainly more personable than) the Guardian website's front page.
Cripes. I know I ripped on Stephen King a few days ago, but I didn't think I'd make him quit the game.
Of course, he's "done writing books". For someone who's written nonfiction, short stories, screenplays, games, and more, that still leaves him an awful lot of wiggle room...
MAME freaks brag about playing the most obscure games ever. But with his handful of a prototype arcade standups, this guy trumps you.
"Everyone uses Windows."
Heck, disproving that is as easy as looking at the browser shares of vistors to this site.
But I still haven't heard that GTA3 is coming out for the Mac, so I say that Myth #4 holds true.
For those of you interested in user-made game engines, here's CUBE, a simple FPS engine. If I have some time, I think I'll unpack this over the weekend and check it out.
When the History of our Monkey Masters is written, this story will play a part.
To sooth your fear with enjoyment, I offer an encyclopedia of playground insults. I dare you to discover the horrible secret of the Wangas wanking tree. Yes, it could be what you think--or it could be worse...
My brain has been teased!
Discussion via email with my WisPolitics.com buddy Jim Greer of the HBO program Canididate 2012 that I linked to below earlier today led quickly to what the geekiest potential candidate might be. The thought started with me, but tumbled rapidly (and thankfully) to Comic Book Guy:
Great. Just great. Now British doctors want health warnings on video games. You know, there's a disease rampant among pizza chefs called "Pizza Cutters' Palsy", but you don't see warnings on those, do you? If you ask me, a simple "Moderation in All Things, Idiots" campaign might be a better tactic...
Are you between the ages of 24 and 29? Ever thought about being a candidate for President of the U.S.?
This joins the list of jobs I've never thought of before.
A piece of wisdom I'd like to share with the world, courtesy of my friend Rob Lennon*:
"If you put everything off until the last minute, it only takes a minute to get done."
* That's Mr. Robert Lennon to you.
Thursday, January 31, 2002
Inadvertantly honest press release of the day?: "Our past games have focused on two things: being late and over budget."
Wednesday, January 30, 2002
NASA is being very specific about where the EUVE satelitte may come down, so I don't think you'll need to worry about it.
If I may pull my favorite bit from last night's State of the Union address:
For too long our culture has said, ``If it feels good, do it.'' Now America is embracing a new ethic and a new creed: ``Let's roll.''
Let's roll. That's goddamn profound.
And I'd like to be the first to cash in on it. Please pass the link to my new Let's Roll, America Store to everyone you know. I want every blue-collar worker in the nation to be wearing one of these by week's end. I promise to buy treats for everyone with the proceeds from my overpriced jingoistic products.
Of course, the time I took to put this store together counts toward my 2000 hours of volunteer time, right?
The most important aritcle you'll read today: "How to Stop Machines Enslaving Humans". Because they must be stopped, you know.
Following a link off of Jon's blog, I took this personality test a few minutes ago. Like Jon, I came up as an Idealist Unwilling to Pay for Full Results. But while filling out the form, I did find the questions interesting--there were quite a few times where I felt like I was contradicting earlier answers, and I think that's how I was supposed to feel. More than "which of these are you", it was much more a case of "you are both of these--which are you more?" It was also interesting to think that everyone who takes the test might think themselves both, say, reasonable and impulsive. Of course, I supposed I shouldn't be surprised to feel manipulated while taking a psych diagnostic...
Apparently Jesus is in Milwaukee.
My favorite line from the article: "A computer tracing of the image (pictured right) makes it easier to see for yourself." Listen, if I need a computer tracing to see the image, is it really clear enough to be a Divine Message?
My second favorite line, which I assign OD readers to diagram immediately: "That if it is meant for me to know anything I pray that I will find out."
As one final bit of entertainment, isolate the first five paragraphs of the story and you'll see that they make a nice little palindrome: Woman sees image in tree, image is amazing, what's amazing is image, image is in tree seen by woman.
Quality journalism, that story.
As my email is completely screwed up, this may be the easiest way to tell Jon that his package showed up and the DVDs are safe in my hands. Thanks, Jon.
Tuesday, January 29, 2002
"Google does not allow pop-up ads of any kind on our site. We find them annoying."
Now that's a policy I can stand behind.
I can find my own Altoid tins, but the other things ReadyMade is sellling are pretty cool. I particularly like the restaurant sign and the museum sign...
Accursed State of the Union address! You will pre-empt 24, and for that you have incurred my wrath!
Why must an informed public come at such a dear price?
While cruising the web for MP3s, I occasionally see tracks like "Britney Spears vs. Eminem" or "R.E.M. vs. U2". I've downloaded a couple to check them out, and found them mildly amusing and (to me) only moderately interesting interminglings of songs by two artists.
But I suggest you go to this page and download the second song, a track by "Osymyso". Regardless of what I think of the style, you have to respect anyone who can cram that many songs into seven and a half minutes (I stopped counting around four minutes in, when I had heard almost fifty songs I recognized, and knew a few had slipped past me.)
At work I've become part of a cabal planning to build a standup MAME cabinet for the office. Planning has proceeded apace, and we're putting together a budget and parts list, though there are still a few crucial decisions to be made (monitor vs. TV, spinner or no spinner...) I thought I had most everything else settled, but yesterday Zusty provided a link to this site about cabinet conversion, which is making me reconsider my earlier conviction to build a cabinet from scratch.
Sigh. Back to the mental drawing board for a couple days, I guess. I'd rather get it right than have regrets. I'll keep you posted as progress on the project continues.
Monday, January 28, 2002
I can only hope that some of you share my unbridled awe towards large libraries. I was deep in the stacks of the Wisconsin State Historical Society doing research this morning when I stumbled across a book on Indian treaties written by Thomas Jefferson and printed by Benjamin Franklin. Not a reprint--the actual book, from the late seventeen hundreds. Just sitting there on the shelf. Granted, it's unlikely that the author saw every copy of his book, and it's likely that it was someone who worked for Franklin and not Ben himself who printed it, but in a Six-Degrees-of-Physical-Separation kind of way, for that moment I felt that much closer to two people I'd only read about in history books.
Beyond that slightly-psychotic mix of sentiment and speculation, I love the high chance for serendipity at large libraries.
If you go to your local public library, you'll find two classes of book: a) books that every library has (a set of encyclopedias, the Guinness Book of World Records, the Chilton manual for a 1982 Suburban...) and b) books that you really don't want to read (Are You There, God--It's Me, Margaret, Stephen King's Evil Comes to Maine Yet Again, the Chilton manual for a 1982 Suburban...) Somewhere in there there are books you actually do want to read, but they're really hard to find, so you end up going home with a 1200-page Grisham novel on 3-day loan and a Chilton manual.
But at large libraries--and even the Madison public library doesn't count here; I'm talking major university size--there are so many volumes in the collection that your chance for finding those interesting books seeded in among the dross is that much higher. It helps if you (like me) tend towards being informationally omnivorous, but it doesn't take too long to find jewels like FEMA's instructions for postmasters in case of nuclear attack, obscure biographies, ancient novels that draw you just by their spine design (I found the work of John Kendrick Bangs that way), subjects-in-collision books on the weirdest topics (William Howard Taft and the American Circus.)
One of the saddest realizations I ever came to was that I'll never be able to read everything I want to before I die...
A writer once told me, "While an author is alive, the best way to honor them is to buy their books, so they get the royalties. Once an author is dead, the best way to honor them is to read their books--at least at that point you know how many you have to go until you've read them all."
Now another list has been capped: Pippi Longstocking creator Astrid Lindgren has passed away. According to her obit, Lindgren wrote more than a hundred 'works'; it might be a while before I get to all of them, but I think I might track down one of the Pippi books later this week. It's been too long since I visited Viila Villekulla.
Sunday, January 27, 2002
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