Because I am Evil Like That

I have a new game. It's called, "I Thought But Didn't Say."

I had to think up this game, because I am prone to thinking many, many highly inappropriate things, and these things might otherwise be blurtled right out of my mouth. Now it's a game! I can restrain myself if it's a game!

Today, playing I-Thought-But-Didn't-Say, I DIDN'T say something about immigrating to a new country and having a thick accent.

Tony, at my work, is from Russia. He's a very good guy. But he has a thick, Russian accent. I don't think his name is Tony, really. I think it's Antonin or something. I mean, Tony is a nickname for Anthony or Antonin, certainly, but I just don't see him as a Tony, what with the Slavicness in his speech.

Don't get me wrong -- I think it's cool, because my mother is from Lithuania. So, I really like hearing him talk. He's actually from Belarus, and they were part of the same kingdom, at one time. I told him we're probably related. Probably.

Imagine the accent in your head, because I'll feel bad if I type "ve vill" instead of "we will" and stuff like that, so it's better if you just pretend.

He was saying, "We will need a program to load this data in and BAM! Process it quickly!"

And I thought, but didn't say: "You mean BAMSKI, Igor!"

Thank you for playing our game today, folks.

Seeing My Face in Their Mirror

I was looking for a program on the network at my new job. I saw a "Tools" folder, and checked inside.

And there was a program sitting in the folder called, "Count.exe." For some reason, I'm not even sure why, it seemed... familiar. It must have been the other files in the folder that made me think so, because Count.exe is not that unique a name or anything.

So, I opened it. And... I recognized it! It was like looking at a much-loved toy you haven't seen in a while. A toy you made yourself. That you love and use and find helpful! And love!

I called over the other programmers, Elizabeth and Tony, and showed them the program, saying, "Hey, guys! Hilarious! This is my program!" At first they thought I was just laughing because I had the same name as the author of the program. And, I admit, I would have thought that was very funny.

But no! Count.exe is mine. My little, dear program. I love that program, and the special programming I did for it, and how much I learned, and the technical details of it...

I am SUCH a geek!

--

Also, for those of you who follow this blog and wonder when the hell I posted about getting a new job... I didn't mention it until now. I do have a new job. I just started this week, and it's kind of a freelance thing, maybe not permanent. I don't really want it to be permanent... I want to make some good tools for this place and help them get set up having a more powerhouse kind of programming group, and then move on.

But, hey! New job!

Richard Simmons is Not Gay?

Richard Simmons

Seriously? He's not gay?

I mean, I don't care who's gay. But it... I think it hurts my brain. The conflict between his claim of being straight and his, well, flamboyance?

I mean... Looking at the picture above... He's not gay?

When Chicago Baked

Sorry, I mean, nobody needs more blogging about Katrina, because that's being done to better effect and more on-the-spot and more full of good info by others.

But I'm just unable to snark properly about the usual stuff for a while. Reading Slate's coverage, for example, gets me so torqued off, and also broken-hearted.

Because, for example, the same damn thing happened in Chicago in 1995, with a massive heat wave there.

(Info nuggets from Slate.com, because I'M not an actual reporter, heh:)

The mayor, Richard M. Daley, went on vacation when he heard the heat wave was coming. At least a week ahead of time, meteorologists warned the city to prepare for the worst.

Chicago had a heat-wave emergency plan, but it was sitting on a shelf, and nobody knew it existed, because the mayor and his cabinet members weren't around.

It was okay, though, because all the rich and white people got out of town, or had air conditioning. The only people who really suffered and died were poor and old. So THAT'S all right.

It's funny. You see mentions of people rallying; Memphis took in 10,000 refugees from Katrina. People are rushing to set up avenues to handle donations to help. You probably have donated, or you know people who have. With so many good people, people who honestly care about others and want to do all they can, how can our elected officials be allowed to vacation through our disasters?

I'm sorry; like I said, there's plenty of Katrina blogging already. Back to Big Brother posts!