All the cool kids are doing it

Remember 2003? Year of the blog, I think it was. And all we ever did was blog via memes. Heather, Chris and Neal are bringing the good times back, and now so am I.

1) WHAT WAS I DOING TEN YEARS AGO?

I had driven out to Lake Tahoe to spend the summer working at the now-defunct Ponderosa Ranch, a "Bonanza"-themed tourist trap on the Nevada side of the lake.

I was a gunfighter, "robbing" the wagon rides that took people up the mountain to have breakfast. I also worked in the photography area, taking pictures of people dressed up in cowboy outfits. I was apparently really good at the latter because:
1) I goofed around a lot, which kept the people who were waiting from getting bored. 2) I understood the basic principle that people wanted to be photographed holding lots of guns. They'd say they didn't need guns, but when I put a shotgun in their hand and four pistols on them they were much happier.
3) I was good at handling crying babies. The trick is to blow directly into their faces. It works 85 percent of the time. It's discombobulating to them and causes them to go quiet and stare at you in confusion. Also, we were in the desert, so most of the time the baby was upset simply because it was hot.

This was the summer that I met the child bride. Ten years ago today we hadn't yet gone out on a date, though. On Fourth of July all the staff had a big barbecue and I tried to hit on Rachel but she was having none of it. Then, at some point, all the guys on staff performed a dance and I was wearing nothing but boxers and chaps. No doubt this is what attracted her to me.

2) WHAT ARE FIVE THINGS ON YOUR TO-DO LIST TODAY?

- Hoover the living room floor.
- Write to Trinity College Carmarthen to enquire about their creative writing master's degree.
- Continue work on my book
- Have dinner with Craig and Claire.
- Same thing we do every night, Pinky: try to take over the world.

3) FOUR THINGS I WOULD DO IF I WERE A BILLIONAIRE

- Pay off all personal debt and debt of my family members.
- Fund the Central Corridor LRT in St. Paul, Minnesota.
- Buy cabins for those friends who have tags on this blog.
- Try to score myself an MBE by donating large amounts to Prince's Trust.

4) FIVE PLACES I HAVE LIVED

- Austin, Texas
- St. Paul, Minnesota
- San Diego, California
- Portsmouth, England
- Cardiff, Wales

5) THREE OF MY BAD HABITS

- I have the emotional needs of a teenage girl.
- I don't listen to people because I am too busy thinking about what I'm going to say next.
- I have that British tendency to jump on bandwagons.

6) FIVE JOBS I'VE HAD

- Shopping cart wrangler at Cub Foods
- Freezer/cooler stockist at Sam's Club
- Gunfighter
- Radio DJ
- Columnist

7) HOW DID YOU NAME YOUR BLOG?

I've answered this question in full before, but the short version is this: a beauty queen asked me to dance, I stupidly said no, I have rued the decision ever since. As God as my witness, I will never turn down a beauty queen again.

8) I'm not tagging anyone, yo. I'm not that retro, bitches.

You don't like chat?

Have I ever told you about my utterly strange job interview in which the interviewer walked out on me? I was applying to work for an internet company that would go belly-up about a month later.

This was in the final throes of the internet boom, when people were still being paid to do fuck all. Indeed, the job I would eventually land paid me to do so very little that I started learning Welsh just to keep my mind active. And we all know how that turned out.

The internet company in question was one of those that believed in the catch-all website concept and was trying to build one targeted at college students.

There persists to this day the ridiculous idea of the portal website, a site from which a user embarks on his or her internet journey, or which encompasses the whole of his or her experience. Are you smelling the bullshit yet? The idea is to build a website that a user would never really need to leave, which translates to audience numbers more appealing to advertisers. How long a person stays on site can often be more important than the actual number of people visiting. But the very nature of the internet makes portal websites a bit foolish. In the same time it takes to come across the dating section in EverythingUnderOneHugeCorporateBanner.com you can just find a website that focuses solely on dating. I think attempting broadcasting via the web is silly.

But no one ever listens to me. If they did, there would be a fucking bullet train running from Reno to Las Vegas, and North Dakota would be a penal colony.

Anyhoo, I went into this interview and cottoned that the guy interviewing me was certain he was onto a winner. He was immensely proud of his clunky no-central-theme website and genuinely excited in talking about it. This probably should have been a clue to me that honest criticism of the product wasn't going to score me any points. So when he asked, "What do you think of the chat feature?" I should not have said: "Actually, I'm not such a big fan of chat. I tend to think of it as a waste of time."

Chat rooms were frustrating experiences of redundancy and flame wars. Nothing of worth was ever said and they were almost inevitably dominated by a minority of flamers (a) who made the experience unpleasant and unproductive

"You. Don't. Like. Chat?!" the interviewer spat in disgust. "OK, uhm..."

Then he got up and walked out. He never came back. After about 10 minutes of sitting there, I stole half a dozen donuts and left.

Almost a decade on, chat rooms are thankfully a thing of the past for everyone other than child predators, but the desire to somehow incorporate users' opinions/feelings into content persists. One method is discussion boards but those are equally clumsy and flame-ridden and require too much effort to maintain.

Recently I heard about Slantly which is a mildly diverting cross of discussion boards and Twitter that I think is supposed to integrate with content, but I'm not 100% sure how. I still don't quite get it, but that hasn't stopped me from joining for the sake of being able to state my opinion in yet another place on the internet (because, you know, four blogs just isn't enough).

My favourite Slantly opinion at the moment: "Professional athletes should be paid in marijuana and iced-out bling."

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(a) A FLAMER IS ONE OF THOSE PEOPLE WHO WRITE IN ALL CAPS AND INSULT EVERYTHING YOU SAY BECAUSE YOU ARE A COMMIE FUCKING SOCIALIST MORON WHO IS FORCING GOD OUT OF OUR SCHOOLS!

Beating prolificacy

I think it's safe to say that I've finally got that damned blogging monkey off my back. I feel bad admitting this, or, rather, I feel that I should feel bad admitting this, but over my hitherto month-long blogging hiatus I have had no desire to write anything.

There are still thoughts. Little tiny electrical currents still flow through my skull (that's all a thought is, according to one of those film strips [Cripes. Remember film strips? I really am old] they showed to us in sixth grade when our science teacher was absent and a sub was sent in to do little more than assure we didn't burn the place down), but I haven't really felt like sharing them.

I still don't, actually.

Who Sits and Watches Trains?

My latest column is out. Actually, it's been out since Tuesday, but I wanted to give more time on top to the story of my being attacked by a crazy woman.

That's life, innit? You start to think things are getting too dull, and then someone comes at you with an axe and Samurai sword.

I've only just noticed that the link I put in the column isn't working properly, so here's the link again. I'm not sure it's worth it for me to ask someone to fix in the story -- I get the feeling sometimes there aren't a whole lot of people reading that column. Not a whole lot beyond those of you who already read this blog, at least.

To that extent, I've been carrying on an internal debate about whether I want to put the fiddle on the roof in terms of my column. "Rhoi'r ffidl yn y to" is a Welsh metaphor that means you've decided to call it quits on something. The fact that it's "yn y to" instead of "ar y to" suggests the fiddle being placed in the attic, but I have always preferred to translate it as putting the fiddle on the roof:

"Right. We've had just about enough of that singin' an' dancin' now. This fiddle's goin' on the roof, it is. With the donkey" (a).

However it's said, I've been questioning whether I want to carry on writing a column for the fine folks at Internet Broadcasting. My dilemma is totally within myself. IB has been very kind in giving me a huge platform, and I have no real complaints apart from the occasional harrumph when I'm told to remove references to sex.

That big platform is my primary reason for wanting to stay on. Well, that and the fact that I do enjoy writing the column.

I also enjoy writing my blog, though (b). Seemingly anything I wanted to say in a column can be said here and I can use as much mature language as I deem fit. But, a blog doesn't carry the same feeling of legitimacy. The column is part of what helped me to get noticed when I was trying to find an agent for my novel. And once I'm done with this little university adventure and again trying to write seriously, it could be an asset.

But the column doesn't pay and it diverges somewhat from what I'm focused on at the moment. The Welsh-language column I write each month for Barn delivers a bit of cash (only enough for a night in the pub, but some is more than none). I am hoping this summer to write a book in the Welsh language, and I also have a few ideas for Welsh-language novels. At the moment, my focus is on a path where an English-language internet column targeted to a U.S. audience doesn't really add much to my CV.

With the exception of this week's column (my favourite line: "If I were a trainspotter, I would put whisky in my tea and draw pictures of breasts in my notebook"), I haven't really been happy with the stuff I've been producing lately for IB. I don't want to turn in crap. I know that everyone in a media company sees him- or herself as a writer, so I don't want to be occupying a spot that someone else might be eager to fill if I don't feel I'm producing something entertaining.

But if I let go of the column, I will never get it back. Opportunities to write on 70-site networks aren't the sort of things that come along every day. IB hits some 16 million people a month. More than five times the population of Wales, every month. Fair enough, 15,999,920 of them aren't reading my column, but it's not the sort of thing you just throw away, is it?

I am plagued by indecision. If you've got any advice, I'd like to hear it.

(a) There is a Welsh children's song about a hat-wearing donkey with two wooden legs who sits on a roof.

(b) Sometimes. From about July to December I was considering deleting all my blogs.

Another brilliant idea that I will fail to cash in on

Occasionally I will think of brilliant things and then I will do nothing about them and be upset when someone else shows some initiative. To that end, I want the world to know at least that this was my idea first:

Tracking devices as fashion accessories

I realised today via a Facebook conversation with Charlotte that if the marketing was done right, millions and millions of people would willingly, eagerly, wear tracking devices -- allowing any and all to know their every movement.

Social networking sites and blogs and constant texting and so on indicate that there are large numbers of people who don't like the idea of being out of contact for even short periods of time. It's as if we are all a bunch of co-dependent girlfriends.

What I envision is a fashionable, waterproof, lightweight bracelet for ankle or wrist (your choice, of course) that allows for satellite tracking. That tracking information is then transferred to a social-networking-esque website that works in conjunction with Google Maps to allow your friends to know exactly where you are on the planet at any given time. The site would also work with Twitter, so your friends can know exactly what you are doing, too.

What fun! You would never ever ever ever ever be alone again.

Imagine: You're at the Starbucks and you're bored. If only you had someone to talk to. You click on your mobile web access and go to AlwaysThere.com. The site keys in on your location and shows you that your friend, or, rather, that girl who took poli sci with you in freshman year, is only 500 yards away. You quickly "wave hello" (or some other similar action via the SuperHello application), a message that she receives on her mobile phone, and within minutes you're hanging out together. How cool! How hip!

And, yes, by law all the AlwaysThere information is available to the Department of Homeland Security (a), but that can be a good thing. What if the IRS makes a mistake and realises it owes you $100 million? You'd want them to find you straight away, wouldn't you?

(a)Yeesh if you look at the top of your browser window on the Homeland Security homepage it says: "Department of Homeland Security | Preserving Our Freedoms, Protecting America." Really? They really have that as their motto? Is irony dead?

May contain mature subject matter, bitches

My grandmother (and a few other family members, it has to be said) occasionally protests to the language and content of this blog. But imagine how this young lady's poor grandmother must feel. I mean, it's a given that any song entitled "Smell Yo Dick" isn't going to be all puppies and bubbles (a), but, crikey!

I've been thinking about language lately. Eric is right that my natural speech is peppered with a fair few profanities. As Papa once said: "Sometimes it just fits."

I generally like to blame my blue streak on my newsroom background. Newsrooms and radio stations are bastions of abusive language. There may be a sort of purging element to it -- if people get it all out before going on air, they are much less likely slip up and lose their jobs.

I think it also has something to do with the vagabond nature of the professions. People in local TV and radio bounce from one place to another -- they very rarely ever connect with the communities that they are supposed to be reflecting. These people have a tendency to want to stand out, a need to be seen. Being incapable of completing a sentence without using words or imagery that would get you kicked out of Sunday school is a subconscious way of getting that attention.

But there are people in newsrooms who don't swear -- they are called "managers." My dad has worked in newsrooms for most his career; I didn't hear a profanity from him until I was 18 years old.

Besides, that doesn't explain why I was foul-mouthed long before I entered the news profession. Yes, I was to be seen in newsrooms while growing up, but it's not as if KPRC was some kind of a brothel. Well, it wasn't in those days, at least. These days it's fucking Sodom and Gomorrah. Lauren Freeman has got a mouth on her that would make the drunkenest of drunken sailors blush, and Bill Balleza insists on fighting interns in Taipei death matches (b).

I don't really know where I picked it up. Various Texas playgrounds are a good start, I suppose. I had a pretty wide range of bilingual profanity and sexually-explicit imagery swimming around in my head by the time I was 8 years old. It was there, also, that I started to learn when to use inappropriate language appropriately. It only takes getting your ass kicked two or three times before you sort out that "pendejo" is worse than its English equivalent.

To that extent, I like to think that I'm not rude simply for the sake of being rude. Indeed, I have a strange set of parameters to profane-language use. On the whole, I shy away from blasphemy, for example. I've got no problem blurting out "Tit-fuck bitch face" in a moment of frustration, but I don't use "Jesus" or "Jesus Christ" as an exclamation. I'm pretty sure Sara cottoned to this fact when we were dating and that's why she started saying it. She will deny it, though. Probably by commenting: "Jesus, Chris, you think everything revolves around you." (c)

There was a short time when I tried to work extended surrealist blasphemy into speech, e.g., "Sweet Baby Jesus Christ Lamb of God Holy Saviour on a pogo stick, what are you doing?", but people tended not to get it and it took a long time to say.

I also tend to avoid the "C" word. Not so much because I find it offensive but because I don't think it sounds right in an American accent. A bit like "wanker." That word's out of fashion these days, but have you ever heard an American say it? It just comes out wrong. We spend too much time on it, as if the word is utterly foreign and we are trying to get our heads around it as it is being said.

Eric once said that one of the things he likes about me is that I say so much stuff that is politically incorrect, without knowing that it's politically incorrect. If my blog were an episode of "Scrubs" that statement would have been followed by a flashback to the time in high school I greeted Sonja Can't-Remember-Her-Last-Name for the first time by shouting at her from across a table: "You should put on a coat. I can see your nipples from here; you're going to put an eye out." (d)

The point is, I do and say things and these are the things that go through my head and I don't necessarily intend for them to shock or insult. Indeed, I have always seen myself as downright prudish.

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(a) "Puppies and bubbles" is my favourite phrase at the moment. Sharon Osbourne used it a few weeks ago in reference to brother-sister duo Same Difference. After a maddening performance that featured a pillow fight, Sharon said: "That was wonderful. The only thing missing were puppies and bubbles."
No one in the audience of hooting consumers managed to catch the sarcasm.

(b) This is a complete and total lie. Please do not sue me, KPRC.

(c) And, of course, it does.

(d) That comment scored me a sexual harassment citation (ah, the early 90s in suburbia). In that brilliantly idiotic bureaucratic way that things are done, when the citation was given to me a week or so later, they refused to tell me what I had said or who I had said it to. Thus it was a ridiculous and totally ineffective punishment; it was impossible for me to correct my behaviour because I didn't know what I had done incorrectly. I only found out when Sonja called me a few months later to apologise. She had mentioned the incident to Lindsay, who convinced her that I was not being offensive, per se, just myself. In a classic example of the kind of unintentional sleaze that I am, after Sonja apologised, I asked her out. Shockingly, she said no. Dyke.

Potty mouth

Actual quote from an e-mail my grandmother sent me today:

"I would go to your blog but I am not mature enough for the language sometimes. If 'mature' means finding profanity and vulgarity humorous."

Bram

I just learned that long-time blog friend Bram Davidson died suddenly a fortnight ago.

I learned about this from Kari and felt ashamed to admit that I hadn't heard earlier because I haven't been reading blogs in a while.

I've been wrapped up in my own little world -- that happens, I suppose. Then something tragic comes along to remind you that all the little shit is really not worth tearing yourself up over.

I'm a winner

I'm not Welsh-American (i.e., someone born in the United States of Welsh heritage) or even Welsh American (i.e., an American citizen born in Wales), but somehow I've taken the prize for best Welsh-American Blog according to the Welsh Blog Awards.

You'll note that this is the first time the Welsh Blog Awards have been mentioned here. This is because I have a problem with the concept of blog awards. I think they are ridiculous, but I'm not 100-percent sure why. I think it partially has something to do with the personal nature of blogs, or, at least my blog. I just write a bunch of nonsense that comes to my head, which more or less reflects how I feel at the particular time of writing. If you like it, rock on. If you don't like it, I guess that's OK, too. But if you like me/my blog simply because someone else does, you're an ass.

Having said that, though, my self-righteousness crumbles if I am the recipient of such ridiculous praise. I am even willing to ignore the fact that I have won a prize for which I am blatantly unqualified. Accolades are accolades, bitches, and I am a shallow man. I'll take what I can get. If I had won a prize for being the Best Black Vegan One-Legged Veteran Blogger Living In Mandan, ND, I'd be displaying the graphic for that, as well.

My Welsh blog took the prize for Best Welsh-Learner Blog.

Annie, meanwhile, won the prizes for Best Blog, Best Personal Blog, Best Humour Blog (I came in second in that one) and Best-Looking Blog. To my knowledge neither of us gets any sort of actual prize beyond the right to feel special about ourselves for a year.

Precious moments

I added a link to it a few days ago, but I want to draw your attention to my favourite blog at the moment: Overheard in Minneapolis.

It's actually a collection of things overheard in the Minneapolis-St. Paul metro area, but that probably wouldn't have as nice a ring to it.

The quote that had me laughing this morning was this one, which I imagine is the sort of thing that Eric's wife, Kristin, would say if she had children.

If you're on Facebook...

The child bride now has a Facebook account. Add her as a friend so she'll feel important.

Teithio

The child bride and I will be travelling around South Wales until Sunday, which will keep me away from the computer for a few days. Considering that I stopped blogging regularly several months ago you probably won't even notice my absence.

Testing

I'm trying to post to my blog from my phone.
---

Great googly moogly, it works. Of course, the likelihood of my ever actually posting from my phone is relatively low, seeing as how the above sentence took me several minutes to write (this bit was obviously written later, on my laptop). I am shit at texting. I am shit at all things phone.

Those of you who have known me a while are thinking: "Whoa, go back a bit. You got a phone?"

Yes. I've finally given in.

For years I have resisted owning a mobile phone because they strike me as pretentious and annoying little things. It just seems pompous to walk around thinking that you are so fucking important that people need to be able to get in touch with you no matter where you are.

Recently when I went to Nant Gwrtheyrn, several members of the group I was with spent the vast majority of their time lamenting the area's inadequate phone signal. They would stand out in the rain and bend in funny angles, desperate to get enough bars to be able to send texts or make calls to their friends, family and boyfriends. I couldn't help but think that they were completely missing the point of being there.

One morning, I asked one of them: "Why is it so important that everyone know exactly where you are and what you are doing? Surely you're not that important. Surely people can survive without hearing from you for a day or two."

She just looked at me funny and didn't really speak to me again for the remaining week and a half of the course.

I realise that phones can be useful and important. In Minnesota and in Wales I've encouraged the child bride to carry one, should she find herself stuck in some snowy/rainy/mountainous wasteland. If, like the child bride, much of your job involves driving over hill and dale, then perhaps a phone is an intelligent accessory. But everyone else, not so much.

My feeling has long been that people own phones because they are status symbols, not because they are needed. People make excuses for needing phones much in the same way that they make excuses for needing 4x4 vehicles. For years I have carried my non-phoneness like a badge of pride.

"And if I ever actually need to use a phone," I would proclaim, "I will turn to the person next to me and politely ask to use theirs."

But now I've given in. My will has been broken.

My technique of using other people's phones was working just fine. I haven't suddenly become more important, popular or employable. I'm still using public transportation to travel within the same five-mile radius. Nothing has changed. I have no good excuses. I don't need a phone. Nonetheless, I now own one.

I suppose it's worth noting that when I lived in Minnesota, I drove a 4x4 pickup truck*.

My phone is loaded with ridiculous features. I have enough media tools to set up my own entertainment network. The thing that appealed to me most, though, was the idea that I could blog from my phone. I could be in Eisteddfod (I'm heading up there tomorrow) and tell you about things almost in real-time. Oooh. Because that's important, see.

But as Sara indicated in the comments, I'm not exactly breaking new ground here. Everyone else was using their phones for e-mail back when I was learning how to strike through things in HTML. And, as I say, I've got a long way to go before mobile blogging would be practical. I write texts only slightly faster than it would take me to etch things in stone.

Odds are pretty good that in a short while, my phone will find a place in the bottom of my book bag, turned off and almost never used. I suppose I am my mother's son in that way. Despite the fact that she carries a phone, my mother is no easier to get a hold of now than she was in 1987.

It's unfortunate, because my phone appears to have all kinds of cool features that will likely go unused. One feature that fascinates me is vocal command. Apparently I can yell at my phone and it will do things for me. It's unlikely, though, that it would do things that would actually be useful: "Phone, call my wife. Don't let her know that I'm drunk, but tell her that she needs to come pick me up -- make up a good excuse. And you're going to have to give her directions because I don't know where I am."

If further developed, this vocal command thing could be quite handy. Imagine if I were still single, I could just yell: "Phone, I'm drunk and lonely," and it would dial one of my ex-girlfriends at random.

"Phone, I need money," and it would call my parents.

*Well, in fairness I drove a Delta 88 and my wife drove the 4x4 pickup. But I had originally bought the pickup for myself.

Pancho Claus reads this blog

Richard Reyes (aka Pancho Claus) has commented on a post I wrote about him some time ago.

With all due respect to any other famous people reading my blog, having Pancho Claus drop by is easily this blog's greatest moment (even better than when I encouraged Huw to drink a gallon of milk in an hour).

Some day when I get time, I will take it upon myself to write the Wikipedia entry that Pancho Claus so rightfully deserves.

Oh, hello

I feel disoriented. It's been a fortnight (FTYPAH: "two weeks") since my last exam and I seem to have gone into hibernation mode since then. I spent the first week of my summer holiday sitting on the couch. Occasionally I'd turn on my iPod, but for the most part I'd just sit, staring at the wall, not really thinking about anything.

I've spent this past week putting together a 20-page outline for a book that no one will read, either because they have no interest or because they can't -- the book will be written in Welsh. I'm writing it in Welsh so I can say really awful things about my parents without them knowing. No, I'm lying.

Ideally, said book will be completed (if not polished) by the end of the summer. I will then store it away with my other book that no one will ever read (the novel formerly known as "Drinking Stories") and it will serve as light amusement to my grandchildren.

Exams went OK. I am worried about how well I did on the grammar exam, but I am hoping they will award pity points, since I am retarded: "You can't conjugate the subjunctive, or identify an adverbial phrase, but your shoes are tied so nice and tidy -- you pass!"

I have been trying to catch up on reading other people's blogs. I am also at least telling myself that I will write to my friends that don't have blogs. I respond to stress (like, say, trying to earn a degree in a language that you don't understand) and new situations (like, say, moving to a new country to earn a degree in a language that you don't understand) by pulling inward. Now that I'm on the other end of this first year, I find myself thinking: "Gosh, where did everybody go?"

They didn't go anywhere, I just stopped talking to them. So, that's where I am at the moment -- promising myself that I am going talk to people and stretch beyond the 50-mile radius I've confined myself to since November 2006. And how are you?

At least she's honest

I got a spam e-mail today from "ericka," a "lonely russian girl" who wanted to e-mail me pictures of herself. As you do. Russia's main export is lonely women. This is why strange middle-aged men are particularly worried about this whole missile kerfuffle.

The thing that amused me about the e-mail from "ericka" was the address: nqgppjsb@fishing.every1.net. Phishing everyone. At least she's honest.

Your face plus my calculator equals likely*

My attitude toward the internets is admittedly duplicitous. I have blogs in their multiplicities, yet I am inclined to roll my eyes at people who have accounts on the myriad social-networking sites like Friendster and Facebook. And, of course, I have accounts on these sites. I hate them, I think they are lame (Friendster especially) but I don't want to be left out.

One of the things I dislike about social-networking sites is the fact that they seem to taunt you with how lame you are. Facebook is particularly guilty of this. It breaks people into networks based on region, academic institution or employer**, which lands me in the Wales network and the Cardiff University network. Any time I log on, Facebook kindly reminds me of my status within my respective networks:

WALES
Members: 36,132
Friends: 1

CARDIFF UNIVERSITY
Members: 13,257
Friends: None

Thanks, Facebook. Thanks a lot. Effectively, what you're is saying to me is this: "Look at how many people don't give a toss about you. You big loser. If you were hit by a bus tomorrow, the police sure as hell wouldn't be using this social-networking site to identify you, because NO ONE KNOWS WHO YOU ARE."

Facebook is harsh, man. Anyway, that's why those of you with Facebook profiles who are also in my address book received friend requests from me today. I'm sorry. Facebook was antagonizing me, making fun of me, and I caved to the pressure. Please make me your friend, so that Facebook will stop picking on me. I promise not to take it as an actual sign of friendship and show up expecting you to let me stay at your place for a few days.

*This post's headline doesn't really have anything to do with the actual post. It's a quote from a conversation that I had with Chris a few week's ago. We decided that it would be a good phrase to put on a T-shirt.

**My former benevolent employer is listed.

It's called 'Yakety Sax,' bitches

Every once in a while I get a huge page view hit from people seaching the phrase "Benny Hill Show polka." I'm assuming these people are searching for the chase-sequence theme tune to Benny Hill; why my blog shows up near the top of such a search, I have no idea.

If people really are searching for the Benny Hill theme tune:
1) It's called "Yakety Sax," by Boots Randolph.
2) It's not a polka.

Guapisimo

Continuing the Chris-is-too-lazy-to-post-anything-other-than-YouTube-videos theme, but with the twist of it being a video that I actually produced, I give you this. It's a video I made for my Spanish conversation course on how I use the Internet. If you don't speak Spanish, don't worry -- neither do I. It's potentially worth watching, though, just for the part when I shout "¡guapisimo!"

My apologies for the sound quality. Some day I will buy a cool microphone and all my videos will have really slick voiceovers.

For people like Beth, who can actually speak Spanish, I would be interested to know how close I've come to being understandable here.

Can life get better? I submit that it cannot

I've had a few people ask me about the fact that the blog has gone dead. Have no fear, all is well, I am just overwhelmed with schoolwork. I'll be back as soon as I can.

(The headline is a quote from comic Brian Regan)