Beowabbit

What I do, explained using only the ten hundred words people use the most:

I help computers do the things people want them to do and try to fix them when they do things people don't want them to do. I help people who use computers to learn about computers and about how computers can do things that people do like speak and walk and move things. I especially help people use computers to send notes to each other. I work in a crazy building that looks like blocks knocked over.

(Tool — Original inspiration.)

I know that 2009 was pretty horrid for a lot of people. One way we might make 2010 a bit better is to spread some love around. So if you care to reply to this post I will give you a response of something I like about you.

(I may be a bit pokey about getting to these, but I will get to them eventually.)

Yanked from plumtreeblossom

Empire Magazine has revealed its list of the 50 Greatest TV Shows ever:

[As mentioned in plumtreeblossom’s thread, this is a very idiosyncratic list. Empire is a UK magazine, so maybe some of the shows we Americans loved weren’t distributed over there.]

1. Bold the shows you watch/used to watch.
2. Italic the shows you've seen at least one episode of.
3. Post your answers.

( The list. )

plumtreeblossom writes:

So this best 50 of all possible TV shows? Where is 60 Minutes? Where is Nova? Where is Masterpiece Theater?

and I agree. And a commenter also asks about M*A*S*H and All in the Family. My own personal list of the ten greatest TV shows (I don’t think I’ve seen enough TV to get to 50) would definitely include M*A*S*H and All in the Family, and probably also Hill Street Blues. [EDIT:Oh, and The Twilight Zone, and maybe The Mary Tyler Moore Show.]

Found via omegabeth:

• Grab the nearest book.
• Open the book to page 56.
• Find the fifth sentence.
• Post the text of the next few sentences in your journal along with these instructions.
• Don't dig for your favorite book, the cool book, or the intellectual one: pick the CLOSEST

 ‘What about if it’s got an urn or a plinth or a potted plant?’ said Nobby.
 ‘Have you got one in mind, Nobby?’ said Colon suspiciously.
 ‘Yes. The Goddess Anoia* Arising from the Cutlery,’ said Nobby. ‘They’ve got it here. It was painted by a bloke with three i’s in his name, which sounds pretty artistic to me.’

That’s watchmen Nobby Nobbs and Fred Colon in a museum discussing when pictures of nude women are Art, and when they’re just dirty pictures, in Terry Pratchett’s Thud. The footnote explains that “Anoia is the Ankh-Morpork Goddess of Things That Get Stuck in Drawers.”

First picture I’ve ever taken with my laptop camera. Sorry about the poor lighting; the walls and ceiling are better lit than I am.

( Photo here. )

I love my sweetie, and I love writing about her! I confess I had quite a bit of trouble with some of these questions, but here goes...

1. They are watching TV. What are they watching?

If this means actual broadcast or cable TV, then either Barack Obama’s acceptance speech in Denver at a bar in East Somerville tomorrow, or election returns on election night, or news of some major event like 9/11. She’s not a TV-watcher.

If this means looking at moving pictures on a TV set, then a movie on DVD.

If this means “video”, then most likely something funny on YouTube, with a political speech on YouTube a close second overall (but maybe first during election season).

( 21 more questions and answers. )

Arrr! I ain’t got time to do today th’ justice it desarves, but I been meanin’ to post a link to this 'ere post on Mongolia, so I reckon as that’ll have to do. If’n that post grabs yer interest, ye may wish to check out th’ rest o’ Team Alala’s swashbucklin’ jarney ’crost Eurasia.

So this “ten things you’d tell your 16-year-old self” meme is really interesting, and I’m learning a lot about people from it, but I’m having a hard time putting myself in the right mindset to come up with interesting answers. The point of the thought-exercise would be to change the past, but if I change the past, I would risk losing people who are very very important to me because what led up to my meeting them didn’t happen. For instance, Boston would have been a better place for me to go to school than New Haven (and I say Boston rather than Harvard because I think UMass or Tufts would have gotten me into the same urban setting), but if I hadn’t gone to Yale I wouldn’t have met beetiger, among other people, and I wouldn’t want to give her up. And if I’d found myself in Boston several years earlier, I would have found a different social circle and the community dynamics would have been different when all my actual friends and sweeties showed up in Boston (if I’d even meet them), and I might not have those relationships.

However, for the purposes of this exercise, I’m going to ignore all those issues and pretend that shuffling the deck and dealing a new hand is something I’m OK with. Otherwise it would be all “Make absolutely sure you go to this party that your friend invites you to, and be really certain you say yes when this other person asks you if they can bring a friend to your party, and don’t be late to this event, but make sure you’re late for this other one”.

So anyway, here’s some information for my 16-year-old self:( Some things I’d tell myself at sixteen, if I were going to tell myself stuff at sixteen. )

There are many things I should be doing right now instead of posting to LJ, but I’m a sucker for interview memes and I’m feeling slothful. :-)

Put the seven deadly sins in your personal order of preference (your favorite first, most despised last).

I had to look them up to get the list. In order:

1. Lust (but not the original luxuria ‘extravagance’) — I’m all for this one!
2. Gluttony
3. Sloth
4. Envy
5. Avarice
6. Pride
(in the sense of ‘hubris’, not in the sense of pride in a job well done)
7. Wrath

Is there a new skill you hope to acquire this year?

( answer )

How long can you go without checking your email before you get antsy for it?

( answer )

What scares you?

( long answer )

Can you think of any wrong that someone's committed to you or a loved one that you're unable to forgive?

( long answer )