Archive for June, 2015

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Various and Sundry Thoughts

Jun

30

2015

Here are some thoughts I jotted down that aren’t quite sufficient for their own individual blog posts. If you’re the type of person who likes Twitter, pretend each of these are tweets.

  • There used to be 5 main Top-Level Domains: .com, .org, .net, .edu, and .gov. Now there are hundred, including .photography, .surgery, and .vacations. It seems to me that having so many and such specific TLDs defeats the point of a TLD. The specific part should be the domain name and the suffix should be general. To paraphrase Syndrome: if everything’s a TLD then nothing is a TLD.
  • If I hear someone say “Sometimes you gotta fight fire with fire”, I check to make sure they’re not employed by or a volunteer with any of the local fire departments. If my house is burning, I want the fire trucks to show up with water, not more fire.
  • It warmed my heart the other day when my son informed me that we were out of dental floss. That must mean he is using it without being told.
  • Kids these days don’t know what an answering machine is. They think it’s something like Siri.
  • People can goof off, but people can’t goof on. Would goofing on mean they were well-behaved?

If a fire breaks out and spreads to thorn bushes, so that staked grain or the field itself is consumed, he who started the fire shall surely make restitution.

Exodus 22:6

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Modern Hydra

Jun

25

2015

For his next labor, Hercules had to clear his inbox. His nemesis for this task was the Thuerkian Hydra.

The Hydra was a serpent-like beast with many email addresses. Each address could carry an attachment venomous enough to make the recipient wish he could unsee it.

The Hydra lived in a cave near the swamps of Thuerk. The cave was also where the springs of Anonymous originated. From time to time the Hydra would leave the swampland and raid nearby villages, greatly complicating life for the peasants who lived there.

Hercules, travelling with Iolas, arrived near the cave. Arranging cloth over his eyes to protect himself from Hydra’s venom, he send a number of hostile and insulting messages to the Hydra, mainly disagreeing with the Hydra’s views on a variety of subjects.

This caused the Hydra to emerge from the cave, enraged. Unwanted email after unwanted email viciously attacked Hercules. He wielded his mouse deftly, clicking on Unsubscribe before the images had a chance to load. But for each email he unsubscribed, two more email addresses started sending him messages.

This was a losing battle for Hercules. He could not escape, he was getting tired, and the beast was growing.

Desperate, Hercules called to Iolas for help. Grabbing a keyboard, Iolas told Hercules to click Reply instead of Unsubscribe. To each message that Hercules Replied, Iolas added a 550 Invalid Recipient header. This prevented new addresses from growing.

Finally, the Hydra was down to its one immortal address. Hercules was able to, with his great strength, unplug that server and bury it under a great boulder from which it could never escape.

The End.

And the dragon stood on the sand of the seashore. Then I saw a beast coming up out of the sea, having ten horns and seven heads, and on his horns were ten diadems, and on his heads were blasphemous names.

Revelation 13:1

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Parking Spots

Jun

23

2015

Here is a diagram of the general idea of a parking lot – lines for cars to park in, arranged nicely in rows and such.

image of a typical parking lot

As you see, in this town, only red cars are available.

But some of the cars are nicer, fancier cars. And the owners know that if they park close to other cars, their cars might get scratched or dented. So they park far away from others.

image of a typical parking lot with fancy cars parked at odd angles

I don’t mind if people do that. As long as they don’t take spots close to the store, they can straddle multiple spots.

But, that is renegade behavior. They must stay within the lines.

How about we update the lines to accommodate people who care about their vehicles?

image of a parking lot with wider parking for expensive cars

There, now they can stay within the lines and protect their cars.

And, if you’re the sort who is annoyed when the fancy cars are parked across two spots, this arrangement should reduce your blood pressure too.

It’s a win-win situation!

Except for the maximum capacity of the parking lot. But if the lot is completely full, you don’t want to go to the store at that time anyway. Come back later when it is less full.

Behold, I would wander far away,
I would lodge in the wilderness.

Psalm 55:7

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Family Conversations, Part 25

Jun

18

2015

The scene: Gamma is looking at a book cover.
Gamma : Is she a mutant?
Me : No she’s a girl. Twelve. No wait. Thirteen. She just had a birthday.
Gamma : What’s a mutant?
Me : Someone who has changed.
Gamma : So she’s a mutant?
Me : No she’s a girl.
Gamma : She’s a teenager.
Me : I suppose she is a mutant.

We’ll have some mutants in our house in a few years.

Me : Don’t throw things down the stairs!
Delta : That was Gamma.
Me : No it wasn’t – it was a marble.

Gotta teach these kids at an early age the value of humor.

Gamma, singing : Puff the magic dragon lived in Galilee.

Gamma : Do snapdragons like to bite bad guys?

I think too much Mario has him overestimating the abilities of flowers.

Other student : if I caught on fire I’d probably run around crazy.
Me : No, you’re supposed to stop drop and roll
Beta : Just don’t roll in a pile of dry leaves

Good point.

Delta : Is a lemon an animal?
Me : No, it’s a fruit
Delta : But chicken is an animal
Me : Yes
Delta : Do lemons have two legs?
Me : Nope, lemons do not have legs.

Delta, showing me his drawing : This is an underwater gas tank it’s burning up with fire. Because it’s the bad guy underwater gas tank.

Bad guys are a popular topic amongst the 3-6 year-old set.

Having said these things to them, He stayed in Galilee.

John 7:9

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Eggs

Jun

16

2015

It’s good to have friends.

We have friends who have a pool. We get to enjoy swimming, and we don’t have to worry about maintenance.

And we have friends who have chickens. We have a few friends who have chickens. We get to enjoy fresh eggs, and we don’t have to worry about feeding them or cleaning the coop. All we have to do is give them empty egg cartons, and we get them back full.

Here’s a photo of part of our fridge:

image of several cartons of eggs in our fridge

That’s right – 7.5 dozen eggs. It seems all our friends had extra eggs all at once. Or rather, their chickens did.

We’re down to about 2 or 3 dozen now.

Anything you have a surplus of? That you’d like to send our way?
Raspberries?
Salmon?
Homemade bread?

And my hand reached to the riches of the peoples like a nest, And as one gathers abandoned eggs, I gathered all the earth; And there was not one that flapped its wing or opened its beak or chirped.

Isaiah 10:14

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Food Thoughts

Jun

11

2015

  • Peaches from a grocery store are much better if they’re packaged in glass instead of metal cans. I never knew that canned peaches could taste like peaches are supposed to taste. The tin cans remove all flavor. But the glass jars are awesome.
  • Conversely, salsa is much better in plastic than in glass. But that’s because the salsa in plastic containers is fresh and will spoil quickly because it is not preserved, whereas the salsa in glass containers is meant to sit unspoiled for a long time. I have become used to fresh salsa and now I skip any glass jar salsa.
  • If chicken salad is made without grapes and runs on the plain side in terms of both flavor and texture, throw some bread and butter pickles in the mix. Big improvement.
  • If you’re eating at a Bob Evans restaurant, don’t let the little children get the Bunny Hop Cakes. Yes, they look fun, but that meal is essentially just frosting. We like the rest of Bob Evans’ offerings, but skip that one.
  • I used to like going to Logan’s Roadhouse because they had good peach tea. They changed their recipe in the last year or two, and now they have great peach tea. I don’t know what they did, and I don’t want to know. It could be 100% high-fructose corn syrup for all I care – it just tastes great.

What’s your vote? Who has the best peach tea?

For the ear tests words As the palate tastes food.

Job 34:3

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The Five Senses

Jun

9

2015

We understand there are 5 physical senses that the human body has. People have tried to introduce various things as a 6th sense, but that is still nebulous.

Having observed current culture, I see the need to document the 5 cultural or social senses.

  • Sense of entitlement
  • Sense of outrage
  • Sense of unoffendability
  • Sense of awareness
  • Sense of immediacy

But these 5 senses have come at a cost – they replaced other senses that had withered due to lack of use. Here are 5 senses that people used to have, and what they should have instead of the senses listed above:

  • Sense of responsibility
  • Sense of direction
  • Common sense
  • Sense of shame
  • Sense of purpose

A senseless man has no knowledge, Nor does a stupid man understand this

Psalm 92:6

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