Gnumoon's Stuff

My super-sweet 16 and internet idiocy

I thought my basketball shooting season had ended with the 'Neers' loss in the 'les, but apparently not. I'm heading down tomorrow to shoot a little-known tournament game that is too insignificant to even
really mention. I'm sure none of you will be tuned in (if you are, look for me on Washington State's side ... I'm there to shoot the UPSET, BABY!) I asked for a shot list and was told "The big white guy." Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

I am mostly hoping that someone takes out Hansbrough again and I am the only shooter on that side and that my shots of the kerfuffle end up in all the major news outlets. Probably won't happen, but I'll be there just in case.

This next bit is completely un-basketball-related. Consider this photo of Pooks in the bath your segue. I love this shot - it's good from a photography standpoint AND a mommy standpoint. (I'll discuss my weekend with the FONG diffuser later.)

Since I was first pregnant oh so long ago, I have frequented an online message board for mothers, expectant mothers, women who are hoping to be mothers, and all other interested parties.

I was able to overlook the proliferation of ridiculous acronyms (TTC = trying to conceive, DH = Dear Husband, LO = Little one, AF = Aunt Flo (that's yer period)) and I've been fairly successful at keeping my cynical nature hidden, since most of the women are fairly nice and going through the same things that I am. (The groups are arranged by your child's birth date, so you are in a group with women whose pregnancies progress at the same time as yours. Rocket science, yes?)

In the past months I've become less active in the group and have morphed into more of an observer. The women who I consider to be like me are more "lurkers" due to time constraints, while the ones who seem to have nothing better to do than bitch about things on a message board (and make blinking scrolling shiny signatures that seem to belong more on MySpace) are the big posters. They have a million bits of badly-worded and horribly-spelled advice about parenting and about why their way is much much better than yours, but I don't see how they have time to DO any actual parenting, since they are constantly posting shit on the internet.

I think it's time to leave the group, and I've been feeling this coming on for some time now. One girl (woman, technically, although I think she's 18ish and her maturity level is even lower than that) called me negligent for putting my baby in daycare "where everyone knows that babies are rutinely (sic) hurt".
I held my tongue about the reason she is afforded the luxury of being a SAHM (stay-at-home-mom), which is that my tax dollars pay for her to sit on her lazy ass and play on the internet all day. (This same girl once made the brilliant statement that formula feeding was better because hers was WIC so it was free and she wouldn't have to mess up her "perfect tits".)

Tonight's example of "reasons I should leave before I go up to the virtual belltower" was during an innocent conversation about how it seemed that the breastfed babies in the group seem to be hitting some developmental milestones a little bit slower (crawling, walking, etc.) and some faster (talking). It was benign enough until someone freaked out because we were "obviously" insinuating that she had stuck a bottle in her baby's mouth at 2 days old and plopped the kid on the ground to fend for herself. I didn't point out how paranoid and guilty her knee-jerk reaction of a post sounded. The fact is that this group of women are more interested in tearing each other down than sharing tips and stories, and I don't have time or energy for that.

I wish there was a more targeted mommy group for people like me. I'm not interested in blinking "siggies" or fighting about elective C-sections or posting "piccies" of who has the hottest DH (or SO). I want a PBS mommy board to float on in the neverending seas of Fox. Not because I'm a snob, but because I have a brain that I prefer to use, and I would love to find like-minded mothers. They MUST exist somewhere.

Facebook Amusements

I have so neglected you, little blog. I'm so very sorry and promise to post again soon. I have much to say.

But I'm swamped at work, so for now I'll just post a screenshot from when I logged into FaceBook this morning. What can I say, I have diverse friends...

And now I'm gonna vomit...

The fence is jumped.
The fork in the road is taken.
There is no going back.
There can be only one.

and the Canons roared.

gonna get you...gonna look you right in the face

Is there any such thing as “Internet karma”? I’ve never heard of it, and yet yesterday I think I experienced just that.

The first thing I did was express, on this blog, my distaste for a certain font. I have had several emails and comments from people who disagree with my opinion, some of them vehemently. I had no idea that comic sans had such a devoted following, and I apologize if my snarky designer comments rubbed anyone the wrong way. Certainly, if you love comic sans for your email or website, who the hell am I to judge or even mention it?

For my half-assed attempt at self-defense, I was more referring to business cards I’ve had to do for accountants or lawyers that were done (by request) in CS- it just doesn’t look professional for that type of business. I also spend a good amount of my day browsing fonts trying to pick exactly the right one, so I guess it’s just something I (over)think about a lot.

Anyway, sorry about that. But see, my ‘net snark came ‘round and bit me in the ass…read on:

Since work was slow yesterday, I got to posting on a message board that I frequent. Normally I will NOT ever discuss religion or politics (because that’s when the trolls come out), but the thread that was going seemed amiable and informative, so I joined in. Not five minutes after I posted a comment, I got flamed with an amazingly insensitive and unnecessary comment that, I’ll admit, really hurt my feelings. I left the board contemplating quitting the internet altogether. (I won’t do that, but it did remind me not to EVER feed the trolls. They’re always there lurking, looking for a morsel to jump on.)

So see, I hurt feelings, and then my feelings were hurt. It’s the online circle of life.

"Have blog, will travel", reads the card of a man...

Hey guys...I need some help! I'm currently waist-deep in my research project for my Master's Degree, and I've chosen to do the project about creative professionals who network via blogging.

If you happen to be both a creative pro AND a blogger, could you please jaunt over here and fill out my little survey? I'm defining "creative professional" as photographers, graphic designers, illustrators, and writers for the purposes of the study. I'm searching your blogrolls for other pros as well, but if you know someone who qualifies, please direct them to the survey as well.

Thanks! If you think of other things I need to be asking, drop an email and let me know.

Due for an intervention?

The other day I had to laugh at my desk, as it was covered by no less than four Apple products. A G5 tower, a (new!) MacBookPro, an (old) G4 iBook, and an iPod. Well played, Jobs. I'll suppose I will drink your hip, trendy kool-aid.

There's even an Apple sticker on my damn water bottle that I hadn't noticed until just now. Does this make me a syncophant? (Just to prove I'm NOT a syncophant, everyone in the market for a laptop machine hear this: the MacBookPros are cool and fun and I upped the RAM in mine so it's really fast, but it will scald your legs. Seriously, it gets HOT- I have to put a pillow under it or I get grill lines on my thighs.)

Currently Listening to: Cemetary Row, by The Minus Five

Y'all...is time travel fer real?!

Watch this.
Now consider:
This woman has more money, power, and fame than you or I could ever dream of.

Fun with Googlism

Googlism is the most fun new web thingy I've played with lately. You just put in a word or phrase and hit enter, and it crawls over Google and returns all the "word or phrase you entered is ..." sentences or fragments it finds.
The results are mostly what you'd expect, but some are really funny and strange. I put in App State and most of the results were "...is in boone, nc," or "...is going to be the team to beat this year in the socon." The best result, however, was " app state is particularly suited to the lazy."

I experimented with favorite musicians. Examples:
geddy lee is generally regarded as the best bass guitarist in rock music
geddy lee is a prophet
geddy lee is an alien

Favorite Cartoons:
invader zim is one of the rare moments in animation that cracks the mold and flows forth with wit and energy
invader zim is so different and oh so cool
invader zim is the cutest person ever

Favorite TV Shows:
trailer park boys is quite offbeat and irreverent
trailer park boys is cops from the criminals point of view
trailer park boys is the shit

Favorite Movies:
heathers is a "slap in the face" comedy about popularity
heathers is peerless
heathers is the anti john hughes movie; a high school film with a sinister edge
heathers is teen suicide

PS- the top return on my first name is:
"xxxxx is actually glad she vomited."

Currently listening to: John Saw That Number, by Neko Case

A shiny new toy

(BEFORE it is mentioned: yes, the pink couch in my office (used for the background of this picture) is atrocious. But it's clean and marginally more comfy for guests than sitting on the floor.)

Yes, ladies and gents, here it is: the brand-spankin'-new Nikon D200 that I've been waiting for impatiently for the past few months. Sadly, the battery had to be charged, so I have yet to play with it. (Although how sadistic am I to take the picture of the NEW camera with the one that's being replaced. That's so mean.)

Also included in the set: new Flash cards, a battery pack, a monopod (with swivel tilt head action!), and a LowePro backpack that will hold all this fun stuff plus both SLRs and an editing laptop. I blew a lot of the budget on a sweet 120-300mm 2.8 lens (hence the monopod), but it's on back-order and I won't have it for a few days. The lens in the picture is for show- it's a great old 180mm that I use all the time.

Note: this gear (purchased for my real job with the "real job" budget) is for sports shooting, not music. I think 300mm might get one a bit too up close and personal with sweaty rockers. Someday I'll purchase a 70-200 mm for myself for music shots, but I can't justify it quite yet. (And I admit that I want to play with the D200 before I decide to buy one of My Very Own.)

In other news, my neck is still killing me- I'm lined up for an ultrasound in the morning to make sure I haven't managed to tear something. It's been a steady diet of ibuprofen and IcyHot packs all day. Isn't it amazing how much we taken our systems for granted until they go offline? I don't think that the left side of my neck is something I considered much- or ever even- until it became the source of all this discomfort.

Currently Listening to: Fallin', by De La Soul & teenage Fanclub (a college favorite!)

The Chancellor has done been Brita-ed

(NOTE: this is just a GIS result for "filter." It has nothing to do with this post, I just can't stand not posting a picture.)

A bit of background for non-nerdy types who don’t use messageboards or fourms: certain websites have filters that catch words or phrases tagged by the moderators to be “offensive,” and automatically change them to something else. This is in an effort to keep public sites safe for work and relatively clean.  Read a more technical definition here.

For example, Fark turns F-bombs into “Fark” (which is where the site got its name), “shit” becomes “shiat,” etc.

Sometimes sites turn filters into something funny so that when it gets posted it says something that the writer did not intend. For example, on Fark if a poster types the “N” word, the filter automatically changes it to say “an attractive and successful Aftrican-American.”

My all-time favorite is on one board that automatically filters the annoying internet-speak phrase “LOL" (laugh out loud) into something so hilarious, yet wrong that I won’t even repeat it here in case y'all are reading at work. Suffice it to say that around these parts we now use the alternative phrase quite regularly instead of actually LOLing.

So why mention it? Because something from work (the big project from Monday, actually) got filtered today on a national website. Our esteemed Chancellor’s last name is that of a bird, and that bird’s name has a word in it that could slangily refer to a part of the male anatomy. So it is unacceptable by this site’s standards. Read for yourself.
You’ll LOL (but keep a hankie handy, in case the other filter gets ya).

Currently Listening to: Lightning Blue Eyes, by The Secret Machines