Buying Cheap, Buying Twice

I broke another Macbook power adapter (old-style); the original one broke at the base, where the skinny cord meets the brick. I was especially careful to wrap the cord properly to keep this from happening again, so naturally, this one broke at the tip:

The newer adapters supposedly aren't as susceptible to this problem.

The dumb thing is that, because I didn't want to pay $80 for a new OEM power adapter, I bought a this as a used replacement off of eBay.

It worked okay until about 2 months ago, when I had to start jiggling the Magsafe connector to get it to charge. Then, about 10 days ago, it broke apart completely -- the Magsafe connector stayed in the port, and the rest of the cord broke off.

The dumber thing is that it still worked, mostly. And for about a week, I used it like this, just being careful to push it together to make the connection.

After a while, the blobs of solder connecting 120V of household AC broke off, so the jiggle trick didn't work any more. At least, not without the end of the connector getting noticeably hot, and even a little... shock-y.

Fortunately, I'd ordered a replacement. And that's the dumbest thing -- I bought another used (refurb) one off eBay.

We'll see how long this one lasts. If it goes, I suppose it'll mean it's time to upgrade to a new Macbook.

I've Drifted to the Left Over the Years

[A post of no consequence to get me out of my slump.]

A month or so ago, I had a stretch where I'd be driving, maybe getting passed on my left or on the inner lane of a dual left turn lane, and I'd get honked at.

I'd be all like, "What the hell are you honking at... beeyotch?!" (Do people still say "beeyotch"?)

After it happened the second time in a few days, I finally turned my side view mirror down to see the road markers, and... yep, I was riding the line.

I think it dates back when I learned to drive in my parents Camry sedan (it was an '88; I took it down with me when I moved down, and it lasted until 2002, when the starter ring gear finally went.) I learned to maintain lane position by positioning the spot on the hood just in front of the A-pillar on the lane marker.

This worked fine, until I switched to the Mazda, which has a more tapered hood; indexing on the same spot on the hood doesn't work as well. So I think that's why I've slid over to the left.

Anyway, as bad as that is, it wasn't nearly as bad as coming into work from Tysons this morning, taking the offramp from 28 South onto Frying Pan Road, and seeing a car on the side of the offramp, facing the wrong way. 

I can't figure out how, but apparently, this person had managed to drive the wrong way up the offramp, saw incoming traffic, stopped, and was kind of stuck, since a steady stream of traffic kept him (or her) from making a U-turn.

Last I saw (thankfully, in my rear view mirror), the driver was trying to back up to a spot where he (or she) could turn around.

Doing a Drive-By on the Rally for Sanity

I didn't attend the Rally for Sanity and/or Fear on Saturday. The dumb thing is that I drove into DC, circled aimlessly looking for parking up all around the Mall, Independence, and Capitol Hill, got jammed up by street closures a few times, then gave up and left.

I'd gotten a late start on the day (hangover), and I heard that the Metro stations were jammed, so I decided to drive in:

Test sign over I-66.

I was going to park at Rosslyn and walk over the bridge, but I couldn't find a spot with more than a 2-hour meter, so I kept going.

Next, I tried to be clever and park at Arlington Cemetery, but the lot closes at 6pm, which was no good. So I headed into DC, and after all that fruitless searching, went home.

Well, I didn't actually go home: First, I stopped by the US Air Force Memorial, which I've never seen in the daytime:

In the middle of all the standard shooting-looking-up-the-spires shots that everyone takes, a helicopter flew by:

Oh, look, a shot looking up a spire. The monument is very metallic (depending how much Photoshop you use):

Then, I headed over to Gravelly Point, to watch the planes land.

There was also a rugby game, which gave people something to watch in between planes (including one that had to abort the landing and go around for another pass):

Anyway, that was Saturday afternoon.

The rest of the photos can be found here.

Overthinking Halloween in a Time of War

Last week, I beta-tested the Halloween costume I'd alluded to earlier -- it's a police uniform:

I'm in the middle.

With the tan and brown color scheme, it's more of a sheriff-style uniform. It's actually pretty close to the Sheriff Grimes outfit on the upcoming zombie series, The Walking Dead, though his is short sleeved and the pants have a tan stripe up the side.

My habit of buying stuff from police supply catalogs started before the Internet made it easy -- I started with a Streamlight hazardous-environment-rated flashlight and some other stuff from the Gall's catalog back in the mid-'90s, when you actually had to seek them out.

Now police and public safety supply catalogs are just another source for bargain sites and Google shopping searches. Which does make it easy to find uniform shirts on clearance for 10 bucks (or less). That's why I had the uniform shirt. And handcuffs (real ones) and a holster (also real).

Add some pouches and some brown pants, and a trip to Ranger Surplus for some patches and pins and a cap gun, and I was pretty much set. (Though I just did get a Sheriff's badge on eBay, and am waiting on a few patches. I actually found some Fairfax and Loudoun County patches on eBay, though I stayed away -- I'd rather stay on the Halloween costume side of things, vs the "impersonating a police officer" side.)

I could be a soldier for Halloween... but won't
I've also got a bunch of pieces of militaria, bits of tactical gear and camouflage that I've gathered over the years, from which I could probably cobble together a passable soldier costume, but the idea of an adult dressing up as a soldier during a time of war makes me distinctly uncomfortable. (Unless it's "sexy soldier." That's okay.)

Even though I never really outgrew my military fanboy phase (I never served), in a time when fewer than 1 percent of Americans are in the military, with an ever-wider civil-military gap even as we're fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, it feels wrong to me seeing a civilian play dress-up for Halloween. Or cosplay. Or airsoft. For adults, anyway.

(Then again, I did wear a flight suit and bomber jacket for Halloween a few years back. But I think "Top Gun fighter jock" is a little different, since that was never on the table, anyway... poor vision, very average reflexes.)

There's a Perfectly Good Explanation Why I Bought Boys' Footie Pajamas

Stopped by Target on the way home to buy gum. (I was all out of gum. I needed gum.)

Here in this photo, there is eight dollars worth of gum, next to eight dollars worth of Belle and Sebastian Write About Love:

They were both on sale, and they're both pretty pink.

On impulse, I also bought a set of boys' size large footie pajamas. They were on sale for ten bucks, and I thought I might be able to use them for a Halloween costume.

That's not going to happen:

I am simultaneously disappointed and relieved that I can't wear boys' size large footie pajamas. (I had thought that with the fattening of America's youth, I might have a chance, but I couldn't even zip up the leg. And why does the zipper go down one leg, anyway?)

Now comes the hard part:

I have to return them.

My Life in Four Quarters

* 1996: The year I left New York and moved to Virginia.

* 1993: The year I graduated college.

* 1989: The year I graduated high school.
 
* 1972: The year I was born. Or so they tell me.

It's not like these are special coins that I saved specifically at each moment in time. I just found one of the years in my pocket, then went digging through my change to find the others.

I Hate the Eternal September

(I've been working on this post, on and off, for at least 5 years. I'm fairly certain that it hasn't been worth the wait. But I'm kind of drunk right now, and I'm also facing some self-imposed time pressure to post this before yet another September passes.)

I hate the Eternal September. It's basically the theory that USENET, and by extension, the Internet, was going to be a sort of utopian playground populated by self-actualized, empowered DIY-coder-types who would harness the power of democratized technology to build the Internet apps to control their own destiny and lead to a pre-Technological Singularity singularity where geeks ruled the world in a pure, technological, many-to-many, disintermediated meritocracy etc. etc. etc... that is, before AOL wrecked it all by unleashing the unwashed masses onto USENET, ruining everything.

(It's a mindset that I ascribe, perhaps somewhat unfairly, perhaps not, to Nicholas Negroponte's Being Digital.)

Now, of course, being a self-admitted former AOL employee, one might chalk this up to pure defensiveness, even though the precipitating action predated my employment there by a few months.

However, if you've talked to me before about social media, you've probably heard my rant against that kind of revisionist technological utopianism:

There is, in fact, a communications medium that allows only particpation by the technically savvy. There are significant barriers to entry, and in fact, you have to pass an entire certification and licensing regime, and if you don't conform to norms and rules, you're out.

That medium is ham radio. And (apologies to my friends who are hams) outside of certain natural disasters and talking to spacecraft in Earth orbit, it is a medium that is essentially irrelevant to the cultural conversation.

My hypothesis is that, without the truly democratizing influence of the unsavvy, unwashed masses flooding the Internet for their celebrity gossip and movie quotes and chain e-mails and so forth, the Internet wouldn't have been nearly as influential and universal as it is now.

Now, by nature, I'm kind of an elitist, but at the same time, I think I recognize the limits of elitism and the power of populism. And I think the influence of the Internet is reflected in both of those concepts.

Anyway, that's just, like, my opinion.

Things I Did Not Do This Saturday (and Why)

There were many, many interesting things going on Saturday, and I did not do any of them.

This was partially due to a work situation that popped up Friday afternoon (as they are wont to due), though I probably could have taken care of it late Friday or early Saturday... save for the extended after-work happy hour.

However, I did not end up making any clumsy drunken passes on any of my cow-orkers, so I guess I'll mark that as a win.

Here are the things I did not do:

* Global CrisisCamp Day in DC (Poor planning; not knowing when to say when)

* National Book Festival (Never been before; why start now?)

* Dulles Plane Pull (Sloth, ennui. Malaise.)

* Virgin Mobile FreeFest (Wasn't planning on going this year, anyway.)

Bonus No-Show: Fol Chen at the Black Cat last Wednesday (Uncharacteristic good judgment that actually turns out to be poor judgment.)

Are Blogger Meetups Still Relevant? (Fairfax County Bloggers Meetup Review)

Here's a quick post about last night's Fairfax County Blogger Meetup.

Since I started working over by Dulles (again) last year, I haven't been out to very many events, and not many DC Blogger Meetups, primarily because heading all the way into town is a pain.

I'd RSVP'ed for this month's Fairfax County Blogger Meetup; I was kind of obligated to at least show up, since they were looking for a place in Falls Church and I'd suggested Clare and Don's Beach Shack

I got there about 8:15pm (it started at 7pm), just as things were winding down, though folks did stick around a bit to chat -- the featured guest speaker was Jeff Sonderman of blog network/news site TBD, so we talked about the state of local news, blog networks, and the area. He also had TBD swag.

Additionally, attending were:

* Jill Anderson of the Lake Barcroft Blog -- she organized the event, though she's handing over group leadership duties to...

* Ellie Ashford of the Annandale VA Blog (and also a TBD blogger)

* Micheal Clark of ShowBizRadio.net

* Doug Francis, a Vienna Real Estate blogger

The nature of blogger meetups has changed, and to a large extent, waned. People generally don't need the same kind of support and encouragement to blog, since the tools and the norms have changed so much. Also, Facebook has largely taken over the social status broadcasting aspect of blogging, as have mobile updates and microblogging.

Still, the networking aspect still has a role, especially for single-issue/themed bloggers, so I think that blogger meetups can still be useful to people.

I very much liked the guest speaker aspect of this meetup, to provide a bit of focus and direction while still maintaining the social aspect (without a rigid agenda) -- hopefully, this continue (next month's scheduled Guest Speaker is Ellen Scott, Community Web Producer for WUSA9.)

Dumb Drive

Driving home last Saturday, I saw the following things on I-95:

* A "9/11 was an inside job" Truther banner hanging from an overpass near Baltimore. It made me annoyed.

* Further along in Maryland, a flight of about 6 twin-engine military cargo planes (probably C-130s) flying low and heading south, I guess for a flyover or something.

* The world's worst turn signal user (with Maryland tags, go figure). His turn signals were on continuously the entire time... he'd be in the left lane with his left blinker going and cut to the right. I don't think he realized that turn signals don't automatically cancel if you make a minor lane change. Throw in the random brake-checks and trying to deal with a NJ State Trooper that was basically pacing us and it was particularly fascinating -- I followed him (from a safe distance) for a good chunk of the southern New Jersey Turnpike.

All of these (except the Truther banner) made me wish I'd had my camera with me, instead of in the back.

Anyway, that was about it on the way down. While I was up in New Jersey, we went to get chain Tex-Mex for my Dad's birthday, and coming back, out in the distance, we saw the 9/11 tribute "Towers of Light" illuminating the clouds.

We had dim sum on Sunday.

The way home was fairly uneventful, though I almost got lost dodging a backup at the Delaware tolls -- fortunately, I had the GPS, and was familiar enough with the area to figure out where I was going.

I did hit a backup on the Beltway (some sort of accident on 270), but that did give me a chance to take a quick snap of the Mormon Temple during sunset:

I'm the Guy Who Still Buys CDs

I still buy CDs. Though usually used (and even then, not in a while). I like having the media, even if it comes in a jewel case that takes up too much room and breaks far too easily. And I like the sense of owning something tangible. I'm a product of my upbringing, where the media and the music were inextricably linked.

Anyway, I saw in the Sunday circular that Best Buy was loss-leading this week with Florence and the Machine's Lungs -- I'd had her on my watch list since hearing an NPR feature on her a few months ago, though since then, she's been pretty unavoidable (they keep using the songs in TV show promos).

I was surprised to see that Underworld had a new album out that was also being promoted -- surprised because I thought they'd broken up (they hadn't: I was thinking of Orbital, though they're back together, so I was doubly wrong.)

Anyway, it explains why they're playing the 9:30 Club next month.

So I got both albums.

2010 So Far in Greenlit Fark Headlines

I haven't been blogging much lately, due to a combination of writers' block, self-doubt, and microblogging. What I have been doing is channeling my creativity (such as it is) into Fark headlines, which are mostly anonymous.

(This can be a good thing, especially when you rely on tropes like corny jokes, bad puns, casual misogyny and stereotypes -- applied ironically, of course. Headline submitters are anonymous, unless they out themselves in the comments, or opt to have their submissions listed on their profiles. I have my greenlit headlines listed, but not my redlights.)

Right now, I'm at 592 greenlit headlines, which puts me at about #89 on the current all-time Fark top submitters list, or firmly on the small end of the short head of the long tail of Fark submitters.

I'll try to talk more about using Fark as an example of headline writing and creating a culture of uncompensated contribution, but for right now, here are some of my more favorite headlines from 2010 to date, in roughly reverse chronological order -- each link below goes to the Fark comment thread, which contains a link to the relevant article. (You can also see all of my greenlights on my Fark profile, including the many lackluster ones that just happened to be submitted at the right time.)

See cells in the Seychelles for the sea scores [This one takes the classic tongue-twister and reworks it for the article. It kind of makes sense in context.]

Video of female service member servicing five service members' members circulating Fort Bliss [There's a better example of this kind of repetition wordplay later. Also, though the wording suggests it, since the article link was to the NYT, you don't actually see the video.]

It's 130 miles to Cowtown, we got a 160-pound barrel, a half-baked agenda on bullying, it's July and we're wearing full rodeo clown makeup. Hit it [An obvious Blues Brothers reference, but it has enough oddness to make you want to click.]

Pentagon surveys the troops: "How icky would it be showering with a gay? a) Squicky. b) Very icky. c) Icky. d) Mostly not icky" [I liked the Squicky/Icky construction.]

Hollister store in NYC infested with annoying, tenacious parasites. Bedbugs, too [Pretty standard classic comedy construction here.]

Muslims are disappointed by Obama. See, they really are just like everyone else [Article rode the wave of a series of liberal breast-beating articles from various places on Obama disillusionment.]

Anti-Semitic: Flipping off a bus full of Hasidic Jews on the Garden State Parkway. Anti-gravity Semitic: Bus full of Hasidic Jews flipping off the Garden State Parkway [I particularly liked this wordplay, which was simply reconstructing the sentence with the same constituent words.]

New Senate bill would require terrorists to present fake ID before buying prepaid cellphones [Somewhat subtle, at least compared to the rest of these.]

Plans underway to nuke New Jersey [Technically true -- not the worst trolling headline you'll see here.]

Al Qaeda has acquired a potentially devastating technology: Autotune [Set up as a serious headline, ending with the punchline.]

Person #1: Isn't it amazing how I can use my cell phone to get coverage about things that just happened in this murder trial? Person #2: You mean the one we're serving as jurors on? [I admit it has kind of a Readers Digest "Life in These United States" feel to it, but it was still funny.]

NJ man arrested for having a minor, amount of cocaine in his car [Some grammar humor of the "Eats, Shoots and Leaves" variety, which in terms of Fark greenlight potential, is only slightly behind Periodic Table puns.]

Design student reinvents the Cone of Silence, which looks amazingly awesome. Would you believe marginally effective? How about irredeemably stupid? [A very direct pull from Get Smart, which fit the subject matter.]

Under certain conditions, it's acceptable for passive voice to be used [More grammar humor. Distressing to see the number of self-professed Grammar Nazis in the thread who failed miserably trying to use the passive voice.]

Roundup-resistant weeds may require more frequent plowing, according to your mom [Every kind of headline is enhanced by a "Your mom" joke.]

Man getting testicular cyst removed accidentally gets the volume discount [Going for a subtle cringe-inducement factor.]

An iPhone. An air conditioner. Dirty underpants. A sock-wearing mannequin. Thousands of cigarette butts. A pregnancy test. Denture cement. Fake breasts. An 8-track tape. A jockstrap [The rhythm of the words is hypnotic, not to mention intriguing.]

Thank you for calling the Federal Nuclear Detonation Response Hotline. Your call is very important to us. Current wait time for the next operator: 24-72 hours. ♫ Tall and tan and dark and lovely, the girl from Ipanema goes walking ♫ [Kind of a meta thing, as action movies have co-opted the Girl Form Ipanema for moments of incongruous calm.]

Photo surfaces of President Obama refusing to shake the hand of a disabled janitor [A trolltastic headline that only works when you click through to the photo:

]

Eiffel Tower attacked, suffering significant structural damage. Story developing [Another trollerific headline -- discerning readers noted the lack of a "NEWSFLASH" tag which this kind of breaking news, if true, would suggest, as well as the news source. The joke is in the photo:

]

Old Bridge old bridge repair repairs fragment fragments, state State Police police speaker, speaking [Probably my best this year -- it sounds like nonsense, but when you parse it out, it makes sense (except for one or two really redundant bits). As I posted in the thread: "Old Bridge [town] old bridge repair [overall project] repairs [the specific action -- this was the most redundant bit] fragment [breaks] fragments [off the bridge], state[s] State Police police speaker, speaking [also redundant, but necessary for the gag]."]

Acupuncture may be useful in treating joint destruction, multi-organ failure, flesh-eating disease, and paralysis. And by "treating" I mean "causing" [Pretty common switcheroo headline.]

Good neighbor: Operates noisy equipment indoors, with the windows closed. Dead neighbor: It's a portable generator [Variant of the comparison headline, a la Goofus and Gallant.]

Whoever said, "There's no harm in asking," clearly never submitted a request under the Indian government's Right to Information Act

Armed robbers in $1 million perfume warehouse heist who shouted "NYPD, hands up" may be criminals, but at least they're not liars

Government sources confirm second party involved in JFK incident [Another trolling headline, technically true but incredibly misleading.]

"You have the right to, like, not say anything. You have the right to an attorney, unfrozen caveman lawyer or other law-talking guy. If I said you had a beautiful body, would you hold it against me in a court of law?" [Rather long headline on the ruling allowing cops to paraphrase the Miranda warning, take to absurdity.]

American military gets its thumb drives back. U-S-B, U-S-B, U-S-B [Another favorite, subverting acronyms and jingoism.]

Pros and cons of a robot army -- Pros: It's a ROBOT ARMY. Cons: It's a ROBOT ARMY [I invariably read this one and hear Norm MacDonald.]

Open workplace romances are increasingly common. You still eat lunch alone at your desk [I actually said "Ouch" to myself as I wrote this.]

Lackawanna Cut-Off cut off for Lackawanna [Another repetition wordplay.]

New York's Central Park sees sharp increase in rabid, aggressive, foaming inhabitants. Raccoons, too [See the Hollister headline above.]

Company has plan to solve energy crisis using orbiting laser satellites. Not sure why they need an underground volcano headquarters, though

Henceforth, NPR will be known as NPR

High school baseball coach encourages players to masturbate instead of having sex, and to ignore that little red LED over there [Icky, but funny.]

Mumbai condom vending machines hit by burglars and vandals. Inconceivable

Isn't trying to analyze comedy fun?

Tonight, on American Top 40 - The 80s: Cultural Irrelevance

1980 is as far removed from (and as irrelevant to) 2010, as 1950 was to 1980.
We knew this, of course, but the math was particularly obvious as I was listening to the American Top 40 - The '80s rebroadcast from July, 17 1980 tonight on 92.5 WINC-FM.

(We also knew at some level that not all music from the '80s was memorable, but listening to the bottom of the list revealed utterly forgettable turkeys.)

On the one hand, I can empathize with the youngsters of today, having to hear their elders droning on about, say, Culture Club, or early U2, just as we had to put up with folks waxing rhapsodic about Perry Como or Elvis.

At the same time, after you've seen things before, you can't help but see the influences of previous generations, where to the folks who haven't, the influences are so integrated into the landscape that they're transparent.

John Scalzi recently mentioned this in the context of movie remakes; this week's Studio 360 took on '70s disco.

Since storytelling has always drawn from the same archetypal themes that go all the way back to the beginning of shared stories, I find the thematic repetition in music particularly irritating, (and haircuts -- particularly the recurring shag/bowl/Bieber haircut that I'll always place in the 70s, even though it tries to resurface every 20 years or so).

Obvious as it may be, everyone wants to make their own mistakes and put their own stamp on things, so Lady Ga-Ga will continue to be Madonna, and pop/dance music will continue to recycle disco and electroclash (with more AutoTune, which we used to call vocoder)

Joelogon Tattaglia Joins the Mafia Wars Witness Protection Program

Last summer, I started playing Mafia Wars on Facebook. It was mostly in the nature of research -- finding out what the fuss was about, looking into Facebook social gaming, etc.

I wrote about it a few times on the NetSol blog, talking about how Mafia Wars gets people to do stuff, as well as how the Mafia Wars gameplay encourages interaction with members of your social network.

There's a lot you can talk about -- casual gaming, the brain chemistry of addiction and gambling, play-acting at transgressive behavior (or actual transgressive behavior, when it came to some developers and affiliate marketers), and most importantly, maintaining contacts via social grooming.

But it also got to be a chore. An essay by A.J. Patrick Liszkiewicz in March, Cultivated Play: Farmville, was still fresh in my mind -- it's all about how one of the rewards of advancing in Farmville is that you don't have to play it as much, as well as touching on obligation and network effects.

So there I was, back in April or May, at whatever level I was at, having just unlocked the Thailand achievement where you achieve top status simultaneously with the Triad and the Yakuza, and then... what? Every additional locale added was just another link to click, revealing another set of arbitrary tasks and achievements.

It ceased having any pretense of fun. So I bailed. Instead of just going idle (which would leave my fairly middlin' to high-level character as a teammate of my friends' Mafias), I went into my own version of "Mafia Wars Witness Protection": I deleted the app, blocked all updates, and didn't look back.

RIP Joelogon Tattaglia

Ultimately, I lasted about a year. I'm not sure what factors, if any, might have kept me in the game -- I'll have to think about that (as will Zynga, no doubt.)

Dumb Things: Omnibus Edition

• Find on my credit card statement that I managed to buy 2 tickets for myself for last month's DC Digital Capital Week kickoff party. (Remember: Stupid should cost.)
• From last month's trip to the San Francisco area: Rented a car for 3 days for $45 (pre-tax)... then, while in a post-flight stupor, effectively doubled the price by agreeing to the Fuel Purchase Option.
• Speaking of the San Francisco trip: Flew in Friday night, took the Sunday red-eye back and went straight into the office.
• For July 4th weekend: Put a lot of time into slow-cooking a Brunswick Stew. Put in a little extra time into burning it.
• Saturday afternoon: Saw an Escalade on Reston Parkway take a U-turn over the raised median so it could get back onto the Toll Road
• Sunday: Watched Primer again. Even with supplemental materials, could not follow all the time travel bits.
• Driving home in the rain tonight: Watching as my headlights caught a frog trying to play Frogger. It lost.