I'm going to try and be more active here again. I think I may be able to succeed once my week-long hiatus from all electronic communication in a couple of weeks is over. I'm going to visit a friend in Portland, OR and have decided that while I am there, I will not check email, facebook, or twitter. For a whole week - rapid detox on social media. I am taking wagers on how well I will succeed. Of course, knowing Brett & Jessie, if I tell them "do not let me use the computer for anything other than maps, transit and flight updates" I'm sure they'll oblige. If someone needs to find me during that time, they can text or {gasp} call me.
As much as I do LOVE facebook - it allows me to interact with a lot of people that I otherwise wouldn't be able to on a fairly regular basis - I am on it way too much. And my recent experiment with twitter confirmed the same - it was just far too distracting. I need to limit myself, which is difficult because I sit in front of a computer all day and it's so easy to just log onto facebook when I'm bored, or can't concentrate, or need a break. But then it turns into an obsession of sorts - so-and-so commented on this-or-that - oooh, I have to check that, and maybe reply! It has allowed me to get into contact with a lot of people I lost touch with, for various reasons. I am not the type of person who "friends" people I don't actually know or want to know. I don't understand that at all.
That was part of my conflict with Twitter. Aside from following various celebrities or news outlets or businesses, all it is, is pushing my brainfarts into cyberspace. I didn't have a lot of "followers" so, therefore, I was pushing those thoughts to a subset of people already on Facebook - so why not just use that? And it seemed oddly anti-social to me - a facade of interaction. I was discussing with with someone who said "Yeah, but actual conversation requires more time and effort. A quick tweet doesn't interrupt anything". Exactly: The absence of time and effort. I'm not interested in "tweeting" with perfect strangers, and all those with whom I want to be friends, I require a certain level of effort and time for them. If my only interaction with someone is through 140 character snippets - that's not a friendship. And right now, I really am craving more interpersonal connections.
I've found that now that the dust has settled, I've reached the "OK, now what" phase of this stage of my life. I want to get out and meet new people, foster relationships (new, old, and newly-rediscovered) but I often don't have the time (or money) to do that as often as I want. Socializing often costs money, especially the kind of socialization I enjoy (the ethanol kind). I'm at a crossroads. How do you meet new people (friends or 'more')? I'm going to a little singles event next week called "Nerds at Heart" --
- OK you done laughing? -
Seriously - it looks like fun. It's not a corporate/yuppie speed-dating thing. I couldn't handle that. There's no way I could "present" myself to a guy in 2 minutes or less. This is a laid back, social event where people who are other self-identified nerds (i.e., they actually LIKE smart women) get together for trivia and party games, a few drinks, and yes, to maybe meet someone they click with. The games are natural ice-breakers - no pressure in trying to think of something witty to say, or the right "getting to know you" question to ask. I'm going with a new friend I just met through some old friends for moral support. I'm both excited and terrified.
Speaking of old friends... I've recently re-connected with a whole group of people with whom I lost touch many years ago. Most of them are high school friends, and a few who I met in college (the two groups kind of merged). Part of the reason I went AWOL is that I had a falling out with one "core" person of the group - or so I thought. Turns out after all these years of thinking he hated me, he actually missed me. I can't even remember what the argument was about. Another reason was that they all moved out to the burbs and I was left in the city, with no car, and everyone stopped coming to the city. Not that I minded taking public transit to certain places, but I was always the one going out of my way and busting my ass to get places when they were all much more mobile. It seemed unbalanced and like my participation was expendable. I felt hurt and a bit abandoned by that. (Ironically, after reconnecting with this group, the exact same phenomenon appears to be happening with my current group of friends. Life is oddly cyclical sometimes).
Now, quite a few of these folks work downtown and we've been getting together occasionally for a happy hour, plus many of them come into the city for various things or choose locations that are accessible to CTA so it's much easier. And, of course, now we have facebook and such to keep in contact between those times. Last weekend, I went to a BBQ with a few of them, and some of the newer faces in the crowd and met some really great people. I'm truly glad to be "home" so to speak.
I've started knitting again. I finished a skirt for myself and now I have to move on to something else that I can bring with me on the plane to Portland.
OK, that's all I have time to write for now. And actually, I wrote more than I thought I would. I guess I really am starved for expression.
Showing posts with label I'm a nerd. Show all posts
Showing posts with label I'm a nerd. Show all posts
10 July 2010
12 June 2008
GraphJam
For all you data nerds out there.
This one is my favorite (for somewhat obvious reasons to music fans)
more graph humor and song chart memes
Related to a recent post:
more graph humor and song chart memes
There's a lot of good ones in here.
This one is my favorite (for somewhat obvious reasons to music fans)
more graph humor and song chart memes
Related to a recent post:
more graph humor and song chart memes
There's a lot of good ones in here.
16 August 2007
Creative solutions
I've always been good at rigging contraptions for purposes other than for what they are intended. This has served me well in both practical and creative means. Just ask John. Sometimes we'll be trying to fix something, I'll look around the room, grab some random item, and voila, problem solved.
Once, while on High School stage crew, I built a pot-belly stove (with a door that opened) out of a stool, some leftover cardboard, old duct tubing, some duct-tape, and black paint. I'm not creative in the conventional sense. I can't paint or draw, but give me a purpose or problem for which to be creative and I'll solve your problem.
For instance, that damn air conditioner. We solved the problem - kind of. First I tried some regular plastic tubing from the hardware store, but it was slightly too narrow and the duct-tape attachments started leaking. The overall concept worked though - some plastic tubing connected to the vent plug, leading into a hole cut in a small plastic bucket and sealed off. The excess water would run through the tube and fill the bucket - which could be easily emptied into a larger, more portable (non attached) bucket. But alas it leaked too much to be worth it.
However... some rubber laboratory tubing - now THAT would do the trick.
So we headed over to American Science and Surplus. This place is awesome. Anyone who sets foot in there no matter how cool, instantly becomes a complete and total nerd. John even got into a discussion with the cashier about the first time he ever saw Windows 95. Yes. It's THAT nerdy.
But, they DO have every size graduated cylinder you could ever want for your home meth lab. They also have - you guessed it - rubber tubing. After we finished talking to the woman who helped us find tubing about the Violent Femmes and whether or not she should purchase a portable air-conditioner, I headed over to the lab section to see if we could find a container with a built-in gasket of some sort - eliminating the bucket-side leakage of the first attempt.
John was perusing the various flak jackets and gas masks when I hear "Hey Laura" and I turn around. He's holding a collapsible plastic water jug with built-in spigot, much like this one.
Perfect. Score one for John.
We got home, after discussing why John could not, in fact, buy every toy he saw for his desk, and set to work.
It took some doing, but the tubing fit snugly over the air-conditioner vent plug after tugging on it with a pair of angled needle-nosed pliers. The water tank works nicely, and it doesn't leak.
However, because gravity is a necessary component to this equation and the plug is about an inch off the ground and there's a slight upturn in the water bottle nozzle, it does collect water, but the "water full" indicator light on and the compressor turning on and off repeatedly still occurs. It's just collecting too much water and reaches equilibrium too quickly, coupled with the fact that without a downhill decline, the flow of water isn't constant.
It is, however, much easier to empty at least. I guess next year (if we're still in a place without central air) we'll have to put it up on cinder blocks. Those would raise it off the ground, but the holes in the middle of the blocks would keep the wheels from rolling. It's really too late this year to bother. We have two more weeks of humidity and heat.
Alas, I tried.
Once, while on High School stage crew, I built a pot-belly stove (with a door that opened) out of a stool, some leftover cardboard, old duct tubing, some duct-tape, and black paint. I'm not creative in the conventional sense. I can't paint or draw, but give me a purpose or problem for which to be creative and I'll solve your problem.
For instance, that damn air conditioner. We solved the problem - kind of. First I tried some regular plastic tubing from the hardware store, but it was slightly too narrow and the duct-tape attachments started leaking. The overall concept worked though - some plastic tubing connected to the vent plug, leading into a hole cut in a small plastic bucket and sealed off. The excess water would run through the tube and fill the bucket - which could be easily emptied into a larger, more portable (non attached) bucket. But alas it leaked too much to be worth it.
However... some rubber laboratory tubing - now THAT would do the trick.
So we headed over to American Science and Surplus. This place is awesome. Anyone who sets foot in there no matter how cool, instantly becomes a complete and total nerd. John even got into a discussion with the cashier about the first time he ever saw Windows 95. Yes. It's THAT nerdy.
But, they DO have every size graduated cylinder you could ever want for your home meth lab. They also have - you guessed it - rubber tubing. After we finished talking to the woman who helped us find tubing about the Violent Femmes and whether or not she should purchase a portable air-conditioner, I headed over to the lab section to see if we could find a container with a built-in gasket of some sort - eliminating the bucket-side leakage of the first attempt.
John was perusing the various flak jackets and gas masks when I hear "Hey Laura" and I turn around. He's holding a collapsible plastic water jug with built-in spigot, much like this one.
Perfect. Score one for John.
We got home, after discussing why John could not, in fact, buy every toy he saw for his desk, and set to work.
It took some doing, but the tubing fit snugly over the air-conditioner vent plug after tugging on it with a pair of angled needle-nosed pliers. The water tank works nicely, and it doesn't leak.
However, because gravity is a necessary component to this equation and the plug is about an inch off the ground and there's a slight upturn in the water bottle nozzle, it does collect water, but the "water full" indicator light on and the compressor turning on and off repeatedly still occurs. It's just collecting too much water and reaches equilibrium too quickly, coupled with the fact that without a downhill decline, the flow of water isn't constant.
It is, however, much easier to empty at least. I guess next year (if we're still in a place without central air) we'll have to put it up on cinder blocks. Those would raise it off the ground, but the holes in the middle of the blocks would keep the wheels from rolling. It's really too late this year to bother. We have two more weeks of humidity and heat.
Alas, I tried.
31 May 2007
Crack for data nerds
A friend of mine recently turned me on to Google Analytics. He thought I'd love it because I love playing with data - it's what I do - and because it's fun stuff. My love/hate relationship with Google has grown more complex now. I hate the fact that they own the world and that they keep track of what I'm searching for... but now those two facts add to my entertainment and talent for procrastination.
Ironic? Maybe.
Fun? It's more addictive than crack. Seriously folks, it's fascinating to me.
It's fun to know who comes to visit your blog for one - it's a sort of voyeurism I guess. I think if they offered information about what the person was doing while reading your site, I'd take it (full leather studded gimp suit while eating a bologna sandwich at 3am in grandma's basement).
I never would have guessed that I'd get visitors from across the world. I mean, obviously I know a few people across the pond and blogger is now fully indexed by Google, but Pakistan? Poland? Yemen? Sure, I suppose some of the topics I write about would probably pique the interests of people in various countries I guess, but I just never really thought my brainfarts would travel that far.
I added Analytics to my blog the first week of May, and so far I have had 1,643 (duplicated) visits came from 71 countries, about 1,000 of those are from the US, as is to be expected since that's where most of you faithful readers reside. It will even allow you to drill down to cities in some places. Like, for instance, I know St. Louis and Chicago are my big hit points in the US (gee, I wonder why?).
Countries with over 50 hits are US, UK, and Canada. Countries with 10-49 hits are Germany, India, Australia, France, Netherlands, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Poland, Italy, Singapore, Malaysia.
Then there's more infrequent visits from Pakistan, Belgium, Sweden, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, Spain, Romania, South Africa, Brazil, Hungary, Indonesia, Switzerland, Mexico, Ireland, Norway, Denmark, Sri Lanka, Hong Kong SAR China, Lithuania, Japan, Finland, Portugal, New Zealand, China, Croatia, El Salvador, Jamaica, Russia, Venezuela, Bulgaria, Kuwait, Guam, Thailand, Taiwan, South Korea, Peru, Iraq, Philippines, Slovakia, Nigeria, Latvia, Puerto Rico, Greece, Cyprus, Chile, Morocco, Oman, Sudan, Czech Republic, Azerbaijan, Estonia, Austria, Argentina, Algeria, Bahrain, Libya, Jordan.
Now, of course, I have no idea what these folks are reading - if anything. They could have found me by accident, said "wow, this is full of shit" and navigated back away. But it's interesting to me that many of these countries have restrictions on free speech and expression. It kinda makes me feel like I should be writing about more important things more often.
I mean, I know this is an open site. It's public, out on the WWW. But sometimes you don't realize that there's actually people out there reading what you write.... it's interesting.
Keywords are the most fun. You can see the crazy shit people search for that leads to your blog. Some of the keywords that have apparently led people to my blog are categorized below into "Ordinary," "Amusing," and "What the...?"
I tried seeing the country/city where "Barking dog ex-lax sausage" came from, but Google gave me an error. I guess it will remain a mystery.
Ironic? Maybe.
Fun? It's more addictive than crack. Seriously folks, it's fascinating to me.
It's fun to know who comes to visit your blog for one - it's a sort of voyeurism I guess. I think if they offered information about what the person was doing while reading your site, I'd take it (full leather studded gimp suit while eating a bologna sandwich at 3am in grandma's basement).
I never would have guessed that I'd get visitors from across the world. I mean, obviously I know a few people across the pond and blogger is now fully indexed by Google, but Pakistan? Poland? Yemen? Sure, I suppose some of the topics I write about would probably pique the interests of people in various countries I guess, but I just never really thought my brainfarts would travel that far.
I added Analytics to my blog the first week of May, and so far I have had 1,643 (duplicated) visits came from 71 countries, about 1,000 of those are from the US, as is to be expected since that's where most of you faithful readers reside. It will even allow you to drill down to cities in some places. Like, for instance, I know St. Louis and Chicago are my big hit points in the US (gee, I wonder why?).
Countries with over 50 hits are US, UK, and Canada. Countries with 10-49 hits are Germany, India, Australia, France, Netherlands, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Poland, Italy, Singapore, Malaysia.
Then there's more infrequent visits from Pakistan, Belgium, Sweden, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, Spain, Romania, South Africa, Brazil, Hungary, Indonesia, Switzerland, Mexico, Ireland, Norway, Denmark, Sri Lanka, Hong Kong SAR China, Lithuania, Japan, Finland, Portugal, New Zealand, China, Croatia, El Salvador, Jamaica, Russia, Venezuela, Bulgaria, Kuwait, Guam, Thailand, Taiwan, South Korea, Peru, Iraq, Philippines, Slovakia, Nigeria, Latvia, Puerto Rico, Greece, Cyprus, Chile, Morocco, Oman, Sudan, Czech Republic, Azerbaijan, Estonia, Austria, Argentina, Algeria, Bahrain, Libya, Jordan.
Now, of course, I have no idea what these folks are reading - if anything. They could have found me by accident, said "wow, this is full of shit" and navigated back away. But it's interesting to me that many of these countries have restrictions on free speech and expression. It kinda makes me feel like I should be writing about more important things more often.
I mean, I know this is an open site. It's public, out on the WWW. But sometimes you don't realize that there's actually people out there reading what you write.... it's interesting.
Keywords are the most fun. You can see the crazy shit people search for that leads to your blog. Some of the keywords that have apparently led people to my blog are categorized below into "Ordinary," "Amusing," and "What the...?"
Ordinary:
poststructural feminism
arab girl
tattoo and subculture and evangelical
Amusing:
Pientology
"hair fairy" gay 1960s
tampons-party
woman pointed chest
febreze deodorant as a deer repellent
seated forced enema kit
hairiest vagina in the world
night elf pussy
barking dog ex-lax sausage
I tried seeing the country/city where "Barking dog ex-lax sausage" came from, but Google gave me an error. I guess it will remain a mystery.
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