Weekend update

Taking a break from all the words to cast a little light on pictures, and suggest you click over to the useless photo site and have a look at what's been posted recently.

Mac-simum

For those of you who read this post from last week, you've probably been waiting anxiously to see how an important event turned out.

Namely, how did my Halloween costume go over at the office last Friday?

First, a reminder of what I wore a week ago:
In short, it was a big hit.

In the pseudo-contest amongst those who bothered to dress up, I got a prize (I tied for "most creative"—which, considering how much make-up and props were involved with the other winner in that category, I have a hard time feeling good about it; however, considering the prize was a plastic skull and a CPK gift card, it's not like it's a big deal one way or another).

(In case you're wondering: There were two Sarah Palins in the costume contest... who tied for "scariest costume"—the judges had a very particular political inclination.)

The people in my department who remembered my previous costumes were appreciative of the conspicuous absence of the neck wound. (See reminder from 2005 at left.)

Not only would have going with a "zombie PC and Mac" have pushed it over the top, undoubtedly it would have ruined the best part of the costume I selected.

No, it wasn't winning a prize, nor the fact that no one else was in the same costume.

Unlike with more gruesome ensembles of past years, at no point did anyone ask me, "So, what are you supposed to be?"

My costume took a few seconds to sink in, but it operated without explanation (well, there were a couple people who don't watch TV and didn't get it, but even they didn't ask what I was; they accepted it as what it seemed to be). I even got some nods of approval from strangers I passed when I went to lunch.

In past years I would get confusion or repulsion or dismissive rolling of the eyes. And while that was entirely expected at the time, I must admit: it got old after eight hours.

The lesson: It's better to be clever than to be gory (even if it's gory and kind of clever). But it's best to be something easily identifiable.

Not judging anything

Last night The Daily Show and The Colbert Report teamed up for a live election night special: Indecision 2008: America's Choice (see it here on Hulu).

However, at the beginning Stephen Colbert thought "America's Choice" was too weak, and came up with his own title for it:


And although the ridiculous stream of words flowed quickly across the screen, I noticed something immediately that distracted me.
"Judgement Day."

In case it doesn't jump out to you, in American English it's generally considered correct to spell it "judgment"--dropping the "e" off of "judge" before appending the "ment" to it. (The British still spell it with the middle "e," but I doubt Colbert's graphics people would be paying intentional tribute that, even though they are our allies now. Without shaking off their empirical shackles a couple centuries ago, we wouldn't be having the event that inspired the special, so it seems inappropriate given the nature of the show.)

But my point is not to vilify a simple lack of running a spell check (and it's likely that the graphics program used lacks spell checking capability). My point, as always, is that my brain cannot stop noticing. And that detracts from my enjoyment in ways that people with (shall we say) a less discerning mindset presumably do not experience; they laugh at the joke without pause.

And most important: Because they didn't notice in the first place, they feel no compulsion to note it on their blogs.

Lucky bastards.

So, if someone could please sneak up on me and hit me in the back of the head with a blunt object--just enough to knock this awareness of how words are spelled, not enough to make me seem like a good Republican vice presidential nominee or someone who'd vote for Proposition 8--I'd appreciate it. (Please don't let me hear you coming, or else I'll almost certainly flinch and that might ruin everything, leaving me with only a concussion and full cognition.) I mean, I'd like to still be able to understand the rest of The Daily Show, without having my viewing options reduced to merely Fox & Friends.

After that, I'll be able to watch TV and read the internet, all without being encumbered with useless knowledge regarding the arbitrary quirks of how our language has been tweaked by whoever* the hell it is that decides how words are supposed to be spelled (even if the country from which that language originated still spells them a different way) and the distracting consequences of that knowledge, which is my right as an American.

(If you could, please hum a few bars of "God Bless America" to yourself to help accentuate that last paragraph. Thanks.)

I'd say maybe it's just me, but that's stupid; of course it's just me. That's my point. I'm tired of it being just me.

No matter what the election results might imply, elitism is the bailiwick of the unhappy. And I'm willing to give a bit of happiness a try.

Someone can knock me slightly senseless. We can do this.

Yes we can.

~

Let's make it simple: In the Thoughts on This section below, please just indicate on a scale of 1 - 10 how much of an asshole I am.

~

* Addendum on November 8, 2008:
An astute reader noted in the Thoughts on This that in the sentence indicated with the asterisk above the term "whomever" should have been used. And that's true. At least I think so. I have used "whomever" in all these posts before; clearly on more than one occasion I have exhibited some awareness of the distinction.

However, now that I think about it, I think that in the moment I was typing that line I was overcome by the spirit of Colbert. And by that I mean I unconsciously adapted "truthiness" for grammatical purposes, and went with what felt right.

For that reason, I shall leave it as is, with apologies to those who are aware of the rules of usage for "whomever" and come across it. Undoubtedly that will cause them to be distracted by it in much the same way I was distracted when watching the show. Therefore, I recommend any such readers rate me high on the asshole scale in the Thoughts on This.

More important than that: This self-revelation about why I did what I did granted me insight into what happened on the show. When those who prepared the graphic in question included "judgement" it wasn't so much that they sought to acknowledge any variation in how it can be spelled. They felt that the "e" was the way to go, and they went with it.

That doesn't change whether the common spelling in American English is "judgment"--and in the Blogger editor it flags the alternate "judgement" as misspelled, as is also the case with the Microsoft Office dictionary for "English (U.S.)" so I'm having to ignore those little red underlines as I type this--nor does it alter my reaction to seeing that spelling on an American TV show, but it does explain how the graphic was completely consistent with the Colbert philosophy.

With any luck, continued viewing of his program will have the same mental effect as the blow to the head mentioned in the original post. I can only hope.

And now is a time for hope.

(Let's continue to not dwell on this starting sentences with conjunctions I've been doing rampantly, okay?)

I voted. It was okay.

Just before I walked out the door this morning to go to my polling place (in the old folks home—er, retirement community—next door to the condo) I got a text from my fiancée, who noted that up where she was (in L.A.), the lines were around the block. This was at roughly 8:00 a.m., an hour after the polls opened.

Down in my neighborhood in Long Beach, it took me a total of 12 minutes to complete my voting transaction. And that includes walking to and from the polling place (which, as noted, was only about 40 yards outside the front door). I did have to wait a couple minutes to sign in (there's always someone who has difficulty with being able to state his or her name, and the people behind the table almost always struggle with finding the names on the list, even when you spell them out), and then after getting my ballot I had to wait another few minutes for a booth to become available. Once in the booth, it took me approximately a minute to punch the holes for the candidates and propositions on the ballot; I did spend some time prior to getting there identifying how I planned to vote, so it wasn't terribly challenging. When I went back to the person who collected the ballots, she commented "That was fast." I smiled politely. She tore off the stub from my ballot and handed it to me. I asked if I could have an "I Voted" sticker, and she said, "Oh, sure," tore off two of them and gave them to me.

On my walk to the train station I passed another polling place (in a church rec room about four blocks away). And there I could see a line of people waiting that was at least as long as the distance from my front door to my polling place. None of those people would be in and out in 12 minutes, that much was certain.

My experience with my polling place has been the same every time I've voted there since 2004, whether voting in the morning or evening. It's always as relatively quick. But clearly that's not common.

Now, I do not believe that the people working at that location are intrinsically more efficient than people working at others. (They aren't necessarily hideously inefficient, but to call them a "well-oiled machine" would be a stretch.) So why were there so many more people waiting at that other location?

Well, conceivably more people who were assigned there chose to vote before work. The retired don't need to worry about hitting the polls in time to get to the office. Or maybe more of the people over on my block were of the percentage who don't vote.

Or maybe the answer was implied by what the woman said to me about the expediency of my voting time. Maybe the people at these other locations are making up their minds when they're in the booth, without having done the research ahead of time. If a majority of those voting are taking up the available booths for considerably longer than it takes for those at the check-in area to process the folks, they'll just hold up the line outside.

So maybe the people on my block who bother to vote are also more inclined to make up their minds ahead of time.

Maybe the people at other polling places, where there are long lines, liken the process of preparing for voting to sitting on a jury, where one is supposed to withhold judgment until all evidence has been given. And that would apparently last until they get in the booth.

Hey, perhaps they figure they're giving all the people waiting in line time to read the sample ballot.

~

Remember: Less than half of eligible voters actually do so. Thus, if you voted today, you're in a minority, and therefore an elitist.

Run for your life or your polling place... or neither

From the crappy-last-minute-ruminations-on-the-election department:

Before we start today's post, I would like to take this time to remind my readers that I have a big corn dog up on the masthead. I think we can all agree that I am in no position to be telling anyone else what he or she should do.

~

On the eve of the election, it seems a lot of people are essentially beseeching everyone to vote. However, I imagine most of those people have very specific loyalties regarding for whom they intend to vote. Thus, in truth, it's probably not so much that they want everyone to vote, but that they want everyone who does vote to vote for their preferred candidate. The implication is that they somehow believe that the ambivalent 2/3 of the country who don't vote would somehow be in favor of their candidate if only those people invested some time in the process. Or perhaps they merely prefer that their side achieve victory by whatever means necessary, and if getting people who really don't give a shit one way or the other to pretend to care about their side for as long as it takes to fill out the ballot, then that's fine with them.

Sure, that's hideously crass. And I'm not saying it isn't. Hell, I admitted four years ago that I am the problem. But that doesn't mean it isn't an accurate deconstruction of the situation. (And if you're so inclined, I'd really appreciate it if you could click on the Thoughts on This link below and tell me how full of shit I am.)

Despite my cynical leanings, I will be voting tomorrow, but as to the rest of you, I say: Vote if you want to. If you don't want to, that's certainly your prerogative. If you weren't going to before reading this, I don't delude myself into thinking somehow I could (or even should) try to convince you otherwise. And if you were going to, I imagine you already have a pretty good idea for whom you intend to cast your ballot.

I would only hope this: You will vote for the candidate who inspires you in whatever tiny way politicians can these days, not for the candidate whose campaign made you afraid to vote for the other side. If you're merely voting against the side you dislike most, if I were giving any suggestions I would encourage you to intentionally undervote. (That is, when you're in the booth, if you don't have any modicum of belief in any of the candidates, leave it blank; don't vote for any of them.)

Seriously. You don't have to. It doesn't invalidate your ballot. It just means you don't have any preference one way or the other.

Which, it sounds like, represents your feelings perfectly.

I know this won't happen, of course. I'm just being idealistic in a horribly cynical sort of way. I'm aspiring to see an election where the tally indicates what people really believe in, not what they're afraid of, nor what they figure they have to resort to.

Fat chance. I know.

The system is well-established, which means it has little to do with how the system could be. Voting's not likely to change that, but hey, it's all we have.

~

Anyway, while it's still a modicum of a free country, please do what you think is best. Even if that involves just following what someone else tells you to do.

As long as that person is not me.