danielbeck.net

Compare and Contrast

Webcomics are so popular, even heartland politicians are starting to make them!

Brent Rinehart for Oklahoma County Commissioner

Sean Tevis for Kansas State Representative

Guess which one I donated money to? (Hint: he’s also a metafilter user.)

Tomorrow will be better

Today I:

Spent four hours on hold, waiting for technical support.
Absorbed every nuance of a Bollywood cover of Madonna’s “La Isla Bonita”, complete with sitar solo. But only one verse and chorus, because that’s all that was on the loop for those four hours.
Learned that telling a voice-recognition system “Oh, for fuck’s sake” at an appropriate volume and level of vocal stress will elicit the response “I think you said, ‘Please let me speak to a customer service representative.’ If that is correct, say ‘yes’ or press 1. If not…” etc.
Discovered that the support email contact form was coded to use a GET instead of a POST, so if describing the issue you’re experiencing requires more characters than will fit in a URL, you’re out of luck.
Found that the Live Web Chat support connects you with a customer service representative who is clearly forced to have at least five simultaneous chat sessions active at any one time, and who is allowed to communicate with you only using macros which alternately apologize for the issues you are experiencing, and repeat the phone number of the customer service line you spent four hours waiting for earlier in the day.
Ascertained that calling the sales line to bitch about a support issue will get you absolutely nowhere, even if it’s the only other contact information available.
Went outside, took a very deep breath, spent half an hour watching a songbird watch me watch the distant contrail of a 747 slowly dissipate into the sky, and took another very deep breath.
Dropped a butcher’s knife on my foot while cooking dinner, by chance blunt end first.
Will maintain a constant input of ambient and experimental music to prevent any recurrence of Madonna, and of chianti to prevent recurrence of anything else at all.

The fireflies are out in force

The forest outside looks like dizziness just before a faint, all flecks of light, insect signals wheeling around the yard.

Have you gotten up really close to a firefly yet? They don’t have just one light; they’re this cluster of seperate little bubbles which don’t all light up in synch, more sort of ripple in and out gradually. (Some don’t follow the main pattern at all, just blink randomly like a stuck pixel showing static.)

I’d never seen that before.

[Later:] I tried to show this to Emily the next night, and it turns out I must’ve been looking at a very fancy or very mutated firefly, because the one we looked at together was just a single undifferentiated light.

Lessons

1: Never cook bacon while wearing a new shirt.

2: If you happen to notice that you are wearing a new shirt while cooking bacon, the correct solution is not “take off your shirt.”

Photo: In lieu of the giant screaming head…

…we decided to paint the kid’s room thusly.

Psychology experiment No. 1: Will this give the child A) an unreasonable love of circles, or B) an unreasonable fear of circles?

danielbeck.net

Compare and Contrast

Tomorrow will be better

The fireflies are out in force

Lessons

Photo: In lieu of the giant screaming head…

Conversations my wife and I have had

Department of mixed feelings

Update

Update 2

Photo: Look at his ickle feetses

Photo: Salamander and lilacs

Photo: Enh enh enh enh

Photo: Look what we got in the mail today!

Photo: Emily would like him to go outside now, please

Photo: Emily greets a bear

Photo: Erin reacts to my sister’s detailed explanation of the proper application of Desitin

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP

Our household, in a nutshell

People with too much time on their hands

Photo: Awkward!

Bioshock: How to spoil immersion, in eleven easy steps

Photo: Duck

Photo: Flight of the Watusi

Photo: Epcot

Photo: Sea Turtle

Photo: Patient at the Turtle Hospital

Photo: The Turtle Hospital Ambulance