Counter-protest

Posted by Johnny at 8:36 a.m.

I wonder what the "U" refers to in the old guy's sign. Judging from the syntax, it is probably a plural pronoun; it might also be poor grammar in that he omitted the "s" from "needs." Whatever this enigmatic "U" represents, I doubt it/they really needs/need Jesus that much.

(And what's with the dude in the pink shirt and plaid shorts? I thought all gay people were fashion conscious. Well, it looks like that stereotype was shot down in flames.)

A Guide to Self-Control (ie: Shame)

Posted by Johnny at 10:14 p.m.

This is amazing. Someone found this Mormon guide to break off a masturbation habit and posted it on the Internet. I love it. I will quote the best lines and offer sarcastic remarks. The original guide can be found here.

A Guide to Self-Control

1. Never touch the intimate parts of your body except during normal toilet processes.

2. Avoid being alone as much as possible. Find good company and stay in this good company.

3. If you are associated with other persons having this same problem, YOU MUST BREAK OFF THEIR FRIENDSHIP. Never associate with other people having the same weakness. Don't suppose that two of you will quit together, you never will. You must get away from people of that kind. Just to be in their presence will keep your problem foremost in your mind. The problem must be taken OUT OF YOUR MIND for that is where it really exists. Your mind must be on other and more wholesome things.

Ok, first 3 are done. I now have exactly 0 friends. But wait, I'm supposed to avoid being alone. Huh? How does this work again?

5. When in bed, if that is where you have your problem for the most part, dress yourself for the night so securely that you cannot easily touch your vital parts, and so that it would be difficult and time consuming for you to remove those clothes. By the time you started to remove protective clothing you would have sufficiently controlled your thinking that the temptation would leave you.

So I need to buy a straight jacket. That will come in handy when I go crazy in 2 days.

7. Never read pornographic material. Never read about your problem. Keep it out of mind. Remember -- "First a thought, then an act."

That's some sage advice. "Kids, when you have a problem, IGNORE IT! It will surely go away, especially if it isn't a problem to begin with."

8. Put wholesome thoughts into your mind at all times. Read good books -- Church books -- Scriptures -- Sermons of the Brethern [sic, Cistern too?]. Make a daily habit of reading at least one chapter of Scripture, preferably from one of the four Gospels in the New Testament, or the Book of Mormon. The four Gospels -- Matthew, Mark, Luke and John -- above anything else in the Bible can be helpful because of their uplifting qualities.

Well, they got one thing right. Reading the Bible does NOT make me horny in any way. Well, unless we're talking about Genesis with Adam & Eve and all that... that's some kinky shit.

9. Pray. But when you pray, don't pray about this problem, for that will tend to keep [it] in your mind more than ever. Pray for faith, pray for understanding of the Scriptures, pray for the Missionaries, the General Authorities, your friends, your families, BUT KEEP THE PROBLEM OUT OF YOUR MIND BY NOT MENTIONING IT EVER -- NOT IN CONVERSATION WITH OTHERS, NOT IN YOUR PRAYERS. KEEP IT _OUT_ of your mind!

What's masturbation? I know not of what you speak. IT DOES NOT EXIST! God, I'm horny.

Suggestions [for Quitting]

11. In the field of psychotherapy there is a very effective technique called aversion therapy. When we associate or think of something very distasteful with something which has been pleasurable, but undesirable, the distasteful thought and feeling will begin to cancel out that which was pleasurable. If you associate something very distasteful with your loss of self-control it will help you to stop the act. For example, if you are tempted to masturbate, think of having to bathe in a tub of worms, and eat several of them as you do the act.

Mmm, nothing gets me more flaccid than a tub of worms. Unless there was a girl in there with me... that would be pretty hot. Wait, damn!

13. Arise immediately in the mornings. Do not lie in bed awake, no matter what time of day it is. Get up and do something. Start each day with an enthusiastic activity.

14. Keep your bladder empty. Refrain from drinking large amounts of fluids before retiring.

15. Reduce the amount of spices and condiments in your food. Eat as lightly as possible at night.

16. Wear pajamas that are difficult to open, yet loose and not binding.

17. Avoid people, situations, pictures or reading materials that might create sexual excitement.

I always find that I'm most tempted when lying in bed, having to piss after eating way too much Ketchup. And then my spandex pyjamas are just so constricting that I begin to think about all the fucking hot Mormon women that I came into contact with that day... I don't stand a chance.

18. It is sometimes helpful to have a physical object to use in overcoming this problem. A Book of Mormon, firmly held in hand, even in bed at night has proven helpful in extreme cases.

19. In very severe cases it may be necessary to tie a hand to the bed frame with a tie in order that the habit of masturbating in a semi-sleep condition can be broken. This can also be accomplished by wearing several layers of clothing which would be difficult to remove while half asleep.

Instead of a Book of Mormon, why not try an onion? That should kill your buzz. Or maybe you can bring a cactus to bed. And instead of tying your hands to the bed posts, which might be too kinky for you, why not just cut off your hands. Or better yet, cut off your penis or clitoris. That should solve all your problems and turn you into a happy, industrious Mormon who only consumes and reproduces - wait, you can't reproduce without a penis. DAMN!

Things pissing me off today

Posted by Johnny at 9:25 a.m.

Windows Automatic Update
If I tell you that I don't want to restart my computer right now, STOP ASKING! God damn it! Every 15 minutes that stupid countdown timer comes up and says "your computer will restart in 5 minutes if you don't interact with this dialog box" and if you don't press "Restart Later," it will restart your computer immediately. What if I went to the washroom and couldn't get back in time to press that button? Would you kill all my programs and force me to lose unsaved work? You would, you asshole, I just know it.

Fuck the asshole manager/lawyer who decided that a major sacrifice in usability was worth the 0% security improvement gained by this so called helpful reminder.

Headphones and Transit
Dear people on the train, please buy some FUCKING BETTER EARPHONES. If I can hear your music, it's either too loud or you are wearing them backwards. I wouldn't be surprised in either case because I've been around train folk for a long time, but I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that it's too damn loud.

Fat white chick: Not only do I not want to listen to techno at 8am, I also don't want to see you dance like your spending a night at the Roxbury. When you bob your head like that, your neck jiggles - it's fucking hawt. Fuck, look what you made me do - I replaced the letter o with aw. I hope you realize that it was done for the purposes of sarcasm.

Asian hipster dude with massive head: If you insist on blasting Kelly Clarkson and miscellaneous Asian power balladeers through your $10 Samsung ear buds, I will have to bring a power drill on the train and run it at full power and hopefully channel the noise directly into your ear drums. This will spare me and the other 20 people within earshot of your god awful music from the vomit inducing pain that you have chosen to inflict upon us, and will hopefully quicken your inevitable hearing loss. It's only fair. By the way, the 80s called and they want their guitar licks, reverb, and mullets back.

The following headphones are 20 dollars and they are sound isolating. This means you can keep your god damned noise confined in your own aural cavities so that your poor eardrums are the only ones assaulted. I spent $200 on mine so that my god awful noise would be kept to myself. All I ask is that you do 1/10th of what I did.


Slow-Walkers
When you're downtown during rush hour, please realize that most people want to get to work in reasonable time and will therefore walk at a reasonably brisk pace. We're not trying to break records, but we also don't want to lollygag around. So if you're too fat or too old to walk at rush hour pace, keep to the right. It's that simple - just keep to the right so that people with fully functioning legs that don't have to support 300 extra pounds can walk past you at twice the speed. Maybe you should try walking a bit faster too for yourself. It's decent exerci.. FUCKING WINDOWS UPDATE GAAARRAAAAHHHH.

Driving 101

Posted by Johnny at 10:38 a.m.

Ok, this is fucking unbelievable. How did this woman get a driver's license? Clearly, our testing criteria is too lenient.

You can't like everything

Posted by Johnny at 9:09 a.m.

Whenever I ask someone what kind of music they enjoy, I occasionally get the response "Oh, I like pretty much everything." This raises some flags. You can't like everything - it's just not possible. When I dig deeper, they usually say, "yeah, I'll listen to rock, country, rap, hip-hop... you know... everything." Ah, yes, everything.

If I had more free time, I would continue these conversation by challenging them on their umbrella statement - the surprisingly narrow "everything." I know for a fact that amongst the ~800 albums I have scattered around my hard drive, I will find something that they will hate. Ideally, it will be something that causes them physical pain to listen to, but I would also accept moderate discomfort.

Many pop music aficionados will grimace when they hear heavy metal, stare blankly when they hear some jazz fusion, or yawn when they hear classical orchestral art music; this isn't enough. I want them at the very least to scratch their heads and at the very most to plug their ears. If my iPod had more capacity, I would carry around a collection of weird music, listed below, in order to help people avoid using the word "everything" due to naivety.

On the off-chance that they enjoy the music the first time they hear it, I would question their aural comprehension abilities, because even a slut for the musically bizarre like me didn't enjoy most of the following list upon first listen, and there is some stuff that I respect more than I enjoy. Without further ado, here is a list of some music I have, much of which I own, ordered by increasing strangeness. Bonus points if you can guess the artist/album names.

1. An eclectic outing by the guitarist of the recently dubbed, "biggest band in the world," that is low fidelity cross between folk and post-punk. It was apparently recorded on his living room floor.
2. A record of film music as interpreted by an avant metal band named after the anti-hero of a series of legendary French crime novels.
3. An infamous and non-famous California "rock" band (now defunct) recorded an album that experimented with genres from death metal to free jazz to surf music. One song was a ten minute lo-fi masterpiece that ended with 20-30 seconds of ear-splitting static. In another song, the singer invented a new phonetic vocabulary/language for the lyrics.
   
4. A record by the same avant metal band as in #2 in which they composed one song per day in April 2005, titled the songs accordingly, and arranged it such that it sounds like someone channel surfing through cartoons with a heavy metal soundtrack. Oh, and there aren't any lyrics, per se.
5. A record of compositions created from the complete destruction and rearrangement of existing pop music by the father of sampling (who took it 50x farther than anyone would ever go).
6. A 70s album that covers pop music from the 60s, but conceptualizes its mind numbing catchiness as fascism in disguise. Thus, the songs are torn up, chewed, and spit out and arranged into two side length pieces. The cover has a picture of Dick Clark dressed as Hitler holding a carrot.
7. Three albums by a New Jersey hardcore band that pushes the genre farther than anyone else. Seemingly random tempo/time signature changes, shockingly technical guitar and drum lines, screamed lyrics - they have it all. This is not screamo.
8. A record of live jam sessions by the prog outing for one of the worlds most inventive guitarists, edited in such a way that the album plays out as a single composition. No vocals, just a heavy, moody, and exhilarating oddity of instrumentals.
9. A 20 minute composition with an ever-increasing tempo (starting at 40 bpm and ending at >400 bpm) comprised of split second samples from 1001 pop songs that were available from the introduction of the CD until 1993. The samples are arranged such that they create an entirely new piece of music with often intriguing lyrics.
10. A record of hell-inspired noisecore by an avant-garde free jazz saxophonist with the help of some Californian experimental types. Apparently the vocalist suffered a migraine after the 8 hour recording session.
11. A double-album of live Japanese noise sludgecore.
12. A 45 minute song consisting of a single guitar/drum metal riff that undergoes a slight transformation every few minutes. Virtuoso musicianship aside, it is almost entirely unlistenable.
    
13. An album that contains both the studio and live versions of a 30 minute piece that sees concert A (440 Hz) undergoing slow transformations, occasionally adding octaves, harmonics, and other sound effects. Yes, you read that right: 30 minutes of concert A.
    

Maintenance: a response

Posted by Johnny at 9:52 a.m.

This post is in response to Kevin's latest post. Think of it as a supercomment.

40

Eight to five times five.
Waste away, waste today.
Awake, I dream
Of sleep.

A new day,
The same day.
Same people,
Same state.

Power to change,
or procrastinate.
Power of faith,
and doubt.

How long will
a known question
have no answer?
Tomorrow, always.

Taken without permission from flunkeddivine.blogspot.com.
© 2007 flunkeddivine.

Amongst some other pithy stuff, this poem, to me, has summed up the disillusionment of working in IT for an extended period of time. Upon graduation, some computer folks think that working in IT will be fun because they can do what they do best, which is geeking it up all the live long day. But what they don't realize is that they're going to spend at least 7 hours of their work day doing what I consider to be the least satisfying part of life: performing maintenance. I don't know how you feel about maintenance, but I deplore it.

Some acts of maintenance are vital and necessary for life, such as eating and exercising, and others are vital and necessary for (eventual) reproduction, such as showering and brushing teeth, but acts like shovelling the driveway intrinsically carry less incentive. Have we not solved these problems yet? Are there not automated systems for performing these household duties?

The two most profitable industries, in my mind, are health care and maintenance. (One might argue that this is redundant because what is health care, if not bodily maintenance?) IT, a subindustry of maintenance, is also highly profitable because Kevin's and my future industry, software engineering, will move further and further away from perfection and increase the need for maintenance, thus creating more IT jobs. This is inevitable. As the size and complexity of software increases, the less perfect it can be.

This idea can be further abstracted and applied to life in general, and I'm most likely rehashing the ideas of many 20th century philosophers. As we strive, in middle class western society, to reduce maintenance so that we might enjoy an extra modicum of our lives, we will inevitably invent technology to help us achieve the unachievable, and it will require maintenance. Instead of removing maintenance, we are merely shifting it.

Let's take, for example, my gripe with snow removal. My driveway is very long and very narrow, which makes shovelling snow an altogether frustrating experience. I would easily pay $1000 for a robot to sit outside of my house and shovel the driveway at the first sign of snow. I'm sure that in a few years, this technology will exist and it will be affordable, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it will be worth it.

Robots, as with driveways, need maintenance. They have some kind of power source that needs replenishment, they have moving metallic parts that need lubrication, and, worst of all, they have software that needs patching. I can easily see a design flaw causing my driveway robot to start shovelling my lawn or the street or a neighbour's driveway. A patch to prevent this flaw might involve RF transmitters placed at the boundaries of the shovelling area so that the robot stays confined to the driveway.

The next flaw could be a physical component of the robot that prevents it from adapting to the lumpiness of a 30-year-old driveway, which would entail sending the robot into the factory for upgrades. And what happens if the robot tips over, or is unable to clean the snow from its snow and boundary sensors? Is it even worth it?

Some of you, the traditionalists, are probably shouting "NO!" into your monitors. "Just pick up a damn shovel!" I professed to deploring maintenance at the beginning of the article, and so if using a shovel amounted to less time spent on maintenance than using a driveway shovelling robot, I would opt for the shovel.

On the other hand, the only reason I am employable is because western society is obsessed with maintenance reduction, and projects like the Driveway Bot 2000 cause the anti-maintenites among us to salivate with lazy fervour. Robots need software and I just happen to be a software engineer. How convenient! Better start writing the course materials for Robot Maintenance 101...

Ah, humanity...

Posted by Johnny at 10:30 a.m.

Is this real? I highly doubt it, but it's damn funny.

The screenshot of the original source material is here, but I have painstakingly typed it out for your proper enjoyment.

This is entitled Burnt Cooter.

ok this is what happening,

my parents are out with family friends, and they'll be back any minute so i need your help

Heres some background:

see, i volunteer on my sisters softball team (i'm 22, the girls are 15)

and whatever yea i met this girl, her name is Alison, and we were going out for a while. We have alot in common, sometimes I help her with homework. I helped her on this english essay and she still got a D. This is because the teacher is a prick ...anywayz

So she came over like an hour ago, and i really want to lose my virginity, so i ask her to have sex

"no, no i cant, its not right" she said, but i told her "don't worry i know what im doing, ill be done in like 10 seconds, pluss ill give you 2 n64 games if you say yes"

So I gave her Diddy Kong Racing, and Ken Griffey Jr Baseball, and then she goes to my room. Shes a bit confused and scarred.

Then i think to myself - yo I need lube right? Cuz i heard you guys on the vesti saying you need to lube up her clit otherwise it wont fit in properly.

Ok so i have no lube, but i really want to lose my virginity - so i grab some butter from the fridge, but its cold, it wont melt - so I microwaved it for 8 minutes, and then i put it in a glass and poured it on her cooter, and now shes saying i burned it.

I dont know what to do, my parents are going to be back any minute and shes crying in the bathroom plz help you guyz are relly smrat and please help me.

Any idea how to shut her up? Should i give her another n64 game?

I believe that this is fake for two reasons.

1. I don't know anyone stupid enough to have sex for N64 games
2. I don't know anyone stupid enough to microwave butter for 8 minutes, regardless of where they intend to put it.
   

Sept 11-related divorce

Posted by Johnny at 12:35 p.m.

This is awesome. I'm not sure when the clip appeared in the paper, or which paper it is, but it's funny:


I think I'd rather be divorced than dead. Life lesson: cheat on your significant other.

A collection of pointless stories

Posted by Johnny at 11:24 a.m.

Story 1 - The Train
I was riding the train this morning and when we got into downtown, this crazy lady started saying things like, "Fuck! Why isn't this train going faster?" and, "Jesus Christ, this can't be happening to me. Go fucking faster! God damn it!" It was weird, then I got off the train.

Story 2 - Oasis ripped off Mr. Bungle
I heard an Oasis song yesterday, called "Let There Be Love," from the album they released last year and the intro is pretty much a direct rip-off of the Mr. Bungle song, "Retrovertigo," which was released in 1999. The Bungle song is way better.

Story 3 - Pool Last Night
Reid and I played pool last night. It was fun.

Story 4 - Substitute Prof (a.k.a. Meta Storytelling 101)
I'm going to tell you a story. In second year, my Signals & Transforms prof was away for a week, so one of her PhD students filled in for her. He decided to tell us a story about his undergrad experience, the details of which I cannot recall. He did, however, prefix the story by saying, "I'm going to tell you a story," then he told the story, which had no point whatsoever, then he said, "So, that was a good story. I'm glad I told it." And so were we. So, that was a good story. I'm glad I told it.

Happy 2007

Posted by Johnny at 9:13 a.m.

I was going to do some kind of extrospective post about the state of affairs in the year 2007 and what I hoped for the future, but time is money and I'm not made of money, people. So then I thought about doing some kind of introspective post about my state of affairs in the year 2007, but that would just bore you. Maybe I'll save that for my 1 year anniversary of singlehood at the end of this month, assuming I make it there (and chances are great). Finally, a recap of my 10 days off would be reasonably pointless, since most of the people who read this blag were present for most of what I would have written about.

Instead of all that pseudo-philosophical bullshit, I present to you, as a late Christmas present, the worst album covers ever (from here). If I find any more today that aren't on the previously mentioned site, I'll post them.

[Edit: This is probably a fake]


















The guy in front is now a US Congressman.

I love you all (well, most of you).

[Edit: Here is another album cover, from this webpage. It looks real to me.]