Monthly Archives: August 2004

Sudden Reappear Rance

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Rance is back for a quick one, and sounding a bit anxious about the next step: how to keep blogging without getting bogged down with hundreds of comments per post. He wants to preserve the community that’s sprung up; dang me if he isn’t surprised and touched that there is one.

I commented that David could set up a mailing list, but that other community members (hee! that’s us!) might prefer something more like a discussion forum or board, or find some other way to moderate comments so as to take the load off the AS.

Of course, I still think he could switch to Blogger, which is free, anonymous, has fairly decent commenting and is easy to configure. I think there might be a moderation option of some sort, too. However, getting several dozen comments per post might still overwhelm it – don’t know.

What do you guys think? Is there any interest in heading in the direction of a group-moderated blog such as Fark or BoingBoing or Slashdot? or figuring out how to use any of the various free or free-ish scripts for creating moderated or unmoderated discussion forums?

Am I nuts for offering to host a mailing list, knowing that I’d be probably be stuck being List Goddess? Yep. Fortunately, it’s likely a moot point, since my impression is that R would prefer to have some control over the moderating process.

I could be wrong – he may be happy to hand over moderating responsibilities to the ravening masses (us again, whee!) and let us handle the interpersonal stuff by our own big selves.

One last note: the AS may wish to check out how they handle things over at high-traffic blogs such as Making Light , where Teresa has comments threads hundreds of posts long. Also: AAR doesn’t have comments, but Al Franken’s blog does – it routinely gets about 400 comments per piece. Caveat: a lotta trolls, and not much control other than IP banning. Both of the preceding blogs are MT installations, requiring the use of a haxor dude or dudette familiar with the ins and outs of Moveable Type for the initial setup. And there would need to be a hosting service. Meh. Probably too much to bother with in the interests of preserving anonymity.

Smart Ken has a very nice site, with a good interface for comments. What’s that software you’re using, Ken?

Edited to add: this excellent lighter. We’ll keep the Zippo lit for ya, R.

.^
/M\
\()/
_|_
[ R ]
| A |}
| N |
| C |
[_E_]

Art Cow Held Hostage: Day 1

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STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – Swedish graffiti artists kidnapped a fiber-glass cow from the international art exhibit CowParade, held power drills to its head and threatened to “sacrifice” it unless the sculptures were declared “non-art.”

A video sent to a newspaper showed the cow flanked by two masked, black-clad figures wielding power drills in front of a sign reading “Stockholm’s Militant Graffiti Artists.”

“We demand that the cows are declared non-art. Otherwise the hostage will be sacrificed,” said a voice on the video. The group gave the organizers of the Stockholm exhibit till noon on Aug. 23 to comply with their demand.

I support this radical action, as I actually suffered the humiliation of dressing as an Chicacowgo Art Cow named Dean Mootin for a Halloween costume competition at work. It was part of a group entry that included Frank Cownatra and Sammy Davis Moonior. We were the Cow Pat Pack. And yes, we sang (or mooed) our signature tunes.

That was when I started everyone at the office my “cow-orkers.”

The next night at a party, I was again an Art Cow, but this time I was a Paint-By-Numbers Art Cow. I wore another Tyvek white coverall, drew in blank numbered piebald shapes, and invited people to color them in using Sharpie pens in different hues. David went as an Art Cowboy and did all the really fun ones, like on my butt and chest. Yep, humiliations galore, but it was a fun time.

The Art Cow moovement is insidious and must be stopped. Only last year, there were Art Ponies in Arlington Heights, and even my beloved Seattle got in on the act with Art Swine. In Utah, there are Art Moose (or Art Meese, if you prefer).

In solidarity with Stockholm’s Militant Graffiti Artists! Bad Art Must Die!

Napa Valley Memories

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napawine013

Travel is such a broadening experience.

Especially when you eat as much good food and drink as much good wine (well, not that much, really) as we did. Plus, the mud helped sweat some of the toxins out of our bodies, or so we like to tell ourselves.

And it certainly helps to give us new perspectives on life (at first this image was loaded sideways – almost left it that way). Anyway, the images will soon be loaded in a new album in my gallery. They will include some rather scary mudbath pictures as well as pictures of Steve eating the entire "small plates" menu at All Seasons, Calistoga. N t to mention a bunch of pictures from the Stinking Rose. In the meantime, I've had a couple of cups of delicious jasmine pearl tea that was a gift from David's friend Adam Sah. He had bought it on his walk from his office to the restaurant; he may have stopped off somewhere like this place to purchase it. And yes, the tiny pearls of jasmine-scented tea really do unfurl as the tea brews; it's a heavenly scented infusion, too. I have a feeling that I'll be buying an Asian-style tea service soon, as my sturdy British teapot and bone china mug from England aren't quite the right style.

 

Suddenly Reminded of My College Years

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SEATTLE, Aug 18 (Reuters) – A black bear was found passed out at a campground in Washington state recently after guzzling down three dozen cans of a local beer, a campground worker said on Wednesday.

Why, do you ask? This story will probably explain why the news of the bear on a beer binge rain with the header “Raaaaaaaiiiii-neeeeeeeeeiiiirrrrrr-beeeeeeeeeaaaaarrrrrrr.”

Yep, drink a lot of Rainiers, pass out amongst the empties, become fodder for a photo op.

Good times.

“The Best Food Teacher Who Ever Lived”

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Alton Brown on the passing of Julia Child:

She gave birth to the modern American cook, to TV cooks, and one might argue, American food in general. She was and always will be our Queen Mother and our den mother, a perfect blend of fun, passion, style and knowledge all wrapped up in a willing self-depreciation that made us all feel a little better about dropping that chicken on the floor.

Oh, God, don’t remind me of the chicken on the floor incident. Oops. Heh.

“Forged In The Fires Of Home Depot”

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Heh! PVP’s got a good gag going about LARP – live action roleplay.

Come to think of it, in the gag commercial for Atlantis with the people “auditioning,” the one guy in the homemade Jaffa armor has a “realistic foam latex” staff weapon. Must remember to point that out to David next time.

Ostrich In Time: Knaves Whine

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Hey, if it’s Tuesday, this must be Severe Thunderstorm Warning Bug night on TV! Every week, 2 minutes into TAR, it’s the SAME goddamn thing. At least the local affiliate knows better now than to interrupt the show with stupid storm warnings that I just have to ignore as hard as I can.

This may not be a good policy on my part, especially if a tornado sneaks up on me from behind. Fortunately, the basement is nearby, and I could still watch the show on the new TV card software David has on his computer down here (snicker). Yeah, that would be a smart move.

Oh, my GOD. Charla and Mirna gone. And with that, it’s official: a Roadblock is a task that only Charla may perform (especially if it’s something disGUSting). Mirna only performed one roadblock in their Race career, and even then she tried to get Charla to do it because she was “afraid” of the little calves in Argentina. Yeah, that’s right, the calves that were quite a bit taller and much, much faster than Charla.

Dang, this team was irritating yet endlessly entertaining, and I’ll sure miss my weekly Desperanto lesson. This week, we learned the Arabic for “Don’t help these Americans, they’re violent,” and once again were shown that an exotic accent makes English understandable in every country of the world. Roll those R’s on Nairobi, habibi, the nice man from Gulf Air will understand you better.

My new favorite team to LOATHE with blazing television-viewing eyes of fire is Colin and Christie. Everyone else that’s left is reasonably pleasant, with the exception of the annoying Godels (Brandon, shut up already about God. You’re embarassing Her). And I was confused by Nicky’s inability to run… maybe she’d have done better to wear something other than tight-ass jeans? In Egypt and Africa? She looked wiped out.

But oh, the loathing for Colin was more than fulfilled tonight at the Roadblock, which was another eating task where a Racer had to open, measure and cook most of an entire ostrich egg, then eat it. Hey, kids! Next week, dysentery! Yay!

That’s right, Mr. Intensity; dump your ostrich egg on the mat, try to scam the taskmaster with a 3/4 full bowl, then attempt to scoop spilled egg up off the mat to make up the difference. Try again with another egg: this time, watch intently as half your eggwhites slither over the edge of the bowl just to get away from you. Now have a nice meltdown and throw stuff around because you wish us to know how incredibly intense you are about doing this shit perfectly.

And yes, this 5-gallon bucket’s for you, Mr. Intensity Giant-Scrambled-Egg Cooking Man.

Thank GOD the sound editor chose not to use the tape from Colin’s body mike when he was repeatedly inspecting the bottom of his bucket (thoughtfully provided by the management of the Kavishe Hotel). That I could not have taken, and I suspect it might have touched off a Complete and Total Barf-O-Rama with the other Racers in the eating arena.

Everyone managed to get through the eggs eventually, but the Twin (Kami, for sure) that took on the task whined and complained that it was too much. Sadly for the Desperantos, it wasn’t enough too much to keep the “fast girls” from completing the task ahead of them.

What do you wanna bet that was the Windiest! Pitstop! Ever! that night? Heh!

Trendspotters will note that while last season was TAR4: The Year of the Poo, this season we have TAR5: The Agony and the Eggstacy!