internet flotsam

[jazzfish]

Parenting baffles me (LJ): Signal-boosting myself from over the weekend, because I know a bunch of very smart people and y'all should read their comments.

Parking tickets by the truckload: "Eighteen companies have special accounts with the city to pay off parking tickets in bulk." Because it's cheaper to pay the fines than to comply with the law. This is arguably a benign instance of the phenomenon; now imagine it extended to, well, to anything. Workplace safety regulations, truth-in-advertising laws, what have you.

Ice Cubes recipe: "I am publishing this recipe, because I am sure that there are other families who have members who don't know how or have forgotten how to make ice when the ice tray is empty." Hilarity ensues in the recipe reviews.

Chutzpam: "In other words, the estimable businessmen and women at realinsurance.com.au have been paying SEO companies to spam the comment sections of sites around the globe. But now Google’s new search algorithms are making that legacy spam really damaging. So now they’re sending out cease and desist notices to the victims of their earlier spamming demanding that they search their archives and remove their spam."

The Phone Stack: "Whoever picks up their phone is footing the bill." I'm lucky enough (or wise enough) in my choice of acquaintances that this has never been a problem, but if it were I could endorse something like this.

Alignment Chart: Gary Oldman, because Gary Oldman is the single most versatile actor working today.

Two percent.

After Taking Beyond the Relational Paradox of Bringing It Back in Seriously, Revisited: "[W]e are not Taking anything Seriously." Because I enjoy Kieran's deadpan cliche snark, that's why. (Viz. The New Catechism of Cliche.)

Things In My Cabinet: This Land Is My Land: "I stopped being conscious of how I looked. Completely." I have no idea what to say about this, but it is insightful and important.

Comments

[plumbob78]

And now I want to watch Rosencrantz and Guildenstern again. It's been less than 12 months. This is not good for the entertainment schedule.

[jazzfish]

I'm unable to see the problem here. :) You could always watch Leon...

[vvalkyri.livejournal.com]

hm. re phones, I've been burned a few times by putting the phone to silent b/c I'm with someone. Once, a friend called late one night when her father in law died suddenly; I was up, but didn't know until I left for home a couple hours later and figured she'd no longer be up. I think that call would have merited interrupting my evening.

I tend to look at the phone and decide whether the call is likely to be a just-say-hi or 'wait, this person never calls.' Sometimes I might answer, "hi, I'm out with friends, is this important?" or more recently I sent a call to voicemail and txted that I was at a gathering, and was it important. It turned out that yes, it was, but could wait until later.

That said, hanging out with someone for several hours, or being at an informal gathering, is different from making it through dinner.

[jazzfish]

That last point's highly relevant. If I'm going to be hanging out with someone for longer than a couple of hours I don't so much mind the occasional "this might be important i'll make sure it doesn't take too long if it isn't." If I'm meeting folks for dinner, I'd be much more likely to develop low-grade annoyance. (In practice I don't meet many people for 'just dinner' so it's a moot point.)

[selki.livejournal.com]

I don't understand why more folks don't use the call-twice method. If it's just a chatty call, just call once (in an evening). If it's urgent, call in quick succession.

[jazzfish]

I think (*think*) the idea is more for work-related things? I dunno. Like I say, it's never been a big problem for me.

[skreidle.livejournal.com]

Best response reblog-title for 2%: "I own so much shit who the fuck even knows if I have a kindle". :)