Voodoo Time Dot Com

So it’s time to move again. We moved here about 3 weeks before I started this site back in March 2002. Since then, I’ve changed jobs. Now driving 60 miles, and spending between two and three hours in the car each weekday is beginning to command an unacceptable share of my time and is gradually sapping my will to live.

Now in the interest of saving money on gas and Zoloft, the only solution seems to be to move closer to where I work in West L.A. And as I do not make the requisite six-figure income necessary to afford a home in this God-forsaken town, we will be moving into another apartment.

As bad an attitude as I sometimes have about apartment living, it can actually be a pretty sweet deal. Probably the greatest convenience is the fact that I never have to spend a weekend afternoon behind a lawnmower. Instead, this is accomplished by no fewer than three dozen landscapers with lawnmowers, leaf-blowers, and jack-hammers at 4:30am each Saturday morning. Similarly, should the flushing action in our toilet spontaneously reverse itself, launching a septic geyser all over the bathroom, I don’t have to fix it. No indeed. I merely need to call the front office, and wait one to three days until someone from Facilities can come by to snake out the can.

Now we just have to wade through the whitewash of ambiguity spilled all over the classifieds. Apparently, every apartment in the greater Los Angeles area is “charming, spacious, and bright” and in a “great neighborhood”. Risking a clichéd what they say vs. what they mean routine, I’d like to take a moment to clear up the smoke to expose these slumlords’ devious schemes.

“Bright” - The walls are painted white.

“Will consider pets“ - …for a $500 deposit.

“Airy” - Keep the windows open, because this place has no air-conditioning.

“Month-to-month rent” - $1100 this month, $1200 next month, $1500 the next month…

“Panoramic view” - …of the freeway.

I’m starting to think that the best that we can hope for is a closet in a crackhouse next to the airport.

…umm, I mean a “Charming junior suite, centrally-located, shopping nearby”.

Bye for now.

OK, so it’s been a week since my last entry. Yet again, I’ve managed to prove my complete inability to focus on what’s important in life - namely, coming up with inane and irrelevant things to write about and wasting everyone’s bandwidth. As usual, I don’t really have any explanation for my absence, but I assure you it is not related to terrorism.

So I got the news today that I am to pursue my MCSE certification. For the unfamiliar, MCSE stands for Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer. This basically means that I have to spend the next year studying like a medical student for the honor of taking seven exhaustively comprehensive exams. Should I succeed, I get the honor of a shiny lapel pin and a wallet-sized credential identifying me as some sort of Windows guru. In exchange for this, I must promise to be thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent. Also, I think I’m no longer allowed to disparage or malign Microsoft.

In addition to selling my soul, my employer also wants to indenture me for a year following my certification to ensure that I don’t skip out for a better offer once they’ve laid out the $150 per exam to get me certified. This all clearly confirms my assertion that I am less an employee than a well-paid slave. Still, the master feeds me and keeps me warm (if only just barely), which is more than I could claim during my brief period of unemployment last year. So, I shan’t complain… too much.

The problem lies in the fact that once I left college, I promised I would never again take another exam as long as I lived. So, I’m more than a little disgruntled at the idea of spending untold consecutive weekends huddled over ponderous books and tedious practice exams. Still, that shiny lapel pin distracts my thoughts and haunts my dreams. So I shall continue on - taking solace in the conviction that such majesty may - nay - will soon be mine. Buoyed by these giddiest of fancies, I fasten my backpack and propeller beanie and hit the books, singing - tearfully, earnestly…

To dream the impossible dream,
To fight the unbeatable foe,
To bear with unbearable sorrow,
To run where the brave dare not go…

Bye for now.

So a couple of people noticed that I haven’t written anything here for a couple days (more or less), so I’ve been given orders to be funny immediately, or suffer unspecified consequences. Once in college, a friend of mine brought a girl around for me to meet. She was nice, but we weren’t exactly hitting it off. So my friend pulls me aside and whispers,

“Dude, I told her you’re funny. Say something funny!”

Oh… be funny! Silly me, I had just planned on telling her about the tragic lawnmower death of my favorite childhood pet. (That didn’t really happen - I’m just trying to be funny.) So I tried to be funny. I really wanted to be funny. It didn’t happen. Now we’re going to share a similar moment of awkwardness as I fail to be funny on command.

So…

I told you all yesterday that I was a little tied-up with a minor disaster at work. Disasters kind of take away my funny. There is really no non-technical way to describe what happened, but think of it this way. Have you ever tried to put a hat on a baby who didn’t want to wear a hat? The hat is the right size for the baby, and it goes so well with the baby’s little outfit and everything. But everytime you put that hat on the baby, the baby just rips it off and starts chewing on it - or throws it to the ground.

Dammit, baby! Why won’t you wear the hat? It’s so cute, and it keeps the sun off your head, and out of your eyes!

Anyway, that’s what I’ve been wrestling with for over a week. The baby is our web server running Microsoft’s IIS. The hat is an applications server called Tomcat that, among other things, allows IIS to serve Javascript pages. If you don’t know what that means, here’s what happened: The baby took a crap, so I had to clean it up. Then once I changed the diaper, and the outfit was all snapped up nicely, the damn baby wouldn’t wear the hat. The hat was made specifically for the baby, but the baby wouldn’t wear it. After much wailing and gnashing of teeth, I found out that the baby will only wear the hat if I put it on in a very unintuitive and complicated way. It took forever to find out all of this, but at least the baby is finally wearing the hat.

This is why I have no children.

Bye for now.

Today I found out about web cliques. Apparently, a web clique is a group of sites with some common purpose or content. And just like in high school, some cliques are very exclusive, based on aesthetics or content (the pretty girls), while others will take whoever will join them (Science club).

And just like in high school, the Pretty Girls™ still probably won’t let you sit with them… or date them. Let’s face it - you’re too short, you dress funny, and you have a dumb cowlick. And you still ride your bicycle to school. I mean, you don’t even play varsity sports, for crying out loud. Any self-respecting Pretty Girl™ has to be able to wear her boyfriend’s letterman’s jacket around. And how are you going to go out for a movie and milkshakes on your bicycle anyway?!

Justis’s high school memories…

Good times…

Anyway, I’m thinking of starting a clique for people with websites who go for long periods of time without updating, since I seem to be rather exemplary of this sort of behavior. All you have to do to join is to neglect your site for days or even weeks at a time.

See you in a couple weeks!

There are things we Southern Californians expect during the summer months. One of these things is warm weather. Normal summer temperatures are in the mid-70s to mid-80s along the coast, mid-80s to mid-90s inland, and in the desert communities, temperatures over 100 F are disturbingly common. Another truth of our existence is the fact that we are a tourist mecca. Summer traffic is heavier, and most locals avoid places like Disneyland as if our lives depended on it.

Another feature of the Southern California summer is smog. While hardly unique to Southern California, the orange-brown haze of nitrogen oxides and carbonous particulate matter is inescapable here. From mid-July through August, a chemical cocktail hangs in the air waiting patiently to begin its slow burn of unsuspecting mucous membranes and respiratory tissues. Last Friday, Southern California was under a Stage 1 smog alert for the first time since 1998. A Stage 1 Alert is the second worst of five air quality levels determined by a Pollution Standard Index (PSI) score.

Good - Very low PSI. A great day to run a marathon.

Moderate - Decent air quality for healthy persons. But those with emphysema should not run marathons on a “moderate” day. Otherwise, think of a “moderate” day as a suntan for your lungs!

Unhealthful - Unfortunately, this is a standard level for most inland communities during the summer here. Often a Health Advisory will be issued on an “unhealthful” day. But no one really takes it seriously. After all, how can you trust air you can’t see?

Very Unhealthful - Also known as a Stage 1 Alert. A Stage 1 day is a bad day for a marathon. Also bad for ditch digging, power walking, helping friends move, or eXtreme gardening.

Hazardous - Also known as the Stage 2 Alert. Don’t even go outside. The air is packed to saturation with solid waste. You’re extremely likely to inhale a turd if go outside without some system of alternative oxygen delivery on a Stage 2 day.

Well, that was my best smog joke, so I think I’ll just stop here. Anyway, if you visit L.A. this summer, and you plan on breathing, consider yourself warned.

Bye for now.

On Tuesday, I learned a painful lesson about growing older. I have a sunburn… on my head.

I’m one of those lucky guys who began battling male-pattern baldness at about 21 years of age, and now at 26, the end of the battle is near, and the reinforcements have not arrived. So I’m in that period of awkward hair styles where there’s just nothing I can do to make things any better, and I still haven’t gotten drunk enough yet to shave it all off.

Anyway, I ate lunch al fresco on Tuesday in beautiful, and very sunny Santa Monica. When you’ve had hair all your life, there are things you never think about. One of these things is UV protection for your scalp, as this is arguably the most utilitarian feature of hair. Just one hour in the midday Southern California sun changed all that for me in a hurry. After such brutal punishment from our neighborhood star, hats are the order of the day from now on. But in the meantime my head is red and painful. Soon it will be itchy and flaky, and I’ll look as if I have the mange - which is cool in its own countercultural way, I suppose. I mean… who gets the mange?

And now, on to the matter of my mid-life crisis. If I’m going to lose my hair early, I might as well get the earring and sportscar out of the way too. And when all you other guys are having your respective crises around 50, I’ll have had mine over twenty years ago. By then I’ll already be well-adjusted in my snappy driving cap, waiting to welcome you all to the club with a scotch and soda.

Bye for now.

For some time now I’ve been growing increasingly interested in the study of physics. For those who have mentally blocked such unpleasant high school memories, physics is the science of matter and energy and the interactions thereof. Physics is simultaneously the study of the very smallest components of the universe, and of the very largest forces and bodies in the universe - including the very universe itself. The ultimate goal of physics, in a nutshell, is to discover the rules under which all forces in the universe interact. The end result being definitive methods by which anything in the universe could be calculated with reasonable precision.

Fascinating. But this all smells suspiciously of mathematics…

And not surprisingly, this is, indeed, the case. Unfortunately there is only so far one can delve into the study of physics before a fairly sophisticated understanding of math is required. This presents a bit of a problem for such as myself, as I officially do not do math. This is not to say that I do not have a fundamental understanding of mathematical concepts. I can, for example, quite easily find the hypotonotoneuesse of a right triangle (given the lengths of the other two sides, of course) despite the fact that I cannot spell it. Beyond high school algebra, however, I am completely inept.

So, in the interest of personal embetterment, I have taken it upon myself to learn calculus. And furthermore, in the interest of not increasing my current student loan debt, I will be teaching myself. In legal circles it is said that he who represents himself in a court of law has a fool for a client. And I am convinced that he who teaches himself calculus stands amongst an entire classroom of fools.

But consider this. Isaac Newton was probably the most brilliant man of his day. He discovered that the force that caused bodies on Earth to fall the the ground was the very same force that kept the Earth itself in the spinning grasp of the sun. It was Newton who discovered that white light was the aggregate of every color in the visible spectrum, and it was he who first separated them through a prism. And when Newton found that the mathematical constructs of the day were insufficient for the complex calculations he was doing, he invented calculus. He did all of this by the age of 25.

I am 26. I bought a book.

Me go learn to math good…

Bye for now.

Learn a foreign language.

Pretend to be a cab driver and talk into your rear-view mirror.

Listen to talk radio with the bass cranked up and your windows rolled down. Rhythmically bob your head.

Read a book or the newspaper. Just be sure to cut a horizontal strip out of the center so you can still see the road.

Build a sun shield for your side window with sticky notes.

Grow a moustache.

Bounce quarters into the ashtray.

Try taking off your socks without removing your shoes.

Practice Morse Code with your car’s horn.

Pretend not to watch people pretending not to pick their noses.

Make your own list of things to do in LA traffic instead of impaling yourself in desperation on your own shift lever.

For the last two nights, I watched Russia: Land of the Tsars on the History Channel. Really interesting stuff… Russia was one of the last world powers to retain an absolute monarchy - lasting until the ousting of Tsar Nicholas II by the Bolsheviks in 1917. Nicholas II was the last of the Romanov dynasty - a family ruling by divine right for over 300 years.

So I was thinking a little about what it must have been like to rule a nation of millions at whim. If I were Tsar Justis I, what kinds of things would I be likely to do? Mostly, the Tsars just started a lot of wars and had a lot of people killed. I don’t think I’m the killin’-folks kind of tsar. But that doesn’t mean that the serfs should start getting all uppity. Siberia is really big, and only a train ride away, you know…

I think it would be much more fun to be the crazy tsar. All of the really nutty monarchs throughout history are truly fascinating. For example, King George III of Britain spoke to trees. King Ludwig II of Bavaria (now Germany) fancied himself a tragic hero, and was a devoted fan of operatic composer Richard Wagner. Ludwig nearly bankrupted his kingdom building enormous fairy tale castles with moats and secret caverns.

So, I’m thinking it would be kind of fun to be Justis the Mad. First, I would have to become an eccentric. I would begin referring to myself in the third person. Then I would cultivate unreasonable phobias, wear odd clothing, and collect exotic animals. And after I reached this Michael Jackson level of oddity… Then I’d get really weird.

By royal decree, all subjects shall immediately change their names to ‘Marvin’, regardless of gender. Henceforth, the collective citizenry of our kingdom shall be referred to as Justis and the Marvins.

Furthermore, all Marvins shall adorn the outside of their homes with a number of garden gnomes, appropriately and intriguingly posed.

Any and all civil litigation between Marvins shall be resolved not in a court of law, but rather by an organized break-dancing competition.

Long live the King. Long live the Marvins.

Bye for now.

You owe it to yourself to watch “Most Extreme Elimination Challenge” on TNN. It’s a reproduction of some Japanese show called Takeshi’s Castle. It’s on Saturday and Sunday nights. Check your local listings.

Anyway, Takeshi’s Castle is one of those Japanese extreme game shows where people do really stupid things for no prize other than humiliation and personal injury. I’ve been watching this show for three weeks now, and I’ve come to realize a fundamental truth of humankind. People getting hurt is really funny. We all know we’re not supposed to laugh when people get hurt. But there is something undeniably hilarious about a guy in tight shorts and a bicycle helmet being knocked over by a huge polystyrene boulder.

I know I’m supposed to feel guilty about that. So I apologize to the hundreds of Japanese people I saw falling down, running into things, being tackled by costumed ruffians, and sliding face first into the mud; because I laughed at all of them. I also apologize to the anonymous student I saw fall on the ice back in college when I was at Iowa State. Watching that poor guy flap his arms like a chicken on his way down was one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen.