Also...

...today is longer than yesterday. Woo hoo!

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Darfur

Riding home the other night, a twisty train of thought led me to Darfur and to wondering what, exactly, is going on there. Interestingly, I received an email entitled "Opportunity to help Darfur" the very next day. The email was great for several reasons:

• I love it when the universe lines things up like that.
• I love it when my friends are involved in neat projects.
• It reminded me to look for news regarding the Darfur conflict, even though I haven't totally followed through on that. Yet.
• It also reminded me that my annual donations to OPB and Mercy Corps should be made soon for tax purposes.

Here's what the email said:

Rebecca, I have been participating in the design of a fuel efficient wood cook stove to help the internally displaced people in large camps in Darfur. Our group has completed small scale trials with representative end users in the camps, and we are now at the point of trying to ambitiously increase the scale of production (most fabrication will take place in Darfur). Because these stove dramatically reduce fuel wood consumption they reduce the risk of violence against women who collect fuel wood, as well as reduce the environmental impact of intensive fuel wood collection. Globalgiving is collecting donations to help fund this effort. They present a good synopsis of the project and its impacts. Updated information will be posted there as progress is made (also see http://darfurstoves.lbl.gov for more background). Donations through Globalgiving prior to December 28th will be matched. I don't like to solicit people to give money, but it is the most powerful thing I can do for this project at this time. Please consider contributing and please pass this on to others you think might be interested in assisting. Thanks.

Enjoy your holidays,
Howdy

So far, they've raised $635 out of an estimated $757,500 needed. I'm happy that I'll be able to help them move closer to their goal.

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Miss USA, whooping it up

Scott Adams (a.k.a., "The Dilbert Guy") accurately sums up my thoughts on the Miss USA scandal.

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I'm amused by this

Mostly, I just want to see what this does. Why are they doing this? Will they attempt to turn it into a social networking site? I think the simple, clean interface is what drew me in. Also, the fact that I didn't have to give them my email address.

(Link via Moments of Adequacy)

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Links I have to share

I stumbled upon these during my sixty second search for a good Gir "woo hoo" sound file, which I failed to find. I only found one with "woo."

• Moose sounds. My favorite is a man saying the word "moose."
• Invader Zim sound library. Includes favorites like, "I love this show" and "Make room for the tuna!"

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Music helps combat road rage

I got angry at stupid people on my way in to work today. I drove in today because a) It's rainy as hell (there were people water skiing in the intersection of Hawthorne and 12th) and b) it's crunch time at work and I don't want to be working until the wee hours.

Anyhow, on the way in, some people did dumb things that made me very angry. So I made up a song about them. It's a fluid song, one that can have different lyrics for any given situation, and I like that about it. It goes something like this.

I'm an idiot and I'm here to ruin your day
I'm an idiot
Woo hoo! [Think Gir from Invader Zim]
I'm an idiot
Woo hoo!

I'm an idiot
And I'm here to ruin your day by driving five miles an hour.
I'm an idiot
And I'm going to ruin your day by being a dillhole

[Then you basically go back to the first two lines and woo-hoo it up until you come up with something else to sing.]

I'm an idiot
And I'd like to ruin your day by making fun of your haircut
I'm an idiot
And I'm more important than you, so I hope you have a bad day

I'm an idiot
And I'm here... to... ruin... your... day [jazz hands!]
Woo hoo!

What lyrics would you add?

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Let me esplain... no, there is to much. Let me sum up.

I've just entered SMITH Magazine's Six-Word Memoir Contest. It's quite a challenge, trying to convey a story in six words, but a fun exercise nonetheless. According to the website:

Legend has it that Ernest Hemingway was once challenged to write a story in six words. The result was "For sale: baby shoes, never used."

Wired Magazine also published an article entitled "Very Short Stories" in November, where they asked dozens of authors to try their own hand at six-word stories. Talk about a quick read!

My own six-word memoir? "Clumsy girl found adventure. Also, bruises."

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Flickr easter egg

If you add a note that says "ho ho ho hat," a santa hat will magically appear. The beards are a little more difficult to place correctly.

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Now that's just embarrassing

Four women showed up to a White House gala wearing the same dress. The same $8500 dress. Including Laura Bush. That shit just cracks me up. Apparently, "Mrs. Bush did the diplomatic thing and went upstairs and changed, but not before an official holiday group photo was taken."

(Link via Boing Boing)

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Finally!

One of the things that bugs me a lot about help forums for programmers is that a lot of programmers are arrogant assholes. I'm not necessarily excluding myself from this list, but the thing that really gets my goat is when someone asks a question about how to do something and receives replies to the effect of, "You should never do that, you idiot."

Not only are these types of replies completely unhelpful, but they don't take into account the fact that there are frequently good reasons for doing things in non-optimal ways. For instance, you might have to cludge something in because you're on a tight deadline and you've inherited some very bad code that simply needs to work. This should never the be norm at any job (although it's common), but it's pretty much guaranteed to happen from time to time.

Even more often is the case where someone is quickly asking for help on a forum and doesn't want to describe their entire database/code architecture, so they provide a short summary of their problem. In these cases, the "You shouldn't do that, you idiot" reply doesn't even apply. Gah! It irritates me.

This is why I was so happy to see this discussion where a chap called Erland Sommarskog took a stand. Someone asked how to insert a column into a database in a specific order and received three replies in 15 minutes that said, "NO, you can't do that." I love that someone else finally got pissed off about this. I think I might have a little crush...

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'Tis the season

I love the Scared of Santa slideshow. It's becoming a Christmas tradition for me to look through and laugh at all the creeped-out kids and the drunk Santas. I'm pretty sure this picture will forever be my favorite.

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