I’m here at the Penguicon, and it turns out, *I* am one of the horribly awkward individuals that becomes a wallflower in a crowded room. Based on my online presence, that might come as a surprise to some. You can hear me lament a bit here:
[display_podcast]
I really don’t have a good reason to hate Digg, but it’s just frustrating that it’s guided by the general public. Because honestly, I think the general public is dumb. Not individuals (I think you personally are shiny), but rather as a whole.
I can write some well thought out, interesting stuff — and get minimal diggs. I can write “off the cuff” nonsense, and get quite a few. Of course, never enough to get the highly sought after popular fanfare — but still, noticeably more.
For some reason, I’ve gotten my brain wrapped around an axle this week, and done my best to get “dugg” to the point of popularity. It never happened, and it was frustrating to boot. So, I figured I’d just go back to writing stuff for the sake of expressing my thoughts. I think I like it better that way.
So, how are you? 🙂
The biggest thing that concerns me about my recent Linux Journal article, is that people might think my hair is normally like the photo… 🙂 If you’re looking for a laugh at my expense, feel free to click through.
(And please Digg the article too, if you like it and know what Digg is…)
It’s officially official. Actually, it was official when I paid my registration fee a few months back, but it’s super ultra certain now. I will be at the Penguicon this weekend in Troy, Michigan. This revelation means that I got my truck running after sitting all winter in the driveway. I’m a bit giddy to drive the old girl again. I miss driving a stick shift. 🙂
I’m going to bring a video camera, and hopefully upload some footage and photos to the Linux Journal site (and maybe here too). If you’re going to be there, please be sure to look me up. We can be geeks together!
(Read here for links to the whole story, and why it’s being written)
Blink/Sophie sat in as fetal a position as possible in the corner of a phone booth outside of Negworth, Amsterdam. Their recent merging was, of course, successful. Both minds were now in perfect harmony, and mostly open to one another. Therein started the awful realization.
“Blink, it’s so hard because our memories don’t line up exactly right. Is that because we interpreted the situations differently?”, thought Sophie.
“Well, normally I’d say yes”, thought Blink, “But our memory divergence goes far beyond what differing points of view would explain. Apart from our thread-bonded love and compassion, everything seems different in our pasts. Even our recent past.”
“Blink, we’ve both changed. I’m a little girl living in the head of… of… well, we’re in the same head!”
“I know sweetie, and I’m so happy to be merged with you.” Blink emoted love to Sophie. “Travel back in our memories though. I’m not even sure what a coconut is, and yet, you remember — no, experienced — us both living on them. Sophie, I’ve never been to a desert island.”
Blink could feel fear well up inside Sophie. Horrible scenes of Not-Sophie, emotions of pain, and crippling terror were flooding their consciousness.
“Sophie! Wait!” Blink solidified their thread-bond, and opened his entire consciousness to her. “I don’t want you to think I’m anything other than Blink. Sophie, you can see everything that I am. I love you. I can’t lie to you. I will not hurt or deceive you.” He could feel her calm down, and relaxed himself too.
Blink/Sophie worked together, slowly piecing together the horrible truth regarding the sterilization fleet. It was Sophie that first realized the fleet wasn’t destroying planets, but rather, terraforming the galaxy piece by piece into parallel universes in order to create the perfect Tragethen empire. Why destroy a planet, when enough dimensional shifting would bring forth a slave planet?
“Sophie!” thought-shouted Blink, “That explains their need for a dual mind!”
Blink/Sophie began to realize the futility in the way the Space Force was trying to defeat the Trageth. Amassing armies was pointless, and the SF officers with their single minds had no way of knowing the Trageth were just trying to keep them all busy. Just as Blink/Sophie started to plan their next move, the phone booth seemed to change.
Yesterday, Linux Journal let me go crazy with an April Fool’s Day joke. I came up with the idea to switch our focus to an old operating system, BeOS, and pretended to seriously report on things pertaining to BeOS. The whole LJ crew got into the fun, and we ended up with quite a round of shenanigans throughout the day.
The downside is that I started working at Linux Journal a couple years too late. April Fool’s website spoofs aren’t nearly as popular as they once were, so the word didn’t get out like it might have even as little as one year ago. Still, it was incredibly fun, and for the most part was taken well by the audience. I particularly enjoyed writing the absurd little “articles” that posted on the front page. They’re very short, and linked below if anyone wants to see them:
The funniest part of the day was that a comment on the youtube video appreciated my humor, and thought my geeky hairdo was “staged” for the spoof. Uh… That’s just how my hair looks. 🙂
Thanks to all that played along, and thanks to Linux Journal for allowing my idea to overtake the website.
You have to be a geek to appreciate this…
This post is part of a multi-blog, round robin, create your own chaos, short story write-a-thon. It’s sorta like Ficlets, but on a larger, less organized, slightly longer form. You can still play if you’re reading this before noon on Sunday, just go to Nathan’s blog and he’ll add you to the pool. It should be tons of fun.
Link to Sophie from Shinola, Part 1 (The story starts halfway down the page)
Sophie from Shinola, Part 2:
Objectively, Sophie knew that the real SpaceForce wasn’t all adventure and excitement, but compared to Chenolla VI, anything had to be an improvement. “Jeez”, she thought, “What’s taking so long?”
It was easy enough to take this little girl’s body over, but over the past few months, the Trageth officer had begun to sympathize with her “family” on Chenolla VI. Why aren’t these idiots preparing for the battle? Yes, the Space Force is powerful, but they can’t defend all the human planets at once. When the sterilization fleet comes to this planet, the best defense the humans will have is fishing poles!
All the preparations were made in the beryllium mine, and the accelerated decay was already spewing beryllium ions into subspace, signaling the start of the first wave. If Sophie didn’t get accepted into the Space Force, and off this planet, she would die with all the stupid fishermen.
“Why are they making us wait, Mom?” Sophie muttered, nervously.
“They’re warming up the brain remover, dear.” Said her mother, as she casually flipped a page in her magazine.
Sophie panicked, and almost suicidally released the real Sophie to avoid the torture herself. After a moment, however, she realized the mother was playing the human lying game. Some humans lied like this more than others, but Sophie’s mother was particularly evil. The past few months had taught her how to deal with situations like this, but with her current stress regarding the interview, she momentarily slipped. Thankfully, the mother hadn’t noticed.
“Shut up, Mom, they already removed my brain in school.”
“Nice, Soph. Nice.” her mother chuckled.
It was reasons like that which required the humans to be destroyed. They lied to their own nestlings! How could they ever be trusted as allies? Sophie was even more determined to get accepted into the Space Force and help destroy these evil creatures. They’re so seductive! So many times I’ve wanted to suggest a peace negotiation, and then they lie for nothing more than evil pleasure!
“Mom, what are you and Dad going to do when I go off to the Space Force?” Sophie asked.
“Oh, I think we’ll be fine, dear. The one I’m really worried about is Blink. Are you sure you don’t want him to stay here? No one is really sure if they can survive off planet, and you might not see him for months.”
Sophie from Shinola, Part 3, written by MWT.
Sophie from Shinola, Part 4, written by Eric
(More links as more parts are written!)
“Be who you are and say what you feel because those who mind don’t
matter and those who matter don’t mind.”