But it is a good scanner. Despite things I will mention momentarily, it does do a better scanning job than Canoscan 6500. This one is called hp scanjet 3970, by the way, which is a lower number, but keep in mind that Canoscan does start with the same 3 letters as Canada. Anyway, I call the new one instead SCAN-OR, lord of the Scanorians of Scanarkandyland, because it often demands that I do things a certain way. It likes to default back to unchangable default settings I don't like after every use, but I suppose SCAN-OR knows best. Also it has a disturbing habit of displaying a message which says "warming up the lamp," but SCAN-OR has a stressful job, so I should not judge. It comes equipped with the trademark Hewlett Packard non-configurable buttons hard-coded into programs I don't use and automated features I'd prefer control over, but SCAN-OR's rule is absolute. I thought I had broken it at one point, or perhaps that SCAN-OR was displeased at my impertinence, so then I was stuck. Help files are no help, especially with a company like Hewlett Packard whose business is primarily with the collective computer literacy pool dilluters who are most likely to be reading help files.
I realize now, if there was an issue that seriously impacted a soft or hardware's ability to work, and Hewlett Packard knew about it, why wouldn't they fix it? Therefore, their "help" only answers questions that a total idiot would have. Make sure that the cables connecting the computer and the HP scanner are securely fastened.
Hey, *that's* what I didn't do! I thought that was its tail! Not just for show? Wait a few seconds for scanning to begin. D'ah! I only waited one second and then ran downstairs to rape the fuse box!
After much worrying, I remembered that I hadn't had it plugged in when I turned the computer on. I've been reserving that outlet space for my zip-drive ever since the computer started threatening me with "primary hard disk drive 0 failure" back in October (I'm so selfish!), but SCAN-OR is all powerful, and that's where the power comes from, and if it doesn't get power right away, it will sulk. At one point, Help suggests turning the computer off and on, which would have worked, but it would not have directly addressed the problem, and that's a stupid way to get used to doing things. Come to think of it, the other scanner also needed to be initialized in such a way, but then, that device only needed one plug. SCAN-OR has aquired many connectibles through its numerous conquests, and 'twould be a shame to not use them.
| Tuesday, December 23, 2003 |
It's down here somewhere.
I found it!
I hate the phrase "the holidays." I won't use it. It's an insincere politically correct concoction, and I shall have no dealings with it. Maybe Christmas is not so noble as to deserve singular mention, but I protest the utterly phony intentions of the people use "holidays" in place of it. Don't toss colored lights and tinsel around while Jingle Bells plays in the background (which actually has nothing to do with Christmas, but still) and then tell me Happy Holidays. Or at least don't expect me to like you if you do. And I'm pretty sure I'd hate "Winter Wonderland" regardless of whether it specifically mentioned anything religious. I think I heard it for the first time in my fourth grade, and I was the only person who didn't know it. I heard it and thought it was notably dumb and pointless. "Sleigh bells ring... are you listenin?" I didn't hear anything. No one around here or anyplace I've been owns a sleigh. And listenin has a G at the end. It's not a necessary omission to rhyme with glistenin, because that ALSO has a G at the end. "Gone away is the bluebird, here to stay is the newbird." What the gary is a newbird? If that's just meant to mean that a bird has come to replace the bluebird, "here to stay" implies it will never leave, and if newbirds are showing up every time blue birds leave, but never leave themselves, pretty soon every newbird will be here, and it's long since happened, I'm sure, so shut up! Just admit you only said newbird to rhyme with bluebird! ADMIT IT! THAT LINE HAS NO POINT! "In the meadow we can build a snowman" snowmans are dumb and a waste of time. You bore me and make me sick. "We'll pretend that he is brafumbrov" WHAT DOES THAT EVEN MEAN?! "He'll say are you married" Why can the snowman talk, and WHY IS THE SNOWMAN ASKING YOU THAT?! "we'll say no, man." What if you are? Would you not sing the song, then? Am I just supposed to take from the "no, man" part that you're a dirty hippie, who don't get married, preferring instead to free love? If so, why was my 4th grade class singing this song?!
| Sunday, December 21, 2003 |
It's been about a week since I've said anything, because I lost internet when I was taken from my SPIDER HOLE.
audience laughs politely, checks watches
McDonald's: i'm lovin' it. There are substantial number of these advertisements. I'm not going to explain their general flaws, because everyone who's seen or will see already hate them. I'm only going to talk about the one with the stupid (naturally) kid who recently transfered to a different school, and can't seem to catch a break. I was always of a status sub-nerd, but even I must admit it would feel quite fulfilling to throw a rock at him. That he tells the story in rap only makes me want to find a bigger rock. This commerciality is special, because it's dumb on a level totally unrelated to market research or ethnic stereotyping.
"No doubt, it was the longest day of my life..."
Just kill yourself now. It won't get better. Or so we thought. Suddenly some skinny lady contractually forbidden to eat them shows up and gives the twart some Chicken McNuggets.
PROBLEM SOLVED.
"...'til I found out why my dad must have made mom his wife."
When I hear a line like that, I think of some cro-magnon man whacking a women with a club and then dragging her by the hair back to the storage pit to have his way.
THAK GET GURL! MAKE WIFE! MAKE UNGLA!
Perhaps that's intentional, but I would expect if McDonalds' had the coveted thawed cavedweller demographic in mind, the lyrics would contain a lot more grunting. Maybe they could get Poof Daddy to do one of his famous "yee, uh-huh" voiceover jobs. Hey, remember when people used to make fun of Puff Daddy for changing his name to Pee Diddly, because of what a stupid name it is? Well I'll tell you, it's not a stupid name. It's a stupidER name.
Anyway, however dad made mom his wife, now we know why. A box of chicken nuggets. I can imagine the weekly arguments:
Mom: "You never loved me, Thak! Mother was right!"
Dad: "GURL KNOW THAK ONLY MAKE GURL WIFE TO GET UNGLA AND CHICKEN NUGGETS!"
But enough of that. Now our protagonist has chicken nuggets and lots of chums, pals, and cult-members. And I'm sure they'll still be his friends once the chicken nuggets are gone, right? I've actually been to school (really) and my available parent had brought me fast food a few times. Suddenly, 17 thugs who one moment prior wished me dead were all around me politely requesting "can I have a french fry? Give me a french fry." I didn't even have french fries, so ha. I hardly had enough of what I did have for myself, let alone a gang of people I hate. I don't know about our hero, but I could probably eat fourty chicken mignuggets, if I liked them, and he only gets one box of five. If we assume the loveless scavengers in McDonaldland are actually more than loveless scavengers, I seriously doubt legend here will even want his new "friends" when he finds himself left with one nugget (feel free to take that out of context). And... didn't they used to come in boxes of twenty? I hate this "smaller portions to fight obesity" buffoonery. No one is fooled. The only problem that's solving is landfill vacancy, because people will just order more boxes to get the same amount of "food" they usually get. I shouldn't have to feel like slightly more of a glutton then I am ordering twice as much just because the servings are half as big as they were five years ago when there was less room set aside in the containers for air.
also:
Now that McDonald's Chicken McNuggets are made with white meat...
So what you're essentially saying is that they were awful before, and anyone who liked them like that, whoever was consistently buying them in greater numbers than the McRib sandwhich so that they were kept on the menu all the time, ought to be ashamed. And maybe those people should be, but the message here is that to continue buying the objects in their modified form equates to nobility. Righty-o, bob-a-low.
...I can totally make his day.
You're going to shoot him?
| Monday, December 15, 2003 |
How is it possible that so many evil wretches can't seem to remember ever being children? We see them all the time, you know who I'm talking about. Good, because I don't feel like remembering any right this moment. I am now convinced that they never were children. They were produced fully grown without fear of developing endearing qualities or general respect for the human species. Many children are just as hatable, but they take too long. Don't believe those lies about clones only being possible when you start them from embryo things. I don't suppose you've ever made a clone? That story was invented when clonemakers realized it was in their best interest to not have anyone know they were making clones. A great example, Paris "Chainsaw" Hilton. I had never heard of her or her sister, Banjo, a few weeks ago. And then suddenly, what's this, she exists, and she's famous. Not for doing anything, but for being related to someone who did something. And now she travels the world, spending her parents' money. A socialite, a man about town, if you will. JUST LIKE JETSETTING JACKIE O. It seems to me as if she was bred in a laboratory, constructed from the remains of Princess Dieana, Aleeyah and Elian Gonsalez (he was killed for this purpose) with just a pinch of Hitler and then unveiled on Mtv one day, and all in attendance applaud and screech once the chips we all know they have in their brains respond to the high frequency command ordering them to believe Paris Hilton is famous and has always been. You know what it's like, that Cat within Hat movie I whined about last month, and may well whine about every month from now on. I don't know anyone who's seen it or that desired to see it. Do you know of any person who's seen it? I'll take from your silence that you agree with me that no one really did. Still, some person whose job it is to say such things insists that Cat in Hat was “number one movie” at a point. Not that that label means anything anymore, but I am meant to think that it does, and that it applied to the production in question at one point. I'm told it
Yes! She went into exile!
This was raving about how shocking it was that Philton has actually done work and earned money. "They" put special emphasis on "earned." That would be shocking, if it actually was work, and additionally that doing such "work" was worthy of 10+ million dollar payoffs. However, the serve cites acting jobs and appearing on the simple farm life show. Ohkhey. Planting seeds, shoveling manure, raping sheep, wearing over-alls for three months = x million dollars? I'd only call that earning if the people who owned the farm were getting paid just as much and before she showed up for doing the same things. And acting? I dare say she wouldn't have gotten that or any 10 million dollar job in the first place if she didn't have 10 times that much to begin with (still, it's nice to see at last an official admission that no, acting need not require any talent). You don't get paid in millions unless you have millions already. That's just the way it is. It's in the manifesto. Read the manifesto, man. That's why we don't have the phrase million-hundredthousand-hundredaire. The less money you need, the more you get. In a few generations, this will either be completely abolished, or have reinstituted the feudal system. Even if you pay Christina Aguilera (whose name will be perfect when the time comes to name a venereal disease after her) 13 million dollars to walk up a flight of stairs and then she buys an 11 million dollar sock, that's still 2 million permanently taken out of economic circulation for hoarding purposes.
The tape? What about the tape? GOTTA WATCH DUH SEX TAPE. Says who? Is it really so hard to find porn on the internet that you have to watch that? I haven't (I shan't), and even I know it's green and badly acted. Why watch it? BECAUSE IT'S THERE. I thought that was why people climbed mountains. I don't mean to imply that this thing is by any means easy to watch, but it certainly requires less effort, and even in extreme circumstances it probably won't end with you cutting one of your own arms off. And... and... how do you know it's even her? Chuck Paris Hilton has approximately zero unique, distinguishing characteristics, visual or otherwise. That could be any dumb slut California clone barbie doll woman in the footage. Ha ha, I bet a lot of people would feel stupid then. Because... watching a pseudo-celebrity do that is less creepy and shameful than watching someone else, I guess.
You, Compuserve?
| Wednesday, December 10, 2003 |
This should not be confused with Motel Advanced, which, while it doesn't have a swimming pool or free continental breakfast, does have wheels on the beds.
Now that I'm thinking of it, what continent is continental breakfast indicative of? Back in the old country we'd have pancakes and bacon and eggs and beef stroganoff and barbecued beets and cucumber scallone and cheese in batter. I've been to some motels in my day, and the best I've seen at the continental breakfast table is toast and cereal, maybe a croissant too if I'm at someplace fancy. Wow, great job Morimoto-san, you burnt bread and dumped a pile of particles into a bowl. Undoubtedly, if I were to murder you right now, your fame is such that you'd be buried right next to the one dead Fat Lady. You may even be talented enough to get your own canceled show on NBC.
So what if it's all “complimentary?” Complements only count if they come from someone you'd compliment right back, and I have no kind words to emit regarding this breakfast.
| Thursday, December 04, 2003 |
By the way, I saw this at least a week before I saw it again and put it here. If it's really such an ineffective ad that no one had claimed the $50 by then, surely the fearsome and ferocious GAMETIGER would have stopped running it by the time I took offense from it. Gametiger. Come on. Surely I'm not the only person who remembers those awful pre-gameboy digital clock technology things also called tiger and also called games. What kind of twit would expect a website named after that to get any traffic at all? The same kind that would give you fifty dollars for knowing how many dots are in a Pac-Man level.
| Another Saturday, November 29, 2003 |
I hate the thank-giving propoganda. With exceeding 90% consistency we are given images of manmen drinking beeyah and watching "the game" and being dopes and womanwomen in a kitchen preparing bland food and being submissive to the dopes and thus just as dopish. It's just a boring, disgusting, "find your place and be put in it" holiday. The only thing I'm thankful for is that as of the time of my writing this there is no way to enforce stereotypes. That was put on hold until the LOAD (Legion of Abbreviating Doom) finally trusts I am computing to their specifications, and I'm not about to worry myself with that when I can't even be sure Ad-Aware isn't secretly burning a barcode into my retinas. So I'll stay with what I know for once, and that is how much I hate the day before the biggest shopping day of the year.
What about the food? The great feast? No. Bad. I hate the traditional food. All of it. Why is this food traditional? Who decreed it must be my tradition? Traditionally, tradition is a thing people did because they thought god(s) would smite them if they didn't. I seriously don't think the only thing between you and a lightning bolt is a spoonful of wet bread crumbs. Stuffing - what is it? And why is it? I only know why it isn't... getting stuffed into me. Because it tastes bad. The only thing I've ever seen it stuffed into is a couple of pouches inside a cardboard box that says "stuffing" on it. Cardboard boxes, as you may know, roamed the plains in great numbers back in 1620, alongside many Pilsbury brand dough-flour-yeast objects in various shapes and sizes. Today, you can get all the freshness and flavor of microwave food in 4x the time right from your oven! And since they're pre-cut, you need only tear them apart and drop them in a basket, and no one will know you didn't bake them! Prior to tasting one, of course.
I've always thought of turkey as meat I enjoyed eating less than chicken. Chicken, then, is something that I generally don't enjoy eating if it's not in a quesadilla, which in this instance it is not. So we're looking at a less-than-none figure here. People like to put gravy on it. You know what gravy is? That's a substance you put on another substance to cover up its flavor or lack of flavor. Now, if the gravy too tastes bad or not at all, tell me again why we don't just eat fudge? Not "nutrition," definitely. And if I wanted that, I could take some mashed potatoes or green-bean casserole which, by the way, I didn't.
"Bah," I say to this Macy's Day. I don't even get time off, since I only go to a school on Monday and Wednesday and don't have any work-jobs, oh poor me. That was a joke, by the way. They didn't make me come in on Wednesday this week.
But bland, god-sanctioned dinner I can take one day out of the year. Something I can't take one day out of the year is a parade celebrating things I hate every day out of the year. And usually I don't, but Zeus was clearly displeased at my comments on stuffing, so I ended up seeing a few minutes of it.
People whine about Christmas being too commercial, but at least that's when it ends. I think the ONE THIRD OF THE YEAR leading up to it, specifically the third third of that third, does much more damage than the one day. And this day does more damage than that day. It's a parade, and yet the fools keep stopping to sing stupid songs. As much as I question an attending spectators' right to exist, it isn't fair to make them stare at the Precious Moments tribute to the life of Mickey Rourke for ten minutes just because NBC cameras are filming Barney singing about good manners a few floats up. I heard a bit of it... It bothered me that Barney had a different voice than I remembered, because the song couldn't help but be prerecorded, and they've been using this one for years. It also bothers me that I noticed. To break up the monotony with a different kind of monotony, marching bands go by playing non-marching band songs. "...and here's the Frupwutch State University Grebloids with R.O.C.K. in the U.S.A." That's such an absurd statement, I wish I had remembered the school or band's name just so it wouldn't sound like I made it up, because I didn't. So if you haven't selected marching songs, why use a marching band, then? The fact that they can march has ceased to be a factor when you've just shown me a guy playing a piano moving along at the same speed. It's certainly not as if anyone likes marching bands. I'd much rather you hired a good band and stuck them on a float. No, not Erin Carter. No, he's not even in a band. He's related to someone who was in a group which was not a band. Hey, I said no. NO, I SAID.
It's never a good sign when the two brain-robbed commentators talking at length about Pikachu comes as relief.
But I was saying, trust me, you'd save money. Although a good band's members might demand higher salaries individually, the total payoff wouln't be nearly as much. The simple fact is that there are usually around 80 redundant people in a marching band, 60 of them drummers. Parades alone could save hundreds of thousands of dollars each year on drummers if they could just get the idiots to stop twirling their sticks around. No one's impressed. Get to work. It is the equivelant of playing Mine-sweeper at any office job in which your task is not to test new versions of Mine-sweeper. (my excuse for not having a job is that I hate Mine-sweeper)
There are balloons, too. Great big monstrous ones, which fittingly depict monstrous animated entities. It's just like an unabridged collegiate amazon.con giftlist of all the things that make me like people who like them to drop dead. We got Arthor the anteater, Little the Bill, Clifford the big-sized dog, Spongebob the Builder and on and on. I challenge you to challenge me to come up with acceptable reasons for hating all of them. I guarantee you I will accept my reasons. Just for the sake of irony, here comes Ronald McDonald following a commercial break. In case I was thinking of leaving, the two announcers seem quite excited to bring me the news that Charlie Brown will not be kicking a football in the near future. Hey hey hey now, I'm staying right here! I bet they haven't gotten this worked up since Access Hollywood previewed the new superb bowl advertisements. The two swear on the souls they possibly had at one point that the fuball will "elude" Charlie Brown. He's not even allowed to try, I guess. I hope for his sake the whole thing is rigged and he's in on the deal. Otherwise it's just cruel, cruel fate at work. It's already been decided. He is forced to exist in a suspended state, made to eternally live out the humiliating experience the whole world wished upon him, inflated and enlarged so that everyone can look on and... not so much laugh at his folly; the entertainment factor of Peanuts was dead long before Charles Shultz was, but just be satisfied that all is as it should be. Turkey will be for dinner, Christmas Story will be on TBS, the rich people will stay rich because they've earned it, the poor people will stay poor because they're lazy, everyone south of Kazakhstan will be safely labelable as terrorists, God will continue blessing America, Charlie Brown will never, ever, kick the foot-ball. Everything's just SWELL. I want to die. That is also swell.
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