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Here’s the thing about the holidays. I think it’s great that everybody gets to be with their families or whatever if that’s what they’re into, and it’s nice having a day off. But, I find the holidays to be just hugely inconvenient.

What’s the point of having a day off on the same day that everybody else has a day off? I want to have my days off on days when everybody else is working so that there is an entire service industry there waiting to satisfy my any whim. Take for instance dining. I keep no food in my house. I have no interest in preparing meals, and shopping is a huge ol’ pain. It’s just way easier to go out — which I find myself doing for pretty much every single meal. Normally, this works out wonderfully. Today, not so much. Today nothing is open. I mean nothing, absolutely nothing. Well, I take that back. Jack in the Box was open.

Those who know me know that I’m nothing if not flexible. No, no - that’s a lie. I’m not flexible at all. I was however very, very hungry. I went to Jack in the Box.

Maybe I was the one who was wrong about this, but wasn’t the Jack in the Box Ultimate Cheeseburger advertised as being for people who didn’t want any of the extras that typically go on the burger? Wasn’t that bad boy just supposed to be a big hunk of meat, cheese and bun (I almost substituted beef for meat, but come on - who are we kidding)? So how come mine came with ketchup? Ketchup wouldn’t have been bad. I was actually planning to add ketchup anyway, but mine also came with mustard. I hate mustard. Well, grey mustard can be OK in the right context. You know - if I’m fully prepared for it, but yellow mustard (?) gross, gross, gross. Do you know what’s worse than mustard? That’s right, it’s mayonnaise. Mmmm mmmmm mmmmm. Mayonnaise - health-y eating with a capital “Y”.

Don’t get me wrong. Mayonnaise is good in its place. It is an integral part of a tuna fish sandwich. I’ve even had mayonnaise on a burger before, and managed to enjoy it. But, never, ever ever on a fast food, two-fisted bundle of intestinal distress like this. You don’t need mayonnaise on a burger that is already just crazy amounts of fatty, calorie laden barely meat. I particularly didn’t want mayonnaise in these ridiculous proportions. The meat to gooey, gross sauce ratio was completely out of whack. The bun was so moist, that it had really lost all structural integrity. I don’t even think you could call it bread anymore. It was really more like dough. I tried to make the best of it. I scraped off as much mayonnaise as I could, and underneath I found — more mayonnaise. It’s slowly oozing through my arteries as I type. If you squeeze me, I’m pretty sure it will seep out of my poors. I’ll probably be squeegeeing white crud off my furniture and clothes for weeks.

Well anyway, happy holidays to you. Please excuse me while I go get sick for a while.

300.3 349.9 meters

The music is really something special too. I may need to start this thing up at work, turn up my speakers and leave for a while.

Wow, there are a lot of plugins out there. I think I just might want to find this again one day.

You want fame? Well fame costs, and right here is where you start paying: Ha ha ha!

Stop Oppressive Gardening

Some interesting ideas about using PGP to sign comments as a way to protect against on-line identity theft. I’ve been extremely cavalier about my on-line identity because the hassle of protecting it isn’t worth the benefit multiplied by the likelihood that anybody would have any reason to want to masquerade as me.

As we move forward though, this could certainly grow to be a huge problem. It’s nice to see some people thinking about how they can solve it while keeping it reasonably simple. It would be great to see this built into the major blogging tools automatically.

Mouse over the face to change the expressions. Very smooth and dynamic. Nicely done.

No, it’s not a 4 week old meme you jaded, denizens of internet cool you. It’s a Dessert Buffet at the Four Seasons in Beverly Hills. This will be dangerous. See, I overeat at normal buffets. They’re always so expensive, I feel like I need to eat more than I really want to get my money’s worth.

I can only imagine how much I’m going to eat at a dessert buffet. But, if you can’t cheerfully gain 5 million pounds during the holidays, when can you? I’m told this is a swank place and that I should wear a tie. That’s fine - I got plenty of ties. I don’t have any grown-up shoes though. My last vestiges of teenage rebellion, that need to be an individual who’s super cool and above it all, is in direct conflict with the additionally teenage like desires to fit in. I’m a complex beast my friends, and I ain’t afraid to end my sentences in prepositions either, so you just better back the hell off.

WTF!?

ElcomSoft: innocent on all counts. Now, if we can just strike down the crappy, crappity, crap, crap law they were prosecuted under, we might be getting somewhere.