Yvette's Inner Geek Blog

In response to my previous post, "What percentage of geeks are vegetarian?" (prompted by an interesting email), I received this sub-question from "Mankoi" via email:

Just a thought on this, FYI. Most of my friends are geeks, and actually most are vegetarian. The ones who aren’t are usually the less geeky ones. I’m not though. Meh. I know it doesn’t really matter. Actually another interesting thing I found is that almost all of my geek friends (myself included) are Atheists. Do you think there is any connection?

Well, anybody want to share their thoughts on a connection between geekiness and atheism?

It never occurred to me that a non-third world country would view cell phones as anything but ordinary at this point in the timeline of the technology-addicted world. But I never paused to think about the possibility that the Cuban government would have prevented people from getting them.

Oh yeah, communism still exists in some places of the world.

That changed today, according to a report from the Associated Press. Good for the people of Cuba. But too bad that the cost to get a phone and maintain a calling plan is so prohibitively expensive for the average person. Baby steps, right? I hope this is a sign of better things to come for them.

The video that actually started yesterday’s political post was sent to me from my darling husband (please don’t make me write DH b/c I do not approve LOL ROTFL BBQ). It helped me start out my morning on the right foot.

My favorite quotes from this clip:

"…this country is based on the fantasy that the government is the voice of the people."

"From now on, We at Diebold will see to it that we properly safeguard the illusion of democracy for all Americans."

"Well, let’s hope so"

The second video for today, in my first-time ever crossover of politics and cat themes on this blog, is from the same guy, Simon Tofield, who animated the other short and delightful cat film I posted on this blog where truth in comedy is explored in intimate detail for anyone who’s ever had a cat. All three of my cats are indoor-only for various reasons, and somehow they still manage to do things like this.

I no longer live in Ohio, where I think my independent vote actually mattered in the general election. (I can vote for Democrats, Libertarians or Ralph Nader until until my spleen bleeds out in Utah and it won’t make a lick of difference.)

So I took a peek at at CNN’s breakdown of Democratic Primaries by County, and noticed the trend that remains constant no matter who is on the election ticket: the larger the city, the more liberal (or, in this case, "fresh-thinking") the vote.

That darker blue "abberation" between Cinci and Columbus is the unmarked location of Dayton (home of the Wright Brothers). Toledo didn’t register as a big city by percentages because it’s not one… it’s just that place you have to drive through to get to Detroit or Chicago on I-80. I’m sure that many people from Toledo would agree (including Katie Holmes).

The percentages for Obama and Clinton, even in more urban locations, are still pretty close. I think it’s refreshing to have two candidates who are so neck-in-neck for the top of the Democratic ticket, and of course it’s history in the making because one of them is a white woman and the other a black man.

P.S. Sorry, Utah, but you fail when it comes to choosing the right presidential Republican candidate.

Does it mean that I’m a writer if, when I de-clutter my house, I find bits of paper and napkins with story ideas scrawled on them? And journals or semi-personal notebooks that I had forgotten ever existed?

One of the more interesting things I found amongst the multitude of Boxes of Unknown (ultimately knowable as school papers, awards, notes and miscellaneous bits of memorabilia from elementary school through college) was a hand-drawn postcard I made and painted with watercolors.

As you can see below, I obviously intended to send it to my religious (Catholic) grandmother but somehow ended up keeping it instead. Perhaps I selfishly decided that I couldn’t bear to part with my own artwork, or maybe my mother didn’t think it was a good idea for my grandmother to know that I had gone to a Methodist Sunday School lesson after spending the night at my best friend’s house. It’s dated a month or two after my eight-year-old chihuahua mix dog, Sprinkles, escaped from a kennel while we were on vacation and was subsequently hit by a car.  

I’m sure that my grandmother would have appreciated receiving this postcard if for nothing more than to know that I was thinking about her. She passed away almost two years ago so it’s too late to surprise her with it at this point.

But if there’s a heaven, and if the Internet is available up there, I hope that she knows I’m thinking about her now and I regret not sending her that postcard fifteen years ago.

I usually save my smirks for later in the day, but a headlining CNN.com article caught my smirking attention this morning.  I’ve heard about the uncontrollable satellite that could come crashing to earth in the next couple of weeks, and that The Man was going to attempt to blow it up with a missile before it entered our atmosphere.

Here’s the first sentence of the article: 

"Pentagon officials said they think a Navy missile scored a direct hit on the fuel tank of an errant spy satellite late Wednesday, eliminating a toxic threat to people on Earth."

Everything sounds great, right? No danger to life as we know it? Hold a sec. Was the phrase people on Earth really just used? Eliminating a toxic threat to people on Earth? That sounds like a sci-fi B-movie to me. Or maybe a fantastic sci-fi cartoon. I hear it in the distance…

"I am Lrrr, ruler of the planet Omicron Persei 8 and controller of a toxic threat to people on Earth!"

Seriously, it doesn’t sound real. It’s weird, scary and humorous at the same time that stuff like that makes it into real news articles. Here’s another snippet, where you can guess which phrase made me smirk a second time:

"China is continuing to closely follow the possible harm caused by the U.S. action to outer space security and relevant countries," Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao said Thursday."

If you guessed outer space security, give yourself a shooting star. I love that China is (supposedly) suspicious because of the USA’s potentially devious actions involving outer space.  I’ll probably never know anything detailed about our government’s full story with this whole thing (or, if you believe any of the conspiracies you see on TV and in the movies, if we’re really the good guys or if we have top secret alterior motives). Maybe China is just cranky about it because this news is stealing their New Year thunder. Or the Rat does not approve of outer space hulabaloo in his/her Year. For chrissake, people, the Rat only gets one out of every 12 years!

Overall, I’m happy to hear the reports of the spy satellite being shot down. I don’t know what naked pictures of me might have been on there, you know? And it’s a really good thing that the spy satellite didn’t fall into China’s territory, because they really don’t need to be seeing that stuff.

Speaking of outer space, I’m bummed that I didn’t get an opportunity to see the lunar eclipse last night. It was cloudy and raining/snowing. Or maybe it was a government cover-up so we couldn’t see the explosion of the spy satellite….

*cue the X-files music* 

The nail is in the coffin for HD-DVD, and the people at Sony are surely ecstatic to finally have a Booyah! in their pocket after the 1980s embarrassment of Betamax. And there’s no doubt that Blu-Ray will rock my world and wreak havoc on my finances in the next couple of years.

I’m very much looking forward to it, though I think I have the majority of the movies and TV shows I need on plain old DVD, most of which look great on my bigass HDTV with my under $100 upconverting player. 

So my acquisition strategy will be different for these new-fangled discs (once I have a player, or a PS3 if Ben has his way). I’ll probably lean more heavily on Netflix, which fits better into my long-term strategy of being less materialistic without giving up my entertainment budget.

I’m not saying that I won’t buy any Blu-Ray DVDs, because that would be complete insanity. I claim only partial insanity. There are select movies and shows that I am already looking forward to… remember that little TV show called Heroes? Please allow me to quote a covetous Wayne Campbell:

It will be mine. Oh yes, it will be mine.  

All future Pixar films will also come into my home in delicious Blu-Ray HD glory, plus a smattering of other fantastic new titles as the average prices (hopefully) decline.

Amazingly enough, it was less than a year ago when I first posted about this format war. And at that point I was considering one of the dual-format players… I’m glad I waited. The thanks should really go to Ben, who convinced me to be patient until a clear winner was revealed.

Now everyone can move forward and Think Blue in ’08! (Aren’t thinly-veiled political statements okay in election years?) 

There was a time when I watched The Daily Show with Jon Stewart almost every night–back when I worked second shift at a hotel and caught the 1am re-run on Comedy Central when I got home. Moving to Utah screwed up my Daily Show viewing because NOTHING is as it should be in Utah, including network or cable broadcasts. Jon Stewart graces the TV with his presence at midnight Mountain Time, with re-runs the next day at 9pm.

I watched a little TV last night to see how the polls were coming in from the Primaries (to make sure that Huckabee didn’t have a fighting chance [he doesn't, but won more votes than I'd liked] and to see if there’s any indication of whether Obama or Clinton are pulling ahead [not really--it's going to be a tight race]).  I didn’t realize that there has been a late-night macho fight going down between Conan O’Brien, Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart about who made Mike Huckabee that came to a head last night:

The build-up and the premise are of course a lot more amusing than the actual fight sequence (though I do love that late night comedy hosts aren’t shy about using horribly disguised doubles). But Mike Huckabee does make a guest appearance at the end, and I find it interesting that he would have done that during the daytime taping before any polling results were in. Not surprising, but just a little post-it note in my brain of "how things work."

I think it might be time to pull out and watch some of the “Indecision 2004″ DVDs that I have to remind me of the hope I had then, and the confidence that I have now, of Bush no longer being president. I know that there’s still a chance that Bush will call a state of emergency and shut down voting so that he remains president for an unspecified and horrifyingly long period of time.

Let’s hope that God will really bless America like all the politicians request and not let that happen.

Pleez halp, I think I’m dying from internal laughter combustion!

The good words of the Holy Bible have come to my monitor, translated into LOLcat on LOLcatbible.com. I recommend starting with Genesis 1:

Oh hai. In teh beginnin Ceiling Cat maded teh skiez An da Urfs, but he did not eated dem.

Da Urfs no had shapez An haded dark face, An Ceiling Cat rode invisible bike over teh waterz.

At start, no has lyte. An Ceiling Cat sayz, i can haz lite? An lite wuz.

If you do die laughing, perhaps you will ascend to an afterlife in which maddeningly addictive cats and their mind-numbingly adorable interweb-speek are with you for eternity.  Yea, I can has eturnity?

On the topic of cats, but not really related to religion, here’s another photo of Phoebe, who somehow absorbed Loki’s body and all that’s left is Loki’s head poking out of Phoebe’s neck.

The wedding reception on Friday evening was very nice, and my friend/coworker was beautiful and happy and put together a great party. I would just like to confirm that there was no alcohol or coffee served, as I suspected. (There was coffee at Ben’s office party on Thursday, probably because of the number of "outsiders" who have recently moved to Utah for their jobs, like us.)

There were only a handful of people I knew at the reception, all through work. So when the dancing started, we weren’t keen on joining the hordes of siblings and cousins rocking out to Snoop Dog and other songs like Fergie’s "My Humps." Quite the difference from the classic crooning of Sinatra-type songs that had been playing as we came in and ate dinner. Whenever I hear "My Humps" (which is not that often), my mind drifts to one of my favorite music videos: Alanis Morissette on YouTube singing "My Humps" in her own style.

Love it!

Anyway, that was the second Mormon wedding reception that I’ve attended since moving here (Ben’s first). It was more of a typical, semi-formal wedding reception (appetizers and mingling, dinner buffet, speeches, photos, cutting the cake, dancing), than the “open house” reception style that is more common out here (bridal party stands in a receiving line almost the whole time, guests arrive to say hello and eat from a buffet and then leave whenever).

We went to bed pretty soon after we got home Friday night (because we’re lame). This weekend has mostly been spent cleaning, eating and shopping with a little holiday decorating and present-wrapping. There is still snow on the ground outside, but it’s struggling to blanket the yard completely because the sun is shining and the temperature is hovering right around freezing. It’s supposed to stay cold throughout the next week, with a 60% chance of snow showers on Christmas (according to the weather.com 10-day forecast, that is). Woohoo!