The Meme Generation

Be prepared, people!

Click through for John’s post. He was nice enough to mention my current project, http://www.onecause.com/, where you can help fund  thousands of organizations, including those that fight hunger and homelessness. Sign up, choose an organization, and do your holiday shopping through the site. You won’t pay more for gifts, but a percentage of your purchase will go directly to these organizations. Win-win.

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I don’t quite understand. Is this that Lady Galaga person you kids are always on about?

(Either way, sleep tight, everyone!)

(via)

The other day, Merlin posted one of his better pieces. I thought it was fantastic, but then, as is sometimes my initial reaction, I decided to be a smartass about it. I meant no disrespect. I’m a good time guy, eh? Yeah! Alright. You know it. You got it. Faboo.

Then I hear there’s been a crapload of backlash (I haven’t seen it) aimed at the post and I’m afraid I might have been grouped in with that. So, let me be clear. I’m a big fan of Merlin’s work. I like that he’s fairly transparent about it, too. I’ve enjoyed chit-chatting about The Dreyfus Model and such with him.  Of course, this was only possible after he forgave me for sending him a David Bowie LOLCat. (Seriously? I thought that was funny?)

If you haven’t read Merlin’s post, go do it.  Then read Marco’s follow-up. I’m not quite sure what people’s arguments with either piece could be, except maybe being jealous that someone else hit upon something that seems so obvious (stop doing stuff that doesn’t matter so you can get to the stuff that does) and they didn’t think of it first.

Case in point, Marco suggests turning off your RSS reader (Merlin’s said the same several times in the past).  Well, of course you should do that. But people scoff and show off how many feeds they’ve got and how many unread items there are and they’re just So Fucking Busy that they’re feeling overwhelemed and shutting off the flow would only make things worse. But have they tried it?

I had to at one point.  When I switched jobs about 2 years ago, I was using NetNewsWire and didn’t want to install it on my work computer for several creepy-startup-founder-reasons I won’t go into here.  Our son was almost a year old and he was not enjoying sleeping very much at all, so my night news reading was kaput for a few months.

The result was I ended up taking an RSS vacation without realizing it. And it didn’t make a lick of difference in my day-to-day tasks, except that I suddenly had a lot more time to do the things that mattered. I have not returned to RSS since. This wasn’t a conscious choice, though. It just didn’t matter anymore. And how often do you pay attention to things that you truly believe don’t matter?

If something is cool or important enough to warrant your attention, it’s going to bubble up. Trust me, with very few exceptions, you will not be kept completely unaware of the latest viral meme involving animals working towards their TOEFL certificates. You can stay in contact people people without staying up to date on every damn thing on the Internet.

That’s the thing about the Internet. It’s big. It’s not getting any smaller. Do you really think you can keep up? Good luck.

And don’t beat on the people who’re trying to help you.

You can be unimpressed that they “only used 3 chords”, or you can be impressed that they got so much material out of those 3 chords.

staff:

Thank you, Apple!

That’s fantastic! Nothing like showcasing the crap iPhone client for your service when we’re still waiting on the new one. What’s the word on that?

Back in 1996, I drove the car my Dad gave me—a 1990 Oldsmobile Eighty-Eight.  It was the Cadillac of automobiles, let me tell you.  Built like a tank, but it handled very smoothly as long as you started to make your turn 100 yards before the turn itself.  I loved it and drove it hard.  Hard enough that the tires went bald.

Heading to work on rainy mid-morning (give me a break, it was a pre-bubble Internet company), I was in the left lane, traveling west on Route 2, a few miles out of Cambridge, MA.  I was going too fast in general, as was my way at the time, but it was much too fast for the weather.

Halfway up a hill, I hit a puddle and started to hydroplane.  First the car twisted clockwise, and I feared hitting the car on my right.  Then the car twisted the other way and I started to wish I’d hit that car.  I remember the next series of events like I was sitting on my couch (this car was comfy), watching a bad movie from the 70s where the pivotal moment centered around a car accident, filmed from 24 angles and repeated on screen for half an hour.

At this point on Route 2, the median is a grassy area, about 20-feet wide, maybe 4-5 feet deep in the middle. My wheels were pointed forward, but I slid down the median diagonally.  I remember bouncing a bit at the bottom, and then heading up the other side.  I hit the pavement and continued to sail across 4 lanes of very confused and freaked out oncoming traffic. SHOOM-SHOOM-SHOOM-SHOOM I barely missed 4 oncoming cars.

The car had slowed considerably by that point, so hitting the guard rail wasn’t too much of a jolt.  I remember the impact, the crunch, and the stereo blaring Underworld.

I was fine.  The car sustained $2500 worth of damage and made a full recovery. Anybody else who witnessed it had a little scare, but that was it.

As I waited on the side of the road for a cop and a tow, a man, whose last name I can only remember as ‘Dalmus’, let me borrow his umbrella.  A huge, red golf umbrella, almost as big as The Travelers one in the commercials.  I mean to say, this thing was big. He told me I could return it to him when I had a chance, gave me his card and went on his way.

I lost the card (twice) and never got his umbrella back to him.  But I remember his face and I remember his gesture.  And I still have the umbrella and use it to this day.

I don’t think I’ll ever find this guy, so I’ve held onto his umbrella until I can find someone else who needs it and then pass it on. I probably won’t pass on the story, but maybe this person will have their own.

This is why I like Julie’s project so much.  Every time I use my ridiculously huge red umbrella to get to work, walk my tiny dog, or get my kid to the car, I think of the kindness of this one stranger who will probably never find out how much I appreciated him stopping to check on me after I almost killed him. (If I do talk to him again, I’ll probably leave that last part out.)

If this one act can make me smile on every rainy day since my accident in 1996, isn’t it worth it to throw a few bucks into the pot to fund a project that will attempt the same thing 1000 times?  In fact, I think it’d make a great holiday gift—give to the project in someone else’s name and click the option to have a Thank You card or some official project stickers sent their way.

A little goes a long way, people.  This is one of those things that’ll make you feel good. You shouldn’t miss being a part of that.

Puscifer - Sour Grapes

Maynard James Keenan’s preacher characters across all of his projects are pretty entertaining, but this one is entertaining, convincing, and has got the best fucking bass line and gospel choir backing him up.

This song came up on shuffle this morning, and I must have looked a fool trying NOT to move to the groove at the bus stop. Because you can’t contain that. Try to only if you enjoy failure.

I’m not sure what people thought, but, once on the bus, everyone offered me their seat.

“Stress-shart” and all such derivative works are Copyright 2008 Ben Compton. Used here without permission.