Clear-Cutting For Portion Control

Ever seen a stump of an ice-cream pint? 

A pint is a single serving.  But sometimes, rationality gets the better of me and I decide that rationing is the way to go, just in case I get trapped under the rubble after an earthquake right next to the freezer.  While efficiency dictates that I eat straight out of the container, the undulating topography of the frozen surface, an inevitable result from eager scraping and scooping, never fails to throw me into deep anxiety, because it is messy, unfinished, undone.  I prefer the clean-cut look.  So I often find myself sculpting the ice-cream with my spoon, ironing out the creaminess and transferring the surface irregularities to my mouth.  Of course, it never looks perfect until you hit bottom.  Yes, it is flat there.

So here's a new tack.  Just chop the damn thing in half.  Use a sharp knife, make a quick, clean cut as in Kosher slaughtering, divide and conquer.  In one fell swoop, better storage aesthetics and multiple fell scoops are created.  Saran wrap is advised to protect the exposed ice-cream.     

Posted via email from Mandarin Menace Lite

It Pays To Not Shit Your Pants

The price of laundry in my building just went up by 100 percent.  Granted, I've lived here for over a decade and therefore have been spared the travails of going to a laundromat, but still, this "facility" is in the fucking garage, where the air is not particularly good, especially when Señora Building Manager (who is a nice enough lady) chooses to ignore - or perhaps she really doesn't understand English - the "No Smoking" sign.  

These washers are brand spanking new, Energy Star and all.  I am happy to support ultra-efficiency - pay a little more, no big fucking deal.  It's good to use less water and less electricity.  (By the way, I always use cold water.)  The landlord should save money in the long run, right?  So why did he not pass on the savings, but instead introduce this tiered pricing system based on Soil Level?  

It is not apparent to me that when there's only one price that people would automatically choose the heavy cycle.  I have always been a conscientious launderer, being the exemplary individual that I am.  Therefore these new machines are pissing me off big time, especially when there is no guidance on what Light, Medium, and Heavy soil-ness mean, except for what might be deduced from here.  Light day, medium day, heavy day for kettlebell workouts?  Light flow, medium flow, heavy flow?  Cat hair?  Dog fleas?  What???  
 
It's like 2 AM and I need some damn quarters.

By the way, some of you know that I have started this other blog, and I will keep using both, just so we can be schizophrenic about it.  Please leave comments and generously Share / Tweet / Like.  

Legacy

Yorat

oh jester, oh fool
behold! such enduring cranial structure
mandible jarringly articulate
temporally fused
with dirt
that foul mouth shuttered
shit! shit! shit!
impression unshattered
of teeth
reminiscent of smile
all in your head

Prey-lude To Roadkill

If you look closely, you will see that this bird is bleeding.  I was walking up Fillmore on my way to my favorite scoop shop, Three Twins Ice-Cream, when I saw a collared cat bounding down the street, bird in the grip of its teeth, obviously having a field day.  The cat reminds me of one sweet cat that I used to play with, but this one is trim, more athletic, a ready plunderer.  No wonder, considering it is being let out like a dog and allowed to hunt like a cat, with the proud owner in tow, who obviously was also having a field day.  The owner-dude chased the cat around the corner.  Trophy discarded.  The freed prey hobbled over to the wall for its photo op, contracting into its own huddle.

Now don't get me wrong.  I do not like pigeons.  Especially when they shit in front of my building, fueled by the bread crumbs that the building manager's wife likes to throw at them.  (I will never be caught dead feeding pigeons in the park, not now, not when I'm 90 and old and decrepit and crumbly.)  I also have no problem with how the food chain works.*  We shouldn't circumscribe the free expression of basic animal instincts, mine or yours or our companion friends'.  But we, as human beings, can do better.  If we're in the business of domesticating canines and felines and feigning civilized behavior, then the following applies: dog owners should pick up, scrape up, scoop up whatever consistency presents; and cat owners - if your toy-pet or pet-toy has halfway bitten through a bird, it is your responsibility to put the victim out of its misery.  It is the decent thing to do.  I would extend the same courtesy if I'd accidentally - or not so accidentally - run over your cat.  

*A tenuous tie-in to the health care debate (+ Darwin + Buddha), but I will attempt ... Compassion FTW, yes.  Universal health care?  Largely anti-evolutionary, if you ask me. We are getting very good at managing and eliminating physical pain, but until we confront and dissolve the root cause of suffering - attachment - we will stay on the same karmic wheel as the pigeon and the cat and the cat owner and the people of Congress.  Just so our little bird does not die in vain, I will make three points to send it off to its next incarnation: 1. An enlightened mind does not get attached to tax dollars, because the IRS will collect anyway; or to life, which will end anyway.  2.  Compassion is a trait of evolved human consciousness; it does not engender a "right" to health care, or to anything else, for that matter.  3.  I am totally okay with the idea that I may end up as roadkill someday; nobody owes me any expensive extraordinary measures to keep me alive.  Just clean up the mess afterwards and don't ruin another person's ice-cream appetite.  That's all.  C'est la vie.

Not A Fan Of Facebook

Since Google rolled out Buzz a couple days ago, anyone who is someone in the tech world seems to have an opinion on what, if any, impact Google's highly integrated social networking platform (integrated with Gmail that is) has on Facebook's valuation. In my mind, there are three types of observers: people who have a vested interest in the product (investors, employees), other "market analysts" and "thought leaders" in such matters, and finally, the users, of which a sub-category is, for no lack of a better word, LOSERS.  

This is my opinion of Facebook as an end-user of Web 2.0 applications.  I don't have bucks to make, nor numbers to crunch, but for sure I must be a data point in the company's monetization model, right? Or, is "my type" of users mostly irrelevant, the way I'm a bank customer getting free checking for life but my bank doesn't ever make a penny out of my three-figure balance?

FACEBOOK DEFAULTS TO ANNOYANCE
And each iteration more so.  Obviously Facebook's strategy is to grow its user-base by relentlessly streaming who's-friends-with-whom info on the News Feed.  It is Facebook's assumption that the typical user is so relentlessly mercenary that has been such a huge turn-off for me.  It is insulting.  I have no issue at all with networking and respectfully making use of connections.  It is entirely within Facebook's capacity to make it a powerful social networking engine without denigrating the meaning of friendship.  Restoring status updates as the default stream would be a great start.  I find it absolutely refreshing that I can hide the Buzz following-follower info from my public Google Profile.  It is not about privacy at all; rather, for once, we can regard ourselves not as part of a numbers game, but as individuals who perhaps have something to share during the day that is of interest or import to other connected beings.  

FACEBOOK IS A DISTRACTION FROM SOCIAL CHANGE
I put it this way because we all need distraction sometimes from life itself.  But if you really care about productivity and not wasting your time in front of the computer on pseudo-social causes or sedentary leisure, consider this:

As of 11:50 PM, Thursday, February 11, 2010, the number of fans belonging to the following Facebook groups:

• I Don't Care About Your Farm, Or Your Fish, Or Your Park, Or Your Mafia!!!  1,737,215
  
  
• I Bet We Can Find 1,000,000 People Who Support Same Sex Marriage  1,664,544
  
  
• I Bet Stanford Can Find 100,000 Fans Before Cal Can!  2,027
  
  
• I Bet Cal Can Find 100,000 Fans Before Stanford Can!  8,563

That there are so many haters of Facebook apps says less about the users of those apps than Facebook's presumptuous notion that their usage is anything remotely newsworthy.  In all likelihood Facebook does not even presume that; after all, it's run by very smart people.  It is blatantly forcing that information upon your News Feed to entice you to click on the brown baby calf.  There must be a certain demographic group or personality trait that is associated with susceptibility to the mooing of the brown baby calf - congratulations, Facebook, for that is your golden calf.  

I support same-sex marriage, but I don't BET on anything to make a statement.  Unfortunately, many Facebook "Pages" and "Groups" only amount to virtual pheromones that give the impression that you're of a certain ilk, that may be of significance as a filter or deal-breaker if you're actually going to mate with someone, but are otherwise inconsequential as a force or even indicator of social change.  To the person who started "1,000,000 Strong Against Sarah Palin" but only hit 21 percent membership target - you're a loser picking on another loser.  GET A LIFE!  

PSA: If you really believe in marriage equality, follow the Prop 8 trial here and support Courage Campaign with your money and activism.  

The red and blue / "gold" comparison proves, definitively, that better Facebooking results do not translate to superiority in anything else.  

FACEBOOK ADS ARE DUMB
I have never minded the "Sponsored Links" that I see on Gmail's web portal.  And if Buzz must come with Google Ads, so be it - it would be a thousand times better than the dumb-ass targeted ads that Facebook advertisers generate with my birth date, gender, and other personal info.  Again, it's not a privacy issue for me; this is just bot-made nonsense.  But I find utterly yucky and icky and distasteful and insulting the language and tone of those ads.  "Are you an 18-year-old idiot?  If you are, we have free crap reserved for you if you qualify.  Hurry up!  Offer expires at midnight."  Really?  REALLY???  Just because an ad picked up on my age doesn't make it a smart ad.  People who click on those ads are fucking losers.  

I have been a disaffected Facebook user for a long while, so I welcome Google Buzz heartily as an alternative, and so far I have nothing bad to say about it.  The bugs will be fixed, and I am awaiting the mobile app for my phone.  If, as I suspect, Facebook's monetization strategy is to capitalize on losers doing what losers do, then my opinion is entirely irrelevant to the stakeholders, which is fine by me, because Buzz will pick it up regardless.  

How I Use Twitter - Or Why (Most Of) You Shouldn't Follow Me

I am @twiddlebells. I knew a couple of my clients were on Twitter and they were cool, hip people, so I signed up too. I wanted to know who their friends were, and whether they could help me spread some @twiddlebells goodness. I also have this narcissistic belief that I am wise and witty (which my Facebook friends will validate). I wanted to impress my tweeps, but soon I ran into a huge problem:

@twiddlebells hates everyone from Obama to God and therefore constantly offends people who are into Obama or God. Therefore you shouldn't follow me if you are easily offended. Chances are, I hate you too. Just because I also hate Bush doesn't make you follower-worthy to me.

@twiddlebells' likeness is represented by the picture of a kettlebell, the same one that everybody steals from Dragon Door. This, in my opinion, is slightly more interesting than the white tweetie bird in blue, green, or orange background. (How are the colors assigned anyway?) I'm sorry if the picture misleads, but I do not tweet about my fucking workouts. Therefore you shouldn't follow me if you're looking for workout ideas, or inspiration, or encouragement. I don't record, I don't track. I train, I enjoy, I do something else.

Fitness often comes hand-in-hand with nutrition. Those of you who read my tweets know that I write about cupcakes and ice-cream everyday. Ad nauseum. Cupcakes and ice-cream are an important part of my stream of consciousness, the recording of which is Twitter's purported raison d'être. Believe me, if you pay me I can show you how to eat five desserts a day (plus two square meals) and stay a Size 0, but you shouldn't follow me if you're looking for weightloss ideas, or inspiration, or encouragement, because you will hate me. I resolved on January 1, 2009 to eat one cupcake a day for the whole year. I have been outdoing myself. Yes, you hate me.

A lot of people follow each other for "networking," professional reciprocity, or whatever you'd like to call it. I respect that, if you are actually making good use of the information you read. If 500 people are following each other and pathologically tweeting and re-tweeting each other's workouts and blog links and the same fitness articles that everybody reads and writing Bravo! and Awesome! to each other - well, I have to say, WTF! I don't write about my own training, and have very little interest in yours. (I do swings and get-ups à la Enter The Kettlebell, end of story.) I appreciate the #followfriday, but really, no thank you. You shouldn't follow me if you keep tweeting about the same topic (workouts) and want me to follow you back. I won't. If you want penpals (and I like having online friends) let's do it on Facebook. (Hello my ex-Twitter-now-Facebook friends!)

I am humbled that some very accomplished professionals are following my Twitter stream. I am sorry I don't have much to add to the discourse, as I use Twitter as a private social vehicle, not for marketing or keeping up with the industry. I hate announcing my own classes and workshops on Twitter and Facebook (which is perhaps something that I should get over, but I am very much a purist). Yes, I did say I want to spread @twiddlebells goodness, but sometimes, you just want to ride the elevator without having a pitch!

I don't care about numbers, so I am not into reciprocal following. I don't use a private account because I want to make it easier for my stalkers and people in general to find me. I prune my follower list periodically. All bots, most businesses, britney.fucked.vids, and creepy people get eliminated. If you look relatively harmless, you stay. If you seem cool and different I may follow you back. Very few people make this cut. I only follow 20 entities - 3 food purveyors, 2 other businesses, 1 cartoon guy, and 14 real people (4 of whom I have not met, but would like to).

Basically, if you're not a personal friend or client (or prospective friend or client), you should have very little interest in what I tweet about, except for the funny vids or pics that we all come across each day. "Following" requires both subject and object (as opposed to "status updates" which only need you) and tweets are what keep friends continuously apprised of each other's thoughts and exploits so a recap is not necessary when they meet again. Tweets are conversational, hence the @replies. If I appear to lopsidedly favor one or two people in my @replies, it's because these tweeps tweet more and thus evoke more responses. If I appear to write about completely random things, it's because in conversation with friends you don't need to repeatedly explain the context. If you think you know the context, don't be too sure. (If I order revenge on you, I won't announce it on Twitter!) I know when my tweeps go to bed because I am a vampire and I don't sleep. If you're up late too and your profile page is where the only action is, I may just go there and hit "refresh." Periodically I find out cool things about people that way. I also love real-time tweets from an airplane, especially at times when I have to stay up late for non-vampire reasons and need some twitteine*. (@virginamerica way cool!)

Admittedly, I am not using social media in a way that might make me more money. I don't want to act in ways that I myself find annoying. Mutual annoyance, mutual masturbation, bots following bots - not my thing, go away. I'm still learning how to navigate Web 2.0 to make it enhance my relationships, not botch them. Yeah, I still hate Obama and God, but I love and value my friends for their love and entertainment value.

*twitteine: an addictive substance, like caffeine, that makes you crave for more tweets; may induce stalking-like behavior. (And you read about it here first!)

PSA: October 17 Level 1 Kettlebell Workshop in San Francisco. I don't mind people tweeting about @twiddlebells goodness!

Back To The Playground

I stopped blogging at the end of January because I couldn't think of more random things to write about myself. Of course, to the unconcerned, everything is random. To someone who cares, this is a little window from which to view the inside workings of my convoluted mind. I'm still trying to figure it out. At this point, all I can say is I know more than you do about what's meaningful for me. No, this is not an exercise of sharing. Sometimes I want to say things that I'm too indifferent or afraid or lazy to say in person, for the sake of not getting into uncomfortable conversations that highlight the need for more uncomfortable conversations. Here, I can hide behind my own polished and uninterrupted eloquence. So here we go again!