Jim’s Brain Online

Posted by Jim at June 28th, 2006

Kristen’s been ordering coffee over the internet lately. From Gevalia. She ordered it because she got a free coffee maker with her first order of coffee. She’s continued to order it and that’s okay. It is good coffee.

An amusing side effect of ordering it over the internet is that they give you the UPS tracking number. Thus, I get frequent updates as to where in the United States the coffee is.

Thus, Kristen comes home for lunch, gets on the computer, checks her email. “Jim, the coffee’s in Tennessee.’ Nine hours later she’s online again, “Jim, the coffee’s in Illinois.”

We will apparently run out of coffee soon. I don’t drink much of it myself, but I’m getting the impression that running out would be a very bad thing.

Posted by Jim at June 26th, 2006

So anyway, today’s my birthday. Not that this is of massive significance, but it is true. My wife and I went out to eat tonight, came home, paid the babysitter, and went about putting kids to bed. While I was giving them a bath, my wife came upstairs (she’d been starting the laundry), telling me that I probably ought to go read Local Area Watch. The author had responded to my post.

That struck me as kind of bizarre since there wasn’t really much to respond to. It was, after all, three lines.

Regular readers of this blog will note that I spend a certain amount of time on some posts and then pretty much toss off others. This was in the latter category.

See, I could have said, “Local Area Watch: A local blog following corruption in local business and politics.” Or, I could have said, “Local Area Watch: A blog about local politics. We need more blogs like it from all sides of the political spectrum.”

What I did say was, “Local Area Watch: …seems to be a blog devoted to reporting on things the author doesn’t like about various organizations and individuals in Grand Rapids.” Though it wasn’t supposed to, it sounds dismissive of the whole enterprise.

Ironically, the blog post in question was supposed to make people aware of local web sites that take on big issues in the community–as opposed to my blog which typically takes on such burning issues as cat drool and poor martial arts techniques found in old movies.

So anyway, I am reminded again that people actually read this thing. I’ll have to edit myself better in the future.

Posted by Jim at June 24th, 2006

I’ve been meaning to write about Grand Rapids websites that follow local news and developments for a while now. Here are a few:

Urban Planet: Devoted to covering the “new urbanism” movement, Urban Planet has forums that talk about Grand Rapids property development, buildings, Grand Rapids history (as it relates to neighborhoods and buildings) and discuss the “mystery project” in excessive detail.

Michigan Buzzboard: Discusses Michigan tv and radio news programming and the personalities behind it. In fact, you’ll find some of those personalities lurking quietly (or not so quietly) in the forums.

Local Area Watch: It’s tagline is “reporting the news the news won’t report in Western Michigan.” It seems to be a blog devoted to reporting on things the author doesn’t like about various organizations and individuals in Grand Rapids.

Posted by Jim at June 16th, 2006

It’s not really finished, but if you’d like to take a look, go ahead.

Posted by Jim at June 15th, 2006

I wanted to write a blog entry tonight. Instead I spent a fair amount of time working with the picture you see below. It appears that there used to be a lamp on the top of this street sign, but it was long ago shattered by the time I took the picture.

Once upon a time these must have been all over town.

Posted by Jim at June 10th, 2006

Comment spam is pretty much unbearable. I don’t mind deleting the occasional piece but last night I got 67–and that was only during the night.

Previously, I’d set MoveableType’s spam filter to a higher level, but unfortunately, I found that spam appears to be indistinguishable from normal comments. As such, I found all six comments on my entry about 6/6/06 in the “Junk” folder. In response, I lowered my spam threshold a little lower. Thus 67 comments about viagra and hair care. And gay porn. One can’t forget the gay porn.

So anyway, I’m moving the spam threshold back up again. I promise to check the junk folder regularly and if your comment fails to appear, my apologies, it’s not personal.

P.S. I’m open to any configuration suggestions you might have.

Posted by Jim at June 9th, 2006

Lately I’ve been amused to check out blogs of people in publishing. As someone with a more than casual interest in someday selling a novel, I want to avoid making mistakes in submitting the thing. While I don’t anticipate that happening soon, the blogs are worth reading simply because they’re funny. Thus I pass on the following links for your entertainment:

Evil Editor
Miss Snark, Literary Agent

Posted by Jim at June 5th, 2006

Tuesday, June 6, 2006 is 6/6/06 on the calendar. Hell, Michigan as part of it’s on-going campaign to attract tourists has decided to have a big party.

Meanwhile Michigan Radio has made some effort to cover the “story.” Multiple times over the weekend I heard the announcer refer to the book of Revelations and 666 as being the number of the devil.

Warning! A Short Rant Follows:
Once upon a time, I majored in religion (and sociology). While I didn’t go into the ministry (though I attended seminary for a couple years), I do know a couple things.

1. The book in the Bible is named “Revelation.” One might say that it has multiple revelations within, but “Revelations” is not the name of the book.
2. The number 666 (some scholars argue it’s actually 606) is not the number of the devil. In Revelation, it is the number of the beast as well as the number of man (as in humanity, not just men). Some scholars argue that Revelation is as much about Nero and the Roman Empire as it is about anything supernatural–which might make 666 the number of Nero for all I know. So anyway, the key point being: 666 is not the number of the devil and it might not even be 666.

OK?

Posted by Jim at June 4th, 2006

An impressive use of Diet Coke and Mentos to imitate a fountain in Las Vegas…

Posted by Jim at June 2nd, 2006

In an effort to cleanse the mental palate of my last picture (of cat drool), I upload these two for your viewing pleasure along with a bit of explanation.

Kevin (Warlord of Marz) sent me these pictures (and a few more) of an occasion on which we and a number of other people walked from Holland, Michigan to Saugatuck along the beach. Inexplicably, I decided that all picture taking must be accompanied by me sticking out my tongue and going “Bleh!” Thus, I look like an idiot in all these pictures. On the bright side, it appears that I may have a future in music should Gene Simmons retire from KISS.

This second picture is funny on a couple different levels. One is that I am probably sticking my tongue out while imitating the whole Karate Kid crane technique thing. The other is that I’ve never seen the Karate Kid and shudder inwardly every time I see the crane technique. Why? I trained in Tae Kwon Do (a martial art much like karate) for a few years. Tae Kwon Do concentrates on kicks much more than karate does.

When I see shots from the movie what I see is someone who’s just about to get really badly hurt. As the movie shows that move, it has the person holding their arms in a position that makes it impossible for them to block anything. Secondly, the kick is delivered to the face which is dumb because kicks to the face are pretty easy to block (not to mention slow). Worse, its also pretty easy to grab the leg, yank the kicker off balance, and then do a little dance on them.

Personally, I’m inclined to go for the knee and keep my hands in front of me so that I can block. Well, with the exception of this picture obviously: