November 23, 2015

Hello, Little Girl

Beatles with no drummer and Stu Sutcliffe on bass. Very rare bootleg.

-- Mal

November 4, 2015

One in ten quintillion?

This is really worthy of not: in a online game I'm playing, an acquaintance had a 97% chance of completing a task successfully, and failed twelve straight times. Children the odds against that are so high, you might as well say "impossible" and forget about it.

-- Mal

October 30, 2015

Robert Heinlein once posed a question:

... "When is it moral for a government to do what it is immoral for an individual to do?"

In reference to violence against women and minorities, I offer the following observations:

I suggest that the institutionalization of violence, especially violence towards our own citizens, speaks to that question. I also suggest that there are quite a few people who do not understand the ethical dictum "What I do through another's hands, I do myself." While I would never try to float a serious proposition that people actually do feel a queasy conscience about committing violence themselves, for many I think the opportunity to be sanctimonious, take the moral high ground, and deplore what our institutions do "of necessity" while sadly acknowledging that necessity, adds a piquant spice of justification to their hatred and greed. I doubt, too, it is a sentiment wholly confined to males, for there are many females who support the misogynistic patriarchy for their own reasons (they must be getting something out of it, though I can't imagine what, unless it is a hope of living a life of luxury and privilege as the appendix of an alpha male, not dissimilar to the hope felt by many of the financially oppressed, that they will be rich one day).

-- Mal

October 25, 2015

Songs with enigmatic lyrics

Post a favorite song with lyrics that are completely intelligible, yet are resistant to conveying meaning. I'll start with an easy one:

-- Mal

October 20, 2015

Looks like a good case for arbitration:

http://www.computerworld.com/article/2994787/it-careers/bank-s-severance-deal-requires-it-workers-to-be-on-call-for-two-years.html

Of course, the bank is probably in a right-to-work state, and can basically screw their employees any way they want to without being liable.

-- Mal

October 19, 2015

Have you stopped beating your wife, yet?

I know I'm bad, but one of the local candidates for sheriff is sending out flyers pledging to "End Domestic Violence," and I immediately thought of this. Maybe he needs to work on his ad copy.

-- Mal

October 15, 2015

A somewhat belated response to a post about women composers...

http://www.openculture.com/2015/10/1200-years-of-women-composers-a-free-78-hour-music-playlist.html

-- Mal

October 6, 2015

Fallen London

I've just started checking out a free browser game called Fallen London (it's been around for 6 years, but I'm always behind the curve). A very interesting steampunky game that is a text-based RPG and has systems to interact with other players. Any Lounge denizens play it? Kind of a cross between Sherlock Holmes and Call of Cthulu.

-- Mal

October 4, 2015

I see Madison Bumgarner made four pinch-hit appearences this season.

I love a pitcher who can hit. It's one reason to prefer the NL over the AL.

Hell, he had a better OPS than the starting shortstop.

-- Mal

October 2, 2015

Just got off the phone with a CSR for my Internet

Suggested she check out Bernie. In my informal surveys around the community here, I have found few people are yet aware of his message. This is obviously a media problem, so getting out the message by word-of-mouth is important.

-- Mal