Back in the 1995/1996 there was exactly one must read web site for me. It was Suck. Now someone took some time and wrote down the story of how it all happened. I felt a little sad reading this. It reminds me of the first time I heard an 80′s music station and thought, “Why is music that I heard in seventh grade now playing on something suspiciously like an oldies station!” Reading the history of this web site reminds me that the old web is gone.

I’ve been bidding on boxes of scissors on EBay for some time. Today I finally won!

To celebrate my good fortune, we’ll have a little contest here. Send me an email with your guess (preferably an integer) on how many scissors I will receive in my 30 pound box of plastic handled scissors. One entry per person please. Whoever guesses the number of scissors correctly will be awarded one pair of plastic handled scissors. In the event of a tie, I’ll select at least one winner based on the entry date. In the event that no one guesses correctly, I’ll award the prize to the person who comes closest to the correct number, without going over.

Special thanks to the co-workers, L_, L_, and the one who likes to be referred to as “my favorite”, for chipping in and making this happen for me.

I hope you wanted scissors for Christmas.

There were a lot of these blooming at Lake Vermillion. Anyone have any idea what kind of plant these might be?

Bonus points to be awarded if you can tell me if this plant is native to northern Minnesota.

One of my favorite Far Side cartoon shows heaven and hell. The punch line is something like “Welcome to heaven here is your harp; welcome to hell, here is your accordion. Whenever someone new joins a project I am part of, I explain to them that “we are, unfortunately, fresh out of accordions”, just to see if they are among the Far Side cognesceti. If they are, they gain valuable project insight. If they know nothing of the Far Side, it serves to cement my reputation as a loon.

[Photo courtesy of JReid]

So when I saw this digital accordion on Gizmodo I immediately wanted to get one and start taking lessons. My awkward lack of rhythm and near tone deafness may make this one of my worst ideas to date. Still the idea of the all electronic accordion amuses me. You can plug in headphones and the device will appear silent. What a boon that must be to the parents of fledgling accordion players. Can you imagine seeing people playing these on the subway and no noise coming out?

This isn’t related in any way, but I found this Larson/Goodal controversy funny. It would fit better into this post if a wild chimp had thrown an accordion at Larson, but we’ll stick with the truth for now.

I love a well told story. My favorite-story-telling-blog-of-the-week is Waiter Rant. I especially liked I’m a Waiter – Not a Psychic Dietician & Nunc Dimittis.

[Link Courtesy or RLP]

If you fill out the survey you can see how you see you stack up against the other respondents.

In 2003 I gave Jeannie a set of cornices for Christmas. One was to be installed over the sliding glass door, the other over the living room window. While I got the first installed pretty quickly, the larger one for the living room languished in the basement, unfinished, for a long time. I finally installed it late last night. It looks great.

Special thanks to Aras for spending a lot of time helping me build what I thought would be a two hour project in his shop. It’s a good thing he charged me the undocumented worker rate for his time, rather than high priced defense contractor rates he used to charge. I think I paid him roughly two hamburgers from Wendy’s if memory serves me right.

Real Live Preacher wrote about the difference between the real person and the persona presented to the rest of the world.

In his post he says this.

I think Chuck suspects that false images can destroy or distort reality. I think this idea relates neatly to the picnic crisis concept I posted about a while back. I think part of the reason people don’t get together for dinner parties or picnics has to do with ideas fostered by TV, movies, Martha Stewart and consumerism in general. People believe that entertaining should look like something we see on a movie set. We can’t just invite someone over until we have to have a sparkling clean house, filled with bankbook breaking furniture, accessorized with the right colors for the season, and food that glistens in the glow of our expensive home made looking candles. The irony of course is that we somehow believe it would be better if we could make our real life resemble an illusion we saw on a screen; an illusion that never really existed except as a well lit cardboard and plastic facade on a movie set. (It’s not that I have anything against fantasy and/or illusion, it’s just that I hate to see people forget the dividing line between two.)

I suspect that he knows that the condition of creating a false self to display to the world doesn’t simply affect pastors — it’s a human condition. Pastors probably have more pressure to present a certain image than most since it’s practically part of the job description. I think he is right when he suggests that this phenomenon is a cause for plenty of loneliness and depression.

Thank you, to all of you who don’t flinch when I slip up and show you something approaching nine tenths of X.

You’ve probably seen these before, but I think they are pretty cool.

S5: It’s a really nice alternative for making a presentation in a web browser. It all runs client side and is pretty easy to edit.

GTD Tiddlywiki: It’s a wiki that is composed of one file and it all runs clients side so you can keep it on your memory stick and use it anywhere there is a web browser.

Now, if someone could only marry these so I could edit my presentation in wiki fashion and display it using the same file.

Matthew and I went to the Stone Arch Bridge Art Festival last Saturday. Matthew is pretty much willing to go anywhere and do anything with me. He seemed happy when he got there and noted that “it smells like cookies.”

I ran into two co-workers at the fair. Toni was at the art fair exhibiting her custom made jewelry. While looking at her wares I was struck by how the process for making custom fishing jigs must be very similar to making the artistic earrings they were exhibiting. I wonder if there are any cross-over artists who tie fishing flies and make earrings. Her earrings were very nice. The other co-worker Amy, who I’ve blogged about at least once before, was out shopping with her mother. I’m always pleasantly surprised when I run into someone I know when I’m out and about in the Twin Cities, doubly so when I can meet a parent.

The fair was pretty nice. The weather was nearly perfect. There were a lot of interesting vendors with very reasonably priced goods. I was disappointed that there weren’t more potters exhibiting as I am actively looking for a nice pitcher for serving water or milk. This show was much nicer than the Blueberry Festival in Ely. At the Blueberry festival it seems like there are always multiple vendors selling beer can whirligigs at near astronomical prices. Nothing wrong with this, it’s just not my taste. (I do admire the fact that those artisans are so willing to drain all those beer cans in order to follow their bliss and create the whirligigs. What sacrifices people make for their art.)

Matthew liked the candied almonds and fresh lemonade best.