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dear screaming-poodle-shit@example.com...

Crooked Timber | Email from Students : [E]ven though universities give students email addresses, it's often the case that students won't use them. Instead they prefer their free hotmail or yahoo or gmail addresses. No problem as such there, except that sometimes the students pick the kind of addresses for themselves that aren't exactly professional-quality. Frankly it feels a bit odd to correspond with, e.g., missbitchy23 or WildcatBongs about letters of reference.

I'll never forget the time we got an email at work from ilostmyvirginity@popularwebmail.com. Clearly they're getting something from webmail that I'm not ;)

around the traps

i hurt :(

On Thursday I went to the bank, then went to physio, then to the doctor to have a skin tag (harmless, annoying bit of puffy skin) cut out of my back. I took the day off, but with unwarranted levels of optimism I did not arrange to take today off as well. As it turns out, today became sick leave.

Physio wasn't too bad, although I wouldn't actually choose to have it done. Wrist manipulated, shoulder manipulated, neck and shoulder massaged (and not the feel-good type), back cracked (literally), wrist ultrasounded, shoulder muscles zapped (electro therapy) and my first ever acupuncture. All in about 40 minutes.

I had thought that getting the skin tag taken off was a simple, "nip it off" type of deal. As it turns out mine was a three-stitch deal; made unpleasant by the anaesthetic not working properly on one side (I could feel more than I was supposed to). The bugger started bleeding again later - cue return visit at midnight. A different doctor with a far less gentle touch cleaned off the blood and put on a new dressing. Frankly, it hurt a lot more afterwards; but at least it stopped bleeding.

Don't get me wrong, I know this is a minor procedure. Just not quite negligible as I originally thought ;)

So today I realise that I can't move properly, no bending and driving in traffic would be a really bad idea. Leah called me in sick when I could barely wake up and moving hurt. It's not the cut (although I know it's there) so much as the fact that every muscle from my neck to my butt is sore as hell from trying to sit/lie/walk ramrod straight the whole time.

Blah. Bring on the medical treatments of science fiction - flesh sealers, nanobot repairers, all the things writers have dreamed up which would make medicine faster, cleaner and less traumatic. Flying cars, or vat-grown donor organs... I'd choose the organs.

around the traps

around the traps

top gear

If you're a little bit of a revhead at heart (like me) you'll probably be happy to know that SBS will be screening Top Gear again later this year. I guess once the season has aired in the UK we'll get it. In response to an email I sent them:

We are pleased to inform you that Top Gear will be returning. The transmission date is sheduled for Monday the 21st August at 7.30pm.

I also mentioned Mythbusters and Iron Chef, but they didn't say anything about those. My guess is they're already definites :)

around the traps

  • Men's ginseng underwear launched - National Breaking News - Breaking News 24/7 - NEWS.com.au. They're also considering viagra undies, although that begs the question of what happens when the undies come off. Next up: the new range of clubber undies, the E-string! Arf, arf.
  • Boing Boing: UK nurses want to supply clean blades and cutting advice to self-harmers: The College is saying, in essence, that it can't prevent cutters from cutting, but it can prevent secondary harm arising from deep cuts and infection. ...which is an approach not overly favoured by current society. Which is a bit weird. Surely the idea of harm minimisation can't be that hard to grasp. Nobody is condoning cutting, but it's a fact of some peoples' lives and if they can do it without ...well, really seriously hurting themselves... then it's better than the alternative.
  • Boing Boing: PC built into whisky bottle. Unsurprisingly cooling was a challenge, but it is one of the neatest mods I've ever seen.
  • Boing Boing: HOWTO send emails that get responses. A shorter version might be 'learn to communicate, you illiterate fucktards'. Seriously though, this is a good article on getting things right. Things that seem simple often turn out to be quite complex, when you really think about them.
  • Boing Boing: Snap-together mini models of designer lamps. Way cool desk toys :)
  • copywrong: of interest.... You may have seen pages which show up the latest 10/20/100 images posted to LiveJournal. While they are kind of interesting to look at (when they're not being disturbing or mind-crushingly banal), they are a serious bandwidth thief. My site got over 100,000 hits between two of them last month alone (an absolutely enormous spike - not sure what to make of it :)). If the real images had gone out (instead of a small copyright notice), It would have used something in the region of 14gigs worth of bandwith. So anyway, LJ got so many complaints there's apparently an opt-out method.

Update: actually, got it wrong. It's more like 200,000 hits so far this month:

  1. 160035 hits, 71.94% of traffic, referrer http://www.nonexiste.net/lj.php
  2. 55433 hits, 24.92% of traffic, referrer http://www.toothpastefordinner.com/livejournal-pictures.php

Those two sites must have been in the news or something.

mod cons

The Judith Wright Centre of Contemporary Arts | MOD CONS choreographed by Claire Marshall: This new work by choreographer Claire Marshall features a cast of 12 QUT dance graduates and her unique movement vocabulary that fuses contemporary dance with robot moves. Mod Cons is inspired by the commercial excess of modern culture, consumer manipulation, advertising hype and social pressure! Claire?s pop culture-inspired works reach out to audiences who don?t usually attend contemporary dance. Her two latest works The Factory; Adventures in Brisbane Subcultures, and Pop Trash at the Judith Wright Centre in March 2005, appealed to underground music culture fans.

I highly recommend you get along to this. Like it says right there in the copy, Claire's work appeals to people who don't normally get into contemporary dance (that's me!). I've seen all three shows (two live, one on tape) and enjoyed them a huge amount :)

around the traps

reputation?

Me: *picks up packet with my new thinkgeek shirt, emblazoned with "it must be user error"*
Me: *shows shirt to my boss, with a chuckle*
My boss: *shaking head* "No wonder we have a reputation..."

Apparently people can't tell when we're being serious.