Author Archives: Leo Tarvi
Patience, and the lack thereof
Just a quick Daily to get the requirement out of the way. I’m working on something, though.
Topic 286:
Who is the most patient person you know?
Honestly, I think I am. It’s the one genuine virtue I possess. I’m having trouble coming up with more to say about that, so I’ll just wax on about patience for a bit.
The funny thing about patience is that some things just cut right through it. Like a pet peeve, everyone has a few things that they just have no patience at all for. For me paperwork is a big one. I can comfortably sit for a very long time and work out every last detail of, say, a math puzzle. But ask me to fill out some forms and I’ll be growling the first time a field seems slightly ambiguous or it asks me a question with more than one answer.
On that subject it’s almost inevitable that I will be growling at that form sooner or later. I think the only forms I’ve seen that were clear and straightforward were order forms. “What do you want, how many, were do we ship it, how are you paying for it”, if only they were all so easy.
On the other hand, ask me to explain a difficult concept to someone and I can calmly re-examine things and try different approaches for pretty much as long as they seem to be honestly trying to understand. That’s led many people to mistakenly think that I’d make a good teacher, I can only assume that they’ve forgotten how much paperwork a teacher has to do.
Recovering
Last night’s zombie pub crawl was pretty awesome. I met some interesting people whom I can’t remember clearly, and ran into a bunch of people I haven’t seen in ages, some literally for years. Glad I went, even if the damn makeup was annoying and sweated off pretty quickly, managing to be both irritating on my face and basically invisible just a couple hours after we started.
I’m feeling a little delicate today, so I’m going to call this my day’s post and go play videogames all afternoon.
Saturday cop-out post
I have a zombie pub crawl to attend tonight and stuff to do before it, so this will be short.
Topic 285:
Do you like surprises? Why or why not? Can you think of the best or worse surprise you’ve had in the last year?
Depends on the surprise, of course. A surprise $50 bill is great, a surprise tumor sucks. I suppose that’s really just saying I like good news more than bad.
No surprises stand out to me over the last year. Well, none I’m willing to write about here, at least.
The more I think about it, the more I’m sure I can’t write an interesting post on this topic. So I’ll talk about the zombie pub crawl quickly and then wrap this up.
Zombie pub crawl. A bunch of people in their 20s & 30s dressed up as zombies lurching mindlessly from one bar to the next. So it’s basically your average pub crawl with grosser makeup.
I’ve dug out a jacket that’s full of moth holes. The kind of thing I really should have gotten rid of long ago, but kept partly because it’s the only jacket I own that actually fits me, and partly for costume stuff like this. I’m combining that with tan pants & shirt, and a hideous red tie that I got at the dollar store, and then all I need is a little makeup and I’ll look like I wandered off the set of a 1970’s George Romero flick.
I’ve also skipped shaving today. My hair is really too long for this look but I’m not willing to cut it just for this. I’m also going to use more deodorant than usual since I expect to be too warm in those clothes and I’m not really willing to smell like the walking dead tonight. Though if I could make myself smell like fresh earth, as though I’d clawed my way out of a grave, I might do that.
Well, that’s all for today. I’ll have something else to tell you tomorrow. Huh, if I drink too much while I’m dressed as a zombie tonight I may wake up feeling like a zombie tomorrow. I’d better watch out.
What popped into my head when I saw this photo.
Photo courtesy of Luca Sartoni.
It wasn’t the sort of neighborhood a fairy usually went to alone, but Tink knew she had to get answers. Uncomfortably aware that anyone, or anything, might be hiding nearby, she put on a bold face and headed towards the meeting site. She only hoped this Deep Wing character, whoever that was, could give her the information she needed.
Walk Without Rhythm
So, here‘s what I got from the Daily Post today. It’s a fairly interesting post about rhythm in words, sentences and paragraphs. But I was intrigued by the very end, which I will repeat here:
Pay attention to which sentence configurations you find most appealing. What makes a given arrangement more appealing to you than another? Can you think of ways in which you might use different sentence lengths to accomplish different rhetorical goals?
If you’ve read, well, any of my writing, you’ll know that I like to use long, complicated sentences with lots of commas, purple prose, and sometimes digressions in the middle. Sentences that often could be acceptably split into two or more. Meanwhile, my paragraphs often have very few sentences, and sometimes could be reasonably connected to an adjacent paragraph. Read the rest of this entry
Bouncy bouncy
Topic #283:
If you found $1000 worth of superballs, and had a free afternoon, what creative use could you put them towards? Can you think of a clever way to use them or a prank you could pull on a friend or co-worker? Write about it.
You know, my first thought is just to take them all up to the roof of a skyscraper and dump them over into the city. Can you imagine watching three or four thousand balls bouncing around like mad? People would be finding them miles away for weeks! I wonder what the headlines would say? “Rain of balls causes havoc!” Read the rest of this entry
Everything’s a pain. It’s still hot, too.
Hopefully that title got all the whining out of my system for a while.
So in naive anticipation of cold weather, I’ve returned to the manly art of crochet. I’ve decided to start off this year’s projects with another scarf, partly because of my limited skill, but mostly because I like scarves. A big part of that is probably because I can only wear them comfortably when it’s genuinely cold, and I suspect I only really like the cold weather because where I live Summer lasts for eight solid months. Read the rest of this entry
Well, that didn’t take long.
Ok, so QTM was in fact the only one I was able to install that actually works with WordPress. I suspect Drivel would if I took the time to find out which API WordPress is derived from, but now I’m annoyed and just want to go off somewhere and sulk.
Two of the programs wouldn’t install because of failed dependencies. One of them was actually an applet, just adding on to the fires of hate stoked by the latest Ubuntu release. Maybe I should just go back to KDE. Anyhow, there’s that project explored and abandoned. I’m more disappointed that I wasn’t able to try out more of the software than I am by not finding one I like, make of that what you will.
I’m going to walk a dog and let my mind wander, maybe I’ll have one more post for you today when I get back, maybe I’ll just read or show up at a friend’s house with a bad movie & pizza. We shall see.
Big Fat Test Post
This is nothing more than a test of the QTM blogging software for Linux. Unless you’re a Linux user yourself, and also a blogger, you probably want to skip this one. Read the rest of this entry
On the many flavors of Linux
I’m a Linux user, and have been for years. I’ve used many different distros since the late ’90s, and for the last three or four years I’ve been pretty stable with Ubuntu. Sometimes I’d switch between the Gnome & KDE versions, but it was always Ubuntu. I’m using the latest version right now, the one that tied up my computer most of the day.
And I hate it. The “Unity” interface is no longer optional, and they’ve taken away my applets. For a couple years now it felt like each new release of Ubuntu was less what I wanted, almost as if they were deliberately trying to push me away. I’m thinking it’s time to start shopping around distros again.
This might make things a pain in the ass for a while. But I’ve been keeping up with the Post a Day thing pretty well so far. Granted that’s mostly by posting crap that nobody would actually want to read, but maybe if I can get used to writing in quantity then I can improve the quality gradually. Anyways, if I miss a day during the next week or two, trying out new Linux distros is going to be my excuse.
Not much of a post
Feels like I’m phoning it in here, but I’m in the middle of the Ubuntu upgrade and can’t do much with this computer right now. I didn’t think it would take this long. You’d think I’d have learned by now to wait a few days before I start the upgrade, but no, once again I jumped right in when there’d be a huge rush swamping the servers.
Now off to read a movie or watch a book, or whatever the hell people used to do to kill time at home in the evenings. I’ll try to have something more substantial tomorrow, unless the new operating system turns out to be completely broken or something.
The Fear of Writing
Well, today’s Daily Post thingy was to pick a topic from yesterday’s list of things you’re afraid to write about and, well, write about it. Nice idea, but leaves me a little light on topics. So I’ll write about learning disabilities and my fear of writing, and the connection between them.
Parents! If you ever hear your child described as “bright but lazy” by well meaning but frustrated teachers, have that kid checked for learning disabilities right away! The sooner you can get them into a program that knows how to work with them, the less it will cast a shadow over the rest of their life.
My learning disability is called dysgraphia.
Breaking with tradition (by copying someone else’s shtick)
Today’s Daily Post topic was to write a list of 5 things you’re afraid to write about. This is impossible for me, as I am terrified of any kind of writing. Which in a way makes tough topics easier for me, since once I get over the initial terror of writing at all there’s little fear left for petty details like “what I am writing about.”
So instead, I’m going to steal an idea from the much-missed Ghastly’s Ghastly Comic (that link is SO not safe for work) and show you what people are typing into search engines that leads them to me. I don’t get enough traffic to do short term versions like once a month, (yet) so this is the entire list since the blog’s creation. I’ll put search terms in bold, with my own commentary in italic.
little janie q It’s such a bizarre phrase.
diaspora social network I found email from them in my spam filter. I’d almost forgotten about it.
leo tarvi That’s me!
kris arden She left a couple of comments, & for a long time her name was the #1 search term. I was worried she might have a stalker.
what does little janie q mean Haven’t a clue.
what is “little janie q” It’s a term of… endearment. Yeah, that’s it.
tumblr stoya No no, this is WordPress. Tumblr’s probably a link or two up.
stoya tumblr Did this get different results?
diaspora review social network I wonder if anyone decided whether or not to try it based on my impressions.
what does “little janie q” mean? It means that sexism is alive & well in the workplace.
gay sex Shouldn’t we get to know each other first?
diaspora social network 2011 Was it different in 2010?
janie q Yup.
leotarvi Yours, truly!
lil janie q They just keep coming!
where does the expression janie q come from If you find out, let me know!
walmart vs women Last I checked, walmart was winning.
what does little janie qs meaning Look, if you’re falling asleep at the keyboard, it might be time to change your approach.
“wars on concepts” I used to think they were stupid things that didn’t work. Now I’m starting to suspect that they’re devious things that work as intended.
diaspora social network aspects Are much like the circles in Google Plus. I wonder if that was inspiration or if Google came up with that independently.
http://www.fourain sex I have no idea.
what mean tarvi Uh oh! Do I sound mean?
joining tumblr It’s neat, but I still prefer Livejournal.
i am getting boring We should start a club!
spider jerusalem rants Yes, yes he does.
rc murphy blog Is totally worth reading. Here’s a link!
tarvi 2011 All year, baby!
tumblr the adventures of Nah, I’ll keep them here.
porn star tumblr I’m sure there’s more than one.
recurring dream story I told mine, what’s yours?
stoya wordpress Has some pretty pictures. Bet you were disappointed with my blog!
leo september 2011 I think that depends on whether your chart adjusts for precession.
how to write a paper on women vs walmart Are you plagiarizing me?
leo legal doc Neither a lawyer nor a doctor. Advice is for entertainment purposes only. Void where prohibited.
i’m a snowflake dammit Right on! Ain’t we all? Preach it!
i learnt tumblr Well good for you, Timmy!
That was more work than I thought it would be. Serves me right, I was thinking I could slack off this time! Well, that’s all for now, I’m going to light some candles, brew some tea, and see about saving Hyrule from the king of evil. Goodnight everyone!
The Adventures of Leo Tarvi 