Today's Mighty Oak

Define your Net Personality

The Great and Secret Show July 23, 2010

The Myers-Briggs test is a way to classify your personality.  A similar test has popped up but in regards to the Internet:

1. Exceptionalist (E) vs. Ordinarist (O). Exceptionalists believe that the Internet is exceptional, extraordinary, and disruptive, the way, say, the printing press was. Ordinarists believe that the Internet is just another new medium, no more revolutionary than, say, CB radio.

2. Technodeterminist (T) vs. Contextualist (C). Technodeterminists believe that the Net by itself brings about transformations against which it is futile to struggle. Contextualists believe that technology by itself does nothing and changes nothing; other factos determine the effects of technology.

3. Optimist (H) vs. Pessimist (P). Optimists believe that the Net is, or brings about, good things. Pessimists believe otherwise. (Note: Since everyone believes their beliefs are true, everyone thinks they are a realist. When someone actively asserts s/he is a realist, s/he is actually asserting a form of counter-optimism, i.e., pessimism.) (Note: The “H” stands for Happiness or Hope.

I think I’m an ECH (but it’s a weak C).

Check out the classification here.

It’s true that every time you hear a bell, an angel gets its wings. But what they don’t tell you is that every time you hear a mouse trap snap, and Angel gets set on fire.

Yesterday's nut

Quick update for everyone, which will be a whole lot of pictures, actually.  Another update with video will be coming later, probably tomorrow.

First off, WWNPHD?  Get your t-shirt here:

There is a Star Wars convention coming up in Orlando.  Even though I’m a huge nerd, I didn’t know about this.  But most importantly, they are giving away custom cereal!  I really want the Admiral Ackbar cereal, but I’m afraid it’s a trap.  Check out Greedo’s and Raisin Han, too!

Quantum Mechanix has some new merchandise, including this awesome figure of Wash from Serenity (I actually just washed that episode yesterday):

Not a picture, but it was an awesome video.  More reasons why I love Rep. Grayson!

An Anglican church in New Zealand has some awesome billboards, including this one which I absolutely love:

Here is the other one I’ve found from them:

Did you follow along with the Old Spice one day social media blitz?  It was pretty awesome, but I loved reading about how they pulled it off.  Sounds tiring, but worth it!

And finally, copyranter takes a look at an ad from  Beirut.  And their nightlife.  Which is apparantly reminiscent of bombs.  Sigh.

That’s it for now, but I’ll be back soon after I get some more work done, catch everyone in a bit!

We knew we had to leave this town/But we never knew when and we never knew how

Yesterday's nut July 17, 2010

Currently listening to and stuck in my head (in an awesome way):

The good old days weren’t always good and tomorrow isn’t as bad as it seems

Yesterday's nut

Couple quick things for everyone.

First off, check out The Old Spice Guy helping someone propose:

Have you seen the periodic table of meat?  Bacon rightfully is in the first position, being a Noble Meat:

I really don’t have anything to add to the title of this post, except of course a couple of expletives.  So, I’ll just say, Stay Classy, Catholic Church.

Speaking of The Catholic Church, for anyone following the Fr. Mark Gruber case, he is now suing.

And don’t forget, if you live in California, to vote to protect traditional marriage:

Just remember:

That’s it for now, catch everyone later!

Wherein I liken myself to one of my favorite bloggers

The King of Spades July 9, 2010

Written: 07/09/2010

I have a couple blogs that I read all the time, and way too many that I occasionally pop in on.  The ones I read all the time are the ones who not only have great content, but a writing style that I enjoy reading.

One such blog is Waking Up Now.  I consider myself lucky enough to have actually e-mailed a few times with Rob back and forth, and he is absolutely amazing!  His videos and commentary are top-notch, level headed, and really a huge community service.  But for whatever reason, I never read his “about” page.  Maybe I never noticed it up at the top, who knows (I just wrote a post for The Great and Secret Show, so please excuse me if I’m rambling, or talking too much about communication type things), so I was a little floored and then cautious about some of what he wrote:

It worked on the job, too. Be the go-to guy everyone enjoys working with. Be nice to everyone and everyone will be nice to you. You smother a lot of yourself in the process, but it’s safer, isn’t it?

That’s pretty close to how I’ve worked at the Boy Scouts, although I added my own little twist.  If I was going to be employed by a company that hates the gays so much, then I was going to prove them wrong about the fact that we shouldn’t be treated as people.  I am going to be the best damn employee they have.  Then maybe some of them will get it, will understand that it doesn’t matter who you love and care for and who you are attracted to.

So I keep that in the back of my mind, pushing myself.  And I’m not the best, although I think I’m probably the second or third best member of the support staff, it is very hard to keep up.  It is a constant struggle to work for an organization that wouldn’t even have me as a member if I was honest about everything.

Keeping that balance is tough.  And it is very draining.  I keep myself going thinking that I’ll be able to change some minds in the future, but that’s not a given, it’s not certain.  That’s one of the big reasons I started this section of writing, to keep myself going, to have some sort of an outlet for all these conflicting ideas and thoughts.  It’s strange, I’ve stopped writing this paragraph at least half a dozen times, because I keep forgetting where I’m going, if that doesn’t tell me my mind needs some sort of release I don’t know what does, as I’ve been told that my natural state of being is multitasking.

Thanks for reading, and I’ll keep plowing forward, both in work and in my writing, I have more of a story to tell yet.

All my best,

The King of Spades

Framing experiences and blogging

The Great and Secret Show

Some fun things to muse about from JOHO:

First, the idea that no matter what we are experiencing, we are framing it for others consumption.  I find myself doing that a lot, and especially how I choose my words (although I think that is me being more of a writer than a speaker, so I constantly rewrite as I think about speaking, but anyway):

but I now find myself shaping experience according to how I might present that experience in public: finding the words, deciding what might be interesting in the experience to someone other than me. Blogging has given the public yet more of a grip on the shape of my private experience.

He continues:

Is that good? I dunno. I don’t even know if it’s generally true. I’ve worried before that the little homunculus in my brain that is always scribbling away is a personal mental disorder. (Shut up, homunculus! I don’t care what you say, I’m posting this anyway!)

Which is all followed up the next day by this:

in the age of broadcast, we fashioned experience so that we were stars of an imaginary broadcast; in the age of the Web, we fashion experience so that we are bloggers with a non-massive, semi-social, potentially interactive readership. Under this fact-free analysis, the Web’s fashioning of our experience should be understand in _contrast_ to the celebrity-based stories we made of our lives during the Age of Broadcast.

Interesting stuff all around.

Men and Gods and Booksellers won’t put up with second-rate poets.

Yesterday's nut

Hey everybody, quick update.  I thought I had some more links with me, but I guess they are still floating out in the tubes somewhere.  I’ll also have a few things for The Great and Secret Show that I’ll be posting in a little bit, so be sure to look for that.

First up, a federal judge has declared DOMA (Defense of Marriage Act) unconstitutional on two grounds.  This was unexpected, but welcomed.  However, I have a sneaking suspicion it won’t stay.  But it’s interesting to watch, especially as the Perry trial is awaiting their verdict as well.  Also fun is that one idea was looking at it from the fifth amendment (I think) which guarantees equal protections, the other, the tenth, which gives states their rights (and is a favorite of social conservatives as well).  Exciting (and confusing legalese)!

The Stranger also came out with a great “New Column” which I’ll post:

Ok, one more piece from The Stranger, this time, in the form of a follow up letter about an internship:

Hey Lindy! I sent an email a while back to the old address of yours I have saved in my account. Since I hadn’t gotten anything back, I figured that either you took that account out of commission OR YOU ARE A BAD PERSON. To account for both options, I wrote a few responses in a “choose your own adventure” style of correspondence.

If your account is inactive/my e-mail exploded, go to page 1.
If you ignored/fiendishly deleted the e-mail, go to page 2.
To run down the cave on the left, go to page 73.

Read the rest of it here

I was tipped off about this post by PG+, but check out this awesome writing about Pittsburgh Poetry (and other local dialects).

Looking to kill some time?  This game is a lot of fun and slightly addicting.

And finally, do you happen to remember how I posted that awesome ad from Nike to start off the World Cup?  Well, maybe it’s cursed!  Slate examines it here in a follow up.

That’s it for now, but I’ll be back in a short while with some more, have a great one!

Wherein I post some music

The King of Spades July 8, 2010

Written: 07/08/2010

I haven’t posted any music (or any media for that matter) here yet.  Music is very important to me, I find it very personal, especially to a wide variety of people at once, but for all different reasons, hence the power.  Anyway, this is Daughtry’s new single, that I’m currently loving:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQJXdzg8Kbk

How the time passed away? All the trouble that we gave
And all those days we spent out by the lake
Has it all gone to waste? All the promises we made
One by one they vanish just the same

Of all the things I still remember
Summer’s never looked the same
The years go by and time just seems to fly by
But the memories remain

In the middle of September we’d still play out in the rain
Nothing to lose but everything to gain
Reflecting now on how things could’ve been
It was worth it in the end

Now it all seems so clear, there’s nothing left to fear
So we made our way by finding what was real
Now the days are so long that summer’s moving on
We reach for something that’s already gone

Of all the things I still remember
Summer’s never looked the same
The years go by and time just seems to fly by
But the memories remain

In the middle of September we’d still play out in the rain
Nothing to lose but everything to gain
Reflecting now on how things could’ve been
It was worth it in the end

We knew we had to leave this town
But we never knew when and we never knew how
We would end up here the way we are
Yeah we knew we had to leave this town
But we never knew when and we never knew how

Of all the things I still remember
Summer’s never looked the same
The years go by and time just seems to fly by
But the memories remain

In the middle of September we’d still play out in the rain
Nothing to lose but everything to gain
Reflecting now on how things could’ve been
It was worth it in the end

Note: Guess we’ll see if the video link still works…

All my best,

The King of Spades

Things are only impossible until they’re not. ~Jean-Luc Picard

Yesterday's nut July 5, 2010

A few, mostly nerdy things to catch up on.

First of all E3!  Here’s a cool recap from Nintendo, that I can’t embed.  Also are interviews about Epic Mickey, Lost in Shadow (which I first heard about from PG+) and Super Scribblenaughts.

I’m also excited about the new Zelda (Skyward Sword), Kirby’s Epic Yarn, and Metroid: Other M.  I’m somewhat excited for the new Goldeneye, and I think it’s an awesome throwback, but I was never really good at the first one, but I can see the nostalgia and potential.

I’m not a  huge fan of the new art style for Zelda, although I can appreciate that it was inspired by Monet (no, really), I think I just need to get used to it:

And here’s the trailer for Kirby:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OK4gKc9OuTk

Also, how awesome is this orange(ish) 3DS:

The new Donkey Kong Country looks great, but again, not one that I’ll pick up, but here’s some info in case you’re interested.

The new Professor Layton looks awesome, although I still have to play the second in the series:

And likewise, I’m not if I’ll pick up Mario Sports mix, but it does look interesting, if a mini-game fest:

Ok, nerd mode is now off.  How about some fun news:

The Tea Party canceled their convention, or at least, pushed it back.

And The Pope can be brought to court, at least theoretically, thank goodness!

And for some brevity, Airpocalypse performed on America’s Got Talent:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lkdva4SNCcw

That’s it for now, have a great one everybody!

Wherein I find some hope

The King of Spades July 3, 2010

Written: 07/03/2010

It’s been a while, a lot has been bouncing around in my head.  I’m taking a short break from writing my last post, it’s big and unwieldy, and I’m going to need some serious editing time to make it coherent. Ed note: if it’s what I’m thinking, it’s still a giant work in progress that will probably never see the light of day.  Probably better that way.

But I found a little bit of hope at work, and I wanted to write it down before I forgot it.

Sometimes I have to remind myself, that even though the organization is hateful and bigoted, a lot of the volunteers (and even some co-workers) are more sensible, and more often than not, just don’t care what’s going on between my ears (that’s a little bit of a reference to Savage Love).

Case in point, one of my favorite volunteers (and I do have a lot of favorites, actually) and I were talking about a man I used to work with at summer camp.  We reconnected on Facebook and I saw the pictures he posted of him and his boyfriend traveling across the country.  The volunteer was even closer with him, as he was very involved in a project together and they worked on it for years, forming a mentoring relationship.  The volunteer refereed to him as one of his “Chiefs” and they stayed close after his term was done, the volunteer even co-signing a car loan for the Chief.

And so I’m reminded that people really are awesome.  That volunteer didn’t have to co-sign for that car.  He was in no way obligated.  But he did, because he cared about this young man, because he knew he was a positive force in his life, and because together, we all work together and make good things happen.

So back to the conversation.  I mentioned that I had just reconnected with him on Facebook (the Chief had moved out of state for med school and residency and that whole process that I don’t understand), and the volunteer recounted when he told him he was gay:

“I don’t understand it at all, but I knew that I wanted him to be happy.  And he told me, and I asked him, I said, ‘[Chief], are you happy?”

No judgment, just honesty, and concern.  And a wish to be happy.

All my best,

The King of Spades

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