The Empirical Manifesto

With my precious time away from work being divided between household responsibilities, my wife, my children, my hopes, dreams & desires - television rarely rears its ugly head into my existence (though I am excited about the new Rizzoli & Isles; more on that in a future post). Nonetheless, I do occasionally get to sit down in my chair in the evenings, in my room, next to my wife who is by this time undoubtedly creatively working on some sewing project in front of the television. That's what I watch - whatever it is she's watching. Admittedly, its usually something on HGTV/DIY, the new "self help" psychology which, unlike its feel-good psycho-babble predecessors, can actually assist you in your household hobbies or endeavors.

When WOMAN HITLER (anagram for Mother-In-Law) last visited, she had missed some episodes of Hell's Kitchen and asked if I could find them online for her. This was easily accomplished, and I sat and watched them with her. Those who aren't familiar with the series, it follows the culinary adventures of real-life chef Gordon Ramsey as he curses, threatens, curses, belittles, curses and threatens again would-be chefs in a "reality show" elimination cooking contest.

Cute.

I guess. Like the hit-television series House they put up with his antics because he's really good. And we all know how I feel about that.

One evening I sat down and Planet Green's Future Foods was on. Basically, you have these zany, good-natured chefs who love invention and find new ways to create high-end, restaurant-quality "sustainable" foods out of almost nothing at all using science. I was immediately drawn-in and fascinated at what these guys were doing and how. They've surrounded themselves with free-thinking geniuses who they turn loose with a secondary challenge while they attack a main course in an outside-the-box scenario and the episodes culminate with this food being served to actual customers and their subsequent feedback.

What fun!

Which made me realize one thing. If these guys can be this successful being friendly and outgoing, why can't Gordon Ramsey? The sad truth is that Gordon Ramsey is just a dick. No bones about it. Between his good food and putting up with him being an asshole, and these other guys good food and not being assholes...well, I'd take the other guys ten times out of ten. Hell, I'd take them even if their food was substandard to Gordon Ramsey's. Gordon Ramsey is just a prick.

I was at the dealership Monday getting an oil change when the manager emerged. How did I know he was the manger? He looked like an asshole. He had his hands on his hips and he was barking orders to some younger salesmen under his breath. Several years ago I walked into a dealership to get my permanent license plates on a new car I had purchased and had asked one of the passing suited men to assist me. He immediately agreed, promised to be right back, called all the salesmen on the floor to his office, chewed their ass that I was not immediately approached, and sent one after me.

My thought at the time was that if he really were as concerned as he appeared, he would've taken care of my needs first. I even considered mentioning that to him. Surely you can run a successful dealership without being an asshole. Then again, I'm surprised that the institution is even allowed to exist in liberal America.

Maybe its because assholes are running things?

At any rate, I'll be glad when we, as a society, stop lending credence to shows like Hell's Kitchen and start exalting programming which lifts up, rather than tears down.

The wife and I watched the first disc of House (M.D.) Season 4 last night, and while I was disappointed that this season continued in its power-rangers-everyplot routine, it also got me thinking about my friend who, despite Dr. Gregory House being a fictional character (who would likely have been kicked to the street living as a junkie long ago) attempts to, in his real life, mimic the hostility and demeanor of Dr. Crankypants.

He thinks its cool. He thinks it helps create an aura of respect around him. In truth, he's an idiot.

As many times as I've tried to explain that the character's abrasive idiosyncrasies are tolerated because he's a genius, and that my friend is not (ergo he'd likely be seen as just an annoying prick) he really feels that there's something to be said for acting like an ass. Gruff, aloof. Angry. These are not traits young people need to enter the workforce with, yet they see these traits as being successful on television, and therefore choose to emulate them.

Early police shows exploited the whole "procedurally challenged anti-authority cop who gets the job done" persona for decades. Something innate to us longs for the underdog to buck the system while simultaneously being applauded for doing the right thing - casting 'rules' and those who look after them as the antagonist. Here's the thing - if you suck at procedure, challenge authority, and suck at your job, you'll simply be fired that much more quickly. We're talking about the real world here.

I'm good at what I do, but I don't think for a moment that if I chose to maliciously ignore safeguards that I wouldn't be fired. Trust is important in any working relationship, and no, "knowing your stuff" is not enough to overlook obvious flaws such as blatant disregard. And while I'm mildly amused at the antics Dr. House pulls, living in the real world myself, I often shake my head in disbelief that there are people who wish to emulate this tremendous asshole. No, its not cool, and neither are you.

I cannot seem to reiterate enough that not only is this a work of fiction, it only works because he's a genuis! Hell, I'd like to be a drunk billionaire playboy throwing money around, buying and crashing exotic cars and bedding a different movie star every night. IT WOULDN'T WORK BECAUSE I'M NOT FILTHY RICH. See? If I became an irresponsible lush I wouldn't be able to keep my job, my family, or my freedom. I'd be thrown in jail. If you can understand how it takes being a billionaire to act like a billionaire with no repercussions, how come you can't see that if you're a garden-variety idiot who acts like Dr. House, people will despise you and you'll never succeed?

No one likes a dick. You don't like people who are rude to you, or despise you. Why do you think it would be cool to be one of those people? I don't understand. Someone is going to knife you in the back and not think twice about it.

And now, a word about schpydurx. To open this forum, I'll admit, I don't understand these Gen X'ers (or Y'ers or whatver the hell 'they' are being called these days). Sure I was young, and had periods of confusion because I didn't know what I was going to do with my life. But this whole angsty "I'm angry at the world because I'm retarded." just doesn't sit well with me. If you're angry because you're retarded, let's start with working on NOT being retarded. And if we can't fix that, then christ man, let's at least work on NOT being angry because of it. But that's just it, isn't it? Is it considered 'cool' to be retarded, to appear incapable of making decisions, or to follow through on the one's you have?

Your revolution is over, Mr. Lebowski. Condolences. The bums lost. My advice is to do what your parents did; get a job, sir.

But if that truly were the case, then why all the angst? Why all the frustration over your imagined oppression? And I'll be the first to tell you that your own stupidity has brought this on you. I won't pander to your depressive ways. I understand that life is a stage, BUT NOT EVERY PLAY IS A TRAGEDY! Dry those emo-tears, pony boy. No one else is going to make you happy - is that what you're waiting for? Its all on you, dude, and the rest of the world? We've evolved. You'd do best to try and keep up.

Case in point - a conversation I had with our young friend earlier this week:

schpydurx: I too am the eternal optimist. However, I am first and foremost a realist who realizes that life is shit and what can go wrong will go wrong. Therefore, I plan for the worst and if something better comes along, then hey, that's cool too. It's called contingency.

ehowton: I too am the eternal optimist. However, I am first and foremost a realist...
This contradicts itself.

...life is shit and what can go wrong will go wrong.
This is called a 'pessimist.' The opposite of an 'optimist.' Are you an optimist, a realist, or a pessimist? And you think I'm confused?

I plan for the worst and if something better comes along...
This is the most retarded way to do things I've ever seen. I think I just found the root cause of all your problems. Dude, you prepare for the worst, yes, but the flip side of that is expect the best! You dismiss a very important facet of this. Furthermore, that's a dumb contingency! A better contingency would be to prepare for multiple scenarios. But not you! You 'prepare for the worst' by waiting for something better to come along? YOU FUCKING PACIFIST! Grab the bull by the horns and go do something!

By getting this rare peek into the post-pubescent mindset, I see that inaction is the number one cause of his discontent. I'd like to offer him some advice here, publicly: It is better to do something, and fail, than to succeed at doing nothing.

There are often many different courses of action you could take given any particular circumstance, that's a given. And understanding that doing nothing at all is quite possibly the worse thing you could do, what do you do? Well, its really quite easy. Weigh the pro's and con's, pick one, and DO IT. Just...fscking...DO IT! Now then, there is a certain element of risk involved doing things this way, and occasionally you will fail. That's OK! If you never failed, YOU'D NEVER LEARN! Failing is a very, very important part of learning, often overlooked. Anyway, here's the clincher, the coup de tête if you will, which will make your every desire come true: Once you start taking these small risks, and begin a life of action, each next decision comes easier. And with the lessons learned from each event, you gain more experience, and the next one becomes easier. Its a cycle of success.

Those analysis droids only focus on symbols. Huh! I should think that you Jedi would have more respect for the difference between knowledge and... wisdom.

If you leave here with only one thing, please make it this: GET YOUR FAT ASS OFF THE COUCH AND DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!

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its 2300 and I just finished a bowl of chili with Town House® Bistro™ Corn Bread Crackers. I crawled out of bed, brought my Vaio UX280P down with me, and cracked a beer. I went to bed at 2000 hours because I was tired and my eyes were burning and I wanted to catch up on some sleep but - that's not going to happen. It all began yesterday just as I arrived home...

The phone beeped and I was being paged to a Nationwide emergency meeting to battle a virus outbreak. I was up until 0200. Sure I slept in a little bit this morning, but it took me three cups of coffee to jump-start myself and at the conclusion of a very busy day I found myself wide awake in bed.

So I brought my minuscule little toy with me and loaded on it all the apps I would need to do remote unix administration with and had fun secure shell'ing into my box, chatting on tiny-AIM with galinda822, and bringing teh max0r across on vnc. Its fun, and convenient, and yes, you can post while laying flat on your back. The screen is bright, vibrant and sharp! But I wouldn't suggest it. While the stylus is fantastic, and the touch screen consistent in its ability, the font is so small that using the built-in "mouse" works much faster. However, there's no good position in which to lay while using the QWERTY keyboard. The stylus isn't meant to push the tiny buttons, and the fingers have difficulty because of a lack of tactile response. In short, I wouldn't suggest this as your daily tool. Unless of course you need to vpn via your wireless home network and solve unix jobs all without having to lift your head from your pillow - then its well worth its weight in gold!

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I was trying to get ampache working again the other night. I had assumed it was my NFS which was causing the catalog to not populate from the mounted volume, but that turned out to not be the case. Let me explain. For giggles, I fired up apache on teh max0r (an odd experience in itself) and installed ampache. Everything came up great, except the population of the catalog. Hmmmm. I then symlinked it to the root dir or the web server, still to no avail. Now, I know I've been away from sysadmin'ing awhile, but I wasn't expecting to delete songs within my mounted directory by use of the rm command! As soon as I saw the disc activity on my iTunes volume, I CTRL-C'd my way out of it. Yes, the symlink was still there, and yes, it was systematically deleting my songs within the mounted directory. Over 500 songs lost in a blink of the eye. I'll bring the dual-layer burner home again this weekend.

I'm still trying to decide if Tony's glaciphobia pertains to fear of alpine glaciers, continental glaciers, or just fear of glaciers in general. Because this is a sensitive subject for him, I never discuss it outright, rather, I try to pick up on associated fears to pinpoint what exactly about glaciers frighten him (though even I admit that glaciofluvial sediments are a touch scary). I don't think his fear of swimming fish is a puzzle piece, (though I was hoping for a good lead) as its not quite ichthyophobia which leads me to conclude that his fear of swimming fish is not a true phobia, rather, taking my lead from psychologists from the University of Arkansas who claim that homophobia is not an actual phobia because it's caused by disgust, not fear or anxiety, that his is completely unrelated. As I discover more, I'll gladly post here on this fascinating topic.

Dreamed that danzigfried and I were going into business together. From what I recall, however, we were dodging the gangland underworld quite a bit. I have no idea why. Perhaps I suffer from bolshephobia, the fear of Bolsheviks?

In an unrelated dream last night, I was packing my stuff as quickly as possible to move the hell out of Missouri. We were going to back to Texas. galinda822 was quite distraught, and kept questioning why, but all I could tell her was, "I gotta get outta here." This one I'm pretty sure stems from my fear of change, metathesiophobia.

schpydurx suggested backing up my iTunes to prevent further corruption. After careful consideration I've decided that he's right. Although it's sure easier to make flippant comments than to actually troubleshoot solutions, I think I'll cron a script to backup the database. That should protect me from any future occurences of this nature. As to backing up the entire iTunes library however...And I'm pretty sure this one is dead balls on with sectoratychiphobia the fear of hard drive failure.

Echoing my chronophobia or fear of time, I would LOVE to see The Barber of Seville at the Saint Louis Opera, and since Dirty Rotten Scoundrels is an entire year away, this is something I could do in the meantime. I really don't have the time for these excursions, but I'd sure like to make time for some of them.