Nothing Much At All

I like having my own web site.  It’s fun to muck around with it and remember how to write HTML and CSS stuff.  I like making changes, trying to come up with something interesting (and someday I’ll do that).

It annoys the piss out of me, though, that something works properly in Internet Explorer but not Mozilla Firefox.  It really annoys me.  I suppose I’ll figure a way around it, but I’m not even sure of that. 

I’ve been totally lax lately, I know.  I’ve just been mega-busy this week and haven’t had time for writing.  I don’t have much time right now, either, but I’m doing it.  I’ve added something else on the “To Do” list.  It’s encouraging that my “To Do” list is getting longer, but it’d sure be nice to actually be able to get to it.

The problem with not having much time is that you need to choose what you want to do with the time you have.  I can’t decide to finally finish BioShock and write up a new satire piece.  It’s one or the other.  And that kind of sucks.

I’m just about done with BioShock, though, so it’ll be something to take off my plate.  Then I’ll have to go back to finishing Oblivion.  If I finish that, then I’m done with games until Fallout 3 comes out.

Come to think of it, I haven’t been playing games very much lately.  What a shame that is.

The Destiny of Millions

Good morning, everyone.  It’s been quiet here for the past few days.  I’ve been very busy and haven’t had time to do anything.  This isn’t an especially good thing but, as the saying goes around here, having a job at all is good.

I’m quite determined to set aside time for myself in the evenings where I can just write.  The Jonathon story is flinging around in my brain.  A re-write of “Have Gun Will Travel” pokes its head in on occasion.  My massive novel involving a lot of high-tech science-y stuff is still percolating.  So many things that I would like to get to.

Then there are the items that I just like to do, such as “Hi-Tech Nostalgia” and “Movie Trailer Reviews.”  Speaking of which, Speed Racer…  looks worse and worse to me every time I see the commercial.

Anyway, the weekend is coming up and I think it’s time to start taking things seriously. 

Fifty Years From Now

The Way We Will Be 50 Years from Today: 60 Of The World’s Greatest Minds Share Their Visions of the Next Half-Century: Mike Wallace: Books ISBN: 084990370X ISBN-13: 9780849903700

There’s a new book out called “The Way We Will Be 50 Years from Today” edited by Mike Wallace. It has essays by sixty of the world’s top minds (why was I not invited?) on what they think the world will be like in the year 2058.

I have a problem with books like these because they don’t seem to be right. We should all remember how predictions from the past

ended up by the year 2000. No flying cars, no moon bases, no “kitchen of the future” with dinner tables that washed dishes for you. The only predictions that seem correct are the ones that are vague, like “computers will be really powerful” and “we’ll have a presence in space.”

In most cases, these predictions seem more like what the author would like to see happen rather than what will probably happen.

I can come up with hundreds of predictions for fifty years from now.

Most of them are mutually-exclusive. I’ve already written about a few of them, but you’d probably have to search around a bit to find them.

Let’s have some fun.

1) New World Order

By the year 2058 the global economy collapsed. The world became re-united under a central leader, a global president. Each country, in turn, is ruled by a local “governor.” Problems arise when these governors can’t get along any better than they did when they were absolute rulers of their country. The global president is completely ineffective at keeping peace. For the world’s citizens, nothing much has changed other than having a central head figure for aliens from outer space to contact.

2) Citizen Tracking

In the coming years, the citizens of the United States will complete their castration of the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights. They will give up their rights of privacy in the interest of convenience. The government will sell them on various programs, such as a National ID card, because it will make their lives easier by having a card that carries their bank information, medical history, voter status, drivers license, and other such things that can be used anywhere. The fact that it tracks everything they do is a minor side-effect. People will gobble it up. RFID implants will be used to keep children safe from kidnappers, hikers safe from getting lost, and your senile grandma from ending up in the wrong house. All tasty foods will be outlawed, due to being unhealthy, and replaced by a nutritious paste sanctioned by the government. Paper and coin money will be phased out so all transactions can be monitored to prevent terrorism. Don’t even think of smoking a cigarette. Alcohol will be permitted so everyone will be happy.

3) Civil War

The events in #2 transpire which creates a rebellious faction. Civil war erupts. While the government won’t use nuclear weapons within the country, it will use other forms of bombardment and land engagements. Chaos ensues, turning the U.S.A into a veritable wasteland. The coastal areas will remain within control of the

government in case other countries decide to use the opportunity to stage an attack on the weakened country, but the interior will be a lot more chaotic and dangerous.

4) The Star Trek Holodeck will be created

Creating a real-world Holodeck will be one of the major changes in human kind history. If you don’t know what a Holodeck is, you’ll have to read about it because it’s too much for me to cover right now. But if everyone had a large closet space that could be turned (for all intents and purposes) into an unlimited amount of space with anything a person desired within then it would be pretty damn neat. Since the US only has information type jobs, all work can be done in a networked holodeck environment. You could phase out janitors and stuff. You could do just about anything you wanted to do without leaving your home. I wrote a whole big thing about it, but you’ll have to search for it. It was last year, sometime.

5) The Creation Of Nanobots

The Feynman/Drexler vision of nano technology will change the entire world in so many ways it would be hard to count. People could live forever, cars and other items could be self-repairing, food would be plentiful and made from garbage, similar to the way the food replicator works in Star Trek. Artists would become the highest caste in our society because the only thing separating what you could have versus what your neighbor could have would be the styling.

Engines of Creation: The Coming Era of Nanotechnology: Eric Drexler: Books ISBN: 0385199732 ISBN-13: 9780385199735

Okay, that’s five. I’m sure I could think of more, but I’m still tired and I’m still not feeling well. If I had some nano bots running through my system wiping out cold virus’ I’d be gold.

101th Post

There’s a store around here that’s selling a one terabyte hard drive for $200.00.  I find this interesting and also kind of annoying.

Back in 1989 or so I bought my first hard drive for around $500.00.  It

was a 10Meg drive.  That would mean that back then I would needed to have 104,857 10 meg hard drives to equal 1 terabyte.  Back in my day this was the stuff of science fiction.  Beyond science fiction.

Even NORAD’s super computer, W.O.P.R. didn’t have that kind of storage.  Of course, it was defeated by some kid with a 1200bps modem so maybe that’s not so surprising.  But still…  Gosh.

I couldn’t even begin to do the math to figure out how many 16K (that’s kilobyte) games would fit in 1 terabyte.  I could, but I’m not going to.  I’ll leave that as an exercise to the reader.

Considering that most computers can use four hard drives (maybe three depending on how you set up your DVD-ROM.  That’s 4 terabytes.  Golly.

100th Post

Hello everyone.  This is the 100th post to my WordPress blog.  It may be the longest running blog I’ve ever had.  This is quite an achievement because I usually lose the password long before this point.

I’ve wracked my brain trying to come up with something really blockbuster to make it stand out, but I can’t.  All you’re going to get is this drivel. 

Some of you may have noticed I put up a piece of fiction.  It’s currently in three places, but that’s not important.  What is important is that I’d like to tack on a piece here and there until it’s done.  I’ll also be revising it because I know it needs some changing.  Everyone is free to comment or criticize.  I wouldn’t be putting it on my blog if I didn’t want anyone to say anything about it.

Another item of interest is that I now have Gardenofentropy.com.  It’s very plain right now.  I was going to have everything on there, but I’ve decided to only keep my forums and fiction blog on there.  The regular blog will always lead back here.  Someday I hope to get to the 200th post.  I’m free and loose with the forums and, probably, the picture thing, so go ahead and look at it.

I think I’ve done a fairly decent job of writing down at least one thing a day.  I know I’ve skipped a few days, but I’m doing better than I have previously.  Some days it just can’t be done.  I’ll try and do an extra days work when that happens.

Some things are still in the works.  High-Tech Nostalgia Part // is still in the pipeline.  I’ll continue with Jonathon.  There’s a couple of other things rattling inside my brain box that I’ll be working on.  And you never know when I might get some extra change and throw up another Vending Machine Food Review.  That’s the second biggest draw that this blog has going for it.  The first is a picture of a kitten.

WordPress shows me what people searched for to get here.  I’m amazed at some of the things that lead people here.  For instance, today “orange kitten fluffy” is at the top of the list.  Anything with “orange” and “kitten” will be the highest ranking search.  I was surprised and happy to see that a couple of people searched for “Rutt’s Hut.”  Some poor soul searched for “erin grey clothes off video buck rogers.”  I didn’t think she had a nude video, but I suppose I could be wrong.  The rest of the searches have to do with gardening and strawberry milkshakes.

As usual, I always look forward to comments.  They’re what keep me going.  That and knowing that someone, somewhere, has read some of this junk.  I’m also happy to take requests.  I’m not sure what that would mean, exactly, but I’m open to hearing about it.

I hope you all have a nice weekend.  Or at least a nice Saturday and Sunday.

The Haunting of Jonathon — Part I

The light just before dawn turned the morning sky gray. From the window over the kitchen sink, Jonathon could see the silhouette of trees against the sky. He sighed, deeply, and set the glass of water in the chipped enamel sink.

A noise had woken him earlier than usual. The noise came early in the morning around this time of year for the last four years.

There was no sense in going back to bed. His alarm would be going off soon. Instead, he poured himself a bowl of Sugar Frosted Flakes and stared at the tiger on the box until they were soggy. He liked them best when they were slightly soggy. Jonathon still had milk in the bowl when he trapped the last flakes with is spoon so he decided it would be cost effective to have some more cereal.

It was a kind of “law of diminishing returns,” he thought. You start out with a full bowl of milk and cereal. When the first bowl is done, you’ll still have some milk left so you pour in more cereal. Only it won’t be as much as the first bowl because there’s not as much milk. The following bowl is the same way with even less cereal. This can be continued until you’re only taking one cereal flake out of the box to sop up the last drop of milk.

Sometimes Jonathon wondered if anyone else thought about these things. He could be a genius or insane, he thought. Or both. He was sure he’d read somewhere that insanity and genius were linked in some way.

He finished washing the bowl, spoon and cup and put them in the green plastic dish rack. Jonathon checked his watch again. He was still ahead of schedule. He left the kitchen intent on taking a shower, but stopped in front of the living room. Or was it a sitting room? Jonathon didn’t know what the difference was; that was Annie’s area of expertise.

The French doors to the room were shut. He stared at them in the darkness of the hallway. Finally, he swung both doors open and looked into the darkness.

The room was usually dark, even during the day. Old and heavy curtains covered the windows. Antique sofas and chairs stood on antique rugs. The walls even had an old style wallpaper covering them, and the wallpaper was covered in paintings with dark wooden frames. It was, overall, a very dark room.

Annie had loved her antiques, though, so Jonathon let her have the room to herself. The room seemed brighter back then.

Friday Nothingness

Friday is finally here and I don’t have very much to write about.  Nearly nothing, in fact.  I’m feeling a little bit better, thankfully.  I could still sleep for a couple of hours if I were allowed to (my work doesn’t allow that for some reason).

I went searching the net a little while ago and found a very old blog I had written about cell phones and text messaging.  Basically, it was about how people using chat programs at the time (ICQ mostly) and IRC were trying hard to figure out how to get a good voice thing going so they could talk to a person instead of typing to them.  Then the cell phones started getting really popular and the biggest selling point about them was sending text messages.  Now you had the technology to talk to just about anybody at anytime without paying long distance charges and people preferred to send text messages.  That was written nearly ten years ago and I had no idea that it would still be the biggest selling point today.

People are just weird.

I had always thought that having a parrot on your shoulder would be cool, but not practical.  I figured that they’d sit there for a minute or two then try their best to get away. 

I couldn’t have been more wrong on that part.  Zoey sat on my shoulder for hours last night.  Mostly doing nothing but preening and poking at my ear and wanting her neck scratched.  This is supposed to be bad behavior because it’s not enforcing the proper behavior of sitting on a perch or something.  But it’s still pretty neat.

Sick

This past winter was a very good winter for the flu virus’.  Everyone I know managed to get it, or something that looked a lot like it.  I managed to fend it off because I’m so wonderful and have a hardy constitution.  At least, that’s what I thought.  I fear I may be coming down with something. 

Sometimes I would like to be sick.  I think it would give me a chance to lay down and sleep for a week or so.  You know, get some bed rest in.  I hardly ever get sick, though.

As one gets older, they sometimes look back on life and wonder about things they haven’t thought about in years.  Today I’m thinking about two places I had been to when I was quite young.  One is Krum, Texas and the other is Benjamin, Texas.  Neither place has much going for it, that I know of.  But I’m overcome with a desire to see if they’ve changed very much.

Krum, TX

It’s been years since I’ve been to either place so I’m not sure if I’d even recognize very many changes.  Benjamin, though, still looks like it’s just a crossroads so maybe it hasn’t changed very much.  I reckon it’s been about twenty years since I’ve been there.  According to my mom, anyway.

Benjamin, TX

Perhaps I’ll be able to make the time to get up there soon, just to look around.  It’ll be interesting for me, but probably not for anyone else.  It’s a piece of personal history, though.

Post-Tax Crash

April 16th should be a holiday.  After all the stress that everyone goes through to make it easy for the government to steal from them it’s the least they could do.

Austin, Texas, is in the top five cities for procrastinating with their taxes.  I don’t know how they work it in other cities, but Austin needs some help.  There’s only one IRS office, and it closed at 4:30pm yesterday.  That’s a few hours short of midnight, when everything is supposed to be turned in.

Since everything needs to be post-marked for April 15th, surely the post offices would be open until midnight.  No, just one.  For the entirety of Austin.  At least they did it right.  The post office is on a two lane road and they turned one lane into a huge drive through.  People that already had postage on their stuff could just give it to a postal worker on the side of the road and be on their way.  If you needed postage you could get into the post office.  It was a genius setup, really.

But it’s all done now, for most people.  Sure, there’ll be people who filed for extensions and forgot and everything else.  But for the rest of the country, we just sigh in relief that we have another year before having to be worried.

Too much, too quickly

I’ve been using computers since I was a kid.  One of the greatest things about computers has been word processors.  I remember reading articles about how it was so much better to use a word processor than a typewriter.  The very best thing about using a word processor is that when you make a mistake you can go straight to the error and fix it.  You don’t need to re-type a page, or a line, just go straight to the mistake and fix it.

And yet, after years and years of using computers and word processors, if I make a mistake, I will backspace the entire line and re-type it to fix my mistake. 

Why is this?  Why can’t I just move the cursor to a word that’s spelled wrong and just change it?  One of the many things that’s wrong with me.

I wonder, sometimes, if we’ve grown too fast too quickly.  If having a world full of huge corporations, mega-malls, tiny computers and other things is more of a burden than a blessing.

You could open a store today, perhaps your own grocery store.  If you were in a spot that had people around and it was far enough away from a large chain so it was more convenient for people to go there then you’d probably do fine.  But it’s only a matter of time before a Wal*Mart or Super Target, or HEB, or Kroger’s, or something moves in.  Then that will become more convenient because they’ll carry more items at cheaper prices than you’d ever be able to charge.  Soon after you would be forced out of business. 

People demand convenience, at any price.  There are even convenience stores designed to be convenient.  They’re small, carry a very limited amount of items, and are grossly expensive.  But they’re usually built into a gas station so you can get gas and that bottle of ketchup you forgot to get.  There’s no sense going all the way to the grocery store just for one item, but if it’s down the street that’s fine.  There’s no reason for someone to do without until the next big shop when you can get it at the corner for only twice the price.  It’s okay to pay double the amount for something as long as it’s only an item or two.

So we demand convenience and we are impatient.  We don’t care how much it costs unless it costs too much.

But do we have too much, too quickly?  Can we really afford iPods, cell phones, GPS units, and all the other things that we like to have because it makes life more convenient?

American workers are protected.  There is a minimum wage that a worker will get.  But it would be too expensive to manufacture an iPod in the U.S., so that work is sent to another country.  Now the American worker makes no money at all.  Maybe even loses her job.  All for an object that plays music.  Multiply that by everything else that we use on a daily basis and you really need to start wondering if iPods, or any MP3 player, is really that important.