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• NPR : Wait Wait — Don’t Tell Me!
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For various reasons, I find that I am feeling rather stupid tonight. The latest instance occurred while I was browsing through the WordPress Lessons, which I really wish they’d had when I first started using WP, and I learned the definition of a trackback. Oops.

I’ve only gotten one trackback, in reference to problems with TagCloud,[1] and it freaked me out no end. Embarrassingly, I had no idea what it meant except that someone has written something related to something I’d written and I was mysteriously being notified of this, and was so startled that I panicked and deleted the trackback from the comments. Now, to my shame, I realize that the trackers-back were simply trying to share more information with me about something I’d whined about, not trying to make me paranoid. Mea culpa. Mea ignorantius culpa.

It seems that, sometimes, just occasionally, it’s good to RTFM. Alas, I tend more toward the “What does this do? Well, let’s try it and find out” school of thought, which is more fun but definitely more haphazard.

Additionally, I’ve been trying for a few days to get del.icio.us to post my new bookmarks to my blog, and progress has been absolutely nil (despite following the instructions[2] gleaned via Lifehacker to what I swear is the letter). I’ve made a few tweaks tonight, and hope that it’ll actually work this time, but who knows?

The most annoying thing is that my PDA has stopped talking to my computer. I’ve checked the connections, unplugged and replugged everything, updated ActiveSync, looked at the settings, and nothing. My PDA, whose name is Severus, is aware that the computer’s there, or at least that he’s connected with the cradle. My desktop, though, continues to snub Severus no matter what I do. I suppose that’s another thing I’ll try to sort out this weekend; I found a MS troubleshooting article, but can’t be bothered to plow through it at the moment. At least I can still transfer files using the SD slot in my desktop — I absolutely adore having the slots built right in, so you don’t have to mess with connectors or adapters or cords that get tangled and so on. And at least I can recharge.

Not being able to synch is somewhat nerve-wracking, though it does bring up another oddity: last month, when I was still able to synch, I’d have to do a soft reset afterwards before I could use the Start menu or the Switcher Bar. Most annoying, but presumably something to do with having a borderline geriatric PDA trying to work with newer software. I’d guess that’s it, at least; I haven’t researched that much yet, either.

Wow. The tasks for this weekend are just piling up: plow through the WP Lessons, figure out the del.icio.us automatic postings, figure out why Severus can’t synch, and then figure out why he needed a reset after synching back when he was able to do that much. And that’s in addition to the homemade seitan I want to try to make, and possibly the cashew-based truffles I was going to make last weekend but never got around to making. Oh, and watch “Serenity,” which finally arrived with RD season 3 on Tuesday.

I think I need a nap.

***

[1] After checking my standalone TagClouds, I can confirm that my feeds still haven’t updated since mid-November.
[2] In this case, the “push the button and see what happens” approach just wouldn’t cut it, because the interface is, shall we say, not of the most intuitive. In fact, “Huh?” is a fairly accurate description of how well I grasp what data should go in which fields.

Maybe it’s because my parents, who are rather reliable in picking out good presents, and I have not yet exchanged gifts, but this year’s crop seems, well, just horrible. The only one that approached reasonableness is the candle set (and even then, the candle is taupe — taupe, I say!), and I can’t really fault the gift-certificate route, it being only a vagary of fate that I happen to despise the store that issued the card. The regifting of the tea, well, that was just funny, and also a useful clue that my grandmother does not like tea. On the other hand, I have received no less than two gifts from people who should know me well enough to have at least some clue of my taste, yet the gifts have either shown no awareness at all or have been so flagrantly the antithesis of all that I am that I have to try very hard not to interpret them as slaps in the face.

This is not to say that I don’t appreciate people thinking of me, but if the appropriateness of the presents reflects how well they know me, or how much they care about getting something suitable for me, then I’d really rather they didn’t bother. Less stress for them and for me. If they’re thinking of me, I’d much rather they just e-mail or call, rather than get me some . . . gawdawful something to act as tangible proof that they know I exist.

Therefore, I am now issuing some rules about present-giving. I am guilty of breaking some of these rules in the past, but shall do my utmost to follow them in future.

1. Thou shalt not gift out of a sense of obligation. Just because you work with, are related to, or live next door to someone is not a sufficient reason to gift. For instance, I found myself buying a present this year for a six-year-old I’ve never met and whose name I couldn’t remember, simply because he is the son of the woman my semi-uncle is involved with. That is ridiculous. I had absolutely zero chance of picking out something he would like, and now they’re stuck with a probably unwanted toy to rehome. Henceforth, gifting shall be entirely voluntary, and you shall only begift those you wish to begift.

2. Reciprocation is not obligatory, especially not emergency improvisational reciprocation. Maybe I was feeling especially generous or flush with money or festive or something, but I didn’t get you a present just so I could get one from you. If that had been my goal, I’d be sensible enough to cut out the middleman and just buy something for myself. If you got me a gift and I didn’t reciprocate, then assume that I didn’t find anything I thought you would like and decided not to insult you with something tacky, or that I’m feeling particularly impoverished at the moment, or whatever.

3. There shall be no gifting without at least some thought going into the process. Is this something the recipient is likely to appreciate? Have you ever seen her wear anything gold, or does she seem to prefer silver? Do you think he’ll really enjoy that book, or would he more likely prefer a video game? If you’re not at least reasonably sure, why the hell are you giving a present to this person anyway? You’re obviously not close enough to them to know their taste. If you really feel you must gift them anyway, skip to commandment #4.

Corollary 3a. If you’re not sure, is it at least something perishable and thus unlikely to place a burden of rehoming or regifting on the recipient? If they don’t like the banana bread you made for them, they can chuck it out and at least rest assured that the bears at the dump (or the compost heap) will have a festive snack. If the wine is corked or the fancy olive oil is crap, they can pour it down the drain, recycle the bottle, and no one gets hurt. The same is not so easily said for gaudy costume jewelry or gewgaws or trinkets, which require more effort to get rid of responsibly.

4. Thou shalt treat gift certificates with caution. Generic is usually better, unless (a) the generic issuer in question is viewed with disdain in some circles and you’re not sure whether the recipient moves in those circles, or (b) you are absolutely, positively sure that the recipient uses and/or can use the service offered. I once gave my mom a gc to Fandango, which is an absolutely wonderful service — in Atlanta. In Statesboro, there is no online ticketing, no kiosk that allows you to bypass the line and just get your prepaid ticket right away. At the time, that wasn’t even available in Savannah, so the gc was completely useless to her and thoroughly pointless.

5. If thou absolutely must do something else, thou shalt consider charitable donations instead. This is what I think I shall do next year for the extended family (those who don’t really know me well, and whom I don’t know well): pick a noncontroversial charity (e.g., HSUS, the Red Cross/Crescent/Crystal) and request that, instead of presents, relatives donate whatever they would’ve spent on me to the charity, instead. They don’t even have to tell me how much they donated, or present any evidence thereof. Also, money I would’ve spent on presents for them will go to a charity of their choice. I like that idea best of all.

SitePal is absofrickinlutely hilarious. (Note: The full effect requires audio, so you can see just how abysmally the animation’s lips are synched to the speech.) For only $10 a month, you too can have your own creepy animated character on your Web site, to boss around and terrify unsuspecting visitors. If you plod through the Overview, you are eventually rewarded with the opportunity to create your own test character, which resulted in about an hour of hilarity for me. I recommend it without reservation to those who are, like me, easily amused.

I think my favorite bit is how the characters roll their eyes in an attempt to follow the mouse around the screen. They look positively demented. If you click on the “Try Demo” button, the resulting character is even funnier. Try making her eyeballs rotate as far as they’ll go, and then make her head waggle around. (Pausing the animation may help, because she becomes more mouse-attentive* when you do that.) Making her go cross-eyed is also worthwhile. The fact that the Demo Host character reminds me a lot of Janet on “My Hero” –especially when her eyes are rolled to the extreme corners of their sockets — just makes it funnier.

I know, I shouldn’t mock. I could not create such animations myself, and these things are probably very advanced examples of technical wossnames. One of the creators will probably eagerly hunt for links to their site and be absolutely crushed that I laughed at their heartfelt strivings to create something exciting and beneficial to humanity. If that happens, I apologize, but I do ask that they perhaps consider testing their models in future to limit the eye-rolling and mouse-following behavior. It’s just not fair to ask visitors not to play with these features. It’s like putting someone in a room with a cat and a small, high-powered flashlight, and expecting them to resist the urge to play chase-the-spot-of-light-until-kitty-throws-up.

Also, given a choice, I’d prefer Max Headroom. (Or Bryce Lynch, but that’s a whole other story there.) Damn, I miss that show. ::whimper:: I will personally nominate for sainthood the first person who releases non-bootleg DVDs of that series. I stupidly lent out my tapes to someone maybe seven years ago, and never got them back. One of the greatest mistakes of my life.

Great, I’m all sad now. I’ll go play with my SitePal character, whom I’ve decided to name Bryce. That’ll cheer me up.

***

*Is it just me, or did that sound rather rude? Maybe I need to get out more.

Update: Here’s a screenshot of Bryce. Hope he’s at adequate resolution:

I should just go to sleep now. I’m probably getting slap-happy at this point.

I’ve got a new desktop wallpaper. :D

It’s not Snape, but Lucius is goooooood, too.

Itemized, for your skimming pleasure.

1. Not having been contacted by anyone after my SOS phone calls and e-mails yesterday, I showed up at around 12:15. Grandmother then informed me that the lunch is in fact at 2:00 (though it later emerges that she told aunt #1 it was at 1:00, and neglected to tell aunt #2 a time at all; at least it wasn’t just me).

2. Having hit the road about 11:00, I didn’t have time to prepare any food to bring and so made do with my emergency food bars. This was vaguely distressing to my grandmother — not because I wasn’t eating her food, which she’d been warned about, but that I only had a small lunch. She is of the old school of hospitality, which requires its initiates to urge more food on guests the instant that they clean their plates, or indeed sometimes while they’re still eating their current helpings.

3. Having recently bitched about how awful Hellmart is, it was of course inevitable that I would be presented with a Hellmart gift card. Thus does the universe amuse itself.

4. One must be careful when regifting; ideally, stick a little name-and-year label on the package when stowing it for future use, to be sure that you don’t give your granddaughter the exact same package of teas that she and her parents gave you two years ago.

5. My uncle (Larry #1, to be distinguished from Larry #2, though they are respectively married to aunts #1 and #2, and also from Original Larry, who was born into the family a few generations ago*) is the only grown man I know who admits to reading Harry Potter. Incidentally, he is also pro-Snape.

6. Today was not my day, dog-wise. Nigel had his infamous and baffling Squeaky Stomach ailment this morning, which apparently can only be conquered by pita bread; regular food will be ignored. My grandmother’s new boxer gave me the hairy eyeball and growled at me, despite my best efforts to make friends; aunt #2’s bassett/shepherd mix looked at me like I was the sum of all his nightmares, and hid behind my aunt. He’s dreadfully shy, so I didn’t take that personally, but I’m a little perplexed by the boxer’s behavior. You would’ve thought he’d assume I was okay, given that my grandmother was standing right next to me and chatting happily. Odd.

***

*That side of the family is rich in Larrys. No chance of a Larry-related shortage there. It is perhaps inevitable that my grandmother tends to call my father, who is not a Larry, by that name anyway, especially given that she treats names as flexible descriptors that can be attached to anyone even remotely the same sex, shape, age, or species. I am usually addressed by my mother’s name, though occasionally by aunt #2’s name. Whatever. She does it to everyone, and always has. She’s good at keeping dogs’ names straight, though. Must be genetic.

Sulk #1: Still nothing from Netflix. The mail did come, but all I got was a stupid credit card offer.

Sulk #2: Though I’d mailed all three of my previous DVDs all at once, Netflix still hasn’t notified me that the third one has been received. Maybe it’s just lagging behind by a few days, like the inbound ones; maybe it got lost in the mail. ::sigh:: I really don’t want to have to call them and sort out a lost DVD mess. I’ve been told that they’re tolerant of that, but I just don’t want to deal with the hassle. Bleagh.

Sulk #3: According to my parents, my grandmother said she would call me sometime this past week with details about the Xmas lunch. Amount of news I’ve received = 0. I assume it’s sometime midday tomorrow, and at her house, but beyond that I have no idea. One hopes that it wasn’t held today. I’ve just called and left a message on her machine, and hopefully someone will call me back or e-mail me or something. If not, I guess I’ll show up about 12:30, and hope someone will be there; if they’re not, I’ll just leave presents on the screened porch and come back, I suppose.

I’m all sulky now. Netflix estimated that my next two DVDs would be here today — Serenity and the third series of Red Dwarf — and they’re not, and I can’t figure out whether the mail will be delivered tomorrow. Probably not. Bloody sluggish postal service. Now I’ll have to wait until Monday. ::sob::

I should just buy the DVDs. They’re on my list of to-get items, but unfortunately that’s kind of a long list at the moment, and there are several other DVD sets jostling for prominence on it. Mostly British series, actually: The Young Ones, Chef, all the Blackadders (to replace my VHS sets, which have all inextricably tangled their respective innards in my VCR over the years), and, should the BBC ever release them, A Bit of Fry and Laurie.

Side note: While watching the first series of RD, I realized that Mark Williams, who plays Arthur Weasley in the HP films, also played Petersen in a couple of RD eps. It’s a very small and only occasionally reccurring role (after all, almost all the crew gets killed midway through the first episode, which kind of limits their screen time), but still kind of cool.

Well, I thought it was interesting.

***

*Explanatory note for those who have not watched Red Dwarf, which is probably most of my friends: One of the delightfully horrible characters on RD is named Rimmer. If you are too young to remember the early/mid-1980s “I want my MTV!” commercials, back when the channel was all shiny and new and vaguely controversial and actually played music videos, then please don’t tell me because I’ll have to go away and lie down with a warm cloth on my forehead and sip restorative teas, and there goes my whole long weekend.

Having the day off, I spent most of the morning faffing around in the PPK forums. I don’t go there all that often, because the volume of posts is a little overwhelming and there doesn’t seem to be a way to get RSS feeds.*

At any rate, the forum time was not wasted, primarily because of this thread. I’ve only made truffles once before, years ago, and I wound up getting bored with the scooping and rolling and just ate the prototruffle substance straight out of the pan, but now I’m thinking I should try again. The origami boxes are cool, too, though my fingers are currently so cold that I doubt I have the manual dexterity to fold them properly. It’s hard enough typing.

Anyway, the truffles shouldn’t be that hard to make, and, if they turn out well, they might be good to bring along to the family lunch thing on Sunday. I’ll be bringing my own main dish at any rate (I’m thinking balsamic-glazed mushrooms and tofu, with maybe a side of garlicky kale), so I might as well bring something to share for dessert, too. Plus, there’s no way I need to eat 50 truffles by myself.

***

*I am hopelessly addicted to RSS and Bloglines. No RSS? I’ll bookmark your blog, but I’m afraid I can’t be relied on to check it all that regularly. Sorry, Jewel Staite. Just not gonna happen. What’s even worse is when a blog I really want to read publishes an RSS feed that, for some reason, refuses to talk to Bloglines. Tragic.

My parents are off to two weeks in Rome; I just got back from dropping them off at the airport. (Driving my dad’s car was, um, interesting. The clutch sticks, and the car itself is bigger than my little Bug, and I can’t figure out the accessory buttons so I drove back the entire way listening to the engine rev weirdly instead of listening to music. Unnerving. I guess I’m used to a turbo diesel instead of a Saturn now.)

Airport traffic was not bad, but people are cutthroat when it comes to the dropoff/pickup area and will not let you in unless you barge. Seriously. I sat there for several minutes waiting politely, blinker on, but not even the barest hint of a gap appeared. Driving an unfamiliar car that isn’t mine, I was certainly not about to try barging and possibly clip someone in my weirdly sized car, or present my dad with a newly dented car. Finally a passing airport cop took pity on me and literally forced people to let me in. Pathetic of me, but kind of him.

The only other relevant bit of news is that my mom might be teaching this summer, which would mean that she couldn’t go on the Ireland tour we’ve scheduled in May. I don’t particularly fancy going on a tour by myself — not being much of a tour person anyway, and certainly not keen on the idea if I don’t know anyone else in the group — but I’m kind of primed for travel. If she winds up teaching, I may see about setting up something on my own. Not sure what, exactly. Maybe Seattle. Maybe Vegas (again). Maybe Maine, though I wonder whether I could find something not fishy to eat there. Ooh, I wonder how much flights to Provence cost? Probably a lot, especially around summer.

Well, at least I’ve got time to plan.