Diary of a Network Geek

Even without being able to speak, his comedic timing is perfect.

Seriously, this comedian is completely hilarious and all his humor is very personal. The video is great, and short, so a quick watch for a break on Friday. It’s from the Britain’s Got Talent show and brought to us via Boing Boing; the Lost Voice Guy. He tried out for the show and, in spite of not being able to speak without a machine, managed to be very funny. And, yes, a lot of his humor is based around his disabilities. He’s still very funny. You can see more at his website, Lost Voice Guy.

Again, he’s good for a laugh, and he’s got a great attitude along with his humor. He’s well worth a few minutes of your Friday, and you’ll feel a bit better afterwards, I think.
Enjoy!

This was originally posted on Use Your Words.

Or at least, getting to know someone.

I am the world’s worst at “small talk”. And, for pity’s sake, do NOT ask me what I’m thinking. Do that and you’re likely to get back some pseudo-intellectual gobbledygook about patterns of language and how we mimic our significant other. No, seriously, I actually found myself thinking about that when I watched a friend completely change his speech patterns after getting married. And, I’ve noticed the same thing with my own speech patterns.
See? It doesn’t take much for me to get off on a tangent. Also, I think of myself as painfully shy, though I know my friends don’t perceive me that way. Meeting people and getting to know them is extremely difficult for me. Though, oddly, I’m now on my second marriage, so I managed to get to know at least two people well enough to marry them. I only got to know one well enough to stay married, though, for whatever that’s worth.
In any case, I know I’m not the only person who has these issues. I know because I read things on the internet. Things like this article at FashionBeans titled “99 Get To Know You Questions, From First Date To Happily Ever After”. The article briefly talks about the pressure of conversation while dating, but then offers a solution; 99 questions to start conversations with a date or partner.
Frankly, that seems like the perfect topic just before a weekend. And, hey, no need to restrict some of these questions to just someone you’re dating or planning to marry! Take a look and see if you feel brave enough to ask your friends what their biggest fear is or what they’re most grateful for in life or one of the many other questions they suggest.

And, in any case, have a great weekend!

This post originally appeared at Use Your Words.

Or, my best advice has been reduced to a small web page.

Seriously, I cannot tell you how many of my friends have come to me with major issues that tend to include things like panic attacks, crippling self-doubt and related side-effects. It’s possible that’s the result of them knowing I’ve been through most of that myself, not to mention surviving cancer when I was single and thousands of miles from family. Really, that kind of thing can harden up your survival skills. Trust me on this one.
My blushing bride tells me that it’s because I’m somehow reassuring. Even strangers seem to think I exude some kind of gentle trustworthiness that makes it okay to tell me all kinds of things.
Regardless of why, I’ve talked more than my share of people out of tough emotional spots before. Off the metaphorical ledge, if you’ll allow me the melodramatic metaphor. My advice, though, is usually really simple; eat something good, drink some water, take a nap.
Well, now, when you can’t find your Uncle Jim to help you through a rough time, you can try You Feel Like Shit, an interactive website that can help you through dark times. You just answer a series of questions and the site helps you make some good, healthy self-care choices that, hopefully, will help you through whatever is going on. The creator, Amanda Miklik, would like to remind you that this really good site doesn’t replace the help of a mental health professional, and neither do I, so we’re on the same footing. And the site may actually be a little more helpful than I am.

Anyway, it’s not exactly a Friday “Fun” link, but it’ll do this week. So, enjoy your weekend, drink some water, eat something healthy and delicious and take a nap.

This post originally appeared on Use Your Words.

An existentialist game about artificial intelligence and, yes, paperclips.

A couple of weeks ago, a friend of mine who read my post about the web-based game, Seedship told me about this fascinating and strangely compelling game, Universal Paperclips. If you follow that link, click on the box in the center to start. There’s no on-site help. There’s no explanation. Just a simple web interface that, if anything, suggests you may want to click a button labeled “Make a paperclip”. That’s it. That’s all.
But, if you are bold enough to start clicking, you’ll quickly find yourself drawn into the strangest game I think I’ve ever played. Initially, you’ll invest a few minutes, to get things rolling, but at a certain point, you’ll find that everything seems to roll along by itself with only a little intervention on your part periodically.

I don’t want to give away anything but I did let my simulation run for more than a week while only playing a few minutes a day. Though, it’s hard to tell, because it did get strangely consuming. I assume that if I let the simulation keep running, it would eventually end only with the heat-death of the simulated universe of the game.
And, if you decide to play, and get stuck, there is a Universal Paperclips WIKI, to help you. I admit, near the end of my time playing, I used it to confirm a few things.
If you have some time, and some patience, try this game. You won’t be disappointed!

This post originally appeared on Use Your Words.

My own political leanings often surprise me.

I should start by saying that I don’t think of myself as a particularly political person in any sense of the word. Sure, I have some very strong opinions about some things, but I mostly keep that kind of thing to myself because I hate the idea of becoming a bore. And, I think I’m a terrifically boring person, though my wife and friends assure me that is not the case. In fact, recently when I pumped out a bunch of messages about the net neutrality changes and the fight in the House and Senate to repeal that very, very bad FCC decision, at least one friend was so surprised he had to ask me about it. Which gave me the opportunity to educate him. It was nice.
But, what the title of this post refers to is the results of the quiz I took at PolitiScales. The quiz is meant to measure where you fall on 8 axes, including the one we think of most; Progressive vs. Conservative. I was surprised to find out that I was only 31% Conservative, but 57% Progressive. More stunning to me was that I rated 57% Regulationist vs. 17% “Laissez-faire” and 52% Nationalist vs. 31% Internationalist. The other axes include; Constructivist vs. Essentialist, Communism vs. Capitalism, Ecology vs. Productivist, Revolutionist vs. Reformist and Rehabilitative Justice vs. Punitive Justice. Again, it was a little eye-opening to me as I’d always thought of myself as both more conservative and global than they measured me as being. Of course, this is just one relatively short quiz and my thoughts on all this are more complicated than they can easily measure with a multiple choice questionnaire. Still, I encourage you all to take the quiz and see how you feel about it. And, maybe, give a little thought to your political life before the mid-term elections later this year.

This post originally appeared at Use Your Words.

Nature is filled with creatures both terrible and beautiful.

I love macro photography. Getting close to small animals and insects and seeing them in a totally new way and on a scale we don’t normally perceive them is something I love to both do and see. And, while I have to admit my skills are meager and mostly focused on still photography, macro videography is even more amazing to me.
So, this week, I’m sharing some wonderful macro video with you by way of bioGraphic, which is a magnificent website filled with incredible video and stills of nature. But, this week, specifically, I’d like to share bioGraphic’s page of “Caterpillar Cameos” videos. It’s a whole page of short, but fantastic, videos of caterpillars that are both beautiful and kind of terrible. While some are brilliantly colored, or even furred, they also may be poisonous or mature into devastating crop parasites. And, let’s face it, something about those creepy, little caterpillar faces are both enthralling to watch and uncomfortable at the same time. At least for me.

Either way, it’s a beautiful thing to behold nature in all its diversity and glory in ways that you may not otherwise seek out.
Enjoy!

This post originally appeared on Use Your Words.

It’s never too late, or too early, to get more secure on-line.

Those of you who know me, know that I spend most of my days toiling in the corporate data mines and as a result, I’ve spent an inordinate amount of time thinking about computer security. I also tend to be tech support for my friends and family, which covers a surprising amount of ground and technical situations. It seems like, lately, the biggest concern has been security. Either people are worried about having credit card information stolen or getting a virus or having some other password violated. Unfortunately, not enough of them are worried about backing up their systems, and, if I’m being totally honest with you, dear readers, I should worry about that more myself.
But, at the end of the day, I’m often left feeling like I can’t possibly give everyone the good advice that they need to stay safe with their technology and the internet. I tend to approach things from a corporate point of view, and even run my own network at home a little bit like a smaller version of the networks I’m responsible for at my “day job”. But, that approach doesn’t work for most people and I don’t have time to do a lot of customizing for their individual concerns.

Now, though, I’ve found a site that can help; Security Planner. It’s a free, interactive guide to let regular people get expert-reviewed advice to help them address their concerns about staying safe on their phones, tablets and computers. You just answer some simple questions about what worries you regarding technology and what can go horribly wrong, and they give you a simple action plan to help you get and feel safer. And, if you’re a more advanced user, or more intensely paranoid, they can help point you toward expert advice that, with a little more research and work on your part, can help you, too.
Best of all, it’s free.
Right now, the site is only in English, but they hope to expand to Spanish and French eventually, too.

So, do me, and whoever else you might go to for tech support, a favor; make a security plan for the coming year now.

This post originally appeared on Use Your Words.

As someone who’s been the beneficiary of charitable giving, I heartily endorse it!

And, actually, you may have enjoyed the benefits of charity, directly or indirectly, too. For instance, if you have had cancer or know someone who has had cancer, you’ve benefited from money donated to cancer research from any of a number of charities. If you’ve used Wikipedia, you have only been able to do so due to donations made to that organization. Also, I know that it’s at least partially my upbringing in the Methodist Church that has helped me form the belief that I should give back some of what I’ve been given. I don’t give it all to a church these days, but I do still like to give to worth causes. That seems like an especially important thing to both believe and do these days with the social and political climate being what they are. If you feel the same, but aren’t sure where to give, I have a couple suggestions.
First of all, there’s the Boing Boing 2017 Guide to Charitable Giving. I don’t necessarily endorse all the charities they list, but there are some good ones there, though several are out of the UK and may not be to my American audience’s taste.
Secondly, I’d like to recommend that you consider giving to established charities in your local area. Find a homeless shelter or women’s shelter to give to this year, maybe, or, my personal favorite, a local stray animal rescue. I lean toward donating toward the most helpless in need in my local area. I like the animal rescues because it’s such a huge problem where I live and it’s mostly domestic animals that have been mistreated one way or another. Domesticated animals are our responsibility and we should step up to that.

So, this Friday before Christmas, I hope you’ll forgive me for getting up on a soap box, but I truly believe that if we want the world to be a better place, we have to make it that way. One way I choose to do that is to donate to worthy causes. Besides, if you donate now, you can take it off your taxes, so it’s a “win-win” situation!

Anyway, I hope you’ll think about it and, either way, have a Merry Christmas.

This post originally appeared on Use Your Words.

While you read this, I’ll be seeing The Last Jedi, in 3D on IMAX.

But, since it’s Friday, I still want to share something great for you. Something fun. Still, I also want to keep with the theme of rubbing your noses in the fact that I’m seeing the newest Star Wars movie while you’re stuck reading my dumb blog. Luckily, Star Wars and George Lucas have been in the news a lot the past couple weeks, so I have plenty to steal, er, “share”.
Let’s start with an article at IO9 about the fans who made an alternate Star Wars trailer featuring the original concept art by Ralph McQuarrie. It’s some live-action as well as animation, but it’s five minutes and twenty-three seconds of awesome. It’s definitely worth a look!
Then, there’s the student film by George Lucas that launched so much of what became science-fiction cinema for the past 40 years. His film, Electronic Labyrinth THX 1138 4EB, would eventually become the feature film, renamed more simply THX 1138, which happens to be an awesome movie. The earlier, student film is only about 14 minutes long, so an easy film to sneak in at lunch. It’s a little retro at this point, but it still has a lot of the aesthetic that makes his later works great. Again, definitely worth a look!

Enjoy and if y’all are good, I may come back and share a review of The Last Jedi!

This post originally appeared on Use Your Words.

Martial arts aren’t just Asian!

Most of the time, when someone mentions “martial arts” you think of kung fu or karate or something similar. But, relatively recently, and by that I mean in the past twenty or thirty years, there’s been quite a Renaissance, if you’ll pardon the pun, in Western or European combat arts. Over the years, I’ve read about several of the groups that have driven some of this interest, but recently, I came across one that was new to me, HEMA or Historical European Martial Arts. And, more or less in keeping with the theme from the past month, I have a link to a free, 90-minute documentary on Historical European Martial Arts titled “Back To The Source”.
It’s quite good, actually, even if it’s free. And, it’s a lovely look at an alternate way to enjoy violence in a relatively safe way.

Enjoy!

This post originally appeared on Use Your Words.