Craft Show

"Where have you been man?"
"Crafting and stuff. You know."
"Hum, no. No I have no idea what you mean. What the hell is 'crafting'"
"You know, crafting and beading and stuff. You know making stuff."
"Like toaster doilies?"
"See I told you, man. You know.."

So I've been a little busy. I was invited to a crafts fair last weekend. Many of you out there just glazed over. You're comatose, staring blankly at the screen right now.

"He doesn't post for almost 2 months and then when we crave a geeky editorial we get 'crafts and beading?'"

Yeah, I know. I'm sorry. Bear with me. So when I'm not geeking out I'm woodworking in the garage. I make pens, bottle stoppers, stuff like that. I sell them in local stores, to help outfit my workshop and desktop. Keep them in the upgrades that they have become accustom. So someone saw my turned trinkets and invited me to a crafts fair.

So I spend like 6 weeks in the shop making pens, bottle stoppers, pendants and mushrooms. I was crazy! I was like the sap and wood chips king.

"Peter!"
"Yes?"
"Why are there wood chips all over the bathroom floor?"
"Weird. I dunno, must have been the kids."
"And in the kitchen, living room and our master bedroom closet?"

Anyway I setup my display on Friday and on Saturday I was required to work the show for 3 hours. Since I was the newbie, some of these ladies had been attending this show for a decade, and a nasty man (one of only two men there) I wasn't given much responsibility.

I was the official basket hander. That's right. Basket hander. I also amended greeter onto that prestigious position.

"Good morning. (SMILE) Basket?"
"Thanks"
"Good morning. (SMILE) Basket?"
"I'm just looking"
"Good morning. (SMILE) Basket?"
"oh... I suppose"
"Good morning. (SMILE) Basket?"
"Can I get a blue one?"

Yep. That was my life on Saturday morning. Saying good morning, and handing out and collecting fancy plastic shopping baskets for little old ladies, bedazzled females and the row of sulking men filing behind them wearing the face I was eager to sport. Instead I was stuck grinning like a school boy and commenting on what lovely finds where inside.

"What a darling mouse. knit?"
"Crochet."
"Of course!"

I was suppose to be relieved at 12:00 but my replacement didn't arrive until 1:30. So I think I said those words about 500 times. No joke. We were crazy packed. When I did get relieved the person said,

"Is that all? That's an easy job."
"Well, I am just a man you know."

She nodded in understanding and I walked away. Sore from standing and with a stupid grin that would take me most of the day to undo.

Signs Of The Time 2

Lock your doors & secure your valuables, the police are around!


It's nice to know where you're headed!


Eh?!


If your not already mad the death, we're going to fine your butt!



No Doubt!

Craiglist Pranks

Sweet Freaking Mercy!

I cannot believe I've left this place dormant for over a month. It appears the at the well of random thought has dried up. Not so. Nay, never...

...Okay well that's about all I have to say.

I've been thinking. That's right, lock your doors and put earmuffs on the youngsters! I give a way a fair amount of stuff on Craigslist. It cool to put something on my driveway, post my address with a picture and just say, "Come and get it!"

People come. I've given away things like as old monitors, furniture, baby gates, stuffed animals and computer memory. Someone somewhere will come. If you post it, they will come.

I have also driven all over town, picking up strange things. Things like like scrap lumber, free tools and even three boxes of old magazines. Anyway, this got me thinking... how do we know that these are legitimate?

If I was really pissed off at a neighbor down the road, couldn't I log in and post a new listing

"Free Lawn Gnomes. There are approximately 73 to choose from. Pick one or take them all! Plus free black and white cat, answers to "Mr. Boffta Wiggles!" if you can catch him. Don't worry he's mostly friendly! 123 Canal Street, Anywhere USA. "

Why not?

International Talk Like a Pirate Day 2009

Arrr! It be that time of year again me hearties. So dawn your peg legs and pray for a scurvy end to all your foes.

Get your Pirate Name!!
I be Pantin' Harley Straw

Now learn the Pirate Alphabet!







Load up with RUM. Now it's time to sing!

Korobushka Stuck Again...

Sometimes I get this song stunk in my head for no good reason. I Feel like playing Tetris now...

I thought I'd pass along the favour!

For the curious

20 Things I Learned From Training

There are two types of training, bad training and needed training. I've never witnessed good training

Training instructors are rarely the cream of the crop

When in training it's considered polite not to fall asleep

This is sometimes unavoidable

Training instructor jokes, laughing only encourages more. AKA Don't feed the bears

Trainers who know anything are few and far between. Don't bet that yours will.

Training input survey. The, 'Will I ever see this trainer again?' gamble.

There is always one person who will never get

To quote a movie, "The cows could program the VCR by now!"

This boob is also the most vocal. Please put your hand down...

They are also the best source of material typo's. How many days is this again?

Pick your lab partners carefully. Four days with "Ned the Halitosis Factory" is far from bearable.

Lab exercises...A simple game of follow the directions, and snicker at your frustrated neighbors

Bored yet? If you didn't bring your blackberry, you could always count ceiling tiles. See #3

Smokers have a training advantage... Time for another break

The best part of training is travel

How do I make three beers look like a legitimate dinner receipt?

The my favorite words uttered in training, "looks like we'll be finished early."

Online training, all the pain and none of the benefits. AKA the mangers favorite training.

All things being equal, even bad day training is better than good day working.

Clippings 2

Some more fun newspaper clippings I've found. Definitely worth a few moments of your afternoon...

I suppose this is just very thorough.
Sounds okay to me...
$3.50 reward? Clearly the man did something bad!
Central Heating?!
Sorry for this one...
Oops. Our bad!
The games criminals play...
I can't think of anything that would add to this, gold metal classifieds listing. Pulitzer. Seriously.
Loves kids. He ate two for breakfast!
Clearly the broads just a troublemaker!
Ah. The happy couple.
The food here is so...well flat.

Lazy Thursday Blues: Caption 28

Got The Lazy Thursday Blues? Well I've got the cure. It's Caption Thursday! I'll provide a picture and you provide the caption.

As always we need to adhere to good taste. Please keep it clean.

Here's the one to get it started:

You sold the last tickle me ELMO!?

Here's the one to get it started:

When did you say your mothers getting back?

Found on the Internet:

1.) Super Mario Brother Thank You Generator. Serious time waster.

2.) Star Wars The Force Trainer - Control it with your Mind! Anygood Jedi knows that a good understanding of the force takes training.

3.) Redneck geeks?

Clippings

Some fun newspaper clippings I've found. Definitely worth a few moments of your afternoon...

With a little extra sauce, they serve up quite nice!
Clearly a chance to finally understand a language!
Coincidence? I'm sure...
I think this was just an elaborate employment drive...
How could they possibly tell that?!
"I knew when I saw the rolling pin, that something bad was going to go down."
um, okay...my favorite?
This one floors me. I love it!
The Utah Fire Department would also like to remind you not to light your shirt on fire.Oh and the Utah Police just called to say...
Don't miss out on this!

Ask A Geek - Illuminati

Q- Makolyte -Does "Illuminati" really exist?

Thanks for the question, Makolyte! I think the answer to this question has many facets. Like a diamond, only lacking in beauty, monetary value or extreme longevity. Basically none of the good stuff, but only the tedious parts. Regardless, I will do my best to answer it. So, lets see...

Is there an all powerful organization controlling world events and leading us in a direction of it's choosing? The answer is simple. I have no way of proving that they exist. Secret societies conspiring to manipulate the world and her outcomes have throughout history been notoriously difficult to document. Go Figure.

That being said, I think we can easily come to the next conclusion. If you can't prove they exist then you probably will have just as much trouble proving that they don't exist. In all honesty, that is what is so much fun about conspiracy theories. I heard somewhere that almost anything can come out 30% in anyone's favor.

Like, If you want to believe something, you can make any evidence 30% effective. It works there there and there, but not here here here and here. As such, anyone can find a ground for their point of view. This is great when trying to prove something might exist. With enough anecdotal and circumstantial evidence you'd be surprised how many folks you could rally to your cause. Even easier if you give away chocolate. People will do anything for chocolate, even bad, hollow milk chocolate items.

"But Peter," you say, "Why would we want to convert people to believing in something that we aren't even sure of ourselves?"

Because if the Illuminati don't exist, then what would be the next best outcome? Right! An army of crazy conspiracy soaked minions ready to do battle with any foe we label as "The Man." So we use our poorly applied statistical data, and overuse of the phrase, "But how can you be POSITIVE?" to harness all the wavering souls we can manage and bring them into our growing fold. Businessmen, politicians, used car salesman and that guy that sweeps up after the elephant parade. We explain to then that we are doing it for the greater good.

Truth? Geeks, love power. Seriously, its a real hoot to be the one pulling all the strings. The main difference between geeks and others is our extreme cynicism to keep up safe (O RLY?) and the ability to harness the power of information. Why else would everyone assume Bill Gates would be a part of this elusive crew?

So what do we have now? A search for Illuminati, that in turn actually created a quasi-reality conundrum. What? See, by searching but not finding them, we ended up raising an army to do our bidding, and we in turn BECAME the Illuminati. A self fulling mission, I would say. Awesome.

So are the Illuminati actually out there? I sure hope...if not what else are we going to talk about while waiting for Left 4 Dead updates to download?