My xanga has not worked properly for two weeks today, and Chris is ignoring my e-mails. You know, the letter Chris sent me (three times — the identical e-mail) seemed so friendly and understanding that I thought we could be friends, but apparently not.
An anonymous commenter on my chatterbox said that xanga was proprietarty. I figured that this was sort of like a Bushism — you know, when Mr. Bush says that quotas “vulcanize” people, or that he wants to get rid of “federal cufflinks.” We all have a lot of fun trying to imagine what Mr. Bush means when he says things like this — it is a popular parlor game around here, and That Man actually has a calendar with a new Bushism for each day, so we can start off our workday with a mind-limbering experience.
For the record, I think “vulcanize” was intended to be “polarize.” My first thought was that he meant work quotas would galvanize people into working harder, but The Empress favors the idea that he meant that hiring quotas would polarize ethnic groups. It was suggested at one point that he was thinking of something that would depress affect — making people like Star Trek Vulcans.
Vulcanizing, in case you are wondering, is an antique method of reparing tires. Rubber, heat, the god Vulcan…
In any case, I assumed that “proprietarty” was something like this. However, Pokey looked it up, and she tells me that lots of technologically savvy people say “proprietarty.” It has nothing to do with being a tart (old word for “prostitute”) or with impropriety (bad behavior). It is rather a variation on “proprietary,” (in computers, the opposite of openly shared, as in software you have to pay for).
I still don’t know what it means to say that xanga is proprietarty, and it does not seem to offer me any clues to repair my broken xanga, but I was fascinated to know of this usage.
So I have knitted not at all this week. I have been working on the quilt. There was choir practice last night (we learned that the Oldest Member, who is an absolute baa-lamb, takes off his hearing aid before rehearsal and puts it in his pocket, which explains some of the things you hear from the tenor section). There has been a lot of weeding to do. My husband lost his mind over the mess in the house, which was a rather time consuming experience for us all. You know. Things get in the way.
But I have been poring over my knitting books in search of suitable small things to knit in the dog days, and I have some possibilities in mind.
4 thoughts on “Thursday June 30, 2005”
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I think I may have to concede to you – I have run out of counterarguments.
All in the first paragraph is quite true. And I could turn it around and say that the ‘scientist’ who refuses to believe in the possibility of some sort of divine power seems just as ‘fundamentalist’ as the Christian who refuses to believe in the possibility that creation occurred somewhat differently than is described in Genesis. Science is nearly as much a matter of belief and faith as any of the other religions. I also agree with you about political clout. There is far more inherent power in those for whom the world is a dichotomy than in those who whom it is not. The latter will always have doubts which weakens their power.
It is also true that, if we consider ourselves to be tolerant people we must by definition be tolerant of those who do have a world view that includes the literal truth of the Bible. Over the years members of my family (including myself) have had discussions with acquaintances – and door-knockers – associated with more fundamantalist portions of evangelistic churches. It always amused me that Mormon missionaries, and often Jehovah’s Witness, would always end up at our place so that they could discuss religion with my father – who was an agnostic. They would be invited in and the debate would go on for 2 hours or more. It never got nasty and the missionaries always left feeling that my father (and later on myself) was nearly converted 🙂 The only time I did get really annoyed was after a discussion with a Jehovah’s Witness workmate who described in detail how her Baptist parents basically threw her out of the house when she converted to Jehovah’s Witness. Almost in the same breath she then started telling me how she told her own daughter to leave because the daughter no longer followed the the Witness way. When I pointed out that she had done exactly the same as her mother the comment I got back was ‘It’s not the same!” (I walked away at that point – otherwise the discussion would have become somewhat less civilised)
No problem with long comments – I do it to you all the time. I’m still smiling at the picture of two people standing on the edge of a cliff deciding on the specifics of an experimental design that tests the theory of gravity.
Chris is from Xanga?
🙂 No, not battered down with words – compared with members of my family when debating, your style (written at least) is fairly restrained. Mental image was probably not quite correct – I am usually fairly useless at thinking in images – it was more like hearing the murmur of the conversation between the two on the cliff but not being close enough to hear the details – very irritating. If you get close enough to hear the debate, let me know.
ahh dear ole shrub. Do you watch the daily show w/ john stewart? He always points out crazy bushisms and nonsensical sayings. It’s fabulous!
I haven’t had THAT many problems with xanga. I’ve definitely gotten the “you’ve found a bug!” screen a couple of times, and like dweezy was saying, the comments screw up once in awhile. I have been thinking of switching services, just for additional features, but that would mean not being a part of the xanga yarn hos!! 🙁 so sad