I was watching the news while working on my computer. Or rather, I was listening to the news; TV is mostly used for background noise. My full attention is on the computer monitor -- whatever I'm reading or typing there.
Because I don't pay attention, a lot of times the program I was mildly interested in (or at least didn't mind as background noise) ends and I don't notice until something annoying comes on. Tonight, it was Insider, which is listed in the program description as: "Celebrity interviews and Hollywood dish drive this entertainment-news magazine."
Their lead-off story tonight was the arraignment of John Mark Karr. JonBenet Ramsey's alleged killer. This is supposed to qualify as entertainment news? Why? Because JonBenet had been in child beauty pageants? Because her parents became reluctant media celebrities thanks to the sensational nature of the case? Or because we don't even pretend anymore that murder trials are anything but entertainment except for the people who are directly involved?
Am I the only one who finds it jarring? "Coming up on Insider, we go to John Mark Karr's arraignment! We interview Paris Hilton and Clay Aiken about their new albums! The first public interview with John Mark Carr's first wife -- did she think he was capable of murder? We talk with Sarah, who's 29 and has a problem -- she's still a virgin! Watch as we try to help her find that special someone! Listen to our exclusive preview of the phone tapes. Is it Karr's voice?"
And on and on. And plenty of plugs for ET, which is coming up next and has pictures of the "Colorado slammer" where he'll be interred. Oh, and Jennifer Annistan's directorial debut and plastic surgery gone wrong, wrong, wrong!
It's the global scale making it worse. It's done now with such calculation. "Entertainment" shows are packaging human misery with greater and greater zest and polish. Humanity acts pretty much the same as it always has. In the days before movies and radio, people used to go to public executions. Pileups or accidents have always brought gawkers -- from the age of the chariot to the automobile age. Or if you were part of a scandal, all your neighbors and townspeople would point and gossip and speculate.
But at least when it was small scale, you might know the people involved. You felt shock or horror or sympathy. You were close enough to smell the blood and see the anguish. I guess it's just another way that we're all becoming more desensitized.
I wonder how long it'll be until we regress to fights to the death and competitive maiming? It used to be a cliche in speculative shows (like Star Trek) and books. Now it seems less of a platitude and more of a prediction.
Tuesday, August 22, 2006
Tuesday, August 15, 2006
Roughing It
Taken from a web site:
LIFE IN THE 1500'S
The next time you are washing your hands and complain because the water temperature isn't just how you like it, think about how things used to be.
Here are some interesting...facts about the 1500s:
Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May, and still smelled pretty good by June. However, they were starting to smell, so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the body odor. Hence the custom today of carrying a bouquet when getting married.
Baths consisted of a big tub filled with hot water. The man of the house had the privilege of the nice clean water, then all the other sons and men, then the women and finally the children. Last of all the babies. By then the water was so dirty you could actually lose someone in it. Hence the saying, Don't throw the baby out with the Bath water..
Houses had thatched roofs-thick straw-piled high, with no wood underneath. It was the only place for animals to get warm, so all the cats and other small animals (mice, bugs) lived in the roof. When it rained it became slippery and sometimes the animals would slip and fall off the roof. Hence the saying . It's raining cats and dogs.
There was nothing to stop things from falling into the house. This posed a real problem in the bedroom where bugs and other droppings could mess up your nice clean bed. Hence, a bed with big posts and a sheet hung over the top afforded some protection. That's how canopy beds came into existence.
The floor was dirt. Only the wealthy had something other than dirt. Hence the saying, Dirt poor.
The wealthy had slate floors That would get slippery in the winter when wet , so they spread thresh (straw) on floor to help keep their footing. As the winter wore on, they added more thresh until, when you opened the door, it would all start slipping outside. A piece of wood was placed in the entranceway. Hence the saying a ...thresh hold..
In those old days, they cooked in the kitchen with a big kettle that always hung over the fire. Every day they lit the fire and added things to the pot. They ate mostly vegetables and did not get much meat. They would eat the stew for dinner, leaving leftovers in the pot to get cold overnight and then start over the next day. Sometimes stew had food in it that had been there for quite a while. Hence the rhyme, Peas porridge hot, peas porridge cold, peas porridge in the pot nine days old..
Sometimes they could obtain pork, which made them feel quite special. When visitors came over, they would hang up their bacon to show off. It was a sign of wealth that a man could, bring home the bacon.. They would cut off a little to share with guests and would all sit around and chew the fat..
Those with money had plates made of pewter [a silver and lead alloy]. Food with high acid content caused some of the lead to leach onto the food, causing lead poisoning death. This happened most often with tomatoes, so for the next 400 years or so, tomatoes were considered poisonous.
Bread was divided according to status. Workers got the burnt bottom of the loaf, the family got the middle, and guests got the top, or the upper crust.
Lead cups were used to drink ale or whiskey. The combination would sometimes knock the imbibers out for a couple of days. Someone walking along the road would take them for dead and prepare them for burial. They were laid out on the kitchen table for a couple of days and the family would gather around and eat and drink and wait and see if they would wake up. Hence the custom of holding a wake.
England is old and small and the local folks started running out of places to bury people. So they would dig up coffins and would take the bones to a bone-house, and reuse the grave. When reopening these coffins, 1 out of 25 coffins were found to have scratch marks on the inside and they realized they had been burying people alive. So they would tie a string on the wrist of the corpse, lead it through the coffin and up through the ground and tie it to a bell. Someone would have to sit out in the graveyard all night (the "graveyard shift") to listen for the bell; thus, someone could be saved by bell, or was considered a dead ringer..
Now me:
And this is why I'm glad I live in the twenty-first century. And why I never understood roughing it in the wilderness.
Mankind spent who knows how many millennia crouching around a fire eating charred meat and retiring to caves or huts with no electricity, running water or toilet facilities. Then getting up the next morning to chase game all day and a missed kill meant no charred meat that night. Generation after generation lived in exactly the same way, with no more hope for changes or improvements than their great-great grandparents had.
But mankind did made progress, very slowly at first: one invention leading to small improvements in the quality of living; one idea leading to more and better ideas. Slowly, very slowly at first, inventions and ideas building upon each other. Then during the Renaissance picking up speed -- faster and faster, leading to better and better quality of life. The explosion of ideas in the last century and a half has resulted in such massive lifestyle changes and improvements in comfort and technology that someone who lived only four generations ago would be amazed at the difference in lifestyle.
I won't be camping out anytime soon! Not even the thirty foot trailers with the running water, TV and air conditioners. If you want that, why not stay at home? And if you want the real cave man experience, go flick your light on and off a few times or get a cold drink out of the refrigerator and think about all the people who've lived before you who would have thought themselves in paradise!
LIFE IN THE 1500'S
The next time you are washing your hands and complain because the water temperature isn't just how you like it, think about how things used to be.
Here are some interesting...facts about the 1500s:
Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May, and still smelled pretty good by June. However, they were starting to smell, so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the body odor. Hence the custom today of carrying a bouquet when getting married.
Baths consisted of a big tub filled with hot water. The man of the house had the privilege of the nice clean water, then all the other sons and men, then the women and finally the children. Last of all the babies. By then the water was so dirty you could actually lose someone in it. Hence the saying, Don't throw the baby out with the Bath water..
Houses had thatched roofs-thick straw-piled high, with no wood underneath. It was the only place for animals to get warm, so all the cats and other small animals (mice, bugs) lived in the roof. When it rained it became slippery and sometimes the animals would slip and fall off the roof. Hence the saying . It's raining cats and dogs.
There was nothing to stop things from falling into the house. This posed a real problem in the bedroom where bugs and other droppings could mess up your nice clean bed. Hence, a bed with big posts and a sheet hung over the top afforded some protection. That's how canopy beds came into existence.
The floor was dirt. Only the wealthy had something other than dirt. Hence the saying, Dirt poor.
The wealthy had slate floors That would get slippery in the winter when wet , so they spread thresh (straw) on floor to help keep their footing. As the winter wore on, they added more thresh until, when you opened the door, it would all start slipping outside. A piece of wood was placed in the entranceway. Hence the saying a ...thresh hold..
In those old days, they cooked in the kitchen with a big kettle that always hung over the fire. Every day they lit the fire and added things to the pot. They ate mostly vegetables and did not get much meat. They would eat the stew for dinner, leaving leftovers in the pot to get cold overnight and then start over the next day. Sometimes stew had food in it that had been there for quite a while. Hence the rhyme, Peas porridge hot, peas porridge cold, peas porridge in the pot nine days old..
Sometimes they could obtain pork, which made them feel quite special. When visitors came over, they would hang up their bacon to show off. It was a sign of wealth that a man could, bring home the bacon.. They would cut off a little to share with guests and would all sit around and chew the fat..
Those with money had plates made of pewter [a silver and lead alloy]. Food with high acid content caused some of the lead to leach onto the food, causing lead poisoning death. This happened most often with tomatoes, so for the next 400 years or so, tomatoes were considered poisonous.
Bread was divided according to status. Workers got the burnt bottom of the loaf, the family got the middle, and guests got the top, or the upper crust.
Lead cups were used to drink ale or whiskey. The combination would sometimes knock the imbibers out for a couple of days. Someone walking along the road would take them for dead and prepare them for burial. They were laid out on the kitchen table for a couple of days and the family would gather around and eat and drink and wait and see if they would wake up. Hence the custom of holding a wake.
England is old and small and the local folks started running out of places to bury people. So they would dig up coffins and would take the bones to a bone-house, and reuse the grave. When reopening these coffins, 1 out of 25 coffins were found to have scratch marks on the inside and they realized they had been burying people alive. So they would tie a string on the wrist of the corpse, lead it through the coffin and up through the ground and tie it to a bell. Someone would have to sit out in the graveyard all night (the "graveyard shift") to listen for the bell; thus, someone could be saved by bell, or was considered a dead ringer..
Now me:
And this is why I'm glad I live in the twenty-first century. And why I never understood roughing it in the wilderness.
Mankind spent who knows how many millennia crouching around a fire eating charred meat and retiring to caves or huts with no electricity, running water or toilet facilities. Then getting up the next morning to chase game all day and a missed kill meant no charred meat that night. Generation after generation lived in exactly the same way, with no more hope for changes or improvements than their great-great grandparents had.
But mankind did made progress, very slowly at first: one invention leading to small improvements in the quality of living; one idea leading to more and better ideas. Slowly, very slowly at first, inventions and ideas building upon each other. Then during the Renaissance picking up speed -- faster and faster, leading to better and better quality of life. The explosion of ideas in the last century and a half has resulted in such massive lifestyle changes and improvements in comfort and technology that someone who lived only four generations ago would be amazed at the difference in lifestyle.
I won't be camping out anytime soon! Not even the thirty foot trailers with the running water, TV and air conditioners. If you want that, why not stay at home? And if you want the real cave man experience, go flick your light on and off a few times or get a cold drink out of the refrigerator and think about all the people who've lived before you who would have thought themselves in paradise!
Friday, August 04, 2006
Hacking up a phlegmball
I posted a comment today in a My Space blog. The blogger had been frustrated, not only by the poor service of a waitress, but also her derogatory comment at the slim tip she'd been left. Instead of confronting the waitress, in a calm and rational manner, she did what a lot of us do: left and felt irritated enough by the experience to blow off steam writing a blog about it.
It's easy to preach and harder to practice, and I admit I've done it much less in the past than I should have. It's hard to find the confidence to stand up and draw attention to yourself. Hard, too, when you're afraid your temper will get the better of you, and you'll descend to a level of screaming and swearing which will cheapen your stand and make you look bad. But I like to think I'm standing up for myself a bit more than I used to and I'll continue to worry less and less about what others think of me until I'm a crabby old lady who says whatever she thinks.
Unfortunately the Internet, with all the great services it provides and friendships between people who never would have met otherwise, opens the door to idiots and creeps also. Stalkers and Pedophiles and Hackers (oh my!).
The Internet allows cowardly, insecure people a degree of anonymity that gives them false courage. They don't use their internet savvy to create, only to tear down what others have created. I've heard graffiti praised as an art form. There are some people with artistic talent who have drawn beautiful pictures on ugly, tenement buildings or rotting fences with crumbling paint or concrete blocks. But that's not graffiti, guys, those are called murals. That is "art." "Rick + Lisa 4ever," "Jets Rule!!!!" and the F word -- no matter what colors you spray paint it in or how many curlicues you use or how psychedelic it looks -- is not art. It is garbage.
Hackers are graffiti garbage spewers. They enter sites, take out content, and replace it with garbage. They do it because it brings a feeling of power to an otherwise sad and unremarkable life. Sometimes they do it because they have a grudge against someone and they figure it's revenge. I suppose they consider themselves like Robin Hood or freedom fighters. They're striking a blow against their enemies, in the time honored tradition of might makes right. Are they any different, morally, than people who break into houses? Are they any different from any other form of bully?
Anyone who thinks it's a joke or no big deal would no doubt be outraged if they began finding things out of place in their house every night when they come home. Little bits of evidence that someone was there -- that someone has the power to get in and out of their house with impunity. Someone who didn't do any vandalism this time, but may later, if they so choose. Hacking doesn't have the danger of someone actually, physically threatening you, but that doesn't justify the bullying, that doesn't justify the small minds trying to make other people feel smaller than they.
These are people who are mentally ill. If they were only taking it out by hacking, maybe that would be a release valve and I could at least think that by hacking they were sparing those around them. But I have a feeling these are people who make life miserable both for those within the Internet and those around them. These are the people who probably trip nerds, feel up women and run, or use their cell phones to take pictures up women's skirts. These are women (and I'm sure that women are hacking in larger numbers as we learn more about the Internet) who make their parents, husbands, boyfriends, children miserable. These are people who spread malicious lies and gossip at work, who litter, who pee in communal pools, who pick their noses in public, who steal candy from babies. In other words (to end with a quote from Blazing Saddles)... assholes.
It's easy to preach and harder to practice, and I admit I've done it much less in the past than I should have. It's hard to find the confidence to stand up and draw attention to yourself. Hard, too, when you're afraid your temper will get the better of you, and you'll descend to a level of screaming and swearing which will cheapen your stand and make you look bad. But I like to think I'm standing up for myself a bit more than I used to and I'll continue to worry less and less about what others think of me until I'm a crabby old lady who says whatever she thinks.
Unfortunately the Internet, with all the great services it provides and friendships between people who never would have met otherwise, opens the door to idiots and creeps also. Stalkers and Pedophiles and Hackers (oh my!).
The Internet allows cowardly, insecure people a degree of anonymity that gives them false courage. They don't use their internet savvy to create, only to tear down what others have created. I've heard graffiti praised as an art form. There are some people with artistic talent who have drawn beautiful pictures on ugly, tenement buildings or rotting fences with crumbling paint or concrete blocks. But that's not graffiti, guys, those are called murals. That is "art." "Rick + Lisa 4ever," "Jets Rule!!!!" and the F word -- no matter what colors you spray paint it in or how many curlicues you use or how psychedelic it looks -- is not art. It is garbage.
Hackers are graffiti garbage spewers. They enter sites, take out content, and replace it with garbage. They do it because it brings a feeling of power to an otherwise sad and unremarkable life. Sometimes they do it because they have a grudge against someone and they figure it's revenge. I suppose they consider themselves like Robin Hood or freedom fighters. They're striking a blow against their enemies, in the time honored tradition of might makes right. Are they any different, morally, than people who break into houses? Are they any different from any other form of bully?
Anyone who thinks it's a joke or no big deal would no doubt be outraged if they began finding things out of place in their house every night when they come home. Little bits of evidence that someone was there -- that someone has the power to get in and out of their house with impunity. Someone who didn't do any vandalism this time, but may later, if they so choose. Hacking doesn't have the danger of someone actually, physically threatening you, but that doesn't justify the bullying, that doesn't justify the small minds trying to make other people feel smaller than they.
These are people who are mentally ill. If they were only taking it out by hacking, maybe that would be a release valve and I could at least think that by hacking they were sparing those around them. But I have a feeling these are people who make life miserable both for those within the Internet and those around them. These are the people who probably trip nerds, feel up women and run, or use their cell phones to take pictures up women's skirts. These are women (and I'm sure that women are hacking in larger numbers as we learn more about the Internet) who make their parents, husbands, boyfriends, children miserable. These are people who spread malicious lies and gossip at work, who litter, who pee in communal pools, who pick their noses in public, who steal candy from babies. In other words (to end with a quote from Blazing Saddles)... assholes.
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