Mister Null

Although at work I am "Mr. Pedantic," and while "The Morally Undefined Ghost of the Person of the Green Flame of Copper(II) Chloride" is another good choice, I think it's about time for me to find a good title of my own. The former, whilst rather often is remarkably fun for me, it's not very flattering and isn't something I really want other people to know about right away. Especially if they're cute and female. The latter, well, it'd be awesome, but would require more work than I'm willing to put forth. That whole death thing is such a pain.

So I'm in the market for a new title, but I'm not sure where to go to discover one. Most stores I know only deal in physical objects--I'm also still looking for somewhere that will sell me bottled confusion, as if I don't already posses enough. And those that deal in things somewhat more abstract, they're way too advanced to bother with things such as titles. Point masses, infinite planes, but no flattering titles.

If anyone could direct me to a titular depot, the reference would be deeply appreciated. Otherwise, well, suggestions are accepted. As long as they're not "Dorkface", I'd prefer something I'd be more willing to let other people know about. Like the cute and female variety.

I suppose I could always go ahead and start working on gaining the title of "The Morally Undefined Ghost of the Person of the Green Flame of Copper(II) Chloride." "The Person of the Green Flame of Copper(II) Chloride" would be a decently impressive title itself. And would have all the ladies swooning, I'm so sure! Although it would probably be cheaper to just have my title be the null string (not "The Null String"), saving a /ton/ of money whenever I get business cards printed.

It's Automagical!

One of the most important inventions of the modern age are the toilets. 3am, 6 feet of snow, outhouse start to look really bad. Or in the middle of July when it's a hundred and fourty out. And since their invention, there have been a variety of improvements. One of the most fun, of course, being the automatic flush.

It's like magic. Throw something in, wave your hands, chant words if you like, and a journey to the center of the world (or at least the sewer) begins. But with the automatic flush comes a slight problem. Some toilet designers simply weren't thinking and combined it and the toilet lid.

Now this obviously doesn't well work. The lid covers the sensor, so it never flushes itself. But then, someone got the bright idea of putting a sticker on the underside of the toilet lids.

"To activate automatic flush, close lid"

If you have to close the lid to flush the toilet, can it really be considered "automatic"?

Grappling Hooks or Dynamite?

Slow Trucks.

Driving down the road, there're lots of signs alongside the road. The Slow Trucks sign makes me think every time, though. I always wonder where the trucks are that I'm supposed to be slowing down. I never see the trucks when I see the sign, maybe they're somewhere in front of me. Or maybe I need to slow down too, as they're somewhere behind. Or maybe they're in the oncoming traffic. Wherever they are, though, it's apparently my job to slow them down.

So while I'm not sure which trucks need slowing, it's still somewhat important to figure out how to slow them down. My first thought was that I needed to install some grappling hooks in my car so I could grab the trucks and apply my brakes. But then the trucks would probably just drag me along. Mass is important in the momentum equations.

Other choices include caltrips or dynamite, or maybe carrying around a trailer full of sand. Although after thinking about it I decided that they probably just intended for me to get in front of the trucks and slow down myself, because even though the truck /could/ run me down, they tend not to.

Of course, I could be reading the signs incorrectly, they might be similar to the falling rocks or wildlife crossing signs. So whomever put up the sign might be saying, "yes, we know there are lots of slow trucks in the area, we've done everything we possibly could to get rid of them, but they're still around. Please watch out for them. Don't make eye contact, and please, please don't feed the trucks."

Language Woes

Words are wonderful (full of wonder), and a ton of fun to play with. Suffixes and prefixes and infixes and any other kinds of fixes add so much extra meaning to words, they allow so much extra depth that could by added via a myriad of other words. Instead of having to memorize a ton of definitions, we instead can just remember a few, and combine them in new and interesting ways.

Of course, taken to the extreme, this will lead to a 1984-type language, in which words can be removed from the language, words which do have extra depth or shades of meaning, because they aren't politically appropriate. But as long as we can retain the extra words, with different meanings and shadings, we can manage to not only keep our freedom, but also converse intelligently with a variety of people. So getting rid of the extra words would be double-plus-un-good. But having the ability to extend the meaning of a word is even better.

Of course, with our complex language (as with many a complex language since the dawn of time), our language has the capability of being both ambiguous and also a lot of fun to play with. Not as much fun as the Romans, maybe, with their oracles that could say pretty much anything and make no sense, but be taken as incredible wisdom and a great prophecy.

And then, even better, when the prophecy was fulfilled (filled to fullness?) they could look back and see that, well, yeah, the oracle's nonsense could have meant things to work out that way.

No, English is much harder to do that with. It can still be played with, the things that you can do with it are pretty amazing. But it still makes me feel aweful.

Gliting Glastries

I love randomness. Although I suppose I'm still debating whether or not there's such a thing as true randomness, the concept that Things Happen without rhyme or reason, some days it just makes me feel better.

Sometimes I'm able to convince myself that true randomness exists. Those are generally the days that I'm having a bad day. The days that I convince myself my car isn't working because a butterfly in Walla-walla Washington sneezed. No true randomness so far. But /why/ did the butterfly sneeze? No real reason, it just did so.

Of course, other days, I convince myself that it did sneeze for some real, if unmeasurable, reason. And that happened for some other, but also unmeasurable, reason. Etc. Etc. Etc.

So basically, my definition of randomness is based entirely on if there /exists/ a reason, or if the reason can be measured, I suppose. But nonetheless, I love randomness.

But ignoring the difference in random- and pseudo-random- things, a long discussion in itself, one of my favorite uses of randomness is randomly selecting words. It's fun to supply random answers when people ask questions. Especially for the questions that people don't really care about the answer to ("how've you been?") or the questions that you obviously wouldn't know the answer to.

Some people don't even notice. They know what they were expecting to hear, so that's what they listen to, and anything you said doesn't matter. Some people give incredibly odd looks. Some people play along and continue the conversation, using that as a valid answer. The latter group is a lot of fun (as is the first--but only for you, not for both parties), but things can get more interesting if you stop using random words, and instead use a random word.

Which probably needs some explanation. Using random words (former) means using a randomly selected word from your personal dictionary. Kumquat, dodo, antidisestablishmentarianism, a word that means _something_ at least. Using a random word (latter), however, means using a random collection of letters which when put together make a pronounceable sequence that does not have a preexisting meaning. The latter is not recommended if you're wanting to have a meaningful conversation, unless you're both really good at playing.

Or if you're wanting to come up with a good name for a band.