cry havoc

Hello, fandom, my old friend. Been so long I've almost forgotten how crazy you are. Almost. It's okay, don't call me, I won't call you.

ANYWAY. So. Noragami. One of the first anime in like forever to really capture me, which tl;dr means: why the hell have I not seen in-depth, sparkling, thought-provoking commentary from either of the Emilys? -- branchandroot and annotated_em, that is. Or even starlady who is not an Emily, but does begin with a vowel, so that's close enough. ONE OF YOU. Satisfy my need for analysis! Or I shall be pushed to poke ivoryandhorn or phoebe_zeitgeist to carry the weight. Which I might do anyway, because analysis.

SOMEONE. AVAIL ME. My former fandom status as a near-BNF compels you!

Also, I just got home after enjoying two glasses of some really nice reisling, the name of which I totally meant to get and did not. In case you couldn't tell from the random name-dropping. Where is my next episode of Noragami? Or my next scanlated chapter? I'm retired from scanlating, so I'm able to say again that scanlators are toooooo slow. Damn it.

Should reisling be capitalized? Inquiring minds want to know. Leik yesterday.

I actually had to explain tl;dr to my sister this evening (while texting). Either I'm hipper than I realize, or my sister is seriously out of touch. I'm guessing the latter. Very eye-rolling, so sigh.

Also also, I realized while talking to my other sister that I AM the disruption at work. Go me! Doing prototypes and shit that will cause nothing but trouble for other departments, and this is WHY I was hired. This is awesome. I'm causing trouble and I'm getting PRAISE for it.

I'm considering changing my tag from "analysis is my chocolate cake" to "analysis is my greek beignet" because holy fuck you people, this shit is awesome. I am addicted to greek beignets. I shouldn't be, but I am.

I just realized that 'reisling' is another exception to the i-before-e rule. Which reminds me of the time I got sent to the principal's office because I demanded to know why 'science' broke the rule of 'i before e except after e'. Yes, newsflash, I have always been a troublemaker.

There was some other also to add, but I forget now. Where's my extensive analysis on Noragami already?

I need something to say to a coworker (who is otherwise a cool person) when for whatever reason he decides to play devil's advocate. Especially when what I'm arguing is something that he later admits is something he also believes in, or at least would like to recognize as valuable. It feels like he's either winding me up for his own amusement (though he doesn't seem amused at the time, so probably not) or just doesn't realize that I can't tell whether he's serious -- and the upshot is that I lose respect for him. It's like, oi, if you're that much of an asshole, then maybe I need to change my opinion about you. Or something.

Today there was talk about UX/user testing. G was somewhat dismissive of there being any value in this. I've done user studies for ten years (contextual analysis and ethnographic studies most especially, which means lots and lots of talking to users at length), I told him every single time I did a user test or interview, I learned something new.

It was almost always it was something that opened my eyes about my own privilege: that I'm abled, that my language skills are top-notch even for a native, that my eye-hand coordination is pretty damn good, that I don't have motor skill issues, that my hearing's good enough, that my sight is good enough despite needing glasses, that I don't have significant learning or cognitive issues that get in the way of my comprehension. Doing user studies, as CP later commented, reminds we designers and developers -- we makers -- that we are not The User. It reminds us to be thankful for the ways in which we're fortunate, and to be humbled about the ways in which we have it easy.

All those things I do when coding like larger click-areas and story-answers on alerts and proper color contrast -- just like all the things some architects do in corporate buildings like wider doorways and bar-handles instead of round handles and ramps at every entrance -- these are all invisible if you're abled, but they're crucial if you're not. And the onus does not, should not, lie on the person who is disabled to make do; the onus should lie on us, as the makers to make the web/world inclusive. Because we have the good fortune and the ability to do so.

But he was arguing against this, and I went along until the point where I said, the web should be inclusive, for everyone; the web exists for everyone. G replied, no, the web exists to make money. (Someone tell that to all we fans who runs sites at a loss out of pure love, but I didn't go there.) The whole 'make money' thing was so cynical, and enough opposite his usual attitude, that I just called it quits right there. We're going to end this conversation right here, I said, and that was that (whew).

I'm not sure whether to be pleased or roll my eyes that he told me afterwards that the reason he loves talking to me about stuff/work is that he always learns something new. Except he excused his responses -- though not in so many words -- as devil's advocate. I'm so freaking sick of oh, I'm just playing devil's advocate. It's going on my list as second-hated phrase, right behind, can't you take a joke?

Dear internets, please give me a good witty comeback for the next time G says he's playing devil's advocate. Not too nuclear, since I do have to keep working with him, but something that makes it clear he's playing a game that I don't respect and don't have time for. Anyone?

In LA Story, the weatherman Harris K. Telemacher ends up befriending a road sign. It tells him that he'll find the key to his happiness by unscrambling the phrase, "HOW DADDY IS DOING". Harris spends most of the rest of the movie puzzling over this, and at the end, he takes his (new) girlfriend to meet the road sign. Yep, side of the LA highway, there they are, talking to a sign.

Harris: I never figured out the riddle, HOW DADDY IS DOING. It's a riddle too tough for me.
Sign: UNSCRAMBLE HOW DADDY IS DOING
Sara: I know it. It's an English crossword clue. See, unscramble means rearrange. Change the "s" with the "h," move the "ing" after the "s," put the "do" after them. Swap the "h" and the "s." And put the "i" behind the "d."
Harris: "Sing Doo Wah Diddy?" That's the mystery of the ages?
Sign: I HAD TO COME UP WITH SOMETHING FAST.

I just discovered that all this time, I've been doing object-oriented programming. I just never really grokked 'object' so I'd figured I was somehow not doing it. Then I get whacked in the head and I'm like, what? That's the mystery of the ages?

Then again, this is a common reaction to me when I stumble over something that's gotten a constant build-up of mystique. Like objects. When I finally grok it, I'm not sure whether to be disbelieving at how simple it actually is, or disbelieving at how much time I spent agonizing about it.

Well, not all people. Just people in the limited category of "people" and "selling stuff". Not to me, the selling part, that is. But people who sell stuff are proving themselves remarkably brainless right now. Almost as brainless as my neighbors in general.

As I've kind of danced around mentioning, there's an app. I built it (and some of you helped test it). It's live now. And boy is it collecting every twit in the city, and believe me, this city has 'em by the boatloads. All kinds of hijinks therefore must ensue.

( I want to shoot them all. )

Don't EVEN get me started on the people actually organizing this. I love em, dog help em, but right now they're driving me crazy and it wasn't that far a trip in the first place. Honestly. YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR. If you want stuff for free, think back to what your site looked like when it was done for free (horrible) and the extent of your social media presence (none). That's what you get when you pay nothing: NOTHING.

Meanwhile, on the neighbor front, we've got a dog living in the 100-acre park behind my house. No collar, possibly fixed, and terribly skittish around people. Probably yet another cruel soul who decided easier to just dump the dog than find it a better home. A neighbor's been organizing a feeding station for the dog, and working on a way to catch it; she even set up a camera to get pictures of it (to help in determining whether it's lost dog or really was dumped). Her wildlife camera is seriously high-quality, getting some gorgeous shots (far better than mine!) and she's been posting them on the neighborhood elist.

( OMG THERE ARE PEOPLE BEING STUPID ON MY LOCAL BROADBAND NETWORK. )

So despite the sudden and terrible drop-off into bleak depression middle of last week (and I don't even have family around to do that for me, I have to rely on the insanity of clients), I've been trying to write. Last stretch of the story, but then again, I'm guessing it must be lagging tension-wise because no one's reading anymore, that I can tell. Am I digging? YOU BETCHA. It's been that kind of week. I could use some reminders of if not awesomeness, at least tolerability. DO IT OR THE APP GETS IT. *bricked*

Per yet another dinner discussion combined with the need to produce some displayable code for upcoming interviews, I decided it was time for yet another insightful and elegant solution to yet another non-existent problem.

Lo, I have created a conlang word generator. Except it doesn't simply spew randomized letters at you, because that wouldn't be elegant at all, would it. No, as befitting my status as a nerd of the first order and a geek of the second, this word generator requires that you enter actual rules for your language.

(As in, whether a word can start with a vowel or a consonant, and the phonetic patterns of syllables, and what vowels can be doubled and whether a word can end with a single vowel or a doubled one, or maybe doubled vowels only occur in the middle of a word and doubled consonants only ever occur in the last syllable.)

Go forth and have fun, if you're easily linguistically amused. Do let me know if you run into problems, though, since I've only tested a little, and not nearly as obsessively as I hear you're supposed to. Or something.

Enjoy!

Alright, that was awfully long, so it's tabled for now.

This is partially leading off my post from this morning. I had the pleasure of chatting with someone, yesterday, who does the same thing I do, job-wise. If you realized how few of us are actually around (for all that our job may sound awfully necessary, most corporations don't seem to agree), then you'd realize also what a rare pleasure it was to talk to someone who totally gets it.

Think of web application creation as a balancing act between two extremes: there's the design (what it looks like, what it does on the page, all the way to colors and fonts and whether you get a thank-you note when you're done), and there's the development (the code, basically). Designers don't code, and coders don't design, for the most part, and IMO/IME this has less to do with any integral dislike between them... so much as the fact that both sides require a lot of expertise. It is not half as easy as you may think it is, to code the backend of an application, or even to do a nicely-turned out page of CSS and Javascript on the frontend. Nor is it half so easy as you might think it is to come up with the buttons and the corners and the logos and the whatever else in Photoshop or Illustrator or Fireworks or whatever is the in-thing this week. These are areas that, to do well, do require a fair bit of training and experience -- and by then, you're probably firmly into the perspective of your area of expertise.

( I'm the person in the middle. )

I have an interview tomorrow. (Nothing big there, been on the search for a few weeks now, but that's another story involving many complaints about the "hot new title" in my industry and the number of managers who seem to be renaming all sorts of non-title jobs to the title, and wasting my time in interviews.) This position is not confused (as far as I can tell, at least) about the title/definition, but it's...

Well, it's a lunch interview.

Y'know, there's a reason I use my initials on my resume and my portfolio and my online site. Not just the basics of not letting anyone have the option of assuming that because I am Gender A or Gender B that I can (or can't) do the job. But also because I've done my share of interviews-in-bars, and interviews-at-lunch, and while I'm not 18 anymore (so I doubt it's necessarily the exact same dynamics), I can't forget those lessons. Lunches are what you do with friends, and dates. You are not on a date with your potential employer, and the casual situation makes it too easy for some guys (already in a position of power via gender, and then as potential employer) to make things even murkier.

Sign me up so very not.

On top of that, I did a search for restaurants around the office's location, because I want to know what else to suggest in case the primary suggestion is Italian. (Pasta, you're great, but you attack people who eat you, and same for you, Pho.) Oh, look, it's nothing but bar food. Independently owned, but you can't tell me that Joe's Bar, Logan's Bar, and something-or-other Bar & Grill, times ten, is going to be anything other than, well, bar food. I loathe bar food. Not because it's bad, but because it's boring. Life is too goddamn short to eat bar food.

(And life is way too goddamn short to eat what American bars believe passes for Irish food. You Irish on my flist, you know I like you, but the American bar concept of Irish food leaves a great deal to be desired.)

Or we could walk the two blocks to the nearest acceptable restaurant -- a Thai place. A quarter-mile away (about two blocks and hang a right, go a block). In 101F heat. For a fucking job interview.

And then I must ask: am I going to be expected to pay for my half? Why? I didn't ask to go on this fucking lunch date. I'd be just as happy not having to walk anywhere in 101F heat at 1pm, thank you, and I'd be just fine sitting in a nice, cool, air-conditioned conference room for an hour. And I wouldn't even have to pay for the benefit of being forced to stomach bar food.

Oh! And I could do it WITHOUT HAVING TO TALK OVER THE UBIQUITOUS TELEVISION IN THE GODDAMN BACKGROUND.

I mean, I don't mind going out to eat. But if I'm going to pay for it, then I want to eat something I enjoy eating, and on top of that, I want to eat it with someone I want to be with. That list of people is really fucking short, and it does not include -- nor will it ever include -- an employer, let alone a potential employer. I am not interested in a fucking social life as part of my job. And I sure as hell don't want to be fighting to keep my attention solid, while choking down bar food, and trying to hear someone (or yell at someone) over the goddamn background noise. Is this an interview, or the equivalent of an introvert's stress test? And I'm supposed to pay for this pleasure?

I really hope I get word in the morning from the second interview with that other company. The one that -- ironically enough -- has offices within walking distance of one of the town's best sushi restaurants. I'm addicted to their sushi. But I still wouldn't go there for an interview.

"...a leader in the field for over half a decade."

Somehow, I'm not feeling over half as impressed as they seem to expect me to be.

1. Payroll calling me about filing insurance paperwork by EOD today. See #2.
2. The cable modem died last night in the wee hours.
3. Payroll calling to tell me to fax it, then. No landline. See also #2.
4. Two conference calls, and two deadlines tomorrow.
5. Coworker asking if I'll email the doc. See also #2.
6. Seventeen minutes and thirty-eight seconds on hold. See also #2.
7. I require chocolate. See all of the above.
8. An 18-yr old twit who not only said, "and that will open the black box," (to which I said, "ah, yes, more often known as the command line,") but also insisted on spelling out config and telling me what it meant. Listen, honey, I was fucking configging while your parents were still making eyes at each other in sophomore-year History class, got that?

Strangely, all that, before eleven in the morning..and I didn't even have a chance for caffeine before it'd all begun. So by the time I realized payroll's insurance form had squeaked in before the modem died last night, I was already beyond caring when I read through the one-page PDF. The usual, this info, that info, blah blah blah, until... If your last name is different from your spouse's, please explain.

Seriously, what the fuck?

I am sorely tempted to write, because we're not from Kentucky.