Electrons composing signals representing bits abstracted into data

Cal King bed, springs, and frame

2008-06-29T07:27:32Z

Anyone interested?

I'm asking $300 for the whole shebang, or best offer. My new bed will be delivered tomorrow (Sunday), so it's pretty much available immediately. I figured I'd let my flist at it before heading to Craigslist.

It's a Simmons Beautyrest Harmony Cal King mattress I'm getting rid of. Matched set. I bought the bed 8-ish months ago from an individual who said it was a return to a store, so it's theoretically only lightly used, but I couldn't find an actual date on the mattress. The set is in fine condition -- it has body indentations, like all mattresses, but still within warranty specs. It's blue. It's firmer than I'd like, and I just got a Tempurpedic mattress to replace it. Frame is a nice, generic, screw-less cal-king frame on (lockable) wheels from Sears, with mounts for a headboard.

Calling all Grind attendees!

2008-05-22T19:31:32Z

If you don't know what the Grind is, please ignore this entry

joyous_tiger and I had a group Grind outing planned tonight, but one of the members couldn't come, leaving a couple people who were guests without a member to guest them in. We're looking for a member who might be willing to guest them in still. I don't actually know the couple, but joyous_tiger does and she has amazingly good taste when it comes to people. Because I'm lazy, I'm going to cut&paste her synopsis:

Is anyone going to the Grind tonight?

I have organized a group to go, but one of the members bailed today, so I have two guests needing to be brought in through someone else. They're a really great poly couple who have been to private parties put on by the sex positive community and who are very socially adept. They would exercise excellent etiquette and are people I hope to entice into membership.

Anyone feel comfortable with taking one or both on as a guest tonight?

Anyone going to the Grind tonight feel up to helping us out?

May Day!

2008-04-21T23:12:12Z

Party at my place, Saturday afternoon, May 3rd.

Standard fun applies. There will be interesting people, games, food, music, and I'm hoping some fire and dancing (bring your poi!).

Theme: spring! fire! rebirth! warmth! Hopefully the weather will cooperate, and we'll have some actual spring weather, instead of this Fall/Winter stuff we've been getting recently...

Please feel free to bring one or two interesting people you would feel comfortable leaving unattended in your own home, even if (especially if!) I don't know them. We have lots of space, and we like meeting new people.

Who	You! ...and your guests :-)
What	Food, conversation, music, and games
When	Sat, 03 May 2008 16:00:00 -0800
Where	The Bit-Slingin' Saloon 3848 NE 87th St Seattle, WA 98115 206-909-0262 (cell)

See you there!

Party at the Bit-Slingin' Saloon!

2008-02-28T23:31:36Z

I'm throwing a party at my place this Sunday, starting at 4pm and ending when people leave (although I'm kicking you all out if we get to Tuesday).

Why? Because the weather has been fabulous. Because my friends just had a child. Because it's leap day weekend. Because I like large crowds of interesting people. Because a good friend of mine is visiting from out of town. Most of all, because I feel like it, damnit.

So! There will be Rock Band, there will be food graciously provided anna_mcann (whose cooking is worth coming for, all by itself), shooting pool, games, and fascinating conversation. There will be fully stocked bar -- but alcohol isn't the main event, as it were. Weather permitting, I'll break out the BBQ and grill up some grillables. If we're *really* lucky, some piano players will come, and can tickle the ivories of the (baby) grand piano in my living room.

Please feel free to bring one or two interesting people you would feel comfortable leaving unattended in your own home, even if (especially if!) I don't know them. We have lots of space, and we like meeting new people.

Summary:

Who	You! ...and your guests :-)
What	Food, conversation, music, and games
When	Sun, 02 Mar 2008 16:00:00 -0800
Where	The Bit-Slingin' Saloon 3848 NE 87th St Seattle, WA 98115 206-909-0262 (cell)

See you there!

Life, the Universe, Everything...

2008-02-17T13:04:08Z

It's been about a year since I've posted how my life was going. I figure I can do it again without boring people too much.

I still work at the same place I did a year ago, although it was a new job then. I'm rakeofdoom's boss. The company went through a really harsh time over the holidays, shrank from about 110 people worldwide to around 60 -- lots of people left, lots didn't get their contracts renewed, and ten or so got laid off -- and got sold. My job is still secure, I think, although out of the five IT people we had, only rakeofdoom and I are still there, still with me in charge of things. It's been stressful. Very. Stressful. Especially this past week, for some reason.

Hmm. Relationships. ariata and I broke up in August, by mutual decision, on very good terms. We're still great friends. I think it was the most mutual parting of ways I've ever experienced, or even heard of. I dated anna_mcann for a month and a half in there (monogamously, for a change), I think September-October, but it went pretty badly. I've been single since then. It took me a while to get used to it, after dating ariata for three years, but I kinda like it now. I have a theory that I learn the most about myself and relationships in the periods between them, and this is no exception. I still can't put things into words, exactly, but I know I think differently about relationships now than I did when ariata and I started dating back in 2004.

I'm actually in that masters program I decided to apply for, the night/weekend M.S. in Information Management at the UW, otherwise known as the Exec MSIM program. I'm in the middle of my second quarter. It's been...boring. Initially, I figured I'd have to wade through a bunch of "intro" classes the first year, and get to the interesting stuff the year after, but it's actually been so slow that I've considered dropping out. Lucky for me, I randomly ran into a second-year student at a cafe I frequent, who suggested I talk with the assistant dean about it. The assistant dean happens to be the professor of one of my classes, so I did, and now it looks like I'll be able to skip the classes I already know cold (like the databases intro class...) and replace them with more interesting electives. I think that's awesome, and will really help me enjoy school. The details of this are still up in the air, though.

For a while, I became something of an outgoing introvert. I guess that's a contradiction of terms, but I mean that I didn't go out often, but when I went out I was really outgoing and met lots of people. I just didn't follow up with any of them. Between work and school, I've been really busy, and just hanging out with a few close friends whenever I've had spare time. I still go out dancing every weekend, and I've started to just "hang out" with people again, which is nice. Not having as much schoolwork this quarter helps, I think.

I've lost another 25 pounds, bringing me down to 240. I plan to lose another 20, and then stop at 220. I seem to drop ten pounds, then stay there for a couple months, then drop ten more. I've been fluctuating from 238-242 for about 4 months or so, now, although it just started to drop again. Still have no special diet to speak of; I just eat what I'm hungry for, and stop eating when I'm no longer hungry (as opposed to sated). I've noticed that I tend to eat more when I'm really stressed, which has been problematic recently.

Actually, stress has been a really big deal lately. Both ariata and anna_mcann, the two people I've frequently slept next to recently, have told me that I occasionally stop breathing in the middle of the night, then start again. I've heard of sleep apnea, but as I felt like I got enough sleep, I didn't think much of it. Now, I'm waking up 3-5 times in a night, and gasp in a breath as a realize I hadn't been breathing. Luckily, suffocating wakes me up. Unluckily, there's something wrong with my breathing hardware. That's kinda scary. It's much, much worse when there's something stressful at school, at work, or socially. It doesn't seem to matter how tired I am. Stress management or no, I think this requires a doctor.

I recently started studying chess again. I do that every couple years -- just start playing a lot, looking up theories, memorizing openings that suit my fancy. I've never been a tournament player, though I apparently play well enough to be one. One of these days I'm gonna play enough to get rated, but I haven't bothered yet. I just sit at Trabant with the chess board in front of me, doing work or homework or just dallying around, and play whoever wants a game. I might even find a tutor again. In six months or so, I'll probably stop playing again. It's what usually happens. I kind of do these things in waves. Next, it will probably be learning haskell (specifically, to wrap my head around monads), which has been on my "to learn before I die" list for a while. I just really like learning; if I'm not learning something, I feel like I'm slowly dying. Although, if I'm bored for long enough (this takes about three days), it actually gets kind of nice. Those three days are torture, though.

That's about the state of my world.

Today, I decided to learn XSLT

2008-02-17T01:58:26Z

I have to shred XML movie data from IMDb into a relational structure, for a project at work. I whipped up something using Perl's XML::Simple, because it's a simple problem, but then I figured it would be nicer if I could use standards to translate from the XML to the insert statements, especially if I could use a stream-based parser to keep memory requirements lower...as you might imagine, IMDb has a lot of movie data. So, I decided to look into XSLT, which I hear is the de facto XML transformation standard, and really awesome, if you can wrap your head around it.

Having been told, by a number of people, that it's actually a fairly difficult idea to wrap your head around, I set aside a large chunk of time to go and learn it. (I'm using the rest of that time to write this rant.) It took me 20 minutes to realize it was just a gimped version of LISP macros, and I'm embarrassed it took me that long. There's nothing conceptually innovative there; it's just a case of looking up the syntax when you need it.

I hate XML. For years and years, I saw the hype, and everyone was "learning" XML. I saw XML listed under "programming" sections in bookstores, and even on resumes. It's just a file format, people! Ever look at HTML? Now imagine that you can specify anything you want for element names between the angle brackets. Throw in a few optional headers at the top, and you've got XML. Want to specify which element names are allowed, inside of which other elements? Make a DTD, describing what elements can contain what other elements. This is not rocket science, and it's not even innovative -- LISP had the same type of hierarchical data structures, complete with a similar syntax, in 1959.

My main beef with it, I think, is that it's so godawful hard to read. Why oh why did anyone think that <name>content</name> was a good set of delimiters? Wouldn't it be clearer -- and more consistent with the underlying structure -- to use simple parentheses, like (name (content)), or even (name content)? That would be much easier to read. Less redundant. Oh noes, we have to count parentheses, instead of searching for a specific end tag! Err...except for the times when we have to count the tags too, because they're nested. Okay. It's a shame there's no hierarchical data syntax that uses that. Oh wait. Nevermind. LISP data syntax. In 1959.

And now, there's XSLT. Well, since 1999 or so. We can embed control flow into our data! Now that control flow is in the same syntax as our data, imagine the possibilities for templating: we can intersperse data and code! Surely, this is innovative. Oh, wait. No. LISP made that innovative leap in 1959, with its partial-execution macro system. (Granted, in this instance, XSL may be easier to read than the LISP macro syntax.)

I admit that it's easier to specify a tree structure with an XML DTD than it is in LISP, or actually anything else I can think of. You can do it, though. Since 1959. Because data and code are the exact same thing in LISP (wow, what an innovation!), you can just "evaluate" the data as code: If it parses, it's legit.

I'm mentioning LISP a lot because it was first. all of these things have been around, and exist in a number of other languages. Perl, Ruby, Python, ML and lots of other languages have hierarchical data syntax. SAX parsing? Every compiler known to mankind uses a similar technology, since the nearly the dawn of compilers. XPath? You have to index the heck out of your XML to make that fast, then you use -- surprise! -- relational databases to do it. The worst of both worlds: Hard to parse by humans, and hard to parse by machines!

XPath, XSLT, SAX ... they're all just libraries implemented for manipulating an arbitrarily decided "standard" syntax. There are better tools for getting each of those jobs done. It's (now) universally supported, so I suppose I'm stuck with it. That's really the only reason to use it, in my opinion. It just happens to be a very compelling reason.

So, yeah. XML is another stupid file format, amid a plethora of equally useful formats. The only thing making it special is organizational backing. Go ahead and use it, but stop thinking it's innately special somehow. Please? It's getting really old.

House Swarming!

2007-09-17T00:01:38Z

helios292 has just moved in, and it's been a while since we threw a party. Clearly, this means it's time to throw one! So, barbeque goodness is gonna go down, this upcoming Sunday. You all are invited.

Location: The Bit Slingin' Saloon, aka My House. If you don't know where that is ... well, I'm sure you have the means to find out. :-)

Date/Time: Sunday, September 23rd, 4:00pm until people leave.

Description: In the immortal words of the new housemate, "meat+fire=win".

Food. Music. People. Conversation. Pool table. Games. Alcohol. Fire. What more do you need?

Commenting is an excellent way to RSVP. ;-)

* Vegetarians and little ones welcome. Even vegetarian little ones.

No context theatre!

2007-09-07T23:35:25Z

Me: Once a day or twice a day?
Her: Twice a day.
Me: Once a day would be no problem, but twice a day will require more thinky-ness.
Her: Well, you have lots of thinky power. You can handle it.

[LJ2ME] Moving a large bed

2007-08-30T23:02:59Z

Can anyone help with moving a california king bed? I need to move it from Queen Anne to Wedgwood, and I'm trying to avoid renting a truck. I can only pick it up tonight after 11, or anytime before 8pm tomorrow. Thanks!

Look mom, no hands!

2007-08-26T01:31:42Z

Comic courtesy of I Drew This, a political commentary webcomic.

Sex and Relationships

2007-08-20T09:02:44Z

For all that I'm about the whole "sex doesn't equal love" thing, I'd never actually had "just sex" before last night. I'd always wanted some sort of relationship from it. The past two nights, though, I've brought someone home, handcuffed her, fucked her senseless till we both had a hard time standing, and then taken her home. And wow, that was some of the best sex I've ever had. I now understand why the bdsm afficionados enjoy themselves so much, and I'm only touching the tip of that iceberg.

I think I've been way too reluctant to push someone, sexually, if I'm actually interested in a long-term relationship with them. Even if they want me to. Even if they've asked me to. It's terrible, but I think I'm much less interesting in bed with people that I pursue relationships with. I've had the whole "respect the woman" thing drilled into my head to the point of absurdity, so if I sense any sort of resistance -- and sometimes it's only in my own head -- I'm likely to never bring it up again. And yes, just sit frustrated, and possibly look around for getting it elsewhere, irked at my partner for my own issues. I'm stupid that way, sometimes.

I've had sex with a few of my previous girlfriends after breaking up with them, and it was always much more interesting an experience after the relationship ended. When I wasn't scared of hurting them emotionally (because I thought them less likely to be hurt, not because I no longer cared), I was able to get past my hangups, and just play around instead of being so serious. It's like I was 18 again -- I learned more about sex in those few rolls than in the dozens (hundreds?) of times I've had sex inside the limits of a Relationship. It seems that if the explicit purpose of the meeting is for carnal pleasure alone, I don't have any weird hangups, and have tremendous fun. So does she, apparently.

Oh yeah, in case anyone missed the memo: I'm single now. For a couple weeks at this point. Trisha and I parted ways on good terms, we're still friends, and still enjoy each others' company. We just both think that being a couple was a bad idea for the both of us, so we stopped. After three years, and with little to no drama. I'm actually a bit surprised, human nature being what it is, but hell -- I'm not complaining. Things were slightly awkward for the first few days, as she basically moved out of my house, but even that seems to have passed already. I hold very few regrets regarding that relationship, and still hold her and her opinions with much respect.

shopping!

2007-08-12T03:29:52Z

I want new clothes, so I can feel pretty. Handsome. Whatever. Here's the deal: I have money. You have good taste in men's clothing. Together, we are unstoppable. Who wants to go shopping with me?

Canadia

2007-03-02T00:52:11Z

Hey all. I'm traveling up north this weekend with the lovely ariata. We're planning on going to the aquaraium, to see the whales. (Whales! In an aquarium! Yeowza) Does anyone know any other fun and interesting things to do in the area?

Little duckies, all in a row

2007-01-21T07:52:26Z

Took the GRE today. I think it actually broke me out of my writers block funk I was in. The writing portion of the test was actually quite fun -- one section asked me to write about how studying something changed your view on the world (which I have no trouble writing for hours about) and the other asked me to rip apart a fallacious argument (which I also rabidly enjoy doing). I expect high writing scores. Math score was fine. Verbal score was enh. Good enough to get into the department I want, in any case.

patterson_ar drove my car into a wall. Slid it, really. Everyone is fine, the damage to the car is fixed, but it's never a good thing to wake up to your roommate crying on the phone because he crashed your car. Conversation:

phone: *RING*
me: "Nyurgh."
him: (obviously very agitated) "Did I wake you up?"
me: "yeah."
him: (more agitated still) "Does that mean you'll be more grumpy than usual?"
me: "Did you crash my car?"
him: "yeah ..."
me: "Where are you?"
him: *explanations of whereabouts and iciness*
me: "Okay, I'll be right there."
phone: *click*
me: (thining to self) "oh shit, I forgot to ask if everyone was okay."
phone: *RING*
him: "hello?"
me: "Is everyone okay?"
him: "yeah"
me: "okay, I'm gonna take a shower first. I'll call you when I'm on my way."

Turns out he just didn't know how to handle a car on ice. Note to Seattleites: TURN INTO THE SKID. But, the collision was at about 3mph, and it just scraped and bent a few things. Broke the mirror. Small stuff. While it was in the shop, I took the opportunity to get a couple other things fixed, so now it has headlights the point in the correct direction (mountings have been broken since I got it, years ago). Yay for visibility. Now to buy some nice, bright lights for it.

I've decided to get a Masters degree. I've found a Masters of Science in Information Management, night and weekend courses only, that fits with my schedule. Two year program. At the UW. That I can afford. So I'm doing it. Now that the GRE is out of the way, I just need to actually write up the application essay and find one more person to write me a recommendation letter. I have one professor and one previous manager; the third will probably be a current coworker.

Work has been ... lots. Lots of work. I really like my new job. I'm just at the point where I can't quite keep everything floating in my head, and have to start actually making policy decisions. Rock the boat! As an IT guy, dealing with developers is simultaneously the best and the worst of it. On one hand, the devs are usually computer savvy enough that we don't have to do much desktop support. On the other hand, they know just enough to shoot themselves in the foot, time and time again, and *still* think they should have root on the production servers. It's a constant struggle to delineate where dev privileges end and IT privileges begin.

Wow. ariata just got a 29 point hand in bridge. Most people won't know what that means, but it pretty much means she wins, even without help from her partner, because she has nearly *all* the high cards.

I've been losing weight. I'm going to get down to 220lbs. That was a good weight for me, I think. I started trying to lose weight in the beginning of November, which wasn't very easy, what with Thanksgiving and all. I was 280lbs when I started, and I was at 265 when I weighed myself a couple days ago. It's gone up and down (up near the end of November, what a surprise), but the overall trend seems to be down about ten pounds a month. I'm happy with that. I'm not really changing anything except when and how much I eat: Instead of eating until I'm full, I eat until I'm no longer hungry (which I've found is literally about half as much food), and I'm eating breakfast and no longer eating in the three hours before I go to bed. I still eat whatever I feel like. Seems to be working.

That's about the state of my world.

Free stuff!

2006-12-10T06:23:26Z

Okay, not much free stuff. Here's the deal:

I have a California King-sized bed. That's almost, but not quite, the same dimensions as a regular King-sized bed. I have a King-sized feather mattress that's in pretty decent shape, that I've been using because it's close enough and comfy. My parents recently gave me a California King-sized feather mattress, which is, you know, a better fit.

So, I have a King-sized feather mattress up for grabs. Bed not included. Anyone interested?

EDIT -- Also up for grabs:

Padded canvas laptop carrying case. High quality, adjustable, just ousted in favor of a backpack.

The random kite-flying monkey

2006-12-02T23:48:23Z

Funny how people think I'm hitting on them when I insult them out of sincere dislike. Ah well. Probably better that way.

Not much going on in my life. I got a new job as Manager of Network Services for UIEvolution, a research and development subsidiary of Square Enix Inc. (i.e. SquareSoft). I used the signing bonus to pay off the last of my consumer debt, which feels immeasurably good. I've decided to use the increase in income to pay for grad school, to get an MS in Information Management, which is essentially a Business IT degree. I hosted Thanksgiving for the first time, which turned out really well.

I still have no idea what my holiday plans are. I'll be spending someof the time in Vancouver with my parents, I'm sure. I have half an inkling to host a holiday party at Trabant (yes, I've spoken with the owners about this -- their idea, actually), but I think I'd rather do that in January as a birthday party thing instead.

I really like my new job. The hardware setups are really quite impressive and organized. I've never seen a patch panel so organized. Whoever designed the system beyond that, however, should be dragged into the street and shot. My predecessor, essentially. I hope people don't feel that way about me after I leave a place. I don't think they do. I typically leave things better than I found them.

Problem is, when I'm bored, only thing I can think of that I'd like to do is go to work. I keep telling myself, "Wait until Monday, Wait until Monday." I envy Trisha's ability to entertain herself with new and exciting things on a daily basis.

Beware of the Craigslist Crazies. No, I don't mean the personal ads. But them too.

Been watching Gilmore Girls. It's really good.

Off to make a wishlist for people.

Looking for a job!

2006-11-01T21:59:09Z

Anyone know anyone who needs skills like mine? I'm looking for a UNIX Sysadmin position of some sort, preferably one that involves some sort of coding and/or UNIX/Windows integration, as that's what I'm good at.

Mob wrangling

2006-10-12T10:54:23Z

I often do things that anger people.

Yeah, what else is new, right? Everyone does. One of the things that's somewhat different, in my case, is that I often know I'm doing it. I often do it on purpose, knowing that it will anger someone. I don't do it with the purpose of angering them. I can imagine some improbable scenarios where I would want to anger someone, for their own safety or something similar, but I really don't think a situation like that has come up. Or is likely to.

I try to be aware of the emotional responses people will likely have to my actions. Sometimes, it's intrigue. Sometimes, it's anger. Sometimes, it's apathy. Sometimes, it's joy. I really do spend a lot of time, energy, and effort to be aware of the feelings of those around me. I'm nowhere near omniscient, but I think I've got a decent grasp on what happens in social interactions, at least emotionally. Contrary to popular belief.

Many people -- and they may be better off than I am -- do their best to keep people from becoming angry at them. I can certainly understand that. People being angry at me sucks. I hate it. It feels bad. I'm sure there are lots of other, machiavellian reasons to dislike it, like lost opportunities or something ... but really, the feeling of rejection is the worst of it. I usually don't think very highly of those people, though. I wouldn't want to be one of those people. If I am over-scared of people being angry with me, I become a doormat, easily pushed around, and often put into situations where I'm not really fond of any of my options. If I don't risk rejection, then I can't really be accepted, either.

There are a few things I value more than avoiding rejection. One of them, and I'm not completely convinced this is a good thing, is avoiding manipulation. If you need some control over me to accept me, well ... I'd rather you reject me. Angrily, if that's your wont. Just a thing. I could probably change it, with effort, over time, if I wanted.

I've actually been doing just that, to a degree. Used to be that whenever I sniffed an attempt to manipulate me (and everyone does it, subconsciously: using societal expectations is how we get along in the world, after all), I would dig in and refuse to be moved. Occasionally this involved being somewhat aggressively stubborn. Well, it often involved that. These days, if it's a small thing that I really don't care about, I don't bother. In other words, I don't care so much about the fact that it's manipulation, and instead care more about the difference in how much I care to do what people want me to do.

But! When that manipulation is coming from someone I interact with a fair bit, or expect to interact with in the future, suddenly the fact that it's manipulation actually becomes important again. It's that whole "slippery slope" thing, to mis-use a metaphor: It's easier, right now, to simply succumb, but succumbing now makes it more difficult to resist in the future. By succumbing now, I'm establishing a pattern, and then any deviance from that pattern is taken as a sign of ill will, and then I have to deal with that, too. I think this is related to that "implicit social contract" thing everyone is always blathering about.

Here, it's more important to me that I maintain my autonomy. So I do. Even if it angers whomever. (Well, I'll make exceptions when I think angering whomever will be directly hazardous to my general well-being. That would rather obviate the whole point now, wouldn't it? The idea of maintaining my autonomy is avoid such hazards.) The way I figure it, if someone will reject me for not cowtowing to their implicit wishes, I'd much rather they do it sooner than later. I rationalize it to myself by thinking that these people would reject me, eventually, in any case ... so I'm just kind of accelerating things. Yeah, I know that's often wrong.

It still sucks.

I have a reputation for being stubborn. And for not listening. And for discounting what other people say. Oddly, I also have a reputation for listening very well, and giving weight to what other people say, and for being very malleable. They're all true. The negative ones are more prevalent, of course, being negative and all. If it's something I've heard dozens of times before, I'm not really gonna bother re-thinking about it unless something drastic has changed, or a lot of time has passed and I think it's wise to revisit old conundrums. I'm definitely going to stick to my guns until someone gives me some better guns. Still, when someone actually does say something I haven't considered, I stop and think about it. Or I go home and think about it, because I'm too cowardly to back down and examine it when it's presented. When I'm given an insight I haven't thought of before, I'll incorporate it. When I'm hearing things I haven't heard three dozen times already, I'll listen attentively. If you're just repeating the party line ... I'm either zoning or cutting you off.

I definitely have a reputation for arrogance. No getting around that one. Even my best friends think I'm arrogant. Hell, I think I'm arrogant. I think it largely comes from the not listening. C'est la vie.

There are certain things that trigger the loud, blaring sirens that are my manipulation alarms. The concept of moral imperative is probably the biggest. Someone tells me how I ought to act, big claxons start blasting in my head. Especially if it's one of those "just because" kind of things, and not toward any particular goal. Pretty much anything that implies that the request is coming from something other than the person talking will do it, too: Saying things like "the boss would like it", "you'll do it if you love me", "it's the right thing to do", "it's just what good people do", the like.

Also, things that make requests that are difficult to turn down, such "Would you mind?" Minding is a much higher barrier than saying you'd rather not: It's extremely impolite to mind something, and it's expected (hah!) that you do what you've just claimed you don't mind doing. Be wary of those who ask you if you mind, but don't ask you to actually do anything directly. I'm not saying to be wary of anyone who asks if you'd mind something -- I will often ask if someone would mind, as a query to find out if they actually mind or not. If it's apparent they mind, even if they say they don't, I'll tell them not to bother. If it's apparent they don't mind, I'll ask them to do it. Be wary of people who consistently use it as their way of "requesting things without requesting things", though.

If you say I ought to finish my homework so I get a better grade, that's explicitly stating what you think that particular "ought" is likely to accomplish. If you say I should tell the truth because people don't trust liars, that's once again saying what that particular "ought" is likely to accomplish. If I care about people trusting me ... yeah, kinda obvious. If you tell me I should tell the truth, and when I ask why you say something along the lines of "you just should" ... yeah, not gonna fly with me so well.

To me, most of these things roughly translate to, "I want you to do this thing, but I'm too lame to actually take accountability for that desire." My opinion of you drops, my respect for you drops, my attachment to you drops, and my trust for you drops. Doesn't mean I don't still like you; I just like you less.

As such, I treat such things like they were desires of the person in front of me. If I wouldn't do it were it a request of the person standing in front of me, I won't do it. Actually, I'll often ask if that's what they want me to do. If they say no, I'll go on my merry way, leaving them frustrated that they can't get me to do what they want without taking accountability for the desire. If they say yes, I'll usually do it, leaving them frustrated that they actually had to admit they wanted it, instead of putting all the accountability elsewhere.

This is when people get angry. Either way. I am fully, completely aware of this. Usually. Makes sense, doesn't it? People who feel the desire to avoid personal accountability are the ones who would get angry about actually needing to take personal accountability for things, whether they did it or not. Sometimes people just get confused by the bit where I act differently than they expect, and anger is a great, tried-and-true cover for confusion. But see, that's okay. I'd rather deal with the anger and the rejection than with being a doormat. This way, even if you don't like me, at least I like me, and that's really important to me. It's more important than you liking me.

I'm not trying to change how you act -- you can continue to be obtuse about it, and you'll continue to get stonewalled, and if that's the way you like it, that's fine by me. I won't have much interest in you for very long, and it will likely be mutual.

I could get into a whole bunch of reasons I think this is a reasonable and positive approach. First off, by giving you what you want only when you're straight with me, I'm setting up a precedence where it (hopefully) becomes obvious to you that the best way to get what you want from me is to be straight about it. The people who refuse to be straight with me are not people I'd typically want around. The people who'd get angry with me for not allowing them to push me around without blame are not the people I'd particularly want to have pushing me around (believe it or not, there are actually people I'd trust to push me around). There's even the arrogant bit about how if you learn how to deal with me, you'll be more able to play well with others in general -- which I truly believe, arrogant as it is.

Now, before you balk (I'm too late, aren't I?) and say, "but that really is what you should do, sometimes -- it has nothing to do with being straight about things!" -- try to figure out why you'd say it, and to me in particular. Why do you care? Why bother wasting your breath? It's because you want something, of course. Sure, it might be true that it's really what I should do. Why do you care? Because you want me to do it, of course. If you can't be straight with me about that part of it, well, we have issues. Even if all you want is for me to be a good person, you good samaritan you, then that's once again a request you have of me: you want me to be a good person. Just admit it and move on.

Sometimes, you might just want to give me information, in case I wasn't aware of it, just to be nice, because you like being nice. In that case, the only thing you want from me (always something) is for me to listen to it. If I already know it, then you've achieved what you set out to do. If I don't already know it, that's cool. That's awesome, in fact. I'll thank you for the information, file it away for future reference, and go on with my life. If I didn't know the boss wanted so-and-so done by Thursday instead of Friday, I'll probably be really glad you told me. If you really are just looking out for me, then you might prefer I do what you suggest, because you want the best for me and all, but you likely wouldn't get angry if I didn't use your information. You'd probably think I was stupid and hopeless, instead. If you actually get angry about it, you wanted something more.

So, yeah. I do things that make people angry. It doesn't make everyone angry, just those who aren't being straight with me. Sadly, this is often because they're not being straight with themselves. Either way, it's people I'm not terribly inclined to get close to, and although it sucks to have people be angry at me, I think the precedent is worth it.

I am so gonna get lynched someday.

I'm on the verge of tears, sitting at my desk at work, and I'm not even sure why

2006-09-11T19:10:59Z

I've been inordinately stressed recently.

I have a doctors appointment tomorrow. It's the first time I've had a checkup in at least 7 years.

It really distresses me when I can't think clearly.

I have a strong urge to just crawl into some hole somewhere and just ... be.

No more people. People are scary. They hurt me.

Double-faced bastards.

Not sure how to feel on this one ...

2006-08-30T23:38:27Z

... so I'll just feel what I feel, I guess. My first response to most stressful things is an enforced apathy, so I'll have to wait until that goes away before I can get a read on how I actually feel about this. It's weird that I can't even figure out what I'm feeling, but there you have it. Forest through the trees, and all that. All I know is that my reaction is a strong one.

My dad just called me and told me he and my mother were having problems, and he's talking about leaving her.

My youngest brother is 16 now. I know for a long time my dad was sticking it out largely for the sake of us kids. I mean, there were other reasons, too, not just that. But, now that the kids are no longer very dependent on them, maybe those other reasons weren't quite enough to offset all the shit that is their relationship.

One of the reasons I'm so against high-maintenance relationships is because my parents' relationship took so much maintenance. Daily talks on the topic of "us" for weeks at a time, in and out of counseling since I was very little, and lots of literal, written contracts regarding behavior. I'm talking about mowing the front lawn before the back lawn, here, not about anything kinky. (Who knows? Maybe they have contracts about that, too.) Taking immense time off work to come take care of things in the family, rules about leaving work exactly at 5pm every single day no matter what.

I look at things like that, and the amount of time poured into simply maintaining the relationship -- not making it better, just preventing it from getting much worse -- and I really, really don't like it. I hear people talking about committing yourself completely to one person ... that's what my parents did. It sucks. My mother has no friends, and my father can't keep a job -- who wants to keep an employee who takes so much time off "for the family" that he's undependable? (Edit: After looking at some numbers from my Dad, I realized that this isn't actually true. He's had 9 employers in the last 28 years, with 5 months of being unemployed. This gives him a 98.5% employment record for those 28 years, with an average of 3.1 years per employer.)

Give me, instead, a relationship where we can just be happy with what we've got, little to no maintenance required. I'm happy? You're happy? Yay. When we have some spare moments, let's make the relationship even better -- but not in a way that requires maintenance. Lots of little things that require a little maintenance add up to LOTS of maintenance in the long run. Want a deeper relationship? Let's take a few hours and spend some time talking about what we want in our lives, or talk about how emotional things affect us. Let's share ourselves with each other, a one-time act that deepens our understanding of one another, and hence our emotional intimacy. Let's not make an agreement to have sex at least twice a week, or to see a movie once a week, or to give gifts once a month, or -- and this one is the worst -- never desire anyone else again. Let's let those things happen as we want them to happen, at the time. Strangely, when there's an actual dearth of something, the desire crops up anyway.

Now, when I promise to give you flowers every week, that's really sweet, isn't it? When I actually give you those flowers every week, is that really sweet? Maybe, especially at first, but after a while it's just the status quo. Let's say I don't promise, and I give you flowers somewhat sporadically, maybe averaging once every couple months, that's really sweet, isn't it? Even years down the line? When I've promised and don't bring the flowers, that's pretty low of me, isn't it? When I do something sweet that then takes lots of effort to maintain -- and that effort doesn't further help anything -- that's creating maintenance. That's stupid. It also makes it so the best I can achieve is status quo, and failing that is bad. Without the maintenance, giving flowers is a positive thing, and not giving flowers is the status quo. It's a difference between being able to make someone happy and being able to avoid making them sad. Stupid. Especially when you make lots of such promises.

That's about it. I'm happy? You're happy? Yay. No need to ask for more.

Actually, a lot of my philosophy stems from this concept. I don't look for problems to fix (badness to turn into neutral), I look for things to improve (neutrality to turn into good).I don't look back for mistakes I've made, I look back for things I could do better. I don't look for flaws in a design, I look for improvements that can be made. Personally, I think it makes it a lot easier to overall improve a situation, because instead of looking only at the flaws, you're picking the best way to improve the situation. Sometimes that improvement is made through removing a flaw. Sometimes that improvement is made by adding something new. In any case, things are how they are, and all you can do is go from there, so you may as well take right now as neutral and go for making it better.

Sexual Exclusivity 101

2006-08-20T03:20:37Z

I don't understand the reasoning behind limiting yourself to one sexual partner. I mean, it's just another physical act, like going on a rollercoaster, or kissing, or dancing. It just seems rather arbitrary to me.

I can understand why it would have been a good idea as little as 50 years ago for safety reasons, but with proper use condoms plus spermicide -- which are amazingly cheap -- you literally have a higher chance of dying in a car accident than getting pregnant¹, yet we think nothing of driving cars or crossing the street.

STD's are now an issue, of course, but if you're concerned about that you can both get tested first and exchange test results, obviating the issue on a case-by-case basis. (If you know they have an STD and you sleep with them anyway, well, that's kinda like jumping out of a plane. No one pushed you, and it's your own damn fault if you didn't check your safety gear carefully enough.)

I kind of understand the "in order to fit in" argument. I don't particularly feel a desire to fit in, though. Never really have. I've found that standing out has generally done me better.

Still, an amazingly large number of people think that limiting yourself to one sexual partner² is a great idea. More than that, an amazingly large number of people think it's the only viable option.

Why is that? Is it just a religious preference?

EDIT: I'd really like to get the opinions from people who have been polyamorous in the past, and are now monogamous. I know some of you are out there. Please?

¹: I ran the numbers. Feel free to do it yourself. I used the USDOT fatality numbers for 2004 (which are lower than 2003 and 2002, and the latest I could find) and the effectiveness ratings published by Planned Parenthood for proper use of condoms and spermicide. Depo alone is even more effective.
²: At a time, at least. The whole "single boyfriend/girlfriend" thing, and only sleeping with them. Nothing says you can't find another significant other, but that typically ends the current partnership, and all that.

Commitment and Variations

2006-08-12T03:33:12Z

In my last entry, I mentioned a few things about exclusivity and commitment. This sparked some conversations in the comments that brought a few other interesting things to the forefront of my mind, and they're actually a bit more organized now.

There are at least two types of commitment. There's the "de facto" situational commitment, which comes from the environment you're in, and then there's the internal commitment, which is a decision to see something to its end.

As an example of situational commitment, consider going to college. If you are halfway through college, and you've taken out loans to pay for the first two years, you will be screwed if you drop out, have loans to pay, and can't command a salary high enough because you have no degree. You are situationally commited to continuing, because there's an immediate cost to leaving. If, at that point, you no longer care about your schooling, it's still in your best interest to keep slugging along. You may eventually hate it so much that you leave anyway, but it's less likely. That's a type of commitment.

As an example of internal commitment, consider going to college. If you are halfway through college, but all of your college career is paid for by grants, if you drop out, you're fine. If you stick it out, you'll be sinking more of your time into the gamble of coming out ahead in the end, but there's no "penalty" for ditching besides discontinuing to learn. If you stick that out, that's an example of internal commitment. There's no "cost" of leaving -- actually, there's a cost to stay, and you're hoping that cost will be worth it when you get to the other side. That's a different type of commitment.

Imagine what happens to the first student if someone comes and somehow makes all his school loans go away. Huge inheritance, rich uncle, whatever. If he doesn't care about his schooling anymore, that student will drop out of school in a heartbeat. There's no internal commitment there.

Now, take a look at exclusivity in relationships, and how it affects commitment. If exclusivity is a requirement for the relationship (romance, business partnership, whatever), then you've got all your eggs in one basket, so to speak. You're forbidden from setting up alternate options, which means that if the relationship dissolves you're left with nothing, and have to start over from zero. You're setting up a situational commitment: There is a cost to leaving, making it the easiest choice to stay, even if your heart isn't in it. This is a huge difference from open relationships, where you explicitly have other options readily available, and leaving only means that you don't get to continue.

What does this mean? Well, just as with school, it means you're probably going to deal with issues that arise, instead of just leaving. It takes a really big issue to get you to leave, because the cost of leaving is so high. You'll have fights but will work things out, and you'll be safer joining money matters because your partner won't leave so quickly.

After you've been together with someone for a while, you can look at the relationship and realize you've built something good. You can look back and realize that, even if you weren't situationally committed, you'd stay with them, because you care about continuing the relationship. Perhaps you've realized that you're becoming a better person for it, perhaps you've realized that you really like spending time with them, or perhaps you've realized that their presence makes your life better somehow. This is the hope.

There's another option. After you've been together with someone for a while, you can look at the relationship and realize that you've built something bad. You can look back and realize that, if you weren't situationally committed, you'd leave in a heartbeat. If you build something bad enough, as with college, it might be worth leaving anyway. And if that cost of leaving were to vanish -- for instance, by randomly (or purposefully) coming across another option, like another lover for emotional support or a different business partner -- you would leave. Then, exclusivity becomes what's keeping you together.

That other option is really bad. It's like the student who hates school, but is sloshing through it anyway just to get through it, because it hasn't gotten bad enough to warrant the cost of leaving yet. That student will probably never finish anyway, and just incur more loans as he keeps taking the short-sighted easy decision of one more quarter until he can't stand it anymore. It becomes a balancing act between the cost of leaving and the cost of staying, and that's just not fun for anyone involved, especially if it continues.

With exclusivity, you're gaining a situational commitment. That is, you're manipulating the environment around you to enforce a situational commitment, regardless of where one's internal commitment lies. This isn't always bad, by any means. It's great if, for example, you need a kickstart to build something. It gives you the safety of an environmentally enforced commitment, while reasons for an internal commitment can be explored and possibly created. This is often an excellent idea, and can lead to the first option, above, where you'd stay with them even if that situational commitment were to vanish.

With an open relationship, you're avoiding that situational commitment. You don't have the option of depending on it while you build something. On the other hand, you also can't get into that choice between a rock and a hard place, where you have to decide between the cost of leaving and the cost of staying. All commitments that exist are internal commitments.

What does this mean? It means that your partner has no reason to leave you, other than wanting to leave you. It means that if they want to leave you, there's nothing external that's stopping them. I'll say it outright: They're more likely to leave you, and they're more likely to do it sooner.

But! If you can manage to actually build something worth keeping, that first option above, they won't want to leave. The ones who leave will either leave before something is built (the downside of being in an open relationship), or after something bad is built (the upside). Whoever stays, you know they stayed due to an internal commitment, which isn't subject to environmental fluctuations, like meeting a hot secretary at work, or a one-time better price on a business deal.

Really, it's all the same arguments as for and against a free or controlled market.

What does all this mean? Well, if you think you have good chances of building something without any need for environmentally enforced commitments, then try open relationships. If you think you have bad chances of building something without environmentally enforced commitments, try exclusive relationships. Or, if you're like me and place great importance on avoiding the possibility of that bad, second option, go for open relationships. If you're not like me and place great importance on avoiding the possibility of losing a great partner at the beginning due to environmental fluctuations, go for exclusive relationships.

Personal choice and all that, but I for one prefer to avoid situational commitments. I don't seem to have problems building relationships worth keeping, even without that particular safety net.

when worlds collide

2006-08-11T23:43:32Z

Tenuously connected thoughts.

It seems that many people conflate "commitment" with "exclusivity". They're not the same thing, obviously. I was wondering why a lot of people equated them, at least in interpersonal relationships, and then it hit me: If you are exclusive, you are committed. It's like putting all your eggs in one basket, which by default gives you reason to commit to protecting that basket. The reverse statement, if you are not exclusive then you are not committed, is not true. It's the standard bit of bad logic: If P then Q, so if not P then not Q. This is wrong, but a lot of poeple think that way, anyway. In any case, if you're unable to point to commitment, then your only measure of commitment in an interpersonal relationship would be looking to see if it's exclusive or not. If it's exclusivve, there's commitment, and if it's not exclusive, you really don't know. If you want commitment, and you're blind to seeing it directly, then why would you take that chance? Makes sense to me now.

I seem to have a different view of commitment to relationships than most people. I commit to making the relationship as good as it can be. Apparently, most people commit to making the relationship survive. That seems silly to me on many levels. First of all, the relationship always exists, even if it changes to become a bad relationship, or an apathetic one. You can't kill a relationship, you can only change it. Second, if you're committed to making it subsist, you're not focused on making it a good one -- and as it's easier (at first) to maintain a bad relationship than a good one, you're giving yourself motivation to make it a bad one. When you commit to making your relationships as good as they can be, the survival of the relationship kinda works itself out. After all, people like being in good relationships. It feels nice.

People are funny. How can you get so hung up on "this is the way it's supposed to be done" when people had vastly different dating patterns 20 years ago, and vastly different dating patterns 20 years before that, and different yet again 20 years prior to even that? It springs forth an intense sense of righteousness, anyway.

If you think you're worthy of being loved for who you are, do you need the safety blanket of exclusivity? It seems that people who are very insecure will want someone who will validate their insecurity, in the form of not caring for them, giving them evidence that they have no reason to be secure. Hello, abusive relationships and swinging. It seems that people who are a little insecure will want someone who will validate their insecurity, in the form of caring for them only if they have no other options. Hello, stereotypical monogamy. It seems that people who are secure in themselves will want someone to validate their security, in the form of caring for them even in the presence of other easy options. Hello, healthy monogamy and, with even more security, open relationships. Validation of self worth as the common theme.

More thoughts, less time...

Story of my life

2006-08-11T10:01:00Z

"I just dumped you and you want to talk about string theory?!"

Through the pain, it's kinda funny.

Lost Book

2006-08-10T21:18:35Z

I loaned my copy of Peter Norvig's "Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach" to someone, and I've forgotten whom. If it's you, o rif you know who it is, please tell me! I've wanted to look something up in it at least three times this week.

UPDATE Found.