:: The Wendy House ::

This phrase is used on an almost daily basis by my colleagues at work.  I’ve heard British ex-pats, now also US citizens, use it.  Apparently they are all super excited every day about something.  Possibly they are not drinking sufficient quantities of Tea to mellow their super excitedness.  Even though super- is a legitimate prefix I wince whenever I hear the phrase super excited.  Super wincing,  I need more tea.

60 mins:  drive to and from Fed-Ex.  Read Sony’s reassuring ‘we’ll help you when its bad‘ message on the box.  I hope its not a confidence vote in their equipment…

5 mins:  to unpack the little beauty christened ‘Darling’ from her box of big open spaces.  Easy access packing,  nice work Sony! 

0 mins:  Read the instructions, warranties, etc.  I don’t think so! I’ll leave that to Matrix (fluffball).  No 6-pack of CD’s? Tinkerbell came with CD’s for Windows, AOL, System Recovery, Antivirus and 5 times the wieght in documentation!

5 mins:  plug everything in,  press the power button and wait to be asked all those IMPORTANT questions.  Wow,  so easy!

10 mins:  Say ‘Yes’ to WAY TOO MANY questions that are important to someone.  Not me.  It’s torture I tell you!  How can anyone seriously expect me to read this stuff?  I am much too excited….   Stop asking me questions and show me the goodies!

700000 mins:  BOOO!   Re-Start! mania.  EVERYTHING and their cousins twice-removed got ‘out of date’ while Darling waited for me in the Sony storehouse.  You know dates can be troublesome.  Then there’s my distaste for that sticky AOL thang.  It’s worth avoiding sticky-clinginess. These all told me to restart: 

1. Windows Update 
2. Office Update
3. Norton Antivirus Live Update 
4. AOL uninstall

Then you have to smile at the antispyware program that proudly announces it doesn’t require a reboot to get updated.  Well done antispyware program

After much booting and geeking around Darling made the pinkier first step into the land of creative accessorizing, oh YES….

what do you want to do?   yes or no 

Firewall or Internet Security?  Could they make the choice more mystical is they tried? 

‘Don’t show me this again’? 

TOO RIGHT mate!

when one weeks unsolicited mail to the Wendy House looks like this:

 

I could use it to wall-paper my home.  Too fancy for my taste in wall decor.  Is there a way to stop the producers of this mail wasting resources on me?  It doesn’t sell me anything.  

OH!  What could it be?! can you SMELL the excitement in the Wendy House tonight? Smells like newbook.  Tinkerbell is getting more finicky than normal….

this post title is a classic chorus lyric line from the song “Bryan Rix” by a cheerful yet sadly obscure British indie band from my home City of Bristol - “The Brilliant Corners“.  Wikipedia explains that Brian Rix was an actor comedian who specialised in farce.  On film

“Rix was regularly seen on screen without his trousers on“

Occasionally I have needed to laugh when seeing someone with their trousers down…

* Spaz.

Your assignment, should you choose to accept it,  is to assess the merits of this statement in less than 1,000 words with direct comparative reference to other belief systems such as religion, democracy, capitalism and the BMI. 

Bonus points will be awarded for:

• using the words ‘ideology’, ‘epistemology’, paradigm’, ‘discourse’, ’shopping’ and ‘anorexia’ judiciously and appropriately.  
• a coherent, succinct, balanced, well structured diet argument.
• cunning use of illustrations,  tables and graphs (the Excel Oracle Effect). 
• undetectable plagiarism of authors that are better at this than you.
• working out what I believe then writing the assignment to align with my beliefs.
• flattery and bribes (beer & cheese).

Points will be deducted for:

• illegibility where either your spelling, grammar, or handwriting is worse than mine.
• peanut butter or other suspicious sticky-stains on the assignment.
• overshooting the 1000 word limit.
• gratuitous use of plastic surgery or interest-free credit agreements.
• disparaging references to my mum.

This blog entry will not self-destruct in 10 sec…

a striking disparity in per-kitty fluffball production 

Happy mumzie day

The BBC explains the origins of the day:

Most Sundays in the year churchgoers in England worship at their nearest parish or “daughter church”.

Centuries ago it was considered important for people to return to their home or “mother” church once a year. So each year in the middle of Lent, everyone would visit their “mother” church, or the main church or Cathedral of the area.

Inevitably the return to the “mother” church became an occasion for family reunions  when children who were working away returned home. (It was quite common in those days for children to leave home for work once they were ten years old.)

And most historians think that it was the return to the “Mother” church which led to the tradition of children, particularly those working as domestic servants, or as apprentices, being given the day off to visit their mother and family.

As they walked along the country lanes, children would pick wild flowers or violets to take to church or give to their mother as a small gift.

The US celebrates ‘Mothers day’ in May.  This website describes the US history as:

In 1907, Anna M. Jarvis (1864-1948), a Philadelphia schoolteacher, began a movement to set up a national Mother’s Day in honor of her mother, Ann Maria Reeves Jarvis. She solicited the help of hundreds of legislators and prominent businessmen to create a special day to honor mothers. The first Mother’s Day observance was a church service honoring Anna’s mother. Anna handed out her mother’s favorite flowers, the white incarnations, on the occasion as they represent sweetness, purity, and patience. Anna’s hard work finally paid off in the year 1914, when President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed the second Sunday in May as a national holiday in honor of mothers.

It’s not clear to me why it a, new,  different day was required.  This website mentions several different, non-christian, celebrations of motherhood.  Wikipedia lists differnet days of celebration in different countries. 

The British pagan goddess Brigantia,  after whom Britain is named, is a mother figure celebrated long before christianity.  I was suprised that my search didn’t easily find information on more diverse celebrations of motherhood being appropriated into the current ‘mothers’ days.  

This design webpage cites several examples of how right handedness influences real world design. Of spiral staircases it says:

Visit any church or castle in Europe next time you are there and you will probably find a spiral staircase or two. Most of them spiral anti-clockwise as they go down (and thus clockwise as they go up). Apparently this was to favor defensive sword use should the building be overrun at any time. If you are up the spiral staircase and are right-handed and facing down the stairs you will have the central axis of the stairs on your left and you will be able to swing your sword at your foe coming up the stairs. He on the other hand will have the central axis on his right and so it will be directly in the way of his sword swings. There is enough contemporaneous information to back up which hand swordsmen used to use in those days…”

‘John Cabot’ sailed to America from Bristol in 1496.  Apparently he is widely accredited as being the first European to discover North America since the Vikings.  In Bristol there is a tower dedicated to him.  This web-page describes the tower with quirkily expressed appreciation of the spiral staircase direction. 

Several castles specifically had clockwise down spiral staircases with left-handed swordsmen to protect them.  why is this good?  Left handed swordsmen normally fight right handed swordsman but the converse is not so, consequently left handed swordsmen are more well practiced in fighting a right-hander than righthanders are in fighting a left-hander. Left handers are often more effective in some ’sports‘ such as ‘fencing’.

Why do castle staircases predominantly spiral one direction based on handedness while driving-sides vary?  The shifting use of the right hand from wielding a weapon against a potential adversary to using a whip on pairs of horses pulling a heavy load appears to have played a significant role.  This webpage describes the evolution of different driving sides.  It cites American and French ‘teamsters’ for initiating a shift from road users predominantly passing with their left hands on the nearside followed by the Napoleonic empire pushing the new standard throughout Europe and the British for doing their “best to stave off global homogenisation“.  This excerpt describes the beginning of the shift:

In the past, almost everybody travelled on the left side of the road because that was the most sensible option for feudal, violent societies. Since most people are right-handed, swordsmen preferred to keep to the left in order to have their right arm nearer to an opponent and their scabbard further from him. Moreover, it reduced the chance of the scabbard (worn on the left) hitting other people.

Furthermore, a right-handed person finds it easier to mount a horse from the left side of the horse, and it would be very difficult to do otherwise if wearing a sword (which would be worn on the left). It is safer to mount and dismount towards the side of the road, rather than in the middle of traffic, so if one mounts on the left, then the horse should be ridden on the left side of the road.

In the late 1700s, however, teamsters in France and the United States began hauling farm products in big wagons pulled by several pairs of horses. These wagons had no driver’s seat; instead the driver sat on the left rear horse, so he could keep his right arm free to lash the team. Since he was sitting on the left, he naturally wanted everybody to pass on the left so he could look down and make sure he kept clear of the oncoming wagon’s wheels. Therefore he kept to the right side of the road…   …An official keep-right rule was introduced in Paris in 1794, more or less parallel to Denmark, where driving on the right had been made compulsory in 1793

Wendy left-handed-inconsistent-potentially-dangerous-passer

do you walk down corridors on the same side as you drive on the road?  

I bump into Americans at corridor corners after forgetting to walk on the right…  …followed by a side-step-dance as we try unsuccessfully to bypass each other…

are more common in the US than the UK.  The carriageways are broader. The cars are broader.  The broads are broader.  It is a bit disconcerting in the outside lane when both directions are moving at the speed limit.

(*US = median)

The following Venn diagram* bears no relationship to any statistically verified scale of objectivist reality.  Ironically(?) it is, relativitly, real to me in a post-modern way.

* created without the help of Excel.

some searchers came to the :: ŦĦ£ ώëñð¥ Ħõů$€ :: looking for creatively spelt words:

• “arabic key bored“
• “thangs that make electricity“
• “miss spelt search“
• “peeps“
• “frendy“

innaccuracy has a gravitational-style force.

This belt has been holding up my Levi jeans for 28yrs: 

Some of the stories it tells are… 

• puppy fat at 16yrs. 
• oral surgery at 17yrs restricted me to sucking body-temperature foods through a straw for over 2 weeks.   Not appetizing, don’t try it at home.
• low-income 18 thru 28yrs.
• comfortable 30’s.
• changed shape in my mid-30’s (girl’s generally do).
• since turning 40 my trousers are getting too big for me.  
• time for a replacement belt.

The silent shiny replacement:

A draft Wikepedia entry summarises multiple categories of irony.  Without knowledge of these categories I used to use them in work and social situations. 

From Wikipedia, my emphasis:

“belief in Britain, Australia, and Canada that Americans are unable to understand the use of irony…   …there are many Americans who do understand and even use irony regularly…   …Americans can be confused by deadpan, ironic comments if they are unaccustomed to double meanings. The unfortunate result is that an American, assuming that what someone says is exactly what they mean, can simply find a visiting Brit rude“

Many = what?  more than 10?

Visiting Brit = what? Someone who intends to return to Britain within 90 days?

In the US I have tried to stop using socratic irony at work.  It appears more likely to produce misconceptions about my actual knowledge and skills.  It gets effective results but I am less likely to be recognised as instrumental in achieving those results.  Sadly, I have felt obliged to change my working style to be perceived as effective at work.

Americans taking my comments ‘literally’ in non-work situations has lead to some bizarre, unpublishable, misunderstandings. I perpetuate the likelihood of these misunderstandings by persisting in using irony in non-work contexts.  Over 40yrs a spontaneous use of irony has beome an integral part of being Wendy.

Reading the Wikipedia definitions of irony helped me understand why I experience many* Americans as ‘earnest’.  I recognise the importance of being earnest.  The US readers of this blog that are not anticipating irony should consider that many (more than 10) of my posts are, dead, ironic. 

* many = those Americans except the Many (10+?) that understand and use irony.

Version 1.0 of :: ŦĦ£ ώëñð¥ Ħõů$€ :: is discovered by searchers from South Africa Saudi Arabia, Norway, China and of course the UK!  These web-addresses took people to V1.0 within 24 hrs:

* search

::W:: intern-national-woman-of-miss-tarry

Fictional* conversation between 2 6yr olds:

Pat:  OW!  why d’you kick me this time?  (tearfully wipping away a trace of blood)

Sam: Chris said you said you don’t like me and someone put dog-poop in my locker and you’ve got a dog and you are wearing big kicking boots and I thought you might kick me with them if I didn’t break your kicking leg first (takes breath) I’ve got some iodine and sticking plaster you can put on that wound.

Pat: PSYCHO-BULLY!**  You are crazy. You talk wierd. (calls out to friends while Sam squirts the iodine) Watch out for Psycho-Bully-Sam…

* any similarity to actual persons or events is purely coincidental or unintentionally based on my subconscious psychic powers.

** not to be confused with the music genre PsyhcoBilly. ‘Pre-emptive attack’ would be an excellent name for a Psychobilly band….

This Excel bar chart told me that silver cars have superior braking-distances to brown cars when driving behind LooSea. 

Who would have guessed?

Apparantly it’s 24 plus or minus 6.  These little gems were all gorgeous-giftys.  Some are over 25 years old!  Each holds special memories of people, places, events and TEA.

Choosing a mug is not an easy or trouble-free task. Anne discovered coffee mug selection can cause grumpiness, inaccurate debit charges, unwanted phone-calls and sad family complications.

Sixth reflection on collective symptoms of what North Americans call a ‘player’*.  Previously listed player characteristics available in my MSN Space archive:

1. Blame redirection
2. Implicit escape clause
3. Creative imagination
4. Preening
5. Busy, Busy, Busy

#6: YOU stopped me from treating you

This is a specific case of ”blame redirection“. The redirection is at YOU.  Here the blame for an unbeknownst treat not happening is your fault based on an implicit weak argument.  As presented by the player you are guilty for their not being able to demonstrate their generosity.  Naughty, naughty you!

Examples:

“I was going to call you tonight but you said you were going to the store“

Implicit weak argument: you will be at the store all evening, you can’t answer your cell phone or return a call while you are out.

“I was going to email you, but you said you were going to email me“

Implicit weak argument: email works on strict turn-taking rules.

“I was going to buy you another pint but you hadn’t finished the one in front of you“

Implicit weak argument: you won’t finish the pint in front of you soon or tolerate lining them up. 

No, wait a minute, that was ME! I’m NOT a PLAYER.  Finish the dregs of that pint NOW before it gets warm and flat while I line-up a replacement.

Players do not appear to realise that this kind of implicit weak argument coupled with little or no actual evidence of generosity makes them easily identifiable.

* Diagnosis of a player does not require evidence of all symptoms. Evidence of a single symptom is insufficent to diagnose a player. This disorder is not yet recognised by the DSM IV.

After 9 attempts to photograph a pair of delightfully playful otters at Woodland Park Zoo I realised it was impossible, because

• my finger is slug-slow compared to an otter 
• otter direction is twisty-unpredictable
• my 4yr old camera shutter speed is ‘leisurely’

Some of the unintended compositions have unique charms:

I turned-off my camera flash when photographing animals at the Zoo.  Many people didn’t.  There were no signs suggesting camera flashes should be turned off for the comfort of the animals.

They all scattered off the plot.  Except one

Below is a list of words and phrases I’ve heard used in the US that could prompt this fictional conversation with mumzie

mumzie: ‘Oh dear.  Gwendolyn, what a pity.  Your language HAS deteriotated since moving THERE”

reply from US-ified wendy: ‘MOM!    So, it’s cool… …ok… …don’t spaz’ (chews gum)

or reply from UK wendy; “Mumzie you are death-defyingly CUTE!  Yes my language has changed a little bit.  The change is not really a problem because people can still not-understand what I’m talking about and I can still appropriately use numerous words of more than 4 syllables. That means there is no need for you to worry. 

mumzie: “That’s enough cheek from you..   …have you brushed your teeth yet today?” (laying an Irony? trap for Wendy)

UK & US wendy:  “MUM!  I’m 42!!!” (Wendy falls into the trap of believing her mother would actually check on her adult teeth-cleaning activities.  Whoops!)

mumsie*: Teeeee Heee Heeeee…. 

Here are the potential mumsie offending words:

“Totally” appears to be used in the US as short hand to confirm agreement.  The UK equivalent is probably ”Absolutely”

“OK” this is used as frequently in the UK.  Here in the NW US they appear to say ‘MK‘,  I’m not sure why.  Mumsie doesn’t like ’OK’ because according to her it’s not a real word.  It’s a word that the American’s bought to Britain in WW2 with their offensive gum chewing habits.  I can remember her saying to me ”Take that gum out of your mouth darling. It’s rude to chew in public.”

“Rocks” used to indicate that something is impressive.   You say “rocks!” As oppose to the slightly more verbose,  specific, mumsie approved variations ”was very impressive’ or citing specific virtues ”I really liked the way the shimmering colours reflected in the moonlight”

“Awesome” (1.) almost the same as “Rocks”  (2.) used to indicate pleasure when someone understands or agrees with you.

“Cool“ appears to have multiple meanings depending on use context.  Here are a few I’ve noticed:

1. I hear what you are saying (OK)
2. I agree with you (OK)
3. That is not a problem (OK)
4. very stylish (Rocks)
5. the right thing to do and done with style. (Totally Rocks)

“So” widespread use of this word to start and string utterances together.  It’s like conversational glue.  There are definitely UK conversational equivalents such as “right“,  “like” “eerrrr”

’spaz“ appears to be used in the US as an abreviation of ’spasmodic’ or ’spasm’.  In the UK this term is more likely to be interpretted as an abbreviation of “Spastic” a derogatory term to refer to people suffering from Cerebral Palsey.  Not politically correct in the UK.

Unlike mumzie,  I do not disapprove of using these words in these ways.  Like mumsie, I prefer minimizing repetition and maximizing creative use of a broad vocabulary that communicates effectively. 

 * I love my mum she’s wicked!

Do cats have an informal, accurate, theory of static electricity?

My kitties adore paper. I leave sheets of crumpled paper on the floor aound my home. They prefer rolling and writhing on the paper than the carpet.  The carpet is not natural fibre.  Rolling on the carpet builds static electricity.  Rolling on paper does not. 

Coincidence or clever kitties?  You decide….

US people appear to avoid using this word.  When in restaurants they use the phrase  ’Rest rooms’.  Descriptions of homes for sale may include 1.5 ‘bathrooms’.  The 0.5 bathroom is one without a bath (uh?!) or a shower.  It appears to mean a room with a sink and a toilet.  Even toilet paper is labeled ‘Bathroom’ tissue. 

‘toilet humour’ exists in the US.  I’m not sure if it is known or referred to by this category.  

TOILET TOILET TOILET!

That felt good,  that felt NAUGHTY.  Teee heeee…

Masquerading under the technically-fancy name: Cognitive Dissonance. This happened when replying to a work-meeting invite where I

• would go because it will be easy to add value and have work-related fun. 
• should not go because it will delay completing stuff I need done by YESTERDAY!  

e-mail exchange:

Wendy:  I may be able to make this, but its unlikely, better to find a replacement for me.  (too difficult to just say ”I can’t be there“)

Colleague:  Wendy,  there clearly is NO replacement for you  :-)

Despite my better judgement and his cute dimples I didn’t propose to this guy.  Last time I checked he was married.  But then US folks have such a quick marriage dissolution time (90 days?) it’s difficult to track.  

This psychic chart says that I will buy a new laptop in the 3rd week of March after a tax rebate.  It predicts I will be happy and not worry about maintaining a terminal-Tinkerbell.

It’s amazing how clever Excel is at telling us the way things will be. 

I call it the ‘Excel Oracle Effect” (eOe).   Excel has predicted that I will be using it to solve 73% of the tricky questions in my life.  The first 9% of these will be covered in the next project:  a ‘boyfriend application generation and classification’ chart.  

Pie chart or Scattergram?  What do you think?

I suspect Tinkerbell knows I’m planning to dump her in favour of a newer, pinker, thinner, faster companion.  She revolted and showed me her version of a BSoD. Appparantly the infamous ‘blue screen of death’ (BSoD) has several different forms.  This might be from the Hardware manufacturer, not a real Microsoft OS blue screen. 

Whatever,  its blue, Tinkerbell died.   

A ‘reboot‘ put Tinkerbell in a temporarilly compliant mood.  I don’t trust her anymore.  She’s been playing up since the shutdown power cable meltdown incident.  A pretty Sony Viao is looking more like a good investment with every day that passes.  I want Windows Vista ‘ultimate’.  If I buy a pretty pink laptop thang before Vista is on sale I’ll have to work-out how to ’upgrade’ and maybe find out what a ‘64 bit processor’ would give me. 

More technical stuff.  YUCK!

While hanging out in geeks heaven I felt drawn to this little beauty.  slim,  shiny raspberry pink and light enought to run with.  Nearly all the essentials in place.  Yummy. 

I asked the sales staff about the scrummy looker.  He was a tad slack on seeing my vulnerability to a potential impulse purchase.  Phew!  I escaped from the store with my credit card still firmly in my pocket and unimpressed by the quality of the sales staff.  Maybe Geek heaven doesn’t tailor goods or staff training to the substantially sized market niche of professional clever-cloggs that likes pretty-pink-thangs…

With Tinkerbell I found this model on sony’s own website and discovered that I could ‘customise’ a purchase with a faster processor and pick it up cheaper than in geek heaven.   

OH YEAH BABY! 

Give me a cheap, thin FAST looker!   

How long can this single gal resist?  September?  Maybe not…

What-ever your gender or sexual preferences looking* at someone the wrong way* should not be justification for job dismissal.

The Guardian reports a case where multinational bank HSBC sacked an employee for looking at another employee the ‘wrong way’*.

I’m planning to wear reflective sunglasses when dealing with wbankers. 

*described using the emotive term ‘ogling’. Given as evidence of sexual harassment