Category Archives: Allure

Yahoo! I damn thee.

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I don’t really damn Yahoo! (YHOO [disclosure: no position]) but I think I’ll go there less now.

Less is really none. I only ever used yahoo.com to test hotel internet connections. Sometimes if I used google.com and the hotel displayed a welcome page the DNS cache would get poisoned and google.com would become inaccessible. Thus I would check the connection with yahoo.com first because it didn’t matter if that domain became inaccessible.

Never mind the recent news about Microsoft (MSFT [no position]) and its spurned attempts to buy Yahoo! out. Never mind how strange it feels to use a word that ends with a punctuation mark, whether in the middle of a sentence or at the end of a non-exclaimed statement.

Yahoo! tricked me into reading part of an article that tells the sad, sad, sad story of a billionaire wife who was refused a divorce on lack of grounds. The assault on my masculinity can not be forgiven. In my defense, I just wanted to know the answer: “In some states, even if you want to divorce, the court won’t let you. Why?”

In some states, even if you want to divorce, the court won\'t let you. Why?

I clicked “Why?” and read half of the first page before I realized that the answer to my question was on another page and that I was reading Elle. I laughed out loud, took the screenshot and started blogging. Surely nobody will read about it on my blog. My masculinity is safe.

What domain should I use for testing hotel internet connections?

Cost of a free stapler

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Wise Bread told me how to get a free Swingline stapler. It’s not Milton’s red stapler but I did have my eye on staplers at the store, so I was interested.

The survey starts with an email address and at some point they’ll collect your mailing address. There was no link to a privacy policy so I went looking and found one after about two minutes. It said they will email me, send me literature, and share my info with other companies.

I pictured myself shredding sheafs of junk mail while grumbling at my shiny new stapler. How much would my free stapler cost me? If I can get ACCO to take me off their sharing and promo lists, not much. I took the survey.

School shooting conspiracy theory

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School shootings (Again) offer no explanations.

Gun control lovers fill their tanks on this stuff (State lawmakers push, pull on gun control following NIU shootings).

This time, investigators find a link (Gunman, Virginia Tech shooter used same Web dealer) suggesting that the shootings might have had a third party in common.

Besides well-meaning but misguided Americans, who would like to succeed in disarming the American populace? A foreign enemy, that’s who.

This is a perfect opportunity for the JTTFs to stop training layabouts to act like terrorists (Myths of Domestic Terror) and find the real foreign agents sowing violence in our midst.

Reality check: I have no more evidence than the articles linked above. Nevertheless, weaker leads have sparked investigations. If our enemies are plotting to weaken our domestic defenses by fueling (and, who knows, possibly staffing) the gun control lobby, they are very wise indeed. I stand behind an “individual rights” interpretation of the Second Amendment.

How can you tell a nightmare?

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I, as my present self with my present possessions and obligations, woke up in a hotel in my college town at the end of a spring semester. All my gear was gone. I was without clothes, wallet, keys, phone, briefcase, computer.

My house—it had ceased to be a hotel room—was full of excited people taking their things and leaving for the summer. Boxes filled every room and corridor so that it was hard to move around. A woman repeatedly caught my eye while flitting in and out of rooms and collecting objects. It was strange to find every bed in my house occupied. These people had made themselves at home in my home and I didn’t recall inviting them but I didn’t mind because they were all getting up and leaving.

Many wonderful items littered the open spaces of my house. There were boxes of music and movies, each one bearing the mark of a well-loved friend and their signature odor. Piles of gadgets flowed out from fireplaces. Happy dogs caromed off everything.

Everywhere I looked, there was a friendly stranger saying goodbye. I would have liked to own any of the things they were taking away but I did not want any of their things and I could not see anyone taking anything that I needed, or that belonged to me. My possessions were still missing and I continued to hunt for them.

After searching every other place, I returned to the room where I had woken up. There was no lock on the door. Somebody was there. It was the woman! She was putting on a shirt. It was my shirt! She was glancing at an empty spot on the table. It was the spot where my things had been! I snatched her by the wrist and demanded, “Where is it?”

The woman yelped and protested. She looked guilty but she was becoming more beautiful before my eyes. I called out, “Help! Theif! Police!” Moving into the corridor with the woman in tow, I found a friendly policeman. The woman denied taking my briefcase with my wallet and phone and computer inside. I hadn’t named the stolen articles! She had obviously taken my things but the policeman urged me to embrace the loss.

“What will happen if you lose those things?”

“Nothing much. I’ll report the credit cards stolen and suspend the phone service. I’ll get new cards, a new phone, a new computer. It’s just a pain.”

“It is a pain. How would you like it if you never replaced those things?”

“That is my dream.”

“Why don’t you let the woman go?”

I looked at her. She had become the most beautiful person in the world and her eyes swore that she was mine.