Good Grief!

And there are absolutely some broken eggs (and permalinks). Good Grief! has moved to a new home, and there is some residual weirdness like missing pictures and boring templates. Do not e-mail me about missing favicons and banner images, or I will ban you, and then you will be sorry. Sadly, I shut off several of the old feeds before announcing the new one, so probably no one is reading this anyway. But just in case, the new RSS feed for Good Grief is here: http://doesthisblogmakemybuttlookbig.com/feed/

Big thanks to Scott of Blankbaby fame for helping me find a host and introducing me to Wordpress. And now, business as usual.

Blogging about blogging is sooooo tedious. Therefore, I will not blog about blogging. Instead this blog is about how I am not blogging about blogging and in fact am not blogging much at all because of a blog project that is keeping me too busy to blog. When the super-secret blog project is over, there will, by necessity, be one of those much-dreaded meta-blogging posts.

In the meantime, if you link here using the goodgrief.typepad.com link, could you update to doesthisblogmakemybuttlookbig.com? Pretty please? If you already use the butt link, carry on.

Please accept this most awesome mp3 (courtesy of Mr. Wade Bloggs) as an apology for all of the blawg nonsense.

Image courtesy of muppetcentral.com.

By entering www.doesthisblogmakemybuttlookbig.com , goodgrief.typepad.com, or any subpage thereof, you are obligated to adhere to the terms of the following End User License Agreement (hereafter referred to as EULA). You are also bound to the EULA if you access the content of this weblog through any means, including but not limited to the following:

1. Visiting www.doesthisblogmakemybuttlookbig.com or goodgrief.typepad.com on any device, including computers, laptops, wireless devices, and all peripherals thereof.
2. Viewing any RSS, Atom, or other syndicated feeds, including specifications that have yet to emerge in Web 2.0, Web 3.0, or other future computing paradigms, provided by this website or by third parties.
3. Using third-party tools that format and serve Good Grief! syndicated content (as defined by (2) above), e.g. newsreaders.
4. In fact, if you are reading this, you are bound by the terms of the EULA, which are as follows.

(1) By visiting Good Grief! you agree to the installation of a small rootkit that will be used to track your keystrokes and mouse clicks. In accordance with the Good Grief! privacy policy, this information will be kept strictly confidential and will be shared only with site operators, their proxies, and a few select marketing companies.
(a) You may opt out of the rootkit installation by sending a written request to Good Grief! PO Box 123 Fishtown, PA 19125. Please include a self-addressed, stamped envelope and your IP address.
(b) If this is not your first visit to Good Grief!, the rootkit has already been installed. This software is property of Good Grief!, and tampering with it will result in criminal prosecution.

(2) You may not link to Good Grief! or any subpage thereof without first obtaining permission from site operators or their proxies. Exceptions may be made for links accompanied by positive commentary, but negative linking will most assuredly be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

(3) Good Grief! reserves the right to refuse service to anyone at any time for any reason.

(4) Good Grief! is a member of the Web 2.0 community and as such remains in Beta. Because this site is in Beta, operators and their proxies accept no responsibility for damages incurred during use, including rootkit damage (see item (1) above), malicious scripts, or sudden urges to drink heavily.

(5) This EULA may be modified at any time without prior notification. Ignorance is no excuse for the law.

As always, thank you for visiting Good Grief!

Hooters

Technical aside: after years of uploading pictures to Typepad, Snapfish, Ofoto, and Flickr, I decided to embrace Flickr for all photo sharing and printing needs (under username Bendystraw).

This picture right here of the sinking Hooters boat is my most viewed stand-alone photo. I have a good idea about which tag attracted the attention, which just goes to show that they can upgrade the Web to 2.0, but people are still people.

The Hooters boat eventually sank and disappeared.

February’s hellish DVD hookup experience has made me reluctant to undertake other electronics-related projects. However, there’s nothing like moving from a one bedroom apartment to a three story house to invoke the siren call of wireless. Well, guess what? It is much easier to install and secure a wireless home network than it is to hook up a DVD player.

Scott accompanied me on a shopping excursion during yesterday’s lunch break and suggested the Belkin Wireless Pre-N Router. So you can see that my router is better than your router: it has three antennae, it’s coverage rules (half of Fishtown, at least), and it has MIMO (multiple input, multiple output). The MIMO is what sold me; it’s a fabulous acronym, and I hereby dub this new purchase Meemo the Router.

Seriously, though, thanks to the people at Belkin who wrote the documentation for this product. The instructions were clear and unambiguous, and the setup couldn’t have been easier. So many companies overlook the importance of good technical writers, but that’s a mistake—because I was able to install the router without feeling like a complete moron, I love it already.

Apparently, certain tasks related to my new job involve Internet Relay Chat. IRC? People still do that? According to this circa-1990s site:

Sure, the Web is nice for finding info and E-mail beats snailmail hands down, but when you’ve been wondering ‘where the others are?’, then IRC is what you’re looking for.

Forgive my stereotyping, but aren’t chatrooms the domain of philandering married types and teenage-loving old men? Aren’t the normal people instant messaging or surfing blogs or something?

I feel so dirty.

PS: If Thing 1 and Thing 2 are reading this, please don’t fire me. I will do what it takes to get the job done, even if that means mingling with unsavory Internet people.

Continuing last week’s theme of weblogs and their impact on offline life…I used to perceive webloggers as introverted, awkward geeks who never leave the house. After starting Good Grief!, however, I found the opposite to be true and met a lot of interesting, like-minded people*, got Blankbabied (i.e., got a job lead based on this site), and met the guy I’m currently dating.

The job story is here, and the guy story is below. After this post, I’m done with the super personal stuff and Good Grief! will return to stupid art posts and doll suicides and Max Raabe.

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This post might be a bad idea:

• I do not like meta-blogging
• I do not blog about my personal life

However, there’s been some talk lately about the intersection of blogs and real life and the influence of the former upon the latter. Specifically, my friend and co-worker Scott was on the front page of last Sunday’s Philadelphia Inquirer, telling the story of his blog Blankbaby and how it helped him land his current job. There is now a movement afoot to coin the term Blankbabied, which means to get hired because of your weblog (i.e., the opposite of getting Dooced).

I started Good Grief! in January 2004 because I wanted a website but didn’t know anything about HTML or FTP or finding a host. Along came Typepad, and I couldn’t resist an opportunity to write something and have it instantly appear on the Internet. Little did I know how this weblog would influence my offline life:

• I got dumped, primarily over a post about the 2004 Madrid bombings.
• In January 2005 I met someone who accidentally found me on a Google search. We’ve been dating for the past six months.
• I got Blankbabied and have just started a fabulous new job.
• I’ve had the pleasure of meeting (and now working with) several Philadelphia bloggers.

The above list is as personal as I’ve ever been in this space, but I wrote it because I’m fascinated by the social impact of technology. This entry is most definitely a temporary digression from the usual smart-ass posts. The story of being Blankbabied is in the extended entry, to be followed by the story of dating via Google (maybe). After that, no more of the private stuff. My mom reads this, you know.

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Yeah, yeah… Google has some super cool applications. As you surely know, Google Maps makes Mapquest seem so late 90s. And Gmail is great once you embrace the “no folders” way of thinking.

But this new Google Talk instant messaging thing being spewed all over the Internet? As Scott observed, it has NO ANIMATED SMILEY FACES! Who makes IM software with NO ANIMATED SMILEY FACES? I cannot endorse this technology.

This message was sent using PIX-FLIX Messaging service from Verizon Wireless!..

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