Oh Amazon

I had to flip the links in another post because I felt like listening to "Nice Guys Finish Last" by Cobra starship, (I like to treat my own blog as a playlist) and the copyright bastards had deleted the the song from youtube, the website that I consider to be my personal music server.

I spent about 10 seconds despising the copyright bastards and lamenting the fact that they could be making money but aren't because they are idiots that tried to legislate away the future. Which reminded me of this amazon affiliate program thing--when I edit my blog I see this add saying I can "monetize" my blog if I becone an "amazon affiliate."

I decided to check it out just now.  Here is a list of stupid questions that I was forced to answer:

1. What is your website(s) about?

Its not about anything.   Oh...thats1 a product.  I should link to it.  Wait, no, Despair Inc doesn't list that product on Amazon.  <-- that was a lot of work


2. "How to you drive traffic to your website?"

I don't was not an option I could select.

3. Which of the following topics best describes the topic of your website(s)?

Yeah, none of the options applied.

4.  What type of Amazon items do you intend to list on your website(s)?

So they expected me to go through each of their categories and know ahead of type what category whatever I feel like linking to the stuff belongs to.  So...I checked them all.  I'd like to imagine that somewhere in the amazon data centers, an application written by somebody I'm not going to like is now patiently waiting for me to link something in the Home and Garden section.

5.  How else do you monetize your website(s)?

This...ok this was wasn't too painful.

6.  What is your primary reason for joining the Amazon Associates Program?

"On a whim" / "to try it out" / "i like clicking on links" / "I don't have a life"
are not answers you can select.

7.  How did you hear about us?

Blogger has this entire big integration thing going on, with annoying and specialized editors for clicking links, and a big tab that says "Monetize," but the people writing the survey didn't think to include blogger as an option.  They also neglected to include any general category that could describe the process of how I became aware of the amazon associates program.  So, I told them I read about it in a blog.

Conclusion

Because I became an "amazon affiliate" there is this big...whats an antonym of handy?  Oh.  Unhandy.  I didn't see that coming.  Anyway, there is this big, unhandy amazon link editor search box thing on my screen now.  It takes up a fair bit of space and I have a feeling if I ever use it, I am going to have to open Amazon.com in another tab first to find what I'm looking for, and then use this miserable little toy once I know exactly what to search for.  I hope I'm not revealing some kind of trade secret here, but little do you know Amazon actually uses unique identifiers to...identify each of their products.  They are text, and are roughly the size of the identifiers that everyone else with a database in the 21st century uses.  You would think that all I need to do is tell blogger that I want a link to a particular product, and identify that product via its exact identifier.  But no.....they wanted to make this easy to use.

Also, because I was an idiot and signed up for the amazon thing, Blogger switched me from the Old Editor that Worked to the New Fancy and Awkward Editor That Doesn't Work As Good.  Creating a link on here used to take me roughly...0.75 seconds (not an exaggeration).  With this new editor, creating a link takes...well, when I press ctrl+v to paste the web address, that address ends up anywhere on this page except for the text box where I was trying to paste it into.  So, if you happen to see a url in thehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vimiddle of a sentence, that is why.  Is this...is this really that difficult?  Seriously.  We've had text editors that can cut and paste since...well, since 1976 apparently.  Let me fire up a calculator.  Yeah, thats 34 years.  We've had cut and paste for 34 years, but apparently the iPhone could only do it recently, and blogger is still working out the kinks.  Wow, in fact...everything is more difficult with this editor.  And its sllooooowwwwww.  I am edging closer to just writing my own software to do this.

Well, anyway, here is the entire point of this post.  Well, first I want you all to know that in the time it took to write this post I could have watched an episode of Dollhouse, and then...done something else for the remaining 20 minutes.  Ooh, dollhouse.  Let me link that.  Ok.  I'm not sure what I linked, but I think it was the right thing.

Well, anyway, take two:  Nice Guys Finish Last, by Cobra Starship.

you got style

you got grace

but kid you try so hard and she just laughs in your face

yeah you're a...

nice guy 

with the wrong attitude

she want a bad boy

Footnotes

1. When I wrote that "thats" in this blog post, meaning "that is," the missing apostrophe in the contraction is not a grammatical typo but in fact a deliberate omission, both to annoy people like you and also because I was too lazy to hit the apostrophe key, even though its right here next to my pinky finger.  Say hi pinky finger! '''''hi'''''

Dear Diary

[Cooking]
I have long been in search for healthy food to eat that doesn't go bad. In this paragraph, healthy food means actual vegetables and other things that grow, as opposed to food inside packaging with moderately bold but effectively false claims about healthiness. My first discovery was carrots: they last for weeks.

Tonight I discovered that you can cut up a red pepper and dump it into the pasta while it is cooking and when it has three minutes left. The three minutes was an accident, as I meant to dump them in when I started the pasta, but forgot. Fortunately, three minutes in boiling water tasted like the perfect amount of time to cook a red pepper. Next time, I'll use alfredo sauce that isn't about to expire.


[Tragic Flaws]
Nothing can be done about the fact that all the wrong people know I am allergic to an undefined set of beers in some way that I don't understand and hate explaining. However, something has been done about the wine problem. I mentioned to Jordan how I seemed to have recently become allergic to wine (not actually allergic, but actually asthmatic, but don't even get me started on that because I'll start ranting about the first Dollhouse episode I watched) since moving here, and how I wasn't allergic to it at first. Ever the wine connoisseur, Jordan suggested I try some foreign wines because of something about sulfates babysitting all those rowdy wine molecules during shipping. Turns out, he was right. I don't know what wine I had with dinner tonight, but it was white and $11 and tasted delicious.


[Plans]
The legal drinking age in Canada is 19. I probably shouldn't open with that sentence. Nonetheless, the next big trip is Vancouver. Why Vancouver? Because it is technically a foreign city and I can go there without using vacation days and Luke says there are more girls there than Seattle.

Also, I think I finally figured out a way to start having fun parties at my place that won't be awkward even if only like 4 people come: Mario Kart. Everybody loves mario kart, and it is one of the few videogames that girls like. Also, we could probably make a drinking game out of it. Like, you have to drink every time somebody wipes out. Now the only question is, should I pony up for a wii or just get an old N64? I am one of those people that likes to whine about how newer games aren't as good anymore, but I don't just whine about it: I regularly play videogames from the 90s. Like Duke Nukem 3D. Man, I wonder if there is any way someone could finish Duke Forever....


[The Fourth Section]
There really isn't anything else in my life even worth mentioning. I just thought this post needed a fourth section. To balance it out. I like Legos. And I cleaned my bathroom mirror today. Today is a monday. I don't like mondays. Have you ever had a case of the mondays? I believe you get your ass kicked for saying something like that. I filled out an "anonymous" survey about what I think of my manager today, but if he sees my answers verbatim, I'm pretty sure the satire will render their authorship unmistakeable. Yeah, I'm on call tonight. I am bored.

The Jackass, the Girl, and the Birthday

Some people have a saying. I try to avoid vocalizing it when I'm around girls, because most of them can't stand the idea. I think it is because they are hardwired to believe in some kind of world where all the nice people end up happily married and all the mean people don't. But I digress.

Last night was this girl's 21st birthday. Bridget's friend. Super hot. We met her boyfriend (and/or ex boyfriend. whatever). His eyes were half closed and he was teetering about, nearly falling, and spent most of the time either ignoring, or saying mean things to her. Birthday girl wanted to go to pioneer square, so we spent about 10 minutes trying to herd this guy into a cab. Then, upon arriving in pioneer square, he punches the cabbie and wanders off.

Then the night got pretty good. We hung out in the last supper club, and even though the dance floor was mostly creepy old guys, we didn't have a problem dancing because there were girls in our group. That might be the secret to going out dancing. Also there were some hot women in their 30s dancing up on the balcony. Yay. I think I dropped over $100 though. And by "think" I mean I know. Ridiculous. The drinks at one bar were $8 a piece.

Anyway, then the bars closed. As in, they turned on the house lights at 1:50 am. I had some beer in my apartment so we planned to rendezvous back at the birthday girls hotel room for the after party. Unfortunately, when drunk people are involved, simple things like the room numbers, room locations, and elevators-dont-work-unless-you-have-your-room key become serious obstacles. To keep a long story short, we were all sitting on benches outside when the girls jackass boyfriend walked up and started shouting this incoherent and exaggerated story about where he'd been all night. According to him, he escaped arrest by mouthing off to the cops. I'll be sure to try that one.

While I tried to be as discreet as I could with my eye rolling, someone else in the group confronted him about ignoring his girlfriend/ex girlfriend, who was very nearly passing out on the bench. He didn't like not being the center of attention though. I wanted to give birthday girl a hug but didn't want to get punched in the face. Although, I have to admit, I am curious about being in a fight where I am sober and the other person cannot stand without wobbling. Especially since I don't have any fight stories--fight stories aren't something to brag about but I think they are nice to have in your back pocket just in case someone thinks you're a goody-two-shoes.

It took a while, but eventually the whole drunken crew made it to their room. Sweet view. We watched a rerun of Family Matters on the tv, made sure the now unconscious birthday girl was comfortably tucked in, and left them to listen to Mr Jackass explain why this girls mother didn't hate him, but hated and loved him. Really, I'm not making this up.

I don't feel like searching dictionary.com for the right noun/adjective, but this guy was basically the opposite of a gentleman. Here's the key though: his girlfiend and/or ex-girlfriend? Gorgeous, cute, smart, nice, fun personality, etc. And despite (because of?) all that abuse she was totally into him.

Same story, different actors.

You're my drug...I'm going to rehab.

Philly.

Fig 1. Philadelphia: one of the cities where people actually know how to cross the street.

The red eye was the worst flight of my life. I'll save the details for a silly drinking game far in the future. I spent the entire day recovering from that flight, which leads me to believe that I might as well just fly early friday morning, since either way I'm not going to do much in philly until 9 or 10 pm.

Friday: The Rum Bar

There is a bar in philly with an entire menu of rum drinks that doesn't serve beer. It is the greatest thing ever--not so much because I love rum (I do) but because I don't like hearing my friends bitch about me always drinking rum, and I am sick and tired of people ordering a pitcher of beer/cider and asking me, again, if I'm allergic to beer, and I am also sick and tired of walking into a bar in Seattle and finding out that they don't serve any liquor. And then, half the time they don't even have my safety beer, the Corona. And there is nothing I can do about it--except announce that I just love miller lite and watch the beer nerds cringe.

Well, they should all come to this rum bar with me in the great city of Philadelphia, and when they can't get their lame ass lauger that nobody's heard of they'll know how I feel. Freakin seattle. What kind of city has separate licenses for beer and liquor? Anyway.

At this rum bar, Matt told me to get some kind of super spiced mojito. It was the spiciest thing I've ever tasted. I'm pretty sure that drink, and all of the animated storytelling I did later, is what killed my voice for the rest of the weekend.

Another cool thing about the rum bar? Walking distance from the hotel in center city I usually stay at.

This paragraph is the original beginning of the friday section. We had to push it back so I could tell you how much I love the rum bar. This was my one social night. Almost none of my college friends could make it, so it was pretty much all high school friends, and the one girl I had been trying not to look forward to seeing too much. There was some kind of drama I don't care about between her and my high school friends, so she didn't sit with them. I asked her to come over and sit with us and she said she was leaving. I asked her to stay, because I wanted to make out with her later. Then she and her friend got really bitchy and said she had a boyfriend. Probably true. I was sad. I said goodbye. I found out later this was the wrong response. I don't know what I did wrong this time. Girls don't value honesty as much as they say they do.

Saturday: the wedding!

I woke up alone and with a cracked voice. Wandered around center city until I found a car rental place that had a car available. I got...a new Ford Taurus. This is one of the worst designed cars I've ever seen. First, the thing is enormous. I'm not even sure if it fits in terrestrial parking spaces. Second, when you get inside? There is very little room. They managed to make a car that is very big on the outside, and very tiny on the inside. Third, there is almost no visibility. The windows are tiny and you get a horrible angle of sight and checking your blind spot is close to guesswork. I surmised from the boatlike feel of the suspension that this is perhaps meant to be a car for old people. That, or it was intended for people that suck at driving, and all that mass is there to protect you from everything you're going to run over.

Despite the shortcomings of my rental, it was quite pleasant to cruise around my favorite highways (422 and 76) listening to whats left of philly's rock stations. I <3 Y100.

Yeah...I had this whole big story in here about the wedding, and this girl I met at the wedding. It took like 45 minutes to write. But then google accidentally deleted it because I typed in a <3 without escaping the <. Ironically, I can't think of a single part of that story that anyone else needs to know. The wedding afterparty was at a cool bar though.

Sunday: the family

I got to play legos with my nieces. The elder one, who had previously shown little aptitude for these wonderful little bricks, surprised me with her creativity by putting a space glowy thingy on a pirate mast and calling it a lamppost. Then we built a town, just like I did when I was younger. Top left, there, thats a castle. My niece decided that a princess lived there, and promptly collected all of the male minifigs, armed them, and set them about the castle, declaring that they were guarding the princess. Oh, and the little house with the red roof, that was made by my older sister.

My other niece made this castle. I think its a castle. The blue is definitely water. I think it is an island castle, or at least an island house.

I am unable to pay attention to both of them at once--not when legos are involved. I have perhaps tens of thousands of individual lego pieces and I recognize every one.


Monday: lunch

I had to return my car in the morning, because of how Avis does business, and my flight was not until that night, so I had lunch with Holly, and then hung out with Nicole for the afternoon. Then we met up with Holly again. Holly and Nicole decided to go get manicures, and I should go with them. I really, really had nothing to do. I mean, I took that picture up top. Anyway, so it didn't hurt. And I have to admit my nails do look nicer now that there aren't bits of skin flailing all over the place. The experience was still too femenine for my tastes, and the asian girl doing my nails seemed quite amused when she found out that niether of the girls I was with was my girlfriend, and in fact they were both nearly engaged/married. I pondered this during my nap while the girls were drying their nail paint.

In terminal A of the Philadelphia airport, I found this:

Pretty cool.


Epilogue

The trip was awesome. As usuall, at the end of it I found my self physically exhausted but mentally refreshed. I wish that I could go back there more often. I'm gonna look into it sometime. Whatever happens, it is definitely a great thing to be able to step out of your normal life for a while and just take a breather. I need more of these.


Wednesday: The 172S!

I almost forgot! Tonight was my checkout flight for the Cessna 172S. I spent all last night furiously studying, instead of doing important things like laundry. Whatever. You see, I normally fly the Cessna 172P. The Cessna 172S has a slightly more powerful engine. Picture a bunch of turtles, and imagine that one of them regularly trains for the 100 meter dash. That turtle is the Cessna 172S. So, I am now "checked out" in it, which means nothing legally, but does mean that my flying club will now allow me to rent the S model,. The next time that all of the Cessna 172Ps are taken, the 172S might still be available. Also, as a result of tonight, I got to fly around with an instructor and am now confident that even after more than a month of not flying, my skills are still fairly sharp, and we worked out some of the kinks with my landings.

I am moving up the flying food chain. Next up, perhaps in a few months: learning to fly a plane with retractable landing gear.

Dear Philly People

Hi, I will be drinking in philly at The Rum Bar tomorrow (friday) night. Its at like 20th and walnut or something. You are all invited to join me.

[Edit]
Ok I've just messaged most of the people that I want to see that don't hate me that I'm pretty sure still live in philly that I haven't forgotten. Oh except for Kristen. Can't hurt to at least invite her, although I can't imagine what random social rule I'm breaking. Ok, the rest of them...I don't have their number. Yeah I think thats everyone.

So if at this point you have not received a facebook invitation to come drinking with me, there are three possibilities:
A) you do not have a facebook account, or you're like never on
B) I am unaware you live in philly
C) I forgot about you, or I think you hate me.

Captain's Log, Stardate blah blah blah, blah blah blah

Today, in theory, was going to be awesome. I was going to get up super early and take these two girls from Starbucks flying, just a quick trip to Bremerton to eat at the diner. Then I was gonna hurry on over to play volleyball at the "beach" called Golden Gardens, which in my mind was not crowded at all and hot girls come over and played with us for a few games. Then I was going to meet up with this girl, go get drinks, and then go salsa dancing, and then play some drunken rock band. It was, in theory, fairly awesome.

Then I tried to schedule the plane and found out there is a "flyin" this weekend so all of the Cessna 172Ps were taken. I am going to start taking lessons in more advanced models, simply so that I will have the option to fly them if all of the 172Ps are taken. I wanted to wait until I paid off the debt from my license, but this thing with not being able to take girls flying is unacceptable. That's pretty much the only thing my license is good for right now. Yeah, I know, seeing the world, and flying is wonderful or whatever, but these cessnas can barely make it over the rockies, and they are only about twice as fast as my car.

Then, with the volleyball. We do this thing here where there are poles setup for you, and you just bring your own net. I thought the fact that you needed your own net would deter a sufficient number of people away that we'd get a court, but apparently there are a ton of hardcore volleyball players that flock to the nearest tiny beach when its nice out. So we found a sort of reject court with bent poles no one wanted to use and strung my net up there, until the wafting smells nearby BBQs drove us mad and we left to get lunch.

At lunch I found out I was invited to the party that I didn't know about. It is tonight. So...I'm gonna figure something out about tonight. I just wanted to share that I almost had an awesome day.

[Edit]
Something about the Civil Air Patrol.

Words of Wisdom

The most common errors my unit tests uncover are that the unit tests were written incorrectly.

Labeling something you don't like as an anti-pattern because it contradicts your own biased opinions on how something should be done makes you a douchebag.

My first time with a pedal

Guitars

I bought a distortion pedal off some guy from craigslist a few days ago. If you are unfamiliar with distortion all you need to know is that it is the magic that makes guitars sound awesome. Except for this pedal. I'm not really into its sound. I eventually found a balance that gave me the sound I want, but I honestly prefer the built-in distortion switch on my AMP. However, every time I've told another guitar player that I have to walk over to my amp and press a switch on it with my hand if I want distortion they have laughed out loud. I understand pedals are how we do it now. This is what mine looks like:



Yeah, I knelt down and took a picture of it just for you. Its 12:48 on a saturday night. Why would I be doing that? I'm on call. Some guys did something to a database tonight, and I need to stay up for a while to check in on this thing that you don't care about.

The main reason I was able to justify buying a pedal was the fact that it was the only way to record into my computer with distortion. The "emulated line out" thing on my AMP transmits a signal that is not distorted and also not even amplified, so the only way to record me playing with distortion was to just put a cheap mic near my amp (as opposed to connecting the amp directly to my computer). Well...long story short now I have a pedal and some more cables I bought from radio shack this morning and I still can't do it. There are a lot of things I can do--most of them involve recording total silence and one involves a really nasty sound getting recorded. I don't know what it will take to make this all work together so I can record myself playing, but I am certain it involves buying more stuff.


Girls

My volleyball team practiced at some volleyball court on a college campus. The sand had a consistency similar to cat litter. Also, since getting rejected by Firefly Girl I started thinking about asking out this girl on my volleyball team--yeah ok so my volleyball team, for the moment, is me and three girls. I know, heaven, right? Well anyway only one of them is single, but she is pretty hot, so the only thing holding me back, besides my desire to continue moping around pining after Firefly Girl, was wondering how long I have to wait before I asked the next girl. They're friends, and I understand there is some kind of...thing. I don't know what the rule is. All I know is when I lived in Philly I texted this girl Kristen asking if she wanted to go to some party. But like most girls she didn't respond, so I waited a few days and texted her roomate, and as soon as I did that they both responded and said no. Well...later they both yelled at me for violating some kind of timing rule I still don't understand. Maybe I just have bad luck with girls with K names. I don't know.

Anyway, none of this is imporant because I think I figured out today that the girl on my volleyball team that I was about to be interested in dating is probably dating someone.

But not to despair, because I recently rewrote my okcupid profile and left a nasty gram in there from my frustration, and as soon as I did so some girl messaged me asking if I wanted to grab a beer. I edited my profile again, thinking that the things I wrote would get me kicked off the site, but instead I was rewarded with more girls messaging me, and then okcupid emailed me to tell me that they have decided I'm an attractive person now, and they will start showing me hot girls.

So, I don't understand how all this works. Every time I am completely honest with a girl in real life they tend to cry to stop talking to me. (the latter is their reaction to my expression of undying love). Or its like the time this one girl said she might visit me in Seattle in like 4 months, and I warned her that by that time I might be dating someone. Yeah that was the wrong answer. After consulting with 1 or 2 people about it, the best guess I can come up with for the right answer is to have not mentioned the possibility of me dating anyone, and just have hoped that my every attempt to too meet someone would fail. Especially since thats what ended up happening.

But on the internet, telling people what you think, even (or especially) when you coat it with bitter sarcasm, just rewards you. I don't think I'm ever going to understand girls.

Also, yesterday I paid $40 to go whitewater rafting with a bunch of girls that aren't interested in me. I didn't know which paragraph to put that sentence in.


Roller Derby

I was invited out to a roller derby. I thought "roller derby" meant we were going to put on some skates and skate in a circle listening to lame music on loudspeakers. That was incorrect. Roller derby means we went to a stadium to watch other people rollerskate. It is a sport. The league we attended was an apparently all female league, so I enjoyed that part of it. The sport involves two teams competeting against each other. The gameplay consists of them skating around in circles and shoving each other around. It must be an unpopular sport, because the announcers kept mentioning the fact that the arena was sold out with excitement in their voice--as if they needed some kind of validation.

The announcers, as well as some kind of cheerleader-like fat man wearing a dress and an ugly rainbow hat, detracted from the fun slightly. One of the jackass male announcers made some bullshit comment about men not being tough enough to wear roller skates and shove each other around like the girls were. I had a sudden desire to bash his face in with a pair of roller skates. Some of my friends think that these violent tendencies are a result of not making out with anyone for so long. I need to stop caring about what other people say; Mr "oh girls are so much tougher than us" probably got laid tonight. I didn't.

Overall, the sport seemed kind of cool, and more fun to watch than hockey (I feel asleep when I went to a phantoms game) but not great. There are some...holes in the rules that occasionally result in some obnoxious and retarded gameplay. Scoring is ostensibly simple, but in practice can be complicated and a bit fast paced.

The bonus, though, was that the half-time show was a drumline from a nearby high school. They were pretty good. They didn't have quints or quads or trips though; the only midrange drum was a guy with a single drum and it was vertical as if it was one of the base drums.

Oh, and no one uses their real names. One way of resolving your sport infereority issues might be to use people's actually names like in the big boy sports. I don't know if it is for safety, or if the people who invented roller derby were gamers, but the team names are like clan names and every player and official is addressed and referred to by their made-up handles, just like they were playing a video game. The handles/screennames themselves were more creative and intelligent than the ones you see in a typical FPS. Almost all of them were non-sexual double entendres. In fact, I think I counted two names that were not double entendres. If I played in that league, I would be tempted to use my real name just to be different.

Then again, it would be nice to hear my teammates call me The Dragon one more time.

Safe

This song sounds really familiar, but I can't place the original.

Verse:
CGFC
AmCFG
CGFC
CGFG

Chorus:
AmFCG
AmFAmG





CGFC close your eyes, let the room fade away, there's a
AmCFG its cold inside and you're starting to break
CGFC what did they do that makes you hold on so tight
CGFG there's no place worth going if the price is your life (don't leave me)

wait
you're safe with me now, just let
me lead the way
when the candle goes out (and when you)

fall
I'll lift your head off the ground, then i'll
kiss you goodnight after I carry you home (stay with me)

AmFAmG

CGFC What can I say when you send me away
AmCFG curse behind your lips, but i promise it can wait
CGFC the distance that you've come betrays your inner strength
CGFG this house was built on hope and the garden's full of grace (come with me)


run
they can't stop of now, cause you
tore down every cage, and i
found a way out (my secret)

love
i feel it somehow, but i
know you won't believe me if i
say it out loud (so when you)

fall
I lift your head off the ground, then i'll
kiss you goodnight after I carry you home

(stay with me)




And then, when my own song gets stuck in my head, I listen to this.


[Edit]
Also, here is the song that has been stuck in my head. In fact, I may have based "Safe" on it. Idk. I don't get it. I hate accordians. Maybe I'm just a sucker for female vocals.

And some other song.

[Edit]
Hmm...maybe I can have "on call" rockband parties?

Or, since weekends are so much more valuable to me, maybe I could trade 3 weeknight shifts for 2 weekend shifts?