A Crappy Way to Begin the Week

As I write this, a certain odor of indescribable severity and unyielding presence is punctuating every olfactory nerve in my body. I feel it seeping into my pores and burrowing deep through several dermal layers. I am now thoroughly imbued with it. Its invasive presence begs the same creepy feeling that accompanies a stray ant running up your leg. My office is inundated with sewage, and I am the lone survivor.

I sit at my desk and wonder how long I will last. My open window provides minimal relief. The smell falls over me like the gentle ripples of an ebb tide. The thermometer reads 62 degrees. My shivering feet are making a gentle squish-squish-squish sound as they chatter against the swollen carpet.

A broken sewer line is a bad thing. A broken sewer line with 100 Marines above you flushing and showering all weekend, oblivious to the tidal wave of shit on the first floor makes a bad thing even worse. We know very little about what happened. We know that at 1400 yesterday is was dry. We know that at 2000 a Marine noticed a growing puddle coming out of the first floor female restroom. We know that this dumbass decided not to call anybody.

The carpet is gone in most of my office, exposing the asbestos floor tile underneath. Ironically, the sewage has thoroughly wetted the tile, eliminating any danger the asbestos could cause. I learned that my office used to be part of a bathroom at some point. And now it has returned to its roots. There hasn't been this much crap on the floor in here in thirty years. It may be presumptuous of me to make that determination. I have no idea what the previous owners did in here. There are accidents.

My window has a thick layer of condensation on it. I figure that moisture is vaporized shit. I breathe much less frequently now. It means less oxygen, but it also means less fecal matter in my lungs. My environmental guy, the guy who has several dozen snakes in his living room, checked out of here as soon as he saw the mess. He said he needed to change his clothes. He is a rather large guy, and he probably had a firsthand account to the worst things that have gone down our sewer. He wasn't playing.

It is hard to work when you can glance out into the hall and see bits of toilet paper on the ground. Such a thing is disconcerting. Alone in a cold building that smells like crap sitting in an office that even the fat snake guy couldn't stand.

Maybe Tuesday will be better.

Right-Click-Drag!

Today is a good day.

Not five minutes ago, I discovered that I can highlight text and then hold down the right mouse button to drag it elsewhere in the document.

Holy crap.

After using a computer for hours per day for about a decade and a half, this shortcut never was made known to me. I am immensely proud of this accomplishment. After all, it isn't every day you learn something this earth-shaking.

But I am hesitant to report it in a broader medium (i.e., a Facebook status update), because I have this sinking feeling that everyone already knows about it. Kinda like Alt+Tab. No one really talks about it, but everyone knows what it is.

So here I am, in the aftermath of my world-changing discovery, and instead of celebrating the achievement with, I don't know, a Coke Zero or something, I'm trying to figure out, with the years of personal contact I have shared with various mice over the past generation, why I hadn't stumbled upon this earlier.

Today is no longer a good day.

The Road to Nobel is Paved (only) With Good Intentions

No one is perfect. I know that. But rarely has a group of highly educated people gooned it so badly. I guess it isn't entirely their fault (they are, after all, Norwegian). But I am holding them accountable for giving Obama a Nobel Peace Prize eight months after he was elected President.

Let's look at the timeline:

September 2008 - Solicitation for nominations published.
November 2008 - Obama elected.
January 2009 - Obama inaugurated.
February 2009 - Nominations due.
October 2009 - Obama given the Nobel Peace Prize.

Similarly, let's look at the timeline for the Nobel Physics winner Charles K. Kao:

1965 - Invent fiber optic communication.
(four decades of exponentially enhanced communications based on said fiber)
2009 - Kao awarded half the Physics Prize.

So guys, what's up? To win the Physics Prize you practically have to reinvent an entire branch of science and then wait several decades. To win the Peace Prize, however, it appears you have to give a couple nice speeches and make some promises. And this can be done after your nomination has been submitted.

What has Obama accomplished? Any revolutionary change in the world in the last eight months? Iraq--no. Afghanistan--maybe worse. Israel--no. Pakistan--no. Gaza--no. South America--no. Haiti--no. Sudan--no. Ethiopia--no.

Obama, in the next 3/7 years, may do something Nobel-worthy. But not now. I haven't been this ticked at Norway since Al Gore won this award in 2007. Or Carter in 2002. What is with the love affair with American Democrats? I'm sure Bill Clinton isn't taking this well. And he's the one who, above the others, might actually deserve it.

Whatever. I'm going home.