22 Words

Exercises in getting to the point (or avoiding it) by saying what I have to say in twenty-two words, not counting titles.

Archive for Miscellanea

A sure sign that you need a new website.

iPowerWeb, if you receive enough complaints about your website that the top feature for logged-in customers assumes they’re frustrated, why not redesign?

5 ways to be boring on Facebook

1. Accept every friend request.
2. Leave profile and status blank.
3. Disable wall.
4. Block applications.
5. But don’t quit—then you’d just be plain boring.

What every boss should keep in mind. (And I know this because mine already does.)

You simply can’t pay committed employees commensurately.

So treat them like they’re doing you a favor, not like they owe you something.

How important is college?

College shouldn’t be considered a take-it-or-leave-it decision. Nowadays, deciding against college is like deciding to not graduate from high school.

Your thoughts?

Someone found my blog by Googling “can i kill a squirrel if in my house?”

My post on squirrel trapping didn’t address the propriety of exterminating domiciliary vermin.

So to that desperate Googler, I say—Heavens, yes!

22 short but important statements everyone should say more often.

  1. I love you.
  2. Let me get that for you.
  3. I don’t know.
  4. Thank you.
  5. No problem.
  6. I see.
  7. Tell me more.
  8. I agree.
  9. Are you sure you want to do that?
  10. See you soon.
  11. Good job.
  12. I’m sorry.
  13. Hey, babe.
  14. Good to see you.
  15. Don’t jump.
  16. I’ll take care of it.
  17. Sure.
  18. My fault.
  19. Whatever you want.
  20. I have an idea.
  21. You’re right.
  22. I wonder.

The infuriating and idiotic results of believing email forwards.


(via Friendly Atheist)

Check the veracity of an email forward before you pass it on.

No. Wait. Stop.

Just delete it.

This isn’t the 90’s.

Earthquake! Breaking news from Louisville

I just leaped out of a shaking bed. No killer was in the room. I checked.

Apparently, I experienced my first earthquake.

6:02 AM Update: It was 5.4 on Richter scale.

6:12 AM Update: Epicenter was over a major fault line near West Salem, IL, 130 miles west of Louisville.

6:33 AM Update: The newsroom is perseverating about the “first reported damage,” some broken ornamental concrete in downtown Louisville.

6:40 AM Update: This is fun. I should be a meteorologist or something. But to get a job, I think I’d need to get better at mongering fear.

6:55 AM Update: Here’s the area that felt tremors as best as I can figure:

7:31 AM Update: OK, all good things must come to an end. I have to go do real work now.

My curmudgeonly resolve to not have a cell phone is being chipped away at.

I’d get a cell phone if no one expected me to check messages. Better yet, if no one called me on it.

Oh, that my being stupid could eventually work for my benefit! But, alas.

One’s intelligence can be so low that one is stupid, but one’s stupidity can never get high enough to make one intelligent.

-Edward Sapir, Quoted in Far from the Madding Gerund, 98

Fancy a footrace? I was working in the hotel lobby to escape the cartoons in the lounge.

The blustery manager almost came unhinged when an off-kilter homeless fellow kept telling him, “Betcha $500 I’d beat ya round the block.”

I imagine many realities are beyond imagination.

My inability to imagine that something unlikely is real is not reason enough for me to believe that it’s actually not real.

The Very Best Pipe Tobacco

Super Value Black Cavendish: Wonderful for a summer evening’s lunt.

Smooth, rich, cheap.

Some company I keep (if I need any defense):


I’m gonna say Post hoc ergo propter hoc 4 times fast.

Post hoc ergo propter hoc
Post hoc ergo propter hoc
Post hoc ergo propter hoc
Post hoc ergo propter hoc

Now you.

5 ways to motivate yourself to get out of bed early in the morning.

1. Go to bed earlier.
2. Make your alarm terrible music.
3. Plan something exciting for morning.
4. Pre-set coffee.
5. Drink several waters before bed.

More?

It’s coincidental, I’m sure, but controversy is good for a kick in the commercial pants.

If the dust-up surrounding Enns’s suspension from WTS motivated me to buy his book, his Amazon sales must be through the roof.

Mediocrity always fights back.

Seth Godin:

Without people pushing against your quest to do something worth talking about, it’s unlikely it would be worth the journey.

What atheist/agnostic/adamantly non-religious people do you admire most?

Friendly Atheist asks what Christians you admire. A commenter wonders if a Christian blog would ask a corresponding question. So I’m asking.