Trick or Treat!

"I am active."

Explanation: Like my Halloween costume? This year my status message is going as one of those ordinary status messages. Convincing, huh? Sure is! Now gimme candy! Candy candy candycandycandycandy...

Special Blog Bonus: It's a Garfield Halloween! (parts 1, 2, and 3) It's totally worth it just to hear Garfield say "candy candy candycandycandycandy..."

My Softest Post Ever!

It was certainly a great deal, but I have to question Target's motivation to sell bulk packages of toilet paper two days before Halloween.

Explanation: I did my part and reduced their inventory by 48 rolls, but they still had more, and I just know that the kids from my neighborhood are over there right now stocking up. I did not look to see if eggs or shaving cream were on sale.

Special Blog Bonus: Here's a comic of the day:


I woke up to "Hey Mickey" this morning, so I figured I'd share my pain with you.

You May Not Have Heard, But...

You may not have known this yet, but next weekend the Indianapolis Colts (7-0) and the New England Patriots (8-0) will play each other.

Explanation: At the end of LAST WEEK's games, all the talking heads could talk about was that there was the possibility of these two unbeaten teams playing each other. This weekend's games meant absolutely nothing, except that both teams managed to remain undefeated, setting up the most-hyped regular season football game ever. (Commentators seem to have suddenly forgotten the last most-hyped regular season football game, which is interesting, because it was probably last year, and at the time they wouldn't shut up about it) On the bright side, networks can now cram even more hype into their pregame studio shows, because they average about seven commentators per show. Also exciting is the chance to hear what Emmitt Smith has to say on the subject. Stay tuned to Monday Night Football tonight for more on the battle of the undefeated.*

Links of the day: Hans Rosling's TED presentation on global trends. While the content of his presentation is quite interesting, what floored me were his presentation materials. I have never seen data charted and presented this well before. You can further explore his work at Gapminder or play with the graphing tool yourself on Google. I am now subscribed to their "Gapcasts" through iTunes.

*Monday night's coverage of the Indianapolis-New England matchup may contain minimal footage of Green Bay playing Denver.

Quicksand Box

From the archives:

"When I was a kid, we had a quicksand box in the backyard. I was an only child... eventually."

Source: Steven Wright

Sam vs. the Sorbet, Part IV

From the archives:

In a close race, Sam figured out his dessert JUST before...

Explanation: The exciting conclusion of the Sorbet Saturday series! First, I should apologize for not finishing this series last week - I had to attend a family funeral last weekend and my mind was totally elsewhere.

Now, you're probably wondering where the rest of this status message went. I can paraphrase the conclusion by saying "JUST before we finished Service Work X" where Service Work X was a legendary work item our department had been working on for at least six years. In general, a piece of service work that has its first birthday draws management attention and must be dealt with ASAP. This item, which became service work once the development stream passed it by for the third or fourth release, was around three years old, I believe. It sure seemed that way. I would have specifically mentioned it here, but I have discovered that you can easily Google for it and I don't want to reveal too much about the inner workings of my company. Plus, any of you readers who work with me already can guess what I'm talking about.

Special Blog Bonus: Mike Stimpson's LEGO recreation of "Lunch Atop a Skyscraper" by Charles Ebbets:

Haiku You, B.C. Haiku You.

Tech's up ten-zero
Three minutes left, then we lose.
It is what it is.

Yeah, it's <bleep>ing haiku <bleep>ing Friday. (Can you tell I'm composing this on Thursday night after the football game?)

I wanted to highlight the phrase "it is what it is" and this seems like the perfect opportunity. This is a phrase people use in one of two ways:

1. "This <bleep>ing sucks, but there's absolutely nothing I can do about it."
2. "This <bleep>ing sucks, but there's absolutely nothing I will do about it."

To paraphrase, the first flavor means "we're screwed" and the second means "you're screwed." A very significant difference. In the workplace, it is important to take note of this distinction, because often management will use the second flavor, but pretend to be using the first.

As for my Hokies, trust me, I am using the first one. I am also using many other choice unbloggable words right now. I composed the following haiku shortly after my Hokies muffed a Boston College onside kick attempt, giving them the ball back with a chance to win the game:

<bleep> <bleep> mother <bleep>
How could you <bleep> <bleep> the <bleep>
You <bleep> <bleep>ing <bleep>

OK. For the rest of the weekend, I shall pretend that there's no such thing as college football. The following is a distraction if you plan on doing the same.

Link of the Day: Play Treasure of Cutlass Reef online.* Drown your college football sorrows by sinking and plundering pirate ships!

*Hat tip to "Jim" for this link.**

**I've seen "hat tips" in other blogs and always wanted to do it myself. Now I have! Thanks "Jim"!

My "Help"

System Up-time Alert: Your system has been running continuously for more than 48 hours. As soon as possible, please shut down, hibernate or suspend your system for at least 15 minutes. To maintain your workstation's performance and extend its life, you should shut your system down and restart it daily.

Explanation: At work, we are required to run a program called My Help. This application has numerous fabulous features:

• At the first sign of a problem, the application pops up a window with a warning. Of course, on my machine, I cannot see the window, I just see the My Help entry appear on the taskbar at the bottom of the screen. In order to actually see the entry, I have to right click on the My Help taskbar entry and then click "Move". I then have to touch the mouse to move the window, which causes my warning to magically appear. This took about 4-5 months to discover.
• My Help warns me about any and all connectivity problems. Generally, I will be working in a terminal (pretty much all I do) and will discover the terminal to be unresponsive. I will then check other terminals to see what kind of connection issue I'm facing. If I have become completely disconnected from the work network, I lose the ability to do anything until I reconnect again, which usually takes about ten minutes. About five minutes after I stop cursing, a My Help window appears to dutifully tell me that I may have lost connectivity. Thanks, My Help!
• Today's status message absolutely takes the cake. I must have received a My Help update recently that now includes this warning. Apparently, the Windows operating system will not function properly if running continuously for more than two days. TWO FREAKIN' DAYS??? This is a joke. An absolute joke. I think the stability of Windows is ridiculous, and even I don't usually encounter problems until I get up near 2 or 3 weeks of uptime. I recall how excited I was when I ran Linux on my desktop machine and my uptime would hit 100 days. Now I guess I have to adjust my standards to 100 hours, huh? My Help is essentially telling me that a daily reboot is a preventative measure. I can't believe somebody was paid to write this application.
• And finally, this is a new perversion that I've noticed all over the world of software. Somebody requires that you run some sort of management program with another program. For instance, My Help is required when you run the e-client at work. Or you download iTunes and you get the iTunes Update application with it. My printer/scanner software has a driver update feature. Even the evil Norton Internet Security comes with LiveUpdate. Have you noticed that the management applications need to be updated more often than the applications themselves? Nine times out of ten, when I download updates for my work machine, there is a My Help update in there. Meanwhile, I think the iTunes Update application solely exists to update itself. Same goes for LiveUpdate. Without the management application, our software would be dead in about a year. But WITH the applications, our internet connection is abused for a lifetime.

Special Blog Bonus: All this complaining is depressing. Here's a comic to add a little levity to your day:

Hello. My Name is Inigo Montoya.

"See? Didn't I tell you she'd never marry that rotten Humperdinck?"

"Yes, you're very smart. Shut up."

Source: This is from The Princess Bride. The grandson (Kevin Arnold) is totally shot down by his grandfather (Columbo) so he can continue telling the story. It's a total throwaway line, but I love it.

Want a better line? How about this one: "Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die."



He could have saved half of his dialogue with one of these:

You're So Vain

You're so vain, you probably think this status message is about you.

Source: This would be paraphrased from the Carly Simon song, You're So Vain. Simon has never said who the song is actually about, but several of her ex-boyfriends are suspected, including Warren Beatty and Mick Jagger. In fact, when the song was released, Warren Beatty called her and thanked her for writing a song about him. Personally, I don't care who the song was about. I'm just grateful that Simon and Jagger never married, because that would have led to a new breed of giant-mouthed horse people.

Sheer Brilliance

Say whatever you want about the rest of the show - naming a Basset Hound "Flash" was a stroke of brilliance.


Explanation: Few dogs look less built for speed than Basset Hounds, so when Rosco P. Coltrane named his dog "Flash", it was just brilliant. If only he could have used some of that brilliance in outwitting those pesky Duke boys, huh?

Here's a little something to get stuck in your head for the rest of the day:



Link of the day: Microsoft's Blaise Aguera y Arcas demonstrates what Microsoft is doing after their acquisition of Seadragon. This is the coolest technology I've seen since the iPhone.

Luckily It's Sunny Today

From the archives:

A day without sunshine is like, night.

Source: This was a bumper sticker I found online. I still think bumper stickers make great status messages.

A Vacation Recap

From the archives:

Let's see. There was a cabin, a lot of rain, some really annoying horseflies, a trip to the CIA, a little volleyball, a dog funeral, seventeen family dinners, a piece of a Danish musical instrument, a strongman competition, celery, fireworks, Liz was late, my toenail was ripped off, a parade, a pool, more dominoes than I could ever imagine, my Intranet password expired, and now I'm back at work.

Explanation: One tradition I've had over the years of posting status messages is hitting the highlights of some time off when I return to work. This was my status after a particularly eventful week and a half off, which included the Fourth of July and a camping trip. By the way, I'm still a little bitter about the toenail thing.

The Tree Joke

Ask me if I'm a tree.

Are you a tree?

No.

Explanation: This is another gem from my college roommate, Matt. You may not find this amusing. Honestly, I don't even think it's a joke. The full effect is totally lost without Matt laughing uncontrollably after saying "No." To this day, I have no idea why he thought it was so funny, but it was still hysterical to see him laugh at it.

Try to Catch Me Posting Nerdy!

M.C. Escher, that's my favorite M.C.

Source: This is a line from Weird Al Yankovic's song White and Nerdy, a parody of Chamillionaire's Ridin'. You may ask how a Weird Al song about being a nerd could possibly be any nerdier. Well, I'll tell you the answer in three simple words: "LEGO music video."



Here's the original for comparison, if you're interested:

Hurry! Before It's Too Late!

Why are you reading this? You should be helping Ellen Degeneres get Iggy the puppy back to those poor children!

Source: Apparently, there was a big to-do yesterday involving Ellen Degeneres sobbing on her show because she adopted a puppy at the shelter, could not keep the dog, and gave the dog to a family (with children! those poor children!) which, as it turned out, was against shelter rules, so the shelter reclaimed the dog, causing poor, poor Dori Ellen to sob uncontrollably in front of her live television audience. THIS warrants five minutes of every tabloid show on television between seven and eight o'clock. Why do I know this? Just don't ask.*



I do have to say, the funniest part of this was listening to Pat O'Brien talk like he was going to do something about it. Again, just don't ask.

But now, to save you a few valuable minutes between seven and eight tonight, Jeremy's Status Message presents Create Your Own Tabloid Lead Story! Simply read the script and whenever you encounter brackets, just choose one of the comma-seperated items within them to create the introduction to your very own lead story for an evening tabloid show!

Good evening and welcome to Entertainment [Tonight, Weekly, Daily, Extra, Magazine, !]. I'm your host [Mark McGrath, John Tesh, Pat O'Brien, James Brown, Joe Buck] joined as always by the [stunning, ravishing, pedestrian, plump, evil Lord] [Leeza Simmons, Pat O'Brien, John Madden, Sideshow Bob, Satan]. Coming up, red carpet fashion [snafus, blunders, no-nos, nightmares] from the [Emmys, Oscars, Golden Globes, People's Choice Awards, Video Music Awards, Tonys, ESPYs, Essences, Oprahs, Enyas], but first, our top story.

[Britney Spears, Britney, K-Fed's Ex, Brit] was swarmed by paparazzi today while [getting out of her car, getting into her car, near her car, by her car, in a public place] and Entertainment [Tonight, Weekly, Daily, Extra, Magazine, !] has the exclusive video! Here, Britney [decked out, clad, slumming, pimped out] in [sweats, a neon pink wig, oversized sunglasses, a not-very-flattering bikini] has some rude words for a photo-taker as she [gets into her car, gets out of her car, commits a felony, juggles her children wihle driving]. Settle down [Britney Spears, Britney, K-Fed's Ex, Brit]!!! Later last night, she had clearly gotten past the [incident, encounter, Britneygate], as she was seen entering [a hot night club, Starbucks, rehab] with [Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton and Lindsay Lohan, oversized sunglasses]. You can trust Entertainment [Tonight, Weekly, Daily, Extra, Magazine, !] to bring you more of this story as it breaks.

Random Observation: If you have exclusive footage of a celebrity interacting with paparazzi, doesn't that make YOU the paparazzi? Just wondering...

*This will be my only post about these tabloid shows, I promise.

Pet Peeve: Going Forward

My Pet Peeve:

People who add "going forward" onto the end of a perfectly good sentence.

Explanation: I have noticed this language phenomenon primarily with two types of people: athletic coaches and upper management. Somewhere along the way, it became acceptable (to them, anyway) to say a sentence and then follow it with "going forward" or "looking forward" or "moving forward" to indicate that they're looking toward the future:

• "We need to reduce costs if we want to increase market share going forward."
• "We must integrate our facilities for seamless deployment of our mission critical infrastructure looking forward."
• "Our defense needs to adapt to these offensive schemes if we want to get better going forward."
• "The tremendous upside potential of that draft pick is what this organization needs to succeed moving forward"

Apparently, in these lines of work, it's important to be perceived as someone who is focused on the future. A leader with "vision" is a leader people will follow. Otherwise, the only thing that leader can be evaluated on is their present performance, and lord knows that's miserable. Would you rather be seen as a visionary, or as the coach of a 1-7 team? Would you rather be seen as a brilliant strategic planner, or as the person who was in charge when the company stock tanked?

If the sentence suggests that an action be taken, it means that the action HAS NOT BEEN TAKEN YET, and hence will happen in the future. You don't need to say "going forward". Nobody says, "I wish I had played tennis in high school going backward." Nobody says, "The weather is absolutely beautiful today going absolutely nowhere."

Trust me, if we can get people to stop speaking like this, the world will be a good place going forward.

Safe For Another 365 Days

So, apparently, Norton Internet Security is designed to protect your computer by rendering it useless.

Explanation: I'm sorry, but I have to rant about this. I just have to.


A couple of days ago, my annual subscription to Norton Internet Security expired. Since then, I have received a daily nastygram saying "Your computer is no longer safe and may explode at any minute!" So, I decided to install a new copy. This actually isn't a big deal. Well, it shouldn't be. I have a brand new copy of Norton Internet Security 2007 lying around from tax time, when I got it on the cheap with a TurboTax rebate deal.

So, I took out my new CD and put it in my D: drive. The D: drive powers up, sounding like a jet preparing for takeoff, but never reads the disk. It never takes off, either. This kind of thing has happened before. After a few minutes (literally) of wrestling with it, I managed to get the CD out and get it into my E: drive. Problem solved.

I started up the installation program from the CD, typed in my product key, and the install was off and running. It suggested that I perform a scan before starting because some threats could cause installation problems. A full filesystem scan takes about 2-3 hours on my machine, so I was hoping that it was going to do something a little less thorough. I bit the bullet and told it to go on its merry way.

The scan window was unique in that it did not show any indication of progress. It was a yellow bar that emulated the red lights on the front of Knight Rider - back and forth, back and forth. In fact, the machine gave me absolutely zero indication that it was doing anything AND the hard disk was not making the usual thrashing sounds that accompany a full filesystem scan. No problem, I just let it go.

An hour later, I still had no indication that anything was happening, so I tried to stop the process. Did I mention that there was no "Cancel" button? I went to click the "X" in the corner of the window, but nothing happened. So, it was time to play the Control-Alt-Delete game and see if I could kill the task from Windows. That worked (although it took several tries and didn't go down without a fight) and allowed me to continue. So, I went ahead and reran the install program, only to be told that "Another instance of the installer is running. Please close it and try again." Lovely. The program apparently didn't die gracefully and left some sort of breadcrumb telling other instances of the installer to also piss me off.

Next I tried to uninstall the first version of the program through "Add/Remove Programs" only to discover that it saw the same breadcrumb as the CD. So, it was time for the almighty Windows cure-all: the reboot. After an efficient 15 minutes or so, I was still staring at a blue "Jeremy is logging off..." screen. It was time to use the power button. After about two solid hours of work, my computer was now off. Not that this had anything to do with my original task, but at least the powered-down computer was not vulnerable to any internet threats.

Being the glutton for punishment that I am, I turned the machine back on. After a normal boot, I managed to get the installer up and running - the reboot must have cleared away the breadcrumbs. I was up and on my way. This time I took the liberty of skipping the scan, and the installer was working its magic. Twenty minutes later, the installer asked me to reboot my machine to continue. I obliged.

When the machine came back up, nothing happened. I went to try running Norton Internet Security only to find that it WAS NOT ON THE MACHINE. The twenty minute install had uninstalled the old version and that's it. At this point, I'm thinking maybe I should have some Lindt chocolates to calm down. But noooo, I decide to re-run the installer. This time, after twenty minutes, it asks me to reboot, and I do. And this time, after the machine reboots, the program is successfully installed! Hooray!

...But wait. When the program was installed, it wanted to download updates. So, I sent it on its merry way, and five minutes later, I had all of my updates. Life was good. Oh, and after another reboot it also wanted to scan the filesystem. Great. Knowing I had to wait two hours for the million or so files to be scanned, I decided this would be an excellent time for a lunch break.

When I got back from lunch, I had regained my grip on sanity just in time to see that the scan was complete. "Life is gooooood," I thought. Now I just had to configure the settings the way I had them before, and the machine would be good to go. Except, I couldn't find a couple of features that I used to use, most noticeably the spam-blocking. I searched all over the internet, only to find out that it wasn't shipped with Norton Internet Security 2007. But, have no fear, they have an "Add-On" I can download to get those features! Oh joy! More installation! (At this point, I believe I was drowning in irony because my own company routinely ships advertised features of our code releases via service packages.)

So, I went onto the site to find the patch, and what did I discover? Norton Internet Security 2008 is available to me for free! Well, I avoided a similar offer before, late in my service subscription, knowing I'd be upgrading in a few weeks anyway. I really didn't have that excuse anymore, seeing as I had 366 days left to my new subscription (minus the half day I'd already spent trying to install the damn thing). So, instead of putting a patch on the 2007 version, I figured I'd just throw on the 2008 version. At this point, you as a reader are probably having the same reaction as the horror movie viewer has to the person who decides to investigate the strange noise in the haunted house instead of jetting for the front door: "You idiot! Why on earth are you going in there? WHY???" But, I digress.

I spent the five minutes it takes to download the installer, only to be told that I had other users logged on and that the installation would be aborted. After much profanity,* I logged off the other account, and to its credit, the installation continued without having to download the program again. Again I had to deal with an installer that used the "Knight Rider" style of status meter. Then, after it churned for about ten minutes, I saw a window had popped up indicating that it was "Gathering error information". Not good. That churned for five minutes and then asked me if would be OK to send that information to the good people at Symantec.**

I said "OK", knowing it would never be seen and pretending that it was instead an obscenity-laden email to the developers of this installer. The installation kept going (with absolutely no mention of the fact that an error had occurred) and asked me to reboot again. Hey, why not? I rebooted the machine and voila! Norton Internet Security 2008 is ready to roll!

My first screen said "Security Status At Risk" in large letters. There were a bunch of things like "Protection Updates," "Inbound Firewall," and "Advanced Firewall" that all had "At Risk" in alarmingly red text next to them. I also had several amber (and slightly less alarming) "Attention" items. Luckily for me, the window also contained a big "FIX NOW" button. With everything the installer put me through, it was nice to have a clear, intuitive user interface to make things right. I clicked the button and a window blinked up on the screen and then vanished. Nothing on the screen changed. I was pretty sure I could make out the Knight Rider status bar in that window, too. This is the best part: After clicking the window several times, I saw that it said: "Please wait while Norton fixes your problems." Are they firing their developers??? That might help.

Not one to be easily discouraged (if you couldn't tell already) I found the only thing in the window I could click - a tab which took me from "Home" to "Norton Internet Security". Under that tab, in alarmingly red bold text, it said, "Configuration is not complete." Luckily there was a large blue "Configure" button just waiting for me to click it. If my configuration was not complete, it seemed intuitive to me that configuring was the way to go, so I clicked it. It did nothing. ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. Not even one of those quick blinking windows. At this point, I had no idea what to do.

After hunting around the screen for anything, ANYTHING to click, I noticed that there was some clickable white text that said "Run Live Update". There was absolutely nothing about this text that would have drawn my attention to it other than the fact that I had run out of other things to click. So my download began.

Things went nice and smoothly after I clicked on the magic text. Here's a brief summary:

• Several minutes of downloading
• Rebooted
• Configured NIS 2008 to my liking
• Turns out with NIS 2008, I STILL need an "Add-on Pack"
• Attempted my own lobotomy
• Downloaded the Add-on Pack
• Installed it
• Rebooted
• Downloaded more updates
• Realized that I could have watched all three Lord of the Rings movies in the time it took to do this. Hell, I could have taken my own ring to Mount Doom.
• Rebooted
• Collapsed

So, I'm here to tell you that in nine easy hours and only eight reboots, you too can renew your subscription to Norton Internet Security. Now if you'll excuse me, there's a Windows security update that I need to take care of.

*I have a unique configuration in that my machine automatically logs in as one user (me), but Norton was installed under another user (Administrator). So, every time I rebooted, I would switch users (annoying), only to be yelled at later because other users were logged in (infuriating). I probably saw this message about ten times during the whole ordeal.

**Perhaps "good people" is a bit too polite. I try to keep these posts as clean as I can. Maybe I could get away with "rhymes with 'wig trucking snow gallant pass downs'"...

Dog License

From the archives:

After moving to Texas about 25 years ago, my grandfather bought a puppy. Nobody in his neighborhood knew anything about dog licenses, but he figured if he went to the municipal building where they issued everything (marriage licenses, fishing licenses, hunting licenses, etc.) he'd be able to pick one up. When he got there, he asked the receptionist where he could go to get a dog license. She looked appauled. "YOU'RE GOING TO HUNT DOGS???"

Source: This is a true story. Texas is a very, very different place than New Jersey.

Sorbet Saturday, Part 3

From the archives:

In many ways, the weather today is not unlike Sam's sorbet was: It's really cold, it's coated with ice, and it'll take Sam five times as long as it should to get through it.

Explanation: Yes, it's time for yet another dig at Sam's sorbet difficulties. This one came during the dead of winter, which it isn't right now, but I'm guessing it's more brisk today than it will be next Saturday, when I run the exciting conclusion of the Sorbet Saturday series!

Special Blog Bonus: Just for the heck of it, here's a comic, too:

A Quick Explanation

Continuing my new tradition of the occasional non-status post, I feel like I should provide a quick explanation of something, since I feel some people who don't know all parties involved may be a bit confused. I am very much involved and occasionally this confuses me.

Several years ago, while playing volleyball, I met another gentleman who also happened to be named Jeremy. It turns out he happens to work for the same company as I do. In fact, it turns out that he also happens to change his Sametime status message daily and has a group of consistent readers.

To make things easier for friends and associates, I refer to him as "Evil Jeremy." Unlike me, he has a goatee, which is as sure a sign of an evil twin as any in this world.* He, in turn, refers to me as "Evil Jeremy," because the evil version of myself would obviously see me as the evil version of himself. It all makes sense, somehow.

Anyway, just to confuse things even more, after reading my blog for a while, he decided to create a blog of his own daily status messages. He calls it a "Blag" actually, but evil twins do what they must, I guess. Anyway, here's my point...

We are different people. I make no claim to his blog or his ideas.** I have provided a link to his "Blag" in my Blogroll in the left column. Feel free to enjoy his ramblings, but please do not confuse him for me.


But why does he talk to himself in italics all the time?


I don't know. I just don't know.


*He also works in hardware - another sign of pure evil.
**Except his concept of a theme week, which I have quite blatantly stolen.

I'm Here Because I'm Bored!

Long week, tired wife.
I have a chance... Time it right...
"Pizza for dinner?"

It's Haiku Friday again!

Minesweeper movie:
"But what if we get an eight?"
"May God help us all."

Do You Know the Muffin Joke?

Two muffins are in an oven. The first muffin says, "Hot enough for ya?" The second muffin says, "AAAAAAUGH! A TALKING MUFFIN!!!"

Source: This gem comes courtesy of my college roommate, Matt. Matt has a bizarre sense of humor, but this was always one of my favorites.

Special Blog Bonus: Do you know the Muffin Man?



"Not the buttons! Not my gumdrop buttons!" I love that line.

Is There a Mrs. Mister?

Carry a laser down the road that I must travel.

Source: Kyrie, a 1985 hit by Mr. Mister.

Explanation: This song came on the radio the other day, and it occurred to me that in the 22 years since I first heard it, I have had absolutely no idea what the words were. So, I finally went an looked them up. Apparently, "Kyrie Eleison" is Greek for "Lord have mercy." For those of you who knew that, congrats. For those who didn't, now you know. There are actually no lasers involved:

Kyrie Eleison down the road that I must travel
Kyrie Eleison through the darkness of the night
Kyrie Eleison where I'm going will you follow
Kyrie Eleison on a highway in the light

Special Blog Bonus: You know who should have lasers, though? Sharks. Sharks with freakin' laser beams attached to their heads.

Find Carlos. Find My Weekend.

Cain is for Charlie and Delta is for Cain. Delta, Delta, Delta starts with D.

Source: The Bourne Identity by Robert Ludlum.

Explanation: Even though The Bourne Identity was written in 1980, apparently it's still very popular at my local library, thanks to the recent movies. I had never read any Robert Ludlum before, and thought I should give him a shot. Plus, I haven't seen any of the Bourne movies yet, so I like the idea of reading the book before the movie tampers with my imagination.

Anyway, I requested The Bourne Identity at my local library a couple of months ago. It finally became available, so I picked it up, but did not get a chance to read it for a little over a week. Then, before my long weekend, I tried to renew the book, only to find that there is a hold on it because someone else wants it. I couldn't renew, and it was due today.

As a result, I spent a very large portion of my long weekend reading the book. In fact, I spent most of my weekend reading the book. That's why it's on my mind.

Repeated throughout the book is the line "Cain is for Charlie and Delta is for Cain." Sadly, every time I read it, I could only think of one thing: Cookie Monster.

It's Not Awful for Me - I'm On Vacation Today

From the archives:

Monday is an awful way to spend 1/7th of your life.

Source: I'm not sure where this line came from, but it always seems appropriate on Mondays.

Explanation: The down side of having a zillion old status messages in the archives is finding an appropriate day for running them. I have "Monday" messages and "Friday" messages, which I can rerun on long weekends (like I am enjoying today). Then there are the tricky ones, "BAP day" which is always a workday and Tax day and stuff like that. I'll find times to run them, but I can't guarantee they'll be as well-timed as I'd like them to be.

Special Blog Bonus: Oh well. As I contemplate scheduling of future archived status messages, we honor the baseball postseason with the following comic:

The Early Bird Gets the Worm, But...

From the archives:

Wheel of Morality, turn, turn, turn. Tell us the lesson that we should learn. And today's lesson is...

"Early to rise, early to bed, makes a man healthy but socially dead."

Source: Animaniacs. Here's an overedited (you have to love these YouTubers) compilation of Wheel of Morality sketches from the show:

Sorbet Saturday, Part 2

From the archives:

sor·bet (sôr-BAY) n. A frozen dessert similar to a frappé, usually made from fruit juice and having a mushy consistency. [French, from Ottoman Turkish sher bet, meaning "Sam can't"]

Explanation: One dessert, four status messages! Of course, this is only part 2 in my series that mocked my coworker "Sam" for his inability to consume this complicated dessert in a timely fashion. For guidance on how to eat sorbet faster, I turned to YouTube, which offers the following clip from Emeril Live. I cannot imagine the brain freeze these gentleman got during this contest.

Am I In the Future?

Wondering why you can see the posts for Saturday through Monday? No, you aren't in the future! It's because we at Jeremy's Status Message are taking the long weekend off. We'll be back with the same content you've grown to detest love on Tuesday!

Happy Columbus Day everybody!*

*Native American readers are not required to enjoy this holiday.

Much Love to the (575)

I think the Phillies
would much rather be playing
against the Mets now.

Explanation: I have watched (parts of) my first baseball games of the year because the hometown Phillies finally made it into the postseason. Their reward? The red hot Colorado Rockies, who are now up 2-0 in the five game series. I was just thinking the Mets would have been a better team to play right now, given their epic end-of-season collapse. Unfortunately, they're playing golf right now. More importantly...

IT'S HAIKU FRIDAY!!!

Large trucks deliver,
But seven A.M. is too
Early for reverse.

"Tickle Me" Elmo -
Soon his fans will be adults.
Hail our red leader.

Hey you! Little Dog!
If you keep "wetting" our lawn,
We'll get Rottweilers.

Special Blog Bonus: More from Haiku Circus

An Excuse To Post That Scene From Swingers

If the NHL season started and nobody cared, would it still have started?

Explanation: To my shock, I discovered that the NHL season has started when watching Sportscenter this morning. Now, like most red-blooded Americans, I don't really care about hockey, but I was surprised to discover that the season had started. So, in it's honor, here's the "Make Little Wayne's head bleed" scene from Swingers. Please note that this clip contains language that is inappropriate for children under the age of... ummm... twenty. Luckily, children don't really find my blog entertaining.



Special Blog Bonus: More Vince Vaughn video game talk in The Breakup:

I Miss Dan Quayle

"It isn't pollution that's harming our environment, it's the impurities in our air and water that are doing it."

Source: Former U.S. Vice President Dan Quayle

Explanation: It's a little known fact that before Al Gore spearheaded global environmental activism, Dan Quayle released his book, An Inkonven Inconveen Enconv Not-So-Good Truth. In it, the former Vice President spoke of how global temperature change wasn't about atmospheric carbon dioxide levels, it was about the world getting warmer.

A Little 'Tussin Goes a Long Way

If I seem a little loopy today, it's the cough syrup.

Explanation: All of these bats flying around my office are making it very difficult to focus, and if you combine that with the fact that they're wearing little party hats and playing mariachi music, and that my monitor just melted again and I'm typing this with my mind, which is a good thing, since my fingers are playing 5-on-5 basketball on the floor right now, it leads to the start of a very interesting day, especially considering that the leaves are falling up and the sun is both rising and setting simultaneously and the Phillies are in the playoffs. The cough syrup bottle said not to operate heavy machinery, so I don't think I'm going to be able to stop the dog from driving that bulldozer down the hallway, which is unfortunate, because we don't have a dog and the hallway isn't big enough to accommodate both the dog and the ten giraffes standing there like bowling pins with those clocks melted over their backs while the Cirque do Soleil performers are chased from giraffe neck to giraffe neck by American Gladiators.

Special Blog Bonus: At least I didn't mix my cough syrup with a Guatamalan Insanity Pepper.



*Interesting note: I wrote "rising and setting simultaneously" before I looked for the Simpsons clip and realized they do a sun bit in there. So, either I think WAY too much like the Simpsons or I subconsciously remember more of their material than I think I do. Either way, it's kind of scary.

"I am active"

I wonder what all those "I am active" people do with all of their free time.

Explanation: Every day, I come up with a new and exciting status message and post to my blog. Meanwhile, there are people out there who don't do that. No blog. No creativity. Just the same boring "I am active" message every day. I just wonder what they do with all of the free time that gives them.

They probably have time to make videos like this: