I don’t really trust anyone who has tattoos.

Even if a man says he is a feminist ally or feminist leaning, I don’t believe him 99% of the time.

If someone can’t operate a computer even after using one for 10+ years, I think they have the IQ of a cucumber.

Anyone who says dismissive things about sex workers I assume is a stone cold idiot in every other way.

If you don’t like catfish or sweet tea, I assume you’re broken.

If you have a baby (as a man or woman), I wonder what is wrong with you.

If you like experimental jazz, I wonder if you have any visits with an audiologist scheduled.

Any TV show that uses an IP address like 7.718.502.4, I stop watching right away.

If a show has mostly men in its cast, I assume it’s terrible and don’t watch it.

I could honestly murder street harassers or rapists without feeling the least guilt about it* (not really unusual for me, but, like, even less guilt than normal).

If someone uses a bunch of text-y abbreviations and elisions, I assume they are either seven or a complete addlepate.

I believe therapy is totally useless per se, even for the people who claim it has helped them.

Most people I believe have kids just out of boredom, or obligation, or a combination of both. Maybe 5% of kids are actually wanted.

I at least partially believe that I must be a space alien.

*I have never murdered anyone. And I am not saying that doing so to those types of people is right or that I ever would do so, just that if I did so, here’s what I’d feel: nothing. I’d go grab a slice of pizza.

Anyone who thinks pre-Stevie Nicks Fleetwood Mac was better is a huge fucking dumbass.

Fleetwood Mac is by no means by favorite band or anything, but goddamn, they were absolutely terrible before Stevie Nicks. Their music sounded pretty much like refried dog vomit.

Nicks just commanded the stage when she was at her prime.

Can’t argue with that.

Also, why did Misty Day have to die in AHS: Coven? She was manic pixie hippie dream witch, dammit.

I couldn’t find a Southern Gospel cover of “Royals,” but I did find this which is really good:

They do really well since a cappella singing groups with no men usually have problems with the bottom end (no bass singers). And I also found this which is really quite creative:

Not a voice like Lorde, though, but who does? She has one of the most unusual and distinctive voices I’ve ever heard.

I just realized that Lorde’s “Royals” shares nearly all important features of gospel music.

Which makes sense, as gospel is very powerful music.

Dominant vocals, repetition, syncopation, harmony (in this case, Lorde harmonizing with herself), call and response – “Well never be Royals (Royals!)” – and strong rhythm. Yep, it’s all there.

I’d love to see a good Southern gospel group cover that song. I bet they’d kill it.

From my own life, I thought of another instance of what would be termed sexual harassment if it had been done by a man to a woman. I didn’t consider it such since I didn’t feel threatened by this woman and I had much more power in the company than she did.

This was someone I had been casually interested in at work, and we’d gone out a few times. She wasn’t in my department or anything, but after a little while I’d realized she was radically dumb and I didn’t really want anything to do with her anymore.

I kept subtly trying to let her down but she wasn’t getting the message.

And then weird things started happening like I’d go to lunch and when I’d came back I’d find her jacket hanging on my desk chair.

“Mike, I think she’s claimed you,” the woman who sat behind me said.

Or co-workers would tell me that she’d just sit at my desk while I wasn’t there.

“Well, what does she do?” I’d say. “Try to get into my computer?”

“No, no,” they’d reply. “She just sits there.”

Or she’d show up at my desk while I was there and say things that would embarrass normals. I am incapable of embarrassment, so it didn’t have the intended effect on me, but she tried hard.

One day she came by my desk to visit me while all of my co-workers were there and said something pretty loudly following a relatively normal conversation like, “This guy I sit next to asked me to suck him off, but I told him I’d rather suck you.”

“I’m not sure I’d stay hard for that,” I said, not missing a beat.

The few co-workers I could see were nearly vermilion at this point from attempting not to laugh.

The woman turned around and walked away and that pretty much ended that, other than a few mooning emails she sent.

It was too bad because she was really pretty in an Emanuelle Chriqi sort of way, but when she opened her mouth to say anything she didn’t seem so pretty anymore.

Like I said, to me it was not sexual harassment because at that company I had a lot of influence (the head of her department used to by my boss, and he liked me a lot), and I could’ve easily gotten her fired if I’d wanted to do so.

Being selfish, one of the best things about most people restricting themselves to tablet and phones for their computing needs is that it will decrease workplace competition.

General purpose computers in the workplace with the standard mouse/keyboard/monitor arrangement aren’t going anywhere anytime soon, and soon enough (probably already is) there will be an entire generation of people basically unable to operate general purpose computers.

This will make them nearly unemployable.

It won’t matter as much for my field – though I think it will matter a bit – but for entry-level fields especially, being able to use a real computer with some skill will soon become a huge advantage and will separate you from your peers.

If you need any more confirmation that the New York Times is anything but a bunch of fascist-sympathizing scumbags for the most part, well here it is.

You know, that’s the same reason that some of my articles wouldn’t get published in military newspapers when I was in the army.

The NYT is just another (and very effective) propaganda arm of the corporations and the US government.

Good cover. I don’t even like the original song.

I’m definitely a geek and a nerd, but I don’t really identify much with geek culture at all.

Like most cultures, I never really fit into it even though technically it’s the one most like my proclivities.

I guess it’s because I’ve always had a healthy ego, and never subscribed to the “we’re so oppressed yet superior and we deserve hot women regardless” mantra that male geeks seem to spout. And anyway, I never believed that there were any women out of my league (to the extent I thought about it in that objectifying way at all), or anything that I couldn’t do if I wanted to – that whole “healthy ego” thing.

Basically, I never bought into anything anyone told me about myself. My self-esteem just can’t be beaten down by others. I’m not built that way, luckily.

I also didn’t feel like I deserved anyone’s attention or time, or that anyone owed me anything.

What the fuck is all these geek’s problem, anyway? I’m asocial as all hell, about the opposite of Mel Gibson in looks, and I’ve never had a problem meeting women.

Not being a dumbass entitled asshole goes a long way, strangely. And being interesting and doing interesting things with your life. Not because you want to “score” but because you want to.

If an ugly-ass introvert like me can spend half a lifetime being with amazing women, you people with way more advantages should be like hanging out with Jennifer Lawrence and shit every day.

But leading an interesting life is key. It’s fun, it makes you interesting, and if nothing else leads to some good stories.

Some of the crazy things that have happened to me I actually tone down (sometimes way down) in person as they are nearly unbelievable to the average cubicle dweller.

I usually don’t tone them down on the blog, though, so dear readers you are getting the real stuff here.

The moment I truly realized my life had completed changed from how I grew up wasn’t until I was probably 24 or 25 or so.

It was at work, and I’d agreed to sub in for a woman on a bowling league who wasn’t able to show up that night.

One of the other guys on the bowling league came by my desk and said, “Thanks for subbing in. I thought you were way too cool to hang out with people like us.” He didn’t say it condescendingly or sarcastically; just as a statement of fact.

Even though I absolutely knew he was talking to me, I actually did that thing people do in movies and looked behind me a little bit to make sure he actually wasn’t speaking to someone else.

That’s a long way from being called a “loser nerd faggot” in middle school, for sure.

I’m not surprised that most people who are attempting to “rescue” sex workers actually do more harm than good.

This includes 99% of Western feminists, too.

Ain’t hardly nobody talking about rescuing Wal-Mart workers, or waitresses, or short-order cooks, and believe me some of those people are just as exploited – and probably more so –  as the average sex worker (and they make a lot less money, too).

Mainly “rescuing” sex workers is about sex-phobia and delusion.

When you see ammo “cooking off*” in movies, it’s portrayed as hugely dangerous, like the bullets are firing as if they were in a gun.

But that’s not actually what happens**. The bullet needs something to “push against” to actually fire, and is greatly accelerated by the barrel of the weapon it’s fired from.

When ammo cooks off, it’s the casing that gains speed (think about why, it’s easy!) and is the part that’s dangerous, though usually not very dangerous as compared to a bullet fired from a gun.

Anyway, no matter that it’s not all that risky, you still shouldn’t throw ammo in a fire. While a .22 LR brass might not really hurt you, as the cartridge gets bigger so does the M x A of the casing.

*Cooking off generally refers to ammo that fires from being overheated, but here I am using it to refer to any “outside of the chamber” firing.

**Source: grew up a a redneck in rural N. Florida where I have seen ammo thrown in a fire, and was in the US Army for five years.

American Horror Story, despite being too campy for me at times, is much, much better than expected.

One of the best things about it is that its stellar cast includes at least 50% women as major characters in every season, and in Season 3, 90% of the cast is female.

It’s nice when a show surprises you like this one did to me.

And Season 2 is absolutely unhinged, in the best of ways.

Also, Lily Rabe rocks.

Stop Buying Load Balancers and Start Controlling Your Traffic Flow with Software.

I frickin’ hate hardware load balancers. Every time I’ve used them, they have caused problems. Will have to look into this; looks really useful.

Yes, this comment perfectly describes my level of obliviousness from the age of 13-25 or so. Something very near that happened to me, and of course I missed the signs.

I was staying over at the house of a girl I used to date, but we’d broken up very amicably about six months before. Her sister was single, very bright and absolutely gorgeous.

On that night as I was about to sleep, the sister came out to the couch where I was about to lie down and said to me, “You don’t have to sleep on the couch. You can sleep in my bed.”

I said, “Oh, no, the couch is fine. Why should you have to sleep on the couch? It’s your house.”

She replied, “Oh, no, I plan to be there, too.”

“Your bed is really small,” I said, completely fucking clueless. “I’ll be fine out here.” Her face looked strangely disappointed as she walked away.

About two weeks later, I nearly crashed my car when I realized she had wanted to sleep with me in the sense of not actually doing much sleeping, and probably thought I was rejecting her.

*facepalm*

In fact, this whole Reddit thread reminds me of myself.

I am almost certain that there are more subtle hints I’ve also missed in the past and never realized.

From talking to other guys over the years, I’d say about 20-40% of them will be nearly completely oblivious to almost all hints; we are just not socialized that way. It’s not on purpose, truly. Fucking trust me on that.