I Shall Be Leaving Now, Because I Am Brave And Strong

Talking to Carin about her All About Soul thing reminded me of another one of my own little kid song misinterpretations. I think the saying in general may have been the bigger problem, but the song definitely played into it since it was everywhere for a while when I was five or six and that’s where I heard it the most.

So if when the going gets tough the tough get going, that means the tough people…leave? Hmmmm. that doesn’t sound very tough to me. Maybe it’s smart, though. If things are going bad, why hang around? What if they get worse? I don’t want any part of that.

And so it was stored in the back of my mind for a while that if something is unpleasant or scary, it’s totally fine to run away. People might even think I’m tough if I do.

All About Soul-Searching

Steve and I were talking the other day…maybe some news story came on about how many couples didn’t make it in the pandemic or something, and I got thinking about a song I haven’t thought about in years. “All About Soul” by Billy Joel.

and suddenly, a memory came rushing back to me. I’m sitting in my room listening to the radio and the song comes on. And I’m frozen in place, listening. It gets to the lines about life not being fair, and things getting out of control, and how it’s gonna get dark, it’s gonna get cold, and all that stuff about getting tough, and I thought “What do you know about my future that I don’t? Why is it going to get all miserable? What’s all this joy coming out of sorrow stuff?”

Then I thought, “The woman in the song sounds like superwoman! So…I have to read minds and say nothing and be there no matter what…but somehow avoid turning into a total jerk when people are being jerks to me.”

For a second I thought about saying something to someone, asking what he’s getting at, but I decided I’d better just figure this out on my own.

I looked up when this song was made. It was in 1993. That makes me a really dumb 14-year-old, or a sheltered one, or something.

Video Of CKCO In 1986


I was hoping there would be more announcements for shows that the station was broadcasting at the time (especially the locally produced ones), but this 15 minutes worth of commercials and clips from Ontario Report A.K.A. the 11:30 news from CKCO circa 1986 is still kind of a neat watch for nostalgia’s sake.

One of the things that struck me watching it, even more so than the “hey, I remember that voice” or “hey, I remember that place” that you would expect, is that I was able, without difficulty, to determine what every commercial was for. God, I miss those days.

Ring. I’m Donald Trump, And I Approved This Message. Ring. Check Out Our New Value Meals. Ring…

I, and probably most of you, know next to nothing about Neil F. Sleevi. For his sake, this is a very good thing. Wherever he is now, I hope that he’s happy, healthy, and counting both his money and his lucky stars that this extremely shitty patent he was granted back in 1989 and subsequently sold the rights to never took off, thus preventing him from being one of the most hated motherfuckers on the planet. Nobody wanted advertisements between rings on their phone calls back then, and before anyone gets any ideas, we want them even less now. You have to be a bit of a sociopath to even dream up something like this, I think.

Method and apparatus for applying messages in a telecommunications network
Abstract
In a telecommunications network, a system for applying messages or data to the customer lines of calling parties during the “ringback” period of telephone call set up. The messages are preferably applied between successive ringback tones during the ringback period and are terminated when the called party answers the call. Advertising messages, civic or company announcements, political messages, informational messages(e.g. news or weather), or other data can be transmitted on the telephone lines during what is otherwise essentially unused times when the line is already tied up.

It’s Daddy Daughter Day Down At The Courthouse

Yup, this’ll totally work. Won’t look suspicious at all. Daddy’s got you covered.

According to the Washington County Sheriff’s Office, around 3:13 a.m. on Friday, Dec. 31, a deputy observed two vehicles traveling “unusually close together” on I-41 southbound near State Highway 33. The deputy noticed the lead driver was continuously swerving, driving half on and off the shoulder, and not maintaining consistent speeds. The following driver was traveling close behind the lead driver.
Authorities say the deputy pulled alongside the pair of vehicles, activated his emergency lights and turn signal to get behind the lead vehicle. The following driver reportedly failed to yield to the deputy and pulled even closer to the lead vehicle; the following driver would not allow the deputy to pull into the lane of traffic to make the traffic stop.
Eventually the lead driver stopped, but the following driver still would not allow the deputy behind the first vehicle, according to the sheriff’s office.

At some point the deputy was finally able to make his stop, whereupon he learned a couple of things.

  1. The “following driver” was the stepfather of the “lead driver”, and he was trying to make sure that she made it home safely.
  2. In this case, what making it home safely meant was doing what he could to prevent “lead driver” from getting arrested for drunk driving for a second time that day.

It didn’t work as well as picking her up and driving her home like a normal person would have, obviously. Of course, I say “obviously” under the assumption that he wasn’t also drunk. To me this sounds like a plan you would have to be drunk to come up with, but since the police didn’t immediately ding him for being in that state, he probably wasn’t.

Children Are Great When They Work

Tell me this isn’t every company meeting you’ve ever been stuck in. THE UX ON THIS SMALL CHILD IS TERRIBLE

Diagnostics and Troubleshooting
This Small Child has no clear sense of hierarchy in either the visual or navigational sense. When it comes to troubleshooting, it is nearly impossible to find the information you need quickly. For example, last night the Small Child stood emitting a high-pitched scream in her bedroom. I tried to quickly arrive at a solution in a natural, organic way. Is the Small Child in pain? Is the Small Child hungry? It took more than twenty earsplitting minutes to learn the Small Child was angry that Flappy the Elephant didn’t pick her up from school. I explained that Flappy is seven inches tall and has no central nervous system, but the Small Child was inconsolable. Future child iterations should include a focused effort on problem-free navigation with fewer operational and cognitive costs.

And That’s Why It’s Called A Memorial Candle

Three intensive care patients in Ukraine have been killed in a hospital fire sparked by a candle lit to remember a recent Covid-19 death.
Another four people are being treated for severe burns following the blaze in Kosiv, western Ukraine, on Tuesday.
According to officials, it began when a candle was lit by a member of staff near five oxygen concentrators – which instantly caught fire.

A member of staff, or to put it another way, the exact sort of person you would expect *not* to do that.

The Drunk Tank Was Cheaper, But Not Nearly As Roomy

I’m not sure I ever want to be this drunk. But staying in a hotel that could be mistaken for the Romanian presidential palace might be pretty ok.

Police said the Irish citizen jumped over a fence and escaped from the Defence and Protection Service after breaking a window to get into the palace.
The secure site is the second largest building in the world after the US Pentagon – and the bizarre breach has sparked a major security review.
The man managed to reach the third floor while drunkenly searching for his room before he was caught after fleeing.
After several hours sobering up he told cops he had been to a party in the city and mistook the palace for his hotel.
He didn’t remember exactly how he managed to break in.
An investigating source told The Irish Sun: “Palace of Parliament has protection systems developed by The Securitatae (the former secret police of Communist Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu).

“It is a mystery how this guy managed to get in.”