Category: Daft Musings

Last week, early in the morning, we heard a horrible screeching noise as our garbage was being picked up. I worried that it was our regular garbage cart, which was full of construction debris from our downstairs bathroom floor, coming apart under its weight. As it turned out, it was merely the sound of one…

When I was just starting to work as a computer journalist, one of the artists on staff offered me a simple job: he had an aquaintance who wanted some help with his new Macintosh computer. Naive as I was at the time, I turned it down on the premise that I couldn’t offer any information…

This morning, columnist Karen Heller mentioned Perfect Mom Syndrome: One year my daughter was in a class where each and every mother looked like a supermodel, even first thing in the morning, except they were all doctors and lawyers who ran 10Ks, sat on charitable boards, and staffed every school committee while turning out exquisite…

Every year, on the first Saturday in May, our neighborhood association sponsors an area-wide garage sale by placing an ad for it in all local publications and distributing flyers about it to all homes. All a household has to do is collect saleable items and bring them outside to sell. Last year, it was a…

Early last Sunday, the driver of a speeding tanker truck carrying gasoline lost control and crashed on the 580-to-80 ramp (that is, the connection between most of the East Bay going to and fron San Francisco and Berkeley). As a result, the gasoline ignited, creating a huge, intensely hot fireball which destroyed the overpass. Needless…

I’m finally catching up listening to Shelly’s Podcast. I know the broadcaster personally, and the best I can explain the show is that it’s about technology, the quest for great music and other fabulousities, and all things Austin. On one of these shows, she played this sound clip: not_enough-booze.mp3 It’s clearly not Shelly, so some…

One of my pet peeves is when people call me Carol. I don’t mind being addressed by any of the variants of  Carolyn, such as Caroline, Karolin, or Carolina, but Carol is a completely different name. Carol is the feminine version of the male name Carroll; Carolyn is the feminine of Charles, which is my…

I just finished reading Peter Hitchens’ “The Abolition of Britain,” and I’m cherrypicking articles to read from the May/June 2007 issue of Mother Jones, and the May 2007 issue of Reason. By many accounts, I should be shredding at least one of them with impassioned rage, but the fact is, I found all of them worth reading, and I can recommend them to anyone who agrees with their opinions, and maybe in particular to those who don’t.

I’m feeling really unpopular these days, because it seems none of Neil’s friends are ever able to visit him for fun and play at his home, and they’re not inviting him over to play with them either. It’s enough to make me wonder about personal hygiene and personality flaws, but I know deep down the…

Early Monday morning, someone broke into Peter’s office building. The intruder damaged some door handles apparently trying to get into various suites, but Peter, who was there, working start-up hours, didn’t hear anything. However, to his dismay, the GPS device was stolen from his unlocked car, and replacing it cost over $200. It was a…