Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac

So apparently Fannie Mae is a creative pronunciation of FNMA, which stands for Federal National Mortgage Association.

And Freddie Mac is a creative pronunciation of FHLMC, which stands for Federal Home Loan Mortgage Association.

Note to news media: you have to tell us this! After hearing a news item on the radio this morning, I was walking around all day thinking Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were the actual names of the things, and I was all "OMG, the Americans give their mortgage lenders hillbilly names!"

Dear Nyquil: WTF?

This box of Nyquil contained two blister packs. On the left of this photo you see the blister packs, on the right you see the now-empty box. This is the entire contents. I haven't taken any pills out yet. So what's up with the blank space at the centre of the top row of each blister pack? Why not put two more pills in each space? If it's OMG too much medication someone might OD or make drugs, why not put four doses in a blister pack instead and package the whole thing smaller? What is the purpose of this random blank space?

Patriarchy leads to bad sex

From Antonia Zerbisias:

Meanwhile, south of the border, the more progressive pundits blame the misogyny inherent in so many societies in Asia and the Middle East, where, according to the United Nations, some 5,000 women every year are executed by their fathers, brothers or other male relatives, supposedly to preserve the family's good name.

If it were funny, it would be ironic.

I mean, how do you restore your reputation if you go around strangling your daughters and sisters?

It's confounding how this works.

Conceivably, men in these societies are guilty of all kinds of crimes against their religion and their states, whether we're talking gambling or drinking, burglary or murder, and yet their families don't seem to feel the need to stab them or stone them to death.

Unless they're gay, of course.

So it seems like their real problem is with people sticking penises in their family members. At its most Freudian root, there are people with penises who think that having a penis stuck in you is the worst of all possible disses.

Now there are lots of places people who know stuff about psychology and sociology and gender theory could go with this idea, but I have no training in these areas and I'm currently doped up on cold medication, so I'm going to take the easy path:

Sex must really suck for people with this attitude.

Just think about it first hand for a second. Quietly and to yourself, think about the sex act that gives you the most direct physical pleasure. Now imagine if you thought this was inherently demeaning to your partner. Not just in a little-games-people-play-behind-closed-doors sort of way, but in a big serious permanent way that affects their entire worth as a person forever and ever.

That takes huge amounts of fun out of sex! Yeah, you still get the physical sensation of friction applied to the genitals, and it's not incompatible with certain kinks, but that's about it really. To take just one example, you know the feeling when your partner does some absolutely brilliant and ingenious feat of intelligence and creativity, and you just have to jump them? These people would never have that feeling! Must be a sad life, for all you get out of sex to be friction against the genitals.

Best (or worst) unlikely cover ever

I thought I was good at coming up with unlikely cross-genre covers. (Latest idea: opera cover of Piece of my Heart). But Jaymz Bee's got me beat. Video quality sucks, but it gets the idea across.

OMG PUPPY of the moment

Arf!

Things They Should Invent: driving schools for people who don't have a car to practise in

A while back, they found that driving school grads have more accidents than people who didn't go to driving school.

It occurs to me that this might be because all driving schools are based on the idea that the student is a teenager who can practise in their parents' car. (If you know of a driving school in Toronto that isn't based on this model, please let me know in the comments. I might need it someday.) A lot of people are, especially in more exurban areas, but not everyone falls into this category.

People who do have a car and an adult driver to practice with may go to driving school, or may just practise a lot and then take the test. But people who don't have an opportunity to practise will have to go to driving school to get even a little bit of practice in. Therefore, 100% of people who can't practise independently go to driving school, while less than 100% of people who can practise independently go to driving school.

What we need is a driving school program that does not assume students will have a chance to practise. They pick you up after school and work and take you driving every day for (1 month? 2 months? whatever's an appropriate amount of time) before your exam so you get enough practice time in with your driving instructor.

Things They Should Invent: hazardous waste pick-up day (in Toronto at least)

Hazardous waste (paint, batteries, etc.) you're supposed to drop of at depots for proper dispoal. Now electronics like computers and TVs you're also supposed to drop off at depots for proper disposal.

This is fine for car people, but unworkable (or at the very least a huge fucking inconvenience) for people who don't have a car. For environmental and congestion-control purposes, Toronto's supposed to be encouraging people to live carfree. Therefore, once or twice a year, the garbage collectors should pick up absolutely anything and see that it's disposed of properly. Don't put people who are living the socially-optimal carfree lifestyle in the position of being unable to properly dispose of all their household waste.

Why are all the BC feet wearing running shoes?

In yesterday's Star, there were pictures of all the shoes from the severed feet found on the coast of BC. (I can't find an online link to the pictures, but it's on page A20 of the July 11 Toronto Star.)

They're all wearing running shoes.

Why are they all wearing running shoes? And all proper athletic shoes, no chucks or skater shoes or anything.

You'd think, given the normal range of human behaviour, there'd be some sandals or some hiking boots in the mix.

This seems like a clue.

Is there sign language for "I've lost my voice"?

I have a really sore throat and it hurts to talk (and to whisper), so I was trying to get my errands done with as little talking as possible. It occurred to me that everyone in the world should learn the sign language for "Sorry, I've lost my voice." That would make things a lot easier.

Then I started wondering whether there IS sign language for such a thing. After all, people whose first language is Sign would never have to express that concept.

But it's really just a colourless green idea, isn't it? We can use English to express such concepts as "My telepathy isn't working very well today" or "I seem to be having technical difficulties with my time machine." So Sign should be able to express "I've lost my voice."

Things They Should Invent: sickness meter

This afternoon I hit that place where you feel like you're coming down with something but you're not quite sure what's going to happen. Either it will go away with a good sleep, or I'll have to take a day off tomorrow. I can't tell which.

It would have been convenient if I'd been able to tell work this afternoon that I'll need to take tomorrow off so they could be prepared. But at this point I have no idea (and don't want to tell them I'll be off then wake up fine and use up one of my precious sick days for nothing).

I want to be able to pee on a stick or prick my finger into a test strip or something and have it tell me how sick I am. I don't need a diagnosis of what I'm sick with, just enough to know whether I should stay home from work. The thingy could count your white blood cells or the germs in your blood or whatever and give you a number, then the number would be on a chart corresponding with instructions like "Take tomorrow off" or "Get 12 hours' sleep" or "Make a doctor's appointment now because you'll feel like crap by tomorrow."

Things They Should Invent: mystery novels with the chapters out of order

The problem with mystery novels is you can basically tell what's going to happen based on how far along in the book you are. You're only a quarter of the way in and the detective has a promising lead? Red herring. There are 30 pages left? The bad guy's going to get caught momentarily. It takes some of the fun out of it.

So what they should do is put the chapters out of order. You start on page 1 and Chapter 1 is right there. Then when you hit the end of Chapter 1, it says "Turn to page 132" and Chapter 2 is on page 132. Then at the end of Chapter 2 it says "Turn to page 47" and Chapter 3 is on page 47. And you keep jumping around the book until you lose track of how many pages you've read and how far along you are. Then when you get to the end of the story, you don't know that it's the end of the story so the surprise is better.

An incredibly stupid thing I can't stop laughing at

I just keep hitting refresh, I can't stop!

You're doing it wrong!

You know you're a langling when

A beauty product I bought came with an instruction leaflet in about eight languages. Of course, I looked through it looking at all the languages, but I couldn't identify them all offhand. So I got all pissed off at the thing for not indicating what the languages are.

Then I realized, normals don't need to know what all the languages are. The typical user doesn't need to know what all the languages are. They'd just locate the language they can read most easily and read that.

Things They Should Invent: everything sucks

I was googling for reviews and feedback about a business I'm thinking about patronizing. (The word patronizing sounds wrong there, but it means what I mean too and I can't think of a synonym.) I found a lot of positive feedback and no negative feedback. But the problem with googling is confirmation bias. So in an attempt to find negative feedback, I started googling things like "$BusinessName sucks!" and "Don't go to $BusinessName" and "$BusinessName is terrible", but there was nothing with quotation marks and the results were inconclusive without quotation marks.

Until we figure out a reliable method of googling without confirmation bias (which I desperately want to do myself and write the definitive paper on it, but that's not gonna happen) we need to solve this problem on the other end, as bloggers and reviewers.

So whenever you're reviewing something negatively, write "$Subject sucks" somewhere in your review. If it's partly negative and partly positive, write "$Subject sucks somewhat, but not entirely". Please do continue making the actual content of the review calm, rational, specific and informative - not just a rant about how much it sucks - but get the "$Subject sucks" string in there somewhere for easy googleability.

What if submetering is actually worse for the environment?

Conventional wisdom is that submetering in multi-unit residential buildings is better for the environment, because residents have an incentive to save energy when they have to pay their own utilities. The problem, of course, is that there are many factors residents (especially tenants) don't have control over. You can't upgrade your insulation, if you're renting you can't get more efficient appliances, you have no control over the nature of the HVAC system. I even know someone who had to pay utilities even though she didn't have a thermostat in her apartment. It got too hot in the winter so she had to open a window because she couldn't turn down the heat, but she still had to pay for all that extra heat. So I've always thought that apartments should have to pass an energy audit before they can be submetered.

But just now I was reading an article about green upgrades that they can make to whole buildings. This makes me wonder if maybe it would be better for the environment to require the landlord to pay utilities instead of the individual tenants. If the landlord has to pay the utilities, they're more motivated to upgrade major things like insulation and plumbing and HVAC - things that individual residents could never do themselves. They might also be motivated to install more cool European things that let you save energy without any effort whatsoever. I don't have numbers, but just by logic and gut instinct it seems like a lot more energy could be saved by landlord initiatives than by any measures tenants could take in their own little units.

A workable alternative to Revlon Quicksand nailpolish

For everyone who's getting here by googling for Revlong Quicksand nailpolish:

I find that Sally Hansen Hard as Nails Xtreme Wear in Vanilla Bean is a workable alternative. It's just a skinch sheerer than Revlon Quicksand, but two coats does give sufficient coverage (unlike most polishes that colour that are so sheer as to be useless). Plus it's one of the most durable polishes I've ever worn, and you can't beat the price.

New marching orders for the pro-life movement

Top Secret Memo

To: All Pro-Life Activists
From: Headquarters
Subject: New Marching Orders
Security: Top Secret, Decoy Mode Only

In light of recent findings, we are now implementing an all new, far more insidious and far more effective strategy. You are hereby ordered to suspend all current operations. Repeat, suspend all current operations effective immediately. Henceforth, only the new strategy is to be used.

Our intelligence agents have successfully infiltrated the enemy and found some shocking but extremely useful information. It seems the enemy has convinced the world that certain earthly troubles outweigh the sheer joy and beauty that is the miracle of life. While this is a distressing development, it also provides the perfect opportunity to bring down the enemy for once and for all, when they will least expect it. Therefore, your mission is to infiltrate and befriend the enemy, win their trust, and identify every one of these problems that they use as an excuse to end lives. Then you will drop into stealth mode, and secretly, behind the scenes, permanently resolve these problems - not just for your subject, but for everyone in the world. Essentially, you will be working covertly to call the enemy's bluff.

For example, some enemy operatives use the fact that a child will have to live with certain medical conditions, or would inherit certain medical conditions from the mother, as an excuse to terminate it. In this case, your mission is to get all these medical conditions permanently and globally cured, so the enemy no longer has that excuse. Other enemy operatives use the fact that the parents simply do not want any children as an excuse to kill any children they do conceive. You can stop them in their tracks by facilitating access to surgical sterilization on demand, so they will never be able to conceive any children to kill. Another common excuse is that the child was conceived through rape or incest. In response to this, you will put an end to rape and incest everywhere in the world. Enemy operatives have also been known to use the fact that they cannot afford to care for and feed their children as an excuse for their bloodlust. Your mission is therefore to manipulate labour policy and social safety nets around the world so that everyone will be able to feed, house, clothe, and educate as many children as they can possibly gestate.

In short, identify every one of the enemy's excuses and eliminate those excuse from existence. Then the enemy will have nowhere to hide.

Be warned, as soon as the enemy gets wind of our new strategy, they will likely try to convince you that it has been superseded. Our intelligence suggests that their modus operandi will be to infiltrate some of our overt channels and issue orders that are more in line with our previous methods. Any such orders are null and void. Repeat, any such orders are null and void. These orders can only be voided through decoy channels. You can find the active decoy location at any time by following the same procedure you used to find this one. Any countermanding orders received through overt channels are to be considered enemy propaganda and handled accordingly.

Headquarters is aware that these are demanding and difficult orders and may in some cases go against your every instinct, but we have every confidence in you, our operatives. Never forget, because of your tireless efforts, there are over six billion souls alive on the planet today. The enemy has no defence against this new strategy, so with your hard-earned skills and expertise, we can crush them for once and for all!

Good luck and godspeed.

Puppy puppy puppy!

Puppy!

Proof that I'm old

So according to Stuff White People Like (that impeccable arbiter of my demographic's taste), bangs are cool.

For white people, the haircut-with-bangs is an important symbol that a female has completed her transformation from a nerdy girl to a cool woman. In fact, if you went to high school with a nerdy white girl who moved to a big city, there is a good chance she will show up to your high school reunion with this haircut.

It was just the opposite for me. When I was the nerdy girl in high school, I had bangs. As part of becoming attractive, I grew them out. (Yes, I'm still nerdy, but I'm sufficiently hotter than I was in high school that this cliche should apply.)

So a complete trend reversal has occurred in the fashion-aware portion of my lifetime. That must mean I'm old.