sickness is a good excuse to drag out old videotapes and watch a TV show.
ah, twin peaks. how very odd you are.i am a good little home remedier:
- i have taken my vitamin C. lots of it.
- it took me literally weeks to resort to cough drops (although now i can’t get enough of them, as the five minutes of relief (at the cost of a completely numb mouth, which i hate) is far better than five minutes more of sore throat hell)
- this morning i gargled with warm salt water (YUMMY!) and drank apple-cider vinegar in warm water (EVEN MORE YUMMY!). these are alleged to help, and indeed, each did seem to help, for about thirty seconds.
- my tea kettle is on, and the mint tea is standing by for hot water infusion. IME, mint tea loaded with ridiculous amounts of honey (about 1/4 c. per pot of tea) actually does work pretty well at least for soothing a sore throat, if not fixing the problem. (that’s what the delicious saltwater and vinegar cocktails are for!).
for the first time in a while, today i seem to actually possess other symptoms of a cold — mildly stuffy nose, mainly. (does crankiness count?) i don’t think it’s a viral thing or strep. but i’m just FREAKING SICK of this sore throat! seriously, it’s been like three or four weeks at this point. it needs to die, die, die. die die!! die sore throat die!
… aaaaaaand, i should have kept my mouth shut, as the symptoms seem to be multiplying. i’ve had two coughing fits (OW) and annoying sneezing issues. i think my cats are laughing at me behind my back. the worst part is that there was a show tonight i wanted to go to, a band i really like (and have really liked for about 14 years now, but have never gotten to see live) is playing up at martyr’s. but if i’m sick i can’t go. BOOOOOOO.Next on Lifetime: One woman’s story of being separated from her most beloved A records: Don’t Touch My Domain!
motherfucking incompetent sacks of shit!
the situation: ziggurat.org claimed to have been expired (false!), and its registrar helpfully redirected it to their crappy “this domain has expired!” pseudo-helpful search portal thingy. i paid up the extortion^Wrenewal fee, figuring i’d get ziggurat back up and then figure out the billing wonkiness. i am such an optimist.or Why I’m so Glad We Have Java Customer Service Chat Applets so We Don’t Have to Use those Awful Telephones where People Actually at Least Tell You before They Put You on Hold. (also known as “Sabrina Was So Pissed Off She Actually Typed Using Capital Letters.”) You are connected to ! Please Wait!
Mike: Hi, my name is Mike. How may I help you?
sabrina: Yes. I am trying to update my nameservers and it will not update them or give me a reason why. It just says it was unable to change or that the nameservers were invalid (they are not)
sabrina: This is for the domain name ziggurat.org.
sabrina: I am trying to give it ns1.mydyndns.org through ns5.mydyndns.org.
…crickets chirping… a tumbleweed blows across my keyboard…
sabrina: Hello?
i find time to bitch about this shit in IRC…
Mike: sorry about that
Mike: i was reviewing your information
Mike: ok all fixed
Mike: if you try it again it will work
THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR PUTTING THROUGH THE CHANGES FOR ME, THE CUSTOMER THAT YOUR COMPANY HAVE INCONVENIENCED THROUGH INCOMPETENCE. oh, no, wait, that’s not what happened, is it?
sabrina: What was the problem?
I am going to eat your firstborn.
Mike: you need to have the domain locking tool in order for changes to be made
Mike: i have added it and it will work now
sabrina: What’s a domain locking tool?
Mike: it is called transfer lock
Mike: so no one can steal your domain or transfer it to a different register without your apporval
OH THE IRONY.
sabrina: Ok, I just tried again and it failed again. Same error message.
sabrina: Says the code is (long string of gibberish).
Mike: do you have the session id?
Mike: ok one second
Mike: strange it worked
YES! VERY STRANGE! STRANGE THINGS ARE HAPPENING EVERYWHERE TODAY, IT SEEMS!
Mike: if you login you will see the change
Mike: and your domain will point to those servers in 24-48 hours
…wherein sabrina begins to lose her shit:
sabrina: …24-48 hours?
sabrina: You’ve got to be kidding me.
…my officemate decided to retire from the office at this point. I may have verbalized some opinions.
Mike: thats how long it takes for dns to update
Incomptent Registrar Tech Support Rule #87: if you use the scary acronym the customer will weep in submissive fear of your clear technical superiority and go away!
sabrina: I don’t mean having cached entries filter out of other people’s DNS servers, that I can’t help — but how long until *your* whois servers refresh the root nameservers so that new enquiries work?
Mike: its the same amount of time
“whats a root nameserver?”
Mike: out system does a dns update every twelve hour
Mike: so it could be at the end of today
sabrina: OK.
“I cannot trust myself to use more than two syllables, and the two I’m going to use aren’t ‘Good work.'”
sabrina: BTW, in future you may want to say something like “hang on, I’m looking up your information” instead of just idling. I was worried this java thing was broken.
Mike: i apologize for that but you gave alot of information, so i had to look it up
Yeah, you’re absolutely right. I should have waited until you asked me which domain name I was talking about and what I was trying to set my nameservers to, because that would have been SOMEHOW DIFFERENT.
sabrina: Right, I’m just saying that saying “hang on a sec” would have helped me out while you were looking that up.
“Yeah, this is all going on my blog. EVEN THOUGH IT DOESN’T MOTHERFUCKING WORK.”
Mike: ok
Mike: was there anything else?
sabrina: No, that’s it for now, thanks.
Mike: no problem
Mike: bye
Mike Has Disconnected
Ciao.
for a while, i’ve been kinda broke. i haven’t been able to keep to the strict regimen of PAC and campaign donations i used to be able to support, back in the good old days before i owned a car and a house. it’s been frustrating, actually. i mean, i don’t miss the endless, endless piles of junk snail mail (how could i, when i still get enough to choke a small pony?), but i did think that it was worthwhile to support the causes to which i sent money, and i wish i could still support them.
foremost, of course, are actual politicians. i like NARAL and all, but i know that they’re going to be continuing to fight without me reminding them what i want them to fight for. whereas, with my representatives in the federal and state government, y’know, they can forget and get caught up in things, until i have to be all, “hey! hey, down here! yeah, me! i want you to vote YEA on that! we totally talked about this last week!” and of course they’re happy to send me letters back in response to the letters i send them (which is nice; it’s good to be acknowledged, at least by whatever poor sad sack of an intern gets stuck opening constituent letters), but as the saying goes, “money talks.” i’ve figured out a way to resolve the “i’m broke” / “i want to donate cash so that government will do what i want it to do” crisis. i am going to go home tonight and eat spaghetti for dinner. and then i’m going to wash out the jar and cut a hole in the lid and it’ll become my official DNC Tip Jar. every time someone does something i like, i tip something into the jar. every time someone does something that makes me want to shake them like a british nanny, i take something out of the jar. at the end of the year, i’ll cash out the sauce jar and send them a check for what they earned. (i’m going to have to take notes, so i can send them a full accounting, as well. that’s going to be the tough part. i hate taking notes.) i think i’m going to have to establish some basic guidelines for tipping. some things will clearly earn higher rewards than others. there will be discretionary additions and extractions as well, of course — i’m sure i cannot begin to imagine dumbassery as yet uncommitted. there’s always more dumbassery than i can imagine. (and i’m afraid to even speculate about an example of rampant dumbassery, for fear the democratic leadership will take that as a challenge to surpass.)| Action | Reaction | |
|---|---|---|
| • Refusing to confirm a Supreme Court judicial nominee who says he’ll overturn Roe v. Wade despite the fact that a majority of Americans don’t want it overturned | … | +$8.00 |
| • (Really) funding Amtrak, and not just in the damned northeastern corridor | … | +$2.00 |
| • Increasing budgets for Head Start programs, public teachers’ salaries, public mass transit systems, alternative energy sources for automobiles, rail shipping, arts and music programs in public schools, or anti-drunk driving education programs | … | +$2.00 |
| • Legitimizing intelligent design pseudoscience | … | -$3.00 |
| • Wigging out over wardrobe malfunctions on national television, as though the sight of a naked female breast will destroy democracy. | … | -$1.50 |
| • Giving up on a fight like a wimpy unwanted stepchild, “for the good of the nation.” (Because, God knows Americans hate arguing with people.) | … | -$5.00 |
| • Actually investigating the Valerie Plame leak, and prosecuting where appropriate | … | +$3.00 |
| • Increasing support for gay marriage | … | +$4.00 |
| • Not behaving like jackasses over gun legislation (in either direction) | … | +$1.00 |
| • Actually, just sort of average everyday not behaving like jackasses | … | +$1.00 |
| • Acting like a jackass | … | -$2.00 |
| • Anything that makes me comment to someone, “wow, it’s almost like the Dems are growing a pair, after all.” | … | +$1.00 |
well is it such a sin to linger with the magazines?
i want a chocolate bar made with something sweet.
i want a stranger with your face,
so i followed her to this place.
it’s been so long, i’ve been around the world.
’cause the canals in camden are filled with bottles tonight.
to watch the ripples fade away,
to feel the rain upon my head,
so i could say, i’ve been around the world. and how i wish i was in your apartment tonight
to hear the rain come down, down upon your roof,
to see your clothes beside, clothes beside your bed,
to lightly listen to your breath;
instead i’ve been, i’ve been around the world. and how i wish i was in your bed tonight
to taste the salt upon, the salt upon your neck,
to feel your body press, pressing down on me;
instead of being, i’ve been around the world. yeah, i’ve been around, i’ve been around the world.
