Nervous For No Reason

making my first "demo" tape

How hard can it be?
I'm terribly excited and nervous about an interesting opportunity. I've been invited to produce a five-minute demo presentation to a web-based training outfit, LearnVisualStudio.NET. This demo is just to see if I have the right stuff to make other longer presentations on my topic of choice, using Oracle database server with Visual Studio. My impression at this point is that this modestly paying gig is mine to lose based on this demo.

I did a little practicing last night with the recording software, and I was quite humbled by how whiny my voice sounds, how scattered my rambling seems and the overall difficulty in doing something I'd feel absolutely comfortable doing in person in front of a hundred folks.

Ideally, I'm supposed to take the demo content in the same direction I'd like to go with my lengthier presentations. The problem with that is, I'm not clear on where I want the eventual content to go, and I don't have the time to plan it out before doing recording my demo today. So, I'm going to wing it as little as possible, but I have no choice to abandon most of my normal caution with these sorts of things.

[update 2007-11-30] I never did complete my demo; it was too awkward and unsatisfying. I guess I'll wear my xenophobic persona a while longer.

FewerThoughts

Steven Feuerstein is one of my favorite persons. Years ago, embracing the spirit of his technical books saved me from an abyss of financial mediocrity, encouraging me towards a wealthy satisfying career which has benefited my family and me in fantastical ways.

However he is the most intellectually dishonest banal bleeding heart liberal when it comes to his political views: FeuerThoughts: Liberal Media bites again? Hah!

Open Letter to Steven:

I want you to understand what people mean when they say, liberal media. What it means is that their bias revolves around four commandments:

#1 There are no moral absolutes.
#2 Hysteria is first; asking intelligent questions is for later (or never).
#3 Feelings matter more than reason.
#4 Words don't mean things.

These concepts are demonstrated consistently by journalists that identify themselves as unbiased in the mainstream media. Now you know.

More On Google

Google Adwords are watching me

Looking for the wierdest ad I can
The revenue upside to me of Google AdWords on this site is infinitesimal. I am intrigued by the algorithm that determines their content on my site. I am absolutely fascinated by the anticipation of how my next blog will affect the ads. My childish anticipatation is that this post will make the AdWords engine meltdown in a manner reminiscent of Kirk vs. The Computer. The truth is that this post actually violates my agreement for placing AdWords; I'm not supposed to draw attention to the ads in any meaningful way.

In the absence of a real audience, I am comforted knowing my Robot friend is always watching.

How Stupid is the MTV Generation?

Proto-typcial bleeding heart outrage and a lack of math skills all at once

So This Evil Teenager Eventually Does the Right Thing...
... and kills himself in Cleveland yesterday after trying to kill teachers and other kids because he didn't get all the proper attention that the center of the universe should receive. However, what catches my attention is that like every story about schools in the US there has to be a sub-plot about how the school is failing all the children somehow. At the very least, there has to be some redirection of guilt away from an evil person to an evil society, somehow.

In this story, the NEA angle du jour is that overcrowding encouraged this latest calamity. The author of this story is intellectually dishonest to introduce this irrationality - given that this spoiled, well-funded charity, school's classroom size has absolutely nothing to do with an evil monster gunning down folks to feed his overgrown narcissism. In addition to intellectual dishonesty, the author obviously suffers from a lack intellectual faculties, period: the story's stated numbers indicate there are 250 students, 30 teachers and classroom sizes of 30. By my math that is about nine kids per teacher and three or four teachers hovering over this massive Hong Kong-like crowding of 30 kids in each classroom. I hate MTV.

So I Googled Me

How vain is that?

It turns out I'm a big hit on Google.
For a make believe word, that comes from a popular cartoon I was amazed at my Google relevance. When I do a simple search on the word crisatunity, I get a first page hit. Which is quite amazing to me for some reason.

So what else does searching for crisatunity net you? Foremost there's an Urban Dictionary definition, which is completely useless. This article uses the word in a title but doesn't expound on it any discernable way in the body. I found this old and boring article by some failed girl comedian. Finally, this data sheet explains its origins in the way I came to know the term. And then there's me.

What do I think crisatunity means? To me, it means turning a seeming momentary disadvantage into a meaningful advantage. I suppose it is analogous to making lemonade from lemons.

Crisatunity Wiktionary

Peculiar Terms For Peculiar Folks

Favorite Thing Today: Wikis
I have felt constrained in my vocabulary for this blog. There are so many unique one-off words and phrases I enjoy using that require too much background explanation. So, Crisatunity Wiktionary to the rescue!

Today's Thought of Revenge
I get to call DirecTV and AT&T today and cancel my services with both despicable companies.