I work in a large cube-farm with offices lining the walls. I am fortunate in that I am in one of the wall offices with a window. I am not so fortunate that I share it with two other people, one of whom smells.

No, honestly, he doesn’t smell. He does mutter a lot though and he covets my mouse pad. God help him if he touches my mouse pad! It has a picture of a kitten on it. With a machine gun. Hence the coveting.

Okay, I’ll stop there. They’re both really good guys and there’s no coveting or smelling or inappropriate touching or muttering or holding of one’s pets for ransom. It is, all in all, a harmonious arrangement. Baking, of all things, sometimes happens.

NOTE: I have no idea if they read these. Let’s hope for a ‘no.’

However, one thing that kinda bugs me is when I pass one of them in the hall. We normally do this at least two or three times as day, as we all having meetings and stabbings to attend. The first pass of the day, we usually say ‘hi.’ The second pass, we generally nod. If it happens a third time, there are embarrassed smiles.

The fourth time though, we have no idea what to do. We just kinda avert our eyes and pretend not to notice each other, even though one of us has obviously just taken the last donut from the kitchen. It’s downright awkward with extra ‘awk.’

We have literally run out of socially acceptable ways to acknowledge each other’s presence. I fear that one day, we may pass a fifth time. I have no idea what will happen. Fists may fly. Tears may be shed. One of us might well scream and throw ourselves out the nearest window. This isn’t quite as bad as it sounds, as we are on the first floor, but still.

It’s weird. I can literally work 10 hours within arm’s reach of them and not notice they’re there. It’s like we all have our own private nerd cocoons. Yet passing them in the hall could someday result in murder. Or at least, a spilled Diet 7-Up.

Cheers,
-Jason

So, apparently Joe is a bastard. I’m a bit fuzzy on some of the details, but Sue yelled this very loudly across the parking lot at about 2 am this morning. She yelled other things too, but it was mostly an incoherent mass of swear words and screaming, sort of one long vowel movement.

Joe, needless to say, yelled back. He did call her a ‘harlot,’ so he gets points for at least shouting imaginative insults.

Joe and Sue, as you can well imagine, are not happy with each other. They yelled for a good five minutes, which is about four hours in ‘I wish I could sleep’ years. They even woke up my cat, which hid under the bed. This is impressive. Only the great ‘Gimmie my money!’ argument of ’07 caused my cat to hide quite so quickly.

For whatever reason, it seems like the parking lot directly across from my bedroom window is the epicenter of infidelity.

NOTE: Try saying epicenter of infidelity three times fast

I honestly don’t know why, unless I have some sort of strange, reverse superpower that makes people get into fights in the middle of the night, sort of a Siren’s Song of Stupidity. Anyway, I’m dead tired and my cat is sleeping on my shoulder, which makes it really hard to type (or move, for that matter). It one thing to keep me up, but when you tire a cat out, that’s saying something.

Cheers,
-Jason

Unfortunately, we've lost another one. Don LaFontaine passed away at the age of 68.

Who, you may ask? Well, he was the 'announcer voice' for over 5000 movie trailers and was recently featured in a Geico commercial. He pretty much defined the trailer as we know it today and was regarded as a legend in the industry.

I never met the man, but he seemed to be genuinely nice. Yet another small piece of our world gone.

A fun interview with him follows:



-Jason

Well, it has been a long, busy week for us here at Wayfarer's Moon.

On Saturday, Leigh and I went minature golfing for a friend's birthday. This involved being outside and hitting a small ball repeatedly into windmills and other fanciful buildings. It was great fun, even though we have the combined dexterity of an aged, possibly ill sloth and being exposed to the sun hurts us.

We decided to not keep score, mainly because this was meant as a fun outing and if we had kept score, I would have been forced to engage Competetive Mode. This means I would have sweated every shot, cursing missed opportunities, and eventually plotting to kill everyone else as that would have been easier and more efficient. We also decided to not keep score because we quickly realised that the 10-year old girl in the group ahead of us would have easily beaten all of us.

Anyhow, there will be a regular update tomorrow and the usual blogs throughout the week.

Cheers,
-Jason

Now, before we get to the all-important task at hand, I would like to announce that we now have an RSS feed! Rejoice!

I actually have no idea what that is, but Leigh said it was good so I agreed.

And now, on with the Naming of the Nerds!

Yesterday, I promised that we would get to your suggestions, so here we are, in no particular order (apologies if names are misspelled).

Chris had several suggestions:
a conclave of nerds
a nerd alliance
a nerd array
a league of nerds

I rather like the ‘conclave’ of nerds. It makes us sound important.

Gillsing suggested ‘nerd-herd,’ which is catchy and rhyme-y.

Alexander Lex V. also had a number of suggestions:
a guild of nerds
a clan of nerds
a circuit of nerds
that bunch of virgins

I do like ‘a circuit of nerds’ though ‘that bunch of virgins’ is apt (though hard to say).

pixie_bit suggested ‘con’ in some fashion. This has advantages as it can be more specific as in a ‘Trek-Con of nerds’ or a ‘Gate-Con of nerds.’

An anonymous commenter suggested ‘Hash’ whilst another suggest ‘pod.’ I rather like Hash, though ‘pod’ is good as well (though it is already in use for whales).

And vonbek suggested a ‘googleplex.’ According to Wikipedia, a Googleplex is ‘a play on words, being a blend of Google and complex, and a reference to googolplex, the name given to the large number 10googol.’ A truly nerd-like word if I’ve ever heard one.

Well, what do you all think? Which of the terms of the last three days do you think best represents nerddom? I’ll post the winner later on and then we can see about getting it added to Wikipedia.

Cheers,
-Jason