Bookmarks; and how you know what you liked six months ago

On March 28, 2009, In Internet Rant, By Andy

I’m a pretty online kinda guy. I wouldn’t go so far as to give myself a geek label because that doesn’t do anything to improve my image with women, but if I lived on a planet with no women I would probably be called a geek. The funny thing about being a geek is that you tend to keep a lot of bookmarks in browsers scattered across various computers between work, home and the odd strangers house you managed to get some laptop time in. To the untrained eye – or less net savvy individual – this collection of links is just a quick way to find favourite websites (hence the term Favourites). (Right now there may be one or two of you tempted to nod your heads and say, yeah but that’s what they are. If you are, slap yourself, because this is wrong). No, bookmarks are windows into a geeks cultural identity; they will tell you what they like and don’t like, and what phases and fads they went through in days, months, years gone past. You can pretty much take all those Favourites links and work out what kind of person they are better than any psychologist armed with a completed Rorschach test.

This became very apparent to me during the week when I migrated all my own bookmarks from the seven computers I use with regularity, and the ones I had in an online bookmark service, all into another online bookmark service (called delicious.com for those interested). I had something like 550 links in total which amazed me to start with, and then amazed me more just seeing what kind of things I had actually bothered to favourite since 2002. I went through periods of being into linux, goth chix, 80’s t-shirts, 80’s music, Annie Lennox, digital cameras, cheap airfares to India, xbmc, crappy blogs *cough cough*, bittorrent, more goth chix, mmorpgs galore, cheap chinese blank cds, russian brides, paranoid cryptoware, and a whole lot more. I did wonder what some psychologist would have made of it all, especially if I had’ve done a Rorschach test with him and said all the pictures looked like vaginas.

I spent about 4 to 5 hours tidying all of the bookmarks up, removing all the ones that had become roads to nowhere, and were from phases I just wasn’t ever going to go through again, like applying for jobs with secret service agencies in every country in the free world (no kidding, I had tons of application forms bookmarked in their own category). In doing so, I got down to 173 quality bookmarks that I think represents the new modern me, and which anyone else would think represents someone in the new electro-bohemian class of society. It’s almost a fitting way to make an online introduction really; swapping bookmark collections to see how compatible you are, and whether or not you should make a date, or block that person to hell. Personally I know if I meet a girl with 100 Favourites in the “Cats” category, I’m heading for the door, and I’m not looking back!

So in the new modern online era our choice of bookmarks define us as much as our choice of furniture, music, movies and porn. All of which would be bookmarks in their own right. Which in the end, really makes my point for me.

:)

Andy.

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Life needs a sense of danger

On March 17, 2009, In Life Rant, Travel Rant, By Andy

Every so often I go through this stage where I feel that life needs a sense of danger to really let me know I’m alive. And I’m not just talking about having a bit of a scare like I might not make it to the train station on time to make my train to work in the morning. No, I’m talking about some shit scarey thing that makes your heart pound like a bastard and not knowing whether or not you’re going to make it out alive. Kinda like what the ultimate adrenaline junkies chase I guess, when they do stuff like extreme base jumping, or extreme crocodile taming Steve Irwin style.

I developed this danger need during my first trip overseas after leaving Australia when I was travelling in Egypt from Dahab to Sharm el-Sheikh in a taxi with three Palestinians I had met in a cafe on the beach while stoned out of my skull. They said they new the owners of a night club there and I could drink for free if I came along. All I heard was free drinks, and I was sold! As was pretty typical we passed through military checkpoints in the car every 50 kilometers or so, which normally wasn’t a big deal, except for this one checkpoint where we got pulled over for a passport check. One military guy came out with a huge fucking assault rifle in his hands, takes one look at the car and the next thing he is screaming at the guard house and these five guys all come running out armed to the teeth with big fucking guns and grenades strapped to their chest. We all got pulled out of the car – except for the driver – and I was pushed onto the car bonnet (front) and the other three were put face down on the ground. Everyone is screaming in Egyptian – or Arabic, I just couldn’t recall clearly afterwards – and then the gaurd on me put the barrel of his rifle about an inch from my face. I honestly thought that was it; siyonara, goodbye, see you all in the next life. My mind went blank, and the only thing I could think of was, I hadn’t even told mum I was in Egypt, the poor woman wouldn’t even know where to tell the Australian Embassy where to look for me. I couldn’t help but stare at the end of the barrel like an acid tripper will stare at a spot on the wall. When you’re faced with the end, it’s funny what will hold your concentration. Well the very next thing, the three Palestinians are being picked up off the ground and their passports are being checked. A minute passed, and then everybody starts shaking hands and patting each other on the back like their old pals. This gaurd who I thought was going to blow me away, gives me this big smile and asks for my passport. I just about drop the thing handing it over my hands were shaking so much.

“Ahhh… Australian… Home and Away… Neighbours… Very nice shows. I love beautiful beaches you have”.

What the fuck is going on? Was pretty much what I was thinking. All I could actually say was some grunts and a few, yeah right’s!

“How you like Egypt? Very beautiful country. Are you having a nice time”?

The warm smile; the eagerness of his friendly conversation; it was all just too much. I didn’t know whether to laugh or scream. So I smiled and said, ‘yeah right’.

After that the gaurds opened up the car doors for us like chauffeurs and we got in and drove off. Just to add to the bizarreness, they all waved us off with big smiles as if farewelling good friends.

Nobody said anything for about a minute, until I turned around (me being in the front seat, and three amigos being in the back) and asked just what the fuck happened, and why the fuck did that just happen to me? One of the guys that that happened all the time, unfortunately he really closely resembled a high profile Middle East Terrorist wanted in several countries, and it was a case of mistaken identity. He apologised, and hoped that my shirt wasn’t too covered in dust from the road. But not to worry, I could enjoy free drinks when I got to the club.

I was dumbfounded, and shocked into stupidity, and just let it go. The rest of the night was a total blast. I had so much fun because it was as if something was liberated inside of me. I felt free and alive. Every drink tasted like the best drink I’d ever had, and every song was like my favourite. Nearly 10 years on, I don’t know what it is, but every so often I think about going out and finding danger like that again just so I can feel alive like that again! Pretty stupid because at the time that happened I never ever wanted to go through that again. But that feeling of liberation was pretty intoxicating.

Funnily enough, since that event, I’ve never actually been scared in my life since. Sure I’ve had adrenaline rushes from exciting times, but I’ve never felt fear since that night.

I wonder if it’s too late to apply for international jetsetting spy jobs with ASIO?

Andy.

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Middle aged boredom

On March 10, 2009, In Life Rant, By Andy

I’ve been pondering for a while the next direction in life. Turning 40 has had some sort of profound affect on me in the way I view the world. It’s as if all of the value systems I was using suddenly underwent a massive shift in order in the same way that an apartment block will undergo a massive shift in order when an 8-on-the-richter-scale earthquake hits. Everything is picked up and thrown asunder, reassembling itself into something unrecogniseable, and awaiting reconstruction back into something meaningful.

Being in my 30’s was easy. The first few years of that decade was about launching myself into the big unknown wide world and experiencing everything for the first time, all up close and personal and raw. I didn’t have a clue what I was doing back then, but I didn’t really care either, each day was exciting and I was learning about the world as I went along. By my mid 30’s I’d found some stability and made a life in a foreign country and was exploring a new relationship that while I knew wasn’t ever going to be long term and stabile, it was fast and furious and intoxicating. The last part of my 30’s was this period of consolidation when I earned my right to live in the country I had chosen as home, and putting a foundation down that was security for now and the future. It represented the end of a time of being able to up and move at a moments notice, but then, I’d moved past that desire as well, so it wasn’t a loss.

Then I turned 40.

It’s funny, but sometimes lying in bed at night just before going to sleep I feel like all the lessons I’ve learned in the past decade are all coalescing into one place in my mind. They are pulling together into a framework that I can use like a ladder to take me somewhere. But I just feel like there are a few things I’m still not aware of to use that framework in any meaningful way. I’m still waiting for something. Which is frustrating when I feel like I want to be more in a hurry to get where all this is taking me.

If I leave myself idle for too long though, I start to realise that I’m bored with all the things in life that used to be interesting. I don’t mean bored in that I no longer like the hobbies I have for fun, or with the people I know. No I mean bored in that in my 30’s I was happy enough for life to lead me from one week to the next because I felt I had time and something interesting would come along. Now though, time is a premium, it’s something not to be wasted, so I get bored easily if weeks pass and nothing interesting happens. Perhaps that’s it; the thing that is boring is not the time between events, but the lack of direction that is still the way I live life. Being more in a hurry means actively taking a direction where I want to go, and make things happen, rather than wait for things to happen in a passive way.

Maybe the boredom is with the way I live life.

Something to think about.

Andy.

 
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Armchair Philosophy

On March 9, 2009, In Chick Rant, By Andy

Envelope philosophy

I have a friend who is something of a philosopher, a person of deep thought who has spent a large part of time on earth plumbing the depths of the human condition, determing what the really important things in life are. He was over last weekend and I asked him what it is that is important in a relationship. Knowing that a picture would convey more than just words ever could, he took it upon himself to embody the answer into a form I could more easily digest intellectually!

It’s rare that male wisdom is shared in a form that everyone, from the youngest school kiddie to the oldest old bastard in the geriatrics home, can see and learn from. So I wanted to share this with you the secrets to making a great relationship.

I can only say, don’t try to take it all in at once. It’s a deep message and takes time to fully appreciate. And to you, my friend who did this for me – thanks mate, for taking the time to care and share!

Andy.

 
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