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As I just lengthily explained, I have very little love for corporate hierarchies and all the folklore that goes with it. Ironically, the ostensibly “free” world of major Open-Source development never fails to irk me in the exact same way…

I have my theories about that, and they mostly have to do with the fact that Open-Source is full of the very same people, who, for one reason or another, might not have made it at the top of the corporate ladder in the traditional world, but are fiercely decided to enjoy the exact same privilege in their own version thereof. Less money, therefore a void to fill, usually by inflating the ego until it touches on all sides. These are all theories… But I do not care to expand on them right this second, if only to add very quickly that Open-Source Software is also filled with an overwhelming majority of selfless, dedicated, bright people, who, in the end, bring the balance way into the positive.

Yet, I do have my beef with many OSS practices in general, and practitioners in particular, but because I have yet to find the recipe for immortality (and just in case you are looking for it too, I can tell you so far that neither baths in young virgin’s blood, nor daily consumption of half a gallon of gin, work), I do my best to spend as little time as humanly possible on such crap. Sure I yammer. a lot. but I am also quite good at packing my marbles and moving to another side of the playground without sulking too much, whenever I really can’t take my little playmates’ bullshit any more…

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Of my years as a code whore for miscellaneous software joints, I really haven’t kept much at all…

Except, that is, a bottomless contempt and seething hatred toward all that ressemble corporations or corporate culture in all its incarnations. I really hated corporate life. And to be fair, the feeling was shared: most of my bosses hated my guts, more or less silently, and the ones that didn’t, usually shared my hatred of higher ranked execs. HR zombies probably spent entire afternoons mentally rehashing every details of my pink slips, PR bunnies’ smiles would freeze to a near-breaking point whenever their bullshitting activities required any sort of interaction or input from my person.

Never, though, was I ever mean to workmates or people reporting under me: they usually didn’t mind my behaviour in the slightest, enjoyed the show and placed bets, if anything… But anybody with a vested interest in keeping the corporate status quo certainly lost many layers of enamel to teeth-gritting, during my stint in some of these companies…

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It is usually pointless to pay any attention to whatever offensive comment Shintaro Ishihara manage to spew with regularity, seeing how he makes little secret of his goal to alienate about every single non-Japanese human being on the planet. The fact that he is the Governor of the greater Tokyo area makes it all the more pathetic.

His last display of xenophobic moronism, though, did manage to make me laugh in disbelief quite a bit.

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I cannot possibly be the only one to have noticed that the girl basically has one. single. pose.

I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m sure she has potential to make it into every college fratboy top ten shaggable. when she gets the coke-induced twitching under control.

But the fact this ridiculously cheap 20 degrees left, 30 degrees down, naughty-girl-with-malicious-eye-and-mischievous-smile is what nowadays passes for a paragon of charm, or even plain basic sex-appeal, is a sad testament to that pathetic MTV culture we live in.

And the fact I just took the time to write this, an even sadder testament to the very low level of productivity of my afternoon.

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Where do people get this intense urge to share meteorological insights with everybody they meet?

Have you noticed how some blogs go to incredible lengths to keep you informed of the exact humidity rate in whatever random corner of the world they happened to be written in, by covering half their homepage with some prominent weather-indicating gizmo. See, the trick is to make this otherwise thoroughly uninteresting data more palatable, by presenting it as an amusing novelty. Whether as a seasonally dressed character in stereotypical outfits, or the perennial Smily Sun and Pissy Cloud icons, there is always an effort to coat the dull core in a layer of pointless cuteness. The point remains: Nobody gives a fuck!

Believe me, there are very few excuses to bore strangers with detailed recounts of your personal adventure in mercury hop-skipping. And most of these only apply to stiff upper-lip middle-aged british men, whose emotional gamut couldn’t possibly cover any other topic, and hapless gaijin trying to maintain a casual level of neighbourly smalltalk, without veering too deep into the murky waters of a language that was specifically designed to let locals single out and decapitate potential invaders.

I mean, why can’t we find deeper subject on which to waste these precious seconds of our all-too-ephemeral lives. Why. Why? WHY? Are we so quick to forget that we are but a walking shadow, a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage. And then is heard no more. Have we descended to such abyss of superficiality that we can no longer reach out to our brother Man and talk to his heart. Do we need to hide behind shallow meaningless phrases and disembodied conversations?

Sad indeed…

…

Anyway, that being said:

Where is my fucking Spring weather!?!

Especially now that my futon sits outside like a giant soaking wet sponge after I failed to remove it before yesterday’s pouring.

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Solving math equations might not be the best thing for my manic-depressive tendencies.

Don’t know what’s more pathetic: that I will lose sleep over an unsolved problem, or that, each time I finally solve one, I start jumping around the room like a maniac for the next 20 minutes (Eriko still refuses to let me carve victory marks on the table).

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Everybody has, I’m sure, heard of how painful it is to rent an apartment in Tokyo.
If you or anybody you know has ever looked for a place to live in Tokyo, then you know all about the race prejudice, the vertiginous deposits, ludicrous requirements, real estate agent mandatory commission and above all the two or three months gift money to the landlord, for the privilege of moving into their slum.

If you needed any more proof, here is one:

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What do we blog about when we have nothing interesting to say and we have already posted so many pictures of the cat in the keitai log that we are feeling a bit nauseated ourself?

Why, but we skim our log stats, of course! Digging that endless fodder of cheap entertainment that are search engine referrer keyphrases!

You know what they say about the correlation between the size of a crowd and its collective IQ? Well that should be a good clue as to what to expect from the Web-using community at large.

Let’s have a look, shall we:
[all italicized search strings below taken verbatim from my February server stats]

  • a guide to better living through alcohol. Easy: Pour. Drink. Refill. Go back to step 1.
  • japanese schoolgirl panties: As we already pointed out, you stand better chances over there.
  • padawan definition: isn’t that Klingon for “acneic virgin”?
  • posted by xanax: No. sponsored by Xanax
  • hunting beavers: just bait them with white birch…

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