CSotD: Your Comic Weekly Man Strikes Back
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Just got an update on my computer, but I haven’t yet figured out what it changed. I don’t recall the last time an update made a drastic change; they usually save those for new versions of the basic program, like when Windows 11 added a thingie so that people with Photoshop disks couldn’t install it anymore and had to start renting the software from Adobe.
You know, changes that users really wanted.
Mostly, when I get that “update and shut down” prompt, I know that I’ll have another one in two or three days after they figure out what the update had screwed up.
They used to force updates on you. I remember when I got this one and, indeed, I was on my way out the door to an appointment. It’s good that they now let you keep working until you’re ready to hand over control.
Come to think of it, it’s been a while since I was nagged about unused icons. I think I spotted this at O’Hare, but wherever it was, I remember telling myself that the folks up in the tower were likely on a different system.
Still, the giant signage for this Denver store didn’t exactly inspire a lot of confidence. I’m not sure animated billboards alongside busy highways are a good idea in the first place, though, granted, in Denver there are plenty of times that you’re just sitting there with nothing to do and would appreciate the distraction.
But I’d note that Burma Shave signs were short phrases spaced along the roadside so they wouldn’t require taking your eyes off the road for more than a second. And we weren’t going 70 mph back then.
I hear that passwords are on their way out, but, then again, I’ve been hearing that for at least 20 years, and most of what changed was the need to add a “special symbol,” to avoid consecutive numbers, to create a password you can’t possibly remember and to avoid writing it down anywhere.
Here’s my tip: Name your dog f!P%^&TRf04.
I’m a little unsure of the setting of Crabgrass. Superballs are still around, but they’re hard to find and they cost more than a quarter. I remember when they were a thing, though we didn’t bat them, since they went far enough without the extra help.
For backyard baseball, the best combination was a (narrow) wiffleball bat and a tennis ball. Kids who showed up without gloves could field a tennis ball, while using a plastic bat kept it from going into orbit.
We did have a ballfield where we used regulation bat and balls, but it was narrow, so anything hit to right field was a ground-rule double and both teams would go into the woods to find the ball.
Good times.
It’s possible that Randal Munroe read this incredibly silly, condescending news story before coming up with the latest xkcd. It seems a group of archaeologists have determined that Stone Age people knew that some rocks were more useful as tools than others, and would travel to places where they could find that kind of stone.
The expert in xkcd assumes Early Man had a choice of technologies, but that’s a joke. The real archaeologists apparently confuse being technically challenged with being an idiot. If you look into hunter/gatherer societies, you find that they were quite good at overcoming whatever technological advantages they lacked.
But jumpin’ jehosophat, even a chimpanzee will choose one twig over another if it would be better for picking up ants.
Juxtaposition of the Same Guy
Some interesting commentary on the subject of “Lies We Tell Ourselves.”
Our first OB/GYN, a noted expert in natural childbirth, urged us to relax because our kids would be just fine, in spite of, not because of, the decisions we made. Obviously, this doesn’t include either total neglect or outright abuse, but Bravo’s mocking of parental expectations is on target.
Meanwhile, there is a point in divorce where you tell yourself it’s going to be very civilized and that you’ll part as friends, but it passes quickly.
I know couples who do well after divorce. A friend of mine invited both his ex-wives to his third marriage, where they posed for a hear-no-evil-see-no-evil-speak-no-evil snapshot. But I would caution you not to expect that outcome.
I say that as someone who gets along well with his ex, but largely because a few years after we split, she moved overseas. Perhaps you could make this a clause in your separation agreement.
I sure miss Jerry Bittle. If you’re still working out your feelings about divorce, you should read the re-runs of this strip at GoComics. And this interview I did with him.
When you get to this point, you can start drafting that separation agreement. I’m hearing a lot of good things about Portugal.
We recently had a bust of 44 Haitian refugees who were caught crossing the border, though I shouldn’t say “we” because it was actually the Canadians who made the arrests. The immigrants were trying to get out of the US and who could blame them?
The place they took them, as it happens, was where I used to go every Sunday to pick up the weekend editions of La Presse and the Montreal Gazette, together with a six-pack of (real) Labatt Blue and whatever good stuff the bakery at the convenience store had made that morning.
Yes, in Quebec, even dépanneurs often have good in-house bakeries.
What was apparently bringing these folks to Quebec was the chance to get the hell out of here, which is the administration’s goal, but, as Boopsie is finding, it does leave some large holes in the workforce.
Anybody can get hired at a call center, since speaking English is no longer a requirement.
There was a moment when call centers popped up here and were seen as a cure for unemployment, but the Powers That Be quickly realized they could save money overseas, not that they were paying folks here a whole lot.
Americans seem to have an aversion to low-paying jobs that suck.
Make America Dusty Again!
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