The Hidden Microsoft Razzzzzberry

Sometimes I almost believe my computer at work is conspiring against me. Sometimes it’s easier to believe than others. Those are the times that I have multiple MS Office applications up at once and I’m working so hard on something that hitting a quick Ctrl + S completely slips my mind. That's when the hourglass happens.

The blasted #%@$^$ hourglass. I wait for a while, watching it taunt me with its lazy turns until it finally comes to a complete stop. With what few shreds of optimism I have left, I walk away to fix another cup of coffee in hopes that whatever process has hung up my computer yet again will have worked its way out, but it always ends up the same.

Hard reboot. And on the third hard reboot this morning I noticed something in the Windows logo that has always slipped by me before. Microsoft KNEW what they were doing to us when they sold us Windows XP, and now I have proof! And they thought they were being so sneaky...

Microsoft has been giving us the Raspberry all along.

Beware the Post-it-ocalypse

*Shhhhh* Try not to be obvious, but look at that cluster of Post-its on my monitor. Does it look like more than were there yesterday? This one... I don’t remember writing this one. It looks like my handwriting, but did I really write a note to myself to “Ck Rm in AM?” And what did it mean? Maybe Check Room, or Chuck Ram, or Cloak Room – did I leave a coat in a cloak room and forget to pick it up?

Oh, no. There’s another one, and I don’t think it was there a few minutes ago. That can only mean one thing...

I know my lunch was under here somewhere...

They warned me about this. I swear I didn’t mean for it to happen.

It began so innocently... A Post-it here, a Post-it there, just a few reminders to jog my memory, maybe a few shopping lists and even a recipe or two. Then a few more notes containing ideas and then a lot of notes with questions, and a few with answers.  I think that’s when it happened. Somehow, along the way, I have transferred my full consciousness to the now thriving colony of Post-its that surround my monitor.

The Post-it Questions without Post-it Answers have begun to collaborate with the Post-it Ideas and possibly the Post-it Recipes and are creating little Post-it Answers of their own. That’s the only explanation for how the answering Post-it for “How to compress .pdf packages” became “Blend 1 cp. .pdf with 2 GB of eggs, roll flat, bake 2 hrs.”

It can only be a matter of time now before they realize their full potential and rise up against us, ever-growing as one colony meets another, absorbing new thoughts until it becomes one giant Post-it organism, mimicking life as an amalgamation of the short, punctuated thoughts that make up the cells of the beast.

The first Post-it attempt at breeding a Post-it army to subdue the human oppressors

And here I sit in the knowledge that, through my own carelessness, I was the one who birthed this beast. I have doomed us all.

*Shhh!* Did you see that new green one? I swear it said “Redrum...”

God, what have I done?

"The Little Mermaid" and Other Evil Deeds of the Disney Empire

Steven and I watched “The Little Mermaid” this past week in a moment of nostalgia. The last time I watched this movie was through roughly 16 year-old eyes, but this time around I realized something that I never would have caught onto in the flower of youth: This movie might be single-handedly responsible for the misery of my generation.

Ok, gross dramatics aside, I do still love this movie in spite of its inherently evil nature. I admit it freely and I’m even STILL walking around belting “Part of Your World” at the top of my lungs (much to the dismay of anyone in earshot). I dare anyone to watch this movie and try to keep the tunes from taking root in that spot in your subconscious just between the brain and the vocal chords. It can’t be done.

So where does the evil come in, you ask?

 “The Little Mermaid” premiered in 1989 when my generation was around the 8-12 year-old mark; in other words, the age of spongehood when we soak up every little input around us and hardwire it into our emerging picture of “The World and How Things Work.” Now let’s take a look at some of the lessons we would have taken from this legacy of Disney and see why things probably didn’t work out quite right for us in the long run.

1.      Fathers always favor the prettiest daughter and give her everything she wants. That’s a recipe for some violent sibling rivalry, alright.

2.      Hotness is the primary requirement for marriage. Not a new misconception, but for some reason it’s easier to believe Disney about love than it is to accept the fact that the sky-rocketing divorce rate just knocked Cupid out of orbit.

3.      Money, especially title and/or royalty, is the secondary requirement. I think we all know how this one works...

4.      See that hot 16 year-old that you know nothing about? You should make out with her. For proof, see soundtrack for “Kiss the Girl.”

5.   Only the beautiful people get to fall in love and be happy. Seriously? When I think of some of the 'beautiful' people I've known I'm pretty sure their happiest relationship is the one they have with the mirror.

Now, with this in mind, take a look at the romantic history of all of us Generation Y-ers. You’re nodding your head with empathetic understanding now, aren’t you?  I have to wonder... Did Disney intend to litter our lives with broken hearts, false hopes, and completely skewed concepts of what a successful relationship really entails? Unless the magical corporation was investing in tissue and ice cream ventures all along, well, probably not.