Dallas Community Really Quick Hits

What have I done to this Sony CEO to deserve this?

Today is payday, albeit just Papa Johns payday and not real job payday. In honor of that and for no other reason, here are some things that are affecting me this holday season:

Coke Zero = good. I never thought I'd like a diet anything, much less a Coke product, but it just tastes like watered-down Coke. Plus, to borrow a phrase from Budweiser Select, it "finishes clean." That means that unlike other Diet Sodas, the 35th sip is as good as the first. It doesn't have that inhuman aftertaste.

Another equation: Coke Zero + a cup of coffee = Mountain Dew, in terms of making me work like a madman. Maybe I should try amphetimines. Hey, my baseball player heros use them.

My wife and I are going to Firewheel mall tomorrow to shop for winter clothes. We're anticipating it being fun, despite the fact that it's in Garland, which as I've explained before is like they took Rockford, IL and drop-shipped it right northeast of Dallas. Nobody likes Garland but cowboys and people who are likely to say, "I reckon..."

Anyway, it's a brand new mall, so there should be a lot of white people from Plano, McKinney, and Allen there. Come to think of it, Frisco's gotta be upset about Garland building this thing -- they couldn't have figured that they'd be competing with what was previously such a craphole. There are only so many affluent white people to go around in northeast Dallas. Plus, they just put a new Nordstrom at North Park, which most honkeys are at least going to check out. The amount and quality of high-toned shopping in my area boggles my mind sometimes. It's a wonder they let me and my ilk even live here.

There's a guy named "Johnny" where I work. Every time I see him, I sing the song "Johnny, don't point that gun at me..." by New Order. I do this in my head, not out loud -- or at least not loud enough for him to hear. I actually like the guy, the song just involuntarily pops into my head. Such is life when you're me.

My thoughts on ID, in radically condensed form: Yes, ID people are on to something; no, it doesn't belong in public high schools; yes, people should be making their own minds up about this instead of trusting the majority of the scientific establishment, because they are biased; yes, the real issue is whether or not the supernatural exists, and what that means for science; no, I don't expect scientists to "give up" and accept supernatural explanations when natural explanations could still be found. I could explain more, but it would be a book. A large book.

There's a big sale starting here today, to celebrate the finishing of the High Five construction project at 635 and 75 here in Dallas. We're celebrating because people will now be able to get home if they live south of us. Before, they had to sleep in the Wal-mart parking lot. Looking at the flyer for the sale, I saw a lot of good prices but also a lot of rebates. So I don't know how it's going to fly, especially since we decided a long time ago that customers wanted to be berated with "protection plans." Any time you work at a regular retail store and your bosses are teaching you how to overcome "buying objections," that's a bad sign. They don't overcome any buying objections at Fry's or Best Buy, and those stores seem to be doing pretty well. Sears, however, is just like where I work -- and looky there, nobody shops at Sears. I'm just saying there seems to be a correlation. Maybe it's a spurious one, but I doubt it.

After the Sony rootkit virus fiasco, I'm not sure I trust the entertainment companies to provide me with an acceptable product. Just put the music on a CD and sell it, holmes! They have the copyright and the monopoly, and they are evil -- all of them. Thanks, DMCA, for ruining entertainment. I hope Orrin Hatch is happy. I hope his Sony rootkit keeps him warm at night. I don't know what all this means, but I do know that I probably will be buying way less CD's. You know, I'm a really good customer. My wife and I buy a lot of music from these people, and they install things on my computer because they hate me for some reason. Why does Sony hate me? Well, Sony, right back at 'cha, buddy.

Maybe when I buy clothes at Firewheel tomorrow the clothes will come with an anti-theft device that installs on my body. Then Gap or whoever can track my every move and make sure I don't copy the clothes and give them to other people. Oh, what's that? You can't copy clothes? So shoplifting is different from copyright infringement, because the retailer is actually losing real money? Imagine that.