I’m all for saving the planet, the environment, the whales, and your mom. I’m down with conserving our resources, totally am buying compact fluorescent bulbs for my house, and I even traded in my gas-guzzling SUV for a smaller, less-guzzling one.

So, you and I? We’re not so different.

How we ARE different, however, is that I have an actual job, wherein I earn money to perform tasks which add value to the company. You stand on a street corner and when I’m traveling between my job and my home, try to get me to talk to you about the environment. Which is all fine and good, but you’re wearing a nylon jacket, made from the very petroleum products you so despise, and it makes me wonder if you also rode in a gas-guzzling SUV while spraying CFC-laden air freshener this morning. Of course, it’s not YOUR SUV. It’s your mom’s. Because you still live at home, and she had to drop you off at the street corner so you could stand in my way. Because you don’t have a job, you have a cause. And causes don’t pay rent.

If you want my attention, don’t pester me in the street; offer something that helps make it easier for me to help your cause. Then you’ll not only gain my interest, you might just get my respect.

Until then, get out of my way, okay?

I was at Fry’s yesterday with Ben, returning some stuff that didn’t work as expected, when I walked past the display for Guitar Hero III. Again. I’ve been saying how I wanted to buy the game for months, but every time I reach for it to head to the register something has stopped me.

That something was wrong. This game is brilliant.

Sure, it’s essentially a purely hand-eye coordination, rhythm-dexterity game; you watch for the little colored blobs to move down the screen and make sure that your fingers are pushing the right buttons at the right time. That’s really it; there’s not a lot of complexity here.

What’s addictive is that because the timing really does line up to the song you’re playing, you get a strange sense that you really are playing whatever song it is. And the song list is great fun.

Anyhow. Enough typing. I need to go rock out.

Gotta say, I was pretty unhappy about the coach-swapping exercise that our beloved Fire went through this past year; anytime your coaching staff goes through turnover, your team has to reform around the new staff. Sometimes that works, other times, well…

So far this season, though, I’m watching as our players are taking up their positions confidently and with a finesse that we have historically reserved for mid-season. That’s good coaching giving these talented players what they need to shine. So, for that, Mr. Hamlett, you have already earned my respect and thanks for bringing back my beloved Fire in excellent form. You’ve certainly chosen some of the best advisors a Fire coach could have, and at least from my seat, it looks like you’re listening to them.

Here’s to the start of a great season for the team nearest & dearest to my heart.

Monday was the 75th anniversary of the repeal of Prohibition. In honor of this, and out of an overwhelming desire to find something to write about other than work, I have hereby added a new category to Dwink.net, aptly named “Beer.”.

Yes, beer. Oat Soda. An ingenious way to turn extra wheat, barley, or oats into a beverage to be enjoyed by the masses, and if we give some yeast alcohol poisoning along the way, so much the better! Let the yeast be warned, when they get a big vat of grain-mash goodness to suck the sugar out of, maybe they ought to jump out before they overdo it! If they can’t take care of themselves, little yeasty buggers, then maybe they deserve to die.  Yeah!

I have come up with my scientific method for determining whether I should sample a given beer, and boiled it down to  a simple set of criteria:

1. Does it come in a beer glass or labeled bottle, or am I at a brewery and it comes in any container from the brewmaster himself?
2. Does it look, smell, or taste significantly of beer-related characteristics?

If so, then yes, it should be sampled. Note, however, that this criteria, when applied to whiskey, will undoubtedly make you pass out before you can get through WhiskyFest.

Hmm. Now I’m thirsty…

As a challenge I’m going to complete a post before I get to the city this morning, so beware: coherency, intelligence, and an actual topic are optional for this post.

Today I’m doing training, which means that I get to take a class on something and then do all the work that I would have been doing had I not been in the class. I’m going to be learning about the parts of Boost that are planned for inclusion in the new C++ spec. I know, I know, riveting material here. Actually, I’ve been looking forward to it a lot; Boost is one of those things that I totally ignore until I need something, and when I do need something Boost usually has it, in an elegant, robust way.

But that’s not all: today my empire at work becomes complete. My new hire gets moved to the desk across from me, and in the process scores a window seat on his third week with the firm. I told you people to submit a resume; perks abound.

Ah, well. I finally feel like I’m making real progress again, and moving forward feels good. Between that and the springtime warmup, I’ve gotta say, things are well.

Friday night I got out of work a little later than I had planned, which was accompanied by some gnashing of teeth on the home front. I got off the phone after apologizing and barrelled into the train station, determined to make the 6:10 train.

Things started out fine; I was doing a little work on my laptop, trying to close any last minute issues so I could play all weekend. Then, the emergency brakes kicked in, and the train lurched to a halt.

I looked up from my lappy and took a glance around. Commuters, some people who had been playing in the city that day, the usual. Out the window: a cell phone sitting in the tracks, a ten-dollar bill flapping in the wind, and an unmoving body, splayed out on the ground next to my train car.

A few scenarios popped into my mind: he had pushed some old lady out from the train, sacrificing himself for her life; his fortune had gone from him in the subprime debacle and he had leapt in front of the train; then, the saddest and most likely one, that he had been gabbing on his cell phone and ignored the oncoming train for too long. We probably won’t ever know; 30 tons of train vs. 200 lbs. of person is a decidedly unfair contest.

The rest of the story is all cleanup; Metra trying to get everyone home, the authorities trying to do their best to determine what happened, the engineer being spooked and requesting to be relieved of duty, the commuters all calling around looking for rides home.

I finally walked in the door about 9:15pm, just over three hours after starting my commute.