funny

I subscribe to several mailing lists. A beelion years ago we used to call these things “listservs”—basically it’s an email address that is an alias for a whole group of people, and when you send mail to it, everyone on the list gets a copy. WebSanDiego was my mailing list for a long while.

Anyway, on mailing lists, occasionally there are people who are annoying, or do what’s called trolling, or are otherwise jerks. Not sure what an internet troll is? Think of YouTube comments. Those are internet trolls.

Now, most civilized lists don’t let in people who are merely idiotic jerks. But there are some people who are frustrating. Again, in the old days, I used to simply send any email from such people to the trash. Nowadays, since I use Gmail for email predominantly, I have a different solution.

I tag them.

People who I find begin to act like bozos, I add a little filter to my email such that when email comes from them, it gets a little tag that says “bozo” on it. It’s a reminder of the previous history with that person, and the red color I give the tag in Gmail’s interface functions like a stop sign. It’s personally satisfying. It also discourages me from replying. Because I don’t want more email with bozo tags in it. My bozo tags make me smile, and not frown, when bozos are bozos.

I have no doubt some might consider me a bozo on email lists. I have been that, at times.

Live and let bozo, I say.

Tony Pierce pointed to some writing in his post our biggest story on la times blogs about how “right wing” bloggers were in a tizzy about this ad:

I read a few, just a few, and chuckled.

We in California live in former Mexican territory. And this ad plays on some of the history with a bit ot humor and the Mexican equivalent of “political incorrectness”—it’s silly to get outraged about an ad directed at Mexican vodka drinkers.

I did chuckle though. More ads should include maps! Maybe we Americans in particular might learn some history and geography!

9/11 Conspiracy Theories ‘Ridiculous,’ Al Qaeda Says

I have met Chuck. He belongs to Dooce and Blurb and Leta. He is awesome. Here’s how awesome he is.

The photos are particularly awesome.

You know, people have made fun of this invention, some even have derided it as cruel. However, I can see some dogs I have known kind having fun. Maybe only for short trips, I admit.

And I’m certainly sympathetic to the fact that dogs can wreak havoc inside a car, as a distraction, making trouble.

Clearly, this is not a product that stood the test of time.

via

The completely appropriate title on this post from over in Vintage Ads is “Banana Hell.”

Enjoy.

Todays’ Email:

Dear Laurel,
Just wanted to ping you on a few great companies in the LA area looking for PHP talent. Let me describe the positions briefly, and I’ll include links to more detailed information on my website. If you’re interested, you can email your most current resume to [REDACTED] and we’ll see if we can get a match.

From March 5:

Hey Laurel,
I just stumbled across your resume in our database and was wondering if you were interested in this opportunity.

My reply:

Dear Recruiters:

I’ve gotten two of these now, and they both infuriate and entertain me. I am not named Laurel. My surname is not Springs. My first name is “Joe.” It matches the email address you have contacted me at: joe (at) artlung (dot) com. My last name is Crawford, not Springs. Perhaps you’re confused. In my resume, you can plainly see my name is Joe Crawford. Perhaps in another one I refer to myself as “Joseph Crawford.” Also, you can read that in 2006 I had a contract with Laurel Springs School in Ojai, California.

Sadly though, I did not become the owner of that august institution. Neither was I was inspired to change my name to match the school—that would be quite something!! I worked on web applications in ASP and SQL server there. I had quite a nice time working with very nice people. Also, Ojai is very pretty, though it does get warm in the summer.

I appreciate your email very much, but I hope you’ll understand that it’s very difficult to take you seriously when you and your database have failed so profoundly.

Sincerely,

Joe Crawford

An old TV commercial for Atari featuring Carol Channing and Kareem Abdul Jabbar. Those graphics were once amazing.

Tom Hanks and David Letterman.

Actual comment spam content left on one of the blogs I manage:

Please, do not delete the given message. Money obtained from spam will go to the help hungry to children ugand+

Won’t anyone please think of the children?