jiggling the handle

Consuming…
William Gibson’s Pattern Recognition
Extra meds

In the aftermath of that lumber truck taking out our mailbox in a spectacular Schwarzenegger moment, I didn’t get around to finishing my “important” blog entry of yesterday. So here goes…

I know I should have called my baby sister on Tuesday night, seeing she was celebrating a significant milestone in her aging process and all. Elvis the Obscure, Winged Goddess of Incontinence and Messaging (new addition to title!), did her job of dropping the requisite hints.

In the words of King George the First: “Shoulda. Coulda. Didden.” I know it wasn’t prudent, but as written in JW’s Celestial Encyclopaedia of Benevolent Excuses (excuse #145): “This cold has been kicking my ass.” Thanks to a fog of phlegm, medication, and Johnston Palace Guard duties, giving Fructose a jiggle kinda slipped my mind. (I did send a card though … on time, I might add.)

The past few days it’s felt like the final installment of Star Wars has been screening in my bloodstream. Luke and his Wookie friends rocketing through capillaries, buzzing low over legions of madly-replicating storm troopers, firing laser canons at rogue viruses as if each were a tiny Death Star. Microcosmic Battle. The Final Smackdown. One result is my breathing sounds a lot like Darth Vadar’s. Another result: I could probably take my show on the road with Barnum and Bailey. “Ladies and gentlemen, come marvel at Blogboy. Watch as buckets of Flubber flow from his chaffed and freakishly large nostrils!”

Those who know me, also know I don’t buy into the philosophy of the great French philosopher and mathematician Verizon Descartes: “I phone, therefore I am.”

The Big Four-O deserves some special recognition I suppose. Though it’s not all that big a deal in the Richter Scale of things--a bit of shaking, perhaps some rattling of nerves, but no major damage. Not like Seven-O, when things really start getting interesting … as Elvis and Rondo can attest.

To make amends, I dedicate this blog entry to my sweet-and-fruity-with-a-hint-of-oak little sis, Fructose the Zippy!

Nearly six years my junior, Fructose and I logged about 12 years in each others’ faces before I headed off to college and subsequently Northcentral Frigia and then Central Balmia. A good fraction of those early years were spent with her playing fly to my reluctant fly paper… this layered on our relationships with Pathose and Lactose--the two intervening sibs. Can you pull me on the sled? Not right now. Aww come on! Sorry, no. Pleeease? No. C’mon, c’mon, pleeease! MAAAYBE!

Since college, the two, maybe three, visits a year haven’t made for much bonding time. Especially since the visits occur amidst a cacophonic blur of Elvis, Rondo, Lactose, Og, Juan Ho, Puppet Mistress, Pathose, Briegol, Velveeta, Gorgonzola, Chachi, Fonzie, Kukukachu, Aunt Mallie, Princess Daffodil, Puppet Master J, the Rabid Pixie, various instruments of music and torture, all mixing with other objects and characters in a frenzied pastiche calling to mind a Nissan car commercial. In other words, typical family gatherings. Thankfully in our family, blood is thicker than Flubber. Zoom zoom.

What’s become of that French horn playing, cheerleading, heart-on-her-sleeve waif?

She’s become a guitar playing, MBA-toting, child-rearing, Pilates-practicing, heart-on-her-sleeve Amazonian. She’s a good natured human hand grenade. Throw her in a room and everyone will be treated to an explosion of mirth and good cheer--likely with some guitar playing and singing involved.

What do I owe Fructose? An extra-special happy birthday wish! And a promise of another sled ride around the block before Richter takes his final toll.

Fructose, shake that thang!!!

I have an important post to make today. Rather than water it down by attaching extraneous pieces of drivel, I’ll trust the blog tool to accept the drivel as individual posts and quickly move them down the page to make way for something of more consequence.

(This last sentence makes me wonder if I, the aspiring Writer, can pioneer a new school of minimalist cliffhanger plot development. Instead of ending each chapter with some contrived, obviously gratuitous plot element, maybe I’ll just end every chapter with the same words: “Yes, this chapter sucked, but just wait. It gets better.” Oooh, I’m tingly with anticipation.)

Late-breaking drivel #1…

I’m proud to announce, to my surprise and delight, I received a reprieve from Googlebot. This site is back on the Google radar!

Feels good to have patched things up with that cuddly eight hundred pound cybergorilla. I’d like to think my special rapport with bots had more to do with it than the threat I made the other day.

Here’s how I picture my new friend:

Thanks MaGoogle! A case of virtual bananas is on its way.

Consuming…
The Da Vinci Code (finally!)
New library card
The usual meds

Today’s question is: Which ring of hell is reserved for bad bloggers?

Still reeling from my expulsion from the Googleverse, spirits were lifted by the WebRing Academy awarding me a star on the sidewalk of the prestigious Moderately Amusing WebRing. I’ve already scraped off two pieces of gum and chased away a couple of squatting dogs.

My recent fall from the Grace of Google was probably due to not having enough (any!?) links from other sites. I sent a query to Googlebot to get the skinny, but, like most of my emails to luminaries in the writing and entertainment fields, have yet to receive a response. I can understand the rank of this site falling a bit due to low traffic and being completely ignored by other sites, but to fall completely off the list! Seems like a disservice to surfers with National Enquirer-caliber inquiring minds.

This episode has opened my eyes to the startling fact that Google is not a one-stop shop! So for now, folks searching for “Herman Munster,” “Pathose,” and “Sponge Bob zither” will have to use MSN Search, Alta Vista, or some other engine to find this site.

I’m keeping my fingers crossed about finding a way back into the good graces of the Googlebot. Perhaps it feels threatened by my work in AI (this or this)? If so, I urge Googlebot to repent from its exclusionary ways or suffer the consequences in the coming Singularity Rapture.

Fortunately, the sting was softened by the WebRing honor.

Some advantages of being in the Moderately Amusing WebRing are: (1) It's free, (2) The name (Moderately Amusing) and byline (“The blogs and sites of some comedians, writers, and amateur taxidermists.”) perfectly describe my stuff, (3) Jiggling the Handle is one of just 12 other sites in this group, (4) A human (Edward, da man!) approved my application, (5) I can now consider myself a peer of Adam Felber!, (6) Perhaps a link from WebRing will be enough to validate my existence to Google? (Yeah, right.)

On the downside, I’m hopeful most people won’t notice that this WebRing: (1) Redefines “vast wasteland” for the Internet (the other sites in the ring are by-and-large un-navigable, broken (I particularly liked whak.com’s visit counter: “You Are Visitor #disabled.” I already knew that!), and haven’t been updated since Al Gore first invented the Internet, (2) The Ringmaster is “former Christian” whose site’s presence in this ring is Moderately Inexplicable (interesting stuff, but sinks the definition of “moderately amusing” to new levels (sorry Ed!)), (3) The ring appears to drive 1 or 2 hits a day (or is that a month?).

Anyway, all-in-all, it seems like a fine home for one Mildly Ironic ™ blogger.

Finally, changing gears…

Thanks to a pointer at Dead-Frog, I was able to create a South Park version of myself. Here’s JWman, like Venus newly born from Botticelli’s seashell, just emerged from the anus of Mr. Hat:

Sorry children.

New byline ideas for this site…
"Your one-stop shop for moral values"
"Will blog for food" (damn, Google shows 2,230 hits for this already)