Another busy week in the books

But you don’t care about that.

I’ve actually scheduled vacation time, so all of you who are worried that I’m working myself to death can relax. I’m taking an extra day for the May long weekend, which I’m using to take golf lessons. A couple of days in June for Robin in the Hood, and a few more days later that month to hang out with my sister when she visits.

I was surfing a few Honda Civic forums this morning. When you fold the bucket seats in my car to get into the back seat, they return to a very upright position that I don’t care for. It’s not that big a deal to notch the seat back, but if I can adjust that myself it’s better.

In my younger days I took part in a few forums, but I couldn’t deal with the lack of respect that people tend to show for each other. It’s easy to project yourself into an online space where no one knows who you really are. Sadly, it’s just as easy to insult someone when you’re talking to their online presence.

Years ago when I was still an electrical-engineering student at UW, a forum for one of our classes exploded into a flame war that I was dumb enough to involve myself in. This was back in ’96 or ’97, before online forums had become as commonplace as they are now.

Anyway, agroup of students were unhappy with the professor, and took to bashing him on the forum. Since I wasn’t the most motivated student, I had never posted on the forum or even read it (which somewhat explains my grades). However, I have a strong dislike for people being disrespectful toward others. Someone showed me the postings that were going on, and I decided that a response was required…not necessarily to defend the prof (whom I didn’t really care for either), but to point out that the behaviour was unreasonable.

Yeah, I know. Big mistake.

I sent what I thought was a very reasonable response. In truth, I don’t exactly remember what I wrote (that was ten years ago), but I know it wasn’t insulting or anything like that. I don’t do that. I just pointed out that the discussion was uncalled for and there were better ways to deal with the issue.

Of course, that didn’t stop others from insulting me. Yeah, the responses were plentiful and often insulting. Good thing I smartened up and just didn’t post again. It would have been too easy to get caught up in the craziness.

At this point in my life I’m not inclined to be heavily involved in a forum. You go online sometimes and see a person who has thousands of posts on a site. For example, an online computer shop that I buy stuff from has a commenting/question system, and some of the people have posted thousands of times…even though they don’t work there. They just appear to spend all of their time posting answers on products they’ve probably never owned.

I guess it makes someone feel like an expert when they have so many posts…like they’re a senior member of something. Perhaps even a sense of ownership, in an intellectual way. Maybe they just want to feel important.

You could argue that I don’t need that, because I’ve got Scatterthought. Maybe. But this site doesn’t make me feel important or special. And it certainly doesn’t make me feel like an expert on anything. You could argue that I’m an expert on Russell Patrick Wong, but I disagree. If anything, this site shows that I’m not an expert on myself…I’m always learning new things about the way I think and feel.

And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Speaking of Russell Wong…there are too many of us for my liking. And yes, I just changed topics on a dime.

There’s another one in Calgary, which I discovered because he also has a Petcetera membership. And there is, of course, the actor Russell Wong, who dominates a Google search while Scatterthought doesn’t show up for a loooong time.

I discovered the other day that Topher Grace (from “That 70’s Show”) is actually named “Christopher”, but didn’t like being called “Chris” as a kid. Understandable…there are a LOT of Chris’s out there. Anyway, he went with “Topher”, which has a neat sound (although a little too close to ‘gopher’ for my liking).

Unfortunately, I can’t go with “Sell” or even “Ssell”. Or “Ussell”, which is dumb. Suppose I could try on “Seller”, but I don’t sell anything. And no, I’m not going with ‘Rusty”. For an online name, I often use “Rustle”.

Years ago I discovered the Web site of Russil Wvong, and I assumed he was my evil twin. I never got an e-mail back from him, which confirmed that he is. At least his name stands out.

Guess I’ll stick with “Russell” and “Russ” for now. And I can’t really do anything about “Wong”.

Alright, that’s enough lounging around for the morning…time to end this long and rambling scatterthought and get out of bed.