Outsmarted

So there I was, having made it home from work in one piece, the shopping had been done and all was set for an evening of relaxation with the missus and our absolutely gorgeous three-months old twins. Little did I know what fate, by means of my better half, had in store for me.

First things first: a little more than three months ago the missus gave birth to twins - a boy and a girl - and since then our lives have revolved around a steady routine of diaper changes, baby baths and feedings. That's not to say it isn't enjoyable, it's just routine, but it has no real bearing on my anecdote for today - I just mentioned it to get a little backstory in place.

Yesterday was no different at first. I came home, and found the twins gesturing enthusiastically for cuddles and food, but first their diapers had to be changed for new ones. The mechanics and logistics of this is certainly not a problem, though at times it might involve highly unpleasant smells and sights. Still, there are worse things, right? Anyway, the missus took hold of the boy and went to sort him out with fresh clothes and a clean diaper. After a couple of minutes she returned with a happy grin all over her face, and she proclaimed with loving enthusiasm that "Great! His poo has taken on a lovely consistency similar to toothpaste, and now it has turned brightly yellow!" She was bordering on ecstatic ... because of the consistency and colour of poo.

Okay, so the little guy has had some stomach issues the past couple of weeks, and it's good to know that he is on the mend, but damn! There's only one poo story I've ever enjoyed, and I'm really not all that interested in neither consistency nor colour. Frankly I find it somewhat unpleasant to talk about poo, stool, feces or just plain shit. But I've got to laugh though, because until the twins were born, so did the missus.

Now for the second bit of my anecdote.
The twins have grown, and while we up until yesterday has had them sleeping together for comfort and warmth, they have now gotten too big for this to be practical in their cots. So, we had to rearrange their beds and sleeping stations by installing separate beds for the twins in our bedroom, and the cot that used to sit in our livingroom then had to be replaced with a "travel cot" we had stuffed into a closet. So far so good, but then it was up to me to get the bed out and mounted in our livingroom.

So I fetched the package-of-bed from the closet and carried it with me to the livingroom. When packaged it is stuffed into a bag roughly the same size as any other travellers bag. However, when I pulled it from the bag, this is what I was presented with:

Trust me when I say that this is a contraption of pure evil, and if I ever were to meet the engineer responsible for constructing or designing it, we shall have words! Words I say!

I take a certain amount of pride in the fact that I am able to take apart and reassemble pretty much anything, but this thing is simply beyond the scopes of reason, logic and normal mechanics. In order to make it take on it's intended bed-like shape you'd have to grab the long bars by the center and then pull upwards rapidly until they snap into place. Well, I pulled and I pulled and I pulled, but nah ... no snapping shut. Instead it managed to land on my foot which today is swollen and tender (that pic is not my foot by the way, but it serves its purpose of illustration).

Eventually I decided to try to outsmart it. So I gently grabbed the long side bars by the center and tried coaxing them together, and what do you know? Suddenly I managed to get one of the long bars locked, and then the other one. However, by this time the cot had seen through my ruse, and as I moved on to try to get the short bars locked, no amount of pulling, twisting, prying, bending or cursing would achieve anything other than unlocking one of the long bars again.

In the end I managed to get the long bars locked again, and left it with short bars unlocked. It's not entirely upright, but it can contain the twins until my next attempt. I'll be damned before I let a simple travellers cot defeat me, so I've got a sort of cold war going between me and the cot. Let's see who's the patient one.

The internet is terrific

I see the internet as being quite possibly the greatest research tool ever invented, but then again, at other times what can be found out there just helps strip away hopes and dreams for the future of mankind.
While browsing randomly I came across this little nugget of brilliance (see the first post in this link):

http://www.gaiaonline.com/forum/morality-and-religion/evloution-and-science/t.39496627/

I'll even quote it here for simplicity:

"For those of you who believe in evolution, how does it explain gravity? The theory of relativity? The planets? The solar system? Oh and this time guys...try putting references in your replies...no references, no replies."

I understand the fact that different people possess different levels of personal knowledge, but honestly; how can anyone be this ignorant of the theories of evolution, relativity and stellar dynamics in this day and age? This person effectively rapes fifth-grade science and has the gall to demand references while not providing some herself. And while I know it is tempting to call Poe's law on this one, I doubt it would be correct after reading the quoted thread in it's entirety.

Pet peeve of the day

People who don't indicate, or people who indicate inappropriately.

I understand that road traffic laws vary throughout the world, but common to them all is that there is a given set of rules and regulations that each and every driver are required to conform to. All of these "rules of the road" as it were, have been put in place in order to a) help facilitate the flow of traffic, and b) to aid in keeping you and those around you safe. Even so there is a frightening number of drivers out there who seem to think that these rules do not apply to them, that somehow they have transcended the need for earthly guidance and that the network of roads, streets and highways must have been built for them alone.

For this post, I will talk about indicators and the fact that people are apparently either a) unable to operate them, or b) unaware of their existence. There is a third alternative, but let's look at these two first. If people were indeed unable to operate the lever that toggles their indicators on I don't believe they could possess the mental faculties necessary to pass the tests to obtain their licenses, so let's assume that it's not "a". However, if they are unaware of their existence another problem becomes apparent; road traffic laws clearly state that all vehicles must be equipped with indicators, and that their use is mandatory in certain situations (changing lanes, getting off on a sideroad, exiting a roundabout and so on). So, every person to take a driver's course are informed about this to great length, and failure to obey these rules will result in a failed attempt at passing the tests. So, clearly the third alternative must be the answer; people can simply not be bothered, or they just don't care about anybody else in traffic as long as they get to wherever they are going.

And then there are those who use their indicators, but use them inappropriately so that their use is irrelevant and might as well be omitted. Many drivers seem to think that turning their indicators on as an afterthought while being well into their turn, or at the same time as they are starting their turn is sufficient. Both are clearly wrong, and neither is helpful to those around you. The correct and proper use of indicators would be to turn them on before you plan to make your turn - ideally three seconds ahead of the turn. This serves a few important functions; among which are: a) it will inform those on the road around you that you're planning to make a turn, and in which direction you plan to go, b) it allows those around you to adapt and react to the maneuvers you're going to make, and c) it might allow those ahead of you to get onto the road if you're getting off onto a sideroad for instance. C is particularly helpful in roundabouts.

Why do some drivers find it so hard to uphold a few simple and sensible rules put in place to aid and protect every person moving about in traffic?

Bring out the welcoming committee

Roll out the red carpet, sound the fanfare and let loose the doves for I have arrived at the blog scene. After having debated (mostly internally) for a long time whether or not I felt the desire to further contribute to clog up the tubes with yet another blog of inane ramblings about my cats, rampant homophobia or last tuesday's bout of flatulence, I finally succumbed. There are millions of blogs available today, and while most struggle to justify their own existence, or seem to revel in being unnecessary, there are some that are good, and a few that are great (and even some that are just plain ridiculous). And though I realise that the chances of me turning up another great one - particularly when considering certain recent life changing events along with my daily schedule - are slim, my ambitious nature in the end convinced me that I just might be able to churn out a product that might at least be considered interesting.

I have never been a person who wrote journals or diaries, and the idea of doing so seems to me to be somewhat redundant at best. Yet even so, I do find the idea of recording important or interesting events for posterity to be valuable, and that's the general idea behind my final decision to join the blogs. However, I can not promise daily updates because, frankly, my life is not that interesting, and I feel no desire to bother my potential audience with details of my chosen meal for lunch, or that troublesome nasal hair I found while getting ready to leave for work. The updates will come whenever I feel I have something interesting to share, when I have found something worthy of commenting upon or whenever I do something which I consider fun and which others might consider entertaining as well.

As the geek that I am I am passionately interested in technology and various sciences, and this blog will obviously also reflect this. I will, for instance, be writing posts about my various projects and experiments which will be carried out, almost always to the amusement of my better half. However, as my, at the time of writing this, three months old twins can attest to, time is at a premium these days, but even so I hope to find the oportunities to carry out my projects. One project in particular, one that to a large degree finally made me decide to start a blog, will be documented. I will be building my own "ultimate machine" inspired by one that I stumbled upon while browsing, and this will of course be documented to a certain extent.

My countrymen will probably wonder why I chose to write this in english, so I will try my best to explain it to them. Let's see; there are soon to be 7 billion people on the planet, and it is estimated that out of those a grand total of 500 million to 1.8 billion people in the world speak english as their first, or second language. How many people fluent in norwegian are there? Approximately 5 million. You do the math. Oh, and yes; I did use wikipedia there; I find it useful - at least as a starting point for further research. However, if I find the time or the will, I might at some point do a translated version for my potential norwegian readers.

So what else is there to say at this time? Well, while I cannot make any promises with regard to the frequency of my postings, I promise to always check my spelling and my grammar to the best of my abilities, and I will provide sources and citations whenever I feel they are appropriate or required. I will not moderate the comments to my posts unless their spelling and grammar are atrocious to the point of making me want to kill puppies.

By the way; I don't have any cats, and last tuesday was flatulence free.