Author: Aaron Weber

Not Even Inventions

Chindogu, or useless inventions, are only the beginning. Now there are Unnovations as well.

Might I also direct you to The Economist’s recent article on body hair, which begins:

AT THE back of a hairdresser’s shop, just off Piccadilly in London, an Irish beautician called Genevieve is explaining what a “Brazilian” is as she practises her art on your correspondent. A Brazilian strip, some are surprised to learn, is nothing to do with Latin American football. Between each excruciating rip, she explains that she is going to remove nearly all my pubic hair, except for a narrow vertical strip of hairs the width of a couple of fingers. This is known colloquially as the “landing strip”.

In only a few years, this form of waxing has gone from the esoteric to the everyday and is starting to rival the ordinary bikini wax in popularity. At the same time the bikini wax is becoming a normal procedure for women of all ages: the youngest person Genevieve has waxed is a 12-year-old girl. Women are styling their pubic hair into hearts, stars and arrows. It is one of the more notable developments in hairdressing since the permanent wave.

Your correspondent also notes that “The average American man spends about 33 days of his life removing facial hair.” I am SO getting permanent facial hair removal.

Like McSweeney’s, but Not Funny

I have been writing a letter in the tradition of open letters to people who are unlikely to respond, except not funny. I know that the McSweeney’s letters are the deadpan sort of humor that is often not funny, and that the letter I have written may be construed as funny, and may in fact be unintentionally hilarious, but my sincerity is almost real here, which is about as close as I get these days. The letter goes:

I know you blame yourself for Ettore’s death, but I do not blame you. I know you blame yourself because I blame myself. I was surprised by my feelings of guilt, even though I could have expected as much: after all, it’s in the insurance company’s pamphlet about dealing with the death of a loved one.

I haven’t heard from you, and I hope that’s not because you’re afraid I’ll blame you. I also hope it’s not because you never liked me all that much. I like to imagine that you are busy doing late-December tasks, that have thrown yourself into work and art as a way to cope, that you are finding your own ways to mourn.

I want to get beyond this writing of saccharine letters about forgiveness and growth. I want to stop waking up in the night thinking “goddamnit, he can’t be dead, I just spoke with him,” or “Monday I have to ask him about the product schedule,” or “I should lend him this album, he’ll totally love this. I want to stop wondering if I could have done something. If I had known, I would have acted, but I did not know. If you had known, you would have acted, but you did not know.

Fear, suspicion, and guilt cling to us, but they cannot help him and they cannot help us.

Also, I feel a need to confess that at the wake, when people asked me how I was, I kept wanting to point at the body and say “I’m doin’ better than he is!” The statement, while true, was nonetheless very, very inappropriate, and I feel bad for even thinking it.

Naming Objects

In the US, a the bucket where you throw refuse is called a trash can. In Britain, it’s typically called a dustbin or a bin. The US versions of Mac OS have a “Trash” folder where you put files you want to delete, and US versions of Windows use a “Recycle Bin.” However, British versions use “Wastebasket.” Nautilus follows that lead: “Trash” in the US English version, and “Wastebasket” in the British English version. Of course, this leads to anger on the part of those who feel that “Dustbin” or “Rubbish Bin” or “Bin.”

Within five minutes of this discussion beginning, it invariably goes beyond insulting Americans (everyone in the discussion agrees they can’t speak properly) to the various portions of the Commonwealth arguing over their respective dialects. I love watching people hash out colonial disputes that have been settled for generations.

Curiously, it’s mostly Australians and English people who do this– the Indian developers rarely get involved. For the most part, I think, Indian programmers are satisfied with the quality of the British translation and want to improve the quality of display for Hindi, Devangari, and so forth.

Sleep

I was up til 3 last night working. I’m still in my pajamas, and haven’t showered or brushed my teeth. It feels like 2001 or something.

I miss those days sometimes, the all-night excitement, the do-or-die “we need this file now, can you do this?” adventures. And it’s nice, from time to time, to have a night like that. But only occasionally. I can’t imagine how Nat feels, running at full speed all the time for the past… three, six, ten years?

I know he gets tired, but he seems to be invulnerable. Part of the aura of inevitability that creates success, I suppose. He’s an amazing person and I do not envy him his position: he works much, much harder than anyone else I know.

Prophylactic Values

“‘What we heard today‘” about over-the-counter emergency contraception “‘was frequently about individuals who did not want to take responsibility for their actions and wanted a medication to relieve those consequences,’ Dr. Hager said. He said he was worried in particular that it would encourage sexual activity among adolescents, who could just buy the drug on their own.”

So, in other words, Doctor Hager, you’re worried your daughter is a slut, and that eventually she’ll end up being arrested for encouraging masturbation.

Clever Spam

They’re getting clever, those spammers. After the five or six word pitch were the following words:, designed to fool my filters into thinking I’d been sent real text:

elegiac disneyland lucre fuchs committee ahead annulling hairpin obsess brain carrageen invincible allotropic barbell sieglinda brazen inconsiderate brinkmanship consonantal azure aluminate nee certain dedicate treat beehive clockwise striptease thule basophilic sycophant depict beat supine sculptural hour hydrochloric eel bloodstone execrate idiotic cleave tango correct elinor muslim mice

And so forth.