Monday, November 25, 2013

3804 Google wants your DNA, too?

Monday, November 25, 2013

Remember when I wondered if Google was getting too big, and too inquisitive?  

Now, does Google want your DNA?  Do you realize how much that test would cost if it weren't subsidized?  Why would anyone want to subsidize it?

I don't like the answer.
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3803 I never got my penny

Monday, November 25, 2013

There's a huge world-wide Secret Santa network being set up through Reddit:  http://redditgifts.com/about/.

I guess I'm a cynic, because I don't believe it at all.  I don't believe the numbers of people, I don't believe the numbers of countries, and I especially don't believe that everyone will actually send decent gifts.  I do, however, believe that this is one heck of an idea for gathering names and addresses, AND interests!  Google ain't got nuttin on Reddit!

Back in the olden days of pen pals and love letters, there was something called a chain letter.  You'd get a letter with a list of the names and addresses of five people.  You were to send some token, like a penny or a postcard to the top name on the list, then make five copies of the letter with the top name/address removed and your name and address added to the bottom, and send it to five new people.  In theory, each person would receive over 3,000 pennies.

I always always always sent a penny to the top name.  Always.  And since I had no allowance and felt so poor, I made ten copies of the letter (handwritten, of course, we're talking about the late '50s) and used my mother's stamps to mail them, hoping that I would get over 6,000 pennies back.

I never got a single penny or postcard.  Never.  Not one.  No one I ever asked ever got a penny.  The only people in the entire world who ever got a penny were, apparently, the ones I sent pennies to.

Way to feel like a patsy.  Maybe this is what contributes to my cynicism.

...and then there were the kids who bragged that they didn't add their name to the end - they jumped the line and added themselves to the top, so they'd get pennies sooner.  They didn't see the hole in that, no matter how many times I tried to explain it.
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Sunday, November 24, 2013

3802 Toe

Sunday, November 24, 2013

I've done something to my toe.

There's a raised marble threshold at the bathroom door, and yesterday morning, walking into the bathroom in bare feet, I stubbed my index/second toe on my left foot on the marble.  The kind of stub where the toe folds under itself.

It hurt really badly.  I said some naughty words.  But then after a few minutes it stopped hurting.  I fiddled with it and it didn't seem broken or anything serious.

By late afternoon there was a red bar across the toe a bit above the base of the toenail, at that last joint.  But it didn't hurt at all and there was no swelling. 

Flashes of brief but intense pain woke me this morning.

It's driving me crazy now.  NOT because of the pain - there isn't any pain unless I move it a certain way.  The crazifying thing is that I can't figure out what that certain way IS, so I can stop moving it that way.

 I can tweak it with my fingers, I can bend it up, bend it down, use it to grip and lift the front of the sandals, everything, with no pain.  As long as I'm sitting there's no pain.  But I can't walk without random electric shocks and sudden hit-my-toe-with-a-hammer surprises. (My kitchen is three yelps wide.)  I'm not worried about it, just annoyed that I can't figure out what not to do, to keep it from biting me and let it heal.

Phooey.

Well, I don't think I would have been going anywhere today anyway.  It's 26 degrees F out there, and very windy.
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