Saturday Night Tunage XIII : Friday Night Fish Fry!

Saturday Night Tunage, starring DJ Wonderduck, has returned!  "But DJ Wonderduck," I hear you saying, "it's not Saturday.  How can it be time for Saturday Night Tunage?"  Well, there's an interesting story behind that... originally, this series was to be on Friday, and be called "The Friday Night Fish Fry, with DJ Wonderduck."  Kinda like the title of this post, actually.

Okay, it wasn't that interesting of a story.  But it was a story, no way you can deny that!  Anyway!  You don't come to Saturday Night Tunage The Friday Night Fish Fry to hear stories, you come for the music... so let's get right to it!  And we've got a theme, to boot... Wonderduck goes to Minnesota!  And I swear that it's all true to the best of my memories.  The coincidences are firmly entrenched in my brain.

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Crowdsourcing

There are terms in this world that I really am not fond of.  For example, "drilling down" is one of them.  It's not good enough that we're discovering the sources of something, heavens no.  We have to drill down instead.  Corporate-speak in all its myriad forms is annoying to me to be honest, but "drilling down" just happened to be on my mind just now.  "Downsizing" and its more offensive derivative "rightsizing" are horrid enough to make my skin crawl.

Another of these cutesy fauxspeak words that's slowly crawled into the modern lexicon is "crowdsourcing".  Take any problem and send it out to the invisible masses on the far side of their computer monitors.  These masses will come back with possible solutions, perhaps quite ingenious ones.  Katawa Shoujo could sorta be considered a crowdsourced project, in a way.  The Oxford English Dictionary was, from the very start, crowdsourced.  I really don't like the term, but there you are. 

I recently stumbled over a great example of crowdsourcing, one that just couldn't occur at any time before now.

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Happy Leap Day!

In case you're wondering, the title of the post and the content don't, in point of fact, have anything to do with each other.  Why do you ask?

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Happy Fun Time!

As you may remember, the next step in my quest to become the Manager of the Duck U Bookstore was to have been an interview with my Regional Manager on Wednesday.  As one would expect, I was busy vacuuming the store Tuesday afternoon in preparation for his visit, not to mention obsessing over whether or not everything looked okay... "do I need to refold those t-shirts?  They aren't all positioned exactly in line with each other, though you'd likely need a laser micrometer to detect the variance..." and trying to figure out if I needed to purchase a new dress shirt for the interview when the RM walked in.

I believe I am rightfully proud that I did not, in fact, pee myself in surprise and fright.  My high-pitched keen of terror did cause every dog within a five-mile radius to come charging to the Duck U Bookstore, however.  Either oblivious to my state of wide-eyed shock and horror or too polite to notice (or enjoying it too much), he greeted me by saying "Okay, it's time for your interview."

I suddenly realized a number of things... first and foremost was that my socks were slightly askew on my feet.  I had a very minor headache.  The t-shirt I had under my polo was clinging to my torso a bit too much for comfort.  My mouth was dry.  I had left my glasses on the cash register so everything over eight feet away from my face was slightly out of focus.  Most importantly, I desperately wanted a cigarette, perhaps more than I ever had before in my life.  And then he said...

"Do you want the job?"

Still somewhat off-balance from his surprise appearance, I replied with "Um... yes?"

"Congratulations, you're the new Store Manager of the Duck U. Bookstore."

The more observant amongst you will realize that while this conversation took place on Tuesday, I'm telling you about it on what is Friday night as I type this.  You see, in the great world of biznez, nothing is official until there's much signing of paper.  Even for something as seemingly simple as hiring a store manager, whole rainforests must be denuded of trees, simply to make those who love nothing more than the act of filing happy.  As the RM had to be in Minnesota bright and early Wednesday morning, he could not stay to get the paperwork rolling, leaving it instead to the Home Office's HR department... normally a good decision, as they're all ace-nifty.  Unfortunately, the HR rep that interviewed me Monday morning did not get in touch with me before Duck U was closed for the day due to a water main break.  A big one.  That was next to a gas line.

So I didn't get to fax in the letter of acceptance until this morning.  But now I'm a Bookstore Manager again.  It didn't really sink in until I closed this evening...  standing there in the dark, the empty bookshelves looming over me: it's all mine.  For the past five years, I've told the various managers that "you're the boss, but this is my store."  And it's true, I really did feel that way.  Now I can honestly say that I'M the boss, and it really is my store.  I'm not currently in charge of anybody, since as of 2pm this afternoon I am the entire staff of the Duck U Bookstore, but that's a minor detail.

I couldn't be happier.  I already feel more relaxed than I have in months.

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Now It Can Be Told

You may remember that, a couple of weeks ago, I mentioned that things had gotten a little exciting at the Duck U Bookstore.  You may have noticed that, at the time, I didn't exactly go into much detail as to what was going on.  I'll put it this way: I've applied for an open store manager position. ("Oh, that's nice.")

At the Duck U Bookstore.

I had my first interview for the manager job today.  Since I didn't obviously pee it down my leg, I gather the second interview will be Wednesday. 

I suspect some of you are scratching your head, wondering just what's going on... and believe me, I understand.  The position was open in July, why didn't I apply then?  Well, that's an easy question to answer: I have the self-confidence of a spavined flea (and "spavin" is a word that just isn't used enough these days).  It wasn't until I successfully ran the store through Fall Rush, the busiest time of the school year, that I realized that I could actually do the job... and maybe even do it well, to boot.  Of course, by that time the open position had been filled.  Well, when it opened up again, I immediately got my application in... and here we are.  MUSIC BREAK!
Not only was Pink Floyd's A Momentary Lapse Of Reason an underappreciated album, but the live tour associated with it has what I consider the ultimate in concert lighting design.  The circle, surrounded by all those computer-controlled lights, is an absolutely brilliant concept, best shown by its use during the song One Of These Days.  When I was actively designing for the theatre and I hit a mental snag, I'd pull out the concert video and just watch the circle's antics.  It always got me unsnagged.

So back to the story.  I've been open-to-close ever since everything went down two weeks ago, because I'm the only person in the store with keys.  Or an alarm code.  Or access to the safe.  And the server.  And the ability to do payroll, receiving, shipping, you name it, I'm pretty much it.  So, yeah, a little worn out... but with the opportunity to become store manager of the Duck U Bookstore.  More news as it breaks.

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Saturday Night Tunage XII

On the border of music and madness, it's DJ Wonderduck back again to spin you the infamous Saturday Night Tunage!  It's been a few months since the last time we did this, so lets get right to it, shall we?  No theme this time around, just the music that's the backing track to the miniseries that is our lives. 

Wow, that wasunexpectedly kinda deep.  Wait, no, not deep... it was shallow, masquerading as deep, kinda like what passes for music these days.  Pop music and pop philosophy here on Saturday Night Tunage!  Next up, the latest hit by Kierkegaard and the Existentialists!

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Broadband Problems BAD!

I have spotty broadband coverage today, something about my signal strength being bad.  Hopefully it'll be fixed ASAP, but I may be not around for a day or two.  Don't Panic.

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Shameless Plug Time!

For many years, I've been on the case of the Official First Friend of The Pond, Vaucaunson's Duck, about his lack of blog, website, or other internet presence.  Y'see, if there's anybody out there for whom blogging was created, it would be Vauc.

For the same amount of years, he has protested my case-being-onning, saying that he fully intended to have a website, but there wasn't going to be any of that "under construction" stuff going on.  He also wanted to find the right hosting service.  Knowing that Big Papa Pixy hizownbadself is a kind and generous tyrant despot dictator Australian ruler of all MuMeeNuVia, I offered to find out for Vauc what he'd be willing to do, but my old friend declined the offer.  *shrug* 

So on and on it went, me ribbing Vauc, Vauc saying "it'll happen, it'll happen."  Well, I'm happy to announce that it has, in fact, happened.  Now to be honest, Vauc's site is a little... well, niche.  I mean, you've got websites that are rather specialized out there (case in point: Combined Fleet).  You've got websites that are devoted to single topics (for example, the lamented Fire Joe Morgan).  And then you've got what Vauc's website is about: chickens.

Well, poultry.  Well, poultry as covered by a small New York publishing firm in the early-to-mid 1900s.  Well, poultry, a small New York publishing firm in the early-to-mid 1900s, and the town it was located in.  As strange as all that may sound, The Van Hoesen Press is honestly quite intriguing.  If you're like me, and god help you if you are, you find learning about stuff you know nothing about to be fascinating and endlessly entertaining.  Here's your chance to be entertained!  I invite my readers to give the place a look-see.  It's actually something of a family history project for Vauc, as Roy Van Hoesen was his Great-Grandfather.

As the website just went live a few days ago, if nothing else we can give it a mini-stress-test... a Duckalanche, if you will.  And, heck, where else would you discover that there was once a periodical entitled "The Bacon Hog Quarterly"?

Posted by: Wonderduck at 09:39 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Yay For Kidney Stones!

I've passed thirteen kidney stones in my life.  They hurt like nothing I've ever experienced before or since.  I am probably the last person to celebrate a diagnosis of kidney stones.

Except when the other option was cancer.

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Grumblerumblerazzin'frazzin'...

Oh yeah, I'm lovin' life right now, and I'm NOT in a good mood.

As the Regional Manager said the other day, "when things go south, it's Wonderduck who suffers."  For at least the rest of the week, I'll be running the Duck U Bookstore.  For at least the rest of the week, I'm also the entire staff of the Duck U Bookstore.  That's right, I'm open to close, alone, all day every day.  On one hand, yay overtime.  On the other hand, boo working myself into the ground.  On the gripping hand, kill me.

"But Wonderduck," I hear you say, which is impressive because I'm blasting a track by Galynerus at about 25% volume, which is loud enough to shake ducks off my two computer hutches, and couldn't actually hear anybody unless they were yelling in my ear... in fact, here, join me, won't you?
"But Wonderduck," I hear you say, "at least the textbook rush is over, right?"  Yep, it's over all right... which means it's time to send books back to their publishers.  Hundreds of books.  Thousands of pounds of books.  Alone.  Oh my achin' back.  Oh, and let's not forget the complaining customers... "no, you can't return the lab manual you've torn 12 pages out of... please stop swearing at me, miss."

I haven't watched any anime in over a week, and that was just a single episode of Bodacious Space Pirates.  So here's what I'm going to do: I'm going to go watch some anime and the Williams F1 Pr0n can bugger off until I feel like doing it (tomorrow or whenever).  Meanwhile, you folks have a whole comments section to play around in until I get back.  Have fun, don't make a mess.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 08:10 PM | Comments (12) | Add Comment
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There Is Justice In The World

It's no secret to readers of The Pond that I am a fan of the Chicago Cubs.  By extension, therefore, I am a detractor of the St Louis Cardinals.  It's as natural as breathing, which Cardinals fans tend to do through their mouth.  One cannot be a Cubs fan without hating the Cardinals.  I assume Cardinals fans feel the same way about the Cubs, though to be honest I've never met one articulate enough to voice such things.  But I digress.  Last season, the Cardinals won the World Series, and it would be churlish of me to not congratulate them on having done so.  One of the heroes of their run was Skip Schumaker, a 31 year old utility player who still goes by the nickname "Skip."  Schumaker, whose name bears a startling resemblance to that of Mercedes F1 driver Slappy Schumacher, was at bat in Game 4 of the NL Divisional Series against the Phillies when a panicked and frightened grey squirrel dashed across home plate.

Unsurprisingly, St Louis went completely gaga for the squirrel, nicknaming it "The Rally Squirrel" and practically deifying the rodent.  T-shirts, songs, plushies, you name it, the Cardinals milked it for all it was worth.  Never mind that they had a good team on a hot run, The Rally Squirrel was the MVP.

Today, Topps Inc released an image of Skip Schumaker's 2012 baseball card.

As with most people involved with the St Louis Cardinals, Schumaker has zero sense of humor.  "I'm not frustrated, I just think people are going to look at it and laugh and that's ridiculous," said the 31-year old who still goes by Skip.  "I don't care about what I look like or anything but it's literally just a squirrel that has nothing to do with me.  It's not disappointing, it's just ridiculous"

You just won the World Series, Skippy.  Lighten up a bit, particularly since it's a limited edition card that will be replaced with a regular one in a short while.  It's funny... get over yourself.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 08:46 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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OV-099

Seventeen years and one day after the tragedy of Apollo 1, the American space program lost another crew.

The story of the Challenger disaster and the associated fallout has been often told, and I won't repeat it here.  What I do want to mention is that I'm one of those few people who was actually watching the launch live on CNN when everything went pear-shaped.  The three major networks were showing normal programming; Space Shuttle launches had already become old hat by 1986.  To CNN, then only six years old and not the monolithic success it is now, launches were still important news. 

And to a young Wonderduck, they were all fascinating.  That I had the flu, or something flu-like, was only a minor impediment.  I had stayed home from school and was sacked out on the couch, covered with a couple of blankets, as I watched the whole terrible event live.  Some say that the loss of the Challenger was my generation's Kennedy Assassination.  I suppose that's so.  It certainly changed me.

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AS-204

45 years ago today, the US space program suffered the first fatalities of its history.  Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee died during a routine training mission when their Apollo capsule caught fire.  The conflagration was aided by a 100% oxygen atmosphere in the capsule.  A single ignition source was unable to be found.  A study did find, however, that the standard nylon astronaut pressure suit of the time could generate enough static electricity to create a spark just from regular movement in the capsule's flight seats.

Their mission was officially designated Apollo-Saturn 204, or AS-204, until April 24, 1967.  At that time, NASA retired the name Apollo 1 in their honor.

Sadly, they would not be the last to die in mankind's quest for space.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 09:47 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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From Daylight to Warbonnets

A lot of railfans love the locomotives.  They like being able to look at these huge pieces of machinery and be able to rattle off statistics about how much horsepower it has, or how much it can pull, or how many of them there are, or whatever.  And who can blame 'em?  One of the (few) things I appreciate about diesels is that the railroads realized that they could be painted in company colors... and so they were.  And what colors!  Everywhere you went, the most boring of engines could be made interesting by the various liveries.  For example, as a young duckling here in Northern Illinois, one of the most common railroad lines to see was the Chicago Central, a junior member of the Illinois Central company.  They ran from Chicago to Iowa with a spur going north to Albert Lea, MN... a more boring trackmap would be difficult to find.  But then you saw the locomotives.

Cardinal and White, and they look glorious.  I don't even know if the company is around anymore or if they were om nom nommed by CN when they took the Illinois Central, but I still remember the plain but beautiful look of the engines.

But that's just the tip of the iceberg.  Let's take a look at some of the better known and beautiful liveries throughout rail history, shall we?

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But Wait, There's MORE!

Dragging my food-poisoned butt to the car this morning, I breathed in the refreshingly cold air.  When it's  12° with no wind to speak of and the sun shining, it's actually rather pleasant assuming you're dressed correctly.  Got in the DuckMobile and she started right up, no problems!  I let her warm up for a couple of minutes as I caught my breath (I'm still kinda shaky after the events of yesterday), then headed off to work.

As I pulled into the main lot at Duck U, the DuckMobile suddenly started to jerk and, well, chug, particularly at low RPMs.  Rubbawhut?  I pulled into a spot, shut her down, went into the Duck U Bookstore and immediately called Ricotta's Automotive, official mechanic of The Pond. 

A few hours later, the owner hisownbadself calls.  "Well, you've got an ignition problem; there was an oil leak into the distributor.  When I called Toyota, parts would be $1000 and take 3-5 days for shipping."  *pause* "Then I called a local parts guy, he's got a new one for $400 and it'll be here on Friday.  The only difference is that it doesn't say Toyota on it.  Oh, and it'll void the warranty."

Cue peals of laughter; the DuckMobile first took to the roads in 1996.  She'll be repaired Friday afternoon, probably.  Weather permitting.

Food poisoning and car problems; two lousy tastes that really suck together.

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Food Poisoning

Tuesday night I had soup and sandwich for dinner.  Around midnight, I started getting stomach cramps... and then all hell broke loose.  For the next 15 hours, my life consisted of the bathroom and my bedroom, trying to get some sleep.

After she got out of the library, The Librarian brought over more bottled water, some gatorade and most importantly, pepto-bismol.  By 7pm I was feeling better.  By 8pm I was able to get up the energy to turn on the computer and chat with Brickmuppet, who'd gone through the same thing recently.

I finally managed to fall asleep at 10pm.  I'm still weak and shaky, but things are pretty much done, I think.

I don't recommend the experience.

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Ph.Duck, re: Our Lunchtime Conversation...

...Albert Einstein was born in 1879, Adrian Sutil still has not found a drive, and here's the Wikipedia entry for "visual novels" (per our discussion of Katawa Shoujo).  Not re: our lunchtime conversation, over at FARK, someone photoshopped a picture of Rumpole!

Pretty darn cool, eh?  Not that he was ever that energetic, but it's a neat bit of art.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 09:27 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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Preach It, Sister...

I feel much the same way right now.  Tuesday is the start of Spring Rush, yet we're already stupid-busy at the Duck U Bookstore.  Part of that can be marked down to being a smidge shorthanded, but it really does seem like we've gotten more customers through our doors of late.  But there's a deeper, darker thing going on as well.  My knees are killing me.  Last Wednesday both of them hurt badly enough to make me weep when I got home.  Unfortunately, there's no position that I've found that makes them not hurt, just some that hurt less.  That'll make Rush Week particularly spicy! 

As you can guess from the picture above, I'm still playing Katawa Shoujo.  I've finished two paths, just stumbled into a third, and have the instructions on how to get into a fourth sitting here next to me.  Based on the two routes I've completed, I'll temper my excitement for the game a bit.  It's no longer "brilliant", just merely very very good indeed.  However, considering that it's an independently produced game made by a collection of amateurs working for free and released for the price of nothing, it's really quite astounding.

On a different note, I've now gone well over a month without a cigarette.  I think I'm handling it fairly well... I only occasionally want to massacre entire villages with my bare hands and drink the blood of my victims.

My ALCO PA post seems to have nudged my "I trains" button again.  Here's the image I'm currently using as my computer's wallpaper:

Inside a Chicago & Northwestern roundhouse, circa 1942.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 11:18 PM | Comments (11) | Add Comment
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What Could Pull Wonderduck Away From Skyrim?

I really didn't think it was possible, but I've actually not played Skyrim for the past four days.  I've been busy cheating on it playing a different game.  It doesn't look anywhere near as good as the latest entry in The Elder Scrolls series.  It doesn't get the adrenaline pumping nearly as much as a dragon swooping down on you.  There's no fireballs flying around the screen, no flashing swords, no murky dungeons or scary monsters.  But still and all, I have had my entire gaming time consumed utterly and completely by this markedly low-rent game... perhaps because I've been waiting for nearly three years for it to come out.  And what, you may ask, is this true paragon of gaming virtue?

It's been released... and it's brilliant.  I reviewed the demo here, and none of Act I has changed... except that they've regraphicalized Emi, for the better might I add.

A review of the full game will be forthcoming... as soon as I get another path or two under my belt.  I've only done one so far, and while initial signs are positive ("...and it's brilliant."), I've seen some thought that the route I've played was the best of the bunch.  We'll see.  In the meantime, if you're interested the full game can be located for free torrent-based download right here.  No matter what, it's already a remarkable achievement, one that was five years in the making: a complete and total ren'ai game, in English, that's at least as good as any Japanese ones I've played.

UPDATE: Brickmuppet and I get all recursive and stuff.

Posted by: Wonderduck at 09:04 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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The "Acceptable" Diesel

I'm a railfan.  Not a particularly well-educated one, I'll admit, but I have a huge soft spot (my noggin, most like) for trains.  Like many uneducated but well-meaning rail buffs, I miss the steam era though it was already over before I came around.  I also think that diesel locomotives all look the same and are boring as heck because of it.  Yeah, like nobody has ever said that before, right?  Even the cutesy nicknames given some of the diesel trains of today don't help: "Jeeps" and "Torpedo boats", feh.  No, there's no way a diesel-electric engine can be as interesting as even the most humble of steam trains.  One of the best moments of my life was riding on top of the coal tender of a steam loco at the Illinois Railway Museum whilst Larry, the husband of my cousin, played engineer for a time.  Sure, once I took my glasses off I looked like a negative raccoon, and I stank of smoke like I'd just walked out of the Towering Inferno, but it was a wonderous experience, one that's long gone.  For that alone, I feel like all diesel locos are evil.

Except for one.

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