Instant messaging is a whole new way of communicating, and the rules are still being defined. Even though I’ve been using mechanisms like ICQ since 1996, I still find myself carefully approaching boundaries I perceive and assume others are aware of.

I remember as a child being taught to answer the phone in our kitchen, it was rotary dial, white, and had a really long cord. When answering it, I had to say “ residence, this is Maigh” and if I didn’t, the privilege of being allowed to answer the phone was revoked.

The other rules that came with it are engrained in me now: you don’t call anyone after 9pm unless someone is in the hospital. You close the call with “good-bye”, you don’t answer call waiting if you’re on with your Grandmother.

The first time I slammed down the phone in a fit of anger, I broke it. It was an answering machine phone my mother had given me as a reward for something or another, maybe not changing my hair color that week or being sent to the principals’ office. Whatever it was, it felt good. I was 16 and full of rage. If the phone rang and you didn’t want to talk, you didn’t answer, no one knew you were really there with a pillow over your head or the phone in the freezer.

My friend Leah mentioned a great bit David Cross had about “looking at porn and having his mom IM him”.(see also: official site)

Seriously, technology has changed everything. You’ve heard it before, and it’s ridiculous how grossly incapable we are of understanding it.

Kids (and adults) can (and do) answer their cell phones in any way they choose at any time they deem appropriate. I’ve been greeted many times in ways that would be punishable in the homes of my youth. Hell, most of my communication anymore seems to be done in Instant Messaging.

Imagine it. The youth of today can crank IM each other then put a block on so their friends can’t retort. When I crank called, it was before caller ID (damn I’m old). Juveniles in soured relationships can just throw a block on their ex.

IM is a new ocean for exploration on our crazy planet, I’ll be out there splashing around in the waves Christopher Colombus-ing it…looking for the edges.

Terminally cool tool : Trillian

I love Mirriam-Webster on line.

Main Entry: lie
Function: verb
Inflected Form(s): lied; ly·ing /’lI-i[ng]/
Etymology: Middle English, from Old English lEogan; akin to Old High German liogan to lie, Old Church Slavonic lugati intransitive senses
1 : to make an untrue statement with intent to deceive
2 : to create a false or misleading impression
transitive senses : to bring about by telling lies
synonyms LIE, PREVARICATE, EQUIVOCATE, PALTER, FIB mean to tell an untruth. LIE is the blunt term, imputing dishonesty . PREVARICATE softens the bluntness of LIE by implying quibbling or confusing the issue . EQUIVOCATE implies using words having more than one sense so as to seem to say one thing but intend another . PALTER implies making unreliable statements of fact or intention or insincere promises . FIB applies to a telling of a trivial untruth .

Tell me you remember Garanimals. For me, it was the first time I was allowed to pick out my own clothes, and what an honor. You find a pair of pants with a zebra tag attached, then find a shirt with a zebra tag attached and VIOLA! Your clothes match! This is how I feel about J.Crew. Lots of solid patterns from coordinated color families means I don’t have to think. Grab pants, grab shirt…VIOLA! They match! Ahhh yes. J.Crew, the Garanimals for grown-ups.

Speaking of grown-ups, I twisted my ankle about two months ago and it still hurts to sit indian style (which I do a lot). Remember as children how you could all but remove your kneecap and all the flesh that protects it and while it would hurt and you might cry — you could carry on. Denim brushing against it wasn’t that big of a deal once it had scabbed up and soon you’d have forgotten your wound was even there. My question is this: along with becoming babies in our mid-life years (speak for myself, right?) are we also awarded more nerve endings? Doesn’t seem like this should still be bugging me. In my mind I’m still a teenager.

Changing the subject, if you have Sirius, check out my friend Alex’s show. M-F 9a to 12p (EST) on channel 143.

Out my window, I can see that someone tipped over a porta-potty. Hope nobody was in there. Man, I’d hate to be the guy that has to clean that thing up.

Has it occurred to anyone else that Doogie Howzer might be the grand-daddy of the blog? Sure, maybe he didn’t post his stuff, but he typed it and shared it with the viewing audience. Alright, well maybe he didn’t and it was really the writers and producers, but you get my point. Quit being so lippy.

Life imitates art, even when it’s tragic. Last night while watching Conspiracies on TechTV about the Illuminati, there was a commercial for some POS Mitsubishi which had an unfortunate resemblance to a recent event in Atlanta where some jagoff didn’t secure a dryer he was transporting in the back of his pickup. It subsequently flew out of the back of his pickup while traveling on the freeway killed a father of two. I’m not sure how I feel about that.

If you live in Atlanta, you owe it to yourself to go see The Atlanta Kookaburras play some Australian Rules Football. It’s like hockey with no skates, ice or pads. Just a bunch of guys beating the hell out of each other in the name of points. It’s SO on my radar.

In closing, I love The Roaming Gnome (watch the videos - bottom of the page). I am so enamored, in fact, that I mimicked this campaign during my own recent trip to my birthplace. I have a series of photos with Turtle…at the Golden Gate, the Palace of Fine Arts, Big Sur. Maybe I’ll share them. Maybe I won’t. You just never know with me. I’m crazy like that.

My desk, left side next to monitor.

I have returned.

A few thoughts.

First, 101 Reasons Why I’m a Vegetarian by Pamela Rice (big ol stinky .pdf, got bandwidth?).

Second, my recent trip to the land of my birth was greeted by a twist of fate that brought one of my oldest and dearest friends and I to the same place at the same time. Those moments with my Anam Cara was fleeting, but even in its brevity I was reminded of who I was once…and of who I can be. All this in a few stolen hours by she who witnessed my undoing and her mate who saw the Preistess.

Lastly, the Golden arms of my birth city, which quietly and without mercy embraces your soul.