True Blood has been pretty damn awful so far this season, and now I think I know why.

The scene is set with four characters in the kitchen. It opens with one character on the phone, saying she’s looking for a part for a busted water heater; a second character is then shown futzing angrily with said water heater. The other two characters are relaxed around the kitchen table. Dialogue ensues between the first two characters, suggesting that the broken water heater is stressifying the household. Not terrible so far, but then the two characters at table start talking.

BOY: “How’s your coffee?”
GIRL: “Hmph. Colder than that ridiculous excuse for a shower.”

Implying, you see, that the broken water heater has caused coldness in the showers and the…coffee. Because people have coffee taps on their sinks.

This season’s True Blood writers are clearly alien visitors who were supposed to be observing humans but got distracted by shiny things, spliffs, and porn. Explains a lot, really.

My playlist, she kept jumping around at random. It was shuffling, and I didn’t want it to shuffle, not at all. I tapped the twisted-arrow shuffle icon, and it only jumped to yet another random song. I tried digging in the Settings, which is where this would’ve been resolved in non-Touch iPods; no joy. I was all, “Grr!”

So I hit the internets, googling ipod touch stuck on shuffle. That’s not exactly what I’d set out to type, but it’s what Google gave as an autocomplete; that should tell you, even if you don’t click through, that I’m not the only one having this problem.

Turns out the solution is simple but damnably non-intuitive. You have to click on the large icon representing the album for the song currently playing, which changes the little icon bar at the top of the screen. That replaces the twisty-arrow that means “shuffle to a random song” with the identical twisty-arrow that means “shuffle this playlist”.

Boo.

From the New York Times:

ACCORDING to a survey of 4,000 people who bought tickets to the new “Potter� movie through Fandango, the online ticket service, 45 percent were 18 to 30 years old, compared with 15 percent under 17.

How many kids 16 and under have credit or debit cards?

…then, by definition, you don’t know how to use that system effectively. Accept it, and act like it.

Here’s how a good three quarters of my phone transactions go:

ME: OK, do [STEP 1]
USER: …
M: Did you [STEP 1]?
U: Huh? Yeah, of course.
M:Right. Now, do [STEP 2].
U: …
M: Let me know when you’ve [STEP 2].
U: Yeah, OK, I did it.
M: Great! Now, let’s [STEP 3]
U: What? I don’t see how to do that.
M: OK, do you see [excruciatingly detailed description of what to look for to initiate STEP 3…think using the VERBOSE command in an old Infocom game].
U: No, I’m not seeing that at all.
M: Could you describe what you see on the screen?
U: Yeah, it’s [description of what you’d see if you’d done STEP 3, jumped into STEP 4 before my prompt, and then veered off into the STEP EPSILON that I was trying to help you avoid]
M: OK, let’s back up to [STEP 3]
U: (irate) That’s what I did.
M: I know, but I need to follow along with you on my screen to make sure we’re doing the same thing.
U: grumble
M: Now [STEP 4]
U: I know that.
M: Now, do you see [prompt for STEP 5]?
U: Oh! OK, I get it now.

click, dial tone.

It’s actually more frustrating in person, because they’ll keep telling you “But I already did that!” And then you do what they told you they already did, and you get exactly what they were looking for, and they never quite realize that what they’d done wasn’t actually what they think they did.

(And then they go on, like, Slashdot and complain about how the helpdesk insists on walking them through the procedure in insulting little baby steps, never comprehending that the baby steps are necessary in order for us to figure out exactly where theyfucked up. Yes, the interface is consistent, but what you do with that interface varies depending on what you’ve just done and where you want to go. I have to follow along with you in exacting detail because I don’t know exactly what each step will be to resolve your particular query. And, by dint of the fact that you called me, you don’t either.)

(And, yes, a lot of this arises from the fact that the interfaces suck. They could be greatly improved, I won’t argue that, but a nontrivial amount of suckage is built into the system because we are forced to provide a single tool that will perform multiple dissimilar functions and which will be used by groups with vastly different levels of sophistication. Le sigh.)

Reading Phil Nugent’s tribute to Casey Kasem, I found the following line:

[Regarding B-movie director] Coleman Francis, who made the movies that Ben Grimm would have made had he been forced to make movies as a front for a border coyote operation.

I have no idea what that line might mean. What would Ben Grimm’s movies be like? What are the characteristics of movies made as a front for border coyote operations, regardless of the filmmakers? It’s evocative imagery, but damned if I know what it evokes. And I love it!

All job applications in the uni system must be filed electronically, and HR has no public-facing terminals for applicants to use. That seems both short-sighted and arrogant of them, but whatever. They send their computerless applicants our way, as we have a bank of computers for community users.

A good while back, an applicant came in and signed up for computer time. A few minutes into her session, she called me over because she couldn’t figure out how to get into her email. A bit after that I was flagged again–she was having trouble navigating the HR site. Soon after that I was with her again, as she had difficulty understanding the (not at all unusual) form. I decided at that point it would be best for both of us if I just hovered until she was finished; she seemed grateful.

I held her hand through the initial process of creating a personal account. There were lots of hiccups, but finally we got her set up and were ready to choose the actual position she wanted to apply for.

She wanted to be someone’s executive assistant. Sigh.

This will be tl;dr. Just saying.

1. You Suck at Craigslist is a fun blog that reposts total-FAIL ads from, well, Craigslist. An entry from today, may have accidentally crossed the line: In the comments, it’s revealed that the author of the ad is a known quantity, a high-functioning autistic who has been the victim of an ongoing campaign by Encyclopedia Dramatica trolls.[1]

   Like many people who become troll bait[2], the person in question is an attention whore who doesn’t recognize the limitations of his talents or the magnitude of his social ineptitude; he also seems to be a genuinely unpleasant person. Unlike (probably) most of those people, this guy has a compelling reason for his behavior: he is, as I said, a high-functioning autistic. Even many of the ED trolls apparently realized it wasn’t on to pick on someone who probably shouldn’t be held entirely accountable for his unusual behavior; the wiki linked above is a spin-off from ED, maintained by the people more devoted to trolliery than human compassion.

   I feel dirty reading the entries, but I keep going. It’s fascinating to see the cruelties visited upon the man, and it’s also fascinating to see the behavior exhibited by the man himself. As a couple of articles have mentioned, he could easily pass as a master fame-whore troll[3] himself if his history as a real person with those attributes weren’t externally verified.

   That last sentence is a little confusing. Imagine watching a movie like Borat or Bruno and then discovering that the titular character was, in fact, not a character at all but a real person exhibiting his real personality without guile or exaggeration. It’s like driving across an ontological pothole.[4]

   OK, anyway. It’s definitely wrong to commit acts of trollery on unconsenting individuals.[5,6] It’s also certainly wrong to document that trollery on a public website. Further, I’m pretty sure it’s wrong for me to spend my evening reading that website; I’m afraid that, had I lived in Victorian London, I might have joyfully spent an occasional evening at the bear-bating pits. This realization is neither pleasant nor, sadly, surprising.[7]

2. In last year’s New York Times article on trolls, one of the alleged Master Trolls defended his actions by claiming he was trying to teach people a lesson, to help them mend the error of their innocent, trusting ways through a sort of tough love. I didn’t, and don’t, buy that justification.

   But check this page. This Vivian Gee person began as just another troll, but over time she pretty much broke character entirely and began giving the subject much-need (and wholly ignored) advice. It seems she really did, at least eventually, want the guy to realize why he was putting real-life people off, why he so frequently fell for trolls’ scams, and what he could do to achieve some of the happiness he desires.

   I’m fascinated by the arc of Vivian Gee. Was the hope to “fix” the guy really there from the beginning, only expressed in a hurtful, malicious manner? Or did she mature over time, grow some empathy? Were her later emails motivated more by genuine concern or by a desire to repent?

3. The subject of these trolls is a genuinely unlikable person who engages in bizarre behavior. He also appears to be an attention whore; he came to the trolls’ attention through self-promotion of his horrible webcomic and through the jaw-dropping videos he posts of himself saying and doing…unfortunate things.

   But, as I said, he’s not neurotypical. He’s autistic, high functioning but still qualified for monthly disability checks. Even many of the people who live for the lulz realize this should put him off limits.

   But that raises some interesting questions. Many trolls realize a line should be drawn, but how do we determine that line? When I say “we”, I really am including most of us; those of us who try to be (or even are) good people realize we shouldn’t mock anybody; even when we’re not making fun, though, we probably try to avoid people who are assholes, those who make us uncomfortable, or even those who are excessively annoying.

   We know there are neuro- and other conditions that predispose people toward atypical behavior, and which in some cases make unpleasantly atypical behavior unavoidable on the condition-holder’s part. We might decide to put up with the foul mouth of a person with Tourette’s, but what if the person with Tourette’s tends to blurt out horrible racist, sexist, or homophobic things? Is there, or can there be, a bright line when deciding whether we’re justified in excluding someone from our lives?

   How about this: do we, should we react differently to a person who just happens to be an asshole and someone who is congenitally an asshole? A more philosophically aware person might make some reference to p-zombies here; a pretentious dick whose dickishness may or may not be involuntary would instead make reference to making reference to p-zombies and would then try to deflect the dickishness through a convolutedly self-aware statement.[8]

[1] That’s what I gathered, anyway. I didn’t realize Encyclopedia Dramatica spawned its own trolls; I’d instead taken them to be compiling the unofficial chronicles of the /b/tards. Of course I realized that there would be overlap between the groups; I just didn’t realize that there were also EDists who act independently.

[2] Not all, of course, or even most. Just many.

[3] I tried to clarify this in the next sentence, but I feel like there needs to be a standard term for people who act like Sacha Baron Cohen or Andy Kaufman but who lack the raw talent or (alleged) piercing social insight.

[4] Driving into? Driving across? Driving through? Exactly how does one drive in relation to a pothole?

[5] I can conceive of consenting troll victims, a community of people who believe its OK to troll among themselves. It would be like playing spontaneous little ARGs.

[6] One could also consider the acts of flash mobs to be a sort of pleasant trollery; the non-participants involved would by definition be unconsenting, but I don’t think there’s any harm done. I’d give the mobbers an ethical pass.

[7] Terrible confession: I did once participate in an act of real-life trollery. There was malice aforethought and everything, although in advance my confederate and I convinced ourselves that it wasn’t really malicious but would be a buncha laughs for everyone involved. As soon as we passed the point of no return we realized how horrible our actions were, but things were irrevocably in motion already. That was 20 years ago and my stomach still turns whenever I think about it.

[8] I miss David Foster Wallace soooooo much.

So let’s say you have a piano, and somebody comes up and says, “Hey, I’ve always been a little curious about trying to play piano. I’ve never touched one before, but I’d like to give it a try.”

Fair enough. You clear off some room on the bench, uncover the keyboard, and get ready to walk him through a crude scale exercise[1], knowing that even “Chopsticks” is usually too much to jump in with a genuine newbie.

So you run a couple of scales, demonstrate basic technique, and then give him a shot at the ivories. He apologizes in advance again for being such a novice, and then he hits the keys and pounds out a rag that would make Scott Joplin sit up and take notice. It’s clear the dude is a ringer.

The motives of the pianist are probably easy to suss out: He wants to impress, or to have a little joke, or something. Before he plays he knows that you’ll know he’s fibbing about his lack of experience; his motivation for the little white lie is bound up in his anticipation of the effect of the lie being revealed, dig?

But what of the boy who identifies as bicurious, but then demonstrates technique that…only comes with lots and lots of practice? Clearly here the reason for the mendacity isn’t reliant on the revelation, especially when the fiction is maintained post-interlude. I can see how a deeply conflicted androphile would benefit by thinking of himself as perpetually virginal despite–let’s be frank here–the apparently non-trivial number of cocks he’s sucked, but I can’t really conceive of how he would be able to maintain that lie to himself. Thoughts?

[1] “Here we go/Up a row/To a birthday party.” Six months of piano lessons and that’s all I remember.

Read this.

And then read this.

Taken together, you get the effect that the people who sent Long-Distance Dedications to America’s Top 40 were always hoping for but rarely hit.

Last month, my trusty iPod finally gave up the ghost, one of it’s headphone-jack connectors worn away into uselessness. I dithered for a while on how to replace it, and this week I finally acted.

I gritted my teeth and shelled out for an iPod Touch, from which I am currently posting. I am, to put it mildly, in love. I had to go for the Touch instead of a coveted iPhone because my stupid Verizon contract doesn’t run out until next May. For another year, then, I’m constrained by the vicissitudes of wifi availability; after that, though…damn, it’s gonna be a long year.