Somehow I don't think browser tabbing was meant for sites whose names start with "assault":

Kris and I were sitting on the couch, watching Paycheck (yeah, we're really behind on our Netflix), with the two dogs on blankets on the couches sleeping.

Suddenly, Kris calls out, "Uhn!"

I turned to at him.

"Aw, uuhhhhhn!"

"What?"

"Oh, ugh, one of the dogs just farted."

"Really?"

"Uhn, yeah."

"And both their butts are pointing to you!"

"I know!"

This morning started with a really loud, jarring phone ring, from not my phone, followed by a muffled conversation, followed by a wild haired, sleepy eyed, not-quite-sober looking attempt at standing up by my fellow all-nighter at SHDH (Mom: it was an overnight programming event where 60+ developers and designers descended on a house in the evening and programmed, designed, presented work, shared ideas, and socialized until the early hours).

My conversation with said guy:

me:  Are you sober?
him:  A good question, Kitt.
me:  And?
him:  The short answer is, "No." But I think I'm sober enough to drive.
me:  Doesn't the first answer negate the second one?
him:  blank stare

Um...

Yeah.

11 of us crashed at the SHDH, waking up the this morning to a smaller morning geek fest, with 8 of us huddled around the tables on laptops, sharing even more geek moments.

Eventually, calls for food overrode all entertainment, and the remaining 10 of us (Jeff, David, Lloyd, Messina, Tantek, Dani, Eris, Andy, Adam and me) drove to Buck's (south! closer to home for me!) for breakfast/lunch. Had an entertaining conversation about procreation with David, allowing my completely non-traditional views on children to filter out. David tried to explain (at my request) his the desire to have children: wanting to raise a mini-me, influencing positively another life, validating oneself through gene propogation. I think fundamentally if that desire is missing, all the reasons in the world aren't going to make it appear. David did point out, in a gentle non-judgemental way, however, how shallow my reasons for not wanting children are.

I took no pictures this weekend, which is a little odd.

Low point of the night: realizing Andy had just rebooted my laptop, and I hadn't saved its session state in any meaningful, recoverable way.

High point of the night: wrastling said laptop from the evil clutches of Andy and Cal as they attempted to both root it, and install the hello program on it that I really, really didn't want.

General impressions of the evening: had a great time, though the saying "You get out of life what you put into it," comes to mind. I had wanted to program in a code-jam scenario, but I spent more time socializing and less time actually programming than I wanted. Which is unfortunate given the level of expertise in that house last night. I think the large number of people made it more social, less tech, and had the numbers been around 20-30, more coding would have been done (by me, unsure in general).

Enjoyed meeting and talking to Elliot and Jesse and Adam and Bryan and Cal (though I'd actually met Cal before at the Carson Workshop in June, as he's the one that presented - Mike pointed out to me that I totally blown off Messina and Ryan King at lunch at that workshop to work on the pagination module during lunch - Andy pointed out he showed up for the bar meeting afterward). I especially liked Alex Russell's Dojo presentation. I'm terribly inspired to add it to the UPA's online rostering system.

Right after I finish up a couple of Messina's demos.

I killed a bird today.

Quite by accident and terribly unexpected.

I was driving home along the sidestreet, actually driving the speed limit, as I was listening to something I wanted to be sure to hear all of (I actually think it was someone speaking at the Roberts confirmation hearing, someone being a moron with something like, "You agree Congress has the right to adjust the size of the Supreme Court, that's Congress, because you know that the Constitution gives Congress this power, and Congress has it." Or something annoying like that. Must have been a Congressman.).

As I passed the street three blocks over, I glanced down and to the left, just as a pigeon (stupid bird) started walking out of the path of the car.

This brilliant ("Brilliant!") bird decided to wait until the last possible moment to start moving, then move in the worst possible way: by waddling.

POOF!

I hit it.

I didn't hear the thump, but I did see the expanse of feathers behind my car, and the rolling body as it tumbled to the other side of the road.

Aw, geez. Bird! WTF!?!

Later that evening, I was thinking about that bird as I made dinner for the Communal Dinner of Wednesday Night™. We hadn't had communal dinner in several weeks, as various other events usurped our normal time. The Chateau's oven was out, so I cooked at home instead of trying to make chicken divan in a toaster over (though the recipe book did include microwave directions, oddly enough).

I was cutting up the chicken for the divan, and pondering: truly what was the difference between the pigeon which I had killed earlier in the day with my car, and the chicken which was killed by proxy for me to eat tonight?

Both were birds. Both were dead. One was providing nutrition, the other a starting point for a philosophical diversion that would probably end in some religious statement I'd regret in twenty years when I decide to run for office.

Point was, there really wasn't much difference. They were both dead.

And while I was pondering the chicken and the pigeon, I couldn't help but wonder what percentage of pro-life people are vegetarian. Because, if I understand the arguments properly, and pro-lifers believe sustainable life begins sometime after DNA merger, and removing a collection of cells that grow from said merger (a collection that cannot exist outside a particular organ of a woman's body) is amoral (regardless of the fact that the removal of any similarly sized collection of cells will result in the same cellular death), and they also believe that such removal of cells is the taking of a life, wouldn't they also believe that the killing of an animal is wrong, too?

And, if that is the case, wouldn't they all be vegetarian?

Which got me to thinking that they might just believe that book that says, in the first subbook, somewhere near the label "1:26"

And God said, Let Us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

which some interpret to be, "Yo, we can eat them." instead of "Hey, we have stewardship, we should take care of them." And they go about eating these animals.

Ah, the Word of God™.

And at this point, I was wondering why people use that particular collection of children's bedtime stories and collection of historical drival written by man and selected by man (there were many other Biblical writings that didn't make it into the "Official Bible") as a foundation for some belief system and fanatic cult.

And that's sure to rile up the last two members of my readership.

Or maybe they'll realize that I just don't get it. I don't understand why. I don't understand how. I don't get the God religions: Judism, Islam, Christianity (all with the same roots, people, did you forget that part?). There are parts that are, sure, a good blueprint for living well, but there are parts that make zero (negative!) sense.

So, my dead bird lead me to yet another, "I don't get it" moment in the kitchen, pondering the inexplicable moments of life.

Last year, at an ultimate tournament I didn't go to, there was an incident wherein a woman was body slammed by an opponent and flipped out when the opponent landed on her. According to eye witnesses, the rugby tackling player had been playing the whole day aggressively and the squished, soon to be freaking out woman had been the recipient of the unsportsmanlike conduct for a while.

None-the-less, when the squishee was squished by the squishor, the squishee freaked out, stood up by pushing the squishor off of her and started flailing.

Most flailing involves throwing arms around wildly and kicking.

Ah, the kicking.

The squishee did indeed start kicking the squishor, and had started kicking her in the face. The squishor, according to the reports, curled into a fetal position and attempted to ward off the kicks and the blows, covering her face as best as possible.

While relating this story to my teammates at Sectionals yesterday, I heard Mark mutter, "Fetal position?"

I finished my story, and asked him what was up. We started talking about how, if you're caught unawares, you might not have the presense of mind to move away from the blows, and would instinctively cover your face for protection. But why not just spin away? Or grab the leg? Do something to stop the barrage of blows, instead of trying to absorb them.

"How bad could it be?" Mark wondered out loud.

Somehow, I have no idea how, Mark arranged to have Heidi, while wearing cleats, attempt to kick him in the face after Sectionals were over. Had the team heckled him into it? Had he decided that empirical evidence was necessary and Heidi was of similar size to the kicking squishee?

Unclear, but the experiment was going to happen.

Well, push comes to shove, and at the end of the last game of the day, when we're all getting ready to leave, packing up and such, Wes calls Mark out, "Hey, Mark, aren't you supposed to be kicked by Heidi? Heidi, do you still have your cleats on?"

Heidi had no desire to kick Mark in the face. What a scandal! Deliberately kick someone in the face? That's awful! No, can't do it.

I could.

I immediately volunteered to help Mark in his fetal position, how hard could it be to defend the blows and spin away experiment. I had enough rough-housing with my brothers to swing a good kick without feeling (too) bad about it, and I had heard enough stories of Mark and his brothers (I could get a good kick in for Kyle and Kevin!) to have exactly zero bad feelings about landing one kick.

So, after the reasonable, "I take no responsibility for any damage I may cause you in this attempt. You agree not to hold me liable for any permanent injuries you may sustain." agreements with witnesses, Mark assumed the fetal position. I stood over him, and on the 3, 2, 1 countdown, kicked.

My first swing was with my right foot, which Mark blocked somewhat easily, and I missed his chin. So, I immediately stepped down with that foot, and swung forward with the left foot.

And clocked him right on the nose.

Full squish. Big cheer from the crowd! Contact!

He spun away faster than I could swing again with my right foot.

Upon standing and verifying he was okay, he explained he could defend the blows, but he had mis-estimated the amount of effort needed to stop the kicks. The first one was low on his elbows, the second one higher on his forearms, which is why it connected.

Spinning away as quickly as possible seems the best option.

But I can still say I kicked a Smith in the face.