Nyx Goldstone

When asked (which doesn’t happen often) what I think the worst site in the world is, without missing a beat I answer with a resounding “DISNEY!” Which usually gets me looks of shock and some appall. One of the curses of living in Southern California, I swear.

My hate-on with the Disney website(s) has nothing to do with my personal feelings on Disney itself. I actually am rather fond of going to the Parks here in Anaheim and I’ve given them quite a few of my teenage and early-twenties years for more than minimum wage. My hate comes from…I’m not sure if it’s bad coding or if the commands from On High are a continued “FLASH IS PRETTY! HUR HUR HUR! MOAR FLASH!!”

Let me explain…

Up until about a week ago, I was using an “upper middle-class” computer, at best. I loved my machine with it’s blue glowy and souped-up-car-grill-like front. I even grew to like the plexiglass side panel that always looked dirty and the annoying fan in it that made the machine near-impossible to comfortably open once the thumb screws were out. It was the first one I paid for and, with some help from my then-boyfriend, built. However, it was getting on in years. Much like my cat, it hit seniority at 7 years and I managed to squeeze another year or so out of before it officially crapped out. The computer, not my cat.

Enter RASSILON! A glorious new machine made from a few bits of SCRATCHING-POST and a whole helluva lot of upgraded hardware. Where SCRATCHING-POST struggled through Facebook games and roughly 8-10 frames per second in World of Warcraft, RASSILON not only knocks them out without breaking a sweat, but it’ll serve me tea and call me mistress, too–all at the same time! Without getting too techy (because I don’t like doing that), I couldn’t go any higher end without being a Government official. Or possibly a Mafia boss.

So, for the last week, I’ve been single-handedly battling Orcs and Dragons without problem. I’ve been watching movies and running programs without even noticing a strain. Then, a YouTube video of the newest Pirates movie made me want to explore the official site. So, happily I went off to Disney’s page and smashed face-first into a wall of data so thick RASSILON stared at it in amazement.

I was stunned. I mean, I just stared at the screen as RASSILON tugged and pulled and WORKED to get the data to me. I was speechless! I was suddenly hyper-aware that my complaints weren’t just misplaced rage at having a slow computer. Disney’s site really is the ONLY site with the power to bog down my computer.

So, seriously, if anyone from the Disney website crew ends up reading this? I really don’t know if it’s the code or the Flash or what…but it’s not user friendly for the average visitor at ALL. If a tech geek with a high-end computer can get bogged down by the Disney site, I can only imagine what it’s doing to someone not as geeky as I. Really, I don’t even have to imagine. I was living it just over a week ago, before the upgrade.

I was excited to retry playing Pirates of the Caribbean Online again…now I’m kinda scared.

Remember how I said I was having a rough year? Yeah… It just keeps continuing…

About two weeks ago, my Facebook feed exploded. Old friends and acquaintances from my high school days had posts one right after another just FILLING my screen. Let me tell you, that’s weird. We’re all current or past artists from LACHSA. That’s a level of meshing schedules that we didn’t have even when we were in school together! To make a long ramble a short burst of information, it turns out that one of our favorite math teachers passed away unexpectedly the night before.

Dallas Russell was an amazing man. Really, there aren’t words powerful enough to express how amazing. His teaching method was more like playing a game than learning math. Even the way he worked out problems! “This is where the fun starts!” Algebra, geometry, it was all fun. There were old school chalk boards in the Cal State LA music building at the time, so Mr. Russell’s hands were always covered in chalk. Not just white chalk, either, but blue and pink and any other color that was in the box. I think it was street chalk, because I remember the sticks being freaking huge!

He’d love to give hugs, too. The term “bear hug” was invented for this man. I’m not in any way a small person and I always had to ask him to ease up a bit because he’d just CRUSH me in his hugs. I could use one right now…

Anyhow, his memorial was tonight and I basically chickened out in going. I didn’t know anyone local going to bum a ride from; I knew that if I drove myself, I’d end up stranded with my car on Figuroa St. because I was crying too hard to drive myself home. So, instead, I let my housemates distract me and did a little more searching for other blogs or reports on Mr. Russell.

What I ended up finding was an examiner.com write up from Ron Irwin. Maybe I’m just emotional right now, but Irwin’s report on Mr. Russell made me miss him all over again. I teared up a bit as Irwin talked about the personal tour of the campus that Mr. Russell gave him and his daughter. Mr. Russell was a very friendly and talkative man. Before and after classes he constantly had students hovering around his desk just wanting to chat a bit with him. A part of me wonders if Irwin knows that now, since his daughter was accepted into the school.

Next month is my 10-year reunion, but now that event seems a little less bright. I was planning on telling Mr. Russell that night, if he showed up, that it might have taken me 10 years, but I finally found my calling in college. I was going to tell him that I was working toward a Masters in Mathematics. If he wasn’t there, I was going to see if I could hunt down his “new” classroom in King Hall the following Monday.

I can’t now. I can’t playfully inform him that it’s his fault I’ve been unleashed on the poor, unsuspecting math department at whatever 4-year I end up attending. I can’t ask him where he would suggest I attend. I can’t ask him what other degrees besides just straight mathematics is there in the field.

He can’t be my mentor anymore and that makes me feel so very lost.

Is Ordering Drinks Without Ice Just a Scam to get More Delicious Beverage? via The Consumerist, sent to me from TrinityLast

Okay, this is a debate I’ve had time and again, though I can’t say I’ve ever had it with the person serving me (thankfully!). I’m a “no ice” person for many reasons, though it usually depends on the situation. I go to a sit-down restaurant, I don’t care about ice. I have a straw and a steady place to sit and drink my drink; plus, I’m more likely to drink it faster because I’m sitting around waiting for my food to show up. But the moment I hit a fast food joint, gone with the ice! NO ICE FOR ME! Why?

Well, I’ll admit, first and foremost, it’s because I don’t want someone to decide that my x-sized drink should actually only be a y-sized drink. Drinks are advertised by volume the cup holds, not volume of the remaining space in the cup. To add to that, I’m ordering an x-sized ROOT BEER (usually), which is pre-mixed in the machine. What I’m not ordering is an x-sized Root Beer-that-actually-is-mostly-water-by-the-end. On top of that, that’s the only amount I’m going to get! Once that’s gone, it’s gone. That’s my first and foremost.

The other reasons are that I do have sensitive teeth and if I’m ordering from a fast food joint, I’m probably going to still be in my car and, by the gods, I’m going to bloody drink it when I want to drink it! Ice has proven, for me, to just be a solid thing that’ll slam the lid of my cup off and slosh everything around more than it needs to…just to turn it into lightly flavored Root Beer water in the end.

So, here’s my school of thought: if I’m ordering a large drink, which the cup is clearly marked at, oh, for the sake of argument, 32 ounces, then that’s the volume I’m paying for. If someone wants ice in their drink, more power to them! They’re the ones deciding to displace that much liquid for the “luxury” of an initially colder drink.

What got me riled up is the commenters who were all “Oh, but if you order a Whopper, you don’t expect them to give you more meat because you told them not lettuce/onions/pickles/cheese.” No, you don’t. Why? Because you know that the burger was supposed to be a certain weight before cooking, you know they’re supposed to put so many leaves of lettuce on it, so many pickles, and so on and so forth. The numbers are right there. So, that being said, why should someone like me feel shamed because I want my full 32 ounces of liquid?

Ice cubes are made by a machine. A machine that is squirting water into a tray that is freezing the ice, then breaking it up and dropping it in a bin. For this argument, I’m ignoring the gross factor of some of the crap found GROWING in machines like that, I’m just focusing on the ice itself. If there’s a specific recipe that needs to be followed, okay… Does that mean that place is hand-making the ice, making sure each cube is exactly the size it should be so Customer A is getting the exact same thing as Customer B, when they both order the same drink? Why do I, a person who feels the pain before my teeth even get near the ice cream bar, have to choose between suffering through watered down drinks or pain? Aren’t I also paying for this beverage? Shouldn’t I be allowed to enjoy it?

One commenter had said that “iced means it’s cold, not that ice is an ingredient.” If you want to require ice be part of the purchase, say “over ice” or something. And the commenters that compared it to ordering drinks at a bar? Really, people?? Weather you order your shots neat or on the rocks, a shot is still 4 ounces (I think… I haven’t ordered shots before, but I think that’s the number). Your alcoholic beverage is measured and THEN poured over ice. I think the bartender would be bludgeoned if he or she tried to stiff people by dropping a cube in a shot glass and telling the customer it’s the same drink, but it has to be this way because they asked for ice.

Try to tell me I’m wrong.