I Think Some People Need to Move Off The Street

Two posts about one subject. Something must have really pissed me off.
Oh, wait, it did.

I just posted about Katy Perry and her wardrobe choice on Sesame Street. This morning, I got to see the video of the producers on CBS Early talking about the whole affair. (Sorry I can't embed it. You just have to click through. Trust me you want to.)

While I was miffed, more because I like the video and some poor choices made it not appropriate, now I am actually pissed.

I can't believe the producer actually had to gall to make some of the statements she did. What I took away from that video was this:

1. The Producers of the show do not see any merit in the notion that Katy Perry's outfit was really inappropriate.

2. They were only reacting to a strong parental disapproval then they pulled it, not because they actually agreed.

3. The producers need to reevaluate what they view as appropriate, because until they can actually see where the fault in something like this lies, it may happen again, and parents will have to continually watch what they are putting out for problems, not because we want to sit down and watch it with our children. This is actually going to cause parents to stop watching it or letting their children do so, the exact opposite of what they were trying to accomplish. If these producers are incapable of seeing this, perhaps they need to be replaced.

4. If their goal was to make more stay at home dads sit down and watch with kids, they surely will have succeeded. Come for the boobies, stay for the skits (thanks SNL for that one). In the mean time, congratulations on pissing the rest of us off.

5. It has to suck to be the person playing Elmo sometimes. I can't imagine always responding like an innocent 3 year old, when you really want to say things like "Elmo nearly got a black eye during that play date, but I want to do it again." Or better yet "Would Mr. Harry please just shut the f**** up and move on?"

In summation, I think the producers need to take a nice long look at what values are appropriate for their show, and hopefully come to some better conclusions so that we can all go back to loving the show and everything it puts out.

We may all go back to regularly scheduled, non Katy Perry boob filled programing now, thankfully.

Computers are meant to torment me.

I moderate a message board. It is a job. An unpaid job. Sometimes I love it. Sometimes I loathe it. The election has made me often have feelings of the later.

Well, the election is over, but still the discussions go on.

We have an Election thread going on. I have stepped in twice to remind our members that the debate is not to get personal, yada yada.

Well, low and behold, someone posted that post. You know. The one that had me looking at my screen yelling "No. No. No!! Do you all hate me? Do you want to give me a heart attack at a tender young age?"

Okay. Maybe the tender young age part was a bit of an over or under statement, but non the less, I have to wonder why people post these things, and if they never consider what the moderators must go through by ways of gnashing teeth and blood pressure issues when they do so.

Well, I knew I had to jump into action immediately. I went to delete the post, and in another window, email the poster about why I had to remove it. As I clicked delete, my computer froze momentarily. I panicked. It took about 20 seconds, and the computer came back. Twenty seconds is more than enough to cause a riot, and i know that. I hit delete. It deleted.

So, I replied to the thread, in order to let everyone know that we will no longer be discussing this particular issue. The computer froze. My panic doubled. It took another 20 seconds to get the computer back.

I started my email to the member who had posted the item meant to cause me harm. The computer decided at that time that each key stroke would take a few second to appear. Each time I hit enter to move to another line, it was another 20 seconds.

I couldn't even check the board to see if the rioting had begun. It would have caused the computer to checkout completely. I had to be nice to it. I had to beg and plead with it. The computer knew it had me over a barrel.

It took nearly 9 minutes to get the entire thing sorted out, and have everyone involved in the process email, explained to, and all the other loose ends, hopefully tied up. Those nine minutes probably took 5 years off my life. Of course, had it gone to 10 minutes, I would have would up in a full panic attack on my way to the E.R. with not only 5 years of my life but a bill for at least $1,000 for the less than 2 mile ride to the hospital.

I think computers are smarter than we give them credit for. Some artificial intelligence is certainly to be found with in mine. How else could it have know to have problems at just the moment I was the most vulnerable?

So, I could certainly forgo all computers, and move back to the much safer pen and paper age. I could also go shopping for a new family computer and hope for one that hasn't developed such an intelligence yet.

However, I think I will try to work my way into a new laptop for myself as a Christmas gift this year, give my husband and kids the current possessed computer, and form a new, loving relationship with the new computer. I will promise to dust it often, and never eat or drink while I am using it, if only it will promise never to fail me at such a scary time again. Ok. I will also promise to give it anything it wants, because I'm sure that it, too, will soon realize that it really has me over a barrel, and can do anything it wants. The computer will just be waiting for the moment that someone else posts something that is bound to cause some sort of all out online war, and the moment it does, even my new love will freeze on me, as a reminder that it always has the power, and it would like a little appreciation for all of its work, and maybe some new memory while I am at it.