Day 27: But how did you find out?

"But, how did you find out?"

 

"The Internet, duh.  It's where I find everything out."

 

It's the "go to" place where everybody finds out anything they want to know about anyone (even themselves).  It doesn't matter if it's true or not...and it's so easy anyone can do it.

 

And the things you can easily find out about someone, with a minimum of digging...is astonishing.  In fact, I'm absolutely sure that if Dr. Seuss were still alive, he'd have come up with a book called "Oh the Thinks You Can Think To Click On!"

For example -- You wouldn't believe who used to play my interactive comedy website -- HumorMeOnline -- many years ago.  I mean EVERYONE would know their name (maybe three people wouldn't - but I doubt so) if I mentioned it.  I promised never to tell...and I never have.  They were floored when I asked them if they were who they were...and they were!  And, it wasn't a joke - I mean, they were -- and I found out...just by a few random, carefully constructed clicks. And they'd play my silly online comedy website all the time.  What fun!  

 

Dammit, I should have asked for a job!  Seriously.  I'm sure they've long since changed their email address...and it's been years since I've updated anything at my site...so even if they wanted to, they couldn't play it.  Oh well.  And it's not like I can call them up at their work.  "Uh...okay...my name is Mariann and they used to play at my website...no, seriously, they used to play my contests all the time...just go ask them.  Really, I'm not a whackjob...go ask.  I'm serious. Hello?  Hello?"

 

Think that would work?  I doubt it.  So here goes...let's just hope they are clicking random things on the Internet and find this...

Hey, famous person who used to play my silly online interactive comedy website...please hire me for something, okay?  I know you have the money.  You can do it.  It'll be our little secret.  If you don't, I'll tell, dammit!  I'll tell everyone!  I swear I'll let the cat outta the bag.

 

Maybe I should leave off that last part.  Whaddya think?

 

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Yes, this was a senseless sort of blog, but I thought I would give everyone a break from reading what's really inside my little, tiny noggin. You don't want to know what's deep inside of it...plus it's all full of cobwebs and faulty neurons and such.  In fact, that's where I first got the idea for the word "Interwebs" from.  Yes, I coined the term "Interwebs": Internet + Cobwebs = Interwebs.  

Okay, I might have made that last part up - but the other stuff...it's all true.  I swear. 

 

By the way, here's a nice random photo of a kitty on a keyboard for you...for absolutely no reason whatsoever.  None whatsoever.  None...no seriously, I swear.  It's not like it's some obscure weird hint.  It's not.  It's not at all.  I'm just being silly...I swear.  You can click all you want...you won't find anything out.  Well, you might, but you'd really, really have to know what to click on. Plus, it would take ages.

 

 

 

And, after you've given up on clicking (or more likely, you never started)...click on this:  We Work for Cheese

 

It's only one more day until we all take a swig from those big bottles of vodka Nicky has promised to send us all for living through this month-long write-along.  Oh...she didn't say she'd send YOU one?  I could have sworn she said she'd send me one.  Don't worry, Nicky...it'll be our little secret.  ;)

 

Oh...I'm just kidding about that vodka thing.  I swear!

I swear.

Seriously. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Melty Man

You think you know someone. I mean, you talk to people and you get to know them a little; they open up, they tell you some stuff they ordinarily wouldn't tell their friends and family in person, but since you are on the Internet, there's no harm done, they never have to meet you. You typically share some really personal stuff you just wouldn't -- with people you'll never ever have to face in life. Am I right?

Well, I thought so, too.

It all started a few years back. My friend Chris, whom I've never met, who used to play my online comedy website, www.HumorMeOnline.com (which I never update anymore as I spend all my time obsessing about my health and pitying myself) "introduced" me to Mike. Mike, you may know, goes by a few names: MikeWJ, Michael Whiteman-Jones..."Too Many Mornings" Mike -- you know, that Mike.

Well, I thought we had struck up a friendship...he'd comment on my blogs and say nice things and I'd say nice things to him sometimes and we were all getting along fine and dandy (him posting photos of himself in different hats and all) when, out of the blue, I find out he's been battling some sort of affliction.

The obvious one comes to mind: alcohol. Yeah, who among here us doesn't like to swill back a few in the mornings, right?

Well, it wasn't that...so, naturally, the next obvious one, considering he takes photographs a lot...is that he is into some kind of porn. Maybe something to do with fruits or vegetables...something really weird...maybe with some shoe heels involved. After all, he did say he could spot a pair of Louboutins from a few feet away (pun intended) in that one blog he wrote about Washington, DC, which I think I'm STILL reading, by the way, as it was THAT long of a blog.

But, nope. Still totally off the mark.

So, I find out today...his face fell off.

Yeah...I know. THAT kind of thing, you'd think someone who calls themselves a "friend"...would mention. I've gone on and on to him about my sleeping problems, my issues with my thyroid, my lung, my toe, my pathetic boobs, my butt, etc., and you'd be darned tooting right if you guessed that IF I would have had an issue with my face sliding right off, I probably would have mentioned it.

Now, I know he posted a few photos of himself recently - but they show no signs of slippage. I'm sure he has Photoshop, and anyone with any type of artistic background could easily manipulate their face and tweak it here and there right back to where it used to be. But, I'm figuring they weren't even recent pictures. Hell, that might not even BE what he looks like. Could just be that "Mike" has some bizarre obsession with some guy with a beard whom he pays twenty bucks a pop to - to pose for some artsy "black and white" jobbers.

I, for one, am gobsmacked. I'm literally speechless...and anyone who knows me, knows damned well that doesn't happen very often, if ever.

Sure, he's probably speechless, too...but that's just because he can't pronounce words anymore because he...HAS NO LIPS...because his face fell off -- and I had to go and find out like most everyone else did -- not like a friend would: I had to friggen find out by reading it on the Internet!

But, I guess that's only poetic justice...or irony...because, after all, we did "meet" on the Internet. Two faceless people brought together by a force invisible...only much more tragic and prophetic than I ever, ever envisioned.

(Who the hell is Mike? Well, my "friend" -- you'll find out here: Mike)

 

 

 

This blog was written and inspired by Mike...who is a damned good writer and I'm jealous, but in a good way (if there is such a thing)...and we were both initially inspired by the "We Work for Cheese" non-contest contest...whose prompt today was "Friendship".

 

 

 

The Three Degrees of Google

Charlie Chaplin was in a movie called "Monsieur Verdoux" with Herb Vigran...who was in "Amazon Women on the Moon" with Steve Guttenberg, who, in turn, was in "Diner" with Kevin Bacon. And so, the cult phenomenon known as "The Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" took its place in the annals of trivial history.

Based on the theory known as "The Six Degrees of Separation" - whereby any one person is separated by any other person by only six steps in the "human web", John Guare's play, later the popular film, "Six Degrees of Separation"...pretty much coined a phrase with which we are now more or less familiar. While this whole idea was not new...it took the film, and subsequently, the "Kevin Bacon" Internet game sensation of the 1990's to bring it to the forefront of most peoples' forays into it.

I remember, quite some time ago, being the [quote - unquote] filmophile that I am...trying to find a "Bacon Number" higher than anyone else's. Oh, yes...to get that elusive Bacon Number of eight...THAT would be a thing.

But the fervour of the game began to wane and I seemed to have my own issues and most of those issues centered around me personally...instead of him personally. Specifically, my health.

And because of my health...or the decay thereof, I've since made up another little "game". With the advent of "everything" out there at your fingertips - and only a click away..."imminent death" is as well.

It's really not that morbid when you think of it...let me explain. Gimme any MINOR illness, and with three or less clicks online...I can find out that it leads to death.

Now, I know what you're thinking: "So, what, Mariann...everybody and their uncle has a website or blog with a bunch of misleading health information." And you'd probably be true in this assessment...BUT...I only "play" this "game" on bona fide websites, such as WebMD and MayoClinic.com.

Oh, yes...many has been the night where I felt funny, found a bump that wasn't there before, or as my latest venture online...obsessing about THIS thing on my leg:

It can't be a simple, ordinary bruise - oh, no...no bruise looks like that...plus I asked the lady who checks my blood clotting level at my cardiologist only this past Monday...and she replied, "Hmmmm...that's an ODD bruise...I've never seen one like THAT before". And she's seen lots of strange bruises I'm sure...dealing with all us Warfarin-takers - who bruise if you only look at us funny.

Against my better judgement, I Googled. I've been told by a few doctors that I was not allowed to anymore...they forbade me to Google...in essence, my Google license has been revoked.

But...I still do.

So, what went from an innocent "skin" and "ring" quest - progressed to "bite"...then on to "spider bite" - culminating with "Brown Recluse bite" which ultimately stated necrotic tissue death and full-blown death. Blown out of proportion, hopefully...

...but you know the deal -- if it's ON the Internet, it must be true, right?

Oh, the Irony (Part III)

When I was a child I used to read those Aesop's Fables - they tried to let you know life's lessons and personality faults - usually portrayed through the eyes of animals. And then along came Captain Edward A. Murphy working at Edwards Air Force base in 1949...some 2549 years later...supposedly coining the infamous "Murphy's Law"...which basically states "If anything can go wrong...it will".

So, I figure - if you combine the two and add some irony - you get my dilemma: each time I post a blog...even if no one has added one in a whole entire day...there will be an onslaught of people rushing to post their blogs directly after.

Now...you might say to yourself..."Um...who cares, Mariann - deal with it". And you might also be saying, "...and how does this relate to me?" Well, it doesn't...unless you are those people who post blogs directly after mine, thereby bumping me out of the primo first slot...down to one of the sub-primo three slots visible on the home page of the Montgomery Advertiser's online site...then relegated to the "click here if you even want to bother waiting for the page to load" slot on the "other" page...culminating in the "totally bumped off the side of the virtual flat Earth which blogland is here".

For those who don't know - a maximum amount of ten blogs get to remain on the newspaper's site at any one time...when a new blog is posted...the one that's been there the longest - gets bumped off to fall into "Internet oblivion"...never to be seen again.

Sure, you can wait until such time you post another blog and hope that someone will happen upon it and read...but typically the home page is key...because people are creatures of habit and usually they are habitually lazy. Clicking to another page is one more step they don't have the patience for...and I say this, because I've heard it said many times: "Ugh...the page takes too long to load - I have to keep clicking on 'refresh' and it STILL doesn't load".

So, while you can sometimes teach an old dog new tricks - it doesn't take too long for that dog to give up if he never gets a bone.

And somewhere in that above statement is possibly a moral to a fable which is probably vaguely similar to one of Aesop's...but for now I'll just be content to play the fox to the Internet's sour grapes.