Cardboard Coffee

One thing that’s always boggled me is the increasing fascination with drinking coffee out of cardboard cups. Part of my fascination stems from the fact that it seems like a huge waste of resources — you could be making virtual reality goggles from that cardboard! But most of my curiosity has to do with the indisputable fact that coffee tastes worse out of cardboard.

I consider that truth to be self-evident. The delicious nectar that is coffee deserves better than to be carried in laminated paper and guzzled through a tiny hole in a plastic lid.

I get it, I get it, you can take a cardboard mug with you on your commute, or as you’re walking down the street, or as you’re waiting in line, and coffee through a plastic lid is better than no coffee at all.

It’s true.

But I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe. I’ve seen people in non-commute non-transit situations pick cardboard over glorious porcelain — intentionally and of their own volition and not while under duress (I checked to make sure).

Usually I can even all I need to. But when it comes to coffee, and porcelain is an option, and you still choose cardboard… I’m all out of evens. At that point, I can’t even.

One time I stopped a good friend as he was doing it, and like a concerned parent I asked him why he would pick the cardboard over the porcelain when both options were right there in front of him, in plain sight, literally on the table. He answered:

I like the idea that if I need to go somewhere, I can take the coffee with me.

Okay, that’s actually a fair point.

I mean, I’d just gulp down the coffee from the porcelain and then go ahead and grab another one in cardboard to bring along, but sure, the above is a cogent argument.

Still, I can’t help but feel like cardboard coffee is becoming a status symbol outside of just mobility: “Look at me, I’m on the move!” And that makes me sad. It makes me even sadder than it does when people add sugar to their coffee.

What is wrong with you people‽

This was originally posted elsewhere.

April 4, 2016

Mocco

This blog just switched names1. It used to be called “Noscope”, which was a name I came up with in 2001. Back then, I thought it as a fun play on the fact that this site was intended to be nothing more than a vent — an outlet I could use to create anything without purpose or scope. Since then the term “noscope” has come to mean something else entirely.

This is now “Mocco”, which is a nonsense word that’s closeish to a coffee ingredient I like. It’s also short, and it was sitting unused in my domain wallet. Welcome, again.

  1. I switched server too, Digital Ocean + Serverpilot is amazing!  ↩

February 26, 2016 Tagged

⌘ + Tab from Photoshop to Chrome

In the latest Creative Cloud release of Photoshop, switching from Photoshop to Chrome with Command + Tab doesn’t work. As a favor for people googling this, a workaround is to set Photoshop in “Full Screen Mode”. Tap F twice, or pick View → Screen Mode → Full Screen Mode. Palettes are hidden by default in this screen mode, but you can unhide them by tapping Tab.

Update: Another excellent workaround is to use Sketch.

February 3, 2016 Tagged

A Culture of Antagonism

It was a day like any other, and it was an innocently looking article like any other. But on this one day, this one particular article and this one paragraph in particular that just missed my good side entirely:

Jim Carrey brought us our first live-action taste of Count Olaf from A Series of Unfortunate Events, but Netflix’s upcoming TV series adaptation is (thankfully) going in a different direction.

It’s an article from The Verge. It’s nothing out of the ordinary, and I like this publication perfectly fine. I hold no grudges against the author either — this could’ve been published in any fine recent publication. All’s good on that front. I’m also not a particular Jim Carrey fan these days, that doesn’t change a thing. It’s just, this one day, that last sentence got to me.

but Netflix’s upcoming TV series adaptation is (thankfully) going in a different direction

On this day — it’d been snowing, by the way, it was rather pretty outside — this one sentence reminded me of everything I loathe about modern online discourse. I read this sentence — and I invite you to correct me, gosh I hope so much that I’m wrong about this — as an off-hand dismissive critique of the older film Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events, starring Jim Carrey, Emily Browning and Liam Aiken. The sentence seems to suggest that this older film is so atrociously bad that the new Netflix series (which I welcome) thankfully goes in a different direction. THANKFULLY! THANKFULLY!!

It’s fun how bright the day can look when snow covers the ground. Yet inside of me, my heart held only darkness.

The 2004 movie is one of my favorite movies of all time. I dare you to watch the following deleted scene, and not at least have a tiny appreciation for the music and the visuals. Gorge on those trees.

 

This scene ends on a simple note: There’s always something. And this film has just that: something. I heartily recommend it to you. Watch it tonight, I’m sure you can stream it.

While I mourn the lack of a sequel, I’m not objecting to a Netflix remake, I welcome it. It’s a wonderful story, I’d love more. What I mourn is that we can’t respect creative work for what it is. Today we apparently have to hate something that wasn’t a runaway box office success and the beginning of an endless franchise.

In fact Lemony Snicket did reasonably at the box office and got a solid 72% at RottenTomatoes. It featured amazing performances by two of my favorite actresses, Meryl Streep and Jennifer Coolidge, not to mention the protagonist kids themselves. The soundtrack is amazing, and the end titles… oh the end titles. Take it in:

There are no levels on which I don’t adore this film. It’s okay if you don’t. 

Lately it just feels like everyone hates everything. Because it’s easier to dismiss something, than to like it. Because if you like something, you put yourself out there. You reveal to the world what makes you happy, what makes you cry, what makes you reflect, cope with, or just enjoy life. Someone might make fun of you for loving something, so it’s easier to hate it. It’s breeds a culture of antagonism, and while it might protect you from occasional ridicule by people not worth your time, it also insulates you from possibly discovering something amazing.

If only we could see past arbitrary notions of what’s cool to like, and judge movies and music and books on their own merits. Because there’s always something.

January 18, 2016 Tagged

Thing I Learned About My Little Pony, By Watching My Daughter Watch My Little Pony

It’s happened. My 4 year old has found a franchise to latch on to. It’s not ideal: the one thing I’m the most allergic to in the world is horses. But if she’s into ponies she’s into ponies and there’s nothing I can do about that except embrace it. She’s got the toys, she’s got the bed-blanket, she’s got the t-shirt, and her favorite pony is Rainbow Dash. It’s a thing.

As an overprotective curling-dad, I consider it my solemn duty to learn about this thing that’s absorbing her attention. So I have been watching the show with her, trying to soak up the pony lore, learn of the details that make out this equestine construct.

The show follows Twilight Sparkle, a purple unicorn, as she visits “Ponyville” — the shining gem of the land of Equestria. You know… from equo in latin? Horse-land? Get it?

Moving on.

Twilight makes friends in Ponyville. Several of them. And she’s taught that though they are all different in appearance, interests, personality and even race, their friendship is the most important thing there is. When they’re all together, their friendship is literally magic. It’s in the tagline.

Sounds good right? It’s perfectly fine that my daughter watches such a diverse, female-positive and all-embracing show, right?

One of my favorite episodes of Lost — bear with me — is the one where wheelchair-bound John Locke cries “Don’t tell me what I can’t do!” and then goes on a walkabout. This is at the core of the values I want my daughter to learn: if she can dream it, she can do it. For that reason I already know the answer to questions she might one day pose to me: “Can I be an astronaut, dad?” YES. “Can I be at the Olympics, dad?” YES. She’ll learn eventually that it might not be a walk in the park, but there’s no reason she should have some sort of arbitrary mental block put in place by me, preventing her from even trying.

Which brings me to Equestria. In Ponyville, there are three races of ponies. The ponies you know, unicorns who have magical powers, and pegasi who can fly and make it rain. They all live and work together seemingly in perfect glittering harmony.

How does this even work? How aren’t the only-ponies perpetually jealous of the other two races?

Ponies are literally born with predisposed skills. Unicorns have magic powers, one of them being that they can write. Pegasi can fly. Sorry Applejack, I suppose you have to manually pluck those apples for selling on the market to make ends meet. If only you were a unicorn you could just use magic, but hey, life’s tough right? Applejack is basically caste-blocked from ever advancing beyond her racially defined place in society.

The fact that only unicorns can write has its own problems. History is written by those who can, well, write… right? I hope everyone trusts the unicorns to be truthful. Better not upset them.

Ever noticed how My Little Ponies have back-tattoos? Applejack has apples, Pinkie Pie has balloons. Those are literal coming-of-age tattoos. Puberty isn’t mentioned, but it’s implied that once a pony reaches that age, whatever “talent” they have is stamped on their back. Forever. A visual indicator of what you are.

The stamps are called cutiemarks.

Back-tattoos aside (some of those are really lovely, I’m sure) I don’t know that I appreciate the idea that you even can have a talent as such—how about those 10,000 hours? What about multiple “talents”: which one gets stamped on you? And why does your one talent need to be permanently advertised to the world? What if your talent is not showering? If you’ll indulge me as I recall a history lesson about mechanical vs. organic societies, this “know your place” undercurrent that permeates Ponyville is a trait I do not find attractive. Also, if I am to ever get a back-tattoo I want it to be something I choose to get. Probably a japanese glyph I think means “fire” but in fact means “toast”. Something I can laugh at years down the line, not something that forever defines my place in the world.

Another observation was that every single pony in Ponyville is either beautifully styled and coiffed at all times. Or an unsightly donkey dragging a cart with a grumpy look on their face. In fact I don’t think I’ve seen a single handsome donkey on the show. They’re like morlocks.

One of the dude-ponies was called “Shining Armor”. A bit on the nose, eh, Lauren Faust? Also, why weren’t there any any girl knights? My daughter happens to love playing knights and princesses. She’s the knight, I’m the princess.

I don’t know what the lesson is. I think I wanted to vet the show, but having now watched one too many episodes with my daughter on the couch, I’m not sure there’s really a lesson to learn here.

Selma likes ponies, she likes watching them on the television with me. Perhaps she doesn’t have to learn about societal norms and expectations and caste systems and harmful stereotypes through a kids show about magical ponies, at age 4. She likes Rainbow Dash, and I think it’ll start and end with that.

As you were.

This post originally appeared on Medium, but is reposted here so I can laugh at it in 10 years. 

January 13, 2016 Tagged

"Because You're Worth It"

A popular brand uses this as their tagline, and it’s always annoyed me terribly.

I was brought up to know that as a human I have inherent value. I try to raise my daughter the same way, so I keep reminding her how much she means to me, bolster her heart to protect her against inevitable douchebags. In that vein, everyone is worth it.

Is worth what, exactly?

This brand sells … perfume? Face cream? I can’t even recall, and I don’t even care. The point is, their tagline is pointing out that you deserve to spend your money on their product. Well what if I can’t afford the product? Does that mean I’m not worth it?

We’ve been over this. The human condition is tough. Things don’t always go as planned. Some people get a particularly short end of the stick of life. There’s no justice to it, just wanton cosmic random chance. Whether you end up able to afford the face cream you’re worth is entirely up to a unique combination of the absence of bad luck, decades of hard work, and growing up in a place where such hard work pays off as it should.

I don’t usually watch TV, so I’m mostly spared zapping by beautiful models parrotting off the tagline in a bubbly tenor. Thankfully, because I think I’d go insane. In a world with people who would take medicine, antibiotics or clean water over a goddamn face cream, the phrase cuts me like a knife on a blackboard.

Everyone is worth it. I believe it’s in a charter somewhere.

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

How’s that for a face cream tagline?

December 9, 2015