Merlin Mann merlinmann

Usage I Dislike

An Epicenter of Wordsmithing…for the Enterprise.

Words: Ugly, Dumb, or Overpriced

When I…	…my intentionality is to…	…and not …	…so I will.
take a walk	look for the chimneys	not get absorbed in my usual bummer thoughts	gently incline myself back to the chimneys
foo	bar	baz	bat

PET NAMES

🐑💩
Sprinkle
Noodles
Come Here!
Pancake (dog)
Mittens
Crackers
Scraps (dog)

Things That Need a Name

The Chicken Problem
The Photoshop Problem
- cf. Unix
- How do you know enough to know which five commands are twenty times more important than all the others?
- banner vs. cd
- "Posterize" vs. "Unsharp Mask"
The Kawaii Marriott Reaction

All the rage was the Scarlet Johansson-branded protective helmet. It's a colorful helmet, it is a planter with 11 specific draining holes, and it's an important crucible for ideas.

We met at a media event held at a junior high. Scarlet was polite, but perfunctory.

Then there was a very small hotel room with glass walls and doors. Stocked with Herbal Bourbons — ice machine didn't work. Scarlet said "No way am I drinking that shit." She was serious and smart. Might be Las Vegas.

Sous Vide Cooking Times

Good?	FOOD	TIME	TEMP	COMMENT
CANON!	pork chops, MED	1:30	143°
CANON!	prime rib roast, MR	6:00	129.5	Works every time!
CANON!	pork chops SUPER thick	1:45	142°	solid MR+
YES	ribeye, frozen, R	1:30	126°	Awesome at low temp
YES	thick pork chops, MR	1:30	142°	SO good
XXX	filet mignon, MR	1:30	130°	XX

Merlin's First Fruity Pleaser

Ingredients

Peychaud's Bitters | 3-5 squirts
Angostura Bitters | 2-5 squirts
Regular Crappy Bottled ReaLime® | 1+ capful
Seltzer Water | 12 oz | Chilled

Steps

Every day, somebody's born who's never seen "The Flintstones"

Cincinnati's independent UHF channel 19 (WXIX, get it?) used to have a "1 O'Clock Movie" that ran for two hours every weekday afternoon. They were mostly old black and white films that, even with all the commercials, often ran shy of the 120-minute block allotted.

When they had to fill the extra time, they'd run a "Questions to the Station Manager" segment, where viewer letters were read and the manager responded on-air. Why'd you stop running Ultraman? (Too violent). Why'd you stop showing pro wrestling? (Too violent). How come you show so many commercials? (Well. We're a business and stuff).

Anyhow. One time a viewer expressed her frustration that WXIX was still showing reruns of The Flintstones, a dumb kid's cartoon that hadn't even been on the air in almost a decade ferchrissakes.

The manager calmly explained that, in addition to lots of kids enjoying the show, you have to keep in mind that, believe it or not, that show is still

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	myname@mysynology:/usr/sbin$ cd /usr/sbin/
	myname@mysynology:/usr/sbin$ sudo /usr/sbin/ntpdate -u time.nist.gov
	Exiting, name server cannot be used: Temporary failure in name resolution (-3)28 Nov 18:58:43 ntpdate[12680]: name server cannot be used: Temporary failure in name resolution (-3)
	myname@mysynology:/usr/sbin$ nc -z -v nist.gov 80
	-sh: nc: command not found
	myname@mysynology:/usr/sbin$ wget nist.gov
	--2023-11-28 19:00:43-- http://nist.gov/
	Resolving nist.gov... failed: Temporary failure in name resolution.
	wget: unable to resolve host address 'nist.gov'
	myname@mysynology:/usr/sbin$