Scintillae's page

Kid DM didn't show, so improv session happened. I think they forgot that I'm a troll.

Well, that ended that shortly and sweetly.

Requestor CC'ed our acting VP on her initial request, most likely to try to pressure me to do something quickly.

*I* tried to be polite. VP didn't.

"NobodysHome is 100% correct. What you are doing is wrong. In fact, it is so wrong that we should meet to discuss what you're actually trying to do..."

Oops. Maybe, just maybe you should think before including upper management on your stupid requests...

You love to see it.

Vanykrye wrote:

NobodysHome wrote:

I know Vany will feel this across the void:

Far Too Many Admins

Erm...they want to make the default user an admin?

No.

I have spoken.

NH: "No admin access for default user."

Whoever asked for it: "But, please."
NH: "No. The internet dragon said so."
Whoever asked for it: "What's an intern..."
NH: "INTERNET DRAGON SAY NO ADMIN ACCESS! ALL HAIL INTERNET DRAGON!!"
NH's manager: "Buddy, we need to talk."

"I know we push a unique passcode for everything, but if you've reached the hoarding stage..."

AD and I made the call this morning to cancel next week's meet due to low registration — pretty much entirely blizzard-induced due to everyone losing the first week of school and prep/practice time — and look for a date to reschedule. I sent out the email first thing this morning and felt like crap.

Literally every reply on the chain has been incredibly supportive and understanding. "I'm so sorry!" "That's unfortunate; let us know the new date." "That happened to me last year. Don't worry about it."

Debate and forensics are stressful as hell, but the community is so worth it.

I gave the kids an IXL assignment to correct grammatical errors in signs, and it's backfiring by giving me an aneurysm whenever I see the images as I circulate to help.

It has also revealed my weakness: I cannot spell restaraunt restauraunt diner to save my life.

demonstrates an impromptu speech for junior high
"Anyone else want to try?"
awkward silence
"...uh, sure."
kid does okay
"Thank you! You get a Jolly Rancher for putting yourself out there. Anyone else?"
half the class is suddenly interested

I swear these things are made of crack.

Kinda the problem with letting the robber barons drive the stagecoach.

NobodysHome wrote:

Vanykrye wrote:

No, that graduation was in my neck of the woods. Unfortunately, even though we were in the same town at the same time it just didn't work out to meet up.

It's where you're flying from that matters -- the booking agencies have been "caught" jacking up prices for people from more "affluent" areas such as San Francisco. So if you and Freehold stayed at the same place it'd be interesting for you to compare prices. The exposé was on sites such as Booking.com cranking up their rates for people booking out of San Francisco, but I'm sure they do similar things to New Yorkers.

Misunderstood. Thought we were talking about hotels still. No, it was definitely easy driving distance for me. gran may have unknowingly met Freehold though.

"The hell is this room service request, 'be delivered by a milkmaid'?"

"Is Italy in Europe?"

My mouse is wireless. I can't use it as a noose.

"Ugh, why am I getting all these results about Muslims?!"
"Hon, your topic was 'Christian-Islamic relations in the Renaissance.'"
"Yeah, they're not supposed to date. What does that-"
"Your research topic for Othello is 'how did Christian and Islamic nations get along?' You're gonna get those results."
"But I said Islam-"
"...Muslims...follow Islam. You're basically saying 'I looked up Baptist, what's all this Christian stuff coming up?'"
"Oooooh."

Can we get another week of snow. Please.

NobodysHome wrote:

It's amazing what being honest with a teenager will do for you.

The problem is that that conflicts with way too many parents' positions that a child should defer to their authority without question.

I have some lovely music to recommend your parents.

We have 28 rooms of high school theater kids from 3 different schools in tonight. I haven't had any trouble, but apparently there were a few complaints earlier in the night. I have noticed, however, that the chaperones for one of the groups has put tape on their doors to make sure nobody goes out and about, and I am sorely tempted to go pull the tape off one of the doors at random. If I was a guest and not an employee, I probably would have already.

I still might.

I haven't done the tape thing, but I have told my speech kids, "Lights out at 10. If any of you causes a noise complaint, I will get creative."

For some reason, they don't want to test this.

Not sure I should be allowed. You're likely to get a feral survivalist squirrel.

I'll stop spreading the love when I feel like it.

It's not snowing enough.

We have a foot on the ground. Tomorrow will be my third day off from excessive snow. My rage grows.

It begins...

We got a reminder that the Cranky Calico was due for some shots. I let the vet know that she'd passed away. They sent a nice sympathetic email and let me know they'd marked her as "deceased".

And as with all automated systems forever, "Deceased" somehow doesn't mean, "Stop sending me reminders."

So now we're supposed to take her in to get all her parasites removed. Nah; I think we're good.

(Amusingly enough I think it was early October that I got the most recent appeal to my father (who never lived at this address and who passed away in 2007) for a donation.)

You should go to the vet with a crystal ball and demand a seance. "No, no, your autocaller insisted. We're here to help the Calico rest easy."

Aaaand, recruiters are now using AI. Or it sure feels like it.

I've started getting weekly headhunting calls asking me to apply to be a Senior or Principal Software Developer at various companies around the Bay Area...
...except...
...I have -0- experience as a professional software developer. I'm convinced that the AI scans my LinkedIn profile and sees:
- 20+ years of industry experience
- The word "Senior" in my current title
- The word "Developer" in my current title

And it fills in the rest.

I'm wondering whether Senior Photography Developers are getting the same offers.

We'll see what develops.

** spoiler omitted **

They probably see them and try to get them investigated for hurting their widdle feewings

Oh, crap, he's loose.

So, the meat shop I mentioned with the suspiciously absent reindeer for Santa's sleigh also boasts a large "under new management" banner.

Now, I'm not saying what exactly these specialty meats are...

I will always remember Scarwall as the place where the babynerds Looney Tunes'd themselves.

One of them was throwing around walls of stone to try and fence in and separate their enemies. What this actually did was keep all of them in a 20' radius because they couldn't spread out anymore... and the AP gave the caster here some pit spells...

I picked it up because I'm now our public speaking teacher, and I figure it can be a good object lesson in "how hard is it to communicate when you're not allowed to use the words you want?" possibly as a lead-in to our nonverbal communication unit.

But mostly it's been used to keep junior high kids busy, and today, my homeroom was curious enough to try it out before Uno. That was an hour ago, and they're still going.

Poetry for Neanderthals is the best purchase I ever made for class.

All reindeer are equal, but some reindeer are more equal than others.

Word, dawg. Shout out to my boy, Rudy thee Beacon.

"So, I've made a bunch of holiday-themed Connections, there's coloring pages. We can just chill."
"...can we finish watching Animal Farm?"

So my sophomores are ringing in the holiday with watching Snowball get chased off by dogs.

The problem with courtesy signs is that courtesy is dead.

As I've complained about endlessly, our city has monthly street sweeping and provided us with "courtesy" No Parking signs that we can put up on street sweeping day. Why are they "courtesy" signs? Because the city won't enforce them.
"What if we call you and ask you to enforce them?"
"We can't. What if you put up the signs after someone is already parked there?"
"What if I provide timestamped photos?"
"You could still put up the sign, take a picture, take the sign down, wait for someone to park, then put it up again."
"What if I record a solid 4-hour video?"
"Nobody's going to watch that."

So as usual, I put up my sign. I moved my cars. And people have been using the convenient open space to park all afternoon. Aaaaand... just as I was typing this up the street sweeper came by while a full-sized van was parked in front of my house.

I'm done. Starting in 2025, I won't be bothering with the city's street sweeping program because it's useless to me and causes me stress.

And this is how the Lawful become Unlawful.

Keep some cheap lunchmeat in the fridge to put on the offending vehicles.

One of my newer table regulars was waxing rhapsodic about how he used ChatGPT as a GM to generate things and I just didn't have the heart to tell him how boring, generic, and uninspiring it all sounded.

I'll admit that I had it generate a couple of campaign outlines to run the babynerds through, but, uh, most of them are twelve and just here to see how many things they can murder, so the bar for keeping them entertained was very low.

I'm just boggled. There are so many articles of "the most iconic opening lines" out there, and it couldn't find one of those to crib? This is advanced stupid.

And it still screws that up.

"Generate a list of 50 opening lines from famous novels."
"The story so far: one of the most famous opening lines in literature. - The Great Gatsby"

You had one f#%#ing job, you technoplebe.

I literally only find AI useful to generate lists or short passages I'm gonna mess up for grammar practice anyway. For anything where the actual content matters, it's beyond useless, but asking it to "generate 100 generic locations, scenarios, and characters" for a forensics event where the kids have to improvise a skit is a huge time saver.

It finally hit a point of "I think I understand; the sky appears green from your perspective."

Is it morally wrong to try and gaslight ChatGPT so I can stall on a creative writing project?

Explain why the sky is green.

No, I'm pretty sure it's always green.

Yeah that looks pretty green to me. Are you using the right definition of sky?

No one ever wants to trace legislation to explain/contextualize sweeping societal trends. puts down lengthy Civil War and hatpin rants

Yes, child. I will gladly drop everything to grade the assignment you turned in three weeks late. It is my highest priority to serve at your beck and call like Jeeves.

Tis the season.

"Why did you give me a C- on my paper?"
"Because I'm exceedingly generous."

All animals are equal, but...

Went to the doctor for my annual physical. Flu shot. Tetanus shot. Blood drawn for bloodwork.

Tomorrow I'm going to the Dickens Faire. Should be... interesting...

Just like a Dickens character, you can contract consumption!

On the subject of grad school, I literally just got the notification that I got a 97 on my final project for an overall grade of 96. Semester 1 done. 8 more classes to go.

"Sorry, can you repeat that for me?"
"The Australian duke Fred was killed by a Siberian."
"...none of those words are right."

Ahh, the Cuban Missile Crisis as ladybugs and flies worried about bug spray.

And Napoleon as Fortnite.

sobs in grad school

Rogue: I follow the red brick road.
Paladin: Yellow.
Rogue: No, there's a lot of blood.

I walked out of the room for 5 minutes before my D&D kids arrived. I returned to discover the following on the board:

Embrace canibilism!!!
NO embrace holyness

I have concerns. Their spelling is terrible.

"...so I can do a speech about K-Pop?"
"For all I care, you can write a speech about how you want to grow up to be a Muppet. I just want people in Forensics."

Do I have to turn in my English teacher card for typing "parallel make alligator brain happy :)" on my notes slides?

I understand that the inflatable Santa sleighs usually only have three reindeer due to the logical limitations of material costs and the size of most lawns that would display them.

However, when you set one up on the roof of a specialty meats shop, it offers an entirely different explanation.

The kids are explaining the concept of a "hear me out cake" to me.

I'm so tired.

Weekly babynerds session begins with four 13-year-olds entering the classroom, pumping their fists and chanting, "Kill the pig! Slit his throat! Spill his blood!"

I'm not really known to drink, but...

Kids. I swear.

"Ms. Scint, I don't know what fable to do for my project."
"Have you researched your event yet?"
"No."
"Don't you think it will be easier to know how to adapt the story if you know what you're adapting?"
"I guess?"
"So what should you be doing?"
"...looking it up?"
golf clap

I love the historical fable project so much. The s@$% I get to overhear.

The Industrial Revolution as aliens or robots (or alien robots) taking over the world.

The Vietnam War as rival lemonade stands.