Category: Best Of

Popular, poignant, or otherwise significant.

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Best Of Debated Disliked

Tribbles Need Not Apply

Today, The Chronicle of Higher Education had a wonderfully misguided article entitled “Bloggers Need Not Apply“. Written by a “humanities professor at a small liberal-arts college in the Midwest” writing under the pseudonym “Ivan Tribble”, the article details how his college’s recent faculty search ended up disqualifying a lot of candidates largely because they were bloggers.

An article this misguided is not the sort of thing I’d expect out of the Chronicle. It illustrates the wrong line of thinking about blogs, the wrong line of thinking about interviewing candidates, and the wrong line of intersecting the two. This is worth picking apart. (Please click through for a full dissection.)

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Best Of Created Endured

L’appel Telephonique Sauvage

L'appel Telephonique Sauvage
A One Act Play
Based On True Events
By Dan Dickinson
CURTAIN UP:
INT. DAN DICKINSON'S APARTMENT.
DAN DICKINSON sits at his desk.  His computer is 
playing "Narcolepsy" by Ben Folds.  His wife, 
KATIE DICKINSON, is sitting on the couch typing 
into her laptop.
THE PHONE RINGS.

DAN DICKINSON
Hmm, wonder who that could be.

DAN mutes his music and walks over to the phone, 
picking it up in his right hand.

DAN DICKINSON
Hello?

There is a SHORT PAUSE, followed by a click.

MALE VOICE ON PHONE
(background noise indicates some sort of call center)
Hello?

DAN is visibly irritated, knowing this is a cold call.

DAN DICKINSON
(irritated) Yes?


MALE VOICE ON PHONE
Dan?


DAN DICKINSON
(somewhat surprised they used just a nickname) Yes?


MALE VOICE ON PHONE
(jovial) How's it going?  This is Pam from Girls' Gone 
Wild...


DAN DICKINSON
*(V.O., representing internal monologue)*
What the FUCK?


MALE VOICE NAMED PAM
(still jovial) We're conducting a short phone survey 
and...


DAN DICKINSON
(strongly) Could you PLEASE put me on 
your "Do Not Call" list?

DAN hangs up the phone, then stares at it, baffled.
CURTAIN FALLS.
END.

I wish I had the wit, comedic timing, and tape recorder of Eugene Mirman – I can only imagine how much unbridled hilarity could have been in store.

(If you liked this one, be sure to read my other life-is-surreal play, The Market Of Boston.)

Categories
Best Of Explained

Quicksilver: From A Better OS X To Even More

This is an intermediate Quicksilver tutorial, to help people who went through my first tutorial and are looking for a little more in-depth information about how to tweak Quicksilver. While there are a few nifty things to do in here that are spelled out verbatim, most of this should be taken as a launching pad into your own self discovery about Quicksilver.

Before going through this article, please make sure your copy Quicksilver is up to date (including plugins), you know how to invoke the hotkey and do basic Quicksilver actions, and can find the preferences window.

This is current through b51 (3800).

You are going to rock and roll. And you can hardly wait for the music to begin. When it happens, you will become a part of that music. You are there. You are going on a musical trip. The highest, happiest trip that you’ve ever been on. Enjoy it, and get into it. Loosen your seatbelts, let’s rock and roll.

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