Tetherd Cow Ahead

Folks, I’m really sorry, but Blogger continues to be stuffed. It all seemed to be working this morning and now I’ve noticed the Comments page isn’t loading again and I’m having further formatting problems.

Blogger technical people are being spectacularly unhelpful. There is no information forthcoming about what the problems are, the magnitude of them, or when, or even if they are likely to be fixed. Blogger Status information continues to be completely useless (they haven’t even changed the message in two days).

This is immensely frustrating as you can imagine. Because of the bizarre and intermittent nature of the problems, I can’t even tell if things are working from one moment to the next.

I’m also extremely busy at the moment and I don’t have time to execute my preferred option, which is to migrate The Cow across to some other platform.

As a result I’m going to put the blog on ice for a week or so, so you won’t see any posts.

I simply cannot convey the measure of my extreme annoyance at this poor service from Google/Blogger. I can only reiterate what I said before: Google is cruising for a fall. If they can’t reliably look after something like Blogger, why would you ever trust them with anything valuable. You have been warned.

Adios for a while.

The Reverend.

So now, I’ve lost all my sidebars and some other utility from my xml template for The Cow. Even though Blogger says the filer is fixed. On checking the Status Page, I got the above, very reassuring page load.

[pulls hair out]

Then I tried to upload this post and got:

Yeah, this looks fixed to me.

Dear All,

I apologize for the idiotic behaviour of The Cow over these last few days, even though it really has nothing to do with me. Blogger/Blogspot is having some kind of spak attack and all manner of craptacular behaviour has resulted. I checked with the Status Page just now and apparently ‘everything is back to normal’.

Well that’s a new reading of the word ‘normal’ anyway, which seems to include the fact that the formatting on The Cow may or may not work, you may or may not be able to make comments, and if you do, they may or may not actually appear.

This is just another incident in a long line of crappy service that has occurred as a result of, or in coincidence with Google’s takeover of Blogspot. It seems that Google has hit that inevitable part on the rising curve where companies (or Empires) get too big too fast and everything goes to shit.

I’ll probably port everything over to an independant site pretty soon, to my great regret. I am philosophically very much inclined toward this wonderful egalitarian model of free shared information, but Google of all people should be aware how important reliability is to such endeavours. And now they’re gunning to get us all to trust them with our personal data.

Well, not me chaps. You just blew it. You were doing good for a while there, and I used to be a big fan. Now you’re starting to look just like any other money-hungry capitalistic venture.

If you have been trying to make comments on The Cow and have been thwarted (by lack of any facility for doing so – wha??), once again I apologize. Please don’t stop visiting me – you’re the only friends I have.

Have you noticed that there is appearing in the news media, a kind of nutty and meaningless phraseology that is peculiar to the popular press? Things like ‘… this senseless act of vandalism was committed in the early hours of the morning…’. Senseless act of vandalism? Like there are acts of vandalism that are sensible…?

Maybe:

Sensible vandals today sprayed graffiti over train carriages but made sure not to endanger themselves or the general public by wearing safety harnesses and protective clothing.

Here in Sydney, we have apparently just experienced ‘the ugly side of racism’. This should not be confused with the redeeming side of racism which is, well, er…

Maybe:

The lighter side of racism was demonstrated in Sydney today, when white children beat and shot aboriginal children in an hilarious spoof of the early colonial encounters with the native inhabitants.

And recently the death of a famous media personality, known mostly for his astute business acumen in the field of tax ‘minimisation’, evoked the headline ‘The Many Sides of an Enigma’.

An enigma is not like a box or other geometric figure. It doesn’t have sides. Not even an inside and an outside. What is wrong with ‘The Many Aspects of an Enigma’, or even just simply, ‘An Enigmatic Man’. Next it will be ‘The Many Colours of Opportunity’ or ‘The Many Edges of Freedom’…

Where do these people learn this mangled form of expression? Do they ever actually think before they write? How long will it be before all language becomes entirely meaningless?

If you run a cafe and a customer asks the question “Is your orange juice freshly squeezed?” there is only one acceptable answer: “Yes, of course!”

If you need to answer “No” then you shouldn’t be offering orange juice on the menu. The chalky bitter-and-yet-too-sweet orange coloured stuff that comes supplied in plastic bottles is about as close to orange juice as Kool Aid is to, well, any naturally occurring substance.

Other unacceptable answers to the above question:

♦”Yes, it’s that brand that gets squeezed daily. We get it delivered every couple of days…*”

♦”No, but it’s organic”

♦”I’m not sure†”

♦”No, it’s Tang”

♦”No, but it’s a really nice brand‡”

Lately, a cafe in my area has taken to providing a certain brand of organic orange juice in an ugly plastic bottle. If you are foolish enough to order it, the bottle is delivered to the table with a straw, no glass. This is all about showing off your preference for drinking expensive organic juice and nothing about enjoyment. It tastes like shit.

Hear me, restaurants of the world: the only acceptable option for providing orange juice to a customer is to get a few big fresh oranges (organic if you desire, certainly), squeeze the juice out of them and deliver it immediately to the table. Don’t put ice in it.

The Cow has spoken.

*No kidding – a waiter said that to me once.
†You may as well say “No”. Any restaurant waiter worth their wage could hardly not notice orange squeezing apparatus. It’s not like it’s a Stealth process or anything.
‡ No it isn’t. Orange juice in bottles does not taste at all like real orange juice. Ever.

So, anyway, the lock on the security grill on my front door* has slowly become harder to open over time and I decide that I need to consult a locksmith.

There is one a couple of blocks from me. I give them a call. Dave, the locksmith, is very helpful.

You should be able to undo two screws and pull out the lock pretty easily. Bring it down tomorrow and I’ll take a look. We shouldn’t need to come out and it will save you money. We’ll possibly need to replace the escutcheon†, the lock, or maybe cut you a new key to the lock. We can probably do it while you wait.

I think it might be that my key is just worn and I need a new one.

Yep, that’s possible too, I’ll be able to tell you straight away.

The next day I take out the lock – Dave was right, it comes out easily.
I walk down to the shop. A buzzer sounds when I open the door. A little fat man comes out.

Hi. Dave?

No, Dave isn’t here today.

Oh, OK. Dave told me to bring my lock down and you could tell me what’s wrong with it. I think maybe I just need a new key.

The guy examines the key and lock.

Nothing wrong with the key. You need a new escutcheon.

Oh, OK, fine. Can you do that for me.

Sure.

He disappears into the backroom. There is some tapping and clunking and a little bit of grinding. He comes back.

There, that’s better.

He turns the key. It looks good. I pay him $13, take it home and put it back in the door. It sticks as soon as I try it. Oops, I think, it’s actually something wrong with the door. Maybe it’s misaligned or something. I take the lock out and turn the key. Nope. It’s still sticking – just like before. I go back to the shop.

It’s still sticking.

The little fat guy peers at the lock and wobbles the key. It sticks. I show him how it works from one direction and not from the other.

I think I might just need a new key – see how badly this one’s worn?

He wobbles the key again.

No, it’s not the key. It has to be in straight and it works – see?

He wobbles the key and it opens.

Yes, I know I can wobble it around and it will eventually open, but I want it to work properly – no wobbling and jiggling. Just open and close.

He sighs. He goes into the back room. There is some sawing and grinding. He comes back. He wobbles the key in the lock.

Ok, now that’s better.

I try it. It sticks two times out of three.

Look, I don’t want it to do this. I don’t care what it takes – do I need to replace the lock? Whatever. I just want it to work properly. Maybe I need a new key made?

He takes the lock into the back room. There is clunking, grinding and more grinding. And more grinding and some tapping. For fifteen minutes. I walk around the shop thinking about how crappy the security is for a lock shop – I could steal a bunch of padlocks, keys and miniature surveillance cameras.

The guy comes back.

There, it’s better.

He wobbles the key to show me. It sticks.

Now look. I don’t want any more of this. I just want it fixed. Do you have a replacement lock. Whatever it takes. I don’t want any sticking. DO YOU UNDERSTAND?

He shakes his head and goes into the backroom. I can see him rummaging around in cabinets. Another guy turns up and there is conversation I can’t quite hear, and they both start rummaging. This goes on for another five or ten minutes. Then there is silence. Then, oddly, some more grinding and tapping and clunking. He’s working on the lock again! I stick my head around the door.

Excuse me, what are you doing?

He holds up the lock.

It’s a bit better!

Look. I DON’T WANT YOU TO DO THIS. I’VE BEEN HERE FOR FORTY-FIVE MINUTES. I JUST WANT A NEW LOCK.

We don’t have any locks like that.

He comes back out into the shop and puts the lock on the counter.

That’s all I can do. See, the key has to be level – there’s too much movement. It’s not a good lock.

But it always used to work fine, and it works perfectly from one direction, just not the other. Maybe it’s the key – see the tine is worn and bent. Maybe it works on the tumblers one way and not the other. Maybe I just need a new key that isn’t worn like this one?

He gives me a withering look that says “What would you know about locks you stupid moron with the IQ of a squirrel?”, disappears for three seconds into the back of the shop and comes back with a key that is exactly like a non-worn version of my key.

He puts it in the lock. It works perfectly.‡

*I may live in the most wonderful city in the world, but we still have junkies.

‡This is an entirely true story. It happened yesterday.