BRAINPAN LEAKAGE

If this blog post seems a bit odd – as if I am not entirely sure to whom I am speaking – well, there’s a reason for that.  I am actually posting it in two platforms. Depending upon where you happen to have your browser pointed while reading this will determine your next choice.

Choose one:

• Here, on the fresh, new, WordPress incarnation of Brainpan Leakage, and over yonder on the old, rickety, Myspace version.
• Here on the old, rickety, Myspace incarnation of Brainpan Leakage and over yonder on the fresh, new, WordPress version.

Okay, now that we have the flowchart crap out of the way, let’s get down to business.

Some of you might be wondering about my decision to move my blog, so rather than field questions in email, I have elected to be preemptive about it and give you an explanation here.  First off,  given some of the email I have already received, I suspect I need to run down some of the basic points:

1. I will no longer be posting full-fledged blog entries on Myspace after the one you are currently reading. All of my blogging will be done via the new WordPress interface, and you can easily subscribe to it by surfing yourself over to www.mrsellars.com/mrblog
2. My Myspace page is not going to go away. Well, let me qualify that – I am not going to make it go away. If Tom hits the wrong key on his keyboard while adding a new video and accidentally tosses my page into the void, well, there’s not a whole lot I can do about that. Talk to him.
3. There will still be something resembling posts on my Myspace blog. Kinda… As I said in point number 1, they will NOT be full blown blog entries. What they will be is a snippet of text combined with a link to the WordPress blog entry. They will show up as a title in the blog listing, just like normal. An example of this is the entry just prior to this one, entitled Day-Jah-Voooo. Some of you have already discovered this and made your way over to the new blog.
4. It is up to you. The blog entries can still be read by going through Mysapce, dinking around with their link security, and ending up at the new blog. This, however, does add steps for you. It would probably be easier to simply subscribe to the new version and avoid the hassle. But, like I said, that is entirely up to you.

Now, I suppose I should address the burning question: Why the move?

Simple really. In fact, the title of this blog entry says it all. But, to take that compressed, dessicated gist of the answer and reconstitute it, I will borrow – and paraphrase – a Dr. Harold W. Smith line from the movie Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins…

“Myspace is a great social networking tool, my boy, but its blog interface doesn’t work the way it’s supposed to…”

Truth is, paraphrased or no, that may not be entirely accurate. The Myspace  Blog Interface might just work EXACTLY the way it is supposed to. However, the fact remains that it doesn’t work very effectively. In fact, it just plain sucks. While you are all probably well aware of this, I shall endeavor to explain anyway…

It all began a tad over two years ago when I started blogging in November of 2006. That is when I was dragged, kicking and screaming, into having a Myspace page to begin with.  I have yet to forgive either of my publicists for that, even though it was an incredibly wise and smart decision for them to knock me over the head and deposit me there/here (choose one). They often make wise decisions on my behalf, then force me to become involved whether I like it or not. That’s just how they are. And, while what they do is good for my career as an author, I can still hold a grudge like a cat who just got a bath.

But, I guess I am doing that digressing thing again…

So, anyway, while there have been many, many blog entries in the original incarnation of Brainpan Leakage, what you, the readers can’t possibly know, is that you have missed probably an equal number of entries that never made it to the screen. Why? See the above opinion about the state of the Myspace Blog Interface (or perhaps it would be easier to call it, the MBI).

In a nutshell, the MBI has unceremoniously gone into la-la land when I have tried to post entries, sending whatever inane ramblings I had just typed into the ether, never to be seen again. On other occasions, it has suddenly wiped the screen free of those nasty, annoying words right in the middle of me typing them – usually when I am about 3/4 of the way through with the entry. Given that typing is a big part of how I make my living, I’m pretty sure it wasn’t me that caused the sudden disappearance. I actually do know my way around a keyboard…

Now, I thought maybe I could circumvent this whole vanishing issue by typing my blogs in Word, or even notepad, then cutting and pasting. Well, that didn’t work out so good. You see, our friends at Microsquish love to embed control codes. The Myspace blog interface is not set up to handle them, and unfortunately no amount of editing – via wysiwyg or html – will allow you to remove them completely. They just keep reappearing and making the text of the blog go all fribble-dee-frabbit. (Yes, sometimes I make up my own words.)

On top of all that, even if you make the blog publically viewable, there are a ton of folks who A) Avoid Myspace like the plague under any and all circumstances or B) Don’t know that you don’t have to have a Myspace account to see a publically viewable blog, and therefore resort to option A.

The last straw, the one that broke the proverbial camel’s back, came just a few days ago when I typed in about 75% of a blog and it suddenly went poof right before my eyes. It was a long blog, but it was one that might well have entertained folks. It was yet another rambling about a clacking domino inside my head as my brain endeavors to download all of the memories I have stored there over my almost half century of existence. But the operative points here are long, 75% finished, and poof.

I was, to say the least, pissed. My calm was damaged. I said many very nasty words, more than once, and aloud. Loud aloud. I think I might have even called Tom a big doody head, what with him being the Myspace ambassador and all.

I suppose I could have spent time retyping it, which probably would have been more entertaining than what you are reading right now, but I didn’t. Instead, I opted to spend that time, plus a little more, to find a better way, in order that my calm no longer be in danger of getting damaged, and Tom could go on about his business without wondering if I was calling him names behind his back.

And, I believe I found one…

My new blog interface is extremely robust. It has autosaved drafts, so there’s no more silly losing of blog entries going on. It is incredibly customizable with widgets, skins, features, and has amazing editability. It is accessible by EVERYONE with an internet connection. It allows for not only common tags but customizable tags as well. There are pingbacks, feeburns, remarkable handling of images and links, notification emails, an easy to navigate dashboard… I could go on and on…and on some more after that…

Yeah, just slap a red wig and some high heels on it and I would marry the damn thing, I’m so in love with it…

And so, there you have it. I’m having an illicit affair with a piece of software. Don’t tell EK.

So, back to the slightly serious… I have now officially “migrated” all of the blog entries from the Myspace version, starting at the beginning posts from November 2006. Well, not ALL… Just the entries with good, timeless content, which worked out to somewhere around 3/4 of them. The rest were contest announcements and such which were dated and weren’t really worth  the time and effort to bother moving.

Hopefully, that answers the question(s). If it doesn’t, well, I am certain I will hear from you.

Okay… Now that the explaining is over I am going to go play with the dominos and see what kind of leak they manage to create this time…

More to come…

Murv

I have no doubt that some of you are far too young to have any clue what the hell the title of this blog references. Or, more importantly, my hidden meaning behind it. But, since you, my readers, tend to surprise me at every turn, I could well be wrong and every single one one of you might know exactly what I am trying to say, in which case you can probably just stop reading now and save yourself some time. Or not. I mean, what fun would that be?

At any rate, I suppose you will let me know. You always do…

So, let’s make our traditional left turn at the Jersey turnpike and start somewhere left and slightly above the middle, like usual…

There I sat last night watching the premiere of “168”. Now, don’t go running to the TV guide looking to see if there is a new show you haven’t heard about, because I’m sure you’ve heard of this one, just not by that particular title. It’s actually pretty easy if you do the math – 168 / 24 = 7. So, yeah, what I’m talking about is “24” season 7 (or as they say, “day 7″…) If you happen to be one of the folks who gave up on this series after the mind numbingly repetetive, lackluster, shamelessly predictable, unbelievable (even with suspension of disbelief), and horribly cardboard cutout seasons three through six, I don’t blame you. I almost did so myself. As a matter of fact, I had quite vocally resolved not to waste my time with it ever again. Why I bothered to watch seasons three through six is beyond me. It probably had something to do with brain drain. (At this point I do feel compelled to note that while seasons 3-6 were at best, unimpressive, the first 12 episodes of season 4 DID contain a very shiny bright spot – that being a friend of mine, Alberta Watson, who portrayed Erin Driscoll, head of CTU. She could have kicked Bauer’s ass, and they should have let her… But, that’s just my opinion.)

At any rate, like I said, I wouldn’t blame you at all if you have given up on “24”, 48, 72, ad nauseum. However, after seeing a couple of clips and hearing a fairly well balanced review and interview on NPR, I bought into enough of the hype to give it a go. To my genuine surprise, “the following that took place between the hours of 8AM and 10AM,” last night didn’t suck at all. In fact, they were pretty good. Therefore, I will be parked in front of the “toob” tonight in order to catch, “the following that took place between the hours of 10AM and 12PM.” If those are also blatantly suckless in value, then I am likely to follow it right on round the clock to 8AM once again. Of course, it doesn’t hurt at all that there’s a smokin’ hot, redheaded FBI babe paired up with Bauer this season. Or that she is portrayed by actress Annie Wersching, who grew up right here in Saint Louis (local pride and all, ya’know…). And, we all know my penchant for redheads with strong personalities… (yeah, I know, ‘nother blog…)

On a side note – if some intern at FOX is scouring the internet for references to “24“, 168, what have you, in order to do market research and happens to run across this blog, I have two messages for the powers that be: First, cancelling Firefly was epic fail, kids. You shot that series in the foot, then blamed it for your incompetence and used that as a reason to cancel it. Admit your mistake and fix it. Secondly, where “24” is concerned, tell your writers that it will suck even less if at some point Bauer gets tired and has nappy time. They included this in season one, and that is one of the things that made it believable. Yeah, he can stay up for 24 hours straight, but he can’t be fresh as a daisy the whole time. Give us a break…We’ve all stayed up past midnight at some point in our lives, so we know what kind of effect it has on a person. We are nowhere near as stupid as you think we are…

Now, back to the regularly scheduled rambling…

But, ya’know, I didn’t come here to give you a review of 168 / 7 today…I didn’t even come here to yak about dominos…well, actually I’m lying about that last part. Dominos seem to be a big part of my life at the moment. Everything triggers a memory and there ya’ go…

So, anyway, Network 23…wait, I’m getting a bit ahead of myself.

So, anyway, DTV…The wonderful, federally mandated, “Digital Television”… Yeah, okay… So, they are forcing broadcasters to switch to a digital signal, thereby forcing consumers to switch/upgrade/otherwise retrofit their receivers to be able to handle said digital signal. This is all being done in the name of freeing up the analog airwaves for other uses. Not sure why that is, honestly. I mean, why couldn’t the other uses just go ahead and use the digital band and leave well enough alone?

Don’t get me wrong. I’m am not some kind of stick in the mud…well, yeah, maybe I am…but, that’s not the point. Stop getting me sidetracked…What I’m trying to say is that I am certainly not against digital technology. I’m sitting here using a computer, correct? I spent 25 years as a computer technician, and recently discovered that my skills haven’t completely rusted shut – not just yet, anyway. I was even a partner in a recording studio some years back, and for the day, we had the latest and greatest digital equipment available. Yet, we still had clients who insisted on using “tube mics” (analog microphones) and analog tape, because of the ambiance it would lend to the sound…

But, here’s why I am having a bit of a problem with this whole DTV thing – Federal mandate and added cost aside. (I mean, I already have satellite TV, so I’m not actually affected where the whole buying a converter box thing is concerned…) My issue is quality. Yeah. Imagine that.

“But Murv, digital is so much clearer, blah blah blah…”

Is it? One would think, yes. I mean, even I thought it would be. But, last night as I sat watching “168” I was proven wrong. You see, throughout both hours of the program it was plagued with digital dropout, signal loss, bizarre digital artifacts, and yes, the good ole “Max Headroom” syndrome, whereby Jack Bauer spent a good part of the time stuttering across my screen as he jerked about like someone holding on to a bare extension cord.

Some of you old timers are now understanding the reference in the title. Those of you who aren’t are probably following the Max Headroom link and will get it very shortly.

So, here’s my thing… I have no idea what the government plans to do with all of these analog frequencies they are freeing up. I think I saw an article about it once, but quite honestly it wasn’t important enough at the time for me to care and remember what it said. However, if DTV is going to effectively thrust us back into the age of Black and White Cathode Ray Tubes and Rabbit Ears with tin foil (yeah, it was tin before it was aluminum) wrapped around them (something I am, unfortunately, plenty old enough to remember quite vividly), I can see a revolution coming…

Just like in Max Headroom. Beat up Winnebagos and Buses traveling the highways pursued by the FCC in their dark government sedans. Constantly hiding out in alleyways, cranking up retractable mast antennas, and all  manned by cyberpunkish folks like Blank Reg and Dominique (see Max Headroom link). A ragtag group of dissenters, defiantly broadcasting whatever they can on pirated analog frequencies, if for no other reason than to provide a picture that doesn’t jerk around the screen like a frog in a hot frying pan before randomly turning into colorful little squares and jibbering like a CD with a scratch in it.

Hmmmm… I already know what EK looks like in leather. (uh-huh, another blog… and probably not Myspace friendly…) I wonder what I would look like in a purple mohawk and a handful of tattoos? Maybe I should buy myself a used schoolbus and go visit an auction or two. I’m betting analog transmitters are gonna be going cheap…

More to come…

Murv