I tried to find images of the women behind most of America's desserts today; it took some work.

For Sara Lee, I tracked down this first:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kitchens_of_Sara_Lee
That gave me her full name. So then I just search for images:
http://images.google.com/images?q=Sara%20Lee%20Schupf&sourceid=navclient-ff&rlz=1B3GGGL_enUS292US292&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&hl=en&tab=wi
And there she was, second row.

Marie Callender was easier.
http://www.mcpies.com/about_us/our_history.php
Bam. Right there on the page.

Mrs. Smith's website didn't have a photo of their namesake, but I got her first name:
http://www.mrssmiths.com/aboutOurHistory.html
Then I just googled that name, and voilá, the piemaker herself.
http://images.google.com/images?q=%22Amanda%20Smith%22&sourceid=navclient-ff&rlz=1B3GGGL_enUS292US292&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&hl=en&tab=wi

Well, okay. I'm not sure WHICH Amanda Smith was the ACTUAL "Mrs. Smith," but I hazarded a guess.*







* "chose the cutest"

"Sheer mass and strength won't cut it, people! We need to give these automatons of death better dexterity than humans could ever achieve!"



Yeah. Good work, engineers. I especially like how you taught the robot hand the vital human-subduing skill like KNOT TYING. Oh, and getting him to use tweezers. Nice touch, there. Nice to know when they're doing precision surgery on us, implanting their control chips, they'll leave very small scars.

I had a delightful experience at the doctor's office yesterday. I originally went in for help with my sciatic nerve, which had been causing me pain at night. So much pain, in fact, that I couldn't sleep. And my long-standing rule has always been the following: "Be tough, be strong, and suck it up, unless it's interfering with sleepytime."

So one X-ray and one MRI later, the doctor informed me that the pain was coming from a disc that was slightly torn and leaking disc-goo onto my a nerve, creating the same sensation one might get from an actual pinched nerve.

The problem could hopefully be solved, he said, by giving me a steroid injection in that part of my spine, thereby giving the disc time to heal. "It's called an epidural," he said, which put me at ease. My wife has had three epidurals, and they were great at relieving pain. Simple math.

Alas, I think what he was trying to tell me was "It's called an epidural, but this ain't your old lady's epidural." He proceeded to tell me that it would, in fact, hurt. "Say what?!" I thought, while successfully maintaining my cool demeanor. Couldn't he numb me wherever that shot had to happen? And where DID it happen, for that matter?

My question was soon answered. He pointed on a little model of the spine to a tiny hole in the tailbone. The shot would go in that spot, as shown in the picture.

You'll notice that needle is going in dangerously close to what I like to call the "no-touchy zone." But no matter! I'm nothing if not a tough, manly, no-pain-no-gain type of ubermale. That said, I did ask if there was anything we could do to avoid the pain -- we ubermales don't like embarrassing other men with our incredible tolerance for pain -- and he answered in one word as he left the room.

"Pray." 

I laughed. My laughter would be short-lived, however.

I switched into a hospital gown, and a nurse prepared the area for the injection by wiping it with iodine-type stuff -- a task I do not envy her. Then the doctor came back in, and got ready to give me the shot of cortisone. I was a bit unnerved when I saw him prepping the shot. I snapped this picture when he wasn't looking.

 

Nevertheless, I was braced for the worst. After all, the spinal cord doesn't extend all the way down that little hole, so there were probably no nerves there to be bother--

"HOLY CRAP THAT HURTS!"

These and other words were among the many, many things I did not scream. I was dismayed to learn that my health insurance didn't cover a nice wooden stick for me to bite down on, which I think might've helped considerably.

I'll be honest: my butt cheeks clenched up tighter than an alligator's jaws on a poodle. In fact, I'm fairly certain I could have held an alligator's jaws shut with my butt cheeks.

"All right, let's try to relax there," the doctor said. "Don't want to break my needle here..."

OH YES. THAT HELPS ME RELAX. THANK YOU, DOCTOR, FOR THOSE SOOTHING WORDS TO PUT ME AT EASE.

I tried to relax, but let's face it -- I have one tight bottom. Nary a day goes by that I don't catch some woman getting ready to spank my tookus as I go by. So he pulled the needle out, whether out of concern for my pain or out of concern for his precious needle, and then decided to give me something to numb the area.

What? Now you decide that? Why couldn't... why would you... WHAT THE CRAP, DOC? I even asked if there was something you could do, and you said to pray! Was that a little test? Were you listening outside the door to see if I prayed, and when I didn't pray you opted not to numb me first? You're a sick man. A sick, sick man.

So he got something to numb it, which, of course, also had to be injected. But eventually it took effect, and I was able to coax my buttocks into their normal, non-bulletproof state. He then finished the injection, which still hurt like the dickens, but perhaps only 3 or 4 dickens, as compared to the hundreds of dickens it was hurting like before.

In the end (HA!) I think it'll be for the best. I won't know for sure for a couple days if it's really helping or not. But if the sciatic nerve pain persists, maybe I can reflect back on the injection and it'll seem like nothing.

I leave you with this stanza from Dr. Suess's "There's  a Wocket in my Pocket:"

"But Randy," you say, "do we really have to worry about robots? I mean, it's not like it would ever be in their best interests to destroy humanity, right?"

Wrong! I give you ROBOTS POWERED BY DEAD BODIES:

From Fox News:

Ah, yes! So now, in addition to angering our creations with our constant abuse, we can now give them a real reason to destroy us all -- for FOOD. "Hey, Z4D9, I'm hungry. Let's go make a war zone."

(Robotic Technology Inc.'s nice touch is that the robot is steam-powered. Hurray. Not just robots -- STEAM PUNK robots.)

My brother Howard is down in Provo playing an all-nighter role-playing game, where instead of controlling swords-and-sorcery-type characters, your character is yourself. And the day is today. And the 4th of July crowds... have all turned into zombies.

I suggested it might be fun if I showed up at midnight or 1 AM, when folks are kinda loopy and tired, and started moaning and banging/clawing on the door. Howard would be in on it; he could text me and let me know if it would be worthwhile on his end.

Alas, by the time 10:00 rolled around, I was too tired, so I texted him that I wouldn't be coming, in three short words:

No zombie randy

The reply I got was

What?

It was at this time that I realized I still have Howard's OLD mobile number in my cell. (I thought I deleted it. Guess not.)

I could've texted back "wrong number, my bad," but what fun would that be? This way, somebody has a little bit more mystery in their life.

I'm glad I didn't write "No randy-zombie," though. I mean, you get that message, and you're glad there are no randy zombies, but now you have new fodder for nightmares.

(And what if there WAS a zombie near the person I mis-texted? What if they were waiting inside their house, and their friend went out to see if all the zombies had been dispatched, and then they got that message? "Oh, I guess it's safe to go outsiAHHHH!" Man, I'll feel pretty bad if that happened.)

So, I'm trying to decide which stories I should be writing, and I've seen some interesting themes that recur between each.

The first one -- and one I've started rewriting from scratch multiple times -- is a deep-future sci-fi about a man taken prisoner on an alien spaceship. After some terrible torture, he escapes into the bowels of their ship, and is torn between committing suicide to prevent that torture from ever happening again, or going on living in the hopes of finding rescue, and perhaps rescuing his fellow-prisoners.

Second, paused at about 45,000 words, is a modern-day sci-fi about a man who has very vivid dreams of a different life. So vivid, in fact, that he can't tell which is his real life and which is the dream.  In one existence, he's powerfully depressed and alone; in the other he has a girlfriend, family, and successful career. He embarks on reconciling the two worlds, while escaping the dangers present in each one.

Third, a short story, is a near-future sci-fi about a woman who awakes to discover that she has no senses except for those that a computer feeds her; she's told that after being diagnosed with terminal cancer, she volunteered for a terrifying experiment which keeps her brain alive, connected to a powerful computer. As she finds herself hostage to the experiment, and to powerful levels of pain-inducing feedback, she has to decide whether to end her frightening new life, or to go on towards an uncertain future.

Whew! Little dark! Are we seeing a bit of my bipolar experience coming through here? Methinks so. The connection between mind and body is a theme in each, and the courage (or other motivation) it takes to keep going. But I have happy endings in mind, really! Well, I actually could end two of them with not-happy endings, but... I don't like not-happy endings. I can admire them, and sometimes they are far more fitting than the happy ones we get, but I hope that I could make happy endings for the stories that DO fit.

Some of my writing is targeted at a Crichton-y style, though some is more Stephen King-ish. By "style", of course, I mean "economic success".  How cool would it be to make up stuff for a living, eh?

The problem I'm facing now is that I don't know what I should be writing. None of them are poking at me anymore, begging to be written. I think I need a nice manic swing to get back into the groove of writing.

Oh, I didn't mention the deep-future sci-fi teleplay about the clone who is trying to rescue his original in exchange for his life-rights, and the modern-day teleplay about surviving a zombie apocalypse.

For somebody who did improv & sketch comedy over the course of 15 years (in over 1000 shows, I've estimated), I sure don't infuse my writing with much humor. There are exceptions, but the stuff I've pursued more consistently is always serious. The only big exception would be my blogging and Twittering, which I generally try to make funny, at least on some level. I just farted.

     I recalled this memory tonight as I was trying to sleep, and laughed. I need to get it in writing in case I get hit by a bus tomorrow, and my brother Bill never shares it of his own accord.
     When I was 15 or so, we had two brooms: one for inside, and one for the trampoline, outside. Leaves would fall year round in Florida, as trees get confused as to whether or not it's Fall, so the trampoline broom just stayed outside because of its frequent usage. However, as I recall, this broom got so weathered that we eventually had to throw it away, leaving us with just the kitchen broom. We kept our broom beside the fridge, as per federal regulations, and would fetch it when the tramp needed sweeping.
     Late one night -- let's say midnight -- I glanced through the glass doors before heading to bed, and noticed the kitchen broom had not been replaced; it was lying on the porch outside by the trampoline. In an unusual moment of fastidiousness, I opened the sliding door, went out, and closed it behind me while I went to get the broom.
     (Why close it? Well, we had two cats that were not allowed outside -- ever -- and it had become an ingrained habit; you step outside, you close the door, even if it's for two seconds. We were pretty paranoid about the cats getting out and catching Typhoid.)
     I grabbed the broom, and went back in the house (again opening the sliding door, going through, and closing it). It was during this second opening that Bill woke up -- he was Billy back then, age 12 or so -- and was rather frightened to hear someone coming into our home in the middle of the night.
     I returned the broom to its position in the kitchen, then walked back towards my bedroom, which is just past Bill's. His door was open at night, as was mine, so we could see the nightlight in the hall. (By "nightlight" I mean "hall light" -- I don't know how we slept with a light that bright on, but apparently the dark was fearsome enough that we couldn't sleep without it.)
     So I'm on my way to my bedroom, almost past Bill's door, when he jumps into his doorway in a Karate stance and yells "Hi-YA!"
     That was funny. What was funnier, though, was that Bill didn't really believe somebody had come in. He was pretty sure it was his imagination, but he was going to play it safe, and use his stellar acting skills to frighten off any possible intruder. That's why, when he saw me there in the mostly-dark, he was mortified. There was a distinct moment before he recognized me as his brother that all he saw was his fears made real: there really was an intruder in the house. It was during that moment that he screamed and fell backwards.
     You really need to imagine the whole scene from my perspective to truly appreciate it. Walking towards my bedroom in the still of night; my little brother jumps out in a fake Karate pose and yells "Hi-YA--", but it's cut short by his scream; his unconvincing stance disappears as he stumbles backwards in terror at seeing me. All out of the blue, all in about a second.
     I wish you could have been there. (Because then we really could have scared him.)
    
    

I just thought I'd share how in the world you fix your computer after this particular browser hijacking happens to you. Here are the symptoms:

• You were invited to use a Facebook application for sending smileys, perchance
• Whenever you search for something, you either get redirected to searchinworldx.com or getsearch0330.com, or maybe something else
• You have a smooth spot on your scalp where you have pulled out all of your hair

First, don't bother with AdAware -- at least as of this writing, 4/14/09, they didn't seem to find the bug I had.

Second, don't bother with Windows Defender, or ComboFix, either. Same reason.

Third, ignore all those people who tell you that you are insane to not run anti-virus software of some kind. I know it SOUNDS like they want you to strangle them with your bare hands, but really, they mean well. Just ignore them.

Here's where to go and what to do, and the special secret that was killing me.

1. Go to http://www.superantispyware.com/downloadfile.html?productid=SUPERANTISPYWAREFREE and download SuperAntiSpyware. Sounds awful, I know. Seriously, I half-wondered if it was going to ask me if I wanted the Ask.com toolbar installed. But it didn't -- it's a very nice program.
2. Install it, and run it. But don't run the quick scan -- do the big-boy, COMPLETE scan. I tried the quick scan and it found some stuff, but much to my chagrin it was still there when I restarted (as it will ask you to do when it's all done). So do a complete scan, and restart.
   
   
   
3. When you restart, you'll find that your browser is no longer being hijacked... BECAUSE YOU CAN'T BROWSE THE INTERNET. This was the painful part for me. I thought it had something to do with my newly-secured wireless network, but it was not -- it was because the hijacking malware changes your proxy settings for all the browsers it finds on your machine, and removing the malware doesn't set the settings back. You have to change those settings back manually.

In Firefox:

1. Go to Tools>Options, then the Advanced tab (don't be scared), the Network tab (stay with me), and click on Settings.
   
   
   
2. See that ugly proxy server it's trying to send you to on port 7170? Yeah. Set your stuff back to NO Proxy. (Unless you were supposed to have a proxy, like for internet filter software, perhaps?)
   
   
   
3. Hit OK a buncha times. Voilá! You're back in business.

In Internet Explorer (sorry, I only have 6.0 installed... no, don't ask):

1. Go to Tools>Internet Options, then the Connections tab, then click the LAN Settings button.
   
   
   
2. Unclick that Proxy Server checkbox, and hit OK a lot. (Again, if you're supposed to have a proxy server, you're on your own figuring out what it's supposed to be. But you know what it's NOT supposed to be? Localhost on port 7170.
   
3. IE will now be happy.

In Safari:

1. Go to Edit>Preferences, then the Advanced tab. Click on Change Settings right there next to Proxies.
   
   
   
2. This will, oddly enough, pop up your Internet Explorer's internet options, if you're running Windows. If you didn't already fix it in IE, you can do so now.
3. Ask yourself why you're using Safari on Windows.

In Chrome or Opera:

1. Hell if I know. Who ARE you people, anyway?

For those of you who are curious, NO, it was not me that got our computer infected, thankyouverymuch. I won't name names, but it was my wife. Rebecca.

Well, good news, fellow robophobes! They're getting ever closer to androids, which, as you know, is a critical first step to terminators. We'll be proven right eventually, and hopefully we'll have enough time to say "I told you so!" before a cybernetic warrior crushes our skull in its vice-like grip.

I love this, I really do: http://blueservo.net/

It's a free volunteer service where you can view any of a bunch of webcams along the Texas-Mexico border. If you see anything suspicious, like would-be aliens or drug dealers trying to cross into the U.S., you can contact authorities through the site and alert them.

http://blueservo.net/sightings/1.php is an example of one of the video streams they had that caught people.