Twenty-First-Century Computing, as Explained by My Mother

Ken AshfordRandom MusingsLeave a Comment

Actually, it’s by the mother of McSweeney’s List writer Pasha Malla, but it could just as well be my mother: the Internet: "Where people mess around with words." e-mail: "A way of communicating with people. You plug in and go for it." website: "Where you post information about a topic. Any topic. It could be anything. Therein lies the freedom." … Read More

Women’s Pro Golf

Ken AshfordRandom MusingsLeave a Comment

Up until today, women’s professional golf has ranked about No. 141 in my list of favorite sports, falling somewhere between tetherball and underwater hockey. But now I would place women’s professional golf at, oh, No. 54. This is why and this is why.

Evaluation Time

Ken AshfordBloggingLeave a Comment

HillaryClinton.com: The Volokh Conspiracy (blog of prominent law school professors): CNN: Emily Mark’s blog: The New York Times political blog (The Caucus) The White House website: Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Model-based Embedded and Robotic Systems Group (affiliated with the Computer Science and Artifical Intelligence Laboratory) website: This blog: Dammit!

My Year Of Being Sybil

Ken AshfordPersonal, TheatreLeave a Comment

What I have been in the past year: Jewish floor shop owner (Little Shop of Horrors) Army psychiatrist or possibly a hallucination (Bug) Oily nightclub owner (The Full Monty) Unemployed steelworker and bad stripper (The Full Monty) Irish priest (The Full Monty) Repo man (The Full Monty) Gay latino dance instructor (The Full Monty) Bespeckled messenger from God (God’s Favorite) … Read More

Mamihlapinatapai

Ken AshfordRandom MusingsLeave a Comment

Wikipedia: Mamihlapinatapai (sometimes misspelled mamihlapinatapei) is a word from the Yaghan language of Tierra del Fuego, listed in The Guinness Book of World Records as the "most succinct word", and is considered one of the hardest words to translate. It describes a look shared by two people with each wishing that the other will initiate something that both desire but … Read More

Domestic Dog Violence

Ken AshfordPersonalLeave a Comment

Bo, the big one, apparently decided he had had enough of the little one’s antics.  Arrow is now missing 1/3rd of his right ear.  He is bandaged for a couple of days, and has to wear a lampshade until Wednesday. Arrow doesn’t mind the missing ear part.  He minds that bandage a little.  But he really HATES the lampshade.  He … Read More

An Open Letter To Matthew Johnson, Managing Editor Of Madison’s Who’s Who

Ken AshfordPersonal1 Comment

Dear      , I start off my open letter with "Dear      ," for one reason: because that’s how you addressed me in your latest email, in which you notified me that I was "recently appointed as a biographical candidate" to represent my "industry" in Madison’s ("Not-To-Be-Confused-With-Marquis’s") Who’s Who Among Executives and Professionals, and to let me know that you … Read More

$78,100

Ken AshfordRandom MusingsLeave a Comment

That’s how much it would cost to buy the 12 gifts mentioned in The 12 Days of Christmas.  I’m willing to bet much of that is due to the five golden rings which, when you think about it, is unnecesssarily extravagent. By the way, that’s up 4% from last year.

Light Blogging For A Few Days

Ken AshfordBloggingLeave a Comment

Okay, well.  It’s the day before Thanksgiving and everyone is gearing up to go to Grandma’s house, or to get up at zero o’clock so you can drag giant Shrek balloons down Manhattan, or to do things that will stay in Vegas, or to spend a few days of much needed down time before tech week (that’s me), or to … Read More