#RASP - Rant Around Several Paragraphs #4: Facebook Feeds

I have a like/hate relationship with Facebook.

I like it because it helps me keep tabs on my friends, brothers, and geographically distant family. It helps me to get to know people I don't see fairly regularly a little better.

On this point, my hate comes out as well: Facebook likes to cater my feed to those with whom I've had relatively frequent or recent contact on Facebook or Messenger. This angers me.

I want to get to know all my friends, and to know what's going on in their heads or hearts. Biasing my feed to only those with whom I actually click a like or something occludes the posts of those who don't post very often. Facebook does this intentionally, of course, because they want your eyeballs, thumbs, and ears on Facebook (and hopefully some of your money, too) 24/7, if they can help it.
Enticing, one, therefore, to stay on there with things they know you'll continue to like and see out makes it worth their while to a have the feeds display that way.

I want, though, to see everyone's stuff. I want the "Most Recent" feed to be something I can default to. I want, when the Facebook app updates, to have the "Sound Off" on the feed option remain off!

I remember the good old days of "The Facebook" with virtual flinging of sheep and various little apps that included national flags of one's heritage, and when one could really connect with one's schoolmates. Then they'd rolled out neighborhoods, and I'd reluctantly had to have Miami as my secondary to FIU. That's still an option in Facebook, actually, a grandfathered thing.

As they've grown more commercial, more ubiquitous, and people are using Facebook for things that had fallen to other places to fill (Messenger for WhatsApp, even though WhatsApp is now a Facebook property anyway; Marketplace for Craig's List; Jobs for pretty much any job board; Memories for TimeHop or just going over one's feed nostalgically; Reviews for Yelp). It's gotten insane. I was on reddit the other day and someone was complaining about the Facebook app size, and all I had to say was, in more creative wording, think about how Facebook has become more than just a social network.

It's become a life draw for some people,

I just want to be able to have "Most Recent" be default so I can know what's going on in all my friends' lives and not just whomever Facebook determines is "worth" my time.

#RASP - Rant Around Several Paragraphs #5: Driving Habits

On May 2, 2017, I'd felt awe at people's driving habits like I haven't felt in a while.

I've spoken about my distaste for people and their driving habits before, but that day really had me in awe and frustration.

There's the person who wanted to turn into my lane, and I into hers. I was ahead of her, but she wasn't slowing down (so defensive driver me didn't pull over). She revs forward and then comes in front of me. Is it so hard to apply the brakes?
Thinking about it on the way home, though, I think it might be partly strategy: let me hold everyone else behind me back and then that person can get into the lane.

Then there was this stupid driver at my exit who, just because she's driving a big vehicle, muscles her way into my lane so she can get in front of me. Then another vehicle tries to get into the same lane from the opposite side, and so she muscles her way to get back in front of the other vehicle. This same pushy/bully driver then muscles her way back into a third lane in front of everyone else.

Today, traffic was really worse than I'd seen it in a while, and it's partly because people were using other lane to try to cut in line in front of everyone else. There was a multi-vehicle trailer that literally held up a lane for about two miles back trying to cut into an exit lane.

People who drive like this, I'm trying to understand. We all have places to where we'd like to arrive, but I don't understand the lack of patience, the lack of concern, and the utter offensiveness of their driving.

One of my co-workers got in an accident that totaled his car yesterday. I don't mean to victim-bash, especially when hearing a description of how the other person drove it sounds sad, but I've seen the way my co-worker drives. He's not a saint on the road himself, and has even expressed he dislikes road rules and speed limits.

#RASP - Rant Around Several Paragraphs #3: Rihanna, Bates Motel's Final Season Premiere, and Her Birthday

So, I wasn't entirely thrilled with the idea Rihanna is in yet another acting gig that coincides with something I've come to love or find interest in. She's not made many songs that I like to begin with (only one of which is actually in my music collection), and I've not been a fan of celebrity hype in general (something that seems to follow her around 🙄). She's a fair actress, so I am not in the outrage camp some people are in of "HOW DARE THEY?!", even though I am a little miffed they'd chosen her.

Looking at my IMDb widget and seeing it's her birthday anniversary today, it had me thinking whether putting the Bates final season premiere on today was intentional or a coincidence. I'm leaning towards intentional (I'm about to expand on the moreso reason for my thoughts) partly because of the Holmesian thought that "rarely is the universe so lazy".

1) People on the Bates Motel Facebook page have chimed in that naturally they bring her in to bring more people to watch a show that has had ever-declining ratings. This may work to a degree, but other shows I've noticed they do this to, it usually literally only lasts the first episode (thinking right now of American Horror Story: Hotel in their plastering Lady Gaga all over the place).

They may want new people to try exposing them to other A&E shows' commercials they're likely to bombard us with tonight (well, those who're watching live, one of whom won't be me because I'd cut the cord months ago) along with the product commercials they're equally likely to overdo ad-vomit-inducing-nauseum. This may be in hope they'll stick around to watch those other shows (even though it probably won't work; remember how they'd tried and failed to entice us to watch that lackluster Chloë Sevigny drama Those Who Kill?).

They may just be experimenting to see if the celebrity hype factor can influence viewership over a longer term (because maybe it may not be as much of a one-off as I'm predicting it will), and use that information to try this again across their networks. They may even be trying to see if it's worth keeping Carlton Cuse around, since he's brought quite a few series to A&E (but I'm sure he's getting more expensive to have around with that tenure).

2) Having the premiere on with Rihanna's birthday might interact with that celebrity hype thing because her fans will probably be flooding her Twitter account and Facebook page with celebratory wishes and lots of views. She's more than likely put on both those places mentions she's going to be on tonight's episode, and so the masses who follow her, for the greater part, will probably do what she asks. Thinking about it, too, there would be the eyes on her IMDb page too, seeing that screen credit.

3) There was one Facebook reply that off-handedly mentioned she was a fan of, if not the series itself, Psycho and/or Alfred Hitchcock. It could be a thank-you to her in passing.

But then, yes, it could be as much a coincidence as the final season premiere of yet another one of my now-cancelled favorite series Tyrant was in that it premiered on the last day of Ramadan (the series taking place mostly in a fictional, majority-Muslim nation).

But rarely is the universe so lazy.

Am I overthinking this? What do you think? Do you agree? Is there another reason there might be? What do you think of her being Marion Crane?

We'll see what the next weeks' ratings show.

#RASP - Rant Around Several Paragraphs #2 - The Birthday Song

So, there has been much talk about he copyright on the birthday song. I'm going to leave that be, because obviously my take on it is the song is public domain and one should be able to use it freely.

No, the point of this post is the singing of the song.

So, we all know the first few lines: “Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday…”

And that's where I pause.

What's the next word in the third line? Is it "dear" or the person's name? There are different opinions on this, certainly, but I'm addressing mine here on this, providing examples of course.

Let's use my name, Kristopha. Should it be October 24 and people have gathered to regale me with gifts and song, in my opinion the third line should go "Happy birthday Kristopha…"

This is because my name has three syllables, the second syllable having the emphasis and not the first or third. Should they have elected to use the shortened form of my name, Kris, the verse would go "Happy birthday, dear Kris", with the "Kris" part drawn out into two "syllables" (Kri-is), just so the post "happy birthday" element maintains three beats and the second of three beats has the emphasis.

So, what about names with emphasis on the other-than-second syllable? For this, we'll use my sister's name, Melonie.

We pronounce her name /'mε l^ ni:/, and so the third line, in my estimation, should be "Happy birthday, dear Melonie". Æsthetically, this pleases my ear, and I think others would agree.

When people in South Africa were singing the Happy Birthday song for Nelson Mandela, it seems a lot of them sang "Happy birthday, dear Madiba", which sounds wrong to me. Since the word/title Madiba has second-syllable emphasis and is a three-syllable word, the line should be "Happy birthday Madiba".

If they'd decided to use his Xhosa name, Rolihlahla, which has emphasis on the second syllable and has four syllables, I'd think it would have the dear: "Happy Birthday, dear Rolihlahla".

If it were my Nigerian cousin-in-law, whose full name is Adetunji (emphasis on the third syllable), there'd be no dear: "Happy birthday Adetunji". It sounds a bit stuffy to call him Adetunji, though, so most of us call him just Tunji (where there would be a dear).

My opinion on any name greater than four syllables is the person would usually have a shorter nickname or an abbreviated name that should fit into these cases.

All that said, I have one more gripe to grapple with: the additional stanzas beyond "How old are you now?". Traditionally in Jamaica, at least, there is a third stanza which goes, "May the Dear Lord bless you." I don't mind this stanza, and it's a nice touch to me but only if multiple people (being more than three) all continue the song through that stanza without pausing.

At my niece's first birthday party, people were pretty much ready to quit singing after the "How old are you now" stanza, but my Dad insisted on singing the Dear-Lord-bless-you stanza too. He was the only one who had continued on to singing it, and the rest of us grudgingly continued on to sing that one. It was just awkward, so my take is one should have some social maturity to gauge pauses and empathize with a group (this coming from someone - me - who is generally socially anxious and awkward anyway!).

That way you don't become the bully who commandeered a nice tradition into a sing-that-stanza-or-burn-in-Hell session.

#RASP - Rant Around Several Paragraphs #1 - Idiocy

I’m starting a new subsection I’m titling RASP, an inspiration from @mallow610’s YouTube video channel-based RISS (Rant in Sixty Seconds, with its haunting, awesome intro tune), in which I get things off my mind that otherwise would stick there until the end of time.

Speed Limits
The United States has speed limits, and as much as especially these stupid-asses that don’t think there are any, or there is any need for any, there are speed limits. There was this guy who – and I don’t even know how he got a driving license, but he was driving – crossed a double yellow line to pass me.

Driving 101: double yellow lines demarcate a separation of traffic lanes that go in opposite directions that standard and commercial drivers should never cross in order to pass another driver (i.e. the diagram showing "Yes" and "No").

This is different from the diagram with the solid line and the dashed line. These also separate opposite traffic lanes, but one can pass another person with caution if everything is clear on the opposite lane!
So I beeped him. This should be another rant, but the point of this one is simply that speed limits exist. On Cooledge Road between US Road 78 and US Road 29 is 40 MPH. Not 50. Not 55. Forty. One the entire stretch of GA Interstate 285 – until such a time as they decide to enact the proposed digital variable speed limit signs that will change during based on DHSMV’s volition/judgment, the top speed limit is 55 MPH and the bottom speed limit is 40 MPH. Georgia State Road 20 has had a speed limit of 45 MPH since the SPLOST-funded renovation of the Loganville-outer Loganville stretch had completed. It’s no longer 55 MPH, people. They put tax-funded signage saying 45 MPH for a reason!

You – sorry – lazy-ass, law-flouting fuckers that don’t feel there should be a speed limit, move your asses to fucking Deutschland. Get over yourselves. I drive the speed limit, y'all should too.

Patents on Genes
The only reason people seem to want to patent genes is monetary. I keep hearing that not patenting stifles innovation; bull! If you can tell me that the drug companies researching the existence of the gene – and then locating it – created the gene as well as the method to detect it, go ahead and patent it. If you have a means of modifying the gene so it doesn’t cause breast or ovarian cancer, go ahead and patent that technique. If, though, that gene in all ovarian and breast cancer sufferers is exactly the same in all of them, and you didn’t do crap to make it so, you have no right to patent it. Sure, patent to Hell the means of detecting the gene, because The Lord knows there are alternative means of detecting anything, but you have no right to patent the gene.

The only reason they want to patent the gene is because licensing it out will yield more profits that getting a Nobel or some other prize in chemistry or genetics or whatever for discovering the actual gene.

Greed will kill the bearers of these genes faster than the genes will while you all sit on your asses trying to patent something you had no hand in creating, only discovering.



That’s all.