iBanjo

Someone at work asked me today about how I liked having a hyphenated family name, because she was thinking of doing it herself. My reaction: BIG mistake, don’t do it.

I seriously regret hypenating my last name, because it creates an endless source of confusion.

• When people ask you for your name, it takes ten times longer to explain, and always requires spelling it out and stressing the hyphen. Over the phone, it’s even more painful.
• It tends to break computer systems. They hate hyphens. They hate spaces. Sometimes, if you’re lucky, computers just smash the two last names together, often truncating them anyway, since the combined last name is often ‘too long’.
• Even when people see it printed correctly, it confuses them. If they see your printed name as “Benjamin Apple-Banana”, many will just call you “Benjamin Apple” or “Benjamin Banana”. It’s like their brain just can’t handle the concept of a double last-name, so it automatically drops one. Which means the whole romantic (or political) point of “encompassing both names” is basically lost on the public.

Really, I would gladly have changed my last name to my wife’s if I could go back in time. It would have made life so much easier.

And don’t forget: if you’re male and thinking of changing your last name, be ready for some serious institutionalized sexism!

O Albacore! Aged
and most prized, but highest in
deadly mercury.

So PC! From a
certified sustainable
tuna fishery,

And caught by “fishing
families” as well. As they say,
“Families that fish…”

Open the can, and
suddenly surrounded by
cats. A hopeful sign.

Bouquet: ocean brine,
like the bottom of a dock.
Cooked in its own juice.

Solid round of flesh,
not ground bits of cheap-o stuff.
Firm succulent loin!

First slice hard to dig;
tearing a single muscle,
my teeth sink right in.

Nice starting flavor,
like a fine steak on a grill
a long smooth middle

With just a whisper
of smokiness. But alas,
a sub-par finish:

Touch of bitterness
on the tongue. Perhaps the fish
was not so merry.

But au jus delights,
Blithely bathed in own fluids
Salty without salt!

So rich and intense,
there’s my albacore quota
for the remainder.

Recommendation:
Pair with soft autumn mornings
or moonlit beaches.

Just got home from OSCON the big Open Source computer convention in Portland. This is the only convention I attend regularly, and every year my buddy Fitz and I give talks about the culture and methodology of developing software in a “volunteer driven” environment (to put it kindly.) Our clik-and-clak routine of bickering, questioning each other, and finishing each other’s sentences has become a bit of a famous gimmick at this point, though we certainly never intended that to happen. Still, it’s one the reasons we record a podcast now and then.

Normally we only give one or two talks at the conference. After all, the real reason people go to conferences isn’t to watch presentations, but it’s to hang out in divey bars with other well-known members of your field and blather gossip. (Right?)

This year we got two 45-minute talks accepted, and were also talked into doing a 4-hour “tutorial” session with four other lecturers. Quite a bit of work! However, a couple weeks before the conference we were reminded that we had also agreed to be panelists in a public discussion, and then once we arrived at the convention we got asked to do another talk at an “unconference” for newbies. And then O’Reilly asked us to do a 40-minute video interview about the 2nd edition of our upcoming book.

So in total, that makes six talks in three days. Absurd! I was so busy running around to blab, I only had time to watch two presentations! And I developed a nasty head cold in the middle of it all. After three days of being hopped up on Dayquil and talking till I was hoarse, I told Fitz that next year we were going to do ONE talk. That’s it, no more. Our routine had officially crossed the line from “fun talky guys” into mouth-flapping whores. On our sixth talk, we had the pleasure of announcing to the audience that it would be the last time we even gave our “Poisonous People” talk, ever. If
anyone ever wants to see that talk again, it’s been up on YouTube for more than a year.

We had a lot of fun outside the conference too. We got to hang out with our buddies Jim Blandy (now a Portland native!) and Karl Fogel quite a bit, as well as Bryan O’Sullivan. I took a three hour self-guided walking tour of Portland with my big SLR camera too. I’m amazed at how beautiful the city is. I’ve never felt so “politically compatible” with a city before… every corner seems to have either a vegetable stand, bike shop, or microbrewery. Free range meat is absolutely everywhere! Upon wondering into the wondrous neighborhood of Ladd’s Addition to attend an ad-hoc bluegrass jam in the park, I discovered my very first Burgerville restaurant. I had never heard of this fast food chain before; it looks like Burger King or In n’ Out Burger, but if you read the signs it’s about as food activist as one can be. Local vegetables (Walla Walla onions), local cheese (Tillamook), non-frozen beef from free-pastured Oregon cow herders. I was in heaven.

Really, truly. I could move to Portland right now. I’ve never said that about another city before. I hope Chicago forgives me.

Photos are forthcoming!