For today’s Mundane Monday, we have a photo of a computer mouse, also known as a computer input device.

You see, at the late dawn of the computer age, we had these things we called “mice” (singular: mouse), just like the rodent variety. Like mice–the furry kind–they had a tail (the cord), were blind (like the mice in the rhyme) and made a squeaking sound when they got all gummed up with hair.

Later, of course, we had optical and cordless mice, and we still called them mice, because the name stuck and renaming things only leads to confusion, even if the later things bear less and less semblance to their original namesakes.

Of course, by your era, you probably use your mind to move the cursor around the screen, which is the function the mouse performed for us. On the other hand, perhaps you’ve done away with cursors altogether, having your brains directly wired to the computer and thus eliminating the need for any visual pointing device, and haven’t the faintest idea what purpose the mouse actually served. Alas, certainly you have games, having no doubt resorted to the enjoyable simplicity of something like Pong. You know how you mentally move that bar to bounce the ball back into your opponent’s field? Well, that’s basically what the mouse did. Only, we weren’t necessarily bouncing balls around, but we placed the cursor at different parts of the screen, double-clicked (did I mention the mouse had one, two or three or more buttons?) files to open them and so on.

Thus, dear future reader, is how we used rodents for electronic communications. Contrary to myth, we did not have cybernetic rodents scrambling about, running our lives and spreading diseases both real and virtual.

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Too bad she’s not napping now, instead of chewing on my chair, my pants, my shirt…

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So, the blogging “experts” say to put photos at the top of your post. Brings in the readers, they say. Mind you, I am beginning to think the “experts” just make stuff up and watch to see if the rest of us mindlessly follow along. So, we’ll do things like post the picture first and pat ourselves on our backs for taking the first step toward blog profitability, while the blog “experts” meet somewhere for lunch and laugh at us as we perform for them like trained monkeys.

But, I have digressed from the Mundane Monday theme. Today, we have a photo of pavement also known as “road surface.” You see, future readers, in the late 20th and early 21st century, we still drove around in cars with wheels. I’m sure you’re familiar with wheels; they’re one of the oldest inventions known to man, right after fire, and you probably have seen them in a museum someplace. At any rate, to make things easier to roll, we paved everything. Horse paths were paved over for horseless carriages, and things just spread out from there. Pictured is asphalt pavement. Asphalt is basically gravel, clay (or peat) and Portland cement or lime. See, we don’t even know what the stuff’s made of, but we put it everywhere. And, where there isn’t asphalt, we’ll use concrete or Bituminous Surface Treatment (BST).

At this point in time, we haven’t developed anti-gravity technology, at least not that we know of. By your future time, Area 51 may have been declassified around the time you first encountered the sentient purple octopodes of Alpha Centauri or when you couldn’t help but notice that military planes no longer had recognizable engines, or both. At any rate, anti-gravity technology is currently not available for mass transit. Sure, hovercraft are available, but they’re hardly ever used anymore. And, tanks are nice, but they lack a convenient trunk for hauling groceries.

Thus the need for pavement. Oh, yes, we have SUVs, but no one takes them off-road. Geesh.

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It’s tempting to say “Flock of Seagulls” but they’re not seagulls.

And, the picture was taken last Thursday, not last Friday, and not today either.

I know. Disappointment all around.

Still, I think it’s a neat shot.

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Yes, I can’t even come up with a full 13 in base-4 math today.

1. Your screen looks dirty. Clean it up.
2. Ants and Elephants need each other’s help.
3. New Tanzanian mammal discovered.
4. Cat says “hello” if you have a good imagination.
5. Ever heard of a hyrax?

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After work Monday, I heard a helicopter. Nothing out of the ordinary really. But, then it circled around a second time, at which point I noticed it was one of those infamous unmarked black helicopters of conspiracy theory fame. I got my camera, and hoped for a third pass, but it just kept on going this time. Thus, the fuzzy picture which you can’t even tell is a helicopter. I suppose I could have just as easily passed it off as a UFO. But, it was a helicopter.

As you may recall, black helicopters rose to infamy in the 1990s when it was supposed they were part of the United Nations invasion force that was going to take over the United States. Of course, that hasn’t happened. And, given the UN’s frequent bungling of, well, near everything, I don’t think we’ll be seeing that day anytime soon.

More likely is that either the markings were on the other side or I just missed them. Still, though, it is kind of interesting to see a conspiracy theory come to life, as it were. And, they didn’t turn around and shoot me, which one would think people involved in some evil conspiracy would be prone to do.

On the other hand, this is just the sort of thing that keeps the conspiracy theories going. People see a UFO and have only fuzzy photos (if any) to show for it, and it’s easy to dismiss it as something more mundane. They offer varying descriptions: cigar-shaped, flying saucer, etc. All those are easy for a skeptic to dismiss. But, it’s harder to convince someone that they didn’t see a helicopter. And, it’s harder to convince yourself that they didn’t see a helicopter. After all, we know helicopters exist.

Once you have something that’s grounded in reality (like a helicopter), it’s easy to attach conspiracy theories to it. I think that’s at least part of the explanation for the popularity of many conspiracy theories. They are a mixture of the real and the believable and, so even if you throw in something unbelievable or unproven, they gain some credence by being attached to those real and believable things.

Helicopters are real. Someone seeing a black unmarked helicopter is believable. Thus, the United Nations planning to take over the United States with a fleet of black helicopters is not entirely impossible.

At that stage, you could toss in just about anything for the third point. The Bush Administration is using black helicopters to scout for weak points in our infrastructure in preparation for a dictatorial take-over before the next election. Hillary has a fleet of black helicopters and is using them to find homes with Obama signs, so they can be framed for some crime and imprisoned before the next primary. Or, the cable company is looking for homes with satellite TV so they can target those neighborhoods with cheaper pricing until they drive the satellite TV providers out of business.

Almost anything can be made to be believable. The best lies always have a grain of truth to them, and so do the best of conspiracy theories. Or, if not truth, at least a level of believability.

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Watch the comments people leave on your blog, especially if you’re not using Akismet or some other comment spam-blocking utility.

Yesterday, I found a comment from Debo Hobo (who is looking for people to expose themselves on her blog) stuck in moderation on my “Grrr Thursday” post.

The first clue that something was amiss was that I’m pretty sure Deborah would recognize a dog when she sees one, and also that she is smart enough to realize that it is generally dogs, and not cats, that like bones or bone-shaped treats. Thus, “her” comment on the cat in the photo was the first indication that something was wrong.

The eMail is sneaky, as it is DeboHobo@…, and where it is @ is a popular free eMail service. So, at a quick glance, it looks like it could be legitimate (especially if you don’t remember your commentators eMail addresses) as many bloggers use free eMail services and utilize their names or blog names as the addressee.

Of course, the URL is where it becomes obvious, as the URL is not DeboHobo.com. Instead, it is a different site, and one with a foreign TLD to boot! I did not visit the site, so I have no idea what it actually is, but judging from the URL, it is not about travel or any of Deborah’s usual topics.

This is the second time such a thing has occurred. The last was a few weeks ago when someone was pretending to be Lewis Empire. Curiously, it arrived just a couple days after Lewis had began blogging again.

People impersonating other bloggers is nothing new, and spammers doing the same probably isn’t either. But, perhaps it is something becoming more widespread? I don’t know if they have some sort of script in place to try to impersonate people that normally comment on your blog, or if it is just random chance, as I do see a number of other spam comments from people I don’t know. But, typically, those are just individual names, and not something you’d recognize as a blog name, like Debo Hobo or Lewis Empire.

At any rate, it may be worth considering installing Akismet or some other comment spam-blocking utility if you’ve not done so already. And, be careful of any comments you personally moderate!

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At this point, I did not think you would believe me without photographic evidence. Thus, the above photo which clearly shows the absence of a computer from my desk. You can see where the computer’s little rectangular feet once rested and the square where the monitor once sat. The cords are from another computer, which previously wrapped behind and in front of (or over) the absent keyboard you don’t see here.

With that said, let’s review last week’s goals and see how I fared.

Finish archiving files and move the old computer off my desk. Done! Finished yesterday (and early this morning). Yay!

Take product photo for my eCommerce site and put it on the site. Took the photo last week, but still haven’t put it on the site. Did I mention that I did remove the old computer from my desk?

Setup printer/scanner. Yes, that did require the removal of the old computer from my desk, which was completed, but I have not yet set up the printer/scanner. I need to clear out some miscellaneous odds and ends that used to sit on top of the aforementioned removed computer and are now without a home. They currently reside in the space the computer once occupied.

Do some work on the redesign for my flagship website. Nope.

I also removed a phone/fax machine from my desk. It’s a new machine, never used, and was covered in dust. You see, that’s been waiting on the completion of my eCommerce site, so it’s just been sitting there. I have taken it to the office, where its phone line was relocated this week. You see, once I finish the eCommerce site, I plan to not work on that stuff at home anymore. All the production was moved out of the house last year, so the phone/fax machine is finally catching up.

Eventually, I would like to get to the point where I am not working 8 hours a day at the office and then coming home and working another 8 hours on the computer at home. Though, for the past while, those 8 hours at home have not been the most productive. It gets tiring after a while.

This past week, I did also finish some projects that were not listed. I just don’t want you thinking I just sit around making lists of things not to do.

Okay, onto this week’s goals…

1. Put the photo on the eCommerce site.
2. Setup printer/scanner.
3. Do some work on the redesign for my flagship website.

I should add more items, but I want to cross all of these off my list before getting into adding additional ones!

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