30 in 30 III - 6 - War on Degeneracy

[aggienaut]

   This is entry number six. Yes it is being posted technically on the 7th, but hey I already wrote a substansive entry or two on the 6th, so you can deal. Anyway I was working on this at 11, but then Kristy tempted me with food.

Theological Degeneracy
   First off a brief theological announcement. A lot of people were all worked up about it being 06/06/06 today. To quote Shemek "Last time I checked there was a 6/6/06 in 1906, and 1806, and 1706 and so on... And, upon further investigation of any historical document, religious or academic, nothing of any significance happend on those dates. So shut the fuck up"
   More theologically though, the origin of this 666 thing lies in Revelation 13:16-18, which reads: "Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead, so that no one can buy or sell who does not have the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of his name. This calls for wisdom: let him who hath understanding reckon the number of the beast, for it is a human number. Its number is six threescore six" - whatever the hell that means. But the point is, its a name. It is not a place, it is not a date, it is a name. Meaning: there is no basis at all for the date of 06/06/06 to mean anything at all, so yeah, shut the crap up

Flatmate Degeneracy
   Anyway this morning I woke up and found a new plate in the sink, all lathered with catsup, directly under the "NO NEW PLATES IN SINK" sign. I placed a post-it note on the plate that said "WTF" and another on the sign with an arrow to the part that reads "if you don't have time to wash your plate asap, leave it in your room until you do" which said "we all agreed to this, if you think the policy should be changed please talk to us."
   When I got back from work the plate was gone, but there was another on the floor in the livingroom. I placed a "WTF - please see agreement" post-it on this as well. I declare War on Degeneracy (Remember the War on Wrong?); and I will prosecute offenders to the fullest extent of Apartment Law (Which currently consists of one clause with three subpoints).


   Anyway, the following are some guidelines of roommate ethics which I think one should do well to adhere-to.
   If you and your flatmates share most food:

• Except with extremely mundane items like bread & milk, thou shouldst not be the first to open a flatmate's food item
  
• Thou should not be the one to finish a flatmate's food item.
  
• If thou finisheth someone else's food item, for god's sake throw away the package (there seems to be some guilt dynamic or something that causes people not to throw away the container/package when they finish someone else's item, as if that would be admitting they finished it).
  
• Except with mundane items, try to resist consuming more than say a third of thine flatmate's food item.
  
• If thine flatmate gets something really unusual that they don't usually get, YOU SHOULD NOT EAT IT -- they probably had plans for it themselves
  
• Try to pull thine own weight in food purchases.

   Obviously, most of these are inspired by personal experience. And when they happened I was like "shouldn't one just KNOW not to do that?!" Well now you know. Obviously not starting someone else's food is pretty minor.. finishing it just slightly more disconcerting...

   And then there are the rules themselves. You can't blame your roommates for not following these guidelines if they haven't been set out for them, but you should probably try to follow them yourself to avoid tension. More on rules:

• If you all voluntarily entered into the lease with no discussed "rules" you can't just proclaim them on your roommates
  
• if rules become necessary adopt them by unanimity if possible, if its really a problem you can go to 2/3rds - majority might be acceptable in some circumstances
  
• if rules become necessary, set them down in writing so there can be no dispute and post them somewhere for reference.
  
• In enforcing rule compliance, try to keep it positive, & nonaccusatory. For example I found that stating the apparent violation of the rules (or in this case labelling the indesputable evidence) and asking if they thought the rule should be changed avoided more confrontational possibilities.

Degenerate Blogging Mentalities
   Anyway, we've had at least 22 people declare themselves as joining 30 in 30 III. Two people have since formally thrown in the towel, and I have a feeling a large number of silently faided away. As I've said I think one of my favourite parts of 30 in 30 is the sense of community and I have done a lot to try to facilitate interaction. I'm very pleased to find that a number of the newcomers now are commenting and building off one another. Tomorrow will mark the seventh day, the end of the first week of this madness. Tomorrow I am going to try to determine who is still really here, just to facilitate group cohesion.
   Everyone is free to decide for themselves what 30 in 30 means to them, but to me, personally, it is not about elitism, and its not about exclusiveness, and these things endanger the future of 30 in 30. I see 30 in 30 as something that is to reach out to bring in new bloggers and facilitate their ability to be all that they can be -- not to be judged by rotian commiepuritan cadres or subjected to immature reactionist abuse by otian brownshirts.
   As such, I will not be continuing to track these negative elements in my community support efforts if they are are still being exclusionary tomorrow when I do my analysis.
   In keeping with my thoughts on the individual ability to define 30 in 30 for oneself, I encourage others to maintain concordant amity with as many participants they desire.


Positive Thoughts
   Today was an epic day of blogging. Several of the 30 in 30 first-timers really distinguished themselves. You all are really coming into your own.
   My pick of the day goes to xaositecte, for his template entry for hilarity in making an actually tasteful satire of us all; but he's followed closely by bartgroks, who actually uses the template for an entry. Incidently, I actually do have an entry template. =[
   apoplecticfittz actually once again blew us all away with a legendary blog stunt - he drank a gallon of milk in under an hour!!! Truly we live in a time of heroes.

PS: This election is really crazy -- Results are coming in bit by bit, at a rate of like 10% an hour. Every time it updates it switches between Heystek being the second person elected, or Levy. /=

Comments

Props to you

[anonymous-frosh.livejournal.com]

Neither of the Propositions are going to be passed. 81 has been holding steady at around 47% vs 53% for a couple of hours, after slowly climbing to that point, while 82 has been widening its gap even more.

[anonymous-frosh.livejournal.com]

LAMAR WINS!!!

[insolent-pool.livejournal.com]

I claim to be active, although I'm busy with research. If I receive the required data, I will post a rather interesting (albeit highly speculative) entry combining pertinent posts I have made.
So I claim interest in a retroactive fashion. :)
Things look fairly dim, since I'm getting few comments on the pertinent posts.. fewer still offering insight I am missing. Which means the penultimate post will suffer greatly.
In essence: The more interesting (and pertinent) comments people make, the more interesting and less speculative the final post will be.

[emosnail.livejournal.com]

I think the lack of comments to your posts is probably do to most of the other thirty in thirty bloggers simply not being prepared to answer such intellectual questions. They are however, very interesting, and I encourage you to continue doing your thing.

Also note all that you don't need to petition me to be considered still active, I don't intend to be viciously axing people for technicalities -- rather culling people who are very clearly not intending to still be included from the lists. ...and those that hate change.

[insolent-pool.livejournal.com]

(I noticed I commented in the wrong post. I place the blame entirely on you, of course. Clearly, my sleep-deprived brain cannot decypher multiple posts :)

I'm not petitioning, merely stating.. I noticed my clock was off, and I had at least one entry marked as 'friend only', so it appeared as only one post (a rather dull picture) was made.

..not to go back to that whole 'intellectual questions' nonsense.
I have not entered college, and I have failed every math course I have taken, along with one (or two?) English course(s), and Chemistry.
I would not put so much weight on my intelligence (I don't!).. so if anyone wants to make a comment, even if it's incredibly stupid, it will be deconstructed and absorbed by my noggin'.

Thick

[basicallyasap.livejournal.com]

The thing to note about apoplecticfittz's milk drinking adventure is that he plays down way too much is that it was whole milk. I can't even drink a cup of that stuff without feeling the bile rise in my throat. Just the thought of the creamy thickness of whole milk makes my stomach turn. It also smells way worse than 2%, 1%, or fat-free.

Okay, I've made my point.
I probably should have posted this in his LJ but those elitist bloggers seem really mean and might flame me like there's no tomorrow.

Re: Thick

[emosnail.livejournal.com]

Good point about the whole milk, blech!

No apoplecticfittz is strongsauce, you should comment to his entry asap.

It was actually really terrible.

[apoplecticfittz.livejournal.com]

I did it all for you and the Blogosphere.

[otimus.livejournal.com]

" Everyone is free to decide for themselves what 30 in 30 means to them, but to me, personally, it is not about elitism, and its not about exclusiveness, and these things endanger the future of 30 in 30. I see 30 in 30 as something that is to reach out to bring in new bloggers and facilitate their ability to be all that they can be -- not to be judged by rotian commiepuritan cadres or subjected to immature reactionist abuse by otian brownshirts."


Actually, we just mostly are annoyed by you bringing in a crew of annoyingly shitty people into what WE started, and having a slew of people thinking it's your idea, and such and such. You're acting like some sort of ambassador of the thing, wether you mean to or not, and it is annoying. Lots of people are annoyed by it. Including people you "like", but they're too cowardly to admit it, so, I'm doing it FOR them. I personally have no problem with you, just so you're aware, and I think many bloggers should be entitled to join in on our parade (...though, Rote doesn't.). However, I don't think shitty bloggers should be entitled to do much of anything except hide and be shitty!

The Newcomers

[emosnail.livejournal.com]

I've never encouraged anyone to think I had anything to do with the founding of it or that I was an authority figure in it. I cited the original posts about it when I discussed its origin.

Yes one or two of the newcomers aren't very good, but several of them are doing very well, and have showed marked improvement. I'd recommend at the very very least focusing on those specifically one thinks sucks, rather than grouping everyone new and myself into one big category of damnation.

But yeah, I have never said anything at all that would portray myself as any kind of "ambassador" "representative" or other official figurehead of 30 in 30 and I think its really silly to hate me based on the perception that I have.

Re: The Newcomers

[otimus.livejournal.com]

I don't think anyone actually hates you, persay. Though a good bunch think you're not funny, and pretty much all the people you brought along aren't funny either. So they're somewhat miffed by it!

Although, I'd like to say this: Take any attacks I put on you lighthearted; I'm a good guy, and I just poke fun. I mean no harm. If at any time it actually does really bother you, I'd gladly stop.

You don't seem like a bad guy in the least, or anything like that. Just... very dull. But that's okay! I'm pretty dull myself half the time. The rest I'm asleep.

Re: The Newcomers

[emosnail.livejournal.com]

Yeah hopefully I'll be more able to think of funny things once finals are over in a week. In the mean time I'm just trying to survive.

As to the newcomers, I was pretty alarmed the first day to see them all posting more or less "normal" entries, which caused me to talk a lot about 30 in 30 "is" and try to provide examples of what I thought good blogging was - and I think this is waht caused some to think I was trying to be a blogbassador or something. But I can think of at least three of them that have made very substantial progress since then coming into line with the kind of blogging we expect of 30 in 30.

Personally, I see potential in these people and want to encourage them. I think its important to have some new people every year to keep it fresh, even if they aren't Fittz's.

[barnabas-truman.livejournal.com]

Clearly the Great Beast is Ronald Wilson Raygun. Crowley's got nothin' on Ronnie.