Boxes, Little Boxes

Blogger is behaving so much better today.

I left a corner open so that you can see how it's put together.

And it looks pretty decent closed, I think.

I need to be at the airport in twelve hours and my new printer apparently inhales ink cartridges, because I just refilled it yesterday, and already it's complaining. It was a freebie when I bought the last iMac, and it's pretty nifty in that it's also a scanner and a copier and it's lightening-fast compared to my old printer and how brilliant, it uses separate cartridges for each colour, so if my printing is cyan-heavy for example, I can still use up all the yellow and magenta. 

Little did I know that no cartridge lasts more than about twenty sets of instructions and cover sheets, three pages of business cards and two pages of stickers (one of "Size 11" and one of "Triangles", twenty-four each). I hope that Office Whatever up the road opens good and early so I can print the last few cover sheets.

Although in real life I'm not much of a joiner, online I've been joining (and leaving) groups since usenet. I once spoke up on alt.abortion and was roundly flamed, but in general it's run the gamut in terms of value from Huge Waste of Eyesight to Extraordinarily Rewarding. I've met people on lists, some only once, some have become good friends (in real life, in the flesh) and overall it's enriched my life immensely.

Today on one of the few lists from which I get mail (and this list is largely content-free; it's a skimmer full of "Me Too"s and "Thank you"s with an occasional worthwhile tidbit) there was a kerfluffle when someone made a joke, liberally laced with emoticons - smiley emoticons - and someone else got all huffy and offended and then when someone else pointed out the meaning of emoticons, got huffier still and said that she'd read it without the emoticons, thank you.

Yes, this is the way of lists, but it made me think how sad it is to assume the worst of what you're reading. Unless you're on KnitFlame or BeadHell, one is in general not writing to piss people off. It's a pathetic indictment of someone's world view that rather than stop to think about what they think they read, they'd prefer to infer dire insults and base intentions. 

It's one thing to be cynical, but quite another to paint everyone with the brush with which you tar yourself.

Frankly, I prefer to think better of people.

And before you ask (as I segue ungracefully into something totally unrelated), yes I am getting ready for Bead Fest: I'm making a class sample!