The company that hosts randomness.com sent me an email last week to inform me that they would have to cancel my account because I had received almost forty thousand hits to my site in the past two weeks, which is more traffic than they can handle.

Of course, it came as somewhat of a shock that I had received forty thousand hits in two weeks. I knew that forty thousand people hadn’t visited Igno-Rant or Thenestor, or else I would have seen more votes in the Igno-Rant survey and more emails from the contact form on Thenestor.

Side note: For those of you unfamiliar with randomness.com, it contains four “pieces”: Igno-Rant, which you are looking at currently, Clip Art, which is sort of an online distraction, WebTips, which is a web design tutorial, and Thenestor, which is my autobiographical piece.

So I looked at my web site stats.

Apparently, the most requested single page within randomness.com was a page within Clip Art called “Naughty Pictures.” It’s a parody of adult web sites. It’s not actually an adult web site. It’s a joke. Trust me. Mom, if you’re reading this, I promise I’ve never actually been to an adult site. My friends told me about them. Yes, I’ll stop hanging out with that rotten crowd.

Incidentally, that didn’t explain where the hits were coming from. I’m still not sure. If I had a better web host, I would have access to a referrer log that would tell me exactly what sites are linking to my site. Alas, I had to search for links to my site via AltaVista and InfoSeek, and the only site they could find linking to mine was some guy on GeoCities. I have a theory, though, that my “Naughty Pictures” page might be showing up near the top in searches for some common adult keywords. I recall that back in April, a search on AltaVista for the words “naughty pictures” always resulted with my page in the number two position.

Anyhow, I was quite disappointed that my most requested page was in the middle of my site, instead of, say, the main page of randomness.com, or even the main page of one of the four pieces of randomness.com. What does that say about the world? In particular, what does that say about Internet users?

As I mentioned, my web host was threatening to shut down randomness.com if I didn’t do something about the situation. So I did the best thing I could think of. I moved the “Naughty Pictures” page to my old account on GeoCities. I just can’t wait to hear what they have to say about that.

Tonight, my faithful audience, I played pool.

Eight-ball, to be exact, but that’s not even important. The important thing is this: For the life of me, I simply cannot play pool.

Honestly, I understand the game–get your type of balls in the pockets (stripes or solids depending on the first ball sunk), don’t sink the other type, don’t sink the eight-ball, and don’t sink the cue ball–pretty simple, right?

It would seem so.

This game is actually much more difficult than I had imagined. In fact, it is downright evil, basically because it seems simple but is actually not. At least, not for me.

You see, the game of pool requires a skill which I have, as of yet, never possessed…aim. I cannot aim. Heck, I couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn with my cue stick, let alone a cue ball.

I could swear that the cue stick is lined up straight, but as soon as I push it, a magic breeze comes out of nowhere, blows across the cue stick, and I end up sending the cue ball to the only spot on the table not occupied by other balls.

Come to think of it, I wonder if there is some kind of repelling force inside the ball. I’ll have to check for magnets next time.

Occasionally I hit a ball directly into a pocket. It is invariably the cue ball.

After two long, aggravating games tonight, I have come up with a few changes I would like to make to the rules of eight-ball…

1. A player should be allowed to hit again if he only manages to brush the side of the cue ball with his cue stick, thus sending the cue ball on a two-inch journey.
2. It should be a requirement that signs be posted around the pool table with the following two statements in bold print:
   • The cue ball is the white one.
   • Do not sink the eight-ball.
3. A player should be allowed to hit again if he successfully bounces the cue ball off all four sides of the table without hitting any other balls, and then sinks the cue ball.

I for one refuse to play this game again until these new rules have been added. I think that is only fair. As for now, I am going to work on my table tennis swing.

I remember doing homework once. The last question on the worksheet was, “How do you feel?” I had to do it just to get to that question. All I ever wanted was to answer that, and no one ever let me. Finally, when I had the chance, I did. I recall writing a two-page answer. Maybe three. The rest of the homework took up half a page. I only did it so I could answer that last question: “How do you feel?”

I hated homework. I still do. Everyone hates homework, I know, but with me it seems to be more personal. It was homework that ruled my life and told me when I could or could not leave the house, watch television, write stories, listen to music, get up and dance, or even eat. I had to get that homework done. It should have been my first priority.

It was not my first priority. It will always be my last. I finally decided to rise against this evil oppressor. I decided never to do homework again. It was, and still is, my greatest cause in the world. Some may fight for the rights of animals or trees–I fight for the rights of students.

Long ago, a bill was proposed in my school district to ban homework from the schools. Many members of the board felt that homework took time away from children that they could otherwise spend with their families. They felt, as I do, that work belongs at work or school–not at home.

I must clarify, in fear of hypocrisy, that working from home is a different matter. I work from home. I build web sites from my home computer. That is my job. However, this is not work that I have brought home from the office. I have no office. If I did have an office, I would not do any of that work at home. I would do it in the office. That is what offices are for. Schools are like offices. We go there for many hours every day. We work there. When the day at the office, or the classroom, is finished, we would like to come home and not feel it constantly looming over us.

When I think of school, I think of homework. I do not think of friends, clubs, concerts, or football games. I think of homework. It simply ruins the memories.

And that is exactly how I answered the last question on my worksheet.

Every year, I get a very uncomfortable feeling deep within my stomach as Thanksgiving approaches here in America. Every year I send out a mass e-mail like this:

HAPPY DEAD TURKEY DAY!!!
            )

(

___

.-'_ =\

c=<___\-_)

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Every year my friends write back and tell me how morbid I am. They say, “It’s only bad if you’re the turkey.”

They simply do not understand.

Turkeys are not the only ones who have a problem with this holiday. There are other casualties at this time of year, and I have deep sympathy for those lost lives. You see, in my past life, I was a cranberry.

At this time, I would like to share with the world an excerpt from the diary I kept while I was a cranberry. I hope this will make the people of America think twice before they devour all those luscious foods:

November 20

Dearest diary,

The plague has gotten worse and I fear for my life. All around me, the others of my kind are being plucked from their homes, never returning again. Where are they going? What is happening to them? I wonder incessantly, and yet I do not look forward to finding out. It is possible that they are being taken to some greater place, I know, but it is also possible that they are simply being slaughtered. Oh, the thought of all that innocent juice being shed sends a shiver down my stem. When shall this torturous panic leave me? When shall I know the truth?

Your faithful friend,

Bob Cranberry

Looking back upon my writing, I am still overcome by a chill. Please, if you are a decent human being, do not eat my brethren this Thanksgiving.

Remember–cranberries are people too.

We have a lot of coffeehouses here in SoCal, and I’m sure that by now you have a lot of them where you are, too. I think they were originally a big thing in Seattle.

Anyway, occasionally one of my friends will suggest going to get coffee, which really means going to act trendy. I don’t have anything against coffee, but I’ve noticed that whenever we go to these places, you could cut the pretentiousness with a knife.

First, you’re only cool if you really know what every single kind of coffee is. And the longer the name of the drink you order, the better. Anything that includes a “shot of espresso” is really cool. If you order a Snapple or something instead of coffee, then you’re out.

Then, you have to sit down and have some kind of deep, philosophical conversation. Now, I can be deep when I want to, so that’s not the problem, but it’s like everyone at the coffeehouse is just having these conversations because it’s trendy. No one’s actually listening to anyone else; they’re all just interested in themselves, and particularly in how well they can seem interested in anything EXCEPT themselves. But they’re just not that convincing.

Of course, I understand this, so I go there all the time.

Fine. So buy one of those “$5 for hungry kids” papers, but then leave the supermarket.

I mean, not to sound evil, but I’m not really interested in flying my ass out to Ethiopia and personally feeding starving children. I’m just not the right person for that.

But I’ve accepted that, and I’m not going to act all self-righteous by being constantly worried about it. I’d rather be happy than concerned.