Sunday afternoon waiting for my sis-in-law’s DNS to update.
Category Archives: General
OnSwipe
I woke at 4am to a cat fart and my brain wouldn’t stop.
Restless, I fired up my iPad and visited blogs I don’t have time to visit (or limited access to during work). At Fortress of Solitude (get that cable, will ya?!) I was shocked to find he had changed his theme. But no… not a theme change as that my finger can now scroll through his content. An iPad plug in? Can it be true?
If you’re looking at DeadRobot.com today, you’re looking at it through OnSwipe, giving you iPad navigation and better finger poking abilities. I love how it transformed my little 2D blog into something like Flipbook, making pages flap over like a magazine (yeah, old school) and displaying buttons a little larger for fat fingers.
The settings could be a bit more robust (not sure where a cover image is presented, or why my logo shows up twice) but it’s certainly an exciting start to something dynamic and simple to use. Me likey!
If you’re not looking at DR.com with an iPad… Hi! Uh… Want a cookie?
Fallen
I haven’t fallen off the face of the earth, and I know apologizing for a lack of posting is the lamest thing in the world.
But in my case it’s true.
Work has hacked away one of my support staff and the workload has become 100%. I’m unable to find time to steal time. Which, I guess is good for all of us, really. The economy being shitty as it is.
I’ve also been busy in the last preps for Disney. It took us close to 4 hours to pack. That in itself is weird since 80% of our trip is just t-shirts and shorts, but we hit snags in the 4 nights of fine dining aboard the ship. We don’t need to bring suits but getting to look just right took a bit longer that expected. Then I needed to fold it, which, to me, is like folding space and time.
I’m no Guild Spacer, Second Class.
Enough of the geek references.
I did go out today and snag some very expensive roaming packages, so there will be updates to this blog while in parks, eating food and barfing beside Expedition Everest. I hope you can join us!
Coming Out: To My Mom
I realized that in the last 10 years of this website I’ve never shared with you, dear internetz, how I came out to the world.
Mostly because it was such a non-event. What with all the drama that preceded my gay cotillion.
A bit of back story for new readers: My oldest brother came out when I was about 11yrs old. I didn’t understand fully what that meant, but I knew there was drama of sorts… my parents were having hushed conversations that were punctuated with “DeadRobot, go to your room.” Later, when I was 16, my father came out of the closet for fear of meeting up with Dan in a gay bar on one of his many business trips to Toronto. Of course the family was shocked, the town of Brockvegas was scandalized, Dad lived a quiet life of a shattered bachelor for all of 10 minutes and then took up with his lover for 14 years. Family came to accept him (including Mom, to a certain degree) and we were happy chucks all again. Okay?
There’s your 8 years or so of drama packed into 125 words or less.
Skip ahead to my 17th birthday. The year I decided that if I was to live my life honestly, I had to tell the people I loved that I was a ‘mo. I decide that I have to make a trip back to Brockvegas to tell friends and family in one fast trip. Get in, drop the bomb, get out, let them decide where their loyalties lie.
Picture my Mom’s house. She’s living with her soon-to-be new husband in a sprawling Brady Bunch style split level bungalow. Mom and I are sitting in the sunken entertainment room (not the good living room, mind you, where the china figurines and untouched furniture resides, no the “living” room where the TV resides) and she magically whips out a photo of me from the year before. It’s of all my sibs laughing as we stand in our grandmother’s kitchen.
“I showed this picture to my co-worker,” My Mom starts, “And as a joke I asked her which one of my sons were gay.”
Uh. Damn. Is my Mom…
“She pointed to you. DeadRobot, are you gay?”
Holy shit my mom just trumped me.
“Yes.” Breathe… breathe… 1, 2, 3…
“Ian!” My mom calls up to the kitchen to my soon-to-be stepfather, “DeadRobot just informed me that he’s gay.”
“That’s good. When’s dinner?” We ate roast beef and yorkie puddings soon after.
Non. Event.
The Way Back – A four hour review
Hey Kids! Shelly here!
At the 6H:13M mark, our travellers discover that they’re sleeping beside the Great Wall of China. At this point I leaned in to SharkBoy and said “This is the worst Where The Hell is Matt? video I’ve ever seen.”
Brief synopsis: a group of men escape a Siberian gulag and walk to India. No really.
Seriously, The Way Back is a good movie, if not a bit long. Peter Weir doesn’t fail to bring epic visuals again. I’ll probably be thinking about it for a few days, which is always a good marker for a good movie.
I give this movie 4 swollen ankles out of 5.
Brother With Robot
Big Brother Dr Dan came for dinner! He insisted on playing with the centre piece.
Behind…Me?
Lazy Rainy Saturday
Everything closed. Rainy. No plans. Nothing to buy.
DVD: Valentines Day. About half way through I picked up my iPad and played Montezuma’s Revenge for a bit. Didn’t miss any of the plot.
Occasionally our hands met under the snuggies.
Happily Confused
You may recall a while back I was nominated (after forcing one of you readers to go nominate me) for Best LGBT blog over on the Canadian Web Blogs Awards. Last month I misunderstood a message to all the contenders and thought after the last round of judging, I was out of the running. I took the badges off my sidebar, sulked into the corner and licked my wounds. I then went into a spiral that everyone does when rejected: Why why why why? I ate like a pig. I threw a Batman Snuggie around my person and parked myself in front of the TV and put Disney’s The Black Hole on repeat.
“Maximilian, the time has come to liquidate our guests.”
And then I got over it, sort of, and started to post more pictures than actual writing. Which, is valid, but not really a great way to get viewers to stick to your site. They need meatier content!
Last night I got a tweet from the site/contest owners saying I’m actually ON the finalist list. Oh. Well! So I’m back in the running I guess. I feel all cool n shit. And very embarrassed.
In all seriousness, I feel strangely small up against the other four contenders. They’re all intensely focused and incredibly interesting with their content. Me, I like to report when I fart in bed.