I’ve been talking smack about how much email sucks. About how email doesn’t really fit into the modern communications model. And about how absolutely terrible email is for doing any sort of collaborative work (wikis and waves are much better in that regard).

My hate-on for email has got to the point where I basically only check my work email. Work email is pretty much unavoidable, especially since I work for a distance organization.

Personal email, though, is something I rarely check. Rather, I check it fairly often, but I don’t bother to actually read most of what shows up in my inbox.

But, lately, email has proved to be a boon.

Email has allowed me to get advice from friends, it has allowed me to plan parties and events (though, Facebook does a better job of this if everyone involved is on it), and it’s allowed me to chat about football with a minister. These are all small things, and all of them could have happened without email, but email expedited the process of each.

So maybe email isn’t so bad. We’ve just got to remember what it does well, and try to avoid using it for what it does poorly.

UPDATE: You’ll notice that “and waves” have been struck through. This is because, shortly after writing this post, I got word that Google will no longer be developing Wave and will ultimately kill the site by the end of the year. It’s too bad, because I was really starting to like the tool.

The image above is creepy, but tame. The photoset on the other side of the link below is definitely not safe for work. It is, however, equal parts fascinating and creepy.

Photos from the Real Doll factory (NSFW), via Love machine!!!! « .one too many..

via Kelly McParland: New Arizona law makes every Hispanic a suspect – Full Comment.

One evening, Harold fell down the front steps of their home and was taken to the hospital. Based on their medical directives alone, Clay should have been consulted in Harold’s care from the first moment. Tragically, county and health care workers instead refused to allow Clay to see Harold in the hospital. The county then ultimately went one step further by isolating the couple from each other, placing the men in separate nursing homes.

This is all kinds of fucked up. Sara showed me this today, and I was completely stunned. I kept saying, “What the fuck?!” out loud as I read it. And she kept saying, “I know, right?! What the hell?!”

Click the link below and read the entire story. It’s just horrible the way that these people were treated. Sadly, it’s probably more common than most of us realize.

NCLR: issues & cases > case docket > greene v. county of sonoma et al..

Why? Because haven’t been completing many of them.

I’ve been coming up with a lot of ideas, but they all seem to be incomplete. I’ll get halfway through a post (or more) and then realize that I don’t know how to finish it. I’ll realize that it isn’t a complete thought.

Sometimes, blogging incomplete thoughts can be a boon. It gives me an excuse to put a question to my readers which, in turn, gives you a good reason to leave a comment or two. We engage in a discussion and we’re both the better for it (I like think so, anyway).

But, the posts I’ve been working on aren’t really the sort that lend themselves to ending with a question like, “What do you think?”

As a result, I have a fair number of incomplete posts in my drafts folder. They sit, looking all sad, waiting to be finished. Sadly, many of them will never get the chance to exit the limbo that is the drafts folder.

Sadly, many of them will never grow beyond half-formed, incomplete thoughts.

The warehouse and production workers in Denmark are rebelling against the company’s new alcohol policy, which allows them to drink beer only during lunch hours in the canteen. Previously, they could help themselves to beer throughout the day, from coolers placed around the work sites.

I, for one, fully support the striking Carlsberg workers, if only in the hope that their efforts will one day result in the right of all workers to drink on the job.

In all seriousness, I find the old policy (the one that the workers are trying to restore) to be perfectly sensible. Sometimes, a cold beer would be the perfect thing to make me work more effectively. As long as no one is getting shit-faced on the job, what’s the harm?

Have A Nice Day Everyone on Flickr – Photo Sharing!.

The main reason for this was that Tumblr makes it incredibly easy to share interesting content that I find around the web. Then, Allan pointed out the Press This bookmarklet in the comments of the first post in this little Tumblr vs WordPress saga; all of my problems were solved.

Well, at least the problem of easily posting things from around the web without having to copy the content, or link, or whatever, and then open up my WordPress dashboard, and then paste the content here. (Which, I realize, is not exactly a serious problem.)

I’ll be sticking with WordPress. I may still change up the theme, making use of one that allows me to use different templates for different types of posts, but I won’t be switching to Tumblr.

However, because I will be posting “found content” more often than in the past, I’ve made some minor versions to the site disclaimer. Feel free to read them, if you care about that sort of thing.

80/365 – Witch Shoes on Flickr – Photo Sharing!.

(This post is basically just a test; I’m trying out the Press This bookmarklet to see how it works.)