Thursday, February 16, 2017

In which we go behind the scenes

At the DJ they make us change our login password about as often as most people change their underwear (which, I will point out, is more often for DJ-type people than debate-type people). So I changed my password a couple of days ago, and it wouldn’t take because I had used that one before, so I put in another one that I immediately forgot. The fallout from this has been frightening. I’ve lost access to a bunch of things that seem to have no recollection of me in any way, shape or form. Every email address yields nothing. Every poke, every pull, every tug—again nothing. Very frustrating. Also not terribly important—will the world end if I can’t look at Tumblr every couple of days? Still, I hate when the computer pulls itself out from under you. Next time I’ll write down my password, which is what I usually do, and put it on my bulletin board. You want to log in as me? Be my guest. Because, the thing is, so do I.

At Penn, Sans-Culottes managed to also pull my computer away from me, slipping in a horrible screaming sound every time I accessed tabroom. I’m not quite sure why, but it was quite amusing, and I used it whenever the Paginator looked like he was going to fall asleep. Then again, the Paginator had the magic spell available to make it go away, and didn’t tell me, so he deserved what he got. Feh!

The thing about the Penn tabroom, as anyone who followed it on Facebook can tell, is that we were right on top of each other for three whole days. It was the smallest conference room ever, up in a garret somewhere, stuffed to the gills with people of the tabulation persuasion. Speech, congress, debate, after-dinner conversation (which is, yes, a real event, although I think they officially call it something else), you name it. You couldn’t swing the proverbial cat, but there we were. And it was a hell of a lot of fun. I think the goal of any decent tab room ought to be to get Kaz to either spit-take or curse, and I think this weekend we got both. The thing is, any sentence taken out of context can be hilarious, if you know how to work it. And this group can take sentences out of context like nobody’s business. You think Kellyanne knows how to twist the language? She’d commit seppuku in five minutes if she were forced to work with us. Then again, we might kill her ourselves before the five minutes were up, all things considered, but we’re not here to talk politics or make fun of Trump and the Trumpettes. They do that perfectly well all by themselves. Come to think of it, the tab room never talks much about politics, not because we don’t all agree, but because it’s just so tiresome. Lately I’m limiting my politics to tweets only. Debate here, entertainment on FB, and snarky politics on Twitter. The balance seems right.

Now I'm looking at not one but two weekends off. I’m still rather zonked from three nonstop days of Penn, so a little sleep for a morning or two will not be viewed askance. Maybe I’ll pull a Palmer and keep my pants off. One never knows, does one?


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