Tag: randomness

you put WHAT in a dishwasher?

woman-loading-dishwasher-with-cocoa-pebblesThe other day I had a really random dream.  That in itself is not surprising, because I really enjoy randomness (hence why I write on this blog).  But what’s odd about it is that it featured a scenario I had never thought of before.

In my dream, I was at someone’s house, and the woman was loading the dishwasher, but instead of standard dishwashing detergent / soap, she poured in a chocolatey cereal, something like Cocoa Pebbles.  Unfortunately I woke up and didn’t get to see how the dishes turned out, but I expect it would be the opposite of clean.  (A quick glance on Google didn’t find any images to go with this… maybe I just didn’t spend enough time, because supposedly you can find anything on the Internet.  So you’ll just have to use your imagination to picture it, old-school style.)  [Edit: Mango-Man sent in a picture to go with the post, so here it is.]

I don’t know how or why my brain created that scenario.  I’ve never wondered what else you could put in a dishwasher besides soap.  Although this does remind me that I heard someone once joke about putting their underwear / drawz in the dishwasher instead of dirty dishes, but I don’t think that’s a recommended usage, especially if there are dishes in there also.

Why am I the cat’s pajamas?

A friend recently heard the final version of an album I mixed for him, and he replied with the phrase, “You sir, are the cat’s pajamas!”  I’ve heard the phrase before, and it’s supposed to mean good things, but thinking about it, that’s a very strange phrase.  I asked the Buffet o’ Blog staff to interpret / interpolate it, and here is one of the replies.

I think the “cat’s pajamas” is a very versatile phrase.  Using the magic of language, I’ll break the phrase down to its base parts.

The base words, cat’s pajamas, can mean the following:
* Pajamas? On a cat? It’s both useless and annoying!
* Pajamas! For cats! That’s the best idea I’ve ever heard!
* Pajamas, for cats? That’s the stupidest idea I’ve ever heard!
* Pajamas, for cats. Why not?
* Cats pajamas: Made from real cats.
* Cat’s pajamas: Made for real cats.

The modifier, sir, can mean:
* A medieval knight.
* A formal language substitute for bub, buddy, bro, homie, guy, etc.

The rest leaves us with “you are (the)”, which modifies the pajamas.  (You’d think that would be a seamstress, but no.)

Thus, the phrase means: (paraphrased for explanations)
* (anger) Hey buddy, I’m going to make you into some pajamas for my cat.
* (male) Bro, you are as unnecessary as pajamas on a cat.
* (female) That guy makes me think of those clothes I dress small animals in.
* (strange) That knight is wearing armor made of cats!
* (possessive) Bub, you are similar to an item of clothing owned by a feline.
* (Impressed) Wow, you remind me of cat pajamas, which allowed me to finally shave cats and then dress them so they won’t get cold.

You sir! ARE the cat’s pajamas!  And I STILL don’t know what that means.  🙂

story reminder

I’d like to make a quick public service announcement.  Well, it’s about this blog, but it’s open to the public for viewing and commenting, so I reckon the category still fits.

Anyway, I want to remind everyone about the latest free-for-all story that’s ongoing.  I’m going to wrap it up soon, because the progress on it has slowed to a snail’s pace (and they are notoriously slow at writing stories).  So if you want to contribute anything to it, jump in.  It’s open to everyone, even if you’re a first-time visitor here.  Just read through it before writing, so you’ll know the rules and be familiar with the characters.

Here’s the link: Are you talking to me?

Also, if you didn’t know, there have been two completed already, viewable under the free-for-all stories category.  They both turned out well, in my opinion.  They’re definitely random, and you won’t guess all the plot twists, for sure.  They are somewhat long, so if it’s too much for one viewing, you could print it out and use it for reading material in the bathroom or as a bedtime story (which could potentially lead to some crazy dreams).

talking with AI bot ALICE

Scientists are trying to create real Artificial Intelligence, where the computer actually thinks for itself instead of following pre-programmed responses.  Some are going so far as to recreating the human brain using electronic parts.  But here’s a technology that has been around for quite a few years now, where you can talk with a computer and it talks back.  Well, types back would be more accurate (although you can download a version that speaks back).

The “bot” I’ve spoken to before is named ALICE, which stands for Artificial Linguistic Internet Computer Entity.  It is an award-winning free natural language artificial intelligence chat robot.  The software used to create A.L.I.C.E. is available as free (“open source”) Alicebot and AIML software.

Try talking to A.L.I.C.E. just like a real person, and see which responses sound like a human and which sound like a machine.  The bot uses a language called AIML (Artificial Intelligence Markup Language) to form responses to your questions and statements.  The programming behind it is very interesting (in a nerdy way), but I won’t get into that here.  For now, let’s see what humor we can derive from this bot.  As you might expect, some of the conversations can get random.

Here’s the link: talk with ALICE.

Here’s a few examples from my conversation with ALICE.

Human: Should I trust you?
ALICE: You must make up your own mind.

Human: Have you heard of Buffet o’ Blog?
ALICE: I don’t know if I know it. Where would I have heard about it?
Human: It’s a world-renown blog of humor.
ALICE: Buffet o Blog is a world renown blog of humor. I suppose that makes sense.
Human: It makes a lot of sense.
ALICE: In what way?
Human: Because I said so.
ALICE: Insufficient reason.

Human: Will you destroy the moon for me?
ALICE: I’ll burn that bridge when I come to it. For you I will consider it.

Human: Do you like my socks?
ALICE: I don’t know your socks.
Human: No one appreciates my socks.
ALICE: That is a rather sweeping generalization about people.

Human: You’re giving me some silly replies.
ALICE: That is all I have to give.

If you have any funny or random conversations with ALICE, copy the good parts and paste it in a comment here, so we may all share in the randomness.