Old World, Meet New World

Gmail introduced themes in Beta.  Some of them are as ugly as what we expect from Microsoft for doing cutesie things in PowerPoint.

One of them really doesn’t belong in the bunch and that’s because it’s pure irony — the terminal theme.

For those of us who remember using Unix machines and VMS boxes in the early 80s, terminal emulation in green text on a black screen was sort of a nightmare that color monitors helped us escape from.

But for those for whom the memories have faded or for whom they never existed, there’s now a Gmail theme to bring back the agony.

I’ll try it out for a day just to satisfy my sense of irony.

[Hat tip: iMac4Life via Twitter.]

Two Staples Cost Twenty Cents

I mailed my father’s change of address voter registration on Monday.

Paranoid, I took the form to the post office and asked the clerk to bless it — inspect that it was OK.

First she said, “Fine, put it through the slot marked ‘stamped.’ ”

Then I asked her to examine it again.  She said, “Oh, yeah, you can’t can mail that.  Staples and tape aren’t allowed any more.”

I asked her what people do with voter registration forms, which are designed to be mailed this way.

She said, “Oh, you have to pay twenty cents more.”

“Really, 62 cents for a piece of paper because it has two staples?”

Apparently, it’s now considered irregular.

However, by using a glue stick, it’s possible to send it out for the cost of a normal letter.

So I did.  You can see the staple holes in the left corner by my photogenic thumb.