Things I Have Learnt Today

Over the last few years it has come to my attention that, shock horror, discussion based on wondering and pondering is gradually disappearing.

This applies because when a conversation reaches a point where people aren't sure about something, the response is simply searched for on Google (other search engines are available shit). No wonder, no pondering, job done. Sometimes I long for the time when just not knowing was okay.

(Or when you wake up, sweating, in the middle of the night and shout "SPLINTER!" as you've just remembered the name of the rat from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles from the conversation you had twelve hours ago. Thanks, brain.)

Whilst perhaps this has increased people's general knowledge, it's another example that our generation, like no generation before, is not good at learning things but is good at learning where to find things. Discuss.

Of course I should point out that I'm guilty as sin of this whole thing too. Today, for example, instead of making phone calls (or just being content with not knowing) I searched for several answers. See the following list.

• The band Lostprophets (apparently formerly known as Lozt Prophetz, which is just stupid) had six permanent members at the time of their disbandment. This means they weren't a not-four-prophet organisation.
• It's not possible to have two people, using the same username and password, connecting to a single Windows RDP connection without one kicking the other off.
• It's relatively straightforward to write a simplistic folder monitor in DOS batch. It's really hard, apparently, to make a freeware GUI one that works the way I wanted it to.
• The DOS equivalent to the Unix command "pwd" is "echo %cd%". Dumb.
• Google Chrome Nanny is your friend (no really. Now I should add "blogger.com" to my black-listed URLs).

And that's just this morning. Oh joy.

Update from this afternoon:

• In Outlook 2010 (see yesterday's rant about how rubbish it is) you have to open a message to resend it as new. Then its under the "Move" panel under "Actions > Resend". Who knew (me, now).
• Also in Outlook 2010 (I'm learning gradually), there's no forgotten attachment check by default. That's bloody rubbish! How often do I forget to add attachments, goodness me, it must be daily. What mortals don't forget to add attachments?

Wow, what an interesting set of posts.