Guest Blogger: Passive Aggressive Notes.com

By Kelsey Moon

I’m not a very confrontational person. If I had my way everyone would get along and everything would always be sunshine and flowers. Unfortunately things don’t usually work out that way, but I have a hard time letting people know when something they’re doing is bothering me. In such cases I am frequently tempted to resort to that paragon of passive aggression: The Note.

Just a quick jot on a sticky pad or a piece of notebook paper stuck to the fridge, filled with all the biting sarcasm you can’t bring yourself to express to the recipient’s face, perhaps even adroitly hidden under a layer of innocent sweetness. It’s the perfect way to communicate frustration, except for one problem. They usually don’t go over very well. In fact, the passive-aggressive note almost always makes the person at whom it is directed even less inclined to do whatever it is you want them to do.

I have realized this and do my best to avoid writing them, no matter how tempting it may be. However, there are apparently plenty of people who embrace the temptation open-armed, because there is a website entirely devoted to documenting such zingers left by frustrated people around the office, the apartment, or any other shared space. The voyeuristic feeling I get while browsing Passive Aggressive Notes.com reminds me a bit of PostSecret or Found, but who doesn’t delight in laughing at other people’s problems?

Some of the notes submitted are intentionally amusing, some are unintentionally hilarious, and others are just strange, as in the case of a girl who came home to find her roommate had employed the blitzkrieg approach and had left 11 nasty (and grammatically baffling) notes around their apartment demanding that she clean up her "dirty."

What a fantastic site. It is a perfect perfect place for reveling in other people’s tactlessness while providing an outlet for one’s own uncivil desires. So now I can both indulge my passive-aggressive urges and keep my friendships!

Via mental_floss

Puppy Bowl IV

Last night, most of you watched at least some part of one of the biggest annual sporting events on American television, the Super Bowl. While I caught the beginning and the end of the game and was delighted with the results, the football game could not keep my attention for very long because I had very little interest in either of the two teams. So as my disinterest grew and not wanting to do any school work yet on that evening, I turned to the trusty TV Guide channel. Most of the entries were pretty dull - what can you expect when competing against the Super Bowl for ratings? - but one particular show caught my attention. Animal Planet's Puppy Bowl (Those with weak stomachs may want to abstain from following that link. It contains ridiculous amounts of nausea-inducing cuteness).

This was not just Puppy Bowl, however: this was Puppy Bowl IV. It is the fourth in a series that is presented as an alternative to the testosterone-infused, high-contact sport of football. It features about a dozen puppies in a football stadium-themed playroom with some toys and not much else. They are let loose to run around and play with one another while a "referee" looks on and cleans things up every once in awhile. In post-production, an energetic soundtrack is added and commentary is provided by Harry Kalas, the legendary voice of the NFL films. My description does not fully convey how mind-numbingly cute this show allows itself to stoop to being.

The action doesn't end when the play clock runs down though. Fans were able to vote online for a Most Valuable Puppy award, and a halftime show was provided by the BISSELL kitties. This whole affair really is something that has to be witnessed to be believed.

In a way, it is not surprising that this show has carved a small niche for itself beside the gargantuan audience of the Super Bowl. I know there are many females (and some males) who have absolutely no taste for football, but could watch puppies run around in circles all day without being bored. In a way, this is a brilliant and successful move by Animal Planet, and I think this point is emphasized by the fact that this is their fourth year running with the program.

In a way, I also think that its just a bunch of dogs running around a box; miniature football helmets or not.

On This Day - 1/30

On this day in history, many incredible things happened. I have compiled a short list (only twelve points!) of some of the more bizzare, cool, or just plain awesome historical events that happened on various January 30ths throughout history. They are in chronological order as follows:

- Oliver Cromwell is formally executed after having been dead for 2 years (1661).

- Antarctica is "discovered" by Edward Bransfield (1820).

- The first attempted assassination of a US President is carried out against then current President Andrew Jackson (1835). Both of the assassin's pistols misfired, and the man was quickly subdued by a 68-year old Andrew Jackson, his favorite walking cane, and the onlooking crowd.

- The most famous seamstress in the world, Betsy Ross, dies (1836).

- Future US President Franklin D. Roosevelt is born (1882).

- The Royal Canadian Navy is inaugurated (1911).

- Adolf Hitler is sworn in as chancellor of Germany (1933).

- Future US Vice-President and founder of the fourth branch of the government, Dick Cheney, is born (1941).

- Mahatma Ghandi and Orville Wright both die (1948).

- The Beatles last public performance is broken up by the police (1969).

- The first computer virus is written (1982). It was given highly meaningful name: "Elk Cloner."

- Future author of this blog, Drew Spickes, is born (1987).

21 years later, here I am. Harding, being the wonderful university that it is, did not allow me to make any stupid decisions that involve alcoholic beverages. Instead, I made a stupid decision that involved a mustache and wore one all day. It felt very empowering and very ridiculous.

3D Mailbox

Email is boring. Yes, I like some of you am easily excited by a late-night communique from Facebook telling me that someone has posted a one word message on my wall, but not all people revel in electronic communication with the same vigor that we do. Email has become a dry, uninteresting wasteland where only business people and the occasional nearly-illiterate relative trying out their new computer dare to tread. Or at least, so believe the people over at 3D Mailbox.com.

Showing an unnatural knack for what the youth of America consider "keen" they have taken the exciting concept of a three-dimensional virtual world and applied it to your email inbox. Popular Massively Multiplayer Online (MMO) games such as World of Warcraft use this concept to bring together thousands of players at once to roleplay that they are wizards, elves, or some other fantasy hero fighting against a greater evil that threatens to envelop the land, all while collecting more powerful weapons and piles of gold. 3D Mailbox uses this concept to help you check your email.

Yes, by downloading and installing 3D Mailbox you will be able to interact with each of your emails as if they were individual people. The first “level” of the program features a Miami resort with a beachside pool which acts as your inbox. Each of your new messages is portrayed as a poorly-rendered, swimsuited beach-goer who is bent on entering the resort. To do this though, they must first go through the bouncer, your spam filter. If they gain entrance, they dive into the swimming pool, waiting for you to join them in the water and "read" them. After they are "read" they towel off and sunbathe at the poolside. If the bouncer rejects the poor person as a spam message, however, they are sent to the beach outside of the resort compound to await being eaten by a great white shark.

This is not a fake website.

This is a real program that real people really use; just not for any practical purpose, say, like actually catching up on your email. I’m sure though there is a fourteen year-old girl somewhere who is probably quite enamored with the new hunk named “Re:Thank You” that her character met by the poolside yesterday.

So if you, like me, are bored and frustrated with regular old email, download 3D inbox* and interact with your email in ways that are beyond your wildest imagination! This video preview gives you a brief glimpse of the exciting world that is waiting for you!



The website also boasts of second and third levels which allow you to both take control of LAX and fight off a zombie infestation in a peaceful rural hamlet. I can hardly wait.

*I would never under any circumstances recommend this program for any sane, productive human being.