Year: 2006

I haven’t done a quiz in a long time and since I’m getting pretty excited about BSG season 3 starting up soon, I thought this would be a good one to do. While Apollo is not the character I would have liked to have turned up as, there are worse ones.

You scored as Capt. Lee Adama (Apollo). You have spent your life trying to life up to and impress your Dad, shame he never seemed to notice. You are a stickler for the rules. But in matters of loyalty and honour you know when they have to be broken.

Capt. Lee Adama (Apollo)
75%

CPO Galen Tyrol
69%

President Laura Roslin
63%

Commander William Adama
56%

Tom Zarek
38%

Col. Saul Tigh
31%

Dr Gaius Baltar
25%

Number 6
19%

Lt. Sharon Valerii (Boomer)
19%

Lt. Kara Thrace (Starbuck)
6%

What New Battlestar Galactica character are you?

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Dear Lipton Tea/Pepsi Partnership/Unilever1,

Recently, my wife asked me to swing by the pet store and pick up some cat food. I did so after work and then stopped at a nearby convienence store to both fill up my gas tank and get something to drink. Desiring something that was not loaded down with sugar or the American favorite “high fructose corn syrup”, I checked out the cold cases and found I had 2 options: plain water or Lipton Unsweetened Iced Tea. Seeing how it was late in the day and I have feeling tired, I picked the caffinated option. Dear god, I wish now I had choosen to stick with water.

The marketing blurb on the side of the bottle claims you brew tea straight from hand-selected tea leaves. If that blurb is accurate then the people you have hand selecting the leaves must be sadistic, tea-hating bastards who desire to inflict maximum pain and suffering on their fellow man. But then if one continues reading the information printed on the bottle’s label; one will find you feel the need to add citric acid (for tartness) and caramel color. That kind of blows away the theory that they’re really hand selecting the tea leaves for their customer’s pleasure. I mean if you were hand selecting good leaves to make tea for the consumer then why do you feel the need to put additives in the tea? After all Ito En is capable of making an entire line of bottled teas containing nothing but water and tea2 without coloring?

I’ll grant that Ito En is brewing green teas, not black. However since you do not appear to produce an unsweated green iced tea; I cannot make a direct comparison. Still this bottle of your tea was easily the worst tea I have ever had3. Hell, even Nestea was better than this! Until you learn how to brew some proper tea, perhaps you should take this crap off the market.

Sincerely,
Mark

1 If you carefully read all the text on one of their bottles, you’ll see Lipton Tea produces their Iced Teas in cooperation with Pepsi and that they are a Unilever brand.
2 I had to change my argument slightly as after checking a bottle I’d not thrown out yet, I found Ito En adds Vitamin C to their tea.
3 Yeah, I drank it all. I was hot, thirsty and had to drive home yet.

A friend recently posted on her LJ where she thinks she’ll be in the next 15, 20, 25 yeas. Since I rarely if ever think about I’ll be in the next 5 years much less farther out; I decided to take a moment to ponder the same question. Here is what I came up with:

2021

  • Age: 46
  • Employment: Still working and probably shoved into some sort of managerial position. Reading the techie news sites so I can follow the conversations being held by the people I’ve got reporting to me. Wondering if we’re ever going to get those flying cars that they’ve been talking about since I was a child.
  • Vanity: Rather enjoying how my beard & hair are intermixed with grey.
  • Health: Still working to get rid of my cookie gut1 and probably starting to take a variety of medications for arthritis.
  • Hobbies: Still reading plenty of sci-fi, fantasy and mystery novels. Actually, I’m probably reading more of the mystery novels as I either don’t understand what they’re talking about in sci-fi/fantasy these days or I just don’t care anymore. Additionally, I’ll be doing odd jobs around the house renovation/restoring bits & pieces of my castle2. Lastly, I’d like to be working more on my photography skills and possibly learning to build furniture3.

2026

  • Age: 51
  • Employment: Starting to think a lot more seriously about retirement and giving this work crap over to these younger guys with all the energy. Probably shifting my retirement investments to being more conservative. Also, taking advantage of my seniority to get myself sent to all the interesting conventions, training seminars and events. Or at the very least all the ones taking place in interesting places.
  • Vanity: Not so sure I like the all grey hair anymore. Particularly when the little whippersnappers running around call me gramps.
  • Health: Finally got rid of my cookie gut, but getting awfully cranky about all the meds I have to take.
  • Hobbies:

2031

  • Age: 55
  • Employment: Some sort of senior design position, as management jobs might get better pay but they all suck.
  • Vanity: Seriously, I’m 55 and not dead. That’s probably all I need to be vain about at this point.
  • Health: Seriously hoping the current research into cybernetics will be completed in time for me to dump my meatbag for some shiny steel & silicon.
  • Hobbies: Going to public places and pretending to be older and meaner than I actually am to annoy all little whippersnappers running around. 😀

Side note: I started writing this post up a couple of weeks ago when the friend’s post first appeared, but as happens a lot set it aside to work on later. Now that I’m going back to work on it again, I noticed a few differences in how I’m organizing the information. Whereas my friend wrote her post in a more narative form; I’ve got bullet points. I can think of two immediate reasons for this difference.

  1. I’m lazier than my friend
  2. My friend studied English and writing; while I studied business & computers. All my training tells me that nobody really wants to sit there and read the crap I’ve written so I’d better convey my point as quickly & clearly as I can. Her training is all about trying to engage the reader in what she’s saying. I think I like her way better. Ah well.

1 I don’t really care for beer, while I do love munching on freshly, baked home-made cookies. Yummmmmm!
2 “Castle” is used here in the sense that every man’s home is his castle. Rather than in the more literal sense, though if that did somehow happen I think it would be pretty dang rockin’.
3 I like woodworking, but opporunities for doing it while living in an apartment have been extremely limited. Since I’m buying a house, I expect I’ll get to do more of this. If only in home repairs and it might lead to more interesting things.