Archive of Humor

Things that now qualify as “me time”

on April 11th, 2011 in Books, Family, Life, Mommy Stuff, Parenting by | 1 Comment

Breastpumping My commute to work Taking a shower The three block walk to return my library books Sleeping Leaning on my similarly exhausted husband and staring vacantly at something on a screen **UPDATE** I just finished Tina Fey’s new book Bossypants and was put to shame by her fantastic list…

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A Parent’s Life as a Video Game

on March 29th, 2011 in Avenging, Favorite Posts, Mommy Stuff, Parenting, Tech by | 2 Comments

My job is in the video game industry, so I tend to think of life in these terms. For example, when I was pregnant with my daughter, I realized that pregnancy is essentially a really immersive resource-conservation RPG. I was always asking myself questions like: “Do I pick up this…

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Parenthood by Percentages

on February 15th, 2011 in Family, Mommy Stuff, Parenting by | 2 Comments

In case anyone is interested in the relative effects of a New Baby, I ran a few numbers this morning. -65% Cussing -50% Cups of Coffee Consumed -98% Cups of Coffee Consumed While Still Warm -98% Alcohol Consumed Before Childbirth +98% Alcohol Consumed After Childbirth +50% Loads of Laundry/Week +100%…

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Out in the daylight with a stroller

on February 9th, 2011 in Mommy Stuff, Parenting, San Francisco by | 2 Comments

I’m sitting at a cafe with my infant daughter. I feel like a monster of productivity, having successfully left the house twice in one day, eaten actual meals, and avoided being covered in poo (for the time being). Elizabeth is the daughter, three months old. She sleeps in the stroller…

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Top Five Things I Have Learned About Babies

on January 25th, 2011 in Avenging, Life, Mommy Stuff, Parenting, Products by | 1 Comment

My daughter, Elizabeth West Firment, was born in early November. The last…ever since…has been a nonstop, nonsleep blur of boobs, love, fuss, and delirium. In the process, I have learned these five things: Ceiling fans are TV for babies. At week six, nursing goes from being a special woodchipper for…

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The Typography of Greenwashing

on January 10th, 2010 in Favorite Posts, Graphic Design, Music by | 4 Comments

Instead of watching House episodes all day like a normal person, I spent one of my vacation days making a video about the media practice of greenwashing. According to the world’s only remaining viable encyclopedia, greenwashing is the “practice of companies disingenuously spinning their products and policies as environmentally friendly.”…

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Me, bouncing around onstage at an O’Reilly Conference

on July 28th, 2009 in Avenging, Film, Tech, Women in tech by | 2 Comments

Last week I spoke at OSCON Ignite, the evening entertainment bit of the O’Reilly Open Source Conference and the Google Awards. Talks took the traditional Ignite format of five minutes, 20 slides. Slides auto-advance after 15 seconds, ready or not. Speakers were encouraged to address their personal brand of geekery….

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Middle Ages Helpdesk

on March 21st, 2009 in History, Tech, User Interface Design by | 1 Comment

This is causing great joy among our phone support people at work. New technology can be so troublesome!

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