Monday, June 4, 2007

Gryphon's Word of the Day, June 4, 2007

The word of the day1 for June 4, 2007 is “preposterous” — adjective : contrary to nature, reason, or common sense : absurd. 

The company I work for has got something against AOL. I used to be able to access my AOL account at lunchtime from my work computer. It was not easy; the company IT group created a little pop-up that reminded one that one can not download anything from the internet without dire repercussions. I didn’t want to down-load anything, just read my mail and write my word of the day, yet I had to click the pop-up every 20 seconds or so to continue what I was doing.

Now I can’t even log onto the web-based AOL to read the mail. This is another example of a hard-wired solution to a potential discipline problem. I suppose that I should be glad that I am still able to receive “foreign” e-mail at work. Closing down e-mail from “un-approved” sources will be the next thing. I just wish they could more easily stop the occasional spam letter that gets through without stopping notes from Cyb or my sister.

The quote2 for today is from H.L. (Henry Lewis)Mencken (1880–1956), U.S. journalist, critic. Heathen Days, ch. 3, p. 34, Knopf (1943):

     It was easy to recognize in him the anti-social animus of a born evangelist, but there
     was also something else—a kind of voluptuous delight in the shabby and
     preposterous, a perverted aestheticism like that of a latter-day movie or radio
     fan, a wild will to roll in and snuffle balderdash as a cat rolls in and snuffles catnip.

;^)  Jan 

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Oh Dear Jan,  i was a wondering what was up. I was just abou to try and e mail you to see if you were ok.  Still it was good to see you this morning personally I think it is a bit  PREPOSTEROUS that you can't use  the works 'puter !! lol, Love sybilsybil45

Anonymous said...

Don't tell me about restriction to internet access at work. Blimey. Used to have piles of problems with that, yet the ex-employers' webservers managed to lose all my work :-(

Anonymous said...

I have imposed my own restrictions on my computer lately Jan.
One.. because of my holidays.
Two ..because of my friend visiting wtih me.
Three.. because I had got out of the habit of coming on-line.
I have been enjoying the break and the recent sunshine as well as the extra time to get out and do things.  I'd been hanging around on line too much..lol!
I wondered why I wasn't getting any alerts from you, even though you had been visiting my journal.  Now I know.
You mentioned conceding to me re-your holiday photos.  Did you get any into an album on-line before your bosses created the menacing pop - up?  I was looking forward to seeing them.  
Lovely to see you visiting with me again Jan.  I enjoy reading your word of the day.
Jeanie xx

Anonymous said...

p.s. I now have you back on alerts....I couldn't find you on my list.....that was strange????  I will blame AOL.  Jeanie xx