What started out innocently enough as a search for “I Want Candy” by MC Pee Pants (second page) somehow ended up with me on the iTunes Signature Maker.

It’s a java app that digs through your iTunes library and generates a file that contains snippets of your favorite tracks mixed together. It’s not exactly pleasurable listening; the author’s sounds okay (kind of like what I imagine an alien SETI program would hear), but it seems like most of them come out pretty atonal.

I imagine the only way to get something that flows well is if you’re one of those people who claims “I have a very eclectic taste in music” but it turns out you listen to a bunch of bands that sound exactly the same, but you have the soundtracks to Manhattan and O Brother, Where Art Thou? to show how diverse you are. Or something.

On the other hand, this is pretty much what it sounds like in my head all the time, so maybe the computer don’t lie.

And speaking of noise, I just realized that I’ve got to be in Florida all next week for work. I’ve known about the trip for a couple of weeks, but I’ve been thinking it was further away. If it’s anything like the last trip, it’ll be that infuriating feeling of knowing I’m at Disney World but being unable to get out and enjoy it because I’m working. And even when I get free time afterwards, it’s no fun going to the parks by myself. Plus, during the week the parks close a lot earlier, leaving only a couple of hours between the end of a work day and closing time. Since I’m contracting, I can’t get into the parks for free unless I’m working there — which means I have to pay full price just to go a couple of hours.

And I’m not really fooling anybody, I realize. Even on a business trip it’s pretty damn cool. At the risk of sounding like I’ve drunk the Kool-Aid: the Disney hotels really just get everything right, and they’re a blast to stay at even independent of the parks. And as for the parks, I’m still hoping I get a chance to check out the new Expedition Everest ride at Animal Kingdom. It’s not supposed to open until next month, but supposedly it’s in “soft opening preview” mode now.

Update: Calendars are hard. Apparently I’m not leaving next week, but the week after. I just wanted to make sure that the Internet was aware of my travel plans. Go on about your business.

It looks like moving everything to the new host worked out okay for the most part. It wasn’t painless — as easy as it is to install WordPress on a new site (and it is ridiculously easy), it’s difficult to move the contents to a new site unless it’s exactly the same as your old one, which is seldom going to be the case. Also, there are a lot of characters that didn’t make the transition, so you’ll see spurious stuff in old posts until I get the time to go back and edit every one out.

Probably more effort than the hosting change will be worth, but what’s done is done.

Yesterday I thought my cold was finally on the way out, because I could actually breathe and see without my eyes watering and go for a minute or more without coughing. But I guess that was “Indian health” or something, because today I feel like a cold turd. I ended up sleeping all day; I kept waking up and immediately falling asleep again. So I get the joy of waking up just as it’s getting dark, and having to be up all night and tired tomorrow.

Plus I kept dreaming about minor comic book characters (like Blue Beetle), which adds another level of creepiness to the already-creepy waking-up-at-nighttime. Bleh.