Rands In Repose

Last night I stumbled across a nice essay on The Makers Of Things. It was a fine Obama phrase, and it’s a great topic. And I'm getting tired of explaining to people that "techie" is an insult and a “geek” is a crippled person who displays their deformity to paying customers. But we need a word, a phrase. “Makers of things.” I can live with that.

But that led me to The Rands Vegas System, an extended blog series from 2002 that ought to rank near the pinnacle of weblog writing. It’s an instruction kit for a Vegas weekend, a how-to for a hidden world of drinking, gambling, and strip clubs. Now this is not my scene, I don’t need this guide, but that’s irrelevant. This is a terrific portrait of a hidden world, and comparisons to Hunter Thompson and Chuck Palahniuk and David Foster Wallace are not out of place.

The writer behind these essays is Michael Lopp, and his book on Managing Humans has been on my reading stack since June 2007. The promotional site is a classic. I was just telling myself that I really ought to find the damn book and read it. And then I glanced to my left. It’s on my desk. Right there. OK, it's underneath Prehistoric Digital Poetry, which is underneath Beautiful Code, which is beneath Eco’s The Open Work. And Ted’s Geeks Bearing Gifts is on top of that, But, yeah, it’s right there.