{"id":1865,"date":"2003-10-22T17:44:32","date_gmt":"2003-10-23T07:44:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/2003\/10\/22\/free-association\/"},"modified":"2019-12-06T10:06:45","modified_gmt":"2019-12-06T18:06:45","slug":"free-association","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/2003\/10\/22\/free-association\/","title":{"rendered":"Free association"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class='__iawmlf-post-loop-links' style='display:none;' data-iawmlf-post-links='[{&quot;id&quot;:6753,&quot;href&quot;:&quot;http:\\\/\\\/www.interalia.org&quot;,&quot;archived_href&quot;:&quot;https:\\\/\\\/web-wp.archive.org\\\/web\\\/20251009035228\\\/http:\\\/\\\/interalia.org\\\/&quot;,&quot;redirect_href&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;checks&quot;:[{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-03-09 09:15:58&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:404},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-03-24 17:25:01&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:404},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-03-28 22:39:59&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:404},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-04-01 08:28:02&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:404},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-04-05 18:27:47&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:404},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-04-08 20:06:28&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:404},{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-04-15 10:30:20&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:404}],&quot;broken&quot;:true,&quot;last_checked&quot;:{&quot;date&quot;:&quot;2026-04-15 10:30:20&quot;,&quot;http_code&quot;:404},&quot;process&quot;:&quot;done&quot;}]'><\/div>\n<p>I hopped onto iChat tonight, and found a message from <a href=\"http:\/\/www.interalia.org\/\" title=\"Among Other Things\">Phil<\/a> waiting for me that he&#8217;d sent while I was off at work. I responded, and then we stumbled into a couple hours of free association. What follows has only been edited to reorder one or two lines to preserve clarity, and one or two tangents have been excised. I thought it was pretty entertaining.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\n  Phil: wow. way to answer 8 hours later.<\/p>\n<p>  Me: lol yeah, well, I was at work<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: How about an away message?<\/p>\n<p>  Me: forgot to set it when I left&#8230;and for some reason, the &#8216;puter never went to sleep<br \/>\n  Me: :shrugs<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Heh. Alright. Phil: you&#8217;re forgiven, just this once<\/p>\n<p>  Me: hrm&#8230;i better be careful about that then<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: But don&#8217;t let it happen again, ol&#8230;.young man!<\/p>\n<p>  Me: :laughs nice<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Actually, it&#8217;s done it for like the last 3 days&#8230; but, whatever.<\/p>\n<p>  Me: really? bizzrre<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: I think your G5 just does not go to sleep.<\/p>\n<p>  Me: or even bizArre<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: bazaar?<\/p>\n<p>  Me: brasierre<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: brazier.<\/p>\n<p>  Me: glazier<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: glandular<\/p>\n<p>  Me: globular<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: gangster<\/p>\n<p>  Me: gangsta<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Gang Starr<\/p>\n<p>  Me: Home Star<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: homerun<\/p>\n<p>  Me: hummer<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: That&#8217;d be nice. I mean, um, uh, er, um, uh, humvee.<\/p>\n<p>  Me: lol Me: (&#8217;twasn&#8217;t an offer)<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Not from you, ol&#8217; man<\/p>\n<p>  Me: hey, now&#8230;there are benefits<br \/>\n  Me: just lose the dentures<br \/>\n  Me: no worries about inadvertent scrapes<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: ROFL Phil: You&#8217;ve put WAY too much thought into that right there.<br \/>\n  Phil: Now associate &#8216;humvee&#8217;!<\/p>\n<p>  Me: LOL Me: ah, right&#8230;(ahem) Me: Harvey<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Harley<\/p>\n<p>  Me: hog<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: heifer<\/p>\n<p>  Me: girlfriend (ouch&#8230;)\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Okay &#8212; a quick aside in my own defense here (free association can be dangerous sometimes&#8230;). I actually had to sit and think about this for a moment after I tossed it out, and as far as I can remember, the <em>only<\/em> time I&#8217;ve ever heard the term &#8216;heifer&#8217; used was to describe an unappreciated girlfriend. A little sad, I suppose, but seeing as how I don&#8217;t tend to run around in farming circles, that just happens to be the case. In <em>no<\/em> way should this be construed as being aimed at anyone I have been involved with, past, present, or future. Anyway, continuing on&#8230;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\n  Phil: platonic friend<\/p>\n<p>  Me: frustration<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: rage.<\/p>\n<p>  Me: prozac<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: claritin<\/p>\n<p>  Me: clarity<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: charity<\/p>\n<p>  Me: alms<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: arms<\/p>\n<p>  Me: bear<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Arctic Circle<\/p>\n<p>  Me: perfect circle<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: maynard james keenan<\/p>\n<p>  Me: hillbilly<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: my dad<\/p>\n<p>  Me: stranger<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: balki!<\/p>\n<p>  Me: (wow&#8230;that&#8217;s a show I haven&#8217;t thought about in years&#8230;kudos!)<br \/>\n  Me: Balkans<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Urals<\/p>\n<p>  Me: urine<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: urinals<\/p>\n<p>  Me: fly<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: hornet<\/p>\n<p>  Me: run<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Lola<\/p>\n<p>  Me: yum<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Jessica Alba<\/p>\n<p>  Me: Alan Alda<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Tony Danza<\/p>\n<p>  Me: Chachi<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Joanie<\/p>\n<p>  Me: Cusack<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Kojak<\/p>\n<p>  Me: bald<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Jesse Ventura<\/p>\n<p>  Me: acting<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Al Pacino<\/p>\n<p>  Me: taxi driver<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: underage prostitution<\/p>\n<p>  Me: pedophile<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Cattholicism<br \/>\n  Phil: er, Catholocism<br \/>\n  Phil: er &#8211; ah, fuck it, you know what i mean.<\/p>\n<p>  Me: lol gotcha<br \/>\n  Me: candy bar and a coke<br \/>\n  Me: (do you know that joke?)<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: no, I really don&#8217;t.<\/p>\n<p>  Me: ah, damn<br \/>\n  Me: okay&#8230;slight detour<br \/>\n  Me: guy goes to confession<br \/>\n  Me: starts to run down his list o&#8217; sins<br \/>\n  Me: mid way through (apparently he had a good list), the priest interrupts him<br \/>\n  Me: &#8220;Hey &#8211; I hate to do this, but I&#8217;ve been in here all day, and I <em>really<\/em> need to take a piss. Could you come over here and cover for me for a few minutes?&#8221;<br \/>\n  Me: &#8220;What? But I don&#8217;t know anything about giving absolution!&#8221;<br \/>\n  Me: &#8220;Don&#8217;t worry about it &#8211; c&#8217;mere&#8221;<br \/>\n  Me: So the guy goes over, and the priest points out a list tacked to the wall<br \/>\n  Me: &#8220;See? It&#8217;s all here. Unclean thoughts, three hail marys&#8230;masturbation, seven&#8230;just follow the chart, and you&#8217;ll be fine.&#8221;<br \/>\n  Me: &#8220;Um&#8230;okay&#8230;&#8221;<br \/>\n  Me: So the priest takes off, and the guy starts filling in.<br \/>\n  Me: The first two people go okay.<br \/>\n  Me: Then a woman comes in, and starts going through her list of sins.<br \/>\n  Me: He&#8217;s doing fine, until she says &#8220;&#8230;and I gave my boyfriend a blowjob.&#8221;<br \/>\n  Me: The guy scans up and down the list, &#8220;blowjob&#8230;blowjob&#8230;&#8221; but he can&#8217;t find it.<br \/>\n  Me: Frantic, he opens the curtain and pops his head out to see an altar boy walking by.<br \/>\n  Me: &#8220;Hey! Kid! What does the priest give for a blowjob?&#8221;<br \/>\n  Me: &#8220;Candy bar and a coke, usually.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: ROFL<br \/>\n  Phil: Awesome. That&#8217;s awesome.<\/p>\n<p>  Me: lol Me: and now my response actually makes some amount of sense<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: so, responding to candy bar and a coke?<br \/>\n  Phil: broke!<\/p>\n<p>  Me: credit<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: check<\/p>\n<p>  Me: Czech<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Slovakia<\/p>\n<p>  Me: europe<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: france<\/p>\n<p>  Me: freedom fries<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: berets<\/p>\n<p>  Me: bad poetry<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: bohemians<\/p>\n<p>  Me: Moulin Rouge<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Nicole Kidman<\/p>\n<p>  Me: (I&#8217;d go with &#8220;yum&#8221; again, but I did that earlier&#8230;)<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: (exactly. )<\/p>\n<p>  Me: Marilyn Monroe<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: (again with the &#8220;yum&#8221;)<br \/>\n  Phil: JFK<\/p>\n<p>  Me: (and that ends the &#8220;yum&#8221;&#8230;)<br \/>\n  Me: brains<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: zombies<\/p>\n<p>  Me: black and white<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Gaussian blur<\/p>\n<p>  Me: photoshop<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: MS Paint!<\/p>\n<p>  Me: crap<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: donkeys<\/p>\n<p>  Me: shrek<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: my door<br \/>\n  Phil: (There&#8217;s a connection there, honest)<\/p>\n<p>  Me: (allrighty then&#8230;)<br \/>\n  Me: knock<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: D&amp;D<\/p>\n<p>  Me: bag of holding<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: dime sack<\/p>\n<p>  Me: 420<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: 187<\/p>\n<p>  Me: \u03c0<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: The cube<\/p>\n<p>  Me: hypercube (which I need to see at some point&#8230;)<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: no, no, DO NOT<br \/>\n  Phil: my word is now HORRIBLE<\/p>\n<p>  Me: really? bummer&#8230;the first one wasn&#8217;t bad<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: second = bad<\/p>\n<p>  Me: ah, well&#8230;thanks for the warning! Me: okay&#8230;off of horrible?<br \/>\n  Me: adam sandler<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: rob schneider<\/p>\n<p>  Me: rob reiner<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: pauly shore<\/p>\n<p>  Me: biodome<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: biocomputing<\/p>\n<p>  Me: nanotechnology<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: self-replicators<\/p>\n<p>  Me: Kiln People (good David Brin sci-fi novel)<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: art majors<\/p>\n<p>  Me: museums<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: history majors<\/p>\n<p>  Me: term papers<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: midterms<\/p>\n<p>  Me: student loans<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: MBNA<\/p>\n<p>  Me: (MBNA?)<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: (loan company, &#35;1 or &#35;2 backer of the Republican party; Apple&#8217;s loan company)<\/p>\n<p>  Me: aaah, okies Me: bills<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: pelicans<\/p>\n<p>  Me: albatross<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: mariner<\/p>\n<p>  Me: baseball<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: hot dogs<\/p>\n<p>  Me: mysterious ingredients<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: cigarettes<\/p>\n<p>  Me: cloves<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: pipe tobacco<\/p>\n<p>  Me: sherlock holmes<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: the Dock<\/p>\n<p>  Me: otis redding<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: whistle<\/p>\n<p>  Me: sound of music<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: gag<\/p>\n<p>  Me: ball<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: arab strap<\/p>\n<p>  Me: porn<br \/>\n  Me: (damn you&#8230;I had to look up an &#8220;arab strap&#8221;, and it&#8217;s just a strap on)<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: rofl<br \/>\n  Phil: camera<\/p>\n<p>  Me: iSight<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: earshot<\/p>\n<p>  Me: wet willie<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Bill Clinton<\/p>\n<p>  Me: stain<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: clorox<\/p>\n<p>  Me: fumes<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: ammonia<\/p>\n<p>  Me: oops<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Britney Spears<\/p>\n<p>  Me: twit<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Steve Urkel<\/p>\n<p>  Me: nerd<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: me!<\/p>\n<p>  Me: (you and me both, actually)<br \/>\n  Me: pride<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: fall<\/p>\n<p>  Me: leaves<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: trees<\/p>\n<p>  Me: druid<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Red Hat<\/p>\n<p>  Me: penguin<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: emperor<\/p>\n<p>  Me: norton<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: ghost<\/p>\n<p>  Me: casper<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: caper<\/p>\n<p>  Me: cape<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: cap<\/p>\n<p>  Me: skull<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: pope<\/p>\n<p>  Me: polish<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: sausage<\/p>\n<p>  Me: hungry<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: me, again.<\/p>\n<p>  Me: broke (again)<br \/>\n  Me: (not to rub it in or anything)<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: (rofl, I didn&#8217;t even notice that)<br \/>\n  Phil: windows<\/p>\n<p>  Me: annoying<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Office XP<\/p>\n<p>  Me: suddenly everything sucks<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: New Orleans whorehouse on a Friday night<\/p>\n<p>  Me: (eclecticism &#62; XP sucks!)<br \/>\n  Me: fun<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: programming<\/p>\n<p>  Me: brainwashing<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Nazis<\/p>\n<p>  Me: Schwarzenegger<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Herr Gropenfuhrer<\/p>\n<p>  Me: Das Blinken Lights<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: BASIC Stamp<\/p>\n<p>  Me: food stamp<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: WIC<\/p>\n<p>  Me: candle<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: wax<\/p>\n<p>  Me: ear<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: earwig<\/p>\n<p>  Me: hedwig<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: inch<\/p>\n<p>  Me: nine<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: nails<\/p>\n<p>  Me: fingers<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: claws<\/p>\n<p>  Me: santa<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: snowballs<\/p>\n<p>  Me: blue balls<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: typical.<\/p>\n<p>  Me: (Y&#8217;know how to get rid of blue balls? Slap &#8217;em and slap &#8217;em until they&#8217;re red.)<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: (OW)<\/p>\n<p>  Me: (anyway&#8230;lol&#8230;off of &#8216;typical&#8217;)<br \/>\n  Me: boring<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Windows<br \/>\n  Phil: (98)<\/p>\n<p>  Me: crash<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: airplanes<\/p>\n<p>  Me: Fight Club<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Red Dragon<\/p>\n<p>  Me: (book was better)<br \/>\n  Me: tattoo<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: (agreed)<br \/>\n  hil: (oh sweet jesus, the first reaction I had to tattoo was another D&amp;D reference)<br \/>\n  Phil: wings<\/p>\n<p>  Me: Crow II (horrid, horrid, horrid&#8230;but she was yummy)<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Underworld<br \/>\n  Phil: (also horrid, but hey, I&#8217;d hit it)<\/p>\n<p>  Me: (oh, damn skippy)<br \/>\n  Me: leather<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: BDSM<\/p>\n<p>  Me: kinky<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: my ex&#8217;s roommate<\/p>\n<p>  Me: my ex (one of &#8217;em, at least)<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: Wow. it&#8217;s 2:30 am and my brain is numb.<br \/>\n  Phil: That has nothing to do with my ex.<br \/>\n  Phil: At least, not on the surface.<\/p>\n<p>  Me: :laughs I guessed<br \/>\n  Me: you out?<br \/>\n  Me: this is going on my blog, by the way<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: yeah, I&#8217;m out. I have to get up for classes tomorrow.<br \/>\n  Phil: Oh, wow, that&#8217;s one hella long blog entry.<\/p>\n<p>  Me: about an hour and a half of free association&#8230;not bad!<\/p>\n<p>  Phil: not at all.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>And that&#8217;s that.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I hopped onto iChat tonight, and found a message from Phil waiting for me that he&#8217;d sent while I was off at work. I responded, and then we stumbled into a couple hours of free association.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2043],"tags":[13],"class_list":["post-1865","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-personal","tag-life"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1865","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1865"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1865\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/michaelhans.com\/eclecticism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}