Here is an article that is, as the young folks say, very meta.

It is no surprise to readers who come here regularly that everything about Dr. Boli is a bit archaic. He tries to keep up with the latest trends, but T-shirts with printed slogans still strike him as a dangerous or depressing novelty, and he has not yet come to terms with the loss of the distinction between “may” and “might,” which confuses him but gives those young folks who say “very meta” no trouble.

This Magazine itself, even in its electrical form, is a relic of a bygone age. When the Magazine moved to the World-Wide Web, the WordPress software that runs the Magazine was four years old. The iPhone was six months old. “Blogs” were the new big thing.

The last time Dr. Boli did any serious design work on the site was when he moved to his own domain at drboli.com. At that time he decided the whole site needed a fresh look, so he turned for inspiration to the type and layout of general-interest magazines of the middle nineteenth century. That was fresh, in the sense that no other site had anything like it.

Because no other site had anything like it, Dr. Boli had to do the design himself. That required writing some code, and Dr. Boli is not suited for writing code. He did it, because no one else would do it. But he did not enjoy it very much.

That was in 2013, which a glance at the calendar tells us was twelve years ago. Since then, the design of the site—technically known as a “theme,” for connoisseurs of WordPress software—has been growing barnacles while the currents flowed around it. It will probably have to be replaced at some point, when the latest software updates finally bury it at the crossroads with a stake through its heart. But for now it still works, if we are willing to put up with some of its archaisms and patch it with pitch and duct tape every once in a while.

Most of the burden of those archaisms falls on the editor of the Magazine, who is willing to carry it. However, the comment system is primitive, and is likely to remain primitive. When Dr. Boli tried the experiment of installing a simple Markdown parser for comments, it broke the site so completely that nothing would appear but a blank white screen. Many readers would tell us that was an improvement, but it is not the intended look and feel of the site. The intended look has words, and the intended feel is something like the texture of fine linen stationery. Thus we are limited to plain text for most commenters.

However, there is a loophole for the pedantic and the stubborn. The comments will parse basic HTML markup. If you are familiar with some of the rudiments of the language, you can use HTML to add italics, bold, block quotes, and other typographic refinements to your opinions. Here is a very short list of formatting codes you can use.

Italics.

You can use italics for <em>emphasis</em> or to set off the title of a book, like <i>Pendennis</i> by Thackeray. 

That will appear thus:

You can use italics for emphasis or to set off the title of a book, like Pendennis by Thackeray.

Note the two different codes for italics. They lead to the same result, but they are semantically different, and if you are pedantic enough to care about that, you probably do not need this list of HTML formatting codes.

Bold.

You can use bold text for <strong>strong emphasis</strong> or <b>other things that need bolding</b>.

You can use bold text for strong emphasis or other things that need bolding.

Once again, there are two semantically different ways to get bold text. They mean different things to anyone who reads your comment by choosing the “View Page Source” option in the browser. You have no one but yourself to blame if you are mocked for using the wrong one.

Links.

You can use <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperlink">hyperlinks</a> to link to useful information.

You can use hyperlinks to link to useful information.

Links sometimes cause our whimsical spam-suppression system to toss a comment in the trash, but Dr. Boli always finds the comments that end up there within a day or two.

Blockquotes.

You can use blockquotes for extended quotations from another writer. (To use them for extended quotations from yourself suggests an enlarged self-esteem that may need to be lanced.)

<blockquote>

From what torments might the poor simpleton of a modern pietist be saved by remembering that Our Lord “spake not without a parable”! —<i>Coventry Patmore.</i>

</blockquote>

You can use blockquotes for extended quotations from another writer. (To use them for extended quotations from yourself suggests an enlarged self-esteem that may need to be lanced.)

From what torments might the poor simpleton of a modern pietist be saved by remembering that Our Lord “spake not without a parable”! —Coventry Patmore.

Small Capitals.

As a special benefit for readers of this Magazine, you can even insert <sc>small capitals</sc> in your comments. Can any other magazine on line offer you that privilege?

As a special benefit for readers of this Magazine, you can even insert small capitals in your comments. Can any other magazine on line offer you that privilege?

This list is not exhaustive. Ordered and unordered lists will probably also work, and if you delight in coding such lists by hand, go ahead and give it a try. You can even add a horizontal rule.

Or you can just write in plain text, and use a carefully crafted arrangement of well-chosen vocabulary to make your point. That might also work.

Easter Bunny.—The Easter Bunny’s given name is actually Bernard, but he has never succeeded in getting most Americans to take him seriously enough to use the formal version of his name.

Imagine walking out of your house to take a drive, tripping over the gardening tools along the way for some reason, and finding that your car is not right in front where you parked it.

You walk back in and ask the butler, “Did someone steal my car?”

“No,” says the butler. “Sir had not driven that particular automobile for several days, so one took the liberty of moving it farther down the street and placing the gardening tools, which sir has been using more frequently of late, closer to the house.”

“Well, that’s fine,” you say, “but it would be more convenient to have the car where I expected it to be. Nevertheless, since I came back in the house anyway, I think I’ll have some tea.” You reach for the Keemun, but pull down Lung Ching instead. Turning to the butler again, you ask the sensible and obvious question.

“Lung Ching was the tea sir drank most recently,” he explains, “so of course one moved it to the front, where it would be easily accessible.”

“Yes,” you try to explain, “but when I reach for a thing, I expect it to be where I expect it, and not in a different place each time. If it’s in a different place each time, I have to go looking for it each time. It costs mental effort. It makes my life harder, not easier.”

But the butler doesn’t see it that way. Every time you reach for something, it’s in a different place. You reach for the toothbrush, and find the soap. You reach for the garden shears, and find the hoe. You reach for your wife, and find your brother-in-law. Everything is constantly moving around, because the butler is always noting what you have used most frequently or most recently and moving that thing to a position he thinks is more accessible.

How long will that butler remain in your employ? Probably no longer than it takes you to write a glowing reference for him to take to the next sucker who hires him.

But your phone and your computer will keep doing exactly the same thing, and you will not fire them. That’s just how they work, you will say. It’s true that you have to go looking every single time for the app you want to launch or the site you want to visit, because things keep shifting around all over the place, but that’s because Google and Microsoft and the rest are determined to make life easier for their users, no matter how much extra work it creates for us.

The ultimate plan, of course, is to make us completely dependent on the choices our minders make for us. Instead of picking the entertainment or information we want, we will pick what the pushers of information want us to look at, because it is less work to do so. If all goes as planned, our entire intellectual life will depend on external direction.

Is this a wicked conspiracy? No; it is worse. It is an unexamined assumption. The people who cause our software and Web sites to take this proactive approach genuinely believe they are making our lives better, and they are so certain that they dismiss the complaints of users as noise from random cranks. They really do believe that we wish not to be burdened with independent thought, so they are not likely to change their ways.

But, speaking as one random crank to a small but select group of random cranks, Dr. Boli would suggest putting a little extra effort into your intellectual life. Do what it takes—install utilities or browser extensions or alternative applications or even whole alternative operating systems—to make sure that you are in control of what you do and what you see on your phone or computer, not Microsoft or Apple or Google. It will be a little extra work, but you will be a happier person. And if enough of us do that, the profit-minded capitalists will take note.

Constant Reader in Connoquenessing. The socks are worn under the shoes because the shoes do a better job of protecting the socks than the socks would do of protecting the shoes.

Budding Artist. Burnt sienna is sold prepared in tubes, whether oil, acrylic, gouache, or watercolor, so there is no need for you to obtain a sienna yourself and set fire to it.

Anonymous, 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, city withheld. The only antidote to human mortality is the belief that one will die reconciled to one’s Maker, and all will be well in the next life; or perhaps the certainty that one will leave a spotless reputation to inspire future generations to emulate one’s example. Or you could try not to think about it. That might cheer you up.

April Showers. Origami is a delicate art requiring skill and practice, and therefore probably not suitable for your Labradoodle.

Wondering in Wilmerding. Unfortunately, the fact that someone is paid a living wage for writing does qualify him to call himself a professional writer, regardless of what you think of his output.

Bighouse Bill. If you are a good swimmer; otherwise, as you point out, you have only thirty-four months to go, and you might as well settle in.

Aunt Bertha of Bellevue. It is considered proper to wear team colors in a wedding party only if your team is in the playoffs; otherwise, you should consider yourself bound by the bride’s decision.

A contract has been awarded for the new $350 billion headquarters for the Department of Governmental Efficiency. It will be built on the Potomac River, where the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts now stands, with docking facilities for the fleet of Efficiency Yachts that will take citizens who can demonstrate a net worth of $750 million or more on Efficiency Cruises, in which they will learn the secrets of making governmental efficiency work for them. A spokesperson for DOGE explained that the Kennedy Center is no longer needed to entertain citizens, since government itself has become a performing art. The name of the company to which the contract was awarded has not yet been announced, but the DOGE spokesperson assured reporters that it would be familiar.

Your local National Weather Service affiliate reminds you that Gloomy Weather Preparedness Week begins at sundown tonight and lasts for the foreseeable future. Why not make plans to attend the entertaining and informative Gloomy Weather Facts and Fallacies PowerPoint presentation scheduled in the prothonotary’s office tomorrow at 10:30 in the morning? One lucky participant will win an umbrella with what we think is the NOAA logo, or maybe it’s just a picture of a bird.

Museum of Dead Bonsai. Largest collection of expired bonsai trees in the Northeast.

Five Mile Run Battlefield. Famous site of Black Friday skirmish over limited quantities of forgotten toy in 2021. Interpretive center in former Boston Market at right end of strip mall.

Museum of Rocket Science. More than 8 galleries of hand-lettered equations in elaborate gilt frames. Don’t miss the graffiti in the men’s room on the third floor!

Envelope World. One man’s tribute to a forty-year career in the envelope industry. If his wife is home, just say you’re here about the taxes.

Blandville Public Library. Mrs. Craig, the librarian, gives hourly demonstrations of silent reading.

It has been a few months since Dr. Boli checked the spam folder, to which a few comments from earnest readers have unaccountably been redirected. To be precise, 16,759 comments have accumulated in the folder since the last time it was emptied. Dr. Boli will not attempt to answer all of them in this article, since that would tax his readers’ patience, but he has picked out a few comments of general interest, each reproduced in full, that may serve to represent the others; and he has responded to each one of them in the honest and straightforward manner his readers have come to expect.

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Your problem is that you are still looking for Dr. Boli‘s articles on AOL. Perhaps you ought to try CompuServe, and please do not hesitate to ask if you need more help.

Thank you for your sharing. I am worried that I lack creative ideas. It is your article that makes me full of hope. Thank you. But, I have a question, can you help me?

No. So much for hope.

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Always a delight to receive a fan letter from James Joyce.

Thank you, I have just been searching for information approximately this topic for a while and yours is the best I have found out so far. However, what in regards to the bottom line? Are you certain concerning the supply?

The supply is indefinitely large. Dr. Boli has not run out of sarcasm yet, and he does not expect to run out at any time in the near future.

Throughout the two-day Day of the Useless get together, which is Mexico’s largest annual celebration and a national holiday as well, the main focus is all about remembering liked ones who have passed on.

This comment has left Dr. Boli thinking he ought to move to Mexico, where at last he would be appreciated at least one day in the year.

On this consideration we must always recognise that we have slipped into the area of determinism.

Indeed, slipping into the area of determinism seems almost inevitable, doesn’t it?

Although he has not obtained permission to do this, he has been abducting and converting quite a few homeless people.

You leave us hanging. Into what did he convert them? And to whom should he have applied for permission?

Hello, I appreciate that you provide detailed information about your dermocosmetics products. This allows me to make informed choices about the products I purchase.

If you have been reading the Magazine under the assumption that you were learning something useful about dermocosmetics products, might we suggest Wikipedia instead? Dr. Boli hates to turn away a reader, but it would be in your own best interest to take your information from a more reliable source. We are not responsible for dermatitis or any other injuries caused by taking our advice on dermocosmetics products.

This brilliantly demonstrated how excessive-pitched or excessive-frequency sounds can break materials apart.

Our attorneys are of the opinion that this Magazine cannot be held responsible for material damages, no matter how shrill the writing may occasionally become.

How fascinating is most of the true world as a gaming environment?

Not very.

Th is c onte nt was w​ritten wi th　t᠎he　᠎he lp ​of G​SA Conte nt Gener᠎at​or Dem oversi on!

We have decided not to purchase the full version of your software, but thank you for the demonstration.