The Breaking of Standards

Each and every day, Sol relies on standards to make his job more fruitful. Whether it is rfc2616 or rfc1034 Sol enjoys when his internets run smoothly. Because they have made his life easier, Sol has become very attached to standards and will fight to the bitter end to defend them.

Sol will openly ridicule and attempt to humiliate those that do not believe in following standards. No matter what the consequence, Sol believes a standard must be adhered to without any exceptions or even minor deviations. When you live on Sols webs, you will play by Sol's rules.

So you're a company who is losing five hundred dollars a second because the programming you had outsourced to India doesn't follow standards? Too bad. Sol doesn't want to listen to you cry like a baby, he has better things to do. When you run on Sol's boxen, you must learn to give a little CR with your LF. Don't like it? Tough titty.

After watching Sol fervently defend these standards it makes me wonder. How can a person so against the man believe in conforming?

Sol. Is it not the American standard to have 2.5 children and a dog? What if I want three children and a cat? Will you break into my house, steal the top half of my youngest child, and teach my cat to bark?

What will you do with the top half of a child? Add it to your collection? Boil it in a stew? Sell it on e-bay? The mind boggles.

If we never broke any standards:

• The world would be flat

• The sun would revolve around the earth

• Every morning a man in a chariot would have to wake up early to pull the sun behind him across the sky. Sol would probably be chosen for this position.

In closing, Sol is clearly a complex person full of internal conflict and paradoxes. More investigation is needed.

The Motion

Sol hates the motion of various things, both concrete and abstract. He often feels as if he is doing The Man's bidding, if he is the motive force, or conversely, feels as if he is at the whim of The Man, if he is the object in motion against his will. Naturally, he prefers his lowest-energy position as observed when Sol "sits" in The Chairs; the same slack is demonstrated amongst his hip-hop brethren as a show of cultural solidarity.
Sol hates moving also because it reminds him of The Dolly, which is designed to move, and which has caused traumatic moving experiences for Sol. He also tends to hate moving:

• piles of heavy records
  
• hundreds of websites
• any DNS entry
• himself, in the morning
• his hat, from his head

Ironically, while Sol hates moving so much, he participates in such activites as skating to and from work in the summer, skating while playing hockey, and skating away from the police when caught tagging something (at least in his ever-moving imagination).

The Batteries

Batteries routinely fail Sol, and he wants you to know that he's mad as hell! There are some days when Sol can not make it through an entire phone call without the battery of whatever phone he happens to be using failing. This typically occurs when he is on a technical support call, and exponentially increases the rage he is already feeling.

Sol's cellphone is routinely discharged. This is because the crappy cordless phone that is close to his workspace loses battery power within 10 minutes of use, forcing Sol to use his personal phone. Then, hours spent attempting to explain things to clients causes his cellphone to die. It is at this point that he begins mutter things under his breath like, "we need an onsite psychiatrist," and "I have dolly envy." What does that even mean?!

Sol will be forever in your debt if you follow him around with a cellphone charger. If this is not possible for you, and you need to get on his good side, you should simply turn your cellphone off and tell him that your battery died.

The Technical Support

Sol hates the technical support. Sol especially hates the technical support purported to be provided via telephone. While one could make an argument that Sol has deeply-rooted personal issues stemming from his employment with previous unnamed employer, where he was abused by callers and employer alike, we shall briefly examine several other factors here:

Outsourcing to India

Long hold times

Disconnected calls

Clueless reps

Sol's employment with previous unnamed employer was lost, and he blames outsourcing to India. Thusly, any time he is forced to ask "What?" or "Huh?" in response to "Pfthanksjoo ferjoocahlink toyuur suunmicrahsusteemz huulpleen..", he becomes angry. Very angry.

When inevitably placed on hold, Sol proceeds to lash out at anyone around him, so that they may share the pain he is experiencing. Perhaps he seeks compassion and understanding for deep emotional scarring from previous unnamed employer, or perhaps sitting on hold is just a massive waste of his time.

After being on hold for 25 minutes (average minimum), and after Sol's brain is scrambled with Muzak, the call will invariably drop. Why, Sol asks? Is it the rep hanging up on him? Is it the long-haul lines to Indida? Is it his cellular signal? Is it the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune? We'll never know, nor will Sol. But when it happens, be prepared to duck. Sol will begin screaming and throwing things, including cigarette packs, Red Bull cans, and Sun hardware.

It may take several calls, and iterations of the above painful experiences, but eventually Sol will have a heart-to-heart conversation with a "knowledgable" rep. Five minutes will elapse, and the creeping realization that Sol knows more than the clueless rep begins to dawn on him. You will know when this point is reached by the ruddy complexion in Sol's face, the slumped shoulders, and the transformation of anger into grief and depression.

The Space and the Book

Sol hates Myspace and Facebook, in fact he loathes all social networking websites, especially blogs. The only social websites he likes involve painting or tagging, discussion of things such as fighting 'The Man,' and anything linux related.

Why does he hate these websites? Most find them to be annoying which is understandable but their bodies are not riddled with hate from head to toe. When Sol spots someone using one of these abominations, he goes into fit a rage. Similar to the dolly, he goes into a Hulk like terror and throws the nearest inanimate object.

I've been known to use the space and book from time to time. When Sol catches me he shoots his laser beam death stare straight through my soul. Then he tells me how these sites were made by the man to watch us and learn our habits. Exposing such precious information like our names and interests is a sure way to have the government come after us or worse scientologists!

But here's the masochist in Sol, he may or may not have an account on both of these popular sites. I've asked about it, he claims to have made a faux profile in order to look out for his friends who will inevitably be:

• stalked by 15 year old girls
• lurked by creepy 20 year old girls
• watched by the government
• brainwashed by the scientologists

If he spots unusual activity he alerts his friends who are then forced to rm -rf their profiles. I hope you all appreciate that he overcomes severe hate and the man to keep an eye on our safety.

The Scientologists

There was a time when Sol liked more things than he hated. A time of innocence, a time of joy. Unfortunately, Tom Cruise pretty much destroyed those halcyon days for Sol.

One day, a happy-go-lucky Sol was walking down the street, minding his own business. He happened upon a table selling a book called Dianetics, a book which promised solutions to all problems related to stress, unhappiness, depression and self-doubt. At the time, he had none of these problems... but as an avid reader he was intrigued. He unsuspectingly purchased this book from the nice people manning the stand, giving them his name, address, phone number, and credit card number.

As you can imagine, things unraveled pretty quickly. Before he knew it, Sol was Scientology Converstion Target #1. They were agressive and unrelenting. The filled his mailbox with propaganda, blew up his phone, and quite possibly had his location tracked via GPS. Ironically, the mere act of buying Dianetics caused the very same problems for Sol that the book promised to correct. This made Sol very angry, and very well may have made him into the person he is today.

To gain Sol's trust, you must denounce Xenu, L. Ron Hubbard, and Tom Cruise. In fact, should Scientology ever be brought up, you should subtly hint that you are a member of Anonymous and are working diligently to bring the bastards down. Only when they are destroyed will Sol truly learn to love again.

The Pizza Squares

Sol hates pizza that has been cut into squares. One might ask, how could a simple difference in the geometry of food change his feelings towards something he normally loves so much? This isn't a nice fillet mignon after all. While everyone has their own preference with pizza - toppings, thick crust, no crust, or even an occasional "white pizza", Sol will primarily concern himself with cut alone.

If Sol orders a pizza for delivery, he makes sure to dictate that it must be cut into normal slices. He discusses the cut much more than the toppings. There was once an instance where an unfortunate pizza parlor made the fatal mistake of ignoring his request and delivering a pizza cut in squares. The pizza was immediately sent back, and the delivery boy may still be in therapy.

If you are ever at a gathering with Sol and the topic comes up of having a pizza delivered, it is best to make sure it is from a location that doesn't normally cut it into squares. This is for your own protection. Offending pizzarias include:

• Mr. Pizza
• Just Pizza

One recent night, after playing a long game of hockey, Sol had hunger that only a slice of pizza could satiate. As luck would have it, a friend observing the game had some extra pizza, which he graciously offered to Sol. We could see the glee in his eyes as he received the aromatic box of cheese, pepperoni, sauce and dough. Unfortunately, that glee quickly turned into dispair as he opened it and saw his worst nightmare: it was cut into squares! An average person would have remarked "Thank you for the pizza, I was hungry." But Sol is not an average person. Instead, he predictably replied "Awww $!%# it's cut in squares! What the @!$#". Alas, his dreams were dashed, and his stomach empty.

We would like to thank Mr. Precursor for this enlightening glimpse into the psyche of Sol.

***Editor's Note: We have invited Mr. Precursor to become the newest contributor to StuffSolHates. - Tommy J

The Chairs

Sol hates chairs. Sol hates chairs because they are not beds or couches. More precisely, Sol hates anything that would have him sit up straight, because he believes that's something "The Man" would want him to do. Accordingly, one can typically find Sol slouched down in any seating device as far as possible. This includes, but is not limited to:

• Office desk chairs
  
• Vehicle bucket seats
• Bus seating
• Taxicab seating

We must ask ourselves why this is.



A controversial theory is: It seems, based on observation, that he believes his hips are located just below his shoulders. This being the natural place for his legs to bend, has him fall into the deepest part of the hated chair.

A more accepted theory is that Sol believes that he is sticking it to "The Man" by slouching, as "The Man" himself sits quite upright and stiff. Furthermore, he feels that this posture will gain him acceptance among taggers and the wider hiphop culture. Quite possibly, this anatomical arrangement is a low-energy state which simulates sleep, videogame playing, and other recreational activities.

Sol has been observed augmenting his chair-hatred when driving vehicles by holding the steering wheel with his wrist as opposed to his hand or fingertips. In this way, Sol has achieved arm-slouch as well. (Driving habits will be addressed in a future post.)

The Winter

Sol finds no part of this image to be heartwarming or adorable.








Sol is thoroughly inconvenienced by winter. In this case, mother nature is actually "the man", holdin' him down with her wind gusts and snow drifts. Winter cruelly prevents Sol from doing the following things:

• Waking up before 8am
  
• Rollerblading to the bus stop
• Being on time for the bus
• Saving the internets
  
• Transferring .au domains

While Sol finds many of winter's attributes grating, he hates the cold most of all. Sol is always about 15 degrees colder than the rest of us. In an effort to stay warm, Sol wears his winter hat for approximately 23.75 hours per day, removing it only for showers and other special events.

The one possible exception to Sol's hatred of winter is snowboarding; however, no one has taken him in quite a while, which certainly contributes to the hate.

Accidentally discussing winter in a positive light (ie. "I made a snow angel last night!") may drive Sol to "accidentally" kick the dolly and possibly hurt himself. If faced with this situation, you should simply reassure him that winter is almost over and back away slowly. He might cheer up once the sun begins to shine again, but probably not... he hates spring and summer as well.

The Dolly

The dolly pictured to the right has caused Sol to have many outbursts about the downfall of society, lazy people and well, flat tires. The dolly in question can only support a small amount of weight. When it has more than two boxes the tires fall off the rims, making it impossible to push. Sol has encountered this issue countless times.

How can a dolly represent so much negativity? Only Sol knows the answer to that question. If you find yourself with Sol and a dolly be sure to state your hatred of the dolly. Declare it useless and you will have a lifelong friend.

Even if you have heavy servers to carry, DO NOT USE THE DOLLY. Using the dolly will only lead to your imminent demise and you will find yourself hated by Sol...no one wants that.

If you do use the dolly and Sol catches you he will become enraged much like the hulk. Which will drive him to loosen the screws holding it together so next time the dolly is used not only will it have flat tires--it will fall apart!

Please note he has parked the dolly in his line of sight, for hours at a time he can be found staring at it--cursing the day it was manufactured. Most people would put things they hate out of their sight, but not Sol; he is all about the masochism.

He also hates photographs as you can see in the above photo. Sol is hiding, because he believes the camera will steal his soul.


That is all.

The Mornings

Mornings do not please Sol. Now, it is certainly true that many people hate mornings, but few actively protest against them. It is in this way that Sol takes the hating of mornings to a new and profound level.

Sol attempts to avoid mornings at all costs. He has two methods by which to accomplish this:

1. Since falling asleep is the quickest way to bring about morning, Sol tries to stay awake if at all possible. This is accomplished via the utilization of Quake and Adult Swim, but is rarely successful.
2. When sleep eventually comes, Sol can remain unconscious through a ringing alarm clock for up to two hours without hitting snooze.

Unfortunately, despite these somewhat effective methods of evading morning, eventually Sol must wake. If you have the misfortune of encountering Sol in the morning, it is suggested that you do not do any of the following things:

• make eye contact
• speak
• shuffle papers
• request a site live
• make any sudden movements

Sol will return to normal by 11am.

"The Man"

Sol hates "the man". In this context, "the man" includes any person or force that requires Sol to do anything that he doesn't particularly feel like doing at any given moment. Examples:

• the federal government
• his boss
• his roommate
• taxi drivers

Sol does not like being kept down by "the man". As such, if you are ever to gain his trust, you must appear to not be "the man", even if in fact you are "the man". This can be accomplished by either quitting your job or tagging something.

Sol's hatred for "the man" is a full time job. In fact, it can at times affect his real full time job, as comng to work means coming to deal with "the man", which at times he cannot justify (this will be addressed in a future post).