by Michael S. Kaplan, published on 2008/11/04 03:01 -05:00, original URI: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/michkap/archive/2008/11/04/9035756.aspx
It reminds me of a joke that I actually experienced a while back.
My cat of blessed memory (Tamara Penelope Kaplan, or Tammy for short) had done something that required stitches.
The veterinarian was quite helpful and she (the veterinarian) gave her (the cat) the stitches, and to keep her (the cat, not the veterinarian) from chewing on them or whatever, she (the veterinarian, not the cat) put a collar around her (the cat, not the veterinarian) that she (the veterinarian, not the cat) would take off her (the cat, not the veterinarian) in a few days.
I'll never forget the recommendation she (the veterinarian, not the cat) left me with.
"Try to have her take it easy for the next few days," she told me.
At the time, I thought but did not say that I wasn't sure how much more easy she could take it without being in a coma. The cat got up when she felt like but also was quite happy to sleep most of the day away more often than not. What, she was supposed to sleep 21 hours a day instead of 18? :-)
Later on, I realized that I had more influence over the President's foreign policy agenda than I do over telling a cat what to do. which made the whole recommendation question where the veterinarian had ever in fact had a cat living with her!
You can't make a cat do much that the cat doesn't want to do.
Now the expression herding cats has been around for a while, and is generally meant to refer to (as suggested in the Urban Dictionary here):
Any difficult activity of uncertain outcome involving numerous and often competing factions that is of dubious value.
If you have ever owned or possibly even observed a cat for any length of time, You will probably understand what the phrase means at a pretty basic level.
Perhaps you do not have a cat living in you house, in which case the preceding text from this blog is all kind of lost on you.
Just take it as read that cats do not lend themselves to being herded.
Then of course there is CATS.
Believed to be an organization rather than a person, this main antagonist in the whole All your base are belong to us thing (which you can read about here), we are talking about a person who is definitely not the type of person who responds well to being driven or directed to do much anything that he doesn't want to do.
Herd CATS?
Whether it is an organization or a person, it is not bloody likely that will be happening. Any more so than one might be able to herd cats.
Though to be honest, it might be easier in the end to herd either cats or CATS then it would be to herd KATS.
KATS, you see, is the Korean Agency for Technology and Standards, and we know how stubborn people involved in National standards can be.
Of course, KATS is pushing the agenda we have all known and loved related to a real dislike for
It does not matter that this is how the script works, putting together these smaller pieces to form the bigger pieces.
And it doesn't matter that for the normal Korean user who types in the Jamo to get the Hangul that this relationship is so firmly embedded in their understanding that many have trouble understanding what the government in South Korea is talking about when they express such negative feelings for normalization, anyway.
One could say that
The opinion of KATS in relation to Unicode Normalization is not exactly normal.
And one could also say that
Trying to get them to change their mind in response to linguistic, technical, or even alphabetical concerns is an objuect lesson in how hard it is to herd KATS!
I think it was William Shatner who said that "irony can be pretty ironic, sometimes." Did we really expect KATS to prove the cliché about herding cats?
Isn't that ironic, in both the genuine and Alanis senses? :-)
This blog brought to you by ᅙ (U+1159, aka HANGUL CHOSEONG YEORINHIEUH)
Phylyp on 6 Nov 2008 4:46 AM:
Heh, I thought this was an OT post until you brought it around to the K. Nice intro (if you can call something longer than the "core" as an intro!)
Michael S. Kaplan on 6 Nov 2008 9:49 AM:
Welcome to the unique and intricate way my mind works, something that this blog actually mirrors quite nicely! :-)
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