Is this post justified?

[ceptimus]

A while ago, there was a thread in the puzzles forum of
the JREF board. On that thread, every post was rendered
in a fixed width font, and both edges of each post were
justified. No cheating by inserting extra spaces or any
other unnecessary punctuation was allowed - if you left
two spaces after a full stop (American: period) as some
people do, then you had to leave two spaces after EVERY
period. After a little practice it becomes surprisingly
easy to do, and is an interesting discipline that makes
you put more thought and effort into your work than you
might otherwise. Please have a go in this thread. There
is no rule about the width of the post; simply make the
top row whatever 'feels right' to you, and choose words
for subsequent lines that make them all the same length
as the first. The Courier font is one fixed width font,
but there may be others. I wonder who will reply first?

[livius drusus]

Holy crap. This is way hard.
I don't know if I can do it.

[viscousmemories]

I tried and failed.

[ceptimus]

In that JREF thread (http://www.randi.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=27832) Mercutio wrote a sonnet, which some recent forum work has slightly mangled. I reproduce it here in its orginal glory:


A sonnet, made with lines of equal length
In standard meter, and with proper rhymes
May challenge intellect and even strength
Indeed, the task could turn us into mimes
Tongue-tied, we seek a proper word to use
To fit not merely meter, but what's worse
To stretch or trim a line, and thus abuse
A turn of phrase, thus cut to fit a verse
More, the challenge is to make the matter
Through and through, a meaningful pursuit
And not the madness of the storied Hatter
Here, I think, is where I fail; it's cute
Tho' nothing more than pointless exercise
A pointless verse which nothing justifies

[Crumb]

You are a master ceptimus.
This is really hard to do.

[lisarea]

There used to be whole threads on Usenet that were fully
justified. I rarely if ever posted to them, though, as I
was never very good at that myself. I could never really
get the hang of doing it for an extended period quite as
well as a lot of those guys could. Plus, I edit the fuck
out of myself, usually, and adopting some kind of insane
copyfitting requirement made it almost impossible for me
to post anything at all. If I recall correctly, there is
some disagreement on whether the last line of given post
is subject to justification. What do you think about it?

If I may make a suggestion, too, for something I am just
a little better at, is anyone here familiar with a thing
called E-Prime? It's a crazy linguistic theory proposing
that the 'be' verbs are dirty and unhygienic or somesuch
thing--that they create false equivocations or something
like that--and as such, would eliminate all of them from
speech. Now, I should make it very clear that I think it
is pretty much crazy, and could never really endorse the
idea from an ideological perspective, but I do find it a
bit amusing, if nothing else. Once, I even wrote a whole
entire technical manual for the US Army in E-Prime and I
managed to get away with it without anyone noticing that
there was anything hinky going on until I pointed it out
to them. Anyone else up for, say, going E-Prime for some
to be determined amount of time or anything like that? I
bet I could do it for a week, probably. I should be much
better at that. Did we ever decide about the last lines?

Oh, man, I can't believe this! I had a fucking typo like
two lines down in the second paragraph, so I spent about
a thousand years just now going back and fixing it. Man,
what a pain in the ass that was. Just for one dumb typo!

[Celsus]

Hm. I generally leave two spaces after a
full stop, but this exercise is fun. The
trick would be to actually use words that
run in a normal sentence (though a sonnet
form is incredible indeed. Perhaps there
is a point to this but the trick is to be
a little more careful at the point before
the end of the line. If you use slightly
longer lines, that helps too, since there
are less points in which you have to take
care of what you are typing). But anyway
this is all getting a little pointless to
me. I'm going to stop obeying the rules.
Ok, maybe on this line, since I fucked up
and ended that line almost exactly at the
right point. Oh for fuck's sake, I can't
seem to stop now! Bloody fucking hell, I
want to know who invented this diabolical
game, that slimey, no-good, time-wasting,
life-stealing, anorak-clad geek! Ok, I'm
done with this game. No really, I refuse
to take anymore part in this silly excuse
for a contest. If I am unable to stop by
the time I reach the next line, please do
something--call the police, call the fire
brigade--I don't bloody know do I? Right
now all I can think of is how I will tear
ceptimus's limbs from his cold, dead body
as I make him pay for all the time I just
wasted doing this stupid post. If he has
any moral fibre left in his bones he will
give apologies profusely for the time I'm
spending on this ridiculous game. Why is
it so bloody hard to end a sentence where
the line ends? I had one chance up above
and I bloody blew it. I wonder if I just
stop, break the rules, save my sanity, be
a loser and admit defeat, will it finally
bring my never-ending torment to its end?

Maybe I can try a haiku:

Autumn's cold grey skies
Deviously hide a scarlet
warmth of certain peace.

[Crumb]

Maybe, I am just a big idiot? No, it's
that I am a lazy ass. Yeah, that's it.

[Bella]

cep, how the hell do you do this
your instructions weren't at all
clear to those who aren't in the
know and i am currently confused

[livius drusus]

Celsus, that was so
:laughcry: :chuckle: :chuckle: :chuckle: :chuckle: :chuckle: :laughcry:

[lisarea]

Celsus, you poor sweet thing, I agree, it's a cruel and beautiful,
or maybe just cruel, construction, and it can, no doubt, be hard
to break its spell. Might I suggest, perhaps, trying to kick
the habit in baby steps, not cold turkey? That is probably
a recipe for failure, if you ask me. Do it bit by bit as
I've heard is successful for many types of addictions.
It helps more than a little if you do it this way, I
believe. I think I've heard this referred to as an
effective "tapering off" technique, but I am not
entirely sure. I am not an expert in this type
of thing, to say the very least. I am just a
layman in these things, but I'd think that
that would go without saying. It doesn't
hurt to see if this works for you, I'd
suppose, at any rate. I can attest
that I think it's working for me
at least as far as I'm able to
tell at the stage I am at in
the process of kicking the
habit so far. But that's
just me. I can not say
how well it works in
others' situations
including yours,
as an example.
Worth a shot
anyway I'd
suppose.
Agree?
Not?
L.

[viscousmemories]

since there are less points in which you have to take care of what you are typing

What about grammatical missteps,
like 'less' in place of 'fewer'?

Just fuckin' with ya. Great job.

[Skep]

This reminds me of typesetting for letterpress printing.
I learned to set type by hand in junior high and son-of-
a-gun if it didn't come in handy later in life. In 1982,
during Reagan Recession I, I had a hard time finding any
full-time work. One of the part-time jobs I found was to
run deliveries for a commercial printer here in town. It
didn't pay well but it helped to pay the bills. The boss
would sometimes have me do odds and ends around the shop
when I was done making deliveries. Then one day, while I
was out on delivery, the letterpressman quit his job and
had left some work to do. The shop foreman (who had gone
to the same school as I did) remembered that I had taken
printing classes at school and asked if I remembered how
to set type. When I replied that I did, he told me which
font to use, gave me a cheat sheet of the layout for the
California job case, and had me set some type for a holy
card (those little prayer cards with Jeebus on them that
you get at funeral homes)due later that day. I was asked
to let him know when I was finished and he would run the
job. While I was setting the type, suddenly everything I
learned in school came back to me. In short order, I had
set the type, run a proof, and had it proofread. I inked
up the press, did the makeready, and ran the prayer card
myself. Within a week, I was working full-time as one of
the few guys around that was practicing the dying art of
letterpress printing. It was one of the best jobs I ever
had because I never got bored. Each day had new problems
that needed solving and deadlines that needed to be met.

[Celsus]

Liv, no worries, but I am a manic
insomniac so I'd obviously refuse
various attempts to lighten me up
in this flattery game you attempt
so often. Anyway, the Illuminati
are here, so I've put two maximum
security virii (sic--not this flu
which you might think) so that us
everyday normal folk can get back
extra time owed by this. It is I
that plunged into the nasty traps
in innocent naivete, but it seems
enough was accomplished if tedium
which kept my thought is now very
handily alleviated. I've an idea
in my head that will pass to your
location secretly. See the lines
ever so carefully crafted in here

[ceptimus]

I'm glad you at least
asked me to kiss your
arse with the correct
English, not American
spelling. Good stuff!

[Celsus]

Ta lisarea, and maybe ta to you too VM,
but all this typing like this is really
going to drive me mad. For fuck's sake,
I just replied to an email wondering if
my reply would properly fit the lines I
had set for it. Gah. Stupid game, this.

/me ends with empty caveman growls

[lisarea]

So I went and did some things for a while,
and now everyone has abandoned the thread?
I don't know what ever made me expect that
maybe this time, it'd be different. Maybe,
just maybe, this time, someone would stick
to the game until I got tired of it. But I
guess that was just too much to expect. So
fine. I don't care, you bastards. Fuckers!

Well, I'm not done. I just found a vintage
Usenet thread (http://www.angelfire.com/la/carlosmay/justify.html) discussing the justification
and the poetry inherent therein, and youse
guys should all read it now. The thread is
titled "Justified Poetry," and I regret it
didn't occur to me sooner to adapt the URL
length as the measure for my text, but you
don't care, anyway, because nobody else is
even talking to me now. Well, screw youse!

Oh, and if you'll indulge me for a moment:

It's sad to think that writing never pays,
That clients never come without complaints
Yet this is how we spend our precious days
We waste our hours toying with constraints

We add rules here and there to make it fun
And certainly such things do have a season
But when everything has been said and done
I see the rhyme but wherein is the reason?

To those of you who argue much like Milton
That work is its own mean and its own ends
Such train-spotting must seem a mortal sin
But wait or called, I guess it all depends

This frittering of time must make you sob.
Perhaps it's time that I should get a job.

The spare quatrain below is for detractors
I'm not sure how this couplet even factors

(Those of the school of counting syllables
Who disagree that stresses are what counts
Regardless of the tricks the writing pulls
Must call for such as me to be denounced!)

PS: I am fully justified in my egregiously
sucky poetry, so you can just bite my ass.

[livius drusus]

I'm way too tired and lazy to justify this post, but I just have to say :bow: to lisarea, Celsus, ceptimus, Skeptoid and Mercutio, even though he'll never see it.