Daynotes on a budget

On the other front, I noticed that Mr. Syroid had a good and fairly well-reasoned rant regarding commitment.  I think Tom's missed the core problem, however, and that's responsibility.  We, as a general people, have stopped taking responsibility for our actions.  Let's put it this way - we used to have "handshake contracts" where two individuals would shake on the deal.  These days, you need a contract and rubber gloves just to shake hands.

We used to have people who would say "my word is my bond" and that was what it meant - if they said they would, they did.  Nowadays, there are so many people looking for loopholes, ways out, and other ways to "screw the system" when all they're doing is A) Screwing themselves, B) Teaching their children (if any) to avoid owning up for things, and C) proving they shouldn't have been allowed to grow up.

Certainly, there are still what I would call Ladies and Gentlemen.  While this occasionally refers to manners and civil behavior, I also believe that people who do live by a code of ethics that they themselves have worked out (Thanks "Gramp Johnson", Mr. Robert Heinlein, Mr. Bill Nelson, and others for my part of that) are more likely to be honorable people, no matter what.  Certainly the ten commandments are a good start, but the "thou shalt not kill" part I have a problem with - If someone kills one of my children, or molests them, or whatever, I can assure you that I will certainly commit crimes upon that person's person until they become an unperson.  And, if I can take my time and make it painful, I likely will.  Is that meant to be a deterrent?  Oh hell no.  If some sick twisted bastard decides to take a fancy to one of my kids, only careful parenting and lots of luck will prevent the sicko from getting my kid.  And only a hell of a lot of luck will allow that sicko to die a natural death.

But I digress.  Responsibility is not something we teach in schools, nor, for that matter, is competitiveness.  Responsibility is something we teach children how to avoid.  And that's wrong.  And yes, part of it is the lawyer's fault.  The legal profession has not grown just by advising people.  They encourage the failed to seek retribution.  The sad part is that there are firms and individuals who say "well, if I do this to 100, and only one sues me, I'm ahead of the game."  It's really beginning to bother me.

I guess it's been six weeks now that I've had to go into an office and get things done.  It's been a stressful "vacation" but I am so very hopeful it will end soon.  And the nice thing is the paychecks continue (for now) to flow in...  Oh, well.  I'll just keep slogging along...

I've really pretty well had it with the gun nuts out there.  Whenever we attempt a serious dialog on weapons certain jackasses begin to howl as if shot, and wrap themselves in the constitution.  Well, that's fine.  But let's take a look at it, shall we?

   Amendment II   

A well regulated militia,
being necessary to the security of a free state,
the right of the people to keep and bear arms,
shall not be infringed.

(I got this from http://rs6.loc.gov/const/bor.html).  Now, please note that it says "A WELL REGULATED MILITIA"  That's a concept that goes back to a citizen-army.  If you get a chance to see The Patriot, I think you'll get the idea.  The Militia was before we decided to have a full-time, standing army, capable of defense of our country outside our borders.

Let's nail down that next one - "BEING NECESSARY TO THE SECURITY OF A FREE STATE".  Now, this one's a bit tougher.  But, if we go back to the OPENING PORTION of the Constitution, it says "We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."  If we are under a threat, then we'd best act against it.  Given what the FBI and others have done recently, it is certainly possible that we have a danger to our country from the inside - Ruby Ridge and other situations being the obvious sore points.  However, if we are the successors to the country that our forefathers created, can we not face that challenge?  In other words, if you think the FBI's a problem, mount up, load up, and head off to the FBI headquarters.  I believe that they are a "necessary evil" and like a shrub occasionally need to be pruned back.  Sometimes savagely, like now.  So if you're going to USE YOUR WEAPONS to preserve the security of our free state, then go to it.  We'll sponge you up and make sure you get a small pile of rocks above your final resting place.  Otherwise, shut the heck up.

The key phrase - where people frequently mangle it into the right to bear arms - "THE RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS".  Given the previous two sections, it's painfully obvious that the framers of this document intended that the weapons so kept be kept for the purpose of defending the free state.  Not for blasting up the neighborhood.

Finally - the second-most important phrase in this amendment - "SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED."  Pretty simple, on the face.  This statement says "you have a right to keep and bear arms, for the security of the free state, and you must get your ass onto the front line should the free state be threatened."

As noted previously, the entire document of the Constitution has been designed to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.  The present overwhelming presence of guns and gun violence threatens our ability to establish, and less insure, justice.  It certainly insures domestic un-tranquility through home violence, children shooting children, and many other crimes.  It threatens our defense, as those who are armed here at home require a significant portion of our own defensive capabilities to defend our homes - not all threats come from terrorists, overseas tinpot dictators, and other violent sporting fans.  And we cannot secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity if dead from a seven-year-old mucking about with a gun.

Mr. Heston, let's get real - being in favor of trigger locks is nice.  Sort of like being in favor, in a general way, of sunsets.  Being in favor of MANDATORY trigger locks is reasonable.  Are you concerned that someone could break into your home and harm you while you fumble to get your trigger off?  Get a home alarm system and a big, noisy dog.  Between those two, you have enough warning (unless you sleep like I do) to take care of yourself.  If you live in such a dangerous area that you must keep a loaded weapon by your side at all times, then you'd best move.  And Mr. Heston, you'd best be prepared to answer to Him whom you played prophet for for the death of each child and each human you and your organization allowed to die rather than allow reasonable safety precautions on your weapons.

And think upon this - NOWHERE in the Constitution does it guarantee the right to hunt, sport-shoot, or any other activity having to do with "arms".  It could quite easily be amended against, should this become necessary.

The other group I want to vilify?  That would be all of those who are turning Anti-Boy Scout.  My disclaimer here is probably standard, but I'll run it anyway.  I am an Eagle Scout, member of the Order of the Arrow (a society of honor campers), and can still recite, from memory, the Scout Oath, Laws, and Motto as I learned them - 

On my honor, I will do my best to do my duty to God and Country.  To obey the Scout Laws : A Scout is Trustworthy, Loyal, Helpful, Friendly, Courteous, Kind, Obedient, Cheerful, Thrifty, Brave, Clean, Reverent, to help other people at all times, to keep myself physically fit, mentally awake, morally straight.

The Scout Motto - Be Prepared.

Now, some of you will laugh, but those principles will get you through life.  Sure, it's going to be a lot less fun if you can't go out and screw the sheep now and again, so I'm told, but you'll be able to look yourself in the eye each and every morning, and more importantly, you'll build a better society.

With the above in black and white, can you tell me why these groups who used to support the Boy Scouts are now retrenching?  I was pretty sure the phrase "...morally straight." was pretty unambiguous, but I think it's reprehensible for those organizations that used to support the Scouts to now renege on the deal and withdraw the support of boys who are too young to understand the issues involved.

Let's put this another way.  My father was about three years old when he contracted polio.  Dad doesn't talk about it much, and frankly, I wish I knew more.  I will tell you what I know for certain - my father contracted this disease somewhere on the other side of 1925, and what was likely a normally happy, active child turned into a frustrated one.  My father is a wonderful man, who sacrificed a great deal so I could have a better life for my kids, and I can never repay him.  However, he wasn't the most physically active of men.  I had an uncle who taught me the rudiments of fishing (while I greatly enjoy time out on the water, and especially casting the lines, as often as not I'd remove the hooks from the spoon lures, or just leave the casting weight on the line as I tossed it out and reeled it back in.  It was the motion and process that was relaxing, not the pent-up apprehension to catch a fish.  Anyway, my father wasn't able to take me camping.

I bumbled into the Boy Scouts in second grade.  Along with oral surgery and glasses, the Cub Scouts made second grade fun.  I got to do the pinewood derby, and came in a disappointing last (lost in the first heat of the first race, with a vehicle that didn't even finish the track - which was all down-hill.  In third and fourth grades, I got better.  In fourth grade, I came in second.  I started going to Webelos meetings in Paul Wellen's basement every week, and we had a heck of a time.  I even remember the idiot play we wrote for the Scout-O-Rama one year (They've changed the name since to the Scout Expo), and made these stupid sorts of puppets - we'd tie them around our necks, and our heads were the puppet's heads.  The body hung below our chins, and the arms and legs were controlled by wire coat-hangers like a Muppet.  The one stupid thing was that the last award you could get in Webelos was called the Arrow of Light - you earned it by memorizing the Scout oath and laws.  Funny that a kid who couldn't do that in fourth grade would go on eventually to earn his Eagle.

Anyway - I joined Boy Scouts by accident, again, when I ran into one of the older sixth-graders one day in school.  He told me about where the meetings were held, and when.  For years, from 1975 until probably 1985, I spent most Monday nights at the Sartell City Hall, the basement of the American Legion in Sartell, or in a park or elsewhere.  My first camping trip was the spring campout in 1975, which took place less than two miles from my home in what is now a regional park.  I loved that site.  My first long-term stay away from home came later that summer when I went to Parker Scout Reservation, north of Brainerd, Minnesota.  In a truly horrifying mistake, I went on a 10-mile hike, intended to get me the hiking skill award.  I broke the motto - I was not prepared.  

Now, you have to realize that the only time I'd ever used non-standard plumbing for good-old-number-two, as it were, was at my aunt and uncle's cabin.  They had an outhouse, which I found wholly objectionable.  At this long-term camp, we had a similar arrangement - each camp site had a shelter of sorts which housed a funnel on a hose, and a seat over a deep, deep hole.  Ours wasn't deep enough.  So I avoided the deep deep smelly hole for as long as I could - we arrived on Sunday afternoon, and by Wednesday, I must have been dragging about 20 pounds of shit.  Literally.

And I was out 5 miles on a hike, no where near a convenience store or home, and didn't want to bother my fellow scouts - so I dropped trow and did the dump in a shallow trench I'd dug out with my boots and hands.  After cleaning myself up with nearby leaves, I buried the leftovers and moved on.

Come Thursday, I had a slight itching in the general area of my "fundament", which was doubly difficult because it was Parent's night AND my folks wouldn't be there and I was desperately homesick.  Come Friday morning, I had a full-blown itch.  And we had the camp Olympics.  They consisted of a number of events, including the horrid relay race.  The entire 80-acre-plus camp area was populated by males, so I shouldn't have been as embarrassed as I was.  The last event of the Olympics was the aforementioned relay race - you ran and dropped your shirt at the first stop.  You dropped your shoes at the second stop.  You dropped your trousers at the third station, ran around the flag-pole, and returned in order to cover up.  If you were a smart individual, you put pants on over the swim-trunks you needed earlier in the events.  If you were foolish, or unprepared (ahem, like me), you just had shoes, shirt, and trunks on.  You see the dilemma I faced.

Despite this, and the full-blown itch which progressed in very very short fashion to the world's worst case of poison ivy (and I defy you to find one contracted in a worse fashion), I found Scouting VERY enjoyable.  From Scouting, and from men like Robert Heinlein and Jerry Pournelle, I formed many of my opinions of the world.  While I fully agree with neither of these esteemed (and in one case, late) gentlemen, I can assure you I am my own man today because of them and people like Bill Nelson, my scoutmaster when I got my Eagle.

Now, organizations which have withdrawn support for the Boy Scouts are, in my opinion, not worth my time.  I will be doing my homework, and should the local United Way withdraw their support of the Boy Scouts, I will support the Scouts with a direct donation.  Should local companies withdraw their support, then I will not shop there, spend time their, give them my business, or work for them.  While the homosexual lobby is strong, I think that these boys are stronger.  And they deserve to be.  While I do not condemn those who are homosexual, I think that they need to look at the Boy Scouts, and realize that the organization IS old-fashioned, IS strait-laced, and IS a bit backwards.  But you know what?  Sometimes that's good.

End of the Rant.  </RANT>

Now, on to happier topics.  First, I've got a THIRD interview with my new potential employer, and just in time to turn it into a bidding war, there's another company on the horizon that needs my particular bent of skills - specifically the combined Mac/PC nature of my work.  So, we shall see what we shall see.  I do hope that they both like me equally and I can get a decent salary from them.  

And on another front, I hear my former employer is preparing for Convention.  Go with God, folks - you're damned well going to need it this year.

Anyway.  I hope this doesn't catch on in this country, or most of our politicians will get the same treatment...  And I think Mr. Thompson has captured the key battleground between men and women in today's posting - I agree with him AND Mr. Pournelle.  And finally, THIS is a reason enough to avoid writing for a living.  That's why I work - well, that, and I don't think I've got the talent to be a writer...

I just can't help it - these damned Olympics will never end.  I love Australia, but it's NBC which I hate with a passion (sorry).  Why in the hell they can't collect the event information into one segment, and run it, I don't know.  Don't give me this crap about building the emotions and all the rest.  What they should do is at the beginning of each evening show a schedule of what's going to run - swimming from 6-7:15 pm, rowing from 7:15-7:30, Fart-lighting 7:30-7:38, Fart-eating, 7:38-7:40, etc., and then run an update to that schedule into and out of each commercial.  And for all of our sakes, ditch the Dagget idiot doing color commentary on the gymnastics, would ya?

I also watched the story on NBC about the swimmer who took about 1:10 longer to finish than the winner (who did his run in 48.something).  Pretty impressive.  That's why there's the Olympics.  Not an excuse to get a bunch of over-paid middle-career athletes together and stomp on the best college-aged players the world can assemble.  This using paid athletes is OK by me if there's a cap on the athlete's income - if they make the average, or less, in their country, then they can compete in the Olympics.  If they're in the top 40% of income, for example, just go the heck home.

More griping later, if I get back on...

I'm not totally ignorant.  I know that a coxswain is the person in the back of a boat rowed by a group of people (sometimes all men, sometimes all women, and sometimes mixed), and I know that there are also boats that lack the coxswain.  However, this morning, when Frank Vascellero on KARE 11's early-morning news program discussed the young fellow from the U of M (I believe his last name was Wherely, pronounced "whirly"), who was participating in the "Men's cox-less fours" without even cracking a smile, I just lost it.  Those poor bastards ought to be given a couple of million annually, plus be put in some sort of witness protection program, and include plastic surgery.  Good Lord.  To be known as the gold medal winner in that sport, I'd be mortified.

But perhaps I just have a dirty mind.  Yeah, that's probably it.

A friend of mine told me once that for every job, there's a base salary.  For every meeting they throw you into before (hopefully) offering you the job, it just adds $10K to the salary demand.  As he was a director-level individual, I had to assume he was right.  I've got one more interview with this new potential employer, and then we shall see.  I've also got a forthcoming opportunity with a company that is a software developer for internet tools - they're interested in my specific combination of Mac and PC skills.  That could be fun.

But I digress.  The delay in finding me a new job is going to impact the small ones in the house, as we're going to miss this year's Renaissance Festival.  That's probably good in a number of ways, the least of which is that we're going through what passes for "fall" around here.  The temperature on Monday hit 89 degrees.  It's been falling pretty steadily ever since - we're hoping for a high of 48 come Sunday.  I sure wish we had a rather "gentle" fall rather than this leap off the cliff into winter thing we've got going.

Well, off for an afternoon of various things, I guess.  Grocery shopping tonight, Lord help me...

Slightly later... Well, it seems Tripod is having glitches with me, and with FrontPage. This morning, I opened FrontPage and cracked open this site with nary a problem. Now, after two complete shut-down/restarts, nothing going. I'm blaming Tripod, because it ain't MY computer - I didn't even touch it between when I got off-line and got back on.

It was a neat week, and wasn't until much later that I realized that it was a pretty wild week - we got three meals fed to us (Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday), plus time downtown (Friday).  It was a very wild week.  Later, I became aware that Great Clips, as a company, is a fairly good place to work for a time.  In my opinion, if you've got more than about five years experience there, you really need to get out.

Let's put it another way - both my wife and I have worked for a wide range of companies.  Some very good, and some very very bad.  I've got "Dominik's Law On Employers" which states that the quality of the work environment experience is directly and inversely proportional to the number of company-logo-bearing-products you receive.  In other words, the worse the company, the more crap they dump on you with their name on it.  I'll just leave it at that.  I think it comes down to the company knowing, deep down, that they're not the greatest place to work, and as a result, they're more likely to want you to do the advertising for them.

Anywho.  I can honestly say that I've never not learned something where ever I've gone.  Ban-Koe was a wonderful experience technically and politically.  I learned a lot of how to, and not to, do things there.  Great Clips is very similar.  I learned technically.  I also learned many other things.  Some day I'll process it into a coherent thought, but at the moment, I'm still too close to the whole process.  And I've got to focus.

And now I'm out of there.  It's a chance for me to move on and take some chances.  I've got a meeting Monday morning at 8 am where we're going to see if potential employer number one finds me acceptable.  Potential employer number two is scheduling a phone interview for next week, and there are about a dozen other resume/applications out for other opportunities.

As noted yesterday, fall "fell" here.  The leaves were all green on Monday, with a few faint tinges of yellow or red.  Today, it looks like about a third of the trees are starting to turn.  Weird.  Here we go again.  And I see where it's Spring and Olympic Fever has hit, they're certainly having a good time with it.  This story, however, is interesting.  As I remember, this Jeffery Schilling character is a converted Muslim (from Minnesota, originally, before he moved to Oakland), who was either engaged to or married to the sister of the fellow who's supposedly in charge of the rebels.  What a shock that he should turn out to be on their side.  On the other hand, I see Mr. Ellison is moving in on Mr. Gates.  Not like it's a shock, and not like he's going to have the influence Gates does.  Oracle's certainly a good product, but it's not the operating system.  Much as Larry would like us to believe otherwise.

Well, after a good breakfast (yeah, right - two cold Andouille sausages, a raspberry/white chocolate yogurt, a chocolate & cheesecake yogurt and a bottle of Mountain Dew), I'm ready to assault the day, and it's best if I start with the frustrations of last night.

We've shopped at Cub Foods in Apple Valley since just about when the place opened.  They originally were a sort of "superstore" type of place - appliances, some clothing, and other things.  They've scaled back to being a really-big-warehouse-type-grocery-store style.  However, I've noticed in the last few weeks that Cub is starting to really suck when it comes to shopping there.  They DO have the lowest prices, and I like that.  However, it's particularly frustrating when you attempt to find a product only to realize that it's been mis-stocked.  For example - Last night we were in the frozen food aisle, looking for Eggo Strawberry Waf-fulls - they're the typical Eggo Waffle (please note, all trademarks recognized, blah blah blah - don't sue me).  We find the Eggo section, find the Waf-fulls section, and find the space for the strawberry ones.  Of course, filled with chocolate chip pokemon waffles.  What's particularly frustrating is that the eldest, who likes these things, can also read.  She's very upset that I do not pick up the box right above the little sticker saying "Eggo Strawberry Waf-fulls" - I explain to her that she can obviously read better than the morons who stock shelves.  She asks what that means, and I say "the people who stock these shelves are obviously stupid.  They can't read."  

Of course, less than three seconds later, this young fellow passed me in the Cub uniform of the day (Green polo shirt with the Cub logo in orange on it).  And upon reflection, I guess it's not true.  They're not stupid.  That's unkind of me, and I apologize.  They are not stupid, they're lazy, which is infinitely worse.  I know whereof I speak, in many senses, because I once lasted about four months stocking shelves overnight in a grocery store (which has since changed to a pet food warehouse, oddly enough).  I'd go in at 10:00 pm on a Monday night, and stock shelves until 6:00 am.  Then I'd head home, pick up my dad and sisters, and we'd go out to college campus.  I'd go to classes, sit in the library or anywhere else there was a chair, and at 4 pm I'd go home.  I'd eat dinner and fall into bed, and sleep from Tuesday about 7 pm to 5:30 the following morning.  I'd get up on Wednesday, go to class, then come home, have dinner, and go to sleep.  I'd get about three hours, and then start all over again.

As I remember, the grocery store closed at 11 pm, but starting at 10 we could put boxes out on the floor.  We'd stock the canned, jarred, and other goods, and others would be responsible for the frozen and cold stuff.  I started with the jelly/jam/sauce/juice aisle, which was pretty rough, and then worked my way across.  You really wanted to do the paper goods aisle, because it was light, quick, and easy work - unless you cut too deeply into the box and wrecked a package.

Anyway, I know it's hard work.  But it's very important that it get done right, and these idiots plainly can't.  They're too lazy to go back and get the right box, which would take a few minutes, and make my daughter happy.  If this doesn't improve (and I have no hope that it will), we'll go to Rainbow instead - Sure, Rainbow's more expensive, but at least they can stock shelves...  And they've got what we want when we want it.  So of course, Rainbow's up for sale, and likely new management will attempt to wring greater profits from their purchase.  What ever happened to "hey, we're not going to hit that $1.10 a share income we blathered about, but we're insuring that people will shop here in the future."  If these big grocery stores are going to keep this kind of crap up, I expect that soon we'll see the return of the mom & pop shops - small neighborhood groceries, with maybe not everything you want the first time, but if you put the shopping list in front of the shopkeeper, he'll have it all next time.  And that's half the battle.  If on-line were more reliable, I'd use it, instead, but let's face it, it's just not there yet.

Now, to see if I can get things straightened out once and for all...  Outlook's throwing errors left and right, and I can't send messages at all.  I get blown out of the water every time I try.  Ugh.  YAFR - Yet Another fubar'ed Restart.

Later: Well, I've got a couple of grenades mounted about my person, and I guess I'll pull and lob as need be.  First of all, last night while watching what little of the Olympics I do watch, some nitwit managed to put a particular piece of equipment up in an incorrect fashion.  The Pommel horse was about two inches low.  Now, that's pretty much the equivalent of sawing the bottom two inches off your legs and seeing how you do.  If you're blasting through the air and expect to hit a solid surface at point X, and this same solid surface has existed at point X on every continent and in every gymnasium you've ever worked in, and here you are at the pinnacle of your sport, and some feeble-minded gas-brained fool puts it up at X-2 inches, you're likely to have problems.

Now, that those problems extend further, to other pieces of equipment, is less a direct connection, but bear with me - you just attempted an event you really know well, and you hosed it up.  Is it any wonder your confidence is shot?

Grenade Two - The Rod.  I mentioned previously about our esteemed junior senator Rodney Grams using the phrase "Can you smell what the Rod is cooking?" - well, apparently what we thought was that very foul smell was, instead, Rodney's cooking.  Now, I'll be honest - if I were Mark Dayton, the other major candidate for US Senate here, I'd have checked my portfolio a little more carefully, but then again, I know what stock I own.  It's all one company.  Easy.  When you're worth several million (perhaps even hundreds of millions), it's probably a little tougher.  And when he discovered that he still had some of those stocks, a few days before the primary, he publicly announced he had these stocks, and was sorry, and was selling them off.  Given the fact that he likely could have made more money by holding onto them (either with the hope that they'll go back up, or with the fact that drug companies seem to be consistent performers, whatever), he dumped the stocks as soon as he found out.  Anyway, Dayton had a few pharmaceutical stocks - and he was attacking the drug companies.  Seems to me to be a pretty stupid thing.  Hi, I've invested in your company, and I'm going to drive down your stock price.  It's kind of stupid, but then again, with The Rod cooking, I guess we're just not all there yet.

Grenade Three - Linux.  Earlier this week Tom Syroid popped a bolt regarding his experience LAST week (or was it two weeks ago?) with Linux as a desktop environment.  Now, not being privy to the internal workings of either Windows or Linux at a programming/decision level, I speak as one who is thoroughly lacking in reputation to pontificate on such matters...  Like that's stopped me before <EGrin>.  However, it seems to me that Microsoft's had problems with NT by attempting to put sheep's clothing on a wolf - they took a desktop environment designed for ease of use, and attempted to soup it up to be a server OS (and yes, I know, it was more the other way 'round - they came up with the neato-keen server side things, and then pasted Windows over the top).  Linux, on the other hand, is taking an OS that is VERY well suited for a server environment, and attempting to shoe-horn that horsepower into a box that will make it onto your desk, and make you forget the ease of use and compatibility that comes with Windows.  Why is it that people are never satisfied with what works?  Gee, I've got a really cool bike here, but if I put these levers and gears on, I can change it from a "you-pedal-faster-it-goes-faster" bike to a multi-SPEED bike - which is MUCH better than the other kind, just trust me on this one (yeah, right, says the remaining sane portion of my enfeebled mind).  And when we strap a rocket pack to your back, that thing should come pretty close to cracking the sound barrier - sort of like that possibly urban legend of the Plymouth station wagon with the JATO unit on the roof that ended up about 500 feet up the side of a cliff... maybe.  Is it just plain possible that the Linux folks should drop the desktop efforts, and concentrate on the server space?  Not like Microsoft's going to drop the server space to focus on the desktop, but hey, we can all hope.  Then again, let's not sell the farm, ma.

What the heck am I doing messing with this stuff?  I've got to get to the Farmer's Market early tomorrow morning.  And Joann, just in case you read this, I should probably tell you that I went to Brian and Alicia's wedding on October 17th, 1987 - same day as the first game of the 1987 World Series, which the Twins played in (their second - they eventually won).  I had met Ann only a few weeks before.  It took me a year to decide to marry the woman.  You'll find yours.  Actually, what's more likely is that you'll realize that you've known him for a long time, and you're just now realizing that it's someone you really don't want to live without.  That's the way married life goes - or at least does in my world, which is something under a month away from my ten-year anniversary - geeze, I guess I'd best get off my duff and start planning for that party...  gulp.

See Tomorrow

Last night, I tried to get onto Tripod.  I'd had a problem on Wednesday of this week, but a restart, and a few hours, and things were fine.  Last night, however, after seven different restarts - after normal, clean shutdowns, after reset-button shutdowns, after everything I could think of, FrontPage wouldn't connect.  While ordinarily I would begin to curse and rage against the fine work Mr. Gates and his assorted minions - er, associates - have committed - er, done, I thought before I tirade against the machine, I should just do one stupid test.

I went to the regular tripod page and attempted to use their tools, using just my username and password.  It kept telling me my password was invalid.  Yes, I know it's got to be in the same case that I used originally.  In sheer desperation, I attempted to get their stuff to send me my old password.  And sure enough, wouldn't you know it, but here comes the e-mail, with username jdominik (all in lowercase), and password "xxxxxxxx" - you thought I'd be foolish enough to give you the correct answer, didn't you?

So, I try again.  I even cut and paste from the e-mail, just in case.  No joy.  After more than four hours of my password being rejected, even though their kindly computers send me the password again and again and again, I finally give up and make request of the powers on high, those mighty people working in tech support.  But how to contact them?  Get stuffed, pal, you lack even the grace to touch the ground where we walked six months ago - go purify thyself in the waters of evian, preferably purchased at great expense to yourself, duuuuude.

And then, this morning, out of sheer frustration, I log on in one last attempt to get in.  No changes, no restarts from last night, nothing.  It just bloody works.  Go figure.

Anyway, yesterday was spent traipsing all over the countryside (and isn't it wonderful to know that I can spell "traipsing" well enough without a second glance that the FrontPage/Office dictionary lets it go?  The shock to me is that it's in the damned dictionary in the first place) looking for more homes to examine.  And boy, howdy, did we find one.  Actually, two.  My favorite was number 79.  More information about it here.  I just loved it - full basement, three-car garage (optional), and just a nice feel all the way around.  Mrs. D appreciated a similar house from the same folks - so now we just duke it out.

I'm just hopeful this isn't all a waste.  I really need more space.  Let's rephrase that - we ALL need more space in this family.  We need more room for putting things away, because, as Mrs. D so correctly concluded, "there's no more 'away' to put things."  We're out of space.  Time to upgrade.  And if they're going to be undoing me to the tune of over twelve hundred dollars a month, I'm certainly of the opinion that that money can go towards building my equity, rather than allowing them to abuse me...

Ah, well.  Off for more house-viewing, then turkey with the fixings for dinner this evening.  Beautiful day out today, and clearly fall - that summer haze that hangs around here is gone, and the crystal-clear feeling is coming.  How do I know?  Simple - Tom Syroid had snow this week, and while we're south of him, we're not that far south.  The worst part is that, for the last three years, we've had remarkably light winters.  Not much in the way of snow storms (yeah, we get snow, but a storm is 40 mph winds, six or more inches on the ground, and six to eight more dropping - that gets you drifts, and other fun things, which allows all the smart folks to say "sorry, I'm in for now."  Of course, all those low-IQ types who've purchased the gas-guzzling SUVs in the last few years will go out and promptly get stuck in various banks, but that's why we put them there.  I'm just waiting for our annual "everyone drive like an idiot or moron day" which comes around typically on the first day we get snow during rush hour.  It turns a usual 20 minute commute into two hours of bleeding hell, as roads that are normally tractionable (if that's a word) appear to be lacking in it.  Therefore most people slow to between 5 and 10 mph to make up for it.  The fun part is when they hit those rare patches of ice, while going 10, and then end up amusing the rest of us out there with displays of ballet-like maneuvers out there on the road.  It's just wonderful.  Makes me wish I was fluent in french like the good Doctor Keyboard.  Oh well.  Enjoy your fall.  The landing's sooner than you think...

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