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Monday, June 10, 2002
Apologies Are In Order
The dearth of content over the weekend was not due to neglect. It was
due, apparently, to an over-abundance of alcohol. For the first time in
a very, very long time, I've apparently exceeded my maximum safe
dosage - that being one beer, one bottled lynchburg lemonade on Saturday, and a repeat on
Sunday.
I was writing, I really was. Especially as the computer's down in the nice cool basement, instead of upstairs in the heat...
Memories and Regrets
Strange way to start a week, but there we go.
Tomorrow marks the last day for Jack's regular daily attendance at his current daycare. But for the occasional drop-in, he won't be there any more on a regular basis.
I can still remember vividly the day we selected that daycare. We'd made appointments and taken Friday, November 15, 1996 off from work to visit various daycare centers - our in-home daycare lady, Marcy, had informed us earlier that fall that she wouldn't be continuing (contrary to the plans she'd announced early that year when we inquired if she'd have room for an infant). We'd planned on visiting three centers with Rhiannon to see how it all worked out.
Of course, it turned out that Jack wanted some input on the decision, and chose to arrive early - in fact, that day. So, some three weeks later, we repeated the process. Took a day off (well, I did), and visited daycares. Daycare Center A was highly recommended by a number of folk, and we felt pretty ... normal in it. It was a nice center. Nothing great, but nice. Close to home, too.
Center B was nice, at first. Then it was the smallest of small things - the director told Rhiannon in a sharp tone not to sit on a chair. Rhiannon complied right away, the woman thought nothing of it, and we went away. I don't know that it ever occurred to her that her one instant of lost temper cost her $12,000 annually in revenue, but that's what happened.
Center C was already in the lead when we came up to the door. Center C had a discount program with Ann's employer of the time, and it brought it's costs down into line with the other places we were looking at. We stopped in. The director came out, showed us around. The teacher that was in the school-age room was gone at the time (few school-agers in the center at 10:30 am). The preschool teacher was there - 10 years experience at that center. The pre-preschool teacher was there - just about to finish 25 years with the company. The infant room was warm, cuddly, and safe. And just one room away from where his sister would be.
They even brought it up - if older siblings wanted to visit at any time during the day, they could. We enrolled.
Rhiannon started an occasional drop-in schedule for a while, and visited the center. Just a few weeks after we started, we went to the one, and only, Christmas program we participated in. I've got the video tape here somewhere of Rhiannon, sitting, poutily, on the front step of the risers, wearing her santa hat, and NOT singing with the rest of the children that well-known Christmas Classic, "Take Me Out To The Ball Game". Yeah, I know.
Over the years, teachers, directors, and others have come and gone. The school-age teacher left for a higher-paying job at another center, and then, when she sat a child on her lap for a talk, was terminated from that company for violations of procedures on physical restraint. She came back, fortunately for us - she's still one of Rhiannon's favorites.
Jack just finished his 18 months with Patty, who is going to remain forever in our hearts (along with Brandi, Jack's infant room teacher, Gail, Mindi, Lori, and all the others) as a huge influence on the children we have today.
Few people outside of the parents of the children realize how much of a family a daycare becomes. We knew, and grieved, as Patty's mother fought and lost her battle with cancer. We listened as various directors and assistants would tell of plans for the center - some accomplished, some failed. We wondered, occasionally, as staff left without saying goodbye - and were thrilled at other times when clearly-unfit hires were quickly weeded out.
Through it all, regardless of the turmoil or peace, small babies grew from eating, pooping bundles to little men and women who would gleefully tear around the room like wild indians - er, Native Americans - or swing from monkey bars like those self-same monkeys.
It will be difficult tomorrow night. I hate goodbyes. I hate leaving things behind, I hate more than anything causing my children pain. But Rhiannon has already made the change and has become quite the better person for it. Her pride in her school uniform has returned, as has her pride in her school, both of which took a horrible beating last fall when children undertook to abuse the "different" kids - as she was the sole child attending that "different" school, she was the easy target.
Jack, as well, will thrive. Presently he's a bit cowed by a couple of slightly older boys, neither of which are anything close to a "good influence" which we'd like to see. The hope is that with their move to a closer-to-home daycare program, he'll meet some kids from the neighborhood, and be a bit better off.
Chihuahua From Hell
Yes. In my neighborhood, even.
Imagine yourself at something under three and a half feet tall, and approaching forty pounds. Imagine the neighbor across the street has a nine-month-old Chihuahua puppy who is carried 30% of the time by one of the children of the owners. Imagine the dog spending much of the day when he is without child stimulation cooped in a garage (ventilated, etc).
Now. Once you have all of that, you can understand from the dog's point his sheer joy at being out in the world, and seeing anyone near his size to play with.
Of course, given the apparent ferocity of a Chihuahua (they do look rather nasty), you can also understand a five-year-old's reluctance to ride his bike or even go play with the other children, as that damned Chihuahua charges after him.
And it's not just Jack. I've seen three other neighborhood children go stark screaming terrified when this yappy little by-blow of the dog world comes tearing around, yipping and barking for sheer joy. He (or she) also tends to play, a great deal, in the street.
I really hate to say it, but I think that damned dog either needs to be tied or caged. The problem is in telling my neighbor across the street about it. But something's got to be done. Jack hasn't ridden his bike in almost two weeks because of this. He's often afraid to go out the front door, if the dog's out or not. I've tried to help by teaching him to growl and bark at Buttons when it comes charging, but Buttons seems to be cut from the same cloth Jack was - the fear circuit didn't seem to get switched on at birth.
Ah, neighborhoods. Between that and the snowing cottonwoods, I'm beginning to wonder why I thought life would be easier here. Oh well. In an apartment, you could yell to the manager. Here, you deal with it yourself. What fun.
Argh, Syntax
I spent two hours today flipping back and forth between language
references and other bits, trying to debug a problem. In the end, the
problem? I had a WHILE...DO loop ending with an END rather than a DONE.
Argh.
Tuesday, June 11, 2002
Overheard in the car this morning...
Rhiannon: "Are these speedless grapes?"
Dad: "Yes, Rhiannon, they go nowhere fast."
Rhiannon: (obviously pained voice) "Daddy..."
Mom: (sigh) "Yes, honey, they're seedless. Your father's just
trying to be funny."
Can't blame a guy for trying. I thought it was a good job, all things considered (see below). At least I wasn't drooling...
Most Interesting
This article (which will be gone in two weeks)
notes that at least 225 of the nation's Roman Catholic priests have been
accused of sexual misconduct.
Now, let's do some "cipherin'" here, and noodle this one out.
Assume 225 priests did something nasty. Screw "inappropriate" and other "politically correct" wordages. Just Plain Nasty.
Now, let's also gonkulate in a few other numbers. Like lets say that each priest confessed to a confessor. Well, let's say half of them confessed. Let's say that those who did were instructed to tell their superior/abbot/boss about it as well.
So we have 225 bad guys. Of those 113 told their confessor. Who can't tell anyone. But let's say the confessor gave a penance; to tell someone else and get help. Let's figure these guys were really remorseful, and did. So that's 225+113=338 priests/bishops/abbots who did it, or knew.
Which gives us a grand total of .489%, or less than half of one percent, who did the deed, and a total of .735% who knew about it and aided (if they did) in a cover-up. Less than one percent of the total population. Yes, that's a large number of wolves in the fold, but it's less than one percent.
Which means we're using a pretty broad, ugly brush to paint 45,662 undeserving people as evil. Or instead of "we", should I say "The Media".
Don't get me wrong. What the evil ones did will color the perceptions of many people. But let's not lose sight of the good ones, either. I nearly did. But there are a lot of good men out there who are feeling even worse than I for what happened, and most of them are trying their hardest to make sure it can never happen again. Hopefully, they'll succeed in the long run.
Velly Intelesting. But Schtupid.
Indeed.
Last week I alluded to some browser technology widget called Pop-up Killer. It is, for me, an indispensable work tool. I actually get a little gleeful watching browser windows span pop-up/under ads that are then killed with a resounding thunk by PUK.
The reason this indispensable widget came to my attention (99% of the time it sits in the system tray politely and quietly doing it's job) was that again today it had been disabled by one of the pages I visited. So I zipped back into the history, and noticed that I'd visited only two sites between adding a site to the banned list (fortune.com uses pop-up ads as well), and they were my grocery delivery service and CNN.com. And I remember seeing PUK still working when I was on Simon Delivers.
So I suspect the code's in a CNN page. I'll find it, believe me.
Uh-Oh - Cheesy Back To The Future Warning
Yup, folks, they'll be
talking punchcards soon.
Though I wonder. Would they be as delicate as tape?
Draggin'
Yesterday evening turned into a series of compounded mistakes in the
field of time management...
Yesterday was warm and muggy - or as we used to say, "Good Storm Weather". That slows everything down.
Checked the regional radar, and could see a storm line setting up that looked to be about 400 miles long (south of Sioux Falls, SD in the south to north of Fargo, ND in the north - yes, THAT Fargo) - but the storms were all lifting to the north - Odds were we might get missed.
Left work on-time to pick up Ann, whose bus was a bit late.
Picked up Jack a little later than normal.
Went over to some friends house to pick up Rhiannon, where she had spent the day playing with a friend of hers.
Spent some time talking with them.
Stopped at the grocery store to pick up treats for Jack's last day, a bottle of root beer, and some cole slaw mix. How that cost me $49 I'll never know.
Got home, put the cupcakes in the new freezer, the groceries away, and had a catch-as-catch-can dinner.
Sent the kids downstairs (with food - a first!) to watch a movie - Ghostbusters. One of Jack's favorites, I dunno why.
Flipped around and got caught up in "Thirteen Days".
Movie ran until 11, which was about two hours PAST where I'd wanted to hit the pillow.
So caught up in the movie we realized we'd missed the 10:00 news - had no idea of the weather.
Conveniently, the act of changing to the basic local station worked - there were severe thunderstorm warnings for most of the counties west of us.
Back downstairs, to check the local radar loop. Said four-hundred-mile-wide storm had narrowed a bit - only covered the state from Brainerd in the north to Mankato in the south - centered on the northern Twin Cities suburbs, but we weren't out of the woods by any means, in a swath about two counties deep - and the front county of which was severe. Lovely. One taking a bead on the house...
Check the severe weather warnings - of course, the county west of us - "Large, baseball-sized hail, damaging winds, frequent lightening, and heavy downpours. Small stream and street flooding advisory."
Great. Get the flashlights, check them out. Remember that when we had the horrid storm back in 1997 which nearly caused us to have to relocate (broken sprinkler main in the apartment building flooded three apartments, and the inspector nearly had our end declared unfit for human habitation, this neighborhood we're in now was out of power for nearly a week. Start thinking how fast I could get a generator for fridge/freezer power.
Collect the candles, etc., and working lighters. Disperse appropriately.
Hunker down for the storm...
Fall asleep.
The storm actually ran through pretty quietly. A quick downpour, a longer period of steady rain, and then nothing. Of course it never stays that way...
4 am, awake for the nightly constitutional. Finished, I realize there's the sound of water running in the house. Go downstairs to check.
Water softener is making a fairly loud noise. Open it up, look inside. No salt visible, best to open and dump the new bag in.
Opened, dumped, the bag is in. Softener still making noise. Poke, prod, and flick various controls, reset them to their original settings (or hopefully near enough). Still no change.
Water softener STILL making funny noise. Highly unlikely to be resolvable at 4 am in my underpants without glasses. Or professional help. Or pants. Replace covers, check kids, go back to bed.
Of course, you all know the end of the story. The next morning, no noise from the softener, no damage to the yard, the paper plate I'd noticed in the yard last night had moved six inches closer to the house (and that in no way improves the odds of the children finding and disposing of it).
The amazing thing is the mental breakthroughs (and breakdowns) you can make when forced to concentrate. I'm again reminded of the old joke... "Don't know where we're going, but we're sure making good time!"
So it goes. My butt be dragging, and dat's all dere is.
Wednesday, June 12, 2002
How Odd
The party of truth, justice, lower taxes, smaller government, families,
children, big business, bigger money, and The American Way - or just the
"Independent-Republicans" locally - are holding their convention this
coming weekend.
How nice. The party that says they're for the family schedules their convention on Father's Day weekend. Isn't that special?
Of course, this election cycle, we've got a governor's race to tolerate. The DFL Candidate has all the charisma of instant mashed potatoes - or maybe I'm overestimating his appeal somewhat. Okay, all the appeal of crabgrass. No, that might be a bit high as well. Let's just say he's a bit of a dork and move on.
The two IR Candidates, meanwhile, are equal to the DFL's challenge, of course, in the pure personality sense. Neither one would stand out next to a beige wall. And no, that's not a comment on their race, either. They could be standing there in loud Hawaii'an shirts and not gather so much as a second glance.
The first fellow, Pawlenty, was thinking of a run for senate against Wellstone, and was told not to do so by Bush & Co. So he set his sights a bit lower. I sure hope he aimed ahead of his foot, or the hole's likely going to be unrepairable.
The other fellow, Sullivan, has been billed as "the inventor of the Pur water filter." Nope. Sorry. Not quite. Turns out that he came to the state a bunch of years ago, found the real inventor of the water filter, bought the patent, founded a company, and made money. Then he sold the company to Proctor and Gamble, and pocketed $27 million. Nice work, if you can get your daddy to finance it for you, I guess.
Now he wants to run the state. Leaving aside for the moment his political beliefs, we're hearing that Mr. Sullivan has no intention of paying even lip service to campaign finance limits. He's going to self-finance the race. How pleasant. Mr. Rich, figuring that he can buy the office with money, as his agenda and personality aren't winning enough, apparently.
This morning on the radio they ran a profile of Sullivan which had the bile just rising in my throat.
"We who are successful owe it to society to work in government."
Well, speaking as one of the little people you've so condescendingly referred to, Mr. Sullivan, I can't tell you how thankful I am that you're doing that. In fact, I've dropped below the words microscopic, miniscule, atomic, and infinitesimal. Perhaps even past zilch, as it so happens. Can I be negatively thankful? I suppose I can in "New Math"... After all, I can get ArthurAndersen to audit the books and no one will be the wiser... oops.
One other negatively intelligent thing Mr. Sullivan has done is contributed to a politician who had aided his company in getting a prime defense contract when Sullivan ran Pur. Wonderfully bone-headed move there. He says it's a "tangental issue". Right.
He says, again, condescendingly, that his ability lay in getting the people at his company to focus on the five things they wanted to do each year. All other issues/items/problems were "tangental". He thinks he can do that for government. He wants to shake it up more. Like Ventura hasn't. God help us, they're going to end up turning this state into a milkshake in more ways than one.
What Sullivan doesn't realize is that government can't have only five individual priorities - it's got about four for each person in the state. There's better roads. Better education. Lower taxes. Better, more responsive government. Clear, coherent leadership. You don't get to be a leader by dismissing people's hot-button issues as "tangental items".
Great. So we've got "I'm not as sexy as instant mashed potatoes" in one corner, we've got "They Made Me Do It" duking it out with "I'm doing it for the little people" over in the other corner, and Jesse still in the middle of the ring, saying "well, I'm not SURE if I'll run again."
At this point, Ventura could laze around on his rump until late September and then come out wearing a feather boa and still win in a landslide. Six votes for ventura, one each for the other fellows. Yeah, landslide. I feel like Rainman.
Oh brother.
Confession to make
I made a boo boo yesterday.
After leaving Jack's daycare for the last time (which went well - when we walked in and got Jack's daily note, it said "More Troble Today". Yes, the summer help has well and truly arrived, and they're working hard on learning how to communicate with us higher primates, now that they've mastered the using of tools - oy vey. I can only hope the note WASN'T written by the young lady who is going to college to try to become a preschool teacher - if so, then I'm just ... well, terrified, truth be told. But that's another digression for another day), we hit the library to FINALLY drop off Jack's overdue book (Mental and other note - while the Burnsville branch of the Dakota county library doesn't charge fines until they mail a notice, Scott charges a dime a day from the day it's due, no notice - just no checkie-outtie until you gets yer books backs and pays yer fines. Okay, then - basta... never mind. ;-). Then we found out A - his book was on my card, B - the books we dropped off last weekend had been overdue by a day, and C - there was one more missing book floating around - "When the Hippo Ate The Teacher". hmmmm... On Ann's card, too. So the Savage library sucked ME dry of cash and started working on Ann... Funny, how it always works like that.
Paid my fines, looked around, checked out a couple of home improvement books for design ideas, etc., and tried to interest Jack in a book about explosions (yes, I know, I'm my own worst enemy - in my defense, it actually stuck out into the aisle and I ran into it by accident, which is why I had it). Didn't work, he wanted the one about "The Great Brain" who was, to my wife, what the Alvin Fernald books were to me growing up. Good fun, not to be missed, and rather subversive.
Then I came home, and didn't get right on the computer. Instead, I wandered about the house, helping Jack find his missing library book. We found the book. Thank God. No more dime-a-day at the library.
By then it was nearly dinner time, so I cleared the table, and sat down with the All-Electronics catalog that came yesterday. While I'm no circuit-cellar guru, I just love linking bits and pieces together to get them to work. Of course, I had a more urgent reason - sitting on a pile of stuff was an old fire engine my father once gave me for a birthday present - battery-operated, with forward/backward and left-right controls. When a lever was switched on the back of the firetruck, the forward/back became up/down for the bucket arm.
Some stupid kid - ok, it was me - chewed through the cord for some unknown reason (I also chewed on my headboard when I was little. No, I have no idea why. I don't think it tasted good, it wasn't lead paint, but that might explain a few things...). So I decided a while back that I'd fix it for Jack/Rhiannon. Give it a longer (6') cord, a better set of switches, a better controller box, and an all-around tune-up.
Went into Radio Shack and nearly fell over when they wanted $2 a switch (I needed four), plus another $4 for the quad-D battery holder and $8 for the project-box to hold it all (yes, a new controller would be good). That's $20, not counting batteries. Plus, they didn't have strain-relief fittings (have to make my own, I guess), nor did they have the oddball eight-conductor cord (no, I don't know why either - I could figure six, maybe, but not eight). Boy, has Radio Shack gone downhill.
So, I'd checked out AS&S last week, and found some of the stuff, and then, conveniently, the All Electronics one shows up.
So, I did a little perusing of that, read Jack and Rhiannon a neat book about the magic paintbrush, ate dinner, then did some more perusing and watched my 3-hour home-improvement-tip videotape from the HomeTime folks. Nothing really new, just a lot of review for the basics on just about everything. My ultimate goal, I suppose, is to get ready for the hopeful eventual home remodeling where we bump south six feet, go up another floor, add on a second-floor deck with stairs down to the first floor, and other assorted foolishness.
By then, of course, it was well past bedtime for yours truly. So I went. It's a wild life, you know?
Pickin' O'the Nits
Yeah, that's me.
The local paper showed up, and their upper-left front-page above-the-fold headline is "Historical Class Graduates..."
I fully realize that I mangle the language. Most of the time, I'm aware of it. I do it on purpose. I do it for effect. I do it because it's what I want (note - I could have said "I do it because I want to" but that would be ending a sentence with a preposition - and the eight thousand plus jokes that go along with that I'll graciously not bore you with).
But oy, "historical class graduates." I wonder if they've openings for english-speakers on the paper's staff.
I doubt I'd qualify.
I Would Be Remiss
If I forgot to mention She
is Back.
Thursday, June 13, 2002
Hmmmm...
I heard earlier this week that IBM, Microsoft, and Verisign are producing a
technology called "Trustbridge" to replace Microsoft's failed
centralized Dot-Net server strategy.
Why is it that I'm suspicious that the company that invented FUD, a convicted monopolist, and a company which has essentially lied to increase it's customer base can produce anything I can trust?
Perhaps it's my evil, cynical ways, but I'd sooner be in a shared shower at the US Catholic Bishop's conference than trust those three with my computer data. Or should I say "More" of my computer data.
Oh well. Yes, I'll be a good boy and eat my soylent green.
I wanna be...
An economic analyst for the media. I'd actually just love any job with the
word "Analyst" in the title. I'm anal enough, I think.
It would be a great job. For example, this morning, there was a report on the radio that last month, consumer spending dropped a bit. According to the radio, it was due to lower spending on new cars and major appliances. It also noted that the price index dropped, primarily due to lower gas prices.
So when I flip over to CNN later this afternoon, I see the stock market's down something like 100 points, and the question "have we all stopped shopping?" is one of their headlines.
Just think - Chicken Little's got a bright future in the media juggernaut. If the sky doesn't fall, well, it was, and will again. And of course, we're all too stupid to understand that after that zero-percent financing binge the auto dealers went on in April, the "I got my rebate and I just gotta spend it" crowd spent it, and then the lower prices and some of us enjoying our purchases, well, hell, yes, we all just decided to not shop - at all - the entire month.
Oy. Buncha putzes.
Butchered English
The actual headline is here for those who wish to read
about "Historical Class Steps Into The Future".
You know, when I was in tech support (still am, some days), we had a description of that type of problem. It was an "Eye Dee Ten Tee" problem. Write it out.
I D 1 0 T
Yup. I'd apply for a job there, but I have the feeling they'd toss my resume. "He done talk funny" or some other criticism being wittily applied, methinks.
Interesting Pop-Up Killer Information
All right. I think I've got a line on the code that disables Pop-Up
Killer.
At work, I'm running Windows 2000 and IE 6.0 with the latest (as of today, who knows about tomorrow) patches. When I work normally, I have two browser windows open. One loads my "portal" page, while the other is open on CNN.
CNN's handy to have, as it refreshes itself every 30 minutes (when it feels like cooperating - sometimes it won't). Today, while I was working away on another project, the CNN window refreshed a couple of times.
A while later (probably 2 hours) I noticed the PUK icon on my toolbar had been disabled. No other browser tasks, windows, or activity that I'm aware of - only CNN.
Now I know my portal page doesn't refresh every 30 minutes - or at all, for that matter. The culprit HAD to be something on CNN's site. Furthermore, it wasn't done on the initial load, but only after the refresh. And I suspect that it was from a refresh where the browser hadn't been brought to the surface for at least 30 minutes. Very, very interesting.
Nasty little piece of work, that.
Bumbling Along
I've been looking back through this journal when I've had the time, and
I've noted that I'm damned dull sometimes. Like lately. I pontificate
a whole hell of a lot (which bothers me more than a little).
I don't talk much about technology because, between the agreements I've signed and the confidentialities I've agreed to at work, I can't much say anything other than "well, look out for that Microsoft bug out there." We've run into some horrid ones at work, and even flown our developers to meet with Microsoft. We've adopted their "Best Practices" in our development and the performance hit is still there. When, however, we do that which we're told expressly not to do, and the thing works just fine, and 1/25th the time, well...
The time I used to have on breaks and during lunch at work has dried up. Truth be told, I eat lunch at my desk, track my time down to 6-minute intervals, and try to be productive 100% of the time. Some of it's certainly paranoia, some of it's the certain knowledge that starting this project with limited training and no assistance is a certain route to failure if I allow that to happen (which I'm trying my best not to), so I keep busy.
At night, I come home, and instead of plopping down in front of a keyboard to see what's out there, I work on the yard, or fix bikes, or work on the never-ending job of Rhiannon's loft, or any of a thousand other projects which are STILL hanging over my head. I've still got a pile of boxes in my bedroom, and another in the living room. When Rhiannon's room is done, there's Jack's - then ours. Then I want to build a table for computer stuff. Then I want to ... Well, you get the idea.
I guess I sometimes wonder if this is all worth it. Perhaps I'm just getting frustrated. I dunno.
Flaming Blue Me...
Well, this message is brought to you by "damned lucky to be here."
Seems like the people who lived here previously (I'm going to stop calling them that, and call them instead "eye dee ten tees". It's much easier) were a bit ... well, effing stupid, if I can be so bold. And feel free to replace effing with any of your choice words starting in "F" and ending in the latter portion of the word "Truck".
Tonight, the lightbulb in Jack's room burned out. I got the stepladder out of the kitchen and brought it into Jack's room. I removed the cover, and unscrewed the bare 100-watt bulb that they'd had in there. As I did so, I noticed the reflective cover that had been installed with the light had curled - I guessed at that point that there'd been a bit of an upgrade for some ... halfwit (again, replace "half" with your expletive of choice) who decided they needed more light - and they upgraded from the 60 or 75 watt bulb to a 100 or 150.
Now, when you've got a completely enclosed light fixture, you have a heat issue. Which means most light fixtures are rated for certain wattages. Higher numbers aren't necessarily better, as they can cause more heat.
At this point, I started seeing what the material was that the reflector was made of. I wiggled it a bit, and was "rewarded" with a nice bright blue flash.
It was at this point I exercised that baser portion of my vocabulary, you know, the end of the stick where those things that you say are rewarded by a good smack by the nun in school? Yup. We called them "Penguin calls" as it was a lead-pipe cinch that you could think one all day long, and even be in the dead center of the school yard, with no one within 100 yards of you, and when you whispered one, one of the penguins would be right next to you ready to apply correction to your vocabulary.
So, anyway, I expletived my way across the room to the light switch, neglecting the trip down the ladder, and slapped the switch off - yes, I know, step 0 in the book. Anyway...
Once I stopped shaking, I grabbed a flashlight and took a look. There were at least four breaks in the insulation that I saw on one wire.
Guess what I'm going to be doing in the near future? In the mean time, the switch is switched off, and it's covered with tape - just in case.
Friday, June 14, 2002
Flopping Into Friday
Yup. Friday. I'd yipee-skipiee, but I'm wipee-outee. Long, rough week. 'Nuff said.
Today is Flag Day. It's also Father's Day weekend. On a smaller scale, it's also our turn to bring treats for the tee ball team. It's also mowing weekend.
How about a spin about the web for news?
This one made me chuckle. Focus on security - hell, how about learn first how to focus, then define security, THEN do something about it? Sounds too easy to me...
This one is something I find both funny and oddly satisfying. I just love it when someone fresh off a conquest that looked pretty messy to begin with sets themselves up for a nasty whomping fall... Mr. Clark fails to note the third way Dell could get into the business of manufacturing and selling printers - Purchase an existing company with it's own R&D, integrate it into the supply chain, and add a set of pages (and a whole bunch of servers) to their web site. Then stand back and watch it print money (oooh, sorry, bad pun).
In the grand scheme of things, there's no one in this world more deserving of being smacked around than Carly Fiorina, in my opinion. HP Needed to focus, not spread out.
And a nervous chuckle here as I wonder what they've been testing in this area of Russia.
Right. But how does one pronounce it?
And there was much rejoicing. And plenty of muttered "well, no SHIT" comments as well.
This one pissed me off. But I figured you already knew that. I guess there ought to be a law...
This made me laugh, too... "When the world's richest man needs a little weekend spending money, he doesn't head to the ATM like you or I do; no, he sells a little bit of Microsoft stock. And this month, Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates did just that, selling about 8 million shares worth more than $400 million, with more sales (an estimated 200 million shares worth almost $100 million) to come in the near future. Don't worry about Gates's financial holdings, though: He currently owns 12 percent of the more than 5.4 billion shares of Microsoft stock--which makes the stock worth about $300 billion on paper. Yikes." From Paul Thurrott and the Windows Update e-mail from Windows & .NET Magazine's mailing list today.
Yikes, indeed. His $50-per-share price when he sold the first 8 million shares drove the market down to the point where the next 200 million shares would be worth 50¢ each. Wow, the power.
Assuming Gates owns some 648 million - er, 640 million - shares of Microsoft stock (5,400,000,000 shares times 12% is 648), the next 200 million will be something like 1/3 of his total holdings.
Of course, if the math is wrong, so are my calculations... ;-)
Now when I can get this type of connection from my broadband modem, look out. Indeed.
This is also a source of great rejoicing. Once there's a problem, there will eventually be a solution. And as we all know, the first step in recovery is admitting you have a problem... SPAM is the problem. Whoo and Hoo, and happy happy joy joy dancing...
I got a feeling this guy isn't going to be around long. Just a hunch, you understand.
And another "well, no kidding" link. Even my five-year-old could figure this one out. "If Person A does something wrong, and Person B knows about it but doesn't say anything, did Person B do anything wrong? If Person B's job was to make sure nothing wrong was done, and something wrong was done, is Person B doing their job?" Sheesh.
And this made me feel good in a perverse way. In a previous job, I developed an entire system which did this sort of work. I still use a similar system. Even though the entire inventory isn't my problem.
This was a bit of good/bad news. Bob Karn was my senior World Lit teacher, and about half the names mentioned in the article were also names in my high school class. Nice to know that things haven't changed much in 20 years. And yes, for the record, we won the State baseball tournament twice (back in old Class A) when I was in high school - '80 and '82, I think. Oh well. Good job, guys.
There's some good news for the space station.
And finally, the "Oh For Crying Out Loud" department. I don't know what pissed me off more - that (allegedly) pedophillic twit wanting to steal the British Throne or the woman from the United States who said that 'seeing Jackson had eclipsed any of the marvels in the historic parliament'. Please, people of London, re-open the Tower and use it as it once was in ages past, and behead both of those idiots. If you can't get both, one or the other will do. If they both make it back to this country, well, I'll be very disappointed. Ain't life grand?
Small Goof
Yup. That's me.
Those Republican rascals who've come to town as the party of business
and lower taxes will be home for Father's day. Rather than muck up a
weekend with political bickering, they required delegates to take two
days of vacation to attend the convention, starting it Wednesday night,
and voting Thursday and today.
Not that it's going to make much difference.
Oh, Brother
Isn't th
at special?
"'The church is about reconcilation. Its highest priority can't be driving out the pedophiles,' the official said."
I hope they get attribution for that quote. If the proposed policy passes, and is rejected by the Vatican, I don't know what I'm going to do. It's not going to be pretty.
But to state that the church is about "reconciliation" while thumbing it's nose at the victims of this crime is ... well, it's hypocrisy.
And before you write to tell me how wrong I am - I believe that any person who takes advantage of another's trust, inexperience, or faith to gratify themselves is wrong. If you think sex with children is fine, then good luck to you, there's plenty of communities with sausage grinders who might approve of a sentence I'm thinking for pedophiles.
Personally, I think rapists and pedophiles should all be given the same sentence we determined while I was in college. Take the man (it's usually a man, though rarely a woman will do it), strip him naked, tie him with his back to a post, arms behind it, above him, and then release a hungry calf into the pen.
I'm figuring the punishment will last all of about ten minutes - death will be a blessed relief from that. And an appropriate punishment.
You know, the only other thing I can think of is that we are approaching the end of days, and the devil himself has taken St. Peter's throne. That's the only other plausible explanation I can come up with.
To allow this evil to continue is ... evil.
At least we know that locally the plan will get adopted, approved or not. You did notice where Harry Flynn is from in the article, didn't you? Thank God for small favors...
Introversion
I suppose one of the reasons I like the internet is that I can, within reason,
reveal only as much of myself and my life as I choose. Certainly, that's a
fallacy as anyone who knows how to Google and can spend 20 minutes or less can
find out an awful lot about me.
I guess I appreciate that because in a way I'm very much an introvert. When it comes to new situations and new people, I take my time. I reserve comment, I watch, learn, listen, and see how things work. I try not to rock the boat until I know how stable it is.
My wife, on the other hand, came home a few months back with a story. She'd taken a test where they determined introversion/extroversion and in her department, she's the "designated extrovert". The rest of the people there are, to varying degrees, introverts.
The story, or comment, she brought home was an observation from I believe her boss. She noted that for Ann, dealing with other people gave her energy. For introverts like the others in her department, it took energy.
Now, if it's a situation where I know most of the people there, and know them well, it's not a problem. If there's a situation where I don't know most of the people, I'll still go along if there are friends or acquaintances I know.
If, on the other hand, I don't know the people, or don't know them well, it's going to suck the energy out of me to go to a social function like that.
I've seen Ann - in a group setting, she shines. In fact, the fewer people she knows, the more in command she seems. When we leave, she'll be all happy and excited. "That was FUN!". I, on the other hand, will feel like a rolled-up tube of toothpaste.
Saturday, June 15, 2002
Yup. Saturday. That day that's about 16 hours shorter than the rest of them.
Awoke early, went back to sleep. Did Tee Ball, then finished outfitting the eldest for this week's Brownie Day Camp. Also bought fireworks at the grocery store.
If you've lived in this state for the last 30+ years, you'll know that for most of that time, anything more powerful than 50-grain caps had been illegal. Which explained the tremendous traffic across the borders to Wisconsin and Iowa around major holidays. And the large sweeps police would conduct, nabbing people who brought illegal fireworks to the state.
And so, in this year of legislative foibles, where the state had a $2.6 Billion shortfall, one of the governor's priorities was fireworks. He got it passed, and we bought. Like fools.
Then home, to mow the back yard, contemplate barbecueing spare ribs (see here for the method I shall try tomorrow - at present, they're already in the fridge, rubbed and waiting...), back out to Menards for a Swede saw, a bunch of stakes for the garden (and peonies, and other things), and more roundup, then a late sandwich-style dinner, and an inauguration of the fire-barrel. It works quite well.
Now to bed. Tomorrow's going to be another busy day - cat boxes, the front yard, and other things. I know not what.
Sunday, June 16, 2002
Ah, yes. Father's day.
Let's back up.
Last night, I had one of those heart-stopping moments.
We were in our back yard. Some ten minutes previous, we saw a local cop car come tearing around the corner and bear down the street at a very high rate of speed. We all looked, or gawked, and then went back to our bonfire.
Prior to the arrival of the officer in question, there had been a number of firework incidents in the neighborhood. Let me rephrase. There had been a number of Minnesota residents exercising their newly-legal rights to blow off fingers, toes, put out their own eyes, and generally burn the neighborhood down with "fireworks".
Not to miss the exercise of this God-given right, we picked up a couple of "fountains" at the grocery store. No idea what they did, but we picked up a pack of four.
Lit the first one off for the neighbor lady and attendant children, all of whom were suitably impressed. When her hubby arrived, lit the second one off.
Shortly after that, with the neighbor kids lighting off all manner of goofball bottlerocket/roman candle type dealey-bobs, we were a bit surprised to hear the police come, and head off into the neighborhood.
Some 20 minutes later, as we were sitting around the firepit, I heard a low voice... "Hey Little Boy."
Instantly my radar went up. No Jack nearby, but the other two older boys and Rhiannon were here. I spun and walked to the front yard, through the gate which we'd told Jack to stay behind. Sure enough, there he was, in the front yard, staring at two kids who were riding past on their bikes.
Shortly after that, the police officer came back past, moving much slower (with additional passengers). And the two kids on their bikes were quite lucky - they'd just lit off a blue smoke-bomb on the corner as the officer pulled up. He looked, looked twice, and pulled away.
According to what we've been told, you need to be eighteen to purchase and light off fireworks. These kids weren't.
So, anyway, Jack's fine, just a little scared. There are two neighborhood kids who know that if they say anything to Jack, they'll shortly thereafter encounter at least one large, fast-moving adult (the neighbor dad also followed me - wouldn't bother me in the least if the kids thought we were a gay couple - the more I can do to terrorize the little monkeys, the better).
Flash ahead to this morning. I awoke, again, to a quiet house. Actually, I'd had a couple of previous nightmares about how small kids had come to my door looking to play with my children.
Turns out they weren't nightmares. Some of the kids in this neighborhood get up too damned early.
Anyway, the kids and Ann went out.
Last year, for Father's Day, I asked for only one thing. I wanted a custard-filled, chocolate-frosted bismarsk donut. It took nearly two weeks to get one, as I recall, but I did.
I didn't ask for one this year, and don't you know I got one? AND a creme-filled long john, a couple other donuts, two picture frames, a crown, a barbecue brush (well, that came Friday), and a belt (well, that came Saturday).
So, what did I do but barbecue?
All right, I admit - I barbecued ribs, but I had a backup plan.
Of course, I also had to teach Jack some of the finer skills - such as drinking
from the hose.
Yes, ribs. They turned out, and I ate some. Nice. Very, very
nice. The keys are low heat, moisture in the kettle, and most importantly,
patience. The ribs were on the grill for SIX HOURS. I turned them
SIX TIMES, which includes four times in the last twenty minutes when I
applied the barbecue sauce. For the record - Famous Dave's rib rub, and
Famous Dave's Sweet And Zesty.
How good were they really? I'm no fan of pork. I like bacon occasionally - I tolerate ham. I'm going to be looking for another rib rack really, really soon. They were THAT good.
Sure - don't believe me. Both Rhiannon and Jack ate some, and liked it - Ann even said I done good. I'll leave it to her tomorrow to include the glowing comments.
Okay, okay - I'll stop bragging.
Well, almost. Yup, there's the remains of the tree I took down yesterday
in the background - I'm letting it dry out before I cut it up for the fire pit.
Happy father's day to all you who are fathers. And for those of you who are Daddies, an even happier father's day to you.
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P. Dominik. All rights reserved. No reproduction without express
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