Sunday, December 31, 2006

Auld Lang Syne

Happy New Year to you and yours! I hope 2007 is wonderful for all of you.

Have a safe evening and please, designate a driver if you are going to be drinking.
Micro$erf

I'm typing to you from Internet Explorer 7, the latest in browsing technology from Microsoft. I usually use Mozilla, but Mozilla seems to be buggy today and I haven't figured out why and haven't yet decided to go the re-installation process. So I decided to try IE7 which I installed weeks ago when it was first pushed down to my computer.

So far so good. I like the inclusion of tabbed browsing. There's something about tabs: once you've gotten them, you'll never go back. I did have some problems with plugins and IE7 at work, but I have more control over fixing them at home than I do there. So far though, I haven't had any problems and it looks like the plugins I had before are working with this latest version. Even with the tabs though, I don't think I'll use IE much over Mozilla. I am assuming IE, with its 90 percent market share is much more vulnerable to security breaches.

Saturday, December 30, 2006

Not a victory

I'm really torn over the execution of Saddam Hussein. Some of you know that I'm morally opposed to the death penalty because it's not reversible. Innocent people have been executed, I have no doubt, and some people (guilty or not) have suffered greatly during their executions. The former reason hardly applies to Saddam. The man was evil, truly a butcher and he visited great atrocity upon his people -- none of this is in doubt.

Saddam's obvious guilt and evilness however doesn't make execution right, especially given the US' blatant complicity in the matter. And really, what good does his execution do for this world? Nothing. Iraq is still in flames, with no solution in sight. Saddam's execution will be merely a footnote in this last year or so, a gruesome way to end 2006. Meanwhile, Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds will continue to battle each other and our men and women in uniform will be caught in the middle.

At this point, Saddam had little to no influence on events on the ground so I'm sure people figured this 69-year old sad sack version of the dictator was dispensable. At least we didn't go through the farce of putting him on trial for every single on of his atrocities and then giving him 12 death penalties. Saddam's reign of terror and his spectre as a leader is finally over, but this execution is not a turning point, and it's certainly NOT something to celebrate or claim as a victory. Instead, I have no doubt that terrorists will use Saddam's execution as yet another reason to wage war on the West.

Friday, December 22, 2006

Scrooge

I never thought there'd come a day when I'd want Tom DeLay speaking for the Republicans, but holy cow, I'd take the Hammer any day over this Virgil Goode who is possibly the very worst possible example of what America stands for. I guess he missed the whole "Give me your tired, give me your poor" indoctrination and was conveniently sick on the day the First Amendment was discussed in class. I'm just amazed at how gracefully Ellison is handling the whole situation, but it somehow doesn't seem right that a guy born and raised in the States and who ran on a platform for improving healthcare is taking a whole lot of heat for actions committed by people who aren't him. Talk about scapegoatin'. And what's even worse, there are a whole lot of people who agree with Goode's comments in the blogosphere. Ugh. Merry Christmas indeed.

Wednesday, December 20, 2006

Thumbity thumb thumb

I have the world's worst hangnail on my left thumb and it's very insistent about reminding me that it's there. So today, I wrapped a band-aid around it and suddenly, I lost the use of my thumb. It's amazing how hard it is to do simple tasks such as opening a bag of coffee when your thumb is incapacitated by nothing more than a band-aid. No wonder we were able to overtake monkeys as the kings (and queens) of the planets. Can we hear it for the opposable thumbs?

Meanwhile, speaking of evolutionary advances, a virgin komodo dragon is expecting.

Tuesday, December 19, 2006

Pretty

NBC has a free download of "O Holy Night" over here. It was performed on an ep of "Studio 60" last week and performed by musicians from New Orleans. Unfortunately the episode isn't available legally online.

Sunday, December 17, 2006

Cool ideas

I used the Cell Phone Lot of Sweat Sock City's international airport this evening while I was waiting to pick up a friend. I'd seen signs on previous trips and I was always like, "What's up with the Cell Phone Lot?" I finally learned on my last trip that it's a gigantic parking lot where you can go and park for free and wait for the person you're picking up to call you, thus eliminating the endless circling (a nightmare at big international airports) or actually parking your car and making the long haul to the terminal.

So this evening, I pulled in to the cell phone lot for the first time ever and took my place with about 30 to 40 other vehicles. At the far end of the lot was a little vending machine hut so you could get food if you needed to. Some people were walking around, including a father with his little boy who was wearing little sneakers with red lights on it. That was really fun to watch. Every now and then, a car would start up, its headlights streaking across the lot, and then it would pull out. I thought it was incredibly cute, because each departure from the lot signified an arrival.

Saturday, December 16, 2006

LotD

The link between vegetarianism and high IQs. Pretty cool.

Thursday, December 14, 2006

The war on Christmas

Apparently the War on Christmas is over now that Wal-Mart is no longer saying "Happy Holidays" or "Seasons Greetings" or whatever other innocuous phrase they were using. I'm all for wars ending, though the 'War on Christmas', mythical as it is, isn't the one I'm really that interested in in ending, but that's another post for another day. The point is, the War is over and we should all be dancing in the streets or something.

The thing is, I will wish people "Merry Christmas" all day long if that's what they want to hear. I have no problem if people wish me a "Merry Christmas". My issue is that the same people who insist on "Merry Christmas," who are upset at the very mention of "Seasons Greetings" or "Happy Holidays", don't seem to want to give that respect to those of us who might have different holidays that are just as important to us as Christmas is to them. My guess is these same people would totally flip out if a Muslim wished them a "Happy Ramadan". But hey, who cares about equality when the War on Christmas is over? I say, bring on the eggnog and your best Christmas shoes. There's going to be some partyin' now.

Wednesday, December 13, 2006

Pay it forward

My resolution for this year is to be a nicer driver. I mean, I don't think I'm a mean driver and road rage isn't something I experience (though I have been a victim once) but I do occasionally get impatient and once in a while, cut people off because I'm in a rush. So for the last couple of weeks, I've been trying to be nicer. I've been slowing down and letting people merge into traffic. What I'm learning though is that my actions are so foreign to people that they often don't get the hint, even when I blink my lights at them. They'll just sit there and eventually it gets to the point where I just give up. But still, I'm making the effort. My hope is that someone will remember that I let them in and they'll pass the favor on to someone else. Anything to make driving in Sweat Sock City a less miserable experience!

Sunday, December 10, 2006

Is this thing on?

Blogger has been less than reliable for the last few weeks and since I didn't have much of importance to say, I've been unmotivated to actually mess with it. Then, despite the fact Blogger has been cranky, last week I decided to migrate to the new version of the software and see what happens. I finally got the email confirmation that the blog was successfully migrated this morning. I still haven't figured out what all the new features are and the interface looks the same to me (which is nice for those of us who adjust slowly to change), but I wanted to go ahead and post to see how this thing worked. You know me -- anything new, shiny and techie, I'm on it. Cross your fingers that this migration means a new era of stability for the blog...

Sunday, December 03, 2006

Be careful what you wish for

I was reading the reviews for "The Sims: Deluxe Edition" on amazon.com because I was curious about the game and contemplating buying a cheap version of it. I've been playing "Civilization III" for years now and I wanted something new and shiny to play with, and so I thought, "Hmmm... Sims." Anyway, this review cracked me up. I'm still interested in the game, but it seems like it'd be huge investment of time. Maybe I'll settle on world domination instead in "Civilization III." No more Ms. Nice Guy!

Saturday, December 02, 2006

Huh

One of these days, I'll post all the blog posts from my drafts folder. Holy cow, I had no idea that there were so many posts that I'd written, thought better of, and clicked 'save' instead of 'publish'. Or maybe, I'll just hold out for the contract for my bestselling novel titled "If I Were Going to Hit Publish, This Is What The Post Would Say". After all, the Top Sekrit stuff has to remain Top Sekrit so I can sell many, many copies because we bloggers don't have many confessions to keep to ourselves.