Just got back from a longish trip. It's nice to be back home, even though the trip was fun while it lasted.
I don't live in an urban area at the moment, so I have to deal with my fair share of critters. Thankfully, they were good while we were gone, and nothing has visibly been investigated by them.
It's cold and windy out tonight. It's really too bad that they lead such harsh lives, especially on nights like these. I'd hate to be a injured little critter with the gusts as they are this evening.
Monday, June 27, 2011
Thursday, June 23, 2011
Good & Bad
Yikes, three days with no post. Not as though anyone has likely found this little section of the internet yet, but who knows?
Still, I should keep up with the posts. Do you know that the average blog has a life-span of approximately 6 months? Read it in an old study, though that might have changed recently. Seems to be a lot more dead sites out there. That and a lot of blogs seem to be "slowing down", as it were. Especially the news & politics blogs, a lot of the ones I go to have either...
A) Authors slowing down due to crushing dispair, or,
B) Authors slowing down because blogging about worldly affairs interacts negatively with their blood pressure medication.
Actually, now that I think about it, I haven't actually posted an "opinion" piece yet. The Portland post wasn't a opinion piece as its a fact that Portland is a glorified hole in the ground. But nothing yet where I have publicly analyzed an event based off of information that may or may not be accurate. Let's do that today. Both links are courtesy of the Drudge Report. Yes I actually have read the articles before posting them, I don't post headlines. I *do* have a little time in the day.
Story #1 (the good news): Archaeologists to raise ancient Egyptian ship
Drudge cycled this story off his page just before I posted it, but it was on there. Anyway, this is actually a pretty cool story, as its not every day you find an ancient Egyptian boat lying around, much less one owned by a Pharaoh. I don't think that this will boost tourism to Egypt a whole lot, as the country's social and economic problems have escalated since Mubarak was kicked out of the big seat. But from a historical (and a historical engineering) standpoint, this is a magnificent find.
Story #2 (the bad news): No Bibles or Jews on DELTA flights to Saudi Arabia
Actually this is NOT the story Drudge linked to. Apparently USA Today messed around with the story just a few minutes ago, replacing the original article with a bunch of "xxx"'s. Most strange. That said, the linked OpEd (also on USA Today's site) has the gist of the article down.
In any event, I will definitely will try and avoid flying on DELTA from now on if at all practicable. DELTA sucks anyway. Most people would be better served by practically any other airline. Even ValuJet. And yes, ValuJet still exists...but it's hiding. It seems to have gotten a bit better over the years, they don't crash very often anymore.
I seem to have gotten a bit off subject. Oh well.
Still, I should keep up with the posts. Do you know that the average blog has a life-span of approximately 6 months? Read it in an old study, though that might have changed recently. Seems to be a lot more dead sites out there. That and a lot of blogs seem to be "slowing down", as it were. Especially the news & politics blogs, a lot of the ones I go to have either...
A) Authors slowing down due to crushing dispair, or,
B) Authors slowing down because blogging about worldly affairs interacts negatively with their blood pressure medication.
Actually, now that I think about it, I haven't actually posted an "opinion" piece yet. The Portland post wasn't a opinion piece as its a fact that Portland is a glorified hole in the ground. But nothing yet where I have publicly analyzed an event based off of information that may or may not be accurate. Let's do that today. Both links are courtesy of the Drudge Report. Yes I actually have read the articles before posting them, I don't post headlines. I *do* have a little time in the day.
Story #1 (the good news): Archaeologists to raise ancient Egyptian ship
Drudge cycled this story off his page just before I posted it, but it was on there. Anyway, this is actually a pretty cool story, as its not every day you find an ancient Egyptian boat lying around, much less one owned by a Pharaoh. I don't think that this will boost tourism to Egypt a whole lot, as the country's social and economic problems have escalated since Mubarak was kicked out of the big seat. But from a historical (and a historical engineering) standpoint, this is a magnificent find.
Story #2 (the bad news): No Bibles or Jews on DELTA flights to Saudi Arabia
Actually this is NOT the story Drudge linked to. Apparently USA Today messed around with the story just a few minutes ago, replacing the original article with a bunch of "xxx"'s. Most strange. That said, the linked OpEd (also on USA Today's site) has the gist of the article down.
In any event, I will definitely will try and avoid flying on DELTA from now on if at all practicable. DELTA sucks anyway. Most people would be better served by practically any other airline. Even ValuJet. And yes, ValuJet still exists...but it's hiding. It seems to have gotten a bit better over the years, they don't crash very often anymore.
I seem to have gotten a bit off subject. Oh well.
Monday, June 20, 2011
Smile, Simple, Stupid
I was trying to design an elaborate background for the last few hours, with every effort invested coming back unsatisfactory, when I remembered the aforementioned "three S's". Remembering that every other blog I go to on a regular basic also has a simple background, I dumped my previous efforts and came up with the black, gray and blue scheme you see in front of you presently. Not the most original scheme out there but at least it won't make you cry blood.
Soon I should begin blogging in earnest (barring the recent Portland post, of course). WE ARE GONNA FEEL THE WORKRATE.
Soon I should begin blogging in earnest (barring the recent Portland post, of course). WE ARE GONNA FEEL THE WORKRATE.
Demonstrating the Intellectual Capacity of a Broken Toaster
A few years ago I toured the West Coast of the United States. One of the localities I happened to visit was Portland, Oregon. I only spent a few hours there, and yet it made an indelible impression on me that will last a lifetime. Truly, it is one of the worst places in the United States. More hobos and street thugs per square foot than any other city in the nation, and it seems that there is a bit of a widespread drug problem amongst all classes in that city. Either that, or the locals are simply less lucid than other areas of the country.
For example, the restaurant (a rather nice one actually) I went to was mostly empty, but the conversations being held in it were...interesting to say the least. Like the engaged couple who called into the restaurant and wanted them to cater their wedding, with the caveat that none of the food was prepared with utensils or on surfaces that had EVER touched a dead animal, on a $7,500 budget. The only problem is that it would cost the restaurant ~$30,000 to get new equipment, as it was not a strictly vegan establishment. The couple wanted them to go buy new equipment and food anyway and stay within the $7,500 budget. The staff, who were otherwise rather professional, were so pissed that they screamed to each other about it for 10 minutes. Which is how I found out about it.
And the people immediately next to me were rather interesting as well. A man was trying to convince a woman about a possible course of action for the evening, which I will lay out thusly:
1) They go back to his place.
2) They watch movies there.
3) She doesn't go home, but he doesn't have sex with her. (He was a bit loud on that point)
4) She sleeps on the couch. (Or maybe he would; the details are a bit fuzzy so many years later, either way its a stupid idea)
Naturally, the woman didn't think that would work out well. After she said this, the man repeated the plan again. And again, the woman didn't say "NO", but said it wouldn't be a workable plan as-is. So then the guy repeated the plan again, the woman said "its not feasible" again...and it never ended. The same conversational line went on and on AND ON. For nearly a whole hour! Of course they both seemed a bit mentally sluggish, but I chalked it up the to the local drug problem, as they were hardly the only people I had encountered up to that point who seemed to have issues with cognitive throughput.
If you think I am being horribly unfair, please take a look at this more recent story from the Portland area. Some people might be surprised at the rank idiocy of dumping 8 million gallons of water from a reservoir because someone took a leak in it. But I'm not. It's Portland.
For example, the restaurant (a rather nice one actually) I went to was mostly empty, but the conversations being held in it were...interesting to say the least. Like the engaged couple who called into the restaurant and wanted them to cater their wedding, with the caveat that none of the food was prepared with utensils or on surfaces that had EVER touched a dead animal, on a $7,500 budget. The only problem is that it would cost the restaurant ~$30,000 to get new equipment, as it was not a strictly vegan establishment. The couple wanted them to go buy new equipment and food anyway and stay within the $7,500 budget. The staff, who were otherwise rather professional, were so pissed that they screamed to each other about it for 10 minutes. Which is how I found out about it.
And the people immediately next to me were rather interesting as well. A man was trying to convince a woman about a possible course of action for the evening, which I will lay out thusly:
1) They go back to his place.
2) They watch movies there.
3) She doesn't go home, but he doesn't have sex with her. (He was a bit loud on that point)
4) She sleeps on the couch. (Or maybe he would; the details are a bit fuzzy so many years later, either way its a stupid idea)
Naturally, the woman didn't think that would work out well. After she said this, the man repeated the plan again. And again, the woman didn't say "NO", but said it wouldn't be a workable plan as-is. So then the guy repeated the plan again, the woman said "its not feasible" again...and it never ended. The same conversational line went on and on AND ON. For nearly a whole hour! Of course they both seemed a bit mentally sluggish, but I chalked it up the to the local drug problem, as they were hardly the only people I had encountered up to that point who seemed to have issues with cognitive throughput.
If you think I am being horribly unfair, please take a look at this more recent story from the Portland area. Some people might be surprised at the rank idiocy of dumping 8 million gallons of water from a reservoir because someone took a leak in it. But I'm not. It's Portland.
Saturday, June 18, 2011
Plus ça change...
The title refers to the recent font change which (depending on your browser) you may or may not have noticed. I used @font-face CSS scripting; it temporarily overrides the original font used by Blogspot. So far it seems to work fine for IE 8 and Opera 11, and given compatibility research I've done this should mean that if you are using IE 4-8, Opera 10.5 [EDIT: or later], or recent versions of Chrome and Safari, you should be seeing the new font.
I have IE9 on another machine, and the font is NOT loading there. So IE9 and (maybe) Firefox might not be loading the new font. I will fix it for IE9, considering that pretty much everyone uses Internet Explorer and sooner or later IE9 or its successors will have a large adoption rate.
But anyway, a large piece of the blog's future style is now integrated and operational. Now I just have to find a decent background picture and we are all set for prime time.
I have IE9 on another machine, and the font is NOT loading there. So IE9 and (maybe) Firefox might not be loading the new font. I will fix it for IE9, considering that pretty much everyone uses Internet Explorer and sooner or later IE9 or its successors will have a large adoption rate.
But anyway, a large piece of the blog's future style is now integrated and operational. Now I just have to find a decent background picture and we are all set for prime time.
Friday, June 17, 2011
Nothing New Yet
The page is still in the process of being formatted. I have a few tricks I'm working on still. It all involves time and money, as usual.
But I want to keep this venture current so, for the time being, I may as well include a new post regarding the last subject discussed here: Greece. Apparently Germany and France are trying to save the sinking ship that is the Greek economy.
Yep, good luck with that one.
Need to start posting about something other than Greece, though.
But I want to keep this venture current so, for the time being, I may as well include a new post regarding the last subject discussed here: Greece. Apparently Germany and France are trying to save the sinking ship that is the Greek economy.
Yep, good luck with that one.
Need to start posting about something other than Greece, though.
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
The Revolution Might Be Televised
The layout of this blog is still being developed, as it was just opened minutes ago.
In the meantime, if you have found your way here some how, I would like to turn your attention to Greece momentarily. The situation there has the potential of becoming quite interesting in the very near future.
In the meantime, if you have found your way here some how, I would like to turn your attention to Greece momentarily. The situation there has the potential of becoming quite interesting in the very near future.
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