Posts tagged: 2006

For anyone who had a really hard time getting just the free expander for stuffit (.sitx files) – here’s the link: StuffIt Expander: Free file expansion – Windows StuffIt Expander: Free file expansion – Mac

My past 3 weeks… I’ve worked ~210 hours… that averages to 70 hours per week… but really I worked almost 100 hours in one 7 day period. One day, i worked from 6am – 2am, and one day I worked from 9am – 2am. Always getting up and working the next day by 9am at the latest and working more than a full day… every day. Why would I do such horrendous work?

AutoHotkey – Free Mouse and Keyboard Macro Program with Hotkeys and AutoText: AutoHotkey is a free, open-source utility for Windows. With it, you can: Automate almost anything by sending keystrokes and mouse clicks. You can write a mouse or keyboard macro by hand or use the macro recorder. Create hotkeys for keyboard, joystick, and mouse. Virtually any key, button, or combination can become a hotkey. Expand abbreviations as you type them.

A great but disturbing email sent by my friend Jason E. (spoon): November 14th, 2006: A student is tasered five times while in police custody while in the library at UCLA. The cops tase him, not because he’s fighting them, but because he is (non-violently) refusing to walk out of the library with them. Note that the cop says, “Stand up or you’ll get tased again.” Of anything on this video that comment really sickens me the most.

Jamglue – Glue it to the man: This is a fantastic tool – to multi-track audio from a collaboartive environment with slick controls and a great/simple user interface. http://www.jamglue.com/people/zeroasterisk screencast tutorial http://blog.jamglue.com/ http://jamglue.com/ I just wonder who has time to make such a cool site… ther interface required would not be simple to whip together. I’m impressed. Get it while it’s beta/hot/free…

The Ultimate Sport – WSJ.com: Besides being relatively inexpensive to play, part of Ultimate’s appeal lies in the fact that stature isn’t as critical as speed and dexterity: catching, throwing, jumping and pivoting. One of the star players for the Filipino team Pula, Panoy de los Santos, for instance, is just 1.57-meters tall (but the fastest member of the team). Another attraction is that Ultimate is a noncontact game, so women like it as much as men do — 35% of the 500 players in the Philippines are female.

don’tvote.com – OH go vote – you voting can’t hurt anything, not voting might.

Marea and DJ’s wedding on Saturday Oct. 28th was wonderful. The wedding proper was at ~1pm at her father’s house in the Tyler Park area. It was supposed to be a very small event, which still ended up being 60+ people. It was an hour of hanging out, then 10 minutes of ceremony, and then an hour of eating and hanging out some more. The ceremony was basically: “we are all happy to be here… do you, and you?

I need some help from some people who understand finances better than I do, am I getting ripped off of a cent a month interest by my bank? (earth shattering importance, of course) Imagine the following (hypothetical) savings account earning 1% annual interest. 1% annual is (0.01 / 365) 0.000027397260274 daily interest. So for every day, you multiply the amount of money you have accruing interest by that daily amount… add the days together and you’ve got your interest amount for that length of days… when your money amount changes (when you add to it or reduce it) your calculations change, so you need to reflect that… a basic table is displayed below…

I would like to take a moment and give praise to Alan. For those who know him, know that he is awesomely quicky, white and nerdy. It gets better when you live with him! I have come home after a bad day several times this quarter, and he has cleaned. We’re not talking just dishes – we’re talkin dishes, sweeping, mopping, cat box, laundry, the whole nine yards. He does these things even though he’s been working all day and probably hasn’t had a much better day than I have.

Benny Benassi’s Satisfaction Videoclip. Warning: flesh and power tools do not always go together this well.

home of the nerd cave | taskbar shuffle and more: Once you download, install, and run Taskbar Shuffle, left-click and drag the programs/buttons on your Windows taskbar to rearrange them. It’s that easy. This is a great tool for those (like me) who usually have over a dozen applications they need to keep open at the same time for work or whatever… thus, you don’t have to hunt as hard for the open program you need to find.

Explorer Destroyer – Switch to Firefox, Make money from Adsense Referral: Get this tool for switching people from IE to Firefox. For each person you switch, Google gives you $1, Microsoft loses marketshare, and an angel gets its wings. I have thought about adding this to my site… I already annoy visitors with a note in the header… perhpas I should try to get paid a little for that annoyance (if successful).

[ Anita’s new wedding ring (the 3rd)]1 This is the 3rd wedding rind on Anita’s finger… all 3 from Alan, and all within the first 5-6 years of marriage. Luckily all three of them together are less than many people pay for one… this weighing in fairly high on the price list at ~$170… we purchased it from Donald R. Pekarek, the jeweler/goldsmith/artist who made it. He was at a local art fair a couple of weeks ago, here in Columbus and though we were not really in the market, decided that it seemed very Anita’ish and she wanted to have a ring again….

YouTube – Adam Menzies: Trampoline Demo: A totally amazing athlete – the movie is fair quality and 6 minutes with good variety. Anyone who enjoys jumping or climbing will be impressed.

Fun, sciencey videos/links: Water Balloon popping in slow motion Water Balloon, filling with dry ice, and collapsing in Liquid nitrogren Representation and explanation of 10 dimensional space (as described in string theory) GeoHacks – 30 minute interesting lecture on mapping and math Thinking Big: Robotics – 30 minutes interview on robotics and intelligence Protien Assembly – 13 min (1971) – hilarious cut-scenes Nagoya City Science Museum – 13 min in Japanese

Iddybud: The Buck Stops with Bush: What we have done in Iraq – the way we went about this venture – is something I’m sure that President Bush now regrets, even though he’d never admit it. We have a strategic nightmare on our hands, and we also have citizens of Iraq – not al Qaeda, but citizens – murdering one another. The children in the photo you see above are real.

Inside Toyota’s hybrid factory | CNET News.com: TOYOTA CITY, Japan–While you’re touring the assembly area in Toyota’s Tsutsumi auto plant, your mind keeps telling you that you’ve been here before. Then it hits you. It’s a lot like the Snow White ride at Disneyland. Robotic cars filled up with wiper blades and other parts amble along a track in the floor, taking parts from the procurement department to other ends of the factory.

YouTube – White and Nerdy- Weird Al This video/song is fantastic… it hits pretty close to home for me and several of my friends, though. Personally it’s hitting at least 40% acurate for me: I’m fluent in Javascript, do webpages for friends, got a friend who went to MIT, have stationary rims, i’ve got a soldering gun, i edit wikipedia, i can quote the whole “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”, and I wanna bowl with the gansta’s.

saw dan bern last night… he’s fantastic – still – always. his second song was “I do what I have to do to make me feel like a man…” which is a great song. during it, watching him, I realized that I too, am a man… sounds stupid, I know. I’ve been married for 6 years and have a real job and real responsibilities and nothing has changed in my life much for the last couple of years….

While suturing a cut on the hand of a 75-year-old Texas rancher, whose hand was caught in a gate while working cattle, the doctor struck up a conversation with the old man. Eventually, the topic got around to former Texas Governor George W. Bush and his elevation to the White House. The old Texan said, “Well, ya know, Bush is a ‘post turtle’.” Not being familiar with the term, the doctor asked him what a ‘post turtle’ was.

Here is a link to an article which paints a less than favorable picture of her. Watch the stock with interest… but you might not want to invest just yet. (note one of the comments that she was associated w/ the Enron disaster)

Talk Like A Pirate Day – September 19: Aye, we be needin’ ya to talk like pirate now or ye’ be considered a spinless land-lubber. If ye’ be needin’ some a guidance-like, watch “Pirates of the Carribian” again and hold fast.

Martha’s Vineyard- August 2006: [<img src="https://zeroasterisk.com/photos/main.php?g2_view=core.DownloadItem&g2_itemId=30381&g2_serialNumber=2" class="giThumbnail" alt="8.13.06" longdesc="Edgartown Yacht Club Annual Regatta" height="150" width="200" />][2] [<img src="https://zeroasterisk.com/photos/main.php?g2_view=core.DownloadItem&g2_itemId=30426&g2_serialNumber=2" class="giThumbnail" alt="August13,06" longdesc="The Edgartown Ligthouse. Featured in &quot;Jaws&quot;..." height="150" width="200" />][3]</p><div class="twttr_button">

MoveOn.org Political Action: The Senate must not pardon President Bush for breaking the law: “The Senate must not pardon President Bush for breaking the law by illegally wiretapping innocent Americans. Instead, Congress should be holding him accountable.”

CNN.com – GOP split as Senate panel bucks Bush on terror tribunals – Sep 15, 2006: The bill was backed by Republican Sens. John Warner of Virginia, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, Sen. John McCain of Arizona and Sen Lindsey Graham of South Carolina. It differs from the administration’s proposal in two major ways: It would permit terror suspects to view classified evidence against them and does not include a proposal that critics say reinterprets a Geneva Conventions rule that prohibits cruel and inhuman treatment of detainees.

Check out this wonderful (heh) picture of molly and Sarah going to Sarah’s wedding…

I got an email to view a video on mtvu.com, but thier crappy player wouldn’t work on windows XP pro 64… so, I went looking for other videos by them: For the Actor – Mates of State – Google Video Mates of State — Ha Ha – Google VideoMates of State – Goods (Its All In Your Head) – Google Video That’s all the MOS I could find… though there was a funny “dancing to” video here and a video commentary: { Mates Of State “Fraud In The 80’s” with director commentary by Arno Salters }.

IHTFP Hack Gallery:Fire Truck on the Great Dome: A buddy of mine who went to MIT sent me this… He said the students have to dodge building security to get to the top of the dome… and the got the fire truck up there by disassembling it, carrying up the parts, and reassembling it on top. Amazing! A lot more effort than most people I know would put into something…

PaperCut- Nghệ thuật độc đáo – ~o0Giải trí Việt Nam0o~:

I am going to volunteer for 7pm Friday… anyone else interested in putting their time where their mouth is… or their mouth on the phone, where their politics are? ———- Forwarded message ———- From: ******* Date: Sep 12, 2006 3:11 PM Subject: Call for Change Campaign Columbus To: alan blount Hello, We spoke on phone today and you expressed interest in helping with the Call for Change campaign to take back Congress.

CUDA Fall League 2006 started today… it was a lot of fun! Less serious than summer league, but a little more serious than a regular pickup game… we played light on numbers as a lot of players were out of town for tournaments. If you didn’t make it, but want to come out… you should!

Going to Lexington to visit Molly, Randy, Simon, and Gena… then going to Louisville. Got a friends dinner going on Sunday night, and family stuff Monday and Tuesday, then back to Colubmus. Leaving now.

Engineered cells beat cancer in human test | Chicago Tribune: In a small study of patients with terminal skin cancer, Maryland scientists have demonstrated for the first time that genetically engineered immune cells can kill off large tumors. The research, conducted by a team at the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, remains highly experimental, and it worked on just two of the 17 patients in the study. But excited government scientists said it is the first time gene therapy has vanquished an advanced cancer.

Five years after 9/11, the Bush administration has failed to keep us safe. In fact, we are less safe. The war in Iraq has diverted attention from protecting America from terrorism. In fact, this past week 9/11 commissioners said Iraq is distracting from security at home. The war in Iraq has inflamed the whole Middle East and is helping Al Qaeda attract new recruits. Osama Bin Laden is still on the loose.

Again, I’m amazed at the generosity of human beings. Perhaps silly, perhaps underused (no idea), and obviously narrow in scope… none the less, I’m still impressed that people have volunteered to make the following happen: Freedom Toaster Freedom Toasters are conveniently located, self-contained, computer-based, ‘Bring ‘n Burn’ facilities. Like vending machines, preloaded to dispense confectionery, Freedom Toasters are preloaded to dispense free digital products, including software, photography, music and literature.

I’m not nearly as anti-nuclear as most of my socially conceious friends… at least as it relates to nuclear power and research. That said, I’m seriously worried about the “bigger stick” theory as it escelates into… well… the upper ranges of weaponry we’ve had for a few decades. Though we’ve been sitting on (or making more) weapons and not really attacking with them (just testing them)… they exist to be used and can be within minutes from right now.

Anita, our step sister Maddie (14), and I went to Houston, from July 20 through August 1st. We drove. [map] First, we drove to and camped at the Hot Springs National Park, during the hottest part of a heat wave. Our A/C could occasionally not keep up, it was so hot… so when we ended up at the park, we went wading (which turned into swimming for some) in a creek that ran through the park.

Looking at the following article: Indian-born scientist developing coated DVD’s that can make hard disks obsolete ..: I find my self thinking that hard drives wouldn’t be obsolete, but OS installations might be. Already there are many LiveCD installations of Linux and Windows, which don’t require a Hard Drive at all, but simply boot to the CD/DVD… With more sophisitication and personalization options (there are already setups where you can store personalizations on a USB flash drive or something) I think the idea of a static state OS would be very appealing.

I don’t often randomly surf for people… but this guy [Matthias Wandel] wrote some software I was using (for the first time, about 5-6 years ago) [jhead] and I randomly browsed over to his personal site and thought he was really (really) cool… Neat projects and inventions, done both logically and creatively (a combination I admire and strive for, though which I tend to exhibit to a lessor degree). he came up in conversation again today and so I found his site again and found this page (among others) which just makes me go all warm and fuzzy:

I had written a decent post about freedom of speech and that it is mostly a facade, but even that facade is wonderful… but the post got lost in the ether (more accuratly, my computer rebooted for unknown reasons). Anyway, here are the news articles prompting the previous post: Secret government or a free press?{#r-1_0} “flag desecration is an unacceptable form of political protest” — U.S. SEN. BILL FRIST » Senate Rejects Flag Desecration Amendment And I ended up reading a chain of wikipedia articles which went something like:

Was the 2004 Election Stolen? Republicans prevented more than 350,000 voters in Ohio from casting ballots or having their votes counted — enough to have put John Kerry in the White House. BY ROBERT F. KENNEDY JR. This is a great article, full of well cited and reasoned points… pointing towards a conclusion which may well get you branded as a conspiracy theorist… but still seems the most likely explanation.

According to the article: Transcendental meditation good for stress: study it goes a bit further than just getting relaxed… Practicing transcendental medicine not only mellows the mind but may also calm the body’s damaging responses to stress that leads to heart disease and diabetes, researchers said on Monday. … Meditation has been previously shown to lower blood pressure, but researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, found it also decreased heart rate variability and insulin sensitivity.

Friday, Anita and I went to Bardstown, Ky to go “Moonlight Kyaking” with Theresa and some of her Rugby Teammates/friends [link]. Before we got there we swung by the Jim Beam plant (thinking it was where Myra did a bunch of cool carpentry work, but it wasn’t) and then the Bernheim Forrest. Bernheim has always been a great place to get back to nature a bit, but it’s gotten a lot nicer… the visitor’s center is amazing, and all the displays and trails we saw, were flawless.

I have really slacked on the the posting recently… I’ve had a good amount to talk about, but haven’t had the motivation to write anything. (at least none that coincides with available time) I’ve played a lot of [I have really slacked on the the posting recently… I’ve had a good amount to talk about, but haven’t had the motivation to write anything. (at least none that coincides with available time)

I have put off writing something in response to my visit to Houston, Tx. Partially due to laziness, and perhaps partially to allow more time for settling of experience… mostly laziness, I suspect. I was there from May 10th – 17th, 2006. About half of the reason I went was simply to have a vacation. It was a chaotic time at work for the prior 2 months and after working many 70 hour weeks in a row… it was time to do something else.

Text of an email I spammed to just about everyone I have an address for: ===INTRO============== I’m sorry to have sent what could be considered propaganda to you. I believe it’s well put together and raises very important questions, furthermore validating those questions and invalidating many official responses with evidence. Because of this, and because it’s so easy to send around (just a link to a video) I have decided to send it to just about everyone in my address book.

If you didn’t already know… Pandora.com. Yes, that’s right. What? You want to know what I’m talking about? Simply, it’s a brilliant option for listen to music. You go to that site, create an ID (only requires an email address) and you get a personalized (personalizable) streaming radio station determined from a seed artist or song. How does it know what music to select? It’s made by the people who did the music gennome project, so they have littereally mapped and classified music (fairly well, it seems) and allow you to guide your station(s) accordingly… bring in variety or isolate to a single vein; the choice is yours… I like that they have more music than I do (at least they have some music I don’t) and so I’m hearing stuff I like and know mixed with compatible music I don’t know.

What I’m reading today (political): Sometimes I do sit down and do an hour or 2 of reading and browsing. I have collected the stories that I would recommend to anyone else interested in our messed up government, situation in the current war (criminal occupation), and world in general. Guilty plea in US bribery probe : An ex-aide to a top Republican lawmaker has pleaded guilty to conspiracy in a corruption case that has rattled the US political establishment.

Sci-Fi Film Fest in Columbus from noon Saturday, April 22 until noon Sunday, April 23 @ the Drexel. Yup – I’m going… you should come… you should bring your friends… geeks – unite, support the geeks who are putting on this event, and eventually – take over the world (the same thing we do every night, pinky).

Interesting link : http://aaronland.info/nytimes/ Read the blurb at the top and then click on the first link [http://aaronland.info/nytimes/related/]. The top image is a map where the top NY Times stories are plotted… but below that is a thought-map, of sorts… a link-chart of buzzwords. kinda neat… to see that almost everything links to “violence” and that the “united church of christ” links only to “churches”, “television”, and “advertising”. just random / interesting.

I have setup a Flickr account/profile and played with it some… it’s totally awesome. I’ve heard of it for years, but haven’t needed anything like it, since I have gallery installed on a server on which I have nigh’-unlimited storage space… Anyway – that’s my excuse for being slow to jump on this bandwagon… I’m here now. The only question is deciding if I want to make the switch and pay for an unlimited account… then move all the photos I have in gallery into flickr… and worry about when their server goes down or looses all of my photos (not that such is likely, but less under my control).

A good laugh (followed by a frustrated sigh) : Guardian Unlimited | Guardian daily comment | God: I’ve lost faith in Blair And a much more sober / disconcerting / conspiracy-theory’ish (but no less true for that) link: www.scholarsfor911truth.org

I just got done watching the movie: Lord of War (2005) I think it was a good film, in the vane of “blow” and “traffic” but with a different angle and a semi-moral overtone. The best part, IMO, is the ending and the open and blatant fact that when it comes to weapons of any sort, the US not only has the most, but sells the most – seemingly to anyone else.

I just got done reading : The Brutal Christ of the Armageddonites – by Jon Basil Utley It’s a great overview of / perspective on the Christian “pro-end-of-the-world” movement which has begun (in this country) to not only become fairly popular, but to be largely represented in the government and the financial elite. This is, no doubt frightening… but again, it brings me back to one of my major complaints about most organized religion… arrogance.

so – there’s some buzz going on (yes, I’m a few days behind) about AOL and Yahoo letting companies pay (them) to send spam… but disallowing spam otherwise… what? If you could dis-allow it, do so. If your plan is put into effect, that means more spam in the inbox. It makes no sense. (links below) AOL/Yahoo Email Tax to Stop Spam: Why It Won’t Work – Gizmodo Yahoo and AOL Announce Pay Per Spam Email Project | Threadwatch.

The Would You Have Been a Nazi Test Achtung! You are 23% brainwashworthy, 18% antitolerant, and 28% blindly patriotic Congratulations! You are not susceptible to brainwashing, your values and cares extend beyond the borders of your own country, and your Blind Patriotism does not reach unhealthy levels. If you had been German in the 30s, you would’ve left the country. One bad scenario — as I hypothetically project you back in time — is that you just wouldn’t have cared one way or the other about Nazism.

Yes, once again, Alan is in posession of a mohawk… life is good – life is good. A mohawk is a wonderful thing for several reasons. Some of them are: I have hair on the top of my head still, might as well enjoy it. It improves my ultimate frisbee game (seriously). It reminds me and anyone else that I’m not really all the way old, yet. It helps instantly filter people, like John’s pants, for any who know.

We have had our bed now for over an week and it is fantastic. I actually found myself sleeping propped up on my elbows one morning – and it was comfortable. We got a Sealy : Reflexion : Venice Beach – a big latext foam bed. We bought it at us-matress.com, but we only had to buy the mattres (no box spring) so it ended up being a less than what you see as the cost.

I’m seeing a lot of articles (and people at work are linking me to even more) warning people about the new Google Desktop Search; like: Google Copies Your Hard Drive – Government Smiles in Anticipation Google today announced a new “feature” of its Google Desktop software that greatly increases the risk to consumer privacy. If a consumer chooses to use it, the new “Search Across Computers” feature will store copies of the user’s Word documents, PDFs, spreadsheets and other text-based documents on Google’s own servers, to enable searching from any one of the user’s computers.

If anyone in the ‘ville hasn’t heard about the New Skyscraper for Louisville – check it out… It looks really cool (in my opinion) and would be a great thing to claim for the city… not to mention, it’d be very nice to have a modern art museum (in a building island, no less). Also – a new google desktop search looks good (as expected).

If anyone is interested, go to https://political.moveon.org/donate/breakingthelaw.html to view the commercial spot (and the facts behind it) MoveOn is trying to get on the air. I’ve long said Bush is as bad or worse than Nixon – indeed, it looks like others are saying the same thing, better. And of course, if you wanted to play a similar game try waronterrortheboardgame.com.

*Seduction Style Quiz results: Au Natural* You rank up there with your seduction skills, though you might not know it. That’s because you’re a natural at seduction. You don’t realize your power! The root of your natural seduction power: your innocence and optimism. You’re the type of person who happily plays around and creates a unique little world. Little do you know that your personal paradise is so appealing that it sucks people in.

I was recently sent a link to the article Explosive Testimony: Revelations about the Twin Towers in the 9/11 Oral Histories, on the site 911truth.org. I think the article, though kind of long, deserves a read. I wasn’t there but i agree that something happened…. it is almost unbelievably incredible that both towers collapsed in such a seemingly controlled manner. If towers / buildings collapsed like that by design, building demolition companies wouldn’t have a job….

I’m in Louisville right now… there are a lot of people in the office for a flurry of meetings and it seemed appropriate for me to come as well. Our biggest meeting started at noon today, and ends at 3pm tomorrow. We stopped for dinner at ~6pm and I came back into the office to work on some stuff… got stuck reading email and working on a side project. Now I’m waiting on a bus to take me back to Theresa’s, where I’m staying….

<MoveOn.org> petition: The President Broke the Law President Bush admitted to personally authorizing thousands of allegedly illegal wiretaps, and he doesn’t plan to stop. Circumventing the Constitution is serious business. This is a big moment. People from across the political spectrum are standing together to protect the rule of law and the principles that are core to our identity as Americans. Can you sign this petition to show Congress that Americans want a thorough investigation of the president’s secret wiretapping program?

It my (Alan’s) 27th birthday today. Thanks to all who have sent cards, emails, IMs, phone calls, etc to wish me a happy one. I’m rather surprised so many people have remembered. Also, special thanks to the “check givers”… all that money is going into savings to replenish the money that was withdrawn to pay for our new bed (soon to arrive). I’m surprised to see that so many people sent jokes (or at least comments) about how old I was getting.

I read the following blog post linked from slashdot. It is part of the blog for SiteAdvisor… a tool for testing for adware / spyware. Those of you who still run into problems with adware and spyware, you might want to try this app out… it couldn’t hurt (unless it was a really clever double-agent type scam to get you to install it. no – i don’t think it is….. yes, it might be.

Here is a great interview with Noam Chomsky entitled There Is No War On Terror. Some of my favorite quotes from it, follow: This is even sometimes discussed. You can find it in the strategic analysis literature. Take, say, the invasion of Iraq again. We’re told that they didn’t find weapons of mass destruction. Well, that’s not exactly correct. They did find weapons of mass destruction, namely, the ones that had been sent to Saddam by the United States, Britain, and others through the 1980s.

I am excited to hear about the possible investigation for the impeachment of Bush (I’ve been calling for it for a while). Too bad it’s not something that I am hearing much about – you all? No? You’d think the investigation for presidential impeachment might be discussed on the evening news, eh? Kind of big news… it sure was when it was discussed as a possibility for Clinton. But not for Bush (yet).

I just got done reading the article: [ Colleagues force DeLay to relinquish grip on leadership of House]1 on The Guardian. I have already heard about this on blackwednesday.org, but it’s a story that makes me smile. Probably not as pleased as Al Franken, or many of the other people who really know how bad DeLay is… I’ve only heard what others (including Al Franken) have told me… but it’s enough to make me fear and loath him.

I have looked for this information before, but the planets have aligned and I was able to find what I was looking for. Here are complete instructions for how to download Real Audio streams and convert them to MP3 (or really, whatever) format: Windows Linux Note: there is actually much more useful information on those pages if you were interested. The tool for Windows is Flashget and for Linux, it’s simply mplayer.

It will be my 27th birthday in on Jan 17th. That is not exciting, but I’m going to try to use it as a ploy to get you (yes – you, the person reading this right now) to give me a present. It wont take money, and really only say… 10 minutes of your time. Please (please) read the following article: Blair Criminalizes His Critics by John Pilger. So many people have put what I would like to be able to say, more succinctly and convincingly than I can… so read their work.

Over 750,000 people have signed on to a letter urging the Senate to reject Samuel Alito’s nomination to the Supreme Court. If you sign on, we’re that much closer to making it a full one million: Sign the letter, (I did). You can also use MoveOn.org to send a letter to your senator about Alito. Personally, I think the lifetime apointments of Supreme Court Justices is dangerous in it’s own right, but I can understand it to some extent… I just think it’s dangerous that the court can sway – and then be stuck in it’s sway for so long.

Before we went to Houston, Anita and I spent some time in Louisville. We were able to see some friends and a good amount of family. We missed out on the big family events, as we were in Houston then… but we still got to play some games and relax and eat and all the basic events of together-hood. I worked in the Louisville office, but because most people weren’t there, I was able to get more work done than I usually do when I go into the office… but still less than I can get done at home… weird, huh?