random thinks

Merry Christmas!

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A couple of amusing, snarky comics to while away Christmas morning. See more at comics.com.

Susan is at work today (one of the downsides of being a pharmacist at a hospital) and I am whiling away the time until she gets home getting ready for us to leave. We are meeting my family tonight in Las Vegas for a few days of "change of scenery". I've never been, and am looking forward to going, but this is a lot of air travel for us in the last couple of weeks. Fortunately this trip is a non-stop flight.

Intelligent Design...bah!

I thought this was appropriate for today. See more "Speed Bump" at comics.com. I just heard via slashdot about the good people of Dover PA getting rid of the F%^&ing idiots on their School Board who pushed the so-called "theory" (and the term can only be used loosely) of Intelligent Design into the science classrooms. All eight of those morons who were up for election were defeated. Couldn't have happened to a nicer bunch of folks, IMO. Read one of the stories here (The Register, UK).

Pat Oliphant on the GOP and Schiavo

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I saw this in my daily e-mail of comics. There are so many things to say about the Schiavo case, but I cannot articulate any of them without getting myself into a ranting fit and saying things that I oughtn't. I can only wish that this cartoon would come true. Check out ucomics.com for more Oliphant.

Very Strange Weather

Yesterday afternoon, the temperature was in the low 50's and it warmed up throughout the night and it was 56 degrees when I got up at 5AM. At some point, the temp started dropping like Ben Affleck's career prospects after Daredevil. I have no idea how cold it is right now, but it is snowing instead of raining.

All the snow is gone, except for the huge snowplowed piles. It's muddy as hell, and squishy, and pretty nasty.

I never thought I'd be saying this, but bring back the freeze and snow cover.

Can We Get Him to Take His Boss With Him???

Interesting news: Attorney General John Ashcroft Resigns: Says U. S. Safe From Terror. Read the article. It says we're safe from crime too!

I guess all the terrorists quit right after they saw the election? Dick Cheney must have been right when he threatened that a vote for John Kerry was a vote for the terrorists. Kerry lost, so the bad guys are hanging it up.

I feel so much safer now. But probably not the way that they meant me to.

Election Day

Today is the day we decide.

Go out and vote.

I don't care who you vote for, just go out and vote.

If you don't, please do the rest of the world the courtesy of not complaining about the outcome.

That is all.

Last Night's Lunar Eclipse

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Last night's lunar eclipse was pretty beautiful. It was a nice night to sit out (a little chilly) and watch the changes. Rather peaceful, taking the time to watch something so slow moving, yet engaging at the same time.

G5 iMac

It's here! I checked the Apple website this morning and saw the new pics of the new box. Pretty sleek. An all in one monitor/CPU that is only two inches thick. 17" and 20" widescreen LCDs. 1.6 and 1.8 GHz G5's 533 and 600 MHz FSB's. 80 or 160 GB SATA HD's NVIDIA GeForce FX 5200 Ultras. Sorry, slipped into geekspeak there.

Looks pretty sweet. I can already imagine some of the interesting stuff that might come up. It is hard to have a CD/DVD drive that spins fast at a nearly vertical angle.

I am jealous of the new box, but not jealous enough to give up my trusty 15" 1st rev LCD iMac, and about $1300 - 1900.

Check it out though. Another impressive design from the gang in Cupertino.

Bad Olympians! No Blogging for You!

Sorry about the title, I could not think of a better one.

It would seem that the IOC is preventing Olympic athletes, coaches, support staff and officials from blogging while the games are going on. They are threatening to yank credentials from anyone caught doing this. They are also banning them from using any self generated media (photos or video) even after the games.

What a crock. With the lack of ticket sales, you'd think the IOC would welcome any publicity it could get.

You can read the article at CNN.com: Olympians largely barred from blogging.

Olympic Badminton Rocks!

I caught Olympic Badminton for the first time today as I was waiting for tech support to pick up the phone. Korea vs Indonesia men's match. It was incredible to watch. Kind of like a mix of table tennis and hard court tennis, mostly in slow motion, with little fits of blazing speed. Very cool. I have heard people knock this as not being a "real" sport, but I think that is crap. These guys were working pretty hard, and there was quite a bit of strategy present.

Of course, this was being broadcast on CNBC, as NBC only seems to be broadcasting the mass appeal activities.

Now...to find the rhythmic gymnastics and synchronized swimming!