Land of Oz

Bits and Pieces

Spam, not SPAM®
I really don't get it. This week my yahoo.com email account filtered out 776 spam messages. .Over 200 of them came from the same source since they were using dates in 2009 to 2036 range to get to the top of the list That's something new along with the multiple copies of crap messages as you can see in the image.

Business Cents

FORT WORTH, Texas - RadioShack Corp. followed through on its announced plans to cut about 400 jobs, but the electronics retailer has been forced on the defensive about its method of notifying laid-off employees by e-mail. ... RadioShack has also closed nearly 500 stores, consolidated distribution centers and liquidated slow-moving merchandise in an effort to shake out of a sales slump. Sales of cellular phones, a key item for RadioShack, have been disappointing. ... Last month, the company hired a former Kmart executive, Julian Day, as chief executive, replacing an interim leader who stepped in when the previous CEO quit after admitting lying on his resume.

You're having trouble with your business so you hire someone who helped take their company into bankruptcy. You gotta love the American way.

Bad Thought of the Night
Late last night while driving home I watched either a drunk or just plain bad driver in a pickup truck jump in front of me and another car coming the other way. The truck then weaved down the road occasionally flashing the brake lights and finally turning off the highway onto another side road while I slowed way down and let him get a long ways in front of me. My thought as he turned off was that he hit a tree before he had a chance to hit someone else.

Bad Thought of the Day
Another 15 year old was shot and killed recently. According to all, she was a good girl who wouldn't do anything wrong and never deserved this. She was also in the back seat of a car full of guys at 12:30 a.m. driving through a known gang area of the city. Mom - get a clue - your kid doesn't need to be out at 12:30 a.m. in the middle of the week.

Not a Bad Thought, but Reality
To folks who look Arab. I understand you're not all terrorists. I understand you don't feel you should be picked out because of your race. However, in today's world, you're going to be and you don't need to make it worse on yourself. Yes, you should be able to get on a plane wearing a t-shirt with Arabic script, and yes you're going to be hassled if you do. Yes, you should be able to buy 200 cell phones at 1 a.m. in a little mid-western town, and yes, you're going to be hassled if you do. Yes, you should be able to wear a burnoose, gather in a crowd and gab, and yes, you're going to be hassled if you do. Sorry, but that's just the way it is right now.

Tires -- again

I don't get the problem with tire companies. Recently we bought four Goodyear tires for my wife's car this time at Discount Tire. In the past (last year) I bought my Goodyears at Northwest Tire. The main reason for me trying a new dealer this time was the experience I had at my last shopping trip at Northwest. This time the prices were about the same with both outfits saying they'd match the other's prices. I decided to spend my $400+ at Discount Tire this time.

Naturally, they didn't check the spare. OK, this time I didn't ask. However, you'd think a tire company would check on the spare. If it was missing or in crappy shape, they'd have another possible sale on their hands. At least checking it would keep me from cussing them out if I did have a flat at 1 a.m. on a back road and found a flat spare. It wasn't close by the way either, it was 10 pounds low. Now to my pet peeve - tire pressures.

The invoice states the inflation pressure should be 32 p.s.i. Naturally, that's not what the car plaque says. It says 29 p.s.i. for normal driving and 32 p.s.i. if the car's load is maxed out. OK, even here, I can understand them getting it too high, it would increase mileage, shouldn't affect handling too much, and is still within specs. However (of course there's a however) they didn't even follow her own specs. Two tires had 32 and two tires had 35. I could kind of see that if the difference was front/rear, but it was driver/passenger side. The driver's side had 32 p.s.i. and the passenger side had 34 - 35 p.s.i.

Why do tire companies say tire pressure is so important (Discount Tires even gave me a free tire gauge) when they never follow the specs? On the Goodyear Web site it says in one place, "Visit your local Goodyear store and get your tire pressure checked for free. Proper tire maintenance is the key to maximizing the life of your tires." and on another page "Air Pressure Check - You may be able to improve your gas mileage by more than $1.50* simply by keeping your tires properly inflated. The recommended tire pressure for your vehicle is located on a sticker inside the driver-side door jam or glove box." The Discount Tire site says, "Air Pressure— The most important item " and on another page in their site, "If you consider the liabilities of not maintaining the correct air pressure -- poor gas mileage, loss of tire life, bad handling (perhaps even loss of control), and potential vehicle overloading -- then the need to routinely add air to your tires will become clearer." I wonder if these companies ever read their own PR?

Urban Jungle

Again. Yes, for all you animal lovers, I'm back to trapping cats in the backyard again. There haven't been as many this year, but so far, one cat has fallen to the trap. This was a nasty, nasty black cat. Both ears were just about gone, and good god, what a stench. I got within about 8 feet of the cage and he hissed and growled and carried on. Honestly, he made me wary of him even inside the cage. I cut some cardboard and wrapped it around the cage until I could get him to animal control. And of course this poor cat is being fed by some of our idiot neighbors. There's no way on earth anyone can convince me this beat-up, torn-up, sick ol' cat was better off alive than dead. I just wish its original owners could be held accountable.

And an update on some of my pet loving neighbors. One of them got tossed from their rental house after not paying the rent. Actually, I'm guessing this was the reason, based on the fact their electricity was turned off due to non-payment. Anyway, they left their whining little dog behind after they packed up and left. My understanding was that another neighbor called the landlord, who inturn called the mother-in-law of the sterling renters, who came to pick up the abandoned pup.

These stupid people who scarf up pets, give them less thought than they do to a pile of rags, just plain suck. You get this idiots who move into a home and figure that grants them the right to keep some animal chained up in their yard. Why? They don't play with them, or spend time with them, or even treat them any better than a rock. Why don't they just buy a brick and keep it chained to the garage. Then, every now and then, they can kick the brick and put some stale water in front of it. Or better yet, how about chaining themselves to their wall and spending the day sitting in the hot sun on the hot dirt. And people who know me wonder why I dislike people.

This Just Sucks

I just heard that Pluto lost its status as a planet. You can quote all the scientific mumbo-jumbo you want, but this is just plain wrong. Why pick on Pluto? It was just minding its own business way out there in the big beyond. All of sudden a bunch of IAU nitwits decide to strip poor lonely Pluto of its planethood. Of course this is from the bunch who feel that distance based on some minute fraction of the circumference of our planet (at least it's still a planet for now) is much better than the distance from toe to heel.

As much as I'm for the scientific methodology, (note, I am aware of the difference between astronomy and astrology, and that sun is actually bigger than the moon) somethings should be left alone. And Pluto is planet - rest easy Clyde.

Magazine Peeves

I like to read magazines. I subscribe to several, buy several from the newsstand, and read some at libraries and break rooms. For all that, there's a bunch of stuff that really ticks me off about them. And yes, while I understand the reasoning behind most of the problems I identify, I still don't like them.

Blow in cards. One or two is one thing, but some magazines seem to come with dozens these days. Next time you go to Barnes and Noble or Waldens look at the floor in front of the magazine rack and you'll dozens of cards on the floor depending on how often the clerks clean up. However, I think what's worse are the bound in cards. Many are bound in so tight, that you rip the page trying to pull them out. There should be only one or two cards, either blown in or lightly glued in. They do make good bookmarks.

Bound in junk. I've been getting magazines lately where the bound in ad/magazinelet/whatever (sometimes it's hard to tell) is bigger than the actual magazine I bought. I really hate the extra thick pages that are bound in as tight as the normal pages. I'm sure I'm not the only one who likes to flip through the pages and those fat pages always make you skip a page or two (which is what I'm sure they're designed to do). It's not bad when you have something glued in with the snot-looking glue, you can pull them out and roll the glue up into a little snot ball decoy, but they usually come out without damage. Which is more than you can say for the heavy single pages bound in. I tear all that crap out and bin it without even reading it.

Ads that look like copy. This bugs me big time. There's sometimes a "advertising section" header or footer, but the ad is still designed to look like it's part of the magazine. Sometimes those things are dozens of wasted pages long - and again, it's tear and toss for me. Even if it means I sometimes lose a real article or two.

Lastly, continued articles and no page numbers. I understand trying to get certain stories in the front of the magazine, so they tack on the rest of the story hidden in the back someplace. Why not keep it all together - I'm not going to skip an article just because it's towards the back of the magazine, but I'm more likely to give up in disgust after trying to find the continued pages - because most of the time there aren't any damn page number in the back. It'll be continued on page 125 and the closest page number is 98, so you have to count from there. If you want to continue stories all over the back of your magazine, you should be bound by law to put page numbers back there.

Talking and talking...

I work in a customer service center. Most of the folks here spend all shift sitting under a set of headphones listening to people's complaints and troubles. I did start out doing that, but quickly realized that wasn't my thing. I went back to school, got my Masters and returned as a technical writer on the Web with minimal phone interactions.

But the point of this is the other people on the phones. I watch these folks spend all day on a phone, controlled by the second, and then watch as they hang up and log off for a break or lunch. And you know what many of them do? They grab their cell and start talking on it - after spending all day on the phone, the first thing they do when done talking on a phone is to start talking on a phone.

When I walk outside I see them dodging clouds of nicotine laden smoke, and talking on a phone. You go to the break room for a soda and chips and they're sitting there - talking on the phone. And even those without cells - there's a couple - use the outside phone lines when they're on break. And of course there's some who are answering email, looking at their cell, reading an IM and talking on their headset.

And I can remember asking the operator to get 206 for me after waiting for our party line to clear.

Not Just Me

ROXBURY, Massachusetts (Reuters)[Aug 20] "... In a shift from trends of the past decade, violent crime is on the rise, fueling criticism of Bush administration policies as a wave of murders and shootings hits smaller cities and states with little experience with serious urban violence. ... one of the shocking examples of a rise in the murder rate across the United States that is raising questions about whether police are fighting terrorism at the expense of crime."

This is an interesting article. A couple of weeks ago, I was saying the same thing, more or less. Our small town (under 60,000) has seen more murders and shootings this year than it has over the last 5 years put together - much to the surprise of the local police chief. (As a separate story, he didn't even know that crime was up - in fact he was quoted as saying crime was down - and he's the chief!!) Last week, a 13 year old pled guilty to trying to shoot a cop - he's also the subject of one of my rants - remember his mom was wailing her kid wouldn't do anything wrong.

I honestly hadn't given much thought to the idea that cops were preoccupied with fighting Al Queida (does anyone spell this the same way twice?) and weapons of mass destruction. Last week Caro, Michigan (pop. 4,000) tossed some guys in jail under suspicion of plotting to blow up Big Mac, the bridge, not the burger. And while I'm pretty sure they were doing something wrong - or at least very suspicious, blowing up a bridge wasn't it.

All-in-all, it's hardly comforting to know you're not alone with an increase in shootings, murders and other violent crime. BTW, if it isn't "a hate crime" does that automatically make it "a love crime?"

America's Got Talent

This wasn't too bad a show. Obviously it had its highs and lows. They picked the winner last night, some eleven year old singer. I was definitely in agreement with the top three, but I think one of the other two acts should've won.

Here's some stuff I liked and didn't like about the show. I don't like the idea that the top three acts were all "ordinary" acts. Let's face it, female singers and Celtic bands aren't all that rare. There are many other shows that are trying to find some singer or another, American Idol, Pop Star, and others are all set up for singers. To my mind, the Celtic band and the yodeler are a little bit harder to find. A plain female singer, no matter how young and talented is just one of several thousands out there.

I think there's a need for Pierce. A lot of this thought is probably because I found him saying almost exactly the same thoughts I was having as I watched the act. Brandy and "The Hoff" (of all nicknames) seemed much too nice and uncritical to be judges. One good example is his ongoing feud with the quick-change acts. Yes, they were very good and I don't have really know how they did it - however, all three of their appearances were basically exactly the same; one wig change, one guy change, change in a banner, change through a box or in a bag, change in a hoop, and duck under confetti. Three times. Yes, a singer sings, but the winners changed their act. And the Millers. Yes, I know he's your brother, but ditch the singer or at least push him way back into the background - he isn't that good - but your harmonica playing is cosmic.

Some final thoughts: I'm really glad rappin' granny didn't make it - thankfully, she didn't even finish in the top five. I was worried for a bit when they first broke them up. And the dude catching the bar with his feet!! Wow! That impressed me. The last magician was almost too polished and slick to be in this kind of show. Had he swapped his 2nd and 3rd show, I think he might have had a better chance. The Celtic folks were so-so good. There was a finely tuned team performance. The overheads always showed them right in line. Lee on the piano - great, but take a couple more years to age - and don't sing (or yell). At Last and the southern cloggers, you both blew this last performance - the one that counted. Your previous performance was so much better.

Lastly, less plain singers and more variety. If you want to sing go on American Idle.

Caro, MI, continued...

This is too good to let pass by...
Reene, whose statement cited the experience of Caro police officials and consultation with federal and other agencies involved in the investigation, said "all decisions relating to these cases have been and will continue to be guided by an objective view of the evidence." He also stated he wasn't backing off "1/4 inch."

But on Monday, Daniel Roberts, the special agent in charge of the FBI's Detroit office, said "there is no information to indicate that the individuals arrested have any direct nexus to terrorism."

And Michigan State Police Director Peter Munoz discounted the idea the men were plotting against the 8,614-foot suspension bridge. Reene was studying the FBI statement, an official in his office said, but had not responded to it by late Monday. He did not return phone calls to his office and home. The men remained in custody and the charges had not been dropped.

But there's more...
Later today, Reene has withdrawn the charges, however the Feds have filed new charges of one count Conspiracy to Traffic in Counterfeit Goods and one count of money laundering.

However in Barney's (I mean Reene's) defense, I also heard that the FBI did send out warnings to all local authorities to keep an eye out for people who were making bulk cell phone buys - and these idiots - Middle East descent or not - did try to sneakily buy them in America's heartland at 1 in the morning. Probably New York or LA wouldn't notice strange crap going on at 1 a.m., but for Caro, Michigan - buying 80 cell phones at 1 a.m. three at a time is suspicious.

Kinda Late - you think??

Hundreds of soldiers shot for 'cowardice' to be pardoned
By Genevive Roberts 16 August 2006
Pte Harry Farr, shot for cowardice during the First World War, is to be granted a pardon posthumously. His pardon came as Des Browne, Minister of Defence, said all 306 soldiers executed during the First World War for cowardice and military offences would be issued a group pardon.

My "Heroes"

First, I'm not really a sports fan - except for maybe the Packers and women's indoor volleyball. So just for yucks, I searched for "police" on ESPN. This was the first page of results...

ST. PETER, Minn. -- Minnesota Vikings receiver Koren Robinson was arrested on suspicion of drunken driving Tuesday night near the team's training camp.

WASHINGTON -- Former NBA player Lonny Baxter was arrested by uniformed Secret Service agents on Wednesday after shots were fired from a vehicle about two blocks from the White House.

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Clarett was arrested last week following a police chase near the home of a woman set to testify against him in a January robbery. Four loaded guns were found in his sport utility vehicle, and officers said they had to use pepper spray to subdue him because he was wearing a bullet-proof vest that thwarted their stun guns.

STOCKHOLM, Sweden -- Sweden's former 400-meter hurdler Sven Nylander, one of five people involved in a drug bust at a party during the European Athletics Championships, said Tuesday he used cocaine.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Titans defensive tackle Randy Starks missed practice Monday, but coach Jeff Fisher said the player charged with domestic assault on his fiancee will be back Tuesday.

CINCINNATI -- Cincinnati waived defensive tackle Matthias Askew on Tuesday, one of five Bengals accused of breaking the law in the past three months.

LOS ANGELES -- USC receiver Dwayne Jarrett and lineman Thomas Herring were briefly detained by police early Tuesday after they were picked up by a female driver in a car that may have been used during a crime, authorities said.

Arkansas -- McFadden, the dynamic back who was the 2005 SEC freshman of the year, had surgery for a dislocated toe in late July -- after a police report says he was involved in a fight outside a Little Rock club.

War?? on drugs

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. agents on Tuesday arrested 138 people [nationwide] in a crackdown on a heroin trafficking organization...

Wow - I'm certainly impressed. I can see why this needed to be up in the headlines. Just think, 138 people connected with pushing heroin busted. I'm sure this will cripple the industry. Just imagine, there's probably thousands of addicts without their fix today - or at least 5 or 6 anyway.

ONDCP says:Approximately 398,000 (0.2%) reported past year [2003] heroin use and 166,000 (0.1%) reported past month heroin use. ...worldwide potential illicit opium production increased to 5,361 metric tons. This is up from 3,549 metric tons during 2003. During FY 2003, Federal agencies seized 5,643 pounds of heroin under the Federal-wide Drug Seizure System (FDSS).

Now the preceding paragraph was taken from a government site - so... Anyway, as you can see the government's War on Drugs is going so well, they managed to seize over 2,000 metric tons more heroin that was produced worldwide. Damn good job Mr. Pres. It's math like that is making our economy strong.

The War on Drugs is working even worse than the war in Iraq. We spend billions trying to catch folks importing, manufacturing and dealing drugs. This use and abuse of mind altering chemicals has been going on since Ooog first O.D.ed on mushrooms - and will continue until Mizar III O.D.s on the designer drug, Mind1.1 five-hundred years from now. Unless you change the people's desires, you're not going to get rid of the suppliers. If people want something bad enough, they're going to do whatever they need to do - usually criminal - to get it. If the government wants to do something about drugs, realistically educate the people, then clean-up and decriminalize the drugs and make available to the people who want it, a legal and safe fix. Then instead of having to deal with some lowlife on the corner selling crack laced with fentanyl, drano and who knows what else, they can go to RiteAid and know exactly what they are getting - just like drinking MD20/20 instead of wood alcohol laced with radiator lead.

Mayberry RFD

An update on the great Big Mac terrorist attack. Right now it seems the only person in the world who thinks the not-so-bright guys trying to corner the cell phone market were going to blow up the Mackinac Bridge is the Tuscola County sheriff. Caro, where this incident took place, is a little bigger than Mayberry, but probably not a lot. I can't help but think of a Mayberry episode with a plot line something like this:

Barney: Andy, Andy the terrorists are going to blow up Aunt Bea's house.
Andy: Calm down now Barney - you don't know that for sure.
Barney: But Andy, they got pictures and new-fangled cell phones and everything.
Andy: Now just settle down, Barn. they're just probably taking some pictures.
Barney: But Andy, you don't understand, they're from the Middle East and they got pictures and they even opened the cell phone packages. They're going to blow up Aunt Bea's house for sure. Let's call out the National Guard.
Andy: Come on now Barn, just hold on. Just 'cause they spent a whole bunch of money buying phones at 1 in the morning don't mean they're going to blow up anything.
Barney: Oh Andy, you don't know - them cell phones can be made into bombs! What about poor Aunt Bea and Opie - they're probably being blown to bits right this minute.

Drivers - and I use the term loosely

It's time for my usual rant this morning. First at the Post Office. Our Post Office hasn't the best parking around and the incompetents who use it make it all the worse. This morning three nitwits managed to take up six parking spaces. And it wasn't like they were high-priced cars that didn't want to get scratched - they were mostly old junkers that anyone wouldn't park too close to anyway for fear of contamination.

I leave the Post Office and head down the street and some guy in a green Aztec (which really has to rate as one of the ugliest vehicle designs ever) stops, makes a U-turn in front of me, and then pulls into a parking lot. Then he backs out right in front of me.

Next I'm at the intersection in the extra right-hand turn lane. There is no cross traffic and some person in a big-ass Buick (probably some old lady, I couldn't see for sure) is sitting there with her turn signal on and waiting for something - sunset I guess. I flash my lights a couple of times and finally toot my horn - not a long mad blast, but a friendly short toot mind you - and she finally makes her turn. And of course she then drives about 30 mph down the 45 mph road. She gets to the next light and stops - did I mention the light was green? This time my toot isn't quite so friendly. Finally she turns right and pulls into a drive down the street. Nothing like a nice relaxing drive to work.

terrorism surveillance of a vulnerable target

That's one of the offenses the three guys in Caro, MI were charged with this week. If you haven't heard, three guys of middle-eastern heritage were buying cell-phones (a lot of cell phones) at 2am at a WalMart in a small town in eastern Michigan. The clerk thought it suspicious that they had bought 200 cell phones, three at a time and called the cops who subsequently busted them. They had around 1,000 cell phones in her van. The guys' story was that they were traveling all over the midwest buying cell phones at $20 each to resell them at $38 in Texas.

It seems most stores have a limit to what you can buy, so they'd keep returning and buying the limit allowed, I guess until the store was out. I see several problems with this story. Assuming the guys' story is true. It would seem to me that if you're buying thousands of cell phones for resale(they say they've done this before) I'm sure you could broker a better deal than buying them retail. Why travel all the way to Wisconsin and Michigan to buy a cell phone to sell back in Texas? And really, how much sense is it for three guys of middle-eastern descent to be buying stuff at two in the morning - and questionable purchases at that. It's not right, but today, when your name sounds like Abdul and you try something "odd" in an almost lily white small town - you're going to raise suspicions.

The main points seem to be that cell phones can be used in bombs. The three guys are middle-eastern. They had pictures and videos of the Mackinac Bridge (Big Mac). Ok, yes, most anything can be used in bombs - nails, water pipe, batteries, flashbulbs, travel clocks, and yes - cell phones. Pictures of Big Mac? Hell, I have pictures of Big Mac. I'd say that most people who've driven over the Big Mac have pictures of it. It's pretty impressive - especially to someone from Pakistan now living in Texas. That charge of "terrorism surveillance of a vulnerable target" really bothers me. Think. Have you taken any pictures of "vulnerable targets" lately? Which is just about anything and everything in from coast to coast. I have pictures of the Blue Water Bridge, Wright-Pat Air Force Museum, the local shopping mall, and my old Air Force base in Biloxi, Mississippi. Does all that make me a domestic terrorist or a tourist? Think. Basically if you carry a camera and a cell phone today, you can be arrested for terrorism. Home of the brave and land of the not-so free.

Lies

There's a big run in conspiracy theories these days, primarily about the government, but also about business, medicine and what-have-you. The surprise to me is why so many are surprised that people believe in conspiracies -- like 9/11. I mean why shouldn't people think there was a conspiracy going on. Personally, I don't think there was a 9/11 conspiracy - at least not in the manner of "our" government blowing up the Trade Center or shooting down Flight 93 with a spy plane.

However I do believe unquestioningly that our government lied about a LOT of the facts dealing with 9/11. Like the Iraq war for instance. If we supposedly invaded a country because of 9/11, why didn't we go into Saudi Arabia? That's were most the perpetrators came from and it's the birthplace of Osama. Supposedly we also invaded because of "weapons of mass destruction" and we still haven't found any of those. We've lost something like 2600 dead and have near 30,000 folks who've left various bits and pieces of themselves back there -- for what?

Lebanon had a democratically elected government and we're supporting an outside country who's trying to erase that vote. Pakistan and India parade their nukes around and we say, so what. North Korea bobbles themselves through another round of missile firing and again, we do nothing -- except say we aren't talking to them again, still or yet, whatever.

Let's face it, our government lies to us daily. Sometimes with good reason, a lot of times with no reason. They tell us they're lying and also tell us that they don't have to tell us why. And the stuff they do tell us is full of crap more often than not. They tell us it's for the people, but the only people getting anything out of it is the bigwigs - the peons are getting the shaft harder and faster than ever.

So why do people believe the worse when it comes to our government - gee, that's a hard one isn't it?

Robin Williams

I like Robin Williams as a comedian. On the other hand, I'm not too crazy about his choice of movies - I've only seen a couple of them. He seems like a pretty cool guy though. I love him on talk shows and seeing his acts. He can make me laugh so hard, I'm always sure to go to the bathroom before I watch him.

He recently checked himself in for alcohol rehab. He's alluded to his drug infused past on numerous occasions - mostly with witty regret. I wasn't aware that booze was part of that. What strikes me as being cool about this is that he seems to be doing it before he has been forced to. This, unlike many others, some of whom are mentioned below:

Yahoo News: Nick Nolte voluntarily entered a Connecticut clinic four days after his 2002 drug arrest. Rep. Patrick Kennedy, D-R.I., checked himself into the Mayo Clinic the day after he crashed his car near the Capitol in May. Actor Robert Downey, Jr. was admitted to a live-in treatment center in 2000 after he was released from jail for drug violations. [And of course, the recent tribulations of Mel Gibson and his alcohol fueled tirade and subsequent "treatment".]

I haven't heard of any such debacle pushing Robin to do what he's doing. He seems to be doing it because he sees the need - or maybe all the above celebs are part of his reason. Whatever, good luck Mr. Williams.

Left Turns?!@#

At stoplights that is. I've been noticing a big increase in the number of drivers (and I use the term very loosely) are not making a left turn at a light as soon as it turns green. This is right before the hoard of very impatient drivers goes zooming across the intersection. Now I don't drive a whole lot, but I probably see this happen at least every couple of weeks or more. What are these people thinking?

I don't think it's absentmindedness. I must admit to allegedly doing this very thing about 7 years ago and it still is very vivid in my mind. I was at a three way intersection waiting to turn left and as soon the light changed, I allegedly did just that, just turned without thinking - much to the surprised look at the oncoming driver. I can still remember exactly what intersection this supposedly took place as well.

However, in the cases I've been seeing lately, I don't think that's the reason for them. You can almost always tell when someone is going to do that. They don't really creep up on the intersection, but there's something in their face that says, "I'm going and I'm going now!" Actually, I'm kinda looking forward to seeing the result when one of those quicky left-turners gets in the way of one of those quicky take-offers and the twain meet in middle of the intersection. They're not usually going fast enough to hurt each other, but it should result in a satisfying display of mangled metal. My only hope is that I don't get stuck in the resulting traffic jam.

Spam, Spam, Spam again

Have you noticed lately that the spammers seem to be trying a new approach for spam? Where it used to be just bunches of different spams, now it's bunches of the same spam. The titles are still misspelled, the grammar attrocious and the subjects just plain stupid, but now they repeat themselves. Not only over a couple of day time period, but at the same time. It's now a regular occurrence for me to get 5 - 8 or more emails with the exact same title - or sometimes the exact same title with a 5 random character prefix attached.

Do these people really think it's more likely for me to peek at and answer one of six identical spams than I would at one? And this all boils down to those stupid one in ten-thousand people who replay to this crap. Get some sense people! No one is going to give you a free Rolex or Louis Vuitton purse and if you're lucky that V1agra or Hood1a you buy either won't be delivered or will be a safe fake and do nothing. If you're not lucky it'll probably kill you or make you sick - which would be a plus for me, since there'd be one less Darwin-challenged idiot to answer spam and make it worth spammers effort.

Gas Prices

Well, guess what I just read on the news - gas prices are going up. This time they say because of the heat wave, like last week it was because of Israel and Lebanon blowing up cedar trees and people. And next week it'll be because of Chris threatening the oil refineries in the Gulf. And the week after that just because $1,318 per second isn't quite enough moola to tide Exxon and friend over until their CEO's next payday.

Why don't they just admit that they are raising the price of gas just because they can - and we'll still pay the price. As much as I hate to admit it, we do have a culture based on supply and demand. As long as they supply the gas, we'll pay whatever they demand.

It's Hot, but...

Heat taxes utilities, human endurance By DON BABWIN, Associated Press Writer CHICAGO - Elderly residents were evacuated ...

Yeah, it's hot. And yeah, I hate it when it's hot. But it's always been hot. Global warming? Maybe, but the high temperature record for Saginaw is 111 degrees back in July 13, 1936. While I know it's dangerous and nasty and just plain uncomfortable, why make such a big deal out of it? "Taxes... human endurance?"

It wasn't really that long ago when there wasn't air conditioning. If you were lucky you had a fan - and really, fans don't go back that far either. Basically when it was hot, you just lived with it. Think back to the way the early settlers dressed - both men and women, but especially women. Most wore more clothes at one time than I could figure out how to wear. No short sleeves, no short light dresses. Heck, most of the time you didn't even see people without ties and jackets.

Now while I would give up my TV before I'd give up my A/C, it isn't something that's been around all that long. In fact, there's still a lot of folks (almost 50% I read somewhere) that still don't have A/C, and probably won't any time soon. So, while yes it's really hot and really uncomfortable, I don't hardly see it as taxing human endurance. Taxing human comfort maybe, and taxing some especially old or young humans maybe, but not really taxing human endurance.

I guess I'm one of those odd ones however since I'd much rather be looking over a snow covered driveway with blowing drifts and a shovel in my hand right now, than at a clear, lush green lawn where it's 98 in the shade and sweat is soaking my shirt and mosquitoes biting my ass.

// posted by Jim-of-oz @ 8/01/2006 02:19:00 PM