yaya!

So Hector is muy fabuloso, and he says that he loves me, and he doesn't want to do anything with me until I am sure that I want to marry him, and he comes over and we just hang out and talk. I'm working on his shy thing, He wants me to quit smoking, I told him he can't tell me what to do and I'll quit when I'm goddammed good and ready. I said I would think about quitting if he could work up the courage to meet my friends for their approval. (he said he gets mad when a group of people are speaking english and he doesn't know what they are saying) I told him to quit being a sissy, you've been here 6 years, your english is fine, my friends are nice people who will understand. Anyway, I really like him, he's adorable, and he wants me to go to Mexico with him. I said that would be alot of fun, but don't expect me to cook you anything besides cereal and lunchables. YAYA! (the immortal words of Lil' John)

(Non-)Startling Research!

Democrats and Republicans Both Adept at Ignoring Facts, Study Finds: "Democrats and Republicans alike are adept at making decisions without letting the facts get in the way, a new study shows.

And they get quite a rush from ignoring information that's contrary to their point of view."

I found this article through Slashdot and I thought you would all appreciate it. It would appear that we partisans, as I am sometimes, are a little addicted to being partisan. I especially enjoyed this quote:
"Essentially, it appears as if partisans twirl the cognitive kaleidoscope until they get the conclusions they want, and then they get massively reinforced for it, with the elimination of negative emotional states and activation of positive ones"
WHEEEEEEEE!

It's the 80

ahhahahaha!!! Having just returned from my date, it seems that I have struck gold, and his name is Hector.

Self Protection

You people know that I don't normally get all paranoi, I may talk about it but rarely ever feel personally threatened. However, in light of the recent activity on the part of the department of justice I can't help but feel a little bit twitchy. Just check out this article on the Dept. of Justice actions relating to search engines over the past couple of weeks. I personally don't use any other search engine but google. However I know certain people use others such as yahoo or MSN. Now, the fact that these searche engines just sold out their customers, without even attempting to protect them from gov't prying, is abominable. And from what I can tell of google, I wouldn't want their database to fall into the wrong hands. They track EVERYTHING. They save EVERYTHING. There is some very sophisticated data mining software out there that can extrapolate frightening amounts of information from a database that large. That is why when I get home tonight I am going to download the software below. Never too late to start worrying about these things.

Tor: Overview: "Using Tor protects you against a common form of Internet surveillance known as 'traffic analysis.' Traffic analysis can be used to infer who is talking to whom over a public network. Knowing the source and destination of your Internet traffic allows others to track your behavior and interests. This can impact your checkbook if, for example, an e-commerce site uses price discrimination based on your country or institution of origin. It can even threaten your job and physical safety by revealing who and where you are."

I found a mole inside Faegre & Benson, which aids my chances of getting in considerably. They have offices in London, Germany, and frickin Shanghai! I can take over China from the inside, legally, Soon...

I want to be a 'snack hamster!'

BBC news:

Snake 'befriends' snack hamster

A rodent-eating snake and a hamster have developed an unusual bond at a zoo in the Japanese capital, Tokyo.

"Managing" your rights out of existence

Boing Boing: DRM primer for librarians: "DRM primer for librarians
Mike Godwin has written a great primer on DRM for librarians. Librarians are on the front lines of the DRM wars, since DRM so often interferes with lending, archiving and preserving creative works. Librarians are also a technology-savvy bunch. Accordingly, Mike's paper is thoroughgoing, smart, and highly recommended."

GM: This one isn't just for librarians though, with all of us listening to music online, working on this blog, reading the news and sending emails. Don't you want to know that you aren't breaking the law by listening to a CD on anything but a CD player? Don't you want to know that the CD you just bought isn't crippled?

Good morning anyway.

birds in the news

So Rhianna, more proof that parrots are intelligent, yet mean...tee hee.

Parrot squawks on woman's affair

A parrot owner was alerted to his girlfriend's infidelity when his talkative pet let the cat out of the bag by squawking "I love you Gary"

I am a Pedant! (see also Spritzy)

"Definitions of pedant on the Web:

* a person who pays more attention to formal rules and book learning than they merit
wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn

* A Pedant is a person who overrates or overuses book learning or pure technical knowledge. Such a person values simple knowledge, (in the form of often obscure facts and rules) over common sense and more general knowledge.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedant

* a person regarded as pedantic or quibbling ( disapproving )
encarta.msn.com/dictionary_1861702240/scholastic.html

* A French term that describes a slight, tingling prickle. See also Spritzy.
www.lovewine.org/"

So I was writing an email to a person about an inconsequential and picky little distinction dealing with payroll and realized that I am slowly becoming a pedant. Being a pedant I wanted to clarify the definition for myself so I googled it and then emailed the definition along with my original email for the edification of my coworkers.

Little did I realize that there are multiple definitions for this most confusing of words.

Do you feel the slight tingling prickle of my post?

Mayhem

Just so you know, I actually don't encourage people build these things, but Chemska would probably like them. Anyway, the page that I link to above is part of Makezine, an online community of Makers, the kind of people that believe the only reason that people make things in the first place is so that they can look at them and make them better. There are some totally awesome things on their blog that you can build yourself. And the fact that alot of people post step by step instructions is pretty cool.

I just finished reading about a 3d rss reader. You have a notebook computer with wifi, point it in a direction and it automatically finds news relevant to the direction you are pointing it at. So you point it towards New York and it gives you the stock prices or something like that. Pretty nifty.

eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

I can't fricken sleep. There is a potential new boy. He is tall and buff with a lusciously dark complexion. He doesn't ogle me or tell me I'm pretty or say things like, "hey my wife will be gone for an hour on Thursday, so you should stop by quick".
He's into photography, particularly frozen waterfall formations...
He thinks I'm fascinating and I can make him giggle. teehee. He has a great smile.
I think our first date should be at Minnehaha Falls, but he wants to get to know me first....by TALKING!!

It's crazy, man, crazy.

Homemade Lego Knitting Machine

Gizmodo, The Gadget Blog: "It works a bit slow, but that adds an even creepier robot, matrix-esque feel to it. Almost as if it’s going to attack you. To understand me in full, watch this video to get a better idea of how it works. The results it produced look spectacular for a little robot who knits stuff. Take that Gramma’."

Looks like you're being edged out by the geeks Rhianna.
You will be assimilated.
Resistance is futile.

HMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

Whitley Strieber's Unknown Country: "A mysterious humming sound, similar to the one reported in Taos, New Mexico 9 years ago, has recently turned up in Kokomo, Indiana, where dozens of people say it’s making them ill."

Do you live anywhere near Kokomo Rhianna? I think that I might need to check this one out if I come to visit you. Bizarre.

Huzzah!

Another entry about the Puerto Rican. They sent me out on routes with her twice and I swore her demise in the event of a third. So they sent her out alone. It was supposed to be 130 papers in Richfield, but she whined her way down to 50. Now this assignment was 2 streets, 3 blocks per street, almost every house recieving a paper. Sober math tells us that your average idiot could fill a sack with papers, and walk through the yards chucking a paper onto every porch you pass. A person of average health can walk a block in 5-7 minutes. A generous deduction would conclude that this would take less than an hour, with perhaps 20 minutes for the commute to and from work. Wait for it......5 hours later, she had 30 papers left. They sent me to find her. She had her dog with, which meant she went home to get it, which could only have added 20 minutes. "You brought a dog?" "Its dangerous out here, I need protection." "You're in fucking Richfield! .....In any event, what in god's name have you been doing out here for 5 hours?" "Delivering papers. By the way, can you tell them I'll bring back the cell phone tomorrow, I'm really tired and just want to go home." I had to end the conversation, as I was dumbstruck. (Keeping the phone after the shift is serious company theft, but apparently she didn't care) So I saved her ass by taking the phone back myself, and refused to help her with the rest of her papers. I suggested she teach her dog to help. Anyway. Thanks to my scathing reports about her inability, upon her return to work she was escorted into Angela's office, with the door locked behind her. She survived this ordeal somehow, as I saw her walk out on her own two legs. What occurred in that room was not relayed to us, but we do no that she no longer works for Strib. I am the absolute minority, once again.

This is something you should read Rhianna.

gobuggy: "ITunes Spying on YOU!

Is Apple's ITunes music player spying on you? This is a huge issue for people who use ipods because in order to get the most out of your player you have to keep the firmware and software updated."

Night of fire!

This is 18 kinds of awesome. Possibly 19. See for yourselves....

Using the SUV to its fullest potential

I've rediscovered the joy of books on tape. I can do an amazing amount of knitting and cross stich while also working my little brain. I just finished listening to the "Shipping News" most of it takes place in Newfoundland and I've decided to take a road trip at the very least to Niagra Falls this summer, and camp while I'm at it. Its so much cheaper and I like to freak out people by brushing my teeth in public bathrooms. Tee hee. I haven't decided on a route yet, it'd have a lot of parks though, probalby on the way back through Canada and around one of the great lakes. I suppose its this or back pack through Europe, Chemska?

Ergonomic work station

Ergonomic work station: "If you work at a computer you are in danger of repitive strain injury (RSI). Setting up an ergonomic work station can be crucial to your health and happiness."

Just thought you would appreciate this. This website is called Instructables, people come up with step by step illustrated instructions on how to do almost anything. I saw instructions for a really cool tree house and also for building a kite surfing kite.

Morning!

training games

Who remembers the Saturday Night Live skit where Mango met J-Lo? "Can you catch a falling star without burning your hand? No. Such is Mango." "Can you piss off a Puerto Rican and live to tell about it?" Well I am here to tell you that I can now cross this one off my list. They are a fiesty breed.
Emily, the new Puerto Rican troubleshooter, (troubleshooters are the minions who clean or do the pariah work. I usually trick them into being my assistant so I can take more breaks) Anyway, it takes her 20 minutes to hand out 6 bundles of news, and I mean lift it out of the cart and hand it to the fairy. She refuses to do routes. "its cold, its too much work, its dangerous, I'm a woman, you can't expect me to do this blah blah blah" She is a whiny self-important bitch that doesn't understand that being paid means working for it. She just wants to strut around in her little cabbie hat and dark glasses complaining about how tired she is and how she can't possibly get her business started with these stupid hours. Pete-master sent us both to uptown. That sadist. He wanted me to try to fix her, but uptown routes are more difficult, not to mention the crackheads that will surely be underfoot. I eventually got sick of her complaining about how she really wanted to be home by 6:30 and she couldn't believe we had do this. And so after a certain point, every time we got out of the car I made her carry the bag with 30-50 newspapers in it, I locked the car so she couldn't get back in and pout. I had her running city blocks, up and down 4+ flights of stairs, and she had to keep up because I told her if I got to the car first I would leave without her. It was great. The look in her eyes was muderous, but she knew I was her only ride home. In the latter point of our mission, she started complaining again about how tired she was and how she couldn't do the last few papers because she was falling asleep. So I floored it and ran three stoplights, the second almost broadsided a car, the third almost took out a pedestrian. She was hyperventilating and babbling, I asked her if that had woken her up. When we were done she leaped out of the car and ran to hers. Good times.

The Case of the Missing Underwear...

Just thought I'd let everyone know that this case is closed. My cotton, size 6, pink floral, "Hanes-Her-Ways" are no longer on the loose with some dirty young boy. If it had been a red thong-it might be a different story.