Wednesday, April 20, 2005
Woo-hoo!
Via Jen, Two Nervous Dogs is back! *does silly little happy dance* Oh, that is good news indeed!
Yay for Deb!
Not only am I glad she’s back in all her Jediness, but also I am delighted she’s posted up a storm today.
I ended up being busy with business improvement. I created a passworded site for my clients. It has a blog on which I will update my whereabouts and availability (sort of a way of people knowing the answer to “is he in the office?"), post tips or links to tips, and whatever else seems useful to communicate with clients. It also has a contact form for e-mailing various addresses via the web, even if e-mail is down, and a second contact form that e-mails me at several addresses, including my cell phone, if it’s more of an emergency matter. Those are linked from the blog. I also made an “eyes only” page for key client contacts, where they can access absolutely every bit of contact info: pager, cell, office, and home numbers, plus multiple e-mail addresses. I recently had incidents where I didn’t have my cell and a client forgot I ever had a pager number, or the pager didn’t work and a client wasn’t attuned to the idea of using the cell number.
It also serves a marketing purpose. My third biggest client hasn’t had me do any work since August. This was a way to pop onto their radar in a way that looks cool and “big.” They mainly brought me in for one project, but it boggles me they don’t have or use regular computer support and maintenance. The other outfit I worked with administers their server and contracted to create a new web site, but they were $20 more an hour than me, and their guy I worked with was… limited. I felt like our rates were reversed most of the time I worked with him. I worry about them, because they are probably letting things slide, letting little problems grow to be big problems for which they then will call me. At least they were happy with my rates. There are a couple people I could do one-time computer cleanups for that I haven’t been able to bring myself to get back to yet because the person referring me whined about my rates, after hiring me because I was lower than the competition, and caught me at a weak moment so I charged no more than half-price. Now I can’t bring myself to go back to a place where they’re not going to want to pay me enough to cover what it would cost me were I having an employee do the work. There’s a lesson in the negative consequences of lowballing.
Anyway, I digress. I was just trying to pop in and show I was still alive and express my appreciation for Deb’s blaze of blogging. I have to go play with Veritas Backup Exec now.
I was missing myself something dreadful.
Yes, I am extra-special-super blunt today. You know what it is? I’m sick of pulling my punches. I adore some of the people who read this site and somewhere along the line I quit saying what I wanted to because it might offend one friend or family member or another, or stir up a controversy I didn’t want to deal with, and you know what? I’m really tired of doing that. I miss proper blogging and I’m no doubt overcorrecting a bit but I fully intend to cut back on the self-editing.
Apologies to anyone this shocks. Yet another reason to get my old archive back on line, I think, as looking there one would see that I sound rather more like myself today than I have in quite some time.
This is just really getting out of hand.
So the federal government bullies automakers into improving fuel efficiency, then realizes that they’re cheating themselves out of tax money, panics, and decides that maybe it should be tracking your car to make sure you’re paying enough.
Assholes.
House Blogging
Don’t miss Caltechgirl’s House blogging over at Ith’s.
Let me just add that I was the lucky recipient of “mag-just-in-case-it’s-preeclampsia” and while I know what a marvelous, wonderful, lifesaving drug it can be, it’s got very, very nasty side effects and even though I realize it was probably prudent, I still resent the hell out of receiving it without any attempt to verify that I actually had a problem. (Yes, I know this because the doc and the nurse had a pissing match over it while standing right next to my bed. Lovely. I also know I didn’t actually have it, but all of this is another story.) So I was really feeling for that poor woman.
And Yay! for Cuddy and the board having the stones to put a stop to Vogler. I really hope Cameron comes back, too.
I know, I know, but I thought they’d at least make it to the midterms without losing it.
OK, since I’m in a fighting mood today, here are a couple more reasons why I’m almost ready to throw the Republicans out with the bathwater:
Sensenbrenner and his asinine scheme to lock all the pot smokers in federal prison for as long as he can possibly manage. This, of course, is a mandatory sentencing plan, since we can’t have judges exercising, you know, judgement. Jeff’s got that one covered if you don’t know what I’m talking about.
Decency standards for cable TV. Because you’re too stupid to figure out what you want your kids to watch and too spineless to actually enforce your own rules.
This crap gives me a headache. It really, really does. I’ve supported the Republicans because I thought they had a few big things right. And I’m certainly not in any danger of falling in love with Howard Dean. But oh.my.God. I’m starting to feel like I’m being nibbled to death by gnats here. Is there any idiotic nanny-state scheme that these people are willing not to be a part of?
Sheesh.
I don’t believe this is even in question.
You know, I’ve been thinking about this “must dispense” thing since I saw an article about it a couple of weeks ago, and I came to the same conclusion John Cole did (if a little less colorfully). There is absolutely no excuse for a pharmacist to refuse to fill a prescription unless it is to prevent a dangerous interaction. Avoiding interactions? That’s a pharmacist’s job. Refusing to fill your prescription for the pill because he is morally opposed to it? Completely ridiculous. It’s not his call to make. If you’re that opposed to the thing, then you shouldn’t be a pharmacist. Period.
You’ve no doubt seen this, but I wanted to register my agreement.
Glenn’s got smart readers:
READER C.J. BURCH EMAILS: “I grow more and more convinced the Republican majority will end itself by 2006 if the Left will just shut up for five minutes.”
Yep.
Hey, if I’m disgruntled, it’s probably already too late to save the thing.
Your Daily Sadie
Tuesday, April 19, 2005
Count me completely unsurprised.
Apparently, the CDC was just a bit overwrought about overweight.
By the way, is it margarine or butter this week?
Meanwhile, Steven Taylor is wondering why the food pyramids. Yes, they seem to be multiplying. Frightening.
Yikes!
Anyone know where the day went? Anyone?
Benedict XVI
From the perspective of a non-Catholic, non-religious person, Joseph Ratzinger strikes me as a good choice for Pope. Looks like he has a sense of humor and was rather bemused when presented to the crowd. I also thought it was amusing that he kept clasping his hands and lifting them in what looked like a victory salute. I’m sure that’s not how he meant it to look.
Time Keeps On Slipping…
One thing about managing Carnival of the Capitalists... It makes me strangely “aware” of the next several months and how quickly they’ll fly.
Here it is, April 19, and the hosting slots for the year are nearly filled. The only ones left are November 7, November 28, December 5, December 19, and December 26. That last one I fully expect to be a day later than normal, Monday holiday edition. And there I am, thinking about Christmas, eight months out.
Grand Rounds Is Up
The latest Grand Rounds, hosted at Living the Scientific Life. It’s an extensive roundup of the latest in medical blogging.
Your Daily Sadie
Monday, April 18, 2005
Sad News
My mother reports that my sister-in-law had a massive stroke and is basically gone but for a decision to disconnect life support. In the tasteless joke department, I suggested calling Congress about it.
This is my older brother’s second wife, with whom divorce is pending. It’s one of those things you don’t wish on anyone, so I will try not to speak ill here. Despite her faults, her utter wrongness for my brother, and everything she did to him, we got along well. There were things I understood that my brother never did, like her love of computers.
Waaaaay back in the mid-nineties, I made a 386 for each of the families of my three siblings who had children at the time. They had DOS, Windows 3.1, a bunch of games and educational stuff, and a batch file powered menu I created and made fancy with ANSI escape codes.
In my younger brother’s family, he was the primary user, getting seriously into computers as a result and letting the kids use it under heavy supervision. In my sister’s family, her kids used it almost exclusively, with minimal supervision, and the older one as a result became a total geek. In my older brother’s family, it was my sister-in-law who became the primary user of the computer, with modest supervision of the kids. She went from having never used a computer to being a huge fan, to the point when she decided to go to college, she started out in computer science, though she eventually switched to English.
My brother is reportedly taking it as hard as I would expect. He has “kick me” lettered neon on his soul, and no matter how much abuse he takes, he doesn’t fall out of love.
The kids will turn 17, 15 and 14 in July, August and December. I feel bad for them, but kids bounce. I’m more worried about my brother, and about the transition back to custodial parent.
I didn’t exactly expect her to live to a ripe old age. Her health and self-abuse would have made that unlikely. Yet this is just one of those random things, not in anyone’s control. Very sad.
Spring in my step
I absolutely adore this kind of weather and it’s been all the sweeter for that it was such a lousy winter. Jay and Sadie and I took a long walk today and it was just absolutely divine. It was seventy-something and sunny and it just doesn’t get more perfect.
Not only that, but the maple tree outside my kitchen window is starting to get leaves. Jay spotted the first hints of green this morning and pointed them out. I almost want to do dishes, just so I can enjoy the sight of the thing.
You know, I’m not much of a fan of the winters ‘round here, but I swear they’re almost worth it for the spring.
Even If It’s Wrong
My youngest brother is in the habit of taking his leave of a conversation, if he has work to do, by saying “gotta do something, even if it’s wrong.”
I was thinking of that yesterday when, as sometimes happens, I had so many useful things I could be doing that I never fully settled on and accomplished one of them. I hate when that happens.
CotC Change of Host This Week
Pieter Dorsman of Peaktalk has kindly agreed to host Carnival of the Capitalists for the upcoming April 25 edition. The scheduled host is in the middle of moving, which disrupted his plan to host.
I’ll update the CotC page to reflect this change soon, and will swap someone into the now vacant May 16 edition.
Rewrite the Constitution
Jeff Soyer visits in detail a topic I have touched upon in the past myself: How the Constitution could be better written.
He’s going amendment by amendment, starting with the first and moving on to the second.
There are rules. You’re free to add a slant or make it a funny version, or to be serious and try to add detail or clarity. You should cover the same item(s) within the rewrite. You’re limited to no more than 75 words and two sentences.
And just because it never hurts to have a reminder, here is the original text of the First Amendment:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
And here is the original text of the Second Amendment:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
Now go see Jeff and give him your rewrite of the First Amendment and Second Amendment.
Oh right. I suppose I ought to do my own. It’s harder than it sounds. I’ve thought about the topic in general for many years, dating back to a rough idea for a series of science fiction novels I had in the early to mid-eighties. Part of my thinking was to show how our Constitution ultimately failed to protect us in the end, show another flawed Constitution written for a colony and how it didn’t work out so well, and finally another colony based on the lessons learned from those. That only as a side element of the story, not as the focus, perhaps with the actual text of the documents as appendices.
As I said in Jeff’s comments, one possibility would be to include a glossary to try to ensure the intended definitions of the words used would be clear in the future. That aside from being as clear as possible in the first place. The Second Amendment sounds intentionally obfuscated, even if it was on account of the people at the time adding a reason clause that meant “and we mean it!”
Okay, First Amendment:
No law shall make any religion official or prohibited, or bar public exercise of cultural trappings associated at times with religions. No law shall restrict speech, unwritten expression, press, or peacable assembly in any form, existing or devised in the future, individual or commercial, nor the right to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
That’s 56 words, I think. Probably not ideal, but I was trying to follow the rules.
Now the Second Amendment:
The government exists primarily for the defense of its citizens, but the people retain the primary right and responsibility of self-defense, so no law shall be made to limit or regulate ownership of guns and other weapons by individuals and groups.
Not sure I like how that came out, but it’s a start. Care to try your hand at it?
How they get away with it:
Over time, one becomes desensitized. For example, when I saw that Charles has a story about traffic cameras, I got all ready to have my customary fit. Instead, my jaw dropped in astonishment when I saw the size of the fine, and my first thought was, well, if the ticket is only seventy-five bucks, I don’t suppose I’d care as much (It was, IIRC, $340 in Fresno when I left a over a year ago), when outrage shouldn’t be based on how much they’re stealing but the theft itself. Even me, they’re wearing down. Sigh.
Freedomist Network?
This sounds interesting. Why be a pseudo-freedomist or neo-freedomist when you can be a real one?
Question of the day:
Does anybody really give a shit what Drudge thinks?
Via, oh, everybody...and he got you talking about him, didn’t he?
Your Daily Sadie
In this picture from the past week, we had put her in a standing position then she held herself up. Mostly. However, I thought this would be a good picture to post to mark the occasion of Sadie having pulled herself to a standing position yesterday, for the first, second and third times.
It was either that or dress her in a chicken suit because she ate chicken for the first time. Heh. That was interesting…
I baked a plain chicken breast, just a little butter in the pan, while making spicy chicken for us. The food processor did a splendid job of turning it into baby food, with just a little water added. It was yummy. Figured if she didn’t eat it I could use it like chicken spread to make a sandwich.
She didn’t like it. Didn’t hate it either, and was kind of intrigued. After a few “do I like this or not” bites, mostly leaning negative, I got out the leftover half of a baked sweet potato, one of her favorite foods. Smooshed a small amount in with some of the chicken, and that went a little better.
Finally I mixed it with pears and she just devoured it. She had 3.5 oz of pears, probably 2 oz or so of chicken, and maybe 1 oz of sweet potato, most of which ended up on the tray. Chicken and pears were a major hit.
Basically the chicken was too bland. Like potatoes, only less so. She likes strong flavors. Or distinctive ones, anyway. She doesn’t seem to be fussy at all, except if things aren’t tasty enough to be interesting. I joked with Deb that I should have put some garlic powder on the chicken, then she’d have eaten it without mixing.
So if she gets sick today, we’ll know it was the chicken. Except if it’s the ice cream my mother insisted on giving her far more than a taste of, as if she was on a mission. We went to my niece Alicia’s third birthday party yesterday.
We’re trying to avoid using the commercial baby food meats, which are reportedly pretty disgusting and not well liked by the target audience. Easy enough to cook an extra chicken breast now and then.
Sunday, April 17, 2005
Carnival of the Capitalists
Brian Gongol’s well laid out Carnival of the Capitalists, the April 18 edition, is up for your surfing pleasure here. Be sure to read the introduction, because it gives the option of sorting the entries to your preference.
If you are linking this CotC from your blog or web site, be sure to look at the end where there is a substitute for trackbacks that will accomplish the same thing. Ditto if you are hosting CotC in the future and would like to adopt a similar design.
Next week’s edition will be hosted at Let’s Try Freedom. Send your entries by 3:00 PM eastern Sunday the 24th to cotcmail -at- gmail -dot- com, or use either the Gongol.com submission form (almost everyone does) or the universal carnival submission form (which is a great gateway to other carnivals and such too).
Entries should be substantively original writing, as opposed to mainly links or quoted text, and should be on-topic in the wide world of business and economics. Politics is not on topic, except as specifically relevant to a post about economics or business that can’t help but touch on the associated politics. Blogging is not on topic, except as relevant to or advice for business.
Future hosts are listed at the Carnival of the Capitalists page. While the info on it needs updating, the lower part of that page gives a detailed idea of what would be considered appropriately on-topic for CotC. There is also a page listing previous CotC locations, if you missed any and would like to check them out. Some of them are no longer at the linked locations, but most are.
Your Daily Sadie Bonus Edition
Normally I post just one picture as the “daily,” but these really go together…
I posted about the things she does recently, and forgot to mention her fascination with examining faces with her hands, that she sometimes volunteers kisses, that she is fully answerable to her name as of at least a month ago, and that she seems to identify dadadada as me and mamamama as Deb. Yesterday she seemed to know what the word “prunes” was. Also yesterday she babbled at Deb from the tub, apparently talking about me, and slipped “daddy” in there along with all the dadas. Probably coincidence, but cool.
Anyway, her latest “scientific study” has been soap bubbles. Recently I got enough soap in the bath to lead to rafts of suds. She studied how they behaved if she set her hand on them, forming up around her hand, sticking to it, changing shape or breaking up when she took her hand away, dissipating if she dunked her hand. Last night she took it to a new level by ducking her head down and tasting some of the suds. Ick. Yet she liked it better than potatoes, which so far she hates no matter what they are mixed with, and how warm, cold, stiff, or runny they are. I tried some of our mashed potatoes on her last night, alone and mixed with the baked sweet potato she loved so much. No dice. She also wouldn’t eat the commercial potatoes, peas and carrots mix, or plain smooshed potatoes without the milk and butter that was in the mashed.
She also figured out that she could generate soap suds by splashing, as you see in these pictures. Instead of getting mellow in the tub, she splashes like a maniac. She also tries to climb over to the faucet to check it out, so I’ve shown her how the (defunct) drain control goes (with effort) up and down. She likes to play with the light switch in the bedroom, too, which she has successfully pushed off and on by herself (it’s one of those round dimmer switches you push off and on). Last night, it looked like if she’d had the right things at the right height to grab hold of, she’d have stood up in the tub. Or probably not, since it’s a bit slippery for that, but she was very close. I was so amazed I called Deb in to see it the second time, so of course she plopped back down and didn’t do it again. Though she did tell her mother that extended story.
She still hasn’t crawled using her knees, as far as we’ve seen. She crawls with her arms and toes, as well as moving herself rapidly other ways. If she’s sitting, she can now rotate and face a different direction without leaving a sitting position, which I thought was cool. She’s not completely steady yet at standing and holding herself up on something like the coffee table or crib rail, but she’s nearly there and just in the course of a couple weeks. We’re due to drop the crib mattress because she almost pulled herself standing in there. The railing is low enough she could potentially tumble over. I suspect we may miss the days of limited mobility…
Saturday, April 16, 2005
Still Poor
I just remembered to check the Mega Millions ticket I bought, since it was $144 million. No dice. Now it’s $168 million. Guess we’ll have to try again.
It would have been a really cool time for it, too. It’s one of those times when the big client will pay me any day for the last invoice I gave them, but I really needed it a few days ago, even though they are far from late yet. Oh well.
The Elusive Toofies (AKA Teeth)
By popular request and little more than sheer luck and repetition, here’s a picture of Sadie’s first two teeth…
Carnival of the Recipes Is Up
The latest Carnival of the Recipes is up, filled with yummy links and controversy-free.
Your Daily Sadie
