Getting old

(xkcd)

Amen.

The Unbreakable Imperator Furiosa

Now this is a movie trailer! Well, it isn't, I guess, but it should be.

Heaven

According to Freethought of the Day (and Wikipedia), today is the birthday of Rupert Brooke (1887-1915), so I thought I'd class up the place with a poem. :)

Here's Brooke's "Heaven":

        Fish (fly-replete, in depth of June,
        Dawdling away their wat'ry noon)
        Ponder deep wisdom, dark or clear,
        Each secret fishy hope or fear.
        Fish say, they have their Stream and Pond;
        But is there anything Beyond?
        This life cannot be All, they swear,
        For how unpleasant, if it were!
        One may not doubt that, somehow, Good
        Shall come of Water and of Mud;
        And, sure, the reverent eye must see
        A Purpose in Liquidity.
        We darkly know, by Faith we cry,
        The future is not Wholly Dry.
        Mud unto mud! -- Death eddies near --
        Not here the appointed End, not here!
        But somewhere, beyond Space and Time.
        Is wetter water, slimier slime!
        And there (they trust) there swimmeth One
        Who swam ere rivers were begun,
        Immense, of fishy form and mind,
        Squamous, omnipotent, and kind;
        And under that Almighty Fin,
        The littlest fish may enter in.
        Oh! never fly conceals a hook,
        Fish say, in the Eternal Brook,
        But more than mundane weeds are there,
        And mud, celestially fair;
        Fat caterpillars drift around,
        And Paradisal grubs are found;
        Unfading moths, immortal flies,
        And the worm that never dies.
        And in that Heaven of all their wish,
        There shall be no more land, say fish.


According to Wikipedia, Rupert Brooke died at age 27 of an infected mosquito bite (in the Mediterranean, where he was serving as an officer in the British navy).

Angry birds vs peace doves

(Alberto Pizzoli/AFP/Getty Images)

I don't know why I think this is funny - it probably wasn't very funny for those two doves - but I had to laugh:

Two white doves that were released by children standing alongside Pope Francis as a peace gesture have been attacked by other birds.

As tens of thousands of people watched in St. Peter's Square on Sunday, a seagull and a large black crow swept down on the doves right after they were set free from an open window of the Apostolic Palace.

One dove lost some feathers as it broke free from the gull. But the crow pecked repeatedly at the other dove.

It was not clear what happened to the doves as they flew off.

(Gregorio Borgia, AP)

You know what's really funny? This same thing happened last year! Heh, heh. I guess the Vatican doesn't learn from experience, huh?

And why shouldn't I laugh? Releasing doves? That was nothing but a carefully choreographed spectacle to promote the Catholic Church. Children? Check. News cameras? Check. 'Tens of thousands' of adoring fans below the window? Check and double-check.

(Gregorio Borgia, AP)

What did they think was going to happen to the doves, anyway? Were they just releasing tame doves into the wild? How long do you think they would last?

That would be like releasing white chickens into the wild. These pure-white doves are no less artificial, no less domesticated. Now, I don't know, maybe the plan was that they'd return home on their own - if they survived. But if not, it would be far kinder just to wring their necks.

(Gregorio Borgia, AP)

And what did those 'tens of thousands' of superstitious Catholics think of this? Did they imagine that magic was involved? Remember, these are the same people who believe in exorcisms. Did they think that Satan was just playing Angry Birds?

Then what about 'God'? Is he such a wimp that he can't even protect peace doves released by the Pope? You see why I laugh?

If at first you don't succeed,...

20 gallons of blood

(NCBB)

This morning, I made another deposit at the bank - the blood bank. That's seven times this year, 160 donations (since 1982, maybe?), for a total donation, so far, of 20 gallons of blood. Woo, hoo!

I'd have a higher total than that, but I was deferred for three years. (On the advice of my doctor, I took an anti-malarial drug before traveling to Guatemala. It was the drug, not the trip, which required a three-year deferral, though they don't restrict donations for that now. Still, the malaria preventative was undoubtedly a good idea, anyway.)

Of course, I've been lucky enough to be able to donate all these years. I started because my place of employment let me leave in the afternoon to give blood (with pay). Then, I worked 12-hour shifts for more than two decades. That meant I always had time free during the week sometime.

When I turned 55, I retired, so I've got all the time in the world now (assuming I can pull myself away from the computer long enough), and I don't have any medical issues which prevent me from donating blood. So this is something that's been very easy to do. Also, I'm O-Positive, which is the most common blood type, so they always need it.

Frankly, it feels good to donate blood. It's not a big deal. It's quick, it's easy, and I don't even notice the loss of a pint of blood every eight weeks. Plus, there are free cookies. What's not to like? :)

After years of donations, though, I had to switch arms. Believe it or not, you build up scar tissue when you poke your arm with a needle 160 times. That's what they tell me, at least. I don't notice anything different myself, but apparently it gets a little harder to find a good spot for the next poke.

Or maybe I'm just getting old, huh? They don't have much trouble with my left arm even now, but it's generally easier to use the right these days.

Afterwards, I'm encouraged to eat heartily and to do nothing strenuous - neither directive being particularly difficult for me. (They also tell me to drink liquids, but I ignore that, I'm afraid.) Note that they don't put a time limit on those things, so I just assume they want me to eat heartily and do nothing strenuous until the next time I come in to donate blood.

That works for me. :)

Did you expect a dog? A kitten?

You might want to keep that on a leash. :)

The wonder of lax zoning laws

(Daily Kos)

The fertilizer plant that exploded in West, Texas, probably hasn't received as much attention as it should, given the Boston Marathon bombing, too. It's really been a surfeit of disasters, hasn't it? But I wanted to post this image, which really drives home the problem of lax zoning laws.

From Daily Kos:

It's tragic enough that maybe three dozen were killed because of the gross negligence of the owners of West Fertilizer Co in West, Texas.

But compounding the carnage, it seems as if half the town was leveled including several schools and houses five blocks from the plant. But wait, there were houses five blocks from a fertilizer plant? There were actually houses across the street from this plant, and not just houses, but two of the town's three schools...

Fertilizer is a well-known component of homemade bombs for a reason—it's extremely explosive. The thought that people would build homes around a fertilizer plant boggles the mind, the thought that they would build two schools directly adjacent to it is borderline criminal. What if that explosion had occurred during school hours? ...

The middle school suffered severe fire damage. An apartment building adjacent the plant was completely leveled, killing about 15. See that tan circle off the northwest corner of the plant? That was a playground. A nursing home was within the blast radius and was completely leveled. You can see many more pictures of the damage here.

There is a reason zoning laws exist. But Texas being Texas, apparently the "freedom" to set up shop next to a bomb trumps everything else—including the lives and properties of far too many in West.

Now, I don't know what caused this explosion, but I really suspect that it's too early to be throwing around accusations of "gross negligence." That might be true, but let's wait for the evidence.

However, just look at that image! (Click it to enlarge the picture, if necessary.) That's why reasonable, rational people support zoning laws!

I grew up in a small town in Nebraska, and I can remember my Dad - a right-wing Republican if there ever was one - complaining that they couldn't get zoning laws passed in the town. So it's not just Texas, not at all. (Still, would any place but Texas put schools next to a fertilizer plant?)

No, government is not always the problem. And yes, we need regulations, because we're social animals. We live together in groups, and what you do can affect your neighbor, sometimes disastrously.

Reasonable people can disagree about the extent of zoning laws, and about the exact restrictions written into the law. But look at that image, and the one below, and tell me that we don't need zoning laws at all.

(Reuters)

More photos here. Make sure you've read this post from a volunteer at the retirement home, too.

Meteorite hits Russia

This is quite a video clip, isn't it? Keep in mind that he couldn't have been very close to the explosion, given how long it took for the sound to get there.

Luckily, this wasn't a dinosaur-killer, or even big enough to cause a nuclear winter. But those will happen someday, if we don't develop the technology - and the will - to identify and stop them.

Of course, the idiots are out in force. I've already seen comments about UFOs, and there's at least one Russian politician blaming America:

One Russian politician said the event was not a meteor shower but a US weapons test, Russia's Interfax news agency reported.

Vladimir Zhirinovsky, the leader of the ultra-nationalist Liberal Democratic Party, was quoted as saying: "Meteors are falling. Those are not meteors, it is Americans testing their new weapon."

TPM has other videos of this meteor strike in central Russia here. According to the BBC, nearly a thousand people were injured, two seriously.

President Vladimir Putin said he thanked God no big fragments had fallen in populated areas.

Hmm,... believers seem to have remarkably low expectations for their supposedly omniscient, omnipotent, omnibenevolent being, wouldn't you say? The best he can do is keep "big fragments" from population centers? Gee, that's really impressive, huh?

I think this demonstrates that we human beings need to protect ourselves. This was a very small meteorite. If an asteroid hit us, that could mean extinction for human beings (and countless other species, as well).

PS. Apparently, it's a "meteor" as it's burning through our atmosphere, but a "meteorite" when it actually hits the ground (most aren't big enough for that and simply burn up as "shooting stars").

Computer crash

(image source)

Sorry to disappear like that, but my computer crashed. It's been down all week.

I just now got it back - this is the very first thing I've done - so don't expect too much until I get caught up with everything else.

And no, I didn't get a lot of work done while it was down, either. When I don't have a computer, I'm always too depressed to work. :)

I did read five books this week, so I suppose I'll be writing reviews of them, eventually. But otherwise, I kept wondering what I used to do when I didn't have a computer. I was completely lost without it.

If you're wondering, it turned out to be just a bad video card. I upgraded to a better card, while I had the chance (if I'd sent the old card back for warranty replacement, my computer would have been down for weeks), but after they replaced the card, the repair shop told me that the motherboard is going bad, too!

I'm on my third motherboard (my third video card, as well), but this one isn't under warranty because it was a replacement for the last one that went bad. Apparently, the warranty doesn't reset. Surprise, surprise.

Well, my computer is working again, for now, but the motherboard could go at any time. Fun, huh? Maybe I need to bite the bullet and buy a new computer...

But not today.

Best pole-dance ever?

Maybe this isn't the best pole-dance ever, but if you've got a better one, I'd like to see it! Here's for making pole-dancing the next Olympic sport. :)

Seriously, this is an incredible display of athletic ability, don't you think? I'm still just blown away by it.

History of English

Funny and interesting, don't you think?

Zombies! Run!

Now, I'm not a runner, because running would require me to get out of my computer chair. But when I was younger, whenever I did run, I found it almost unbelievably boring.

So if I were a runner, I think this would be just what I'd need. But what do I know? Check it out here, if you're interested.

More computer problems

I can't imagine how we managed without computers, but sometimes, I just want to take an axe to mine.

About three weeks ago, I lost my internet access for a few days. But that was only a bad modem. I had to wait for a new one to be shipped to me, but it wasn't a big problem or a huge expense. At the very least, the problem was relatively easy to diagnose, at least with the help of my ISP.

Then this week, on Tuesday, my uninterruptible power supply crapped out. But that was obvious. I don't know why - or even what, exactly, happened - but it was easy enough to buy a new UPS, so I was back up within hours.

Yeah, I didn't like the extra expense, but the hardest part of these things is usually just discovering which piece of hardware or software is causing the problem. (The howling alarm from the UPS, combined with the complete lack of power coming from it, was a pretty good clue this time.)

The rest of the afternoon, and all evening, my computer worked fine. But the next morning, I got the dreaded "blue screen of death" when I started the computer. And although I got it running a few times, and even ran a successful checkdisk, I kept getting that BSoD every 20 minutes or so.

So on Wednesday, I took the computer to the repair shop. Late in the day, I got the news: a bad motherboard. But wasn't that still under warranty? After all, this was the second time they'd diagnosed a bad motherboard. (Last time, when I just had an intermittent problem, it took them five weeks to finally repair my computer, and they installed a new hard drive first - without actually curing anything.)

"Oh, no," I was told. "I'm sure we didn't install this motherboard. I would have remembered ordering a board like this."  I was really sure that they had installed it, so I made him check his records. "No, I don't see it."

Well, I needed to think about what I wanted to do, anyway. But after I hung up, I checked my records. Yup, they'd installed the motherboard in December, 2009, so surely it was still under warranty. I called back and told them I had the invoice right in front of me. They'd definitely installed that motherboard only about a year and a half ago.

So OK, they found their records then, but there was a new problem. It was going to take up to two months to get the motherboard repaired or replaced under warranty. Now I was getting a little bit pissed. I didn't blame them for the faulty hardware. But on the other hand, I didn't buy the motherboard myself. I didn't even choose that brand (the computer had come with a different brand of motherboard).

I'd taken my computer to the repair shop a year and a half ago, and they'd diagnosed the problem and ordered a replacement motherboard they'd thought was of comparable quality. Maybe I was being unreasonable here, but I expected them to stand behind their choice.

To their credit, they agreed pretty readily to install a temporary motherboard - a cheaper one - while mine was being repaired or replaced. And although I had to pay for it, I'll get the cost of the motherboard back when they remove it again in a few weeks.

I'm still spending a couple of hundred dollars for labor, but even this lower-end motherboard would add a hundred to that. And I'm not going to be missing a computer for up to two months, either. So I'm quite happy with the deal...

...Especially since this does seem to have fixed the problem. My computer seems to be working fine, so apparently it was the motherboard. But what's going to go bad next?

This is like repairing a used car. How much money do you want to put into a used car before you finally decide to buy a new one? OK, maybe it's not quite like that. This was a high-end gaming computer when I bought it, but that was five years ago. And since then, I've had to replace everything but the case and the DVD burner (the power supply, the monitor, and the motherboard twice now).

Oh, well. I'd love to get a new computer, but I really don't need one. This one still does everything I want. And I've had major construction work done on my house twice so far this summer (not to mention needing a new furnace last winter). And given the way the stock market has been crashing, maybe I should be saving my pennies right now, huh?

I'm basically just bitching. If you can't gripe on your own blog, where can you? I seem to have computer problems about every six months or so, on average. And even when the parts are still under warranty, there's an expense. And the aggravation factor.

Really, it's hard to do without a computer these days. I've got my old Windows 98 machine, but as of three weeks ago, with this new modem, I can no longer use it to access the internet. I can still play games - old games, at least (but those are often what I'm playing, anyway) - but that's not the main reason why I need a computer.

It's amazing how quickly computers have become indispensable, isn't it?

See if you can find Nebraska

That's a map of the United States as seen by a New Yorker, from Funny or Die. Click on the map to embiggen.

Of course, I had to post it here because of the treatment of Nebraska. (At that, we did better than Iowa, huh?)

Maybe I should stop feeding them?

(from Cute Overload, via the Lincoln Journal Star)

No, this isn't one of my squirrels, but I don't know why not.

Roll a D6

No, I'm not this kind of game-player. I always thought it would be fun, but I've never really had the chance. Basically, I stick with computer games.

But I understand the enthusiasm here and the culture. This is about using your imagination - not passively, as with a book or movie, but actively. You don't watch a story unfold, you create the story yourself, at least in part, and with your fellow gamers.

Being human, gamers run the gamut. But they're always willing to laugh at themselves.Check out The Guild, for example, or The Order of the Stick.

If you want to laugh at them, fine. But I suspect that a lot of that is just jealously - jealous that they're having such a good time. I'm rather envious myself.

Besides, I like the video parody.

Rabbit jumping

According to this article, "rabbit dressage is set to take the world by storm." Hmm,... maybe if they add cheerleaders and beer...

The best part is that the leashes are said to be "vital to prevent uncontrolled breeding." Well, they're rabbits.

Nice t-shirt!

It's based on this comic. Buy the t-shirt here.

And no, I don't get a cut. If I wasn't so swamped with Blood Bank t-shirts, I'd have ordered this one already. I might anyway. It's really appealing.

Fall seven times and stand up eight

(John Deering)

I've seen a number of political cartoons about the recent earthquake/tsunami disaster in Japan, but I think I like this one best.

It takes nothing away from this tragedy to believe that Japan will recover from it. Just the reverse, in fact. The spirit to overcome such setbacks is what makes us more than simple victims of circumstance.

And they've done it before. After all, Japan rose from complete devastation in World War II to become an economic powerhouse and a world leader.

"Fall seven times and stand up eight." Yes, indeed. You have to admire that kind of spirit, even as we certainly all sympathize with them right now.