Sense, Nonsense, and Not-Sense

So. This is a bit awkward to write, not just because there's a whole cultural Thing involved here, but because, y'know, we try so hard to put up a front of invincibility, or at least competence, that it's difficult to say that you've basically Failed.

I've bought into the myth of the American Dream, where it should be possible for any person to enjoy a middle-class lifestyle with a family (or at least a significant other and yourself) on a single income, especially one of a government functionary with a reasonably good college degree. Perhaps in another economy, this might be possible.

I knew that this was basically impossible for someone at a minimum wage job, even providing for themselves. For a while, living by myself, it seemed like I could pull it off - at least for living by myself. Then, well, relationships, and pets, and unexpected expenses, and let's just say that the budget is not looking healthy. And continues to not look healthy.

This is not, unfortunately, the kind of thing where I can say "I just need a little money to take care of those unexpected expenses and all will be well." I would rather not be a charitable burden on someone for an indefinite amount of time, until my salary catches up or the budget gap gets filled with work from my significant other. So, to try and fill the budgetary gap, at least until my S.O. can find steady work, I present the following offer:

I Want Work.

I have various and sundry skills - I can write, read, edit, create ePUBs, make simple static web pages, research, simply edit audio, images, and video, and and other things. I have various oracles that may be helpful to you. Programming, unfortunately, is beyond my ken. I'm pretty good at looking at something and being able to adaptit with some examples and a lot of thinking, but creating stuff out of whole cloth? Not my thing right now.

There are a few caveats:

1. Obviously, whatever Work you have to offer will have to be something done electronically (or that you're willing to pay for the postage cost to and back for). I cannot travel, nor do I expect you to be willing to travel for the Work
2. This must be Work that you are willing to pay for. I can't take much in trade (unless it's a Really Cool Trade) because the bills still have to be paid.

Prices are to be negotiated based on the Work you would like me to do. Payment method will have to be negotiated, as I do not have PayPal or other electronic methods. You can leave a comment or use the private messaging system to contact me. Any comment threads will be screened upon request.

So, yeah, I need work. And lots of it.

Please pass the message along to your contacts and others who might have some money to spare and Work they are willing to pay someone to do. I know, in this economy, that this is unlikely, but it never hurts to ask.

Please link to this post so that I can be sure that everything is in one place.

Greetings! Here's something that is probably illegal if you actually do it inside the United States - the ability, using WINE, to remove Adobe DRM in a Debian-flavored Linux variant. Good to use to make your bought e-books portable. Bad to pirate e-books from your library's collection. Seriously. Use this knowledge responsibly.

Hyperbole and a Half returns, with an intimate look at what depression can be like.

An anonymous author explains what life in the closet is like - a lot of fear and self-policing. Would that we lived in a world where everyone could be as open and comfortable with different people as George Takei is in making an anti-bigot PSA.

Ever wondered what it might take to be a librarian? Here's a guide on what the profession is going to require of you. Think it's all about sitting and reading books now?

For something a little less daunting (but no less important), The Digital Literacy Assessment from Northstar Online. A very nice resource for those looking to learn how to get going in the on-line world. For those working on a more intermediate coursework, the six technology skills expected of all incoming freshmen.

(Thing is, not everyone in the profession has the skills we need for this...and doesn't necessarily feel like there's an environment for them to learn it.)

One to two hours of Internet time is almost not enough or not nearly enough time for the modern job seeker or Internet-less person to achieve what they need in any given day. And that's without microbarriers that raise a little bit of aggravation, drain a little bit of energy, or otherwise sap the ability of that person to achieve what they want.

Out in the world, The Untied Kingdom wants images to be registered and fully metadata-ed to receive full copyright protection, otherwise, anyone can exploit them. And then license them to someone else to exploit, and so on...

France adopts marriage equality. Stateside, Rhode Island, Delaware, and Minnesota (as of August 1) are also members of the Century of the Fruitbat. (Minnesota defeated an anti-equality constitutional amendment in 2012).

The National Library of Wales caught fire.

And Hungary stopped being a funcitioning democracy, apparently.

Domestically, A former Mitt Romney campaign intern was charged in connection to a blackmail scandal where the intern threatened to expose alleged nude pictures unless more nude pictures were sent to him.

In case you were wondering, no, it's not legal to hunt deer in a Wal-Mart parking lot.

Nor will things end well if while on probation for neglecting one child's proper medical care so much that they died, parents allowed another child to die by not getting proper medical care.

The body of a student wrongly identified as a suspect in the Boston bombing was discovered in Rhode Island - cause of death unknown as of the linked article, but there will likely be an investigation to see whether or not the intense scrutiny, including several organizations that should have known better, had something to do with it. Elsewhere, a teenager rappping about current events finds themselves charged with terrorism and set on a $1 million USD bail.

And finally, students are being suspended for dance moves.

The National Institutes of Mental Health are abandoning the DSM in favor of a biological research standard being developed, which can only help bring more and better data about mental health into the psychological practice.

Confronted with a justification from the Bible to allow for immigration reform, Senator Sessions of Alabama could not then justify its opposite using the same book.

A teenager attempting to contract a sex worker through the Internet was instead pepper sprayed and robbbed of his savings. Elsewhere, a judge took as much pleasure as possible in writing his opinion regarding an ordinance involving strip clubs.

In technology, The Edwin Mellon Press has decided that the proper response to criticism is to issue dubious legal threats to bloggers and their affiliated websites and organizations. Because trying to chill opinions of you is exactly the way that you get people to stop criticizing you in an Internet age.

You could, however, go one step further and be Fox, sending DMCA takedown notices asserting they are the rights holders to Cory Doctorow's novel Homeland, because copies of the novel, properly shared, are being assumed to be the show of the same name.

Having made all their ebooks DRM-free a year ago, Tor reports that their sales are just as strong, if not stronger, and that the piracy of their books hasn't increased in any noticeable way.

Kinect can now order pizza. The Internet is not amused.

Using optical technology to read the pits and grooves (much like how we read compact discs) on the cylinders and records he left behind, the Smithsonian has created digital recordings of the voice of Alexander Graham Bell. One can now listen to the voice of the person who first patented the telephone.

Finally, the last time C02 levels were this high on Terra, there were no humans there to measure it.

In opinions, why one might think that making people think of suicide is not the best marketing tool for your vehicle.

A coffee shop in Seattle has publicly called out the city&apso;s new law requiring paid sick leave for all employees by announcing their decision to charge 1.5% more for their coffee due to the policy. They could have done it quietly and nobody would have noticed, but in publicly declaring things so, they have put themselves on the same side as

Why haven't we heard more about the fertilizer explosion in West, Texas, which did more damage, was deadlier, and is far more likely to happen again than the terror attack in Boston? Oh, right, because corporations that pay advertising dollars have a vested interest in making sure you never know about what malfeasance they're doing.

The time and care that you put into grammar and spelling choices when you write formally makes it easy for your reviewer or recipient to know what kind of time and care you put into the work behind the writing.

Warren Buffet mocks those who invest in precious metals, preferring to invest in things that actually produce value and goods.

There's a giant scandal of sexual abuse in the white community, yet do you see the white community having to repeatedly stand up and disavow and deny and claim how much white people aren't like that small minority?

Last for this entry, Creative Commons Licenses are awesome things - because images, once released to the web, have a life of their own. Sometimes with credit, sometimes not, and sometimes the BBC asks for permission to use your CC-licensed image. That said, citations are your friend, dammit - ESPECIALLY because the Internet is continually changing hypertext. Trace things back as far as you can go, as close to the original as you feel you can hit. And finally, because copyright is a beast, make sure that you know and can prove that images you use are either properly licensed, public domain, or have explicit permission for use. Because, apparently, Fair Use doesn't necessarily cut it when it comes to images.

And one badass response to the idea that women can't be serious gamers.

I should do these more often...so that I don't have quite so many links to post at a time.

It's been way too long since I updated - mostly I've been on vacation, and doing my other work to make sure that my bank account stays healthy. The good thing is, I've seen numbers in my checking account that I haven't seen in years, thanks to an excellent refund check and the other work. The problem is, it's only a temporary lift. Life will intrude again, and before the year is out, I suspect that all the happy that I have now will have vanished with the money.

I have an idea for a headcanon fixfic regarding the Whoniverse, based on my stubborn brain insisting that Amelia Pond would have been killed in "Praise Him". It also apparently involves the Doctor playing 16-bit video games to get the right idea of how to accomplish the fix. I'd think about it, but I'm not sure I could write Rory appropriately equally adorable, incredulous, and furious at The Doctor's apparently cavalier attitude toward the whole venture. Maybe when I get time.

So, let's get to it. The Dead Pool Actors Guild welcomes Annette Funicello, Mouseketeer and unwitting instructor in the use of camera angles, at 70 years of age. The Politics Forum raises some eyebrows at the arrival of former Prime Minister Thatcher at 87 years, and the Art Critics department holds a place of high honor for Roger Ebert at 70 years of age.

Out in the world today, A 7.8 Richter earthquake struck and shook around the nation of Iran. Persons believing this is somehow G-d's punishment to the Muslims will be sent over there one-way.

New Zealand officially supports marriage equality. Uruguay officially supports marriage equality. The United States? Still has schools considering disciplinary action against a teacher that used the word "vagina" in a biology class about the reproductive system and an organization that believes that it might be okay to let gay men in as members, so long as they're under 18 and have no aspirations of being leaders when they become adults. But only might, as the Boy Scouts will get lots of pushback saying that they should stay discriminatory.

Domestically, two bombs exploded near the finish line of the Boston Marathon, killing at least three and wounding many more. After asking for video and still imagery from the large amount of spectators recording the event, the FBI identified two persons as suspects in the bombing. One was killed in a guns-and-explosives shootout, then the second was apprehended later in the day after a massive dragnet failed earlier. A tip called in turned out to be fruitful. The parents of the two suspects claimed that their boys had been framed by someone else. The investigation continues.

That's the good part. The bad part was The New York Post running a front-page story about two men who were not suspects, calling them "bag men" and claiming the FBI wanted to talk to them. They would later run a much smaller story saying the men had been "cleared", but at no point have they apologized for splashing the two men on the front page and drawing public scrutiny onto them.

And Senator Lindsey Graham wanting "enemy combatant" rules to apply in the case and lamenting the lack of a UAV tracking the suspect, with the implication that things would have been so much easier if the drone could have just killed the suspect. Other conservative commentators suggested that the fact the two young men were immigrants from a very young age means that immigration reform needs to be scuttled and the borders locked down, including Steve King of Iowa, because clearly we're just letting in ALL THE TERRORISTS. The other conspiracy theories that worked their way up into government aren't helping, either.

A fertilizer plant in Texas that also stored and created ammonium nitrate exploded, killing 14, injuring more, and destroying more than 50 homes in the process.

The House of Representatives hates you and wants to be able to spy on you as easily as possible. Additionally, the IRS believes it can access your e-mail without a warrant. And furthermore, research indicates that even anonymized, it doesn't take a whole lot of data to match a pattern to a person.

North Carolina believes it may establish a state religion, ignoring federal court decisions that extend the prohibitions placed on the federal govenment in the First Amendment to state government. Said bill died quickly, however, once attention was brought to it.

An Alaskan lawmaker used a racial slur to describe Hispanic immigrants, then did not apologize for it. A GOP official used the n-word in describing construction. He did later apologize for the remark after running through his complete list of excuses.

Kansas's legislators and governor declare life begins at conception, their vitriolic hatred for women, and their dedication to ensuring that women who come in for abortions are told lies.

Senators that voted against cloture on S. 649 explain their cowardice and obstructionism as part of a bizarre zero-sum game - that somehow, they only have enough in them to support one or two controversial issues, instead of as many as come before the Senate to be thoughtfully and completely considered before voting. Gridlock is no way to govern, and if there were a procedure in place to do so, I'd call for a confidence vote in the obstructionists or find a way to get the parlimentarian to rule the obstructors out of order when they choose to filibuster everything without reason.

Finally, here's a reason why you publish your data and subject it to review and the scientific process. It's possible that the push toward austerity and economy-wrecking...is based on an Excel error and really awful methodology.

In technology, We know that packaged food is usually bad for you with regard to fats and cholesterol. They're also over-salting them.

For better dining, a Wine Aroma Wheel by Pierre Boucheron - so that you can talk about the things that make your wine great.

Also, a proof-of-concept that suggested it may be possible to hack planes by exploiting flight systems and delivering control payloads. The aviation administrations responded swiftly and said it wasn't possible to hack live planes so easily.

In opinions, Elite panic - the thought by the rich that everyone else thinks like they do...and that they might be able to do them harm. And we'll couple that with a study that suggests that violence may act and spread much like a contagion.

From AlterNet: the best way for the people who want a Christian nation and the people who want a giant separation between religion and government to win...is to adopt each others' strategies. Amusing.

Not so amusing: Wouldn't it be great if we could think of assaulting women in the same mindset that we think of assaulting cats? It would certainly stop a significant amount of bullshit just with that one little shift.

The more we get to know people, both QUILTBAG and reactionary conservative alike, the more our opinions tend to shift toward letting gay people come out of the closet and trying to push reactionary conservatives in. Thing is, if you push the conservatives into the closet, they don't get enough opportunities for youto see them and evaluate whether you agree with their policies.

Last out, People who complain about things on social justice fronts...often are doing so because they love those things and want them to be better, not because they hate them. And it's more productive to criticize someone's practices rather than to claim they don't have the same label you do.

And last for tonight - a Quidditch World Cup just concluded, IT Security, in a very short read, and an acapella singer of chiptunes and video game music - that sings all the parts himself.

These things have happened that have direct effects on me.

1. I get to scratch off several markers on my Experience List. (It probably means I've increased my librarian level quite a bit without looking.) Namely, the squares that say "Major system malfunction caused by rolling crash" and "Petty thievery by user cabal" can be checked off, as can the multiplier of "two major incidents happening at the same time", "2x incidents while you are the person in charge", and "2x incidents while the boss is on vacation." Plus the bonus experience that comes from both happening on a Monday and one in the evening.
   
   Yeah. The first warning sign was when the catalogues went down. No biggie, we thought, because the staff clients still work.
   
   Then people couldn't authenticate with their library cards for the public terminals. (Those of you in the know have probably said an expletive reflexively.)
   
   Then it was temporarily fixed. Then it crashed again, and this time it started taking staff clients off-line. We were able to limp along in there terminals that were working and manual checkout procedures.
   
   Then came the theft, where users knocked the hinge pin out of our printer fee cash box, after having posted lookouts. After which they reached in, grabbed a handful of bills, and exited the library. So now I have to gather all the information for that while still trying to provide service tip or customers add the infrastructure is failing.
   
   I managed. Everything in proper place, and the system came back on later.
2. I must be too impatient for my organization. I see the possibility of a good idea, and I want to gather up funding and do some research on whether it would be a feasible option (including potential measures of success) and then I want to go do it. The organization does not move that quickly, nor does it really encourage employees to go skunkwork or 20 percent things. I'm trying to think of ways that we could start moving toward the leading edge instead of the trailing edge, but more often, I have to not throw my hands up in frustration at how long the process takes for anything that could be a good idea to get approved. Someone told me that it's a generation gap between new workers and older managers. Maybe that's it. Either way, holding patterns, even on cheap ideas, suck.

1. When giving advice, especially unsolicited advice, leading with a variant of "you suck" is probably not going to get your advice listened to, even if it is completely correct.
2. I can scratch another entry off my "real librarian" list, as I had to clean up a child's vomit this week.
3. It can be incredibly frustrating to deal with someone who insists their way is the correct way, sometimes to the point of not telling you all the steps in what you want to do, so that when you do step one differently, you have to undo it and redo it their way because of the hidden step two.

Real updates soon, we promise.

"He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information on the State of the Union,..." - and thus the mandated report begins again for this year. It being an annual event is mostly due to tradition, and the oral address is a relatively recent return, as writing was the popular form for much of the United States' existence. This particular address follows an inaugural address talking about the history and shared struggles of the nation and its peoples as well as a mass shooting that appears to have galvanzied public opinion. Perhaps because those killed were defenseless children and their teachers. Perhaps not. In any case, I'm using the remarks as delivered by the President in the actual speech.

The beginning is normally boilerplate, or sometimes a stretch, to show off the things that are improved in the union this past year. Considering we're still crawling ourselves out of a recession, there was a lot of low-hanging fruit to pick. Recognizing that there was still a long way to go helped. Making mention that the remining war and its cost can come to an end soon is also a good thing. Pointing out that the American people expect their government to govern could have been a much sharper edge used, if one were trying to go for accuracy, but just saying so probably caused gasps in the mainstream media.

Then come the commonsense reforms - cut defense, reform the tax code to be fairer, and STOP BEING OBSTRUCTIONISTS, GOP. Increase jobs by funding projects to innovate in many areas.

Plank two: climate change. Start shooting for multiple targets - energy independence, reduced climate emissions, and more/better renewables and clean energy. Fix the infrastructure that supports all of these innovations. (It creates jobs!) Let people refinance their mortgages so as to free up some money.

Plank three: Universal preschool and high schools that can get students out with the skills needed to get jobs. Early learning research says that having quality preschool is very helpful for getting kids ready for schooling. And if our high schools could graduate students that could get good jobs, that's excellent, instead of requiring a collegiate degree to make minimum wage in an unrelated field.

Plank Four: Raise the standard of living. Reform immigration, DREAM-style. Pass the Violence Against Women Act. Although, the way he framed it actually frames women in terms that try to appeal to men that aren't going to support Obama policies anyway, instead of allowing those women to stand on their own right as independent women and supporters. They're also intimately tied to the proposal to raise the minimum wage, as more people, especially single mothers, are finding that their costs are more than their income, even with multiple part-time jobs all running concurrently.

Plank Five: Take care of the soldiers. Which is a twofold position - wind down the war that has already gone on too long, and then take care of the veterans that are coming back. Process their disability claims swiftly, get them the benefits they deserve, and help them with the stresses of readjusting to civilian life after a decade plus of deployments and combat.

The Interlude: The voting process needs reform. Because 200,000 people not voting in Florida is a bug. Because a 102 year-old woman shouldn't have to spend six hours to vote.

Plank Six: Let's actually put in some meaningful gun reform. Or, at the very least, put those proposals that have been drafted to a proper up-or-down vote. STOP BEING OBSTRUCTIONISTS, GOP. Most of their constituency is okay with sensible reforms and against the NRA's more extreme stances.

And that was the speech. The question is whether or not the GOP will decide to abandon the "must not let Obama win at any cost!" ideology. The Republican Response would show whether or not they were ready to grow up and act like serious people...

...the result? FAILURE. (And the Beltway should be ashamed of themselves for focusing on the water-drinking instead of the substantive commentary.) Sorry, Senator Rubio, your star has entered a decaying orbit.

The Republican Response appeared to be disjonited and not related to the speech that preceded it. We're using the Fox News Insider transcript.

The opening lines talk about immigration leading to "Hey, I have the potential to do well, and that's the most important thing, not like that socialist way of thinking that says people need more than opportunity to succeed!" The Obama is a Socialist meme died before the Birthers came into existence. Let it go.

Furthermore, the idea that government was the problem of the economic crisis and slow recovery is empirically discredited. The Big Government thing is not true, either - at least not in the financial area that has been deregulated to the point of allowing such crisis problems to happen. Blaming the government and the Affordable Care Act for private employers not hiring is disingenuous - it's the employers that decide not to hire because they're more interested in profit for certain individuals, not the government.

The false motives attack is, erm, disproven by your own colleagues, Senator Rubio. Mr. Ryan's plan for entitlements was not just "more flexibilty for states", it was "a block of money that everyone has to fight over". Most of the candidates fielded in the last election catered quite a bit to the rich - Mr. Romney, Mr. Brown, Mr. Ryan... there's moer of a pattern there than you can admit, Mr. Rubio. (Also, how's the list price of your house coming?) The Republican Party needs to pay attention to the effects of their policies on everyone, not just on their donors. (Have an example: Republicans love big government when it's about shaming poor people. And even the libertarians are all for big government when it suits their needs.)

Also, while it's nice to say that the economy needs to grow, we like concrete plans explaining how, rather than just saying that mythical growth will solve all our problems. "Solyndra" jab is low. "Government creates more debt than ever" is false, as is "the real cause of our debt is Obama's spending and nothing else."

And that final swing, saying that many of our problems are moral and have to be fixed that way? I'd like to know what you mean specifically about that, Senator Rubio, since it seems pretty obvious to me that you're calling out soe of your fellow Americans for being moral degerates. I'd like to know who they are that you mean, so that they know you don't represent them or care about them.

It just didn't address the things in the President's speech, and it rehashed several old lines of attack. So I guess the GOP still doesn't really want to be ready to be responsible grownups. (Based on behavior since, that theory is pretty well confirmed.)

Greetz. I might be venturing into the world of doing a guest post Elsewhere. I've got a draft, and I think it works. What I want are eyeballs to make sure there aren't confusing things, unfortunate implications, or worse in there.

Can't offer any compensation for it, but maybe I can read over something of yours in exchange. Comment or message with a way of getting a hold of you.

Please and thank you.

For lighter fare, let me tell you what this pat week was like for me at work :

Monday: Teenagers destroy section of coffee bar-like seating by sitting too many bodies on the counter. Counter fine, support structure bent out of shape.

Tuesday: Talk with boss, find out that "being in charge" does actually mean you have the authority to move people from what they are doing if you need them elsewhere, and also that it means you're supposed to know and be aware of everything relating to an invent. Previous knowledge to this point has been vague statements and Capricious Boss's whims. Talk structured as "things to keep in mind" rather than "you screwed up", so panic triggers kept to a minimum.

Wednesday: Power outage one hour before scheduled end of shift. Demonstrated competence and awesome in getting everything locked up and closed off. Too bad nobody there to see it but fellow staffers. Find it that being person in charge does not confer authority to close library during dark hours after reasonable time has passed to see if power will return, but must instead wait for the sayso of a much higher authority. Takes me 75 minutes to get home instead of 20 after power returns to branch because power is still out on commute home, and nobody understands how to behave at nonfunctional lights.

Thursday: Webinar convinces manager of what I have been trying to say all along about video editing computer - needs stuff to do creation with. May actually get stuff, maybe?

Friday: Extend slideshow in teen area (driven by kiosk mode Firefox and code snippets in Javascript helpfully provided by #code) to display movie file ads. Tests successful. Comment code (and associated shell script from #code, as computer is running Slacko). Booyah.

And that's on top of the requests to work miracles, unjam computers, find good reading material, and deliver stern warnings about the noise levels in our teen area.
My job is never boring.

Hello, everyone. The economic crash hurt us all, we're told, but women and girls have been hurt more, because they started in a worse position. Even with the gains of the last few years. Makes yo uwish that you could just say to a girl, "Whosoever holds this hammer, if [they] be worthy, shall possess the power of Thor", and let it be so. Might help a lot when a Catholic hospital is suddenly certain fetuses aren't people when the fetuses are involved in a lawsuit against the hospital for malpractice and when Catholic hospitals reportedly refuse a victim of sexual assault so that they don't have to tell them anything about pregnancy options. (Oh, and the porposed New Mexico bill that would require a rape victim carry their pregnancy to term, lest they be charged with "tampering with evidence" and supposedly pro-life leaflets that are incredibly bizarre and most likely Blatant Lies.)

A challenge for you - can you describe a difficult concept using the most common ten hundred words in the language? Or perhaps you would prefer to develop new identities for yourself, that will lead to new habits as you become those identities?

Also, there's a love meme going - nominate yourself or others!

Out in the world today, having failed in competing in the cable market, a cable channel is asking the Canadian government to require it be carried on basic cable.

The United Kingdom is asking for DNA samples from men who were convicted for being gay when it was illegal to be gay (law since repealed) because the government wants to make sure that all their potential threats to society or violent people have their DNA catalogued. You can guess what kind of massive FAIL this is.

Domestically, having built an organization that is highly motivated to elect a President, the Obama campaign is reforming as an issues PAC and hoping to use all of that power to persuade the Congress to do liberal things.

Speaking of the President, there was an inauguration, and this time, the President apparently wanted to take a moment and appreciate the phenomenon of the ceremony of the swearing-in of a President. There was also an inaguration speech that talked about the ongoing struggle to live up to the demands of the Constitution, including mentioning the Stonewall Riots for the first time.

The FBI, when compelled to release information about how they were tracking citizens without warrants, released [REDACTED]. No, that's not a joke. That is exactly what they released. Elsewhere, shall we compare the relative punishments of a person who was doing scholarly work versus those who wrecked the economy?

The Republican Party decided to delay their debt ceiling fight for four months.

In less federal matters, a jailer readily admitted that he offered female inmates privileges and prohibited items if they would strip or expose their breasts for him. Because, y'know, men in charge of women in a prison environment isn't a perfect place for abuse.

In several states where Republicans control the state legislatures and governors, plans are underway to rig elections for Republicans using gerrymandered districts to award electoral college votes. Virginia opened fire while a tie-deciding vote was in Washington to watch the inauguration, and Michigan suddenly seems very interested in it after playing by the rules meant their man lost.

Many millions tuned in to hear Lance Armstrong, cyclist extraordinaire, talk about performance-enhancing drug usage and his own alleged doping.

In technology and sciences, an explanation of why effective merging is so damn difficult, or, why everyone will try to run the shortest route possible, thereby making it the longest route possible.

an insight into how the leprosy bacteria is able to spread itself in the body - hijacking cells and reverting them to an earlier stage of development.

Jumping gene material...that hops across entire genomes!

And then...using a genome sequencer to track an outbreak of a drug-resistant superbug, and then to prevent the outbreak from spreading.

Elsewhere, Nokia was decrypting secure traffic on their proxies to compress it for data plans...but didn't tell anyone that's what they were doing. Suffice it to say, when discovered, there was quite a bit of outcry.

For some good things, looking to fireflies to improve LEDs. And what might very well be the weirdest keynote at CES to date. That said, the gadgetry on display was quite impressive...if out of the price range for the average consumer.

Last out, boosting productivity through images of adorable baby animals.

Welcome to opinions, where Ayn Rand is disproved through visiting the actual developing world.

The Dissent of a Woman lets us know why "creepy" is a necessary designation for men, whether being actively predatory or cluelessly creepy.

The Internet contains lots of people to meet - and being able to meet them safely is something we should be teaching our children.

A priest made a 911 call after he had become stuck in kinky gear - and then was sex-shamed all over the Internet for having done so. This is not cool. For as much as there's a time and place for making fun of hypocrisy, when it comes to doing so because someone did a responsible thing, that's not okay.

Additionally, a deliberately transphobic article received a smart response...with one transphobic comment that could have been easily apologized and fixed for... which didn't happen. And that was harmful to feminism. And demonstrated there's still a gap between the LGB and the T. (Those of us on QUILTBAG have quite a few more gaps to close.)

Out of this section, all the things that video games reflect on our society...and a few things that could be done to curb how much kids are exposed to that part of society.

Last for tonight, a Batmobile from the 1960s Adam West series sold at auction for $4.2 million USD, how people of warm climes deal with cold snaps, and the decisions one must make when it comes to seeing movies.

Right. So I promised an explanation when I asked about the differences between "best" and "most" uses of work. If you haven't answered the questions (currently located a few posts down at The Many Meanings of "Best"), please do so before continuing on with this post.

( It involves work and co-workers )