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Another Sunday down.
Jan. 8th, 2007 01:47 amToday was another semi-sick day, although I did get more medicine and a humidifier to attempt to keep my nasal passages clear and unblocked. The humidifier’s cute, too. It’s a penguin.
Leading off tonight, we have worst. high school. analogies. ever.
Continuing the trend of dim bulbs at work, though, we get Pelosi saying Congress won't fund an escalation, but she and the Dems do support sending in more troops. (Link has Flash) The progressive wing of America is not going to be happy about that, since they probably elected Democrats on the proposition that they would start getting troops out, not adding more potential corpses. At least Pelosi’s being honest about not being the perfect progressive. Some pundits on the conservative side, as The American Conservative notes, are having some rather selective amnesia about their positions. There’s also the spycopter in the skies over Jackson, Mississippi to wonder about - what it can and can’t do in terms of surveillance and what it’s actually going to do in regard to privacy are questions that really need to be sorted out before the chopper takes flight.
Getting dimmer still, In Iraq, a bill that the U.S. is helping to draw up would give major oil companies 30-year contracts to Iraqi oil and keep up to 75 percent of the profits until drilling costs are recovered. Afterward, they’ll have a mere 20 percent of profits, still double the industry average. But we went into Iraq for Freedom and Democracy, right? This oil stuff must just be a fringe benefit. Nothing to see here, citizen, move along.
In a classic case of the left hand not having a clue what the right hand is doing - The LA Times Reports on the "Dark Cloud" over the Gates Foundation - namely that the corporations that they invest in are often behind the pollutions and problems that the Foundation’s grants are trying to fix. One wonders whether the Gates Foundation will actually decide to try and steer the companies themselves in a positive direction, as well as trying to fix the messes left behind. According to the article, though, it doesn’t look like that will happen anytime soon.
Of course, some dimness could be alleviated by paying attention to warning labels. The threat of lawsuits, however, produces some award-winning warning labels. (Hey, that group’s from Michigan! M-Law's Wacky Warning Labels.) There are some other warning labels that are pretty silly, and a bigger list of some real doozies of warnings, but there are few that can unseat the granddaddy of all stupid warnings, The Cobb County Board of Education "Evolution is a theory" warning. Not to say you can’t try yourselves with the Warning Label Generator. That said, occasionally a warning label can be put to good use - not by having it proclaim All Your Base Are Belong To Us, but instead making a poignant political comment in French.
Going from just dim to pitch-black, though, we get the Family Foundation of Virginia trying to force couples with children to stay married by requiring consent by both parents before divorce. There are exceptions for abuse and cruelty, but really, if there has to be consent to divorce, claiming abuse is like some of the Islamic statutes on rape - the woman has to bring forward four male witnesses who saw it, and even then, for all I know, she could get charged with adultery. If a motion like this passes in Virginia, we could all be in for a very rocky road of morality legislation, hiding behind the “zOMG! Think of the Children!” defense.
This is actually a rather bright idea, I’d say. Dark restaurants where the food, and the dining experience, is in total darkness. Not only a good idea of how the blind view the world, but someone who was blind could work there with no significant disadvantages. Sighted staff use night-vision goggles, apparently. A dark restaurant might be the perfect place to try those foods you’ve been told are delicious, but that you can’t look at for fear of being ill. Or maybe just as a place to try something new, with no preconceptions.
Craftiness striking again creates Domo-kun iPod containers. I still haven’t seen an episode of Domo-kun, to my knowledge. Maybe I should watch some to get what the craze is about. Other creative things include Harry Potter and the Lego Chess Set, three-dimensional cookie cookie cutters, - the duplication is intentional, I assure you - and the world's first 4'33" ringtone.
Something useful to visualize - what does 200 calories look like? For several foods, drinks, and liquids, if you want an idea of how much 200 calories (10% of the standard RDA) is, you can see how much more or less you can eat of certain foods to maintain your caloric requirements.
That’s it for me tonight. Hopefully, the cold goes away!
Leading off tonight, we have worst. high school. analogies. ever.
Continuing the trend of dim bulbs at work, though, we get Pelosi saying Congress won't fund an escalation, but she and the Dems do support sending in more troops. (Link has Flash) The progressive wing of America is not going to be happy about that, since they probably elected Democrats on the proposition that they would start getting troops out, not adding more potential corpses. At least Pelosi’s being honest about not being the perfect progressive. Some pundits on the conservative side, as The American Conservative notes, are having some rather selective amnesia about their positions. There’s also the spycopter in the skies over Jackson, Mississippi to wonder about - what it can and can’t do in terms of surveillance and what it’s actually going to do in regard to privacy are questions that really need to be sorted out before the chopper takes flight.
Getting dimmer still, In Iraq, a bill that the U.S. is helping to draw up would give major oil companies 30-year contracts to Iraqi oil and keep up to 75 percent of the profits until drilling costs are recovered. Afterward, they’ll have a mere 20 percent of profits, still double the industry average. But we went into Iraq for Freedom and Democracy, right? This oil stuff must just be a fringe benefit. Nothing to see here, citizen, move along.
In a classic case of the left hand not having a clue what the right hand is doing - The LA Times Reports on the "Dark Cloud" over the Gates Foundation - namely that the corporations that they invest in are often behind the pollutions and problems that the Foundation’s grants are trying to fix. One wonders whether the Gates Foundation will actually decide to try and steer the companies themselves in a positive direction, as well as trying to fix the messes left behind. According to the article, though, it doesn’t look like that will happen anytime soon.
Of course, some dimness could be alleviated by paying attention to warning labels. The threat of lawsuits, however, produces some award-winning warning labels. (Hey, that group’s from Michigan! M-Law's Wacky Warning Labels.) There are some other warning labels that are pretty silly, and a bigger list of some real doozies of warnings, but there are few that can unseat the granddaddy of all stupid warnings, The Cobb County Board of Education "Evolution is a theory" warning. Not to say you can’t try yourselves with the Warning Label Generator. That said, occasionally a warning label can be put to good use - not by having it proclaim All Your Base Are Belong To Us, but instead making a poignant political comment in French.
Going from just dim to pitch-black, though, we get the Family Foundation of Virginia trying to force couples with children to stay married by requiring consent by both parents before divorce. There are exceptions for abuse and cruelty, but really, if there has to be consent to divorce, claiming abuse is like some of the Islamic statutes on rape - the woman has to bring forward four male witnesses who saw it, and even then, for all I know, she could get charged with adultery. If a motion like this passes in Virginia, we could all be in for a very rocky road of morality legislation, hiding behind the “zOMG! Think of the Children!” defense.
This is actually a rather bright idea, I’d say. Dark restaurants where the food, and the dining experience, is in total darkness. Not only a good idea of how the blind view the world, but someone who was blind could work there with no significant disadvantages. Sighted staff use night-vision goggles, apparently. A dark restaurant might be the perfect place to try those foods you’ve been told are delicious, but that you can’t look at for fear of being ill. Or maybe just as a place to try something new, with no preconceptions.
Craftiness striking again creates Domo-kun iPod containers. I still haven’t seen an episode of Domo-kun, to my knowledge. Maybe I should watch some to get what the craze is about. Other creative things include Harry Potter and the Lego Chess Set, three-dimensional cookie cookie cutters, - the duplication is intentional, I assure you - and the world's first 4'33" ringtone.
Something useful to visualize - what does 200 calories look like? For several foods, drinks, and liquids, if you want an idea of how much 200 calories (10% of the standard RDA) is, you can see how much more or less you can eat of certain foods to maintain your caloric requirements.
That’s it for me tonight. Hopefully, the cold goes away!
