Quote for the day

"Heaven never helps the man who will not act."
-Sophocles

Think about it.

Now respond.

West Coast vs East Coast

I was sitting in a clothing store while Jill tries on some new work clothes. (She just got her hair cut today, and apparently the trim requires some cute pants and a spring-colored jacket ;-) ) And thinking about the basketball game we watched last night on Idaho Sports dot com (or something like that).

They showed some commercials and had radio-ad voice overs during the game with local companies (some frozen yogurt chain that was expanding) and big chain stores (like Les Schwab Tires).

One of the Les Schwab commercials mentioned something about Free Beef. And I thought - this probably wouldn't fly well with segments of the East Coast audience; they're probably not likely to get new tires because they can get some beef to feed their growing family with. But they may be interested in (properly inflated) tires made from partially recycled materials that they could pay additional fees for to offset their carbon usage.

(ASIDE: Not really sure how that works - or if it applies to this situation - but we were looking at British Airways tickets from Dulles to Heathrow (that were $250 one way) that had a check-box during the ticketing option where you could voluntarily add a few dollars per ticket to offset your carbon usage. Apparently. They were the first airline to offer that http://www.britishairways.com/travel/csr-your-footprint/public/en_gb . )

Anyway - just made me think about some of the West vs East differences I've noticed.
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Quotable quotes?

We watched WarGames last night. Jill had never seen it, and it had been years since I had. (To be honest, I'm not one to recommend movies - everyone has different tastes - but I think this one is worth renting some time for several reasons, upon which I may or may not explicate.)

Anyway - the quote.

At one point in the movie, the young antagonist is talking to his female friend in his room about this scientist/programmer that he was researching, only to discover that the individual was dead. The following conversation takes place:

JENNIFER: He's dead?
DAVID: Yeah, here's his obituary.
JENNIFER: He wasn't very old.
DAVID: Well, he was prety old. He was 41.
JENNIFER: Oh yeah? Well, that's old.

Guess you have a different outlook on life expectancies if you're a 17-year old back in the early 1980's?

At another point in the movie, a character discusses the extinction of the dinosaurs and the rise of the humans, and then notes that perhaps humans won't be around all that much longer. He says:

FALKEN: And when we go, nature will start again. With the bees, probably.

Nothing deep to say about the bee quote, but it was a random connection to the other movie we rented that Jill wanted to see, The Secret Life of Bees.
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Stuff I was going to blog about...

When I find something online that I like, I'll put a link to it in a draft email and type up some initial thoughts. That way, I can go back later and cut-and-paste from there to Blogger, or just hit "send" and send it to my Blogger address(es) to post automatically. However, I've been behind lately and I have nearly 30 drafts saved. I tried to post a few each day for the last few days, but I realized I keep finding new stuff and the thought of going back to write up all those seems daunting. Plus, some of it is old(er) news, and--in my mind--won't quite have the zzzziiinnggg that I was hoping for when I first saw it and thought I'd write about it.

That being said, I figured I'd post the links and my one-sentence summary and clear out my draft folder. (Yes, I like things neat and organized). Now you can scroll through and pick out what you think is interesting. I happened to think they were all interesting (at the time) - and figure there's something of worth/interest/distraction here for everyone. Enjoy!

In no particular order:

1) US News: A Slim Majority Favors Obama's Order to Close Guantánamo Bay (01/26/2009)

2) New York Times: John Thain resigns BofA (01/23/2009)

3) Clay Christensen's Disrupting Class Blog

4) The NCAA, the BCS, and the US Congress

5) Where's Waldo? - Inaugural Style

6) Governor Romney's Remarks to the House Republican Conference Retreat

7) President Obama: Too tall for the chopper? And here. And President Bush got flack for a closed door...

8) Panic, Sully, and Washington

9) Disappointment:
You can thank Senators Susan Collins (R-ME), Olympia Snowe (R-ME), and Arlen Specter (R-PA) for throwing any semblance of fiscal discipline to the wind as they voted in favor of the [controversial] $838 billion, providing the 60 votes needed to end debate on the bill and pass in the Senate, and Senator Edward Kennedy (D-MA) came back from convalescence to make the vote 61.

Republicans claim they were prevented from offering amendments. Surely you have heard by now about some of the earlier controversial items (such as prophylactics and new grass, among others) - and perhaps you have heard President Obama "blast 'tired old theories.'"

One problem- [BHO campaign rhetoric- pay increase with spending cut] [continuing gov't spend to stimulate economy that Pres. Bush was trying. $200B didn't work- so $800B will?]

Besides the long list of things that don't affect the nation's infrastructure [see Heritage Foundation's list], there's something else you should be aware of:

An amendment was added that will significantly affect your health care, and create another bureaucratic organization.

opinion article re. health care amendment on Bloomberg

the gov't telling doctors what they should and shouldn't be doing to treat you; ie, the rationing plan

5 most misleading BHO statements

10) Obama Lobbyists: making lots of money post-campaign on K St -OR- over a dozen exceptions made to let them work for the Administration

11) NOVA show re. FISA, NSA, etc.

12) The Internet, the First Amendment, and You. Could bloggers be sued for telling the truth?

13) Minnesota Senate Race / Recount Update

14) A Manual for the White House.

15) Local News: Streetcars for Alexandria? Expanding the public transit in the Arlington/Alexandria area.

16) Another note or two re. the USS Port Royal (remember, the Navy ship that got stuck out by Hawaii?)

17) Local News: New NOVA political blog that I found

And more to come!

Did I read that right?

Bulldozer rams Israeli police car
Palestinian driver shot after injuring two officers and hitting empty bus in attack in Jerusalem

Come back after you've read the article.














Anyone else notice that the taxi driver fired shots?