My MySpace

Despite my best efforts not to, I have actually filled out my MySpace page. I'll keep doing the blog thing here, because I like the format and I use my Yahoo account all the time anyway. But if you're insanely bored or one of those MySpace profile snoops, have a go at my page.

Assault Weapons

So the ban on assault weapons expired a while ago (article) pretty much because of GW. Clearly this doesn't affect my daily life in suburbia, but it kind of makes you wonder sometimes what you might be able to buy.

Well, an acquantence recently purchased the above for about $1500 total. Yes, that's an M4. Something most people if they ever see, it's only in a video game. So if you've got a little cash (and what drug dealer or terrorist doesn't?) then you can legally own one of these bad boys too. Nice. I guess.

Where's the outcry?

C'mon. All you people like to ban Barbie because she's so perfect. And then ban video games because of bad parenting in the Midwest. And sue teachers for bringing kids to museums where there might (gasp) be a nude statue.

Now I'll appeal to you -- please ban this crap. And all the toddler-sized shorts that say "sexy" too. And about 90% of the printed Ts at Old Navy now.

GPLv3

I appreciate the concept of the GPL license and even the FSF. However, I'm often at odds with some of this now because I work for a software vendor. We have to be very careful about working with GPLed code. We also have to face it every day as competition. But the concept is good.

With recent talk about version 3 of the license (version 2 has been the mainstay for quite a while now) that will address DRM and patents and lots of other needless things, I was very happy to read this article that includes Linus Torvald's comments on why version 2 was so great. Good news. I worry that a version 3 of the license could be even worse for commercial users; after all, it's the devil you know against the one you don't. At least we all know the ramifications of GPLv2 well.

A good day for football

I only got to watch most of the Eagles game, but here were the good things:

• Eagles beat the 49ers (well)
• Giants lost to Seattle
• Pittsburgh lost to Cincinnati
• Ravens beat Cleveland, after being down most of the game
  

Of course, not all is great. I was rooting for Houston over the Redskins, but Washington won. Not a big surprise really, but it would have been great to see them start 0-3! It was good to see Denver beat the Pats also. Dallas was off, so they didn't win, which is good too

Eating cockroaches

What is this world coming to? An interesting marketing idea -- eat a live cockroach and get line-jumping rights. Kudos to the idiots who do this, but I plan to die an old man never having eaten a roach, thank you very much.

John Rocker

I don't want to advertise for this idiot, but I just saw this on Fox News. I can't even verbalize it right now, but I find this so completely offensive on several different levels. Yet another way to identify the close-minded idiots of this country.

Thomas Starr King

Wikipedia page

This is somebody everybody should know, but nobody does. It's a shame. His statue is about to be taken down and replaced with Ron Reagan.

Go Eagles

Working for a company based in Houston doesn't typically affect my limited watching of sports. I was able to jump on the Astros bandwagon last year, so that was a plus. But this week the Eagles handendly beat the Texans in Houston (no big surprise, really). So I suddenly have to be careful about giving my boss and CEO too much of a hard time

By the way, I love this "anti-TO" thing they've been saying about Stallworth (who wears #18 opposed to TO's #81).

First day of kindergarten

We've done a couple orientation sessions, but this is the first real full day of school for Jake. I walked him down to the bus stop this morning (a first for me too!) and finally his #3 bus showed up and took him away.

Now I can't wait for this afternoon to go down and pick him up and hear all about his day!

Cleaning Windshields

I read online recently about this and thought I'd pass the info along after trying it out.

First get some decent glass cleaner. I've been using this ammonia-free foaming stuff from GUNK that works well. The world of cleaning products is certainly one where you get what you pay for.

So spray the cleaner on your windshield and then take a piece of newspaper and loosely crumple it up. Work in circles to clean the glass until there's no more cleaner (i.e., the glass should be dry). You'll need to use a little effort to remove bug marks, but they should come off.

Now look at the finished product -- no streaks and no fuzzies. Compared to the traditional Windex and papertowels, using a good cleaner and "lint-free" newspaper makes a world of difference. Even better, do the inside and out and even at night oncoming headlights won't show off all the streaks you couldn't see during the day using traditional methods.