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April 24, 2007
On the Passing of a Friend
My laptop died Sunday. It became ill on Friday and despite my best efforts it finally croaked on Sunday. I can't feel too badly, though, it was old by laptop standards (6 years) and served me almost flawlessly that entire time. I never upgraded it once (besides a OS update) and so it went out of the world the same way it came in, as a 1st Generation iBook. So now I'm typing on a brand new Core 2 Duo Macbook with all the whizzes and bangs that come with it. It feels a little funny and despite how fast, shiny, and wonderful it is I'm having a bit of trouble getting used to it. I'm sure I will here soon but for now I feel like I'm being unfaithful to my old friend.
It's amazing how lost you become without a computer these days. The inability to check my email was irritating but not a disaster by any stretch. What was a disaster is that all my bills and most of my accounting was on my old computer. I get my statements by email. My banking is primarily online. Without a computer I was dead in the water. Computerized living is convenient when your computer works but when it's gone life becomes much harder. I called Citibank this morning to pay them by phone and the snarky person in Customer Diservice kept giving me a hard time about not using their convenient online bill pay system, a system which I usually use but it's hard to pay bills online without a computer. I tried to make it clear to her that my computer had met an untimely fate but she just didn't get it. Don't get me started on phone support though, that's an enitrely other blog that I'm not quite ready to write yet without a lot of explitives.
Posted by at 04:53 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
April 16, 2007
On Northern California
I just got back from Kauai'i, Hawaii. Great place, beautiful. One common topic of conversation while standing around waiting for something, or relaxing with other tourist types is "where are you from". Seems like a reasonable question, everyone's traveled in to the State and it starts a conversation nicely.
When I mentioned to people that I was from Northern California 9/10 responses went something like this, "Oh, like around the San Jose area?" These weren't from Hawaiian's, or from people outside of California. These were responses from Californians who lived in the LA area. Apparently if you live in L.A. the State ends somewhere around Vallejo. Hey, that's fine by me. Draw a new border, let them have all the freaky libs and then they can buy all the water they currently steal. Sounds like a plan.
Posted by at 01:35 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
April 04, 2007
On Lassen County
PRESIDENT BUSH VOWS TO VETO BILL WITH AMENDMENT TO FUND LOCAL SCHOOLS AND ROADS
Besides being an example of now not to write a newspaper headline, this further lamentation by a particular writer on the subject of getting money for Lassen county proves how ignorant she is about the importance of NOT accepting bills that include pork-barrel spending. I've said it before but it warrant repeating: Lassen County needs money to fix it's roads and fund it's schools, but if that money comes from a pork project it's not money worth having. This is a classic example of House Democrats throwing up a red herring to try to get support behind a war funding bill that won't pass and then duck out of their obligation to fund rural counties. Once this bill fails, and it will, the Dems can wash their hands of Lassen County and counties like it while pointing the finger at the President for not supporting the bill. For shame.
BAY AREA MAN DIES WHILE STUCK IN SNOW STORM
It's tragic but it's not the story here. A man from the Bay Area suffered medical complications while touring Lassen County and died while driving. His wife ran from the vehicle, flagged down another motorist to alert EMS, but then couldn't remember where she left her vehicle. Personnel from Mountain Life Flight, South Lassen Ambulance, Lassen County Sheriff, and SEMSA Ambulance responded to the call. Eventually it was the Mountain Life Flight crew who spotted the vehicle and alerted other responders to the scene. While the patient was pronounced dead at the scene this is an example of how when local emergency personnel put aside political issues for the beterment of public safety more can get done. Had the helicopter not been involved in the incident it would have prolonged the search, cost more money, and had the man been sick instead of deceased, imperriled his life.
FFA TEAMS WIN BIG
I love seeing news about teenagers doing something well. FFA and other youth organizations like it teach teens about discipline, hard work, acheivement, ambition, success, and failure. These particular teens are an example of a team that worked hard, set their sights on a goal, and proceded to acheive that goal. Congratulations are in order.
Posted by at 05:18 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
April 01, 2007
On War Story 6
From Lt. S. Randall, US Army in Afghanistan:
So far we've been kicking the shit out of the taliban over in the ghorack valley. for those of you who are following my posts, thats the area where we had that big air assault which was on the news. That operation has resulted in us pushing the TB further to the west. Counter attacks from them have stepped up as well. They've been using alot of hastily emplaced IED's to slow our ground guys down. I personally got to see one of these, as you all know. luckily they havent resulted in any coalition casualties.
we're now planning on pushing harder into the west, in hopes of pushing them even further than we've already have. Unfortunatly this means we're going into an are where there have been alot of SAM's reported. This could mean bad news for us flyboys if these reports are true. we're still optomistic though. The spring offensive that we've heard so much about, hasn't been nearly what was predicted. And the mortar attacks on our base have slowed down as well. I know that there is still alot of time, but hopefully we keep pushing the way we are and these guys will have to regroup and resupply themselves. by which time me and my friends will be out of here.
I know i just jinxed myself but hey.