Posts from — November 2004

The township where I live has been in our neighborhood systematically cutting down all the trees that line the streets. They are trying to prevent the spread of an invasive pest known as the Emerald Ash borer. It’s a terrible shame to see these wonderful 15 year old trees being cut down. I drive down the street and it looks like I’m in some barren tundra wasteland.

And the Ash Borer isn’t the only threat to our landscape. With the constant commerical development in our area, field after field is being stripped of all the trees to make way for another shopping plaza or office complex. Instead of beautiful corn fields and pine forests, now you see CVS pharmacies and banks. You can’t go a mile without seeing another drugstore or bank - and they’re not stopping. Each new development brings more traffic to the area and soon everything will be gridlocked. The other day it took me over 10 minutes to turn out of our subdivision. I suspect it comes down to taxes and money. Greedy bastards.

I look on these barren plots of land and think of that TV advertisement with the Native American weeping for his land being polluted. And the tear running down his cheek.

The American Film Institute is deciding on the top 100 movie quotes of all time. Among the favorites are “Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn” and “Houston, we have a problem.” It was fun reading through the list of contenders and remembering all the good quotes over the years.

AFI has also compiled other movie-related lists.

So what’s up with our neighbors? On one side is a couple, that own four cars. For some reason, they park them up and down the street and NEVER in their driveway. Once I watched as the husband stood outside and guided the wife in her car out of the garage, past his car parked in the driveway and into the street. I suspect there was an incident where she ran into a car in the drive and now needs assistance. So he parks all the cars in the street, away from reverse-challenged wife to avoid a collision. Her car is the only one left in the garage and has a clear path to the street.

On the other side are three people with four cars. I counted and there are ten places to park on their property. So why must they leave their ugly van in front of our house blocking the mailbox? What’s the extra car for? Why are they invading our bubble? I’d talk to them about it but the only evidence I see that someone actually lives in the house is the movement of all these cars.

I guess it could be worse - it could be raining.

Alex Albrecht reports in his blog The Screen Savers on G4TechTV is gone. Owned by Comcast, the G4 network gave pinks slips to most of the cast and crew the other day. I thought I heard they axed Martin Sargent from Unscrewed as well.

I’m wondering if I should be sad about this news. While I’m not happy to see anyone lose their job, I was getting bored with the new format of the show. I compare all the shows to the original Screen Savers (back in 1996) with Kate and Leo and none have measured up. Back then they took live calls from viewers and actually talked about computers.

The current trend of the show is more about gaming and guests and a bunch of other stuff that don’t interest me. I’ll be interested to see what’s coming up next for The Screen Savers. Maybe they’ll go back to basics and start talking more about computers.

Dear Rest of the World,
As you might have heard, there have been troubles here at home. 49% of us are really sorry. Do you think it would be alright if I crash at your place for about 4 years? I can pay rent.
Love,
Michael

For more apologies, visit SorryEverybody.com (thanks Steve)

As I come into the office every day, I often see the same people outside taking a smoking break. It’s very early so presumably they go outside shortly after arriving to work to start their smoking. Shouldn’t they try get something done before going out on a break right away? When you’re punched in, doesn’t the company require you to work? Apparently not.

During my travels throughout the day, I see the same smokers outside enjoying their well-deserved smoke breaks. Lately I’ve come to realize these people are very clever. To get paid while standing outside on personal business is pure genius.

I did some figuring and discovered I would gain hours of personal time at work while still getting paid. If I multi-tasked during my smoke break, like calling friends on my cellphone, I would get even more of my personal business handled. I think I may be on to something here.

20 cigarettes per pack
1 cigarette per hour
8 hours at work
8 cigarettes smoked during work
15 minutes per break (go outside, smoke, visit with other smokers)
120 minutes per day
2 hours per day
10 hours per week
40 hours per month (almost an entire work week!)

But there are websites like The Truth. They provide some hard facts about your health and smoking. As an ex-smoker I can testify to it’s deleterious effects. What about the extra breaks I could take if I started smoking again? You can have them, I’d rather live longer.

I finally got around to adding a “Sideblog” feature to the main page. If I come across something interesting while browsing the Web, I’ll share them in the Sideblog. You’ll notice them appear regularly in addition to my regular posts.

The cool part about the Sideblog is it’s a totally separate weblog. Entries made in that weblog automatically appear in this one. My next project will be to add an self-updating RSS feed to the sidebar.

The archive page is also online. So if you’d like to catch up with this site, check it out.

“The Evil Genius of Comment Spam.” I turned off comments to all but registered users for now. The volume of spam was getting a bit out of hand.

With MovableType 3.1, I was able to moderate all the comments. But each time someone entered one, I would get an email notification asking for my approval to post on the site. For a time, I was getting upward of 75 emails a day from comment spammers. None of this is a big deal, there are few legitimate comments on the site anyway. I just like to have some outlet for anyone reading to post what’s on their mind.

REMINDER: Go and vote today.

If you having trouble deciding on some of the issues, visit On The Issues for some help.