Month: September 2006

Hallowe’en Costume for Mich’s office party

Mich’s office is having a hallowe’en party next month. We’re having some problems trying to decide on what to wear.

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Some of the costumes from last year were pretty cool (and some quite elaborate). To the left is a link to the gallery for that party. We went as “The Matrix”‘s Neo and Trinity.

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Mich is tending towards something slapstick/humorous while I’m tending towards something maybe more statement oriented (or sexy for Mich with me acting the foil).

BTW, based on last years pictures, I think Mich looks quite fetching with black hair. Opinions?

The Baby Names Wizard’s Name Voyager

Yeah, yeah it does seem odd for me of all people to be posting something about baby names, but this Java-based wizard is a slick visualizer showing you how popular various names were at various times. The bigger the name, the more popular it was.

Click here to see what I mean, it really is interesting to see how popular *your* name was when your folks named you. And was your aunt *really* given an old person’s name or was her name hip at the time?

Summoned for Jury Duty

It had to happen sooner or later, I received my first summons for jury duty. Apparently I’ll be a candidate for a “Petit Jury” – which I have never heard of – as opposed to a “Grand jury” that we all know and love from t.v.

I’m actually looking forward to it, thankfully I’ve got a job that can tolerate such an interruption.  The terms are hysterical mind you. I will be compensated the kingly sum of twenty-five dollars per day and I also get free parking (a good thing too as that would have pretty much eaten away the entire per diem amount…).  I’m not allowed to read local newspapers, but I can do something with computers – apparently modem connections will be available to me. I guess I can’t get any local news on the internet.

I can expect to spend up to a week on this enterprise. I’m *really* hoping that I actually get to listen to a case rather than sit in the waiting area for the whole time just wasting away my days with the other folks who have been seconded into this task.

Don’t get me wrong, my attitude probably seems a little jaded, but I really don’t believe that the judicial system has kept pace with folks and their modern predelections. I suppose it was fine to drag some farmers in from their fields (hopefully not at some critical harvest/planting time) and expect that they would be completely unaware of any current events, and would hold no opinions about most things judicial, but that reality is long gone..

My understanding is that the average person in early 20th century America had about the same amount of information squirreled away in their brains as one could find in a current edition of a New York Times Sunday edition newspaper.  We know a lot more now than the proles of any era this world have ever known and the idea that we would not have opinions about all that information is not a realistic one.

I’ll post what the experience was like when the deed has been done.

Pandora’s Star

Pandora's StarPandora’s Star by Peter F. Hamilton

Yet another masterpiece from one of my favorite science fiction authors. Peter F. Hamilton has the ability to create a rich universe of diverse and interesting characters. Projecting forward from today, with a few technological advances, we find ourselves colonizing the galaxy with the aid of stable wormhole technology. Since we can get from point A to point B without even needing to fly, we find here a society whose primary means of transporation is… trains. Interesting jump that.

Anyway, between life extension technologies, the ability to “relife” deceased folks and the inexorable march forward of the human race, we get to see a society that has had to deal with the population explosion that naturally happens when so few folks – just the ones that choose to – die.

After we get comfortable with this new society, now we must see how it reacts when threatened with a civilization that is completely alien in philosophy and execution of society from our own.

I am eagerly awaiting the next book in this series, “Judas Unchained” which is on order at Amazon as I type this.

An excellent read – 980 pages and it was still way too short!

Air Tran’s sense of humor

Besides helping to keep down the cost of flying, I like Air Tran for their sense of humor.

When I first looked at these pretzels, handed to me on our (not so) recent trip to Toronto, I was wondering if it was a case of “lawyers gone wild”. The front of the bag says “How to Eat Gourmet Pretzels on a Low-Fare Airline”.

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Expecting to see something like “Open bag, eat pretzels” I turned over the bag and smiled when I saw:

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Gotta love that 🙂

Does Anything Eat Wasps? : And 101 Other Unsettling, Witty Answers to Questions You Never Thought You Wanted to Ask

Does Anything Eat Wasps?: And 101 Other Unsettling, Witty Answers to Questions You Never Thought You Wanted to Ask Does Anything Eat Wasps? : And 101 Other Unsettling, Witty Answers to Questions You Never Thought You Wanted to Ask by New Scientist
Ever wonder which alcohols tend to give the worst hangovers (hint: clearer alcohols have less of a kick..)? Why your legs will feel stiffer two days after heavy exercise rather than the next day?I didn’t know what to expect (I received this book as a gift) but I *did* enjoy it. The answers, rather than coming from the editors or writers of “New Scientist” magazine come from the readers. There is a lot of expertise out in the world. There are more smart and learned people than “New Scientist” could ever hope to hire, so why not take advantage of that fact and let this diverse group of folks actually respond to the questions themselves?Sometimes the answers seem a little condescending (maybe that’s the British way?) but most of them are enlightening.

A worthwhile read – perfect for that last bastion of privacy.. the loo!

Yellow Ribbon Tree Experts

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One of our pine trees, the one closest to our shed out back, was struck by lightning not too long ago. We didn’t notice immediately, but the strike killed the tree. We *did* start noticing when hunks of bark began sloughing off…

In looking at the tree we noticed gaping holes in it which indicated that all was not well. We also noticed similar holes in the nearby trees. All of these trees are pretty big. If any of them fell they could land on our house or that of our nearest neighbor.

So we decided to contact a tree cutting service. There are very few people I know of who has had a good experience with one of these outfits. They seem to either damage the property or they don’t haul away the debris or a myriad of other issues.

A friend put us in touch with “Yellow Ribbon Tree Experts”. Gary – the company owner – came by and we immediately liked him. He was able to answer all of our questions and quoted us what I felt to be a fair price.

I’d earlier been approached by a fellow who “was in the neighborhood and can give me a deal while he’s working on a nearby yard”. His price was somewhat lower than Gary’s but I wasn’t really able to nail him down on all the details so I decided to pass on him.

We had contacted two other tree companies, also recommended by friends. One had a child’s voice on their answering machine which was not very encouraging. It didn’t really matter since they never returned our call. The other, the woman who does the estimates was one of the illest sounding people we’d ever encountered. I don’t know what she’s really like, but she sounded really bad each time we spoke with her on the phone. And apparently her life is in a shambles (sick, problems, etc.) which she thought we’d like to know about. Hmmmmm… so we passed on them as well.

Here are some pictures showing the progression of the trees disappearing from the back yard:

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It took them the better part of the day, they had to carefully pull down the tree nearest the shed. They did it with no damage to the shed at all! They *did* end up crushing one of our neighbors’ bushes when one of the pieces coming down had an unfortunate bounce and roll. Gary went next door to work out replacing the bush.Once they were gone, there was only a pile of wood shavings where the stumps used to be (which we have since used to cover our pathways – saving us having to pick up any pine bark nuggets this year..).

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Overall everything went well, there were some scratches on the post at the corner of the patio and on our garbage box from the trees dragging past those but these were easily dealt with using some spare paint.
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