WWJD

I put the finishing touches on my senior paper tonight, checked to make sure I cited all my sources (forgot 5 or so throughout the paper) and saved it. It is now 28 pages (including the bibliography) and I will be turning it in tomorrow morning and after that…I’m not sure what I’ll be doing. I kinda wanna go ride the lightrail again, though I no longer need to go to the Mall of America any more.

I think I just want to take a ride, do some reading, and then walk around the mall for a bit. Just something mindless, browse around, maybe check out some deals at Barnes and Noble.

I dunno. I just want the opportunity to go do something because I have free time.

Then tomorrow evening I’m going to watch the Holidazzle parade downtown with a friend. Should be fun I’ve been working so hard the last 2 weeks. I’m glad its over. Next semester will be a piece of cake.

This one’s for my brother who picked on me for not posting something meaningful in a while…

I broke up with my girlfriend on Saturday.

So, I haven’t really posted anything meaningful in a long time. But I figured this out a few days ago and I’m rather proud of it, so here goes.

I like to keep myself organized, and used to use some widget to display my calender’s daily tasks from the iCal calendar file. But I stopped doing that because of lightning (a calendar extension for Thunderbird), which has a tasks/events pane right next to your inbox in Thunderbird and displays them in Today, tomorrow, and soon format. Very handy. But, I also use my phone as a calendaring system, which would mean I’m essentially putting things into 2 different systems. Well, not any more.

So to start with, I integrated GCal into lightning so now instead of having a calendar file on my computer, it syncs to GCal on the web. To do that, simply follow the instructions here. Its really easy. Once that’s done, make sure your google calendar is the one set to display (in case you have 2 like I did when I set this up). Then it will show all of your events from your google calendar!

Now for the next trick. I some times put things in my phone, and don’t add them to my computer, which isn’t that big a problem since the phone will remind me too, but its nice not to have to put things in 2 different places. Plus my phone’s calendar is limited to like 100 characters or so per event. So, what I did was I set up my phone with google so I could send an SMS with an event in it to my calendar, and it would be automatically added and synced to my computer calendar. Follow google’s instruction’s here for that.

Once you have your phone set up with google, it will send your events for the day to you in a text message. You can also text it for events for the next even of the day, the whole day, or the next day. You can find that here.

I really love this set up as it makes adding things to my calendar so easy and I never have to worry about syncing things up any more. Plus it lets everything live in the cloud instead of taking up space on your hard drive. A little scary I know, but if you already do it with your email, what’s one more thing?

So Manderz over at Perfectography is having a contest to give away some of her prints. Check it out!

First, I started off with the release candidate.  So, the liveCD started off good.  I had sound and everything, and it all loaded really fast.  Then I installed the system and restarted, and it had a lot of updates.  Didn’t even need to use the non-free driver for my ATI video card, it worked just as if the non-free driver HAD been installed ubuntu 8.04.  Really cool.  I also do like the new logout/shutdown menu, but that’s not really sucha big deal for me.

My biggest concern is that Ubuntu 8.10 is supposed to have better support for usb webcams out of the box.  Like mine.  The webcam worked fine in 8.04, and now it does NOT work in 8.10.  Needless to say, I’m not all that happy (or surprised to be honest, as I had installed the new v4l that comes with 8.10 in 8.04 and it broke my webcam too) and I will be installing 8.04 tonight as soon as I can test out installing ubuntu to a thumb drive.  Then I can roam around school with it and take advantage of their oh so carefully set up computers!  Muahahaha. But really.

I kind of expected more from them.  I hope I can submit my system information somewhere so they can find out about this problem.

So I can graduate next semester with only taking 2 classes, maybe 3 at the most. To do this I have to apply for a reduced course load. This is good news. I need a physical science core and one more class for global studies. I’m hoping to take a course on international education as well, to fulfill my global studies major. Its also the field I think I want go into.

And the news gets better. These courses meet on only Tuesday and Thursday, so I would have a 4 day weekend. Now, the only thing I was worried about was that taking a reduced credit load would mean losing financial aid money, but the financial aid office called me the other day and gave me some great news. As a graduating senior I’m allowed to apply for a reduced credit load and it also will not reduce my financial aid even though its not full-time status. This is doubly awesome. Not only will I get the same amount of money from my aid, but my tuition will be reduced depending upon the number of credits I actually end up taking. So, I could potentially receive even more of my financial aid money next semester than I did for this semester. That too is awesome!

I will be planning more trips down to Kansas City next semester, at least now as it looks like I’ll be having more free time. We’ll see about that though

So for my physical science course I have chosen Geology and Cinema (it looks enough like a cakewalk kind of course to be fun and educational).

Also, here’s the workload: 20% reports/papers, 50% quizzes, 10% in-class presentation, 20% laboratory evaluation.

Description:

GEO1005 offers an introduction to the Earth Sciences using the depictions of geology and geophysics offered by the popular media, cinema in particular, as springboards to discussion and development. Much of what most people believe about the geologic history of the Earth, life on it and the processes that shape it is gathered from films. Much of that “knowledge” is wrong, often very wrong, but the myths promulgated by movies can be very enduring. GEO1005 exposes those myths and sets out a basic understanding of the modern Earth Sciences. We cover such topics as: formation of the solar system and Earth, Earth’s 4.5-billion-year history, the fossil record of life on the planet, volcanism, earthquakes, climate change, streams, oceans, deserts, glaciers, natural resources and Earth stewardship. Emphasis is placed on the interactions between geologic processes, man and the environment, with the control of nature as an overarching theme. Each lecture topic will be prefaced with clips from Hollywood movies. Several movies will be shown in their entirety (the Core, Dante’s Peak and Jurassic Park) with students asked to critique the reality of science depicted in the movie. The laboratory component introduces students to minerals and rocks, geologic maps and the basics of geology field work. Material in lab follows that of lecture and offers students the opportunity to gain hands-on experience.

So I just loaded up a new theme, it was giving me some problems so I just deleted the offending lines of code and reuploaded the files. One of these was the RSS footer… please let me know if this has broken anything!

This is from his book Jealous Witness. I heard this on NPR, and it is where I got the script from. None if it is mine.

——

I was sharpening my chainsaw when they called me from Washington, DC to ask me how to fix the economy.

This request focused my thoughts, or the lack of ‘em, to such a fine point, I gave my 14 inch Echo an edge it never had. Good enough for cutting half a cord at least, to keep the woodstove going through October. I love not paying the oil company a nickel. Except for the half-galon of gas and the chain-oil, but I’m fixin’ to make the thing run on plum brandy. I’ve got a plum tree. Ah, where were we? The economy, yes. Seven hundred billion dollars is more than enough money to buy every able-bodied American a chainsaw, a solar power generator, and a stake in a communal well and windmill. Also red-dirt and plum trees. That would probably only cost about one hundred billion, and you can use the other six hundred billion to buy everybody their house outright. Now everybody can own their house and be green and self-sufficient and can go back to whatever they were doing before the world ended: watching TV. Except for me, I was sharpening my chainsaw.

So I go back to it and I see a line of refugees coming up the road to move in with me: it’s people… from the future! It’s worse than I thought: these are people independent from foreign oil, carrying solar-powered chainsaws, full of American ingenuity. After the bailout, they owned their own homes, they didn’t pay into a corporate energy grid, and they didn’t worry about food because they grew it on the roof. They didn’t drive because they didn’t have any jobs to drive to, and every garage in America was the site of an invention that was so darn beneficial nobody needed anything from the store. Without worries about money, without a job, and with extra space in the garage to grow food and invent, these people forgot about the stock market, stopped borrowing money, even forgot how to shop - in short they stopped being american. These unamericans got their exercise raking the compost instead of circling the mall; they homeschooled their children and were never again embarassed that their kids knew more than they did. Heck, they were in heaven, the place where the pursuit of happiness leads to when you stop pursuing it. Such self-sufficiency made the economy grind to a halt, so the government had to do something again: they called in the army to chase everyone out of their self-contained greenhouses.

And now they are coming up the road to my place because I’m a poet and I live in a compound defended by polygamist haikus.

What did you do wrong? I asked the first of the refugees to get over the pallisades. “Nothing,” he said, “we just got out of debt and stopped watching TV! So the urge to buy things on credit disappeared. So they sent in the troops. First thing they did was to put a forty inch plasma TV in every room and fixed it just so we couldn’t turn it off. Just like in Orwell, only with much sharper images. They are calling this the Second Bailout, or the Bail Back In.”

“At least the Second Ammendment is safe,” I said. “Nobody took away your guns, and the founding fathers didn’t say anything about TV.”

And with that my chief haiku welcomed them thus:

make yourselves at home

you won’t be bailed in or out again

you’re safe in Second Life

Dear MoveOn member,

Yesterday was John McCain’s 72nd birthday. If elected, he’d be the oldest president ever inaugurated. And after months of slamming Barack Obama for “inexperience,” here’s who John McCain has chosen to be one heartbeat away from the presidency: a right-wing religious conservative with no foreign policy experience, who until recently was mayor of a town of 9,000 people.

Huh?

Who is Sarah Palin? Here’s some basic background:

* She was elected Alaska’s governor a little over a year and a half ago. Her previous office was mayor of Wasilla, a small town outside Anchorage. She has no foreign policy experience.1

* Palin is strongly anti-choice, opposing abortion even in the case of rape or incest.2

* She supported right-wing extremist Pat Buchanan for president in 2000. 3

* Palin thinks creationism should be taught in public schools.4

* She’s doesn’t think humans are the cause of climate change.5

* She’s solidly in line with John McCain’s “Big Oil first” energy policy. She’s pushed hard for more oil drilling and says renewables won’t be ready for years. She also sued the Bush administration for listing polar bears as an endangered species—she was worried it would interfere with more oil drilling in Alaska.6

* How closely did John McCain vet this choice? He met Sarah Palin once at a meeting. They spoke a second time, last Sunday, when he called her about being vice-president. Then he offered her the position.7

This is information the American people need to see. Please take a moment to forward this email to your friends and family.

We also asked Alaska MoveOn members what the rest of us should know about their governor. The response was striking. Here’s a sample:

She is really just a mayor from a small town outside Anchorage who has been a governor for only 1.5 years, and has ZERO national and international experience. I shudder to think that she could be the person taking that 3AM call on the White House hotline, and the one who could potentially be charged with leading the US in the volatile international scene that exists today. —Rose M., Fairbanks, AK

She is VERY, VERY conservative, and far from perfect. She’s a hunter and fisherwoman, but votes against the environment again and again. She ran on ethics reform, but is currently under investigation for several charges involving hiring and firing of state officials. She has NO experience beyond Alaska. —Christine B., Denali Park, AK

As an Alaskan and a feminist, I am beyond words at this announcement. Palin is not a feminist, and she is not the reformer she claims to be. —Karen L., Anchorage, AK

Alaskans, collectively, are just as stunned as the rest of the nation. She is doing well running our State, but is totally inexperienced on the national level, and very much unequipped to run the nation, if it came to that. She is as far right as one can get, which has already been communicated on the news. In our office of thirty employees (dems, republicans, and nonpartisans), not one person feels she is ready for the V.P. position.—Sherry C., Anchorage, AK

She’s vehemently anti-choice and doesn’t care about protecting our natural resources, even though she has worked as a fisherman. McCain chose her to pick up the Hillary voters, but Palin is no Hillary. —Marina L., Juneau, AK

I think she’s far too inexperienced to be in this position. I’m all for a woman in the White House, but not one who hasn’t done anything to deserve it. There are far many other women who have worked their way up and have much more experience that would have been better choices. This is a patronizing decision on John McCain’s part- and insulting to females everywhere that he would assume he’ll get our vote by putting “A Woman” in that position.—Jennifer M., Anchorage, AK

So Governor Palin is a staunch anti-choice religious conservative. She’s a global warming denier who shares John McCain’s commitment to Big Oil. And she’s dramatically inexperienced.

In picking Sarah Palin, John McCain has made the religious right very happy. And he’s made a very dangerous decision for our country.

In the next few days, many Americans will be wondering what McCain’s vice-presidential choice means. Please pass this information along to your friends and family.

Thanks for all you do.

–Ilyse, Noah, Justin, Karin and the rest of the team

Sources:

1. “Sarah Palin,” Wikipedia, Accessed August 29, 2008

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarah_Palin

2. “McCain Selects Anti-Choice Sarah Palin as Running Mate,” NARAL Pro-Choice America, August 29, 2008

http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17515&id=13661-9123094-I0setax&t=1

3. “Sarah Palin, Buchananite,” The Nation, August 29, 2008

http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17736&id=13661-9123094-I0setax&t=2

4. “‘Creation science’ enters the race,” Anchorage Daily News, October 27, 2006

http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17737&id=13661-9123094-I0setax&t=3

5. “Palin buys climate denial PR spin—ignores science,” Huffington Post, August 29, 2008

http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17517&id=13661-9123094-I0setax&t=4

6. “McCain VP Pick Completes Shift to Bush Energy Policy,” Sierra Club, August 29, 2008

http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17518&id=13661-9123094-I0setax&t=5

“Choice of Palin Promises Failed Energy Policies of the Past,” League of Conservation Voters, August 29, 2008

http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17519&id=13661-9123094-I0setax&t=6

“Protecting polar bears gets in way of drilling for oil, says governor,” The Times of London, May 23, 2008

http://www.moveon.org/r?r=17520&id=13661-9123094-I0setax&t=7

7 “McCain met Palin once before yesterday,” MSNBC, August 29, 2008

http://www.moveon.org/r?r=21119&id=13661-9123094-I0setax&t=8