Tivo has an email newsletter for subscribers and there’s occasionally a useful morsel so I get it. But then you get one like today’s (sorry, the marketing-fu over in Alviso just isn’t up to posting these on the web), which leads off with the reason enough to unsubscribe:
“Not yet a member of TiVo Rewards? You’re crazy.”
I shit you not.
To be pondered: typo
I am enjoying football soccer more and more these days but am still baffled by the rules on when and how much contact is allowed between players before a referee calls a foul or gives a card.
English as a third language: “infrastructural essence“
Scamming new parents for permission to spam in the last minutes before childbirth. Staffing levels at pharmacies that make customers scream and workers cry. Political wolves treading on the spines of hypnotized, anestheized, nearly euthanized sheep. Absurd toilet cleaning products that prove beyond a reasonable doubt that our consumerism and corporatism are converging somewhere near the seventh ring of Hell.
I think you see my point. Oddly enough, work is good and home life is pretty sweet.
Spam, of course, is just generally annoying and I wish it would all go away. In the meantime, at least some of it is good for a laugh. A few examples:
Then I wonder how many people never see this part of it because they read HTML mail directly.
I’m usually four square with the NY Times editorial board but my question about Moralists at the Pharmacy is: Why are doctors allowed to exercise conscious on this matter and not pharmacists? More broadly, the issue is whether anyone (not employed in an explicitly religious organization) should be allowed to bring their moral judgment to bear on work. This sure does open up a huge can of worms for which I don’t have a useful answer.
Watched (still watching, actually) some soccer. Manchester City’s new boss got a taste of his squad’s quality when they blew two points by giving up the tying goal with seconds left in injury time. Chelsea widened the gap with a 3-1 thrashing of Southampton, the first goal typical of Frank Lampard’s frightening recent attacking sense; I wonder if people’ll start calling him Shark soon. Liverpool stole three points from Bolton, 1-0, despite not putting much offense on display and avoided the temptation to look ahead to Tuesday’s Champions League Italy trip to meet Juventus. I’m still a little dumbfounded that the goal came from Igor Biscan but these are three very valuable points.
Yes, today is opening day of Season X for MLS. Two expansion clubs, both in the West, and nearly every team has done major surgery on the roster. Landon Donovan has returned from Europe but with the Galaxy, pushing Guatemalan scoring machine Carlos Ruiz to renamed (no more Burn) FC Dallas. But that should be okay with Ruiz since he gets to partner with Eddie Johnson, the hottest player to wear an American jersey since Donovan’s emergence in 1998.
(The Galaxy didn’t have LD due to flu and other issues left them deficient up front, so they lost the 3-0 to Columbus while looking like they missed preseason training. Okay by me. I also watched a chunk of the league’s opener, DC United gave new boys Chivas USA a 2-0 review of why they hold the MLS Cup despite losing Ryan Nelson to the Blackburn of the EPL and Freddie Adu not ready quite yet to storm the league.)
The Earthquakes lost LD, Ronnie Ekelund, Jeff Agoos (to MetroStars) and Richard Mulrooney (to Dallas) while Eddie Robinson returns from major injury to partner Troy Dayak in central defense. Craig Waibel will open wide right and Wade Barret comes back after a two year stint in Scandanavia, to reclaim the captain’s armband though Wes Hart, Danny Cailiff (new from the Galaxy) and second year player Ryan Cochrane figure to get plenty of playing time over the course of the season. Hart may feature on the wing as well.
Dominic Kinnear will open his second season as boss with two youngsters in the center, Ricardo Clark (the fee for Agoos) and rookie Danny O’Rourke (College Player of the Year from Indiana), both only 22. Brad Davis (the fee for Mulrooney) will try to add pace from the left flank, doing well in recent training and leading the team to victory in the Carolina Cup. Ian Russell and Brian Mullen showed some skill last year but definitely need to step up their game if San Jose is to improve on last year’s fourth place regular season finish.
The big question will be up front. Without LD to slash through defenses and provide service, Brian Ching needs to show his league leading 12 goals were not a fluke and Dwayne Derosario, producer of the 2004 MLS Goal of the Year, has to stay healthy and not be bummed out by a failed attempt to sign with a European club in January. Alejandro Moreno is another new name on the roster, traded from the Galaxy, and though he’s done some scoring could not crack their regular starting XI in three seasons; Ronald Cerritos returns for another go with San Jose after three years elsewhere; and, rookie Julian Nash, acquired late in preseason, is in the big, muscular Emile Heskey mold and might be good in relief when Ching needs a break.
Kansas City moved East, meaning the Quakes should make the playoffs even with the changes. They get Preki back from injury and otherwise have most of the same roster that took them to the brink of a title in 2004, meaning that 2005 is likely going to see the East become one big mass of bruises.
(I’m watching the opening match with the Revolution on a webcast, I forgot to check if this was happening and so missed the first 60 minutes; check the MLS front page on game days for video links to see if a game is available. Nasty game. What was Eddie Robinson thinking with the tackle that got him sent off? And Mr. Onstadt, 20 yards off your line while missing a defender, that was two points right there. Next week we host Chivas USA, here’s hoping for three points.)
DC will only be better, especially with some of the Adu glare toned down and Eskandarian , only 23 himself, growing by bounds. Columbus, poaching chippy Ante Razov from the Fire to partner speedy Edson Buddle, looked solid and aggressive in today’s win with MF Kyle Martino standing up to a pounding and emerging teenage star Danny Szetela looking far more experienced yet not quite 18. MetroStars, who have a teen MF star of their own in Eddie Gaven, and New England–Clint Dempsey was last year’s Rookie of the Year–look to be the odd men out when the post-season begins in October.
If I had to say, DC, Kansas City and Dallas look like the class of the 12 going in and DC will edge Dallas for a fifth league title. But there are 31 games left to play with more than ever before broadcast on FoxSoccerChannel, ESPN and ABC. Enjoy.
We did some long overdue second bedroom cleaning out today (thanks Sweetie!). Made me realize that I’ve lived in this place for six and a half years and despite my efforts crap has accumulated. I found a plastic bad in the closet that had business cards and scratch notes gathered as much as 15 years ago. An assortment of out of service cell phones. A reminder that we ought to put the old scanner and printer on eBay (unless someone wants to give us, say, $60 for the pair).
Clipper Club of New Jersey, now there was a good group of people and an amazing return on my time investment. I found a bunch of business cards from that group. My entire adult career was basically driven to success off of that and especially one man. David Chazin was always willing to answer my newbie questions, then getting me hired into his group at a consulting firm where he was exactly the mentor I needed. This also reminded me of his sad loss when his wife Ruth Lapin perished on 9/11. I have a couple of old business cards, maybe one of them will still work; I doubt a CompuServe email address will.
Also found some more guitar stuff to send to my nephews, a nice guitar strap, an effects box and a few music books and a half dozen very young kids books that can go in the package for the nephew-to-be. Computer stuff for the Big Guy. An old photo of me getting an award while working at the since-deceased Home Insurance, the printout of my final submitted draft for Life With Unix.
There was a slip with Brian Marasca’s phone number. Brian was someone I worked and palled around with back in the Clipper days. He wrote one of the more excellent third party libraries, ObjectDB, which was the subject of my second article for Software Development and climaxed with the phrase “Buy it, love it, live it.” This went over well with Brian so when we ended up working a block apart in Manhattan (and later together), I got to enjoy his very fertile mind.
Finally got out of the house and over to Vitamin Shoppe where we found some good specials on Atkins bars and muffin mix, getting for about $60 an overstuffed basket that retails for more than twice that. Finally used up a ‘gift’ card at Sears–never shop there if you can avoid it–by picking up a totally cute pair of tops for the aforementioned nephew to be. And treated Sweetie to a caramel latte.
“the World Must Be made Safe for Democracy”: 88 years ago today, President Wilson used this phrase as the rallying cry to join the United Kingdom and France against Germany in World War I. Was this the phrase’s origin as political rhetoric?
My pal Chris Tung has put together Getting Real: A compilation of the app development wisdom of 37signals, check it out.
test post
Two very different cases, hugely different scales, but very same outcome for the perpetrators: A.I.G. Discloses Its Accounting Was Improper in Some Deals and Salt pond effort suffers setback. In the AIG case some top executives have lose their jobs, more may yet, and shareholders are still out at least $1.7 billion; here in the South Bay government officials (or contractors, not clear on this point) allowed “millions of gallons of contaminated water into the bay last summer in violation of their environmental permits” but the regulators involved are not planning to impose even the trivial fine the law offers.
Do I hear jail time? No. Do I hear big fines? No. Even a public apology? Ha ha ha ha!!!
The boys bounced back from Saturday’s disappointment and a return to sea level down in Alabama. A couple of lineup changes: Brian Ching came on in place of suspended Damarcus Beasley (yellow cards), Steve Ralston took a midfield spot from resting Carlos Reyna, meaning Landon wore the captain’s band, and Cory Gibb was on Greg Berhalter on the back line.
We showed terrific energy right from the start, which Guatemala just wasn’t ready to handle, and so in the 11th minute Eddie Johnson broke through for his eigth goal in eight games with the national team. His new FC Dallas strike partner, Carlos Ruiz, trotted out his complete trick bag over the 90 but all he earned was a yellow card that will keep him out of Guatemala’s next qualifier. Props to American defender Oguchi Onyewu for shutting dow Ruiz and giving a much stronger performance than he did Saturday.
Well into the second half Ralston banged one past their keeper, probably the best player for the visitors given the many saves he had to make and the lack of any serious pressure on Kasey Keller. Who recorded his 37th shutout for the US team tonight.
Nice break for us: Mexico could only manage a 1-1 draw on the road at Panama so we are second in the CONCACAF group after three matches, six points to Mexico’s seven, and the next match not until June.
The Supreme Court put out another candle today with their decision to not take the appeal in Troy Publishing vs. Norton: Justices Refuse to Shield Reports of False Charges. Maybe I’m giving this decision too much significance but if that was so then I don’t think “[l]awyers for more than two dozen of the nation’s largest press organizations” would have been spending time on the case. The simple fact that a politician tossed out the kind of nasty accusations on which this case centers is, in my book, by definition newsworthy; for a court to rule that the media have no absolute right to report this is dazzling.
And not in a good way. Voters have a tough enough time clawing through the oil slick of spin without courts limiting reporting in favor of the reputation of politicians. The politicians can seek a more reasonable remedy against the original speaker and the papers are hardly reprinting the accusations as delivered truth.
Repeat after me: judges are not all modern day clones of Solomon. They are as human as you and me, even with the fancy black robes and big wooden gavels. Most importantly: judges are appointed by politicians and many of them were politicians, or heavily involved in politics, before ascending to the bench.
Did I throw you off by using ascending? Seems like the American public does think in those terms. Love or hate the decisions, the common view seems to be they are handed down from on high. Consider the emotion level of reactions to the rulings over the last few months regarding Terry Schiavo.
Dan Gillmor: A Dying Craft, or a Dying Business?
Full circle: many outlandish statements have been made about the judges who decided against that poor woman’s parents. Death threats but also some that are surely slanderous, some made by politicians that are purposely exaggerated, intended to inflame the political base.
Last week, executives at the New York Times Company and Knight-Ridder would have laughed me out of the office for suggesting they think twice about publishing those comments. Tomorrow those offices are going to be full of men and women figuring out whether and when to risk the wrath and financial penalty of a lawsuit.
The Sex Project: Suck Your Own Dick. Umm, because the Internet is full of it. This is not safe for work or for people who value their precious mindspace. From a certain perspective, may also be funny.
Victor R. Fuchs and Ezekiel J. Emanuel: How to heal health care: vouchers for everyone. An interesting proposition for reforming the payment system, removing employers and Medicare from the mix, but leaving the free market aspects of private insurance plans and providers in place.
Jello. Do you like Jello? My mom and dad, who shared a lot of the cooking chores, made it once in awhile when I was a kid though I preferred pudding. Pre-Cosby though. Pre-Atkins too because pudding is way too many carbs to consider eating now. Jello is a great Atkins dessert, with whipped cream. Recently Del Monte came out with low carb canned fruit, which doesn’t involved any more artificial ingredients than any other canned fruit and tastes fine to me, and so now we add that in. I’m staring at the empty little glass dish that my Jello and whipped cream was in, sitting on top of an equally empty water glass. They’re on a coaster so no problem.
AOLMusic will have the first single from Devils & Dust available for the listening pleasure for 24 hours beginning tonight at midnight; have to see if that means Eastern Standard Time or what, maybe I can hear it before bed time. Song title: same as the record. Second, he’ll be on VH1’s Storytellers the weekend of April 23/24, right before release on the 26th and I wonder if this will be the same video that will be on the backside of DualDisc format CD. [via NJ.com’s Bruce Blog]
Related: Little Steven’s radio series Underground Garage is now on Sirius (the other satellite radio service ;). Still, I’m not ready to fork over yet another monthly fee when I barely listen to radio anyway.
Hope I’ve reached your optical sensors in time for your auditory enjoyment of numero uno!
Later: Not a song I instantly love but very interesting. The repeated overlays of some guy saying “AOL First Listen” are getting in the way of my enjoyment.
BillSaysThis 