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Early Conceptualization of the Internet

Potrzebie System on Google Calculator

I didn't know that!

Not only didn't I know that Google now supports the Potrzebie measurement system, but...

1. I didn't know how to spell Potrzebie.

2. I didn't know that it was a measurement system.

3. I didn't know that Donald Knuth invented it.

Learn something new every day (several somethings on most days).

Wedding Anniversary:

Ed was in trouble. He forgot his wedding anniversary. His wife was REALLY angry.

She told him, "Tomorrow morning I expect to find a gift in the driveway that goes from 0 to 200 in less then 6 seconds AND IT BETTER BE THERE!!"

The next morning Ed got up early and left for work. When his wife woke up she looked out the window and sure enough there was a box gift-wrapped in the middle of the driveway. Confused, the wife put on her robe and ran out to the driveway, and brought the box back in the house.

She opened it and found a brand new bathroom scale.

Ed has been missing since Friday.

Please pray for him.

The Value of e-mail, a Holiday Story

Got this from a friend the other day, thought it was insightful:

An unemployed man is desperate to support his family of a wife and three kids.

He applies for a janitor's job at a large firm and easily passes an aptitude test.

The human resources manager tells him, "You will be hired at minimum wage of $5.35 an hour. Let me have your e-mail address so that we can get you in the loop. Our system will automatically e-mail you all the forms and advise you when to start and where to report on your first day."

Taken back, the man protests that he is poor and has neither a computer nor an e-mail address.

To this the manager replies, "You must understand that to a company like ours that means that you virtually do not exist. Without an e-mail address you can hardly expect to be employed by a high-tech firm. Good day."

Stunned, the man leaves not knowing where to turn and having $10 in his wallet, he walks past a farmers' market and sees a stand selling 25 lb. crates of beautiful red tomatoes. He buys a crate, carries it to a busy corner and displays the tomatoes. In less than 2 hours he sells all the tomatoes and makes 100% profit. Repeating the process several times more that day, he ends up with almost $100 and arrives home that night with several bags of groceries for his family.

During the night he decides to repeat the tomato business the next day. By the end of the week he is getting up early every day and working into the night. He multiplies his profits quickly.

Early in the second week he acquires a cart to transport several boxes of tomatoes at a time, but before a month is up he sells the cart to buy a broken-down pickup truck.

At the end of a year he owns three old trucks. His two sons have left their neighborhood gangs to help him with the tomato business, his wife is buying the tomatoes, and his daughter is taking night courses at the community college so she can keep books for him.

By the end of the second year he has a dozen very nice used trucks and employs fifteen previously unemployed people, all selling tomatoes. He continues to work hard.

Time passes and at the end of the fifth year he owns a fleet of nice trucks and a warehouse that his wife supervises, plus two tomato farms that the boys manage. The tomato company's payroll has put hundreds of homeless and jobless people to work. His daughter reports that the business grossed over one million dollars.

Planning for the future, he decides to buy some life insurance. Consulting with an insurance adviser, he picks an insurance plan to fit his new circumstances. Then the adviser asks him for his e-mail address in order to send the final documents electronically.

When the man replies that he doesn't have time to mess with a computer and has no e-mail address, the insurance man is stunned,"What, you don't have e-mail? No computer? No Internet? Just think where you would be today if you'd had all of that five years ago!"

"Ha!" snorts the man. "If I'd had e-mail five years ago I would be sweeping floors at Microsoft and making $5.35 an hour."

Which brings us to the moral of the story:

Since you got this story by e-mail, you're probably closer to being a janitor than a millionaire.

Sadly, I received it also.

Apple: Zune outselling iPod on Amazon

When you've nailed the analysis, I can't think of any reason not to brag about it (quoting myself):

I imagine it has a lot to do with Apple not allowing retailers of their products to compete with one another on price.

If I'm going to buy an Apple product online I might as well buy it from Apple where it can often have it monogrammed and gift wrapped for free. If you could get them significantly cheaper at Amazon I'm sure they would be selling more of them.

Add to that the fact (I think) that you can ONLY buy a Zune from retailers, not directly from Microsoft:

http://www.zune.net/en-us/products/wheretobuy.htm

and I really don't think there is any validity to this comparison.

I do think though that Apple's lead in this area will die a slow death unless they do something new to differentiate themselves. At the volume the innards for these things are being cranked out by whatever godforsaken country they are coming from, there is just no way for any US "maker" to claim a leadership position.

They are positioning themselves as a general purpose upscale consumer electronic company (some might call this painting themselves into a corner).

Keep an eye out for the iBeam (a small white radar detector that once you're stopped will actually try and talk the officer out of giving you a ticket), the iContact, a knobless no-moving-parts stereo entertainment center that you control by staring at various parts of it and the iCUP for which no product details have been, uh, leaked.

Nokia 810 Fan Video

YouTube - The Day The Routers Died...

Very good one:

Link from Valleywag.

Usenet Still Funny After All These Years

> i went to the bathroom and when i came back, my computer was gone. I called
> > verizon service guys but they were of no help. Should i switch to cable?
> >
> >

OMG! You actually *can* string words together to make a complete sentence!

Are you sure it's gone? Could you have taken it with you to the bathroom and flushed it down the terlet?

Here's what you do: locate your modem or router. (I'm going out on a limb here, and assuming you have DSL.)
Locate the ethernet cable that comes off the modem/router.
Follow the ethernet cable to the end farthest from the modem/router.

Is there a computer there?

If not, check the sewer.

But what if you have wireless?

The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet

Why in the world anyone would want to post their personal stories on the Internet I don't know. But people do, and some times these stories seem so tragic and real that you just want to reach out a helping hand how could I resist?...

My own little soap opera(s) of this nature happened in the late 70s early 80s and often enough that I think of my own emotional makeup as being more scar tissue than anything else, but I allowed myself to be too self absorbed (don't we all?) and got what I probably deserved in the grand scheme of things. Suffice it to say that I've retired from romantic entanglements, more by choice than by necessity (even though two CAN live more cheaply than one, managing ones finances as a single person is MUCH easier).

So here, semi solicited, is my very jaded view of the subject:

What is there that is more important about a (with emphasis) *modern* *human* relationship than ego?

Now let that last thought sink in for a bit while I say that we (mostly) have been conditioned by Ozzie and Harriet/Bradie Bunch (substitute your own TV adolescent societal programming) to think that the only NORMAL mode of human existence is to get married and raise as many children as your income allows you to support. Not only does (did) this formula seem to work on TV, but it clearly worked in real life for long enough for us as countries world-wide to develop schemes such as Social Security that actually DEPEND upon it. Ponzi schemes collapse without an ever broadening base. But even before Social Security schemes, this system actually worked very well. One kid could support two parents into their old age, two could do so better, three better still. There was a "natural selection" advantage to larger families, but not so extreme that smaller families were wiped out. If you are a Darwinian, you probably imagine that some process sets an optimum number of kids for things to just work nicely, with variations on either side being preserved in the gene pool for, uh, lets say, GLOBAL WARMING! (Al Gore is proud when you work this into conversations on ANY other topic.)

Now back to: What is there that is more important about a (with emphasis) *modern* *human* relationship than ego? Well, if you are really paying attention, there's sex for one. Part of that involves ego too though in ways that are really hard to tease apart. Let's simplify though and factor sex out of it on the assumption that, in this modern pr0n driven Internet world you can always become a do-it-yourselfer.

Oh yes, and one more thing, (at the risk of devolving into a Monty Python sketch) a fanatical devotion to spreading our DNA all over the place.

Our world has changed much faster than any natural selection process can keep up with. If we could just keep things steady for a few thousand years, with no major new technologies, industries, disruptive housing breakthroughs and so on, I'm sure the hand of Darwin would make adjustments to our psyches, gonads and so forth (in addition to having enormous heads and longer fingers as all the sci-fi authors predict) to make everything come out just right again. Of course this is complicated by the fact that so many of us have opted out of the gene pool in one way or another. Many of us may have ideal traits, but we certainly aren't passing them on, forcing nature to constantly re-invent the wheel so to speak.

Where was I? Oh, anyway, (human) society has placed a whole new layer of pressures on us beyond the formerly natural kill-or-be-killed simplicity that various animal species have to deal with. Take birds: watching one of those nature films, when the male birds parade around, wing and tail feathers spread wide, trying to gain the "affections" of the female birds, one male bird gets selected to fertilize those eggs. What does the rejected male bird feel? I've often wondered. Is it just sexual frustrations? Are their "egos" crushed? Do they become suicidal? If birds had Civ IV to resort to would they? (I'm serious!)

I've read where many, maybe even most, animal species mate for life. Others only long enough to get one generation of offspring going followed by each partner seeking another mate for the next time around. Maybe natural selection hasn't been able to settle on a "best" formula in this area which is why there seem to still be so many people who do it successfully one way and so many other people who do it successfully another way. We've all seen, known or even been a part of a family unit with one husband and one wife, mated for life, raising children (or sometimes not) little or no infidelities, friends for life, teammates, if you will. God bless them, and by the way, in my experience these are mostly religious people, who have succeeded in this lifestyle IN SPITE of egos, IN SPITE of sexual urges and IN SPITE of Darwinian propulsions to spread the seed a little further. They got where they were by human rationality of the type that has to be intentionally exercised (whether you agree with the results or not, they got the results THEY wanted).

The other successful model that comes to mind is Hollywood. Here copulation is king. Slam, bam, thank-you mam. Why do they even bother getting married? Oh, yeah, so that they can get their pictures in Variety. Not a lot of forward thinking goes on here. Or thinking at all as far as I can tell. But it makes kids in large numbers, and these people are rich, so the kids are well provided for, at least financially. And do these "stars" get too upset during the breakups? Not so you can tell in most cases. If you lower your expectations enough you can live with almost any circumstances I suppose.

I don't know about you, but as free-thinking as I once was, I couldn't picture myself in multiple casual relationships over my lifetime. Oh I did get around for a while, but for me it was always a search for what I hoped would be an ultimate permanence. I too was more often mentor than mentee, more often financial provider, more often the emotional support rather than the one supported and certainly gave as good as I got in the sex department (or at least that's the way it seemed to me at the time).

But at some point (and it took far too long as I had been given the advice many times) I realized I had never gotten comfortable with the notion of being alone. From high school onward I was always "on the make" holding off any thoughts of marriage until after college by an extreme exercise of will (and the knowledge that parents would probably cut off funding). And then in the AM (after marriage) it was one relationship after another, all ending as soon as the sex wasn't so good any more (for one of us). Without wanting to, I was leading the Hollywood lifestyle, when what I really wanted (or thought I wanted) was the Ozzie and Harriet lifestyle.

So I went solo. It was rough. Particularly since I am not the macho type of guy who likes to do manly things like fishing, hunting, or home repair for that matter. I went to restaurants alone, even nice ones where I'd never been without a date. Quite an exercise of self confidence to go to a fancy French restaurant alone, and sit there and read a book. This will flush out any secret desire you have to be the center of attention. Yes, people will think "what's WRONG with him, why isn't he WITH someone?" and whats more you will know that is what they are thinking. But after about two years (I think that's what it took for me) you won't care. And after another two or three years you might actually start to dread the thought of another relationship. Or you may decide to dip your toe in the waters again, find a woman on an Internet dating service who "loves" you for who you are, only to find that she's married with kids.(and not all that unhappily married as it turns out). And lest you think I'm making that up, it happened to me. (TWICE!)

But enough about me, lets get to what YOU think about me? No, that's from another comedy bit. In the final years of my career, I was hit on by many women, a few of which I actually found attractive and after they asked around and found out I wasn't turning them down because I was gay or anything their efforts only increased. I've been the intended victim/subject of several matchmakers. I keep telling them they are wasting their time. They invite me and the woman over for dinner at the same time (not telling me in advance) hoping for nature to take its course. I'm polite, but I know better than to let nature take its course, because that course is for us all to breed like rabbits, and whether we call it sex, or ego, or self esteem, or even layer some societal ponzie scheme requirement, or the need to spread the faith by out producing the other faiths, you know, deep down inside you know, that human happiness of a lasting kind is not what it is all about. Lookout Jim it's a trap! (Star Trek) that is, unless you get religion or some other "ion" and make that relationship you seek secondary to some other goal (and I'm not saying there is anything wrong with this approach).

In closing, if you are not discouraged enough, consider that:

(1) All the good ones are taken. Really, there is no getting around this. Of the happy old couples that I've known that live together until they die, they either got together when they were young, or they got together when they were so old that neither of them had enough time to jump ship first. If you want someone who is not a chronic ship-jumper during middle age, your going to have to find someone who's mate has tragically taken from us in the prime of life. You will never be loved as much, if at all. Your reason for being chosen as the replacement might be a subject best never explored.

(2) No matter how objective you try and be, all is probably not as you've presented it. Maybe you snore really loudly (I do) or your farts really stink (as do mine) and those are two things she has never been able to stand, but she has never been able to confront you with them because, since those things are so important to her, she thinks they might be really devastating to you as well. One of my gals had a big nose. But I never told her I really LIKED big noses. Come to think of it, most of my gals had big noses. Darn I wish I had thought about that sooner.

Anyway. Glad I could help you out with this. I look forward to updates.

Get Linux Genuine Advantage. NOW!

Once you've installed Linux Genuine Advantage™, you'll want to register and send in your licensing fees to receive these important benefits:

* Your computer, which worked just fine before, will continue functioning normally!
* Our software which you just installed will not disable logins on your computer (as long as our license server keeps working properly)!
* It's totally awesome!
* We might not raise the yearly licensing fees in the future!

Pogue’s Posts - Technology - New York Times Blog

'Clearly, they’re exploiting the lawless, Brave New World of the blogsophere, where, since they’re Not Quite Journalists, they don’t feel constrained by any of those pesky journalistic ethics guidelines. Like the one that says, “You don’t keep $2,200 gifts from the subject of your review. You might think you can still write an impartial review, but it’s highly unlikely-and either way, nobody will believe it.”'

I'm willing to endure David Pogue's wrath, risk my (non existent) journalistic integrity and accept one of the free laptops from Microsoft. I'll also guarantee a bad review of Windows and Office, comparing them unfavorably in every way with Open Source Software alternatives. I have nothing against Acer or AMD though, so I can't promise to pan those products. You can use my negative review to demonstrate that this was not a bribe.

Yeah, that's the ticket.

Hey, today at Sam's club I noticed the formerly empty shelf normally filled with laptop computers now has three new residents. The top price was $900 and there was a quite nice system for around $500. Better hurry Microsoft the value of this bribe "loaner laptop" is going down all the time.

Users told to dump servers, return to mainframes

The cost of ownership of a mainframe are between 30 and 60 per cent better than 30 Sun servers or 300 Linux servers, Illuminata says.

I think I saw this in a Woody Allen movie once.

The New Pocket Casualty Counter From The Associated Press!

Are you freakishly obsessed with the daily casualty count in Iraq? Do you find yourself disappointed when a day or two goes by and no American soldiers die? Have you ever been at a cocktail party and said, "How can we be so damn jovial when George Bush is responsible for a death toll in Iraq that is approaching one-tenth the total of British dead in the Second Boer War?"

If you answered yes to any of these questions, you need the new Associated Press Pocket Iraq Casualty Counter! Now the information you need to make bizarre, extraneous points about the Iraqi War is at your fingertips, 24 hours a day!

Spam "solved" by 2006

Yes, Gates predicted it would be "solved" by now, and so it is.

I get almost none now that I use Gmail instead of crappy Windows software.

Thanks Bill!

New Rules Make Firms Track E-Mails, IMs

Martha Dawson, a partner at the Seattle-based law firm of Preston Gates & Ellis LLP who specializes in electronic discovery, said the burden of the new rules won't be that great.

Oh! the irony.

Intel Details New Microprocessors

"The new chips, expected to become available in the second half of 2006, are partly based on the design in the Pentium M the processor component of the company's popular Centrino technology for notebook computers. It also will share some features with the Pentium 4 underlying architecture."

Perry Mason: In point of fact Mr. Intel, isn't it true that your so called "New Architecture" isn't just a souped up version of your old architecture and this is just more marketing hype rather than true innovationn?

Intel: Bu.. but, competition is so fierce right now I... I...

And Intel must be lead from the witness stand in tears after blurting out a confesion of committing MoreOfTheSame.

Perry Mason: I have no further questions your honor.

GamesIndustry.biz - PlayStation 3: The industry's best-kept secret?

GamesIndustry.biz - PlayStation 3: The industry's best-kept secret?
Word had leaked out that Linden Labs plans to replace its entire server farm with a single Sonly Playstation 3 when the product debuts next year. A company representative stated that they expect hardware costs for server equipment to drop to "somewhere in the $200-$300 range".

Ambulation

A few years ago a very well-to-do liberal (did I have to mention that?) colleague at work took an interest in my preference in shoes as they often do. She didn't think my somewhat old Sperry Topsiders were suitable to the task of, well, enclosing my feet and all those duties associated thereto.

Now I should add that the Sperry Topsiders (let's just call them "boat shoes") were not my idea in the first place. Several years prior to that I had worn some sort of "sneaker" which took the form of "running shoes" except that they had Velcro fasteners where there would have otherwise been shoe laces. Not having laces was a problem for this (oh, did I mention) other well-to-do liberal person who took an interest in my footwear. She convinced me to switch from my awful Velcro laden sneakers that I think came from somewhere like K-mart for $10 a pair and switch to these nice upscale boat shoes, complete with LEATHER shoe laces that needed to be re-tied about every 15 minutes. Not to mention I feel much safer in them when I am on a boat, that is, if I had a boat.

The cost of the boat shoes was around $75 at he time I think, which I considered excessive. But they were almost as comfortable as the $10 Velcro sneakers and eventually I got used to wearing them. I tried gluing the leather shoe laces to keep them tied, since I never used the laces when putting the shoes on or taking them off (just as I never used the Velcro on the sneakers.) All shoes should go on when you forcibly shove your feet at them and come off when you step on the back of one shoe and pull. Seems simple enough to me. Glue didn't work though, and after a few years of this, and other solutions, I took to tying the laces with square knots, so that even if they LOOKED untied, they remained snugly on my feet. Even the square knots would come undone eventually. I really don't think cow skin was designed to be used in this way. Snipping the excess off at the square knot wouldn't do since there wouldn't be anything to grip to re-tie it. I ended up just tying a series of square knots one on top of another until the top of my shoes looked sort of like an old-time Chinaman's pony tail.

Maybe that's why the more recent liberal fashion consultant thought that I should visit the Earth Shoe store and get something that (to her at least) looked nice and was comfortable too. So I did. And about $150 later I was wearing sort of brown leather clog-looking things with no laces (I liked this) and no heels (I wasn't so sure about this part). They are big up front where the toes are, and the lack of heel was supposed to cause the foot to comfortably "roll" forward as you walked.

These shoes were indeed comfortable for a few days. For some reason though which I don't recall at the moment, I felt compelled to go back to my "boat shoes" after a couple of weeks. This immediately got noticed. My excuse of "not wanting to wear the Earth Shoes out too quickly" was met with the suggestion that I buy a second pair.

I suppose many a friendship has been sacrificed over such a thing. In any event the Earth Shoes found there way here to the beach, where I am now where I thought they might serve as "dress shoes" if I ever needed such a thing (apparently I don't) and the next time I laid eyes on them the special protective spray which the Earth Shoe store salesman had convinced me was essential to proper enjoyment of the shoe had turned into some sort of smorgasbord for green mold. Nothing else in my closet was similarly affected, so I think they really did like that spray. Or perhaps they came in on it.

I've continued to wear the Sperry Topsiders, and only that brand, not just ANY boat shoe, for many years. I've had 4 or 5 pair. I wear them until they disintegrate. Well, actually longer than that, for as they disintegrate I "fix" them as best I can, applying glue here, string there, and whatever it takes to avoid the need to break in a new pair. I've even found an "outlet" store at the beach where I can get them for $50 or so, which is a fraction of what they cost now in regular stores.

All of this, preamble (word chosen carefully) to my shock and horror at seeing a pair of Earth Shoes at Walmart the other day for $15. On a whim, I bought a pair. There was no spray to go with them, and no salesperson nearby to suggest I needed any. They are made in China. I bet the pair I got for ten times as much was too. I wonder what these Topsiders actually cost to make? If I were paying $15 for them I'd be a lot more inclined to throw them away and break in new ones more frequently than I do. If this makes me a tightwad then I'm comfortable with that. I like to know what things cost to make, and that the people in between me, the consumer and those Chinamen who make the shoes and inform me as to how to tie the laces are not making too comfortable a profit.

For well-to-do liberals, money is no object, if it achieves the goal of making MY feet look better, just as personal taste is no object to those in the condo association who want everyone's door to be the same horrid orange. Those who know something about how government works, and who don't either work there, or have unlimited resources, would do well to shop for less expensive alternatives I think.

Or maybe it's just a coincidence that my last two shoe consultants were liberals.

And all of THAT as preamble to my slipping on my new Earth Shoes today and going for a walk on the beach. Spring has sprung I guess, or the 50 degree temperature and lack of wind combined for very moderate FEELING weather. That, coupled with my new shoes, and their "rolling" action and before I knew it I realized I had walked a VERY long way.

Yesterday being St. Patrick's day had a noticeable impact on the beach. Or at least I guess that's what did it. This place is deserted this time of year and it's common to not see another single soul on the beach or any sign of humanity. From the parking lot, and noises in the distance I infer that some are making a long weekend here out of St. Patrick's day, one of the many holidays that I can be blissfully unaware of unless it is brought to my attention. Oh yes, I was careful to get off the streets early yesterday and really had forgotten all about it until I noticed all the tire tracks on the beach. It seemed that every dune crossing had been the site of drunken celebrants testing their four-wheel-drives. Quite a few had apparently brought wood with them to half burn for warmth in the night and then quickly cover with sand until the flame was gone, or not.

I wasn't consciously paying that much attention to the tire tracks or the burnt wood so much as the things uncovered by last nights activity. Due to my eyesight being no better than average for a person my age I tend to collect mostly brightly colored or large things on my beach walks. I'm sure many a tiny treasure has escaped my notice.



As a result, a large snail shell (A) that isn't broken will usually get my attention. The ones found here are not often very attractive, although with some oil and a bit of work they can be made to be quite decorative. Since attending a lecture on the subject broken bits of glass (B) are now picked up by me rather than being passed over. Some people actually SELL this stuff making an old Heineken bottle carelessly tossed into the ocean a modern investment vehicle. I used to think that such glass was worn down mainly by the action of sand, but I learned that salt water actually weakens the structure of molten silicon dioxide (and whatever else they happen to mix with it) accelerating the speed with which those razor sharp edges become harmless, and rendering a Noxema, Haley's MO, or some fancy new fruit drink's bottle (C) difficult to distinguish and giving the glass surface a patina hard to duplicate by mecchanical means. Of course, at the lecture I attended, I found that through proper chemical and spectroscopic analysis one can trace these glass fragments back to their source, be it a modern day bottling plant or a hand blown item from the 1600s (none of which appear in my collection I am sure.)

In fact I often note that the beach is one of the few places that you can safely walk barefooted without much concern. Almost anything except a discarded hypodermic needle is quickly rendered safe to the bottom of the feet in one way or another. Most things submerge themselves in the wet sand at a uniform rate so that if you "relax" your feet (I'm not entirely sure I know what I mean by this) you can walk down the beach without looking where you are going and only occasionally feel something uncomfortable enough to make you check for skin breakage. Almost any metal corrodes rapidly to the point where it is unrecognizable. There is no such thing as stainless steel here. Only gold has much chance of surviving in a recognizable form and I have yet to collect my first dabloon. Wood rots in interesting ways and plastics of all sort may last, but they are quickly covered with sea plants, snails, and other mollusks to the point where you might recognize a familiar shape without being able to see any of the original surface. No, my feet are safe as I amble down the beach this time of year in my Earth Shoes. I have absolutely nothing to worry about.

That is, other than crushing something I'd like to collect (D) like this tiny conch shell about whose inhabitant we can say "We hardly knew ye." As the sand protects our feet from sharp things, it also protects items such as this from multi-ton drunk-driven ersatz dune buggies on St. Patrick's day nights. Our tiny departed conch friend is indestructible by comparison to it's former lodgings (E) which I have seen on the beach frequently thinking it is some sort of washed up plant. But actually I found that these are conchs egg casings. Normally I find these totally empty with a small hole on the outer edge where the young ones have left. Close by to this one however I found a separated unit (F) with no such hole, and not one, but many tiny unborn inside, shell, and all.

The conch, like the snail, of course, makes do with only one foot, albeit the majority of its body serving that purpose, and has no need of an Earth Shoe, or a boat shoe for that matter.

When one walks, one thinks, and without knowing it finds that they have reached the public beach in Delaware with a pocket full of treasure and a seemingly long (now) slog back to that speck in the distance called home. One can but try to get back before damage is done to those collected beach goodies and thoughts.

Making up for months during which I mostly cut and pasted excerpts and my quick reactions to things "collected" on the Internet it occurs to me that the quality of such "blogging" isn't far above the time wasted watching TV. It is nice then from time to time to actually create something, especially as I sit here and realize that those shoes have rubbed a small blister onto the inside of my right foot.

I should go now. I have an "Urgent" message from Sears, informing me that they are all out of the money I gave them to insure I'd never have to have a kitchen appliance replaced. It occurs to me now that Sears gets my money if something breaks, and they get my money if it doesn't too. There is something of the "Earth Shoe" phenomenon in this that I'll have to study more carefully. Look for an update.

Update: Well, I'm here adding tags to my old posts. I noticed I promised an update, so here it is. I let all my Sears extended warrantys expire. Most of this stuff costs about twice as much to replace or insure as to fix, plus, in replacing them you usually get new features, energy efficiency, etc. Also, I'm still wearing the Waolmart Earth Shoes. They don't ever seem to wear out. They smell a bit though. So I throw them in the washing machine from time to time.