Thanks, Google!

New Toys!

A while back, I created a Google personalized homepage.

Now, Google has added themes to decorate your home page with - mainly a banner across the top of your page. And the banners change over time.

I chose a beaches theme. If I wake up at a decent time, I get to see a very nice sunrise. The spectacular colors fade to blue and the bright sun moves across the banner. Late evening brings a beautiful sunset, followed by the moon moving across darkened skies.

Bascially, there's a new banner for every two hour time block! I'm lovin' it!

Lunar Eclipse Photo/Art

APOD: 2007 March 22 - Goa Silhouettes

A truly amazing picture.

What a great contest!

I think my application for it must be somewhere in my mail stack.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUKN1618495320070319

Sponsored by publisher Little, Brown and Co., the competition promoted "A Perfect Mess: The Hidden Benefits of Disorder," by Eric Abrahamson and David Freedman, a new book that argues neatness is overrated, costs money, wastes time and quashes creativity.

I might be the most effective person in the world!

Talk Amarillo has been shut down

The message board sponsored by our local newspaper (and Morris Communications) has been shut down, possibly for good.

Trolls (who may or may not be alter egos of regular members) came and started posting a lot of really stupid threads, dredged up threads from 2 and 3 years ago to clutter up the "most Recent Posts" page, and finally, posted porn images on the board.

Here is a link to the message board main page:
http://forums.amarillo.com/cgi-bin/bb/ultimatebb.cgi

Do you think that the fact that the listed e-mail address is defunct is telling us how much consideration they're giving to re-opening the board?

Medical Savings Accounts...

... are the creation of Satan...

There are Medical Savings Accounts I believe that really ARE savings accounts, where money can carry over from year to year.

Alas, mine is not one of these. You have to guess by January 1st how much your out-of-pocket medical expenses are going to be. Guess too much and you lose the excess. Guess too little and you lost the benefit of paying untaxed income for health care.

So far I have learned that I am a horrible guesser. I should back up, and say that I am new to the game of health insurance and medical bills, having been sheltered for nearly 24 years in the Army, and not surprisingly, given what I do, being stationed near major medical facilities that met all of our health care needs. So I have no sense of what things cost.

Year 1, 2004, I signed up for the max of $5400. Lost about $4200 of that.

Year 2, 2005, I signed up for $1300. Spent about $3600 in out-of-pocket expenses and so paid about $700 in taxes unnecessarily.

Year 3, 2006, I signed up for $2600. I just got through turning in all my receipts and stuff for about $1900 worth of expenses. So, another $700 down the drain.

This year, I'm signed up for $1300 again. We'll see.

France's Villepin calls for 2008 Iraq troop exit

France's Villepin calls for 2008 Iraq troop exit - Yahoo! News

Hey, dude, go ahead and withdraw all the French troops in Iraq by 2008. Oh, wait. . .

How young is too young to be left alone?

White Plains boy calls cops on mom who ordered him to do homework

Gist of the story is that a 10 year old called the cops to complain that his mom was making him do homework. When the cops came to investigate, the mom in question wasn't home; she was working the lunch shift at a local restaurant.

She is now facing child endangerment charges and 1 year in prison for leaving a 10 year old child alone.

You know, I started BABY-SITTING other people's children by the time I was 10, and had been left watch 3 younger brothers and sisters by the time I was 8. Yeah, there were rules - no later than midnight, my folks had to be home, or nearby/reachable by phone, my folks had to know the parents.

With my own kids, we would leave them alone for an early evening outing around the time they were 8 and 10, and progressively longer times as they got older.

It all depends on the kid, and sure, some safeguards are necessary, but leaving a ten year old alone for a few hours a day during a school break seems perfectly reasonable to me.

Shut Down the Middle Schools?

Shut Down the Middle Schools? asks Maggie Gallagher in an op-ed piece for Yahoo! News.

Interesting points. Especially the parts about the kids growing up respecting the teachers and principals from their elementary school, and better parental involvement.

The Civil War happened. Get over it.

Or better yet, discuss it. Learn from it. (Hint: it was not all about slavery!!!)

But don't try to wipe out all traces of it. Texas was part of the Confederacy, for better or worse, and the history of the Confederacy is indelibly linked to the history of Texas. University is where you are supposed to figure out that how to think is more important than what to think. Learn how to think for yourselves, but allow others, including those who come after you, that same liberty.

Story here:
UT panel to discuss Confederate statues

"That's Not Me" "I'm Not a ______"

Mel Gibson.

Michael Richards.

Michael Vick (flipped the bird to the booing home crowd after Atlanta's 4th loss in a row Sunday, Fined $10,000 by the NFL)
*********************************
Sorry guys. That IS the real you.

The other you is the facade. The you you'd like the world to see and to believe in.

But a little booze, a little provocation, and the real you is there for everyone to see.

Listen to Billy Joel's "The Stranger" sometime.

Plausible deniability is no longer an option. Admit that you have issues. Deal with them. Get over them. Get real.