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Dean Gets It

Stirring campaign announcement speech by Howard Dean. The more I learn about him, the more I like. And more than any candidate I’ve known of, Dean is using the collaborative power of the internet to build support. All politicians and candidates have had web sites, but Dean has a blog and a meetup space. More importantly, he’s somehow managed to generate more backing funds in a shorter period of time than analysts figured he’d be able to. There’s a lot to his platform, bu what seems to be lighting fires is his blunt declaration that we’re not just living through a standard right-wing pendulum swing — the country has been taken over by extremists who don’t represent what most Americans believe America stands for.

Gives me hope. Take it back.

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GFCIs, Oops Hole

A dozen receptacles in the new house are two-prong. Those always turn out to be the ones into which you need to plug a three-pronged electric cheese grater. Adapters aren’t really safe, elegant, or convenient, so I’m removing all the old receptacles and replacing with ground fault circuit interruptors. Which takes a bit of hard swallowing, since the old receptacles all had lovely bakelite covers, which now go into a drawer to gather dust.

Hired a pair of electricians to do the hard work prepping new circuits for the garage, add a receptacle to the kitchen, replace our antique fuse box, add a phone jack, etc. We love ’em, they’re great. But came home from a wedding today to a VERY contrite note explaining that a “miscommunication” had resulted in a 1.5″ hole accidentally being bored through our beautiful new floors. Mercy. I can just see how the moment unfolded:

“I got daylight.”

“I’m not seeing your drill bit.”

“I’m through.”

“Where are you?”

“Uhhh…”

They came up on the wrong side of a wall. Rather than behind the stove in the kitchen, the hole is near the stereo, in the living room. They’re willing to pay for repairs of course, but what a drag.

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Miles Walks… And Etc.

Miles has exploded on the scene. Two months ago he started standing up while holding onto things. A couple of weeks ago he started skipping the props and standing on his own. And yesterday he took his first step. Not a big daddy step, just a wee step followed by a crash, but it was a step. By the end of today he could take several small steps in a row. Pictured here as a mighty Teamster with industrial lunchbox and coveralls heading off to build skyscrapers.

He seems better at lifting one foot than the other, and sometimes walks in a semi-circle. Nine months old and already wallking. We’ve got our hands full. Amy was in the shower today and he crawled in to join her, clothes and all. Just looked up at her, “In case you were wondering where I was, well, here I am!”

A few months ago the game was for me to try and build a neutron tower faster than he could crawl over and knock it down. Now the game is that I build the tower sans cherry and he “walks” over and puts the little red cup on top (only his coordination is kind of gross — he tries to place it gently but whacks too hard, knocking it down by accident — that’s okay, it’s all fun).

Miles can pull toilet paper off the roll and eat it. Miles can steal keys off tables. Miles can change channels with the remote and can go to Picture In Picture mode (we hate that). Miles can pull turds out of the cat box (which is now safely out of reach). Miles can pull items off the shelves at the hardware store from his perch in the trolley.

You try moving into a new house with a Tasmanian Cutey Pie Tornado!

Delay on assembling the nine-month gallery until my server finds its way back home.

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Fly Me To NY

Just got a msg from MacWorld Creative Pro Conference and Expo confirming that I would be doing my “set up OS X as PHP/MySQL development rig” dog and pony show in NY City on Tuesday 15. Whaaaa???!!! First I’ve heard. But they’ve even set up a web page describing my presentation. Seems they’ve simply mirrored the lineup from MacWorld SF from last January. Hmmm…. I wouldn’t mind a trip to NY, especially if they’ll pay travel and lodging, and I definitely wouldn’t mind doing another MacWorld. But I doubt they’ll pay anything — perqs most likely limited to a free conf pass.

Blows my mind that the first I hear of this is two weeks prior to the event, and that they set up the whole thing without even inviting me. Sure, I’ll drop job, house and home, let Amy take care of Miles alone, and spend money we don’t have on travel and board just for the ego stroke. Happy to help!

Music: Cat Power :: The Devil’s Daughter
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Pollan on McDonald’s Anti-Anti-Biotics

In an interview with UC Berkeley’s Public Affairs dept., J-School prof Michael Pollan throws water on McDonald’s announcement of intentions to cut back on antibiotics in beef. Pollan distinguishes between antibiotics used to spur growth and those given to fight disease. McDonald’s has only agreed to cut back on antibiotics for growth.

What McDonald’s has done is say that they will favor suppliers that are not using antibiotics for growth promotion. Now they didn’t say anything about the other use of antibiotics. “Prevent disease outbreaks” is key. In that sentence is the license to continue including antibiotics in the feed every day. The other question that comes to mind: If you’re using antibiotics both for growth promotion and to control disease, how do you know which is which?

Something I didn’t know before reading this: Cattle are now ready for slaughter in 14 months, rather than in three years. Good thing, too, because they couldn’t live much longer on account of their livers being shot full of holes by an acidic diet of corn, rather than the mellow grass they’ve evolved to eat. That’s why we don’t eat beef liver anymore – 40% – 60% of beef livers are full of abcesses by the time the cattle are 14 months old.

This just makes me so, so sad. I really do need to read Fast Food Nation.

Music: Tosca :: Busenfreund
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Ohlone Greenway

First day back at work after the move. Miraculously, I was able to keep my bicycle commute (had been prepared to sacrifice that if necessary to become a home owner). It’s 50% longer than before, but the beauty part is, 80% of the ride is now totally off city streets. The Ohlone Greenway cuts north/south through Berkeley/Albany/El Cerrito, several miles of quiet asphalt amidst trees, along a creek, through grasslands, beneath the BART tracks. Not only is it an even better way to start the day, but Amy is happy knowing I’m safer on dedicated trails rather than battling for space with cell-phone drones in rolling caves.

Music: Mildred Bailey :: Someday Sweethart
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14,600

Speakeasy’s max allowable distance from the C.O. is 15,000 feet. Our new house is 14,600. Line speed drops with distance, so we’re on the outer limit for acceptable DSL service. Jacked in yesterday (no phone jack in new office, ethernet across the kitchen floor for now) and was pleasantly surprised – very snappy and we might have gotten lucky. Still need to do careful upstream testing — if too slow, will have to rethink birdhouse hosting. Three possibilities to solve: home T1, put server in colo, drop the business altogether. There had to be a gremlin in the bush.

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Dust Bunnies, Clean Slate

Saturday a huge effort — half a dozen friends helped us load and unload a 14′ truck twice and a half. Everyone sore and exhausted and totally satisfied by end of day, wrapped up with beer and a big Thai feast — El Cerrito has a bunch of great Thai restaurants. Head cold deepening and worsening, worked right through it, no choice. Sunday Amy and I back to Raymond St. alone to clean up – three hours of excavating dust bunnies and Murphy’s-ing the floors. Kind of a drag to be working on the old house when all you want is to assemble the new one, but in the end it felt really good — pardon the cliche’, but “closure” felt whole. Ready to move on. Head cold turned into chest cold. Hacking chest and it hurts, but Monday spent bootstrapping the house, bringing up systems, putting the kitchen together, etc. Clean slate. And the million hidden expenses begin.

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Hackett, Peck

Me: Did you know Buddy Hackett died yesterday? I read in his obituary that he was born “Buddy Hacker.”

Wife: When I was a girl my dream husband was Gregory Peck.

Me: I’ll try to fulfill your ideals and be more Gregory Peck-like.

Wife: Not just Gregory Peck. Gregory Peck as Addicus Finch in “To Kill a Mockingbird.”

No problem, baby.

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Mass Distraction

Stirring piece at The Email Activist summarizing the story thus far re: absence of WMDs in Iraq, and the total public apathy about it. We bombed the hell out of a country and were wrong about the reasons why we did it. And no one seems to care. This is serious stuff, but you’d think from watching the news that Lacie Petersen was more important/interesting than 3,000 dead innocent Iraqis.

The piece goes on to connect our collective apathy to right-wing media control. A recent CNN piece on the absence of WMDs stepped through a long list of reasons why we haven’t found a smoking gun, but did not even mention the possiblity that there were no WMDS to begin with. Feed the public a steady diet of subtle manipulation and this is what you get:

A recent CNN-USA Today poll revealed that nearly 80% of Americans believe that the war was justified even in the absence of WMDs.

Sums up with an interesting example/argument showing why claims that the media is left-manipulated are false:

The Radical Right has been railing for over a decade against the biases of the “liberal media.”  But if they truly believed their own claims, then shouldn’t they be protesting with us against the loosening of media ownership regulations?  Shouldn’t they be shaking in their jackboots at the prospect of a monopolized liberal media?  Ah…but on this subject all is silent from the bad boys of talk radio and trash TV.  They seem to know the truth about who pays them and why.