Somebody PLEASE explain graduation traditions to me.  I’m getting my Master’s degree in a couple of weeks (more on that closer to the event) and I just can’t comprehend how ANY of the standard crap…I mean trappings associated with the ceremony are intended to “honor” the graduate.

You’ve worked very hard to achieve your degree, so we’re going to ( Read more... )

A-1 Appliance Parts
While I haven't actually purchased anything from A-1 Appliance Parts, I have dealt with several of their staff members in various capacities and have always found them to be beyond courteous and helpful. In fact, they offered considerable help at a time when I really needed it. Overall, good place due to good people.

From a blog entry about Michael Jackson linked from BoingBoing:

It's always uncomfortable to see someone who's been ruined by fame; what was distressing about Jackson was that even though he was ruined by fame before his 20th birthday, he kept pressing the lever, and getting rewarded with still more fame, and still more ruination.

I couldn't ( Read more... )

I confused Mur Lafferty twice recently via Twitter.  The second was an accident due to the vagaries of TwitterFox, but the first was a response to a tweet in which she used the term "classy."  I replied with my long-held rule of thumb that (present company excepted) people who use the word classy usually aren't.  Her response was "Um, OK."  I would ( Read more... )

JERUSALEM REPORT
From Mike Evans the founder of the Jerusalem Prayer Team

President Barack Obama addressed the world's Muslim population Wednesday at a joint session of Al-Azhar University and Cairo University in Cairo, Egypt. He greeted the assembly by saying, "assalaamu alaykum." The question now becomes: Did the President know exactly what he was ( Read more... )

Just linked to this from a Fred Thompson tweet:
Obama quietly issues statement.

From the Straits Times:

Suicidal man shoved off

Beijing - A Chinese man was pushed off a bridge by an angry passer-by after his threat to commit suicide held up traffic for five hours, ( Read more... )

Made a "care hackage" for a friend's 14 year-old son.  A cheap flash drive with PortableApps installed, a couple of installation files for other free programs, and a copy of Little Brother.  All free and legal and way cooler than anything I had at 14...except maybe my precious white canvas Nikes.

I don't know whether I'm handing him a digital ( Read more... )

( Read more... )

If Microsoft sold office furniture.

Maybe not as good as Neal Stephenson's cars/tanks/batmobiles analogy*, but still pretty accurate.  And yes, I'm still running Vi$ta at home.  Why?  Because we don't have Open Source hardware yet.  While it's true Linux is free you still have to run it on something.  Frankly I don't trust myself to partition my ( Read more... )