Cars

My wife and I recently went out for a little sightseeing with a friend and his wife.  The day was nice, but what really stuck in my mind was his car.

Unlike another friend, who said that all he wanted was something with a roof, wheels, and a steering wheel, we like a certain level of comfort in our transportation.  For example, in the Venza, we have XM radio, power sun roof, power drivers seat with lumbar support (very nice for long trips) - that sort of thing.  Better than your basic Ford, but not outrageously better.

This was my first experience in an outrageously better car.  Oh, my.

We're not sure which type of car it was, but we think (we did a little research afterward) that it's a Peugeot 508. Wikipedia says that it's a 'full size luxury car', and we have to agree.  From the incredibly comfortable leather seats, the hyper-efficient air conditioning (absolutely appreciated, as the day was scorchingly hot) to the Heads-Up dashboard display (a little screen pops up and projects instrumentation onto the windscreen so you don't have to glance down) and drivers array of Bluetooth and other devices, it's an amazing car.

Expensive?  Oh, yeah.  But now I think I see why people buy more than four wheels and a roof.

Driving in France

I'm not a particularly adventurous guy.  Though I'd like to think of myself as either some studly young bucko confidently striding the world with nothing but a lightly loaded backpack and an iPhone, or the silver-haired septuagenarian who always shows up on travel brochures with his impeccably coiffed wife, the truth is that I'm just a pretty average guy who finds it hard to get out of his comfort zone, in a lot of areas.  That goes for driving on vacation, too.

Normally, that would be no big deal.  Take a week, go to Boston or Los Angeles, rent a car.  I know where to go, I know how to get from here to there, and if I don't, there's a GPS.  Renting a car, driving it in France, for me -- the experience was a little different.  It started with the clerk at the counter, who did speak English, but overlaid with a thick Afro-French access.  There were times when neither of us understood the other.  And I'm giving this guy money? The process of actually getting out on the road was straightforward  (if you ignore our surprise at learning that the car was a diesel; it handled well, but had almost no instantaneous acceleration, so you'd stomp on the accelerator - and then slam on the brake when it abruptly lurched forward).  And the fact that it took us two loops around the lot to get onto the highway (which I don't feel too badly about; we followed another vehicle doing exactly the same thing).

Then we were on the road, and the fun began.  As I think I've mentioned elsewhere, the French drivers in Paris are aggressive.  They're not homicidal, like Boston drivers,  and they're not permanently enraged, like New York drivers, but they are aggressive.  If they see a slot in front of you where they can fit their car -- and their cars can be quite tiny -- they'll dart into it. Even if they see a slot forming, they'll start to move into it.  Fortunately, they're generally quite good drivers, so they can pull it off.  I saw cars stopping at an intersection for a bicylist, expressed surprise to a French friend, and she was surprised at mine.  They don't do that in America?  Someplaces, yes.  Not all.

And that rule about only use the left for passing?  They tend to believe it.  Multiple times, I'd be going along in the right, move the the left to pass a semi, and in the time it took me to get safely around and ahead of the truck, I'd have a previously-invisible way in the distance car right behind me, indicating its surprise that I hadn't moved back yet.

And, of course, the motorbikes.  And motorcycles.  And scooters.  Damn serious, all of them.

The GPS was quite helpful in the country, particularly when, due to a lack of coins (thank you, French bank), we didn't want to get onto the autoroute (we would not have been able to pay to get off), so we told the GPS no toll roads, and it performed admirably, eliciting only the occasional where the hell are we? Can you find us on the map?  In the city was a whole different story.  About every ten miles, it'd lose satellite lock, and then we had to hope that a key point wasn't about to turn up before the device decided Oh yes....turn right here...Yes, into the river.  Which it did on occasion.

Driving in France is fun, and interesting, and occasionally very interesting.

Flexibility

Found here.

French Kiss

I got to have my face close to some very cute teen girls when I was in France.  And to some women I didn't know.  One guy, too.

The reason was the bisou bisou - the habit of greeting women (usually) with a double cheek kiss when you first meet them, and sometimes on departure, too.  It's not actually a kiss with the lips; its a kiss where you bring your face in next to theirs on one side, make a kissing sound, then switch sides and do it again.  (If you actually kiss them on the cheek, they don't complain, though.)

This happened the first time I met the mother of the family with whom we stayed for a week; it happened every single time I met one of the teen girls who are friends of the family's teens; it happened the first time I met the wife of the fellow in Lyon, and the wife of the fellow in Aix-en-Provence, and when I met the bride in Paris.  Didn't happen when I met the woman in Toulouse (we were moving quickly through an airport at the time).  And it happened each time I met the young woman from Athis-Mons.  Somehow that last one means more to me -  maybe because she was cute (though all those teen girls were no slouches), maybe because I regard her as a close friend.

Whatever, it happened a lot.  It went very quickly from a what the - oh yeah, they do that, here to an expected ritual.  It doesn't mean something -- most of these women didn't even know me, and only one is fond of me -- but it's nice, somehow.  My wife said she particularly liked it when the good-looking teen boyfriend of our host family made a beeline for her.  Can't blame her for that.  I would see two or three bathing-suit-wearing teen girls getting ready to leave the house where we were sitting, talking,  and I'd smile, knowing what was about to happen.  Though I do admit, getting it from the guy surprised me.  Didn't feel odd, though - he's a pretty friendly guy.

The French do a lot of things that I like, and that is one of them.

Called

Just received a sales call from "John in the shipping department of medical alert" who wanted me to know about their wonderful system that's been recommended by "thousands of hospitals".

Scary part is, what with feeling a little dizzy in the heat, I may actually need that some day. Gah.

Meetings

One of the people that we met on our vacation is a young woman that I've known through Conversation Exchange for about a year.  She and I have never actually spoken together prior to this; for familial reasons, she won't let herself be heard speaking in English to a guy.  Skype-text only. This lead to her thinking that her English was pretty bad, when in fact it's pretty good.  I've noticed this in several French people. Because the standards of French schools regarding excellence in language are so high, they tend to think that they are poor communicators in English.  In fact, some are, but most of them do quite well.  Tough to convince them of that because, of course, one of the things that you say to someone you like (or just that you want to be polite to) is no, actually, your English is quite good, even if you're thinking I wonder what it is that they just said?

But this woman is, in fact, good; she rarely hesitated, and she almost never used the wrong word.  Most of our conversation was in English, because my wife was there (there's my excuse) and because it's tough for me to understand quickly spoken French (there's the actual reason).  We talked, probably, for about three hours over the course of two days, and it was completely delightful.  Much better than Skype-texting! For one thing, verbal communication lets her native intelligence shine through, in a way that texting just can't do.  For another -- well, sometimes it's just nice to sit in the sun and have a leisurely chat with a friend.  I was going to say 'a new friend', but that's not true -- as I say, I've known her for about a year.  But in a way, sitting there in the sunlight - it was.  I liked it.

It's a little odd that we've become friends, as we have very little in common - but one thing that we do have is that our attitudes towards ourselves and towards other people are very similar.  We find it hard to form deep friendships; we don't think that we're as good as we ought to be (though in different areas), and we like to be alone.  Pretty much sounds like a description of people who would not get along, but we do.  Sometimes we talk about her life (she's got to endure some problems that aren't her fault) or schooling (she was just accepted into a prestigious legal education program, though she scoffs and says oh, it was just by accident), while sometimes we talk about mine.  Curiously, I find her life interesting and mine boring, while she feels the reverse.  Each of us can't understand why the other is interested!

It was pretty cool. I wish that it had lasted longer.

It DID sound familiar....

Toulouse

The first city I actually saw on our vacation was Toulouse.  I'm not sure of the 'official' pronunciation; the people with whom I stayed said Toolooz, quickly, though I heard TooLoose, too.

However it's pronounced, I can see why people like it. My hosts live on the outskirts, in PECHBONNIEU (that's how they always wrote it; it seems to me a French thing to do that, not to mention to have FRANCE on  a separate line when writing the address.  And an all-caps last name, too.)  Pechbonnieu is another of those words that I'm sure is easily for a native to pronounce; for me, I usually came out with Peshbonnoo.  I'm sure that isn't right.  Anyway, the area where they live is somewhat rural, to the point where they have what I'd call a huge garden -- the square footage is probably about the same as I have, but where mine is grass, trees, and bushes, their's is mostly fruits and vegetables, along with a bit of lawn.  And this is the small garden; they also have a farm somewhere.

One day we went into the city.  We didn't go all the way in, but rather parked on the outskirts and took the train. (The station's name is La Vache, which made me smile.)  The Toulousian metro is small and efficient;  it's completely automated, which makes a lot of sense to me.  We emerged near a central square that was being prepared for 14 July, the French national holiday, the next day.  It's a delightful area.  We spent a little time in an office building that I regarded as very old, and they probably didn't think too much about.  It includes the mayor's office, where people get married frequently in a huge, ornate hall.  I really enjoyed seeing the inside of the building, particularly when I noticed that in one hall, the name of one of the politicians whose portrait was in the hall was Bastard.  Yes, my friend said, laughing, we have bastards as politicians, too. 

Here's a view from one of the windows, as well as from near an ice cream stand across the square.

We also went to an art museum (have to admit, the nicest thing there was how cool it was on a hot day; the display was actually of photos taken in New York in the 1950s; I actually grew up knowing some of those areas), and walked around a bit over the river, where we watched some boaters, as well as a dog who'd jumped in, splashed around, and then couldn't figure out how to easily get out again.  Fortunately for the dog, there were steps.

The next day, it was a rush to get to the TGV station, which was jammed with what appeared to be college students on holiday, as well as to find out where my section of the train would stop.  The station itself is actually quite pretty, and I wish that I'd been able to see more of it.  Perhaps one day, I will!

Ver---sigh.....

They say that you can't see all of Versailles in one  day. Absolutely true. The place is a monument to excess. The line just to get in is huge -on a busy day, about an hour of standing on a cobblestoned plain. Crowd control is poor, amenities nonexistent. No benches, no shade, no vendors, no toilets. And precious few inside,either.  The building is magnificent, but my feeling is: if you've seen three huge halls and one huge chapel, you've seen them all.

Though I admit that the gate attendant was surprised when I left before trying to slog all the way through.

some lessons

If you are using a prepaid SIM card, make ABSOLUTELY sure you know EXACTLY how to reload it, and dont wait till that last minute. For one thing, French tabacs, which sell recharge cards, are closed on Monday (the one next to my hotel, anyway).

English language GPS is nice but when it mangles foreign street names, it can be infuriating.

Small portable tool are useful.  This includes tweezers.

Always pack Pepto-Bismol (not available in france). Antacids, too.

Credit card companies will block access to your card - even a prepaid debit - if they suspect your 'pattern of purchases' indicates someone stole the card. You get to call them and list the last few, to prove its you.

Hats are a good idea, even if they DO make you look like a tourist.

Small smart phones are nice, but TOO small can drive you crazy.

Dropbox is a terrific service, although the upload function for Android could use a ´select all´ option.

The TGV is expensive and worth it.

The French autoroute tolls are automated and take euro coins. Some take euro notes. They dont take prepaid debit cards, even with chips. Chipped credit only.

French banks don´t  like to give change.  Stores don´t, either.

Internet access is not a given. Neither is air conditioning.

nope

You hear about people who can happily slog across Europe or Soutb America, live in hostels, chow down on the local food, mix with the natives. Yeah, thats not me. I do like where I am at the moment,especially now the temperature is no longer in the scorching range, and I am already think about the next time that we come   - but right now, with two days to go---- I'm essentially packed.

YL

The 18 year old daughter of a fritend is now officially part of a couple...three days after having a screaming, crying, shrieking argument with him.

I really don't understand teen girls.

yeah, but..

Many words sound nicer in French. La Poubelle,  for example,is the trash can. Nicer.

Hearing a French truck emptying la poubelle at 7AM, though.... Not so magical.

observation

2 weeks without internet access, finally got it. Bliss. Next day ...Man this thing is slow!

Vacation

I'll be gone for the next three weeks.

Watchdogs

This promo for a new game looks pretty interesting..... bet the NSA would like it!

Druggie

Nothing like packing for a trip and seeing 3 weeks supply of the drugs you take, all in one place, to make you feel old and decrepit.  Pretty soon I'm going to need a separate bag, just for the drugs.

Wondermark Excellence

Discussions

We just had a moderately tense discussion with our daughter.

The primary focus was her desire to attend a drill team event that's being held over three days, at a location that's 90 minutes from here.  We don't feel comfortable with the idea of her driving that far, that often.  Mixed into that is the cost of that event, and whether we're willing to pay any of it, as well as the cost of another event, more expensive, and whether we're willing to pay any of that.  I know that it's traditional for fathers to feel as if they're the child's draw-at-will checking account, but this was a bit much.  It particularly affected my wife, who made the point - with obvious efforts at self control - that the daughter's going to get everything she wants, here, and not even have to fund it all, while we're asking her to do things - cleaning her room being the big one - and getting blown off.  We finally got it somewhat resolved, though, as I said to my daughter later, you have to realize that this is generosity on our part; unlike college, we don't feel the need to fund any of this.  But, she pointed out, I did say that I could pay it all myself if necessary.  Yes, I replied, I heard that.  It sounded like Hey, I don't need you to let me go, I can pay for this out of my own funds! She had the grace to look abashed, and to admit that that was part of it.

And then, ten minutes later, she asked me what I thought of an idea for a volunteer summer job, next year, that would give her practical experience in arranging the logistics for about 170 people in a drill team - arranging food, arranging practice arenas, setting up transportation, getting props moved,  setting up sleeping locations, all of that.  I told her that so long as she realized this would mean she wouldn't be earning money, the experience itself sounded quite valuable.  Not sure it will happen, but she's thinking about it.

So we're still a little disgruntled, but perhaps not quite as much as three hours ago.

Observation

Don't offer comments when a woman is angry about her daughter's failure to clean to the mother's standards.

Bread

Found here.

1. More than 98 percent of convicted felons are bread eaters.
2. Fully HALF of all children who grow up in bread-consuming households score below average on standardized tests.
3. In the 18th century, when virtually all bread was baked in the home, the average life expectancy was less than 50 years; infant mortality rates were unacceptably high; many women died in childbirth; and diseases such as typhoid, yellow fever and influenza ravaged whole nations.
4. More than 90 percent of violent crimes are committed within 24 hours of eating bread.
5. Bread is made from a substance called "dough." It has been proven that as little as one pound of dough can be used to suffocate a mouse. The average American eats more bread than that in one month!
6. Primitive tribal societies that have no bread exhibit a low occurrence of cancer, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's disease and osteoporosis.
7. Bread has been proven to be addictive. Subjects deprived of bread and given only water to eat begged for bread after only two days.
8. Bread is often a "gateway" food item, leading the user to "harder" items such as butter, jelly, peanut butter and even cold cuts.
9. Bread has been proven to absorb water. Since the human body is more than 90 percent water, it follows that eating bread could lead to your body being taken over by this absorptive food product, turning you into a soggy, gooey bread-pudding person.
10. Newborn babies can choke on bread.
11. Bread is baked at temperatures as high as 400 degrees Fahrenheit! That kind of heat can kill an adult in less than one minute.
12. Most American bread eaters are utterly unable to distinguish between significant scientific fact and meaningless statistical babbling.

RED

Last week we Tivo'd a flick called RED, the original version of one called RED 2 that's coming out this month.  The previews of that one looked pretty good.... and now that we've seen the original, I can see why it yelled 'sequel me'!  I think that in the whole 90 minutes or so there were, perhaps, 2 minutes that were wasted.  Not at all a bad flick.  Here's hoping the sequel lives up to it.

La Maison Des Voitures

This is the kind of thing I admire greatly and would never, ever consider getting.... even if I could afford it, which is another never ever.

But the 'dream of every man' moniker seems a bit much.....

Eh

Found here.

Invite

I received our invitation to our friend's wedding in Paris, to be held at the end of the month. Based on the quality of the invitation, I now understand why they're having three separate ceremonies.  It's easily the classiest thing that has ever arrived in our mailbox. 

Governing

I just read an article on a new, fresh idea in administration of city and state government.   Actually, a couple of ideas.

One is, don’t administer by emotion, administer by data.  Track what works, determine why it works, propagate it.

The other is, give people the freedom to determine how to meet goals, using their own initiative.  Don’t tell them how, tell them what.   And along the way, establish communications with other agencies, so that you can support each others goals.

Speaking of which: have goals.  Broad, overarching, multi-year, multi-agency goals.

I don’t know what’s worse – realizing that these people are hotted up for something that the private sector discovered more than a decade ago, or realizing that they’re hotted up for something that the private sector substantially gave up on, more than a decade ago.  Actually, to say gave up on is unfair, since many of the pieces are still out there, and I’m willing to bet that those which haven’t been overcome by the creeping algae of bureaucracy are still pumping along.  But the original, shiny, Big Idea Big Picture stuff that looked so good before they took off the wrapper and tried to make it work?  That, not so much.

People really want fast, straightforward solutions.  Government’s no different, I guess.

Hokus SCOTUS

So the Supremes now say that if you are silent when talking to the police, they can take that as an admission of guilt, and that you have to say you don't want to talk to them before you have Fifth Amendment rights, only those don't come into play until you're arrested?


Police state, coming up.

Found

Found here, at katinca.tumblr.com.

 

Hey, MAV?

The whole concept of micro air vehicles (MAVs)  tends to creep me out, mostly because I see them as having a lot of potential for abuse from both the police if you aren't doing anything wrong you have no reason to hide and the criminal element, which tends to have the same opinion, though more monetarily oriented.

But the science behind them fascinates me, which is why I found this article from IEEE Spectrum about research at Cornell to be fascinating.  Basically, they're testing the use of a neural net to allow a MAV, equipped with a single camera (we don't need no binocular vision!),  to 'read' an environment rapidly and find a safe path through obstacles.   Another step towards truly autonomous vehicles. Scary, but fascinating.

Book 'em

I bought a large book of pictures of small towns in my home state  for use as a gift to the first family I'm visiting.  The book cost $35; with their discount card, it cost $32.  I liked it enough that I asked if they had a second copy, so I could give it to another family, but they said no.  So I came home and looked on Amazon.

$26. 

Free shipping because I have the Amazon Prime membership, which costs the same as the bookstore discount card.

And that's why brick and mortar bookstores are in trouble.

Shogun Tango

Found here

.

Just a note....

I've been taking significantly more insulin, the last six months, than I had in prior years, and still having trouble.  The endocrinologist I consulted it boosted it again, said that she'd keep an eye on it and was available for questions.  I liked that a lot -- and, by and large, I am not a person who likes doctors.

Ahah!

From Dog Eat Doug

Heh

A Serious Condition

News

You know how sometimes you wonder if something might be true, and you hope it isn't, to the point where you've about convinced yourself that it isn't, and then you find out that, in fact, it is?  Got some of that type of news today.  It's nothing bad....but it's unsettling. And it's going to take me a little while to get used to it.

For one thing, people who know me pretty well weren't sure how I'd react to it.  And that's almost as unsettling as the news itself. In fact, as I think about ...more so.  I thought that they knew me better than that. It almost feels as if they didn't trust me.  I know that's not true, but it's how it feels.

I want to believe that its unsettling because someone I care for could get hurt.  That's true, but it isn't all of it. The rest is that it changes my life, even though I'm just an observer to the main event.  I don't like that change.  There's an old joke about babies being the only ones who like change.  The older I get, the more I think that's true.  Good changes, happy changes do occur....but not very often.

This one isn't bad, but change is scary.  I wish it wasn't happening.

===============
I'm about 60% over it. 

Quote

From this article in the LA Times:

"Obama said he would listen to us.  We didn't know he meant literally."

Feedly

Well, rats.  One of the people who looks at this blong has their own location - but on Google Plus, which I don't use.  And Feedly seems unable to grok what G+ is all about.

Spies

I've been thinking about this whole NSA thing.  Not thinking deeply -- I'm not sure I've ever done that, about anything -- but frequently.

I think that that Ben Franklin quote about those who give up a little liberty ... is pious and mistaken.  I'm willing to bet he wouldn't have said it as it's quoted, but even if he did, I think it doesn't matter.  I think we need defense against intangible enemies, and if giving up a little liberty gives that defense, I'm for it.  On the other hand, when I see the NSA say that they stopped fifty terrorist plots, I think Really? Terrorist the way that we think of them, all organized and funded, or two guys grousing over a beer in Pakistan because they hate having the Americans there and wish they could do something about it?  I don't doubt that they've stopped some number -- and of course, how many would it take for me to say well, okay, you've made your point.  They stopped one terrorist from blowing up one car in a Walmart parking lot in Minnesota?  Ten airplanes from flying into ten more buildings?

The idea of spying on foreigners doesn't bother me until I think about the idea that a) some of those foreigners are my friends, and b) their spy agencies regard ME as a foreigner, so guess what.  I think that the spying is necessary.  It's trusting that they are being held to high ethical standards that flummoxes me.  Obama says yes, of course they are, but I doubt he actually can be sure that they aren't lying to him. We've seen enough examples of major corporations suffering grievous losses because a trader or clerk did something stupid or malicious or both.  How does he say with confidence that some cryptographer isn't accumulating his own stash of interesting or salacious information, just as the TSA found some of their people were doing (after swearing that no, of course not, it's not even technically possible). 

I dislike not believing my government, and Obama, but I don't.  I think they are right about the threat.  I think they are right about this being an effective method of addressing the threat.  I don't believe that it's the only way, or the best way, or the most ethical way.

But perhaps I've just seen too much West Wing.

...for my horses

Phones

Received the phone for use in France, yesterday.  It seems to work here, too.  I'm trying not to wonder exactly why, as in oh holy hell is it running up charges as if it is calling from France?  Because it does have a French phone number (ie, the prefix is ooh-la-la, though inside France you drop the la-la and just say ooh).  But here's the thing: I hate it.

Oh, I like that it does lots of things.  But I spent half a goddam hour trying to type my name into something.  Its 'smart typing' should be relabled incredibly sensitive and enragingly idiosyncractic random character selector.  And the size of the freaking keys makes me feel like my fingers belong to Andre The Giant.

Why didn't the size of the damn phone even occur to me?

Get Me Some Makeup....

Cancer Promo

What if cancer -- well, some kinds, anyway - gave you great abs?

Art

Much of what is called modern art, conceptual art, performance art, hell-if-I-know art leaves me cold.  It reminds me of the dining-room-table scene in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.  Such is the case with this stuff.  But the last photo grabbed me.  And made me dizzy. .

School of Hard Sums

Australian Awesome

Instructions

 

Found at PhDComics, here. 

Facebooking

Alert

 

It seriously never even occurred to me that they spy on Americans, and tell the NSA the result, while the NSA spies on their people, and tells them.  Result:  spying happens, but nobody spies on their own people. Except, you know, accidentally. 

Ah. I See.

found here.

Further

Just learned that my daughter plans to give a check to her former fourth grade teacher, to use in buying more books for her classroom. 

I am amazed and delighted.

Colors

I found this on one of the blogs that I read.


"My second grade teacher liked to ask us,
“How do you feel today, on a scale of one to ten?”
Ten always meant I’m super, thank you
and one was always not today, Mrs. MacAuley, not today.
But I never liked numbers, they would always
twist and rebel against my mind so I chose
to speak in colors instead.


January third - I am the color
of mint chocolate chip ice cream
but I’ve eaten all the chocolate chips.
I am calm.

February seventh - I am a bruise of
blues and violets today. I think it would
be best if I sat by the window.
These are unhappy colors.

April eleventh - I am turquoise, I am magenta,
I am every color in the rainbow.

April thirtieth - I am gray, I am silent.

May first - I am orange, the color of melting
creamsicles on a beach in July.

June twelfth - I am as yellow as the school bus
that will bring me home to summer. I am free.

Twelve years later, I still use colors.
The winter makes me feel cobalt blue, the ocean
turns me a seafoam green. Violets and purples
leave me uneasy and scarlet is a fever of fury.
Some nights I drown in shades of navy, denim,
and cornflower but other nights I meditate in forests of
harlequin and shamrock. 

But you,
you leave me a blinding white followed by a soft yellow:
the color of sunlight after a period of darkness."

No Problem

The 35-year-old man and his young son were visiting from Phoenix and were at a friend's house.

Police say the boy somehow found a gun in the home's living room and accidentally fired it and a bullet hit his father, who was rushed to a hospital where he died.  

Just a kid accidentally killing his father.  What's the big deal?

I'll Never Need It, But....

AntiObama

My wife thinks that in the next election, you may see Democrats running against "Obama's NSA scandal.  I think she could be right.

Being Watched

Once again, the NSA, keeping us safe....  

Of course, we're not allowed to know where they are, who they call, from which telephone number, how often, any of that.  But they're allowed to know that about us.  Without telling us.  And to keep the information for a very long time (Oh, didn't we erase those records? Darn.) 

My sister-in-law tells me that if I knew the things she knows about possible terror threats (she's an executive at FEMA), I would be aghast.  Probably true.  She believes this means I should trust the government without reservation, at which point I stop talking with her, because I like her, and wouldn't want to use the words that come to mind.  All I know is, if we knew how often grubby people (but with pure hearts, they swear) are peeking through the keyhole, we'd be horrified and enraged. So, of course, they keep it secret.  For our own good, they swear. 

 It comes down to whether we can trust people who aren't clearly accountable and punishable.  When it comes to things like this, I'm guessing not.

Do we need this kind of snooping?  I think so.  I do believe what my sister in law says. I am sure that if I knew of the actual threats, I'd be horrified.  Even given that paranoid people see threats where none nationally exist, I'd be horrified.   But that belief does not mean that I am willing to give free, unfettered access to my life over to people who feel that they alone can judge what they should have access to know.  They need responsible oversight.  I would be perfectly willing to trust senior politicians to look over this information, these procedures and determine if it's warranted - except that lately, the senior politicians seem much more interested in protecting themselves than in protecting me.  They'll give me up in a heartbeat, for, you know, the good of the country.

There's a quote people like to use, to the effect that those who are willing to give up some liberty in order to gain some security deserve neither.  I don't agree with that.  I think that some snooping, some watching, is necessary.  But without clear accountability?  No.  Even the law is not above the law.  Or, at least, it shouldn't be.

Funds

My daughter just went over to the elementary school which she'd attended, and while she was there she visited with two of her former teachers.  She came back excited and enthused about the idea that one of them, every year, buys a set of the Harry Potter series - and every year pieces or all go missing.  She said is there a way that I can give money to her so that I can pay for the next time she does it?  And is this kind of thing something I could do every year?

Boy, you think you can't get more proud of her, and then......

Surprised

I got a surprise today.

I came across a post on a website saying that the US Capitol Police wouldn't let an organization get a permit for a demonstration until they showed the police their organization's website.

I thought well, that's uncalled for.  What the hell?  And then I noticed that the organization was a branch of the Tea Party, for whom I have no use at all.  Still, fair's fair, so I put a comment there which said something like I am not a supporter of the Tea Party, but this is unconscionable and intolerable.  I figured I would get a response, and I wouldn't like it. Figured it would say Well the hell with you if you don't support us, you bastard.

I did get a response.

It said something like I am a supporter of the Tea Party, and I thank you for being willing to step outside the lines to express your support on this issue.

I was astonished. Civility? 

Shopping

I normally don't have problems when doing our grocery shopping. But when my daughter asks me to pick up "some detangling shampoo..."

That doesn't appear to be a word that they like to put on the ten thousand bottles in the women's hair care area.

Seeing Red

Once again we see what happens when weak frightened men armed with pepper spray encounter unarmed civilians.... this time in Turkey.

Hugs Are Awesome

From FullPunch......

Staffing

Goggles

Nations of the World

Rein in Your Computer

News Headline: “National Spelling Bee winning word: ‘knaidel.’ ”

QT put the winning words from the most recent five years though its spell-checker.

The spell-checker failed on all five:  “Laodicean,”  ”stromuhr,” “cymotrichous,” “guetapens” and “knaidel.”

Never miss an opportunity to humiliate your computer.

From Zay Smith.....

Not Christmas? Who Cares?

This is delightful.

This is just Wrong

Conversations

Conversations aren't going too well for me, lately.  Nothing major, just....unsettling.

For one thing, I was supposed to talk with a new partner yesterday.  This is the person I spoke with for five hours during the first week.  I'd gotten a note saying that she was looking forward to talking again this week.  Yesterday, nothing.  No sight of her on Skype.  I figure hey, things happen, she'll be around later.  Probably true.  But still....

And for the other, yesterday while I was waiting for my mento to do something, I noticed that a kid in the classroom was wearing a wrist bracelet.  This kid is stocky, with short hair, but obviously had breasts, so I figured it was a girl who identified as a boy.  The kid looked depressed, so I made a comment about the bracelet.  I said Yeah, I wondered what the wristband that guy was wearing was.

Whereupon the reply was I'm a girl. 

I know, probably not a big deal.... but I feel badly about it.  I sure to hell hope I didn't set back two years of therapy. Clearly, I'm not as good at perking up kid's spirits as I thought.


Maybe I should keep my mouth shut around people I don't know, huh?

Hmmm

You remember those ads about How does the guy who drives the snowplow.....get TO the snowplow?

My daughter's working her first day shift at her summer job.  She had to get up early.  Which meant that I had to get up earlier to cook breakfast.

Hmmm.....

samsung

We have a samsung galaxy tablet.  Its pretty nice.  One thing, though.

You watch a video, and the device's sound is off? It turns the sound on.  Usually ok, but if you are in bed, trying to be quiet? And suddenly something's music comes blasting out?

Yeah.  Not cool.

Perl?

Once again, an XKCD comic that I love.

Oregano, You Say?

From Not Always Working:

A Long Time Ago In A Grocery Store Far, Far Away

Grocery Store | Ontario, Canada | Employees, Geeks Rule

(An employee giving out free olive samples at the grocery store.)
Employee: “Hey, you should try some too, they’re really good!”
My Stepfather: “I don’t really like olives, but thanks.”
Employee: “But they are different! They’re cured in oil instead of brine, and have oregano on them to give them a really nice flavour.”
(The employee continues to wax-poetic about the olives until my Stepfather finally agrees to try a small one.)
My Stepfather: “Hey, that’s pretty good. Did you Jedi mind trick me or something?”
Employee: *blank stare*
Me: “These are not the droids you’re looking for?” *hand motion*
Employee: *continues to stare blankly*
(Another employee, Employee #2, who is stocking shelves behind us and has heard the exchange is nearly on the floor laughing. As we walk away, we hear her trying to explain things to Employee #1…)
Employee #2: “Okay, so there is this movie called Star Wars…”

And now I want some of them..... Canada, you say? 

Moving It

Found on Wall to Watch.




Marilyn Monroe, Eli, Wallach, Thelma Ritter, Clark Gable (Misfits 1961)
Sophia Loren (It Started in Naples 1960)
Jayne Mansfield (Dog Eat Dog! 1964)
Natalie Wood (Gypsy 1962)
Kim Novak, William Holden (Picnic 1955)
Anita Ekberg (La Dolce Vita 1960)
Ann-Margret (The Swinger 1966)
Gina Lollobrigida, Rock Hudson (Come September 1961)
Romy Schneider, Jack Lemmon (Good Neighbor Sam 1964)
Brigitte Bardot (Come Dance With Me! 1959)
Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, George Segal, Sandy Dennis (Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? 1966)
Jill St. John (The Oscar 1966)
Mamie Van Doren (Untamed Youth 1957)
Shirley MacLaine, Gene Kelly (What a Way to Go! 1964)
Cyd Charisse, Robert Taylor (Party Girl 1958)
Raquel Welch (Flareup 1969)

Money

Had a conversation with my daughter about money.  Nothing specific.

She said that when she was younger, and realized that other kids got a bigger allowance than her, she would cry.  And then she'd get over it.

Is this a cool kid, or what?

O.M.G.

Found on Imgur.

Want to try again, Wolf?

Found at Loathsome Profusion.

Indeed

  

...and yes, I looked up that verb. 

About Right

Singapore

Though I suppose that somewhere in the crowd there are people saying Dammit, I just want to get to my airplane!

So Who Won?

Working

My daughter just left for her third day of work.  She is already counting the days until she is done (about 59).  I asked her how much she earns an hour, and gave her a rough calculation of what she'll earn if she sticks it out.  She said that helps.

Beer

I'm not a beer drinker.  I've always thought the taste was strange.  At best, I might try an 'artisan' beer if we happened to be at a restarant offering that, perhaps a 'wheat beer', and I could drink about a third of a glass, but that was it.

Last week, we went to a local restaurant that specializes in Belgian food, and, what the hell, I tried a Belgian Raspberry beer.

It was actually good.

Dogged

Tumbld

Yahoo won't screw up Tumblr.  No.......  they'll just make it better. 

And we all know what that means. 

TJOT

Courtesy of The Joy of Tech:

Out of Darkness

We went to see Star Trek: Into Darkness last night.  The initial take on it was that it was satisfactory, but as we thought it over later -- even just on the drive home from the theater -- we decided that no, actually, it wasn't. There are several reasons for this.

For one,  much of the movie could be an Arnold Schwarzenegger or Bruce Willis flick -- lots of noise, things blowing up, crashing together.  Several times we looked at each other and said what did he just say? Wait, who are those guys?  This thing that just happened, is it good or bad? You need a cheat sheet.  There's a line in Moss Hart's autobiography where he talks about a play he has written, one that isn't quite working, and he isn't sure why -- it's funny, and people are laughing, but still, they seem unsatisfied.  He consults a friend who suggests that he insert a quiet scene to give the audience a chance to catch their breath.  Would that that friend was available to JJ Abrams.

For another, the plotting seems to be at the level of Saturday morning kids shows. I'll get you next time, Kirk!  Next time!!!!  There's not much of a backstory for the bad guy.  There's a vague one -- this guy did something really bad, then they toss in a well wait maybe he's not a bad guy, followed by other not-really-much-of-a surprise events, including Kirk going out to kick ass and take names after several attempts to display emotion on the part of the lead characters. (Kirk and Spock don't fist-bump, but if they did, it would be better than the existing Kirk looks chagrined or Spock looks perplexed.)    

Yet another problem is that they have several cute little references to Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan.  (Okay, fair's fair: the first reference is unexpected and actually kind of neat.)  They do everything but the Monty Python wink-wink-nudge-nudge -- including, in places, using exactly the same dialogue as was used in Wrath of Khan, down to the identical accompanying hand gesture. Exactly. My mento, the kid I mentor at the school, will sometimes say, referring to an event in a video game, Really?  They're really doing that?  I had the same reaction.  Was this scripted by JJ's 13 year old son?

Plus, they killed off a character who, objectively, was minor, but I liked him.  They didn't use Cumberbatch nearly enough.  They seemed fascinated by this thing between Spock and Uhura.  They inserted another character who added virtually nothing to the plot, apparently so viewers would say awwww....look who it is!   There's at least one then a miracle occurred moment. And....and... oh, you get the idea. 

I don't think this is the death knell for the Star Trek series, but I think it's wounded.

Rooked

The problem with having read The Rook, by Daniel O'Malley,  is that now everything else seems lame.  Why? Because it was unbelievably good.Stay-up-two-hours-after-going-to-bed-to-finish-it good.  If you liked The Hunt for Red October, think of how it felt, first time you read it.  Like that.

Fortunately, he's writing a sequel.  I should stock up on sleep now, while I have the chance. 

Not Exactly A Flashmob

but who cares?



Of course, there's always this --



and this -

Notivated

I have little motivation today, and none at all for a certain foreign language.

Schedule

Always nice to learn that the offspring has scheduled herself for an appointment  that we knew nothing about until the time for it was past, an hour ago."But I thought you knew about that!  I thought you would tell me!"

Welcome to growing up, kid.

Seems fair

Card

My daughter just read to me the hand-made Mother's Day card she's going to give her mother when we see her tonight.

It was so cool, it brought tears to my eyes.  Literally.

Yes, Please

When I was younger, I would have wanted one of these. I would have thought it fun and even elegant.

In fact, I still do.

Found in the Art Is In My Heart tumblr.

Chess

I am continuing to read The Rook, in between bouts of dammit I need to finish translating that short French article, and I must say that I'm starting to worry.  This book is so good -- can he maintain the level for the next 300 pages?  Or will the book, at some point, jump the shark?  Only one way to know, I guess.

Magical

The restaurant we went to for Mother's Day brunch had these in the men's restroom.

(Not, not me. I found it  here.  But is that awesome, or what?)

What ho....

There's a decent little restaurant in a town not too far from here, and today we went there for lunch.  Parking, I noticed a small bookstore that I'd seen before but always thought fah, small bookstore, small town, what could they possibly have?  Two books heavier and fifty bucks lighter, I was walking back to the car when my wife pointed out that the town library was just across the street.  Since it's just up the block from a local college, I thought It has potential, let's take a look.... Twenty minutes later, two more books heavier, we returned to the car.

Given that I had the two new books -- not to mention the four or five at home -- I didn't really need the library books, but they spoke to me. Take the first one: seriously,  how can you put down a book that starts with this?

Dear You:  The body you are wearing used to be mine.

Learning

Just learned that my mento, who'd started to show some improvement, has slipped dramatically in his performance.

Hoo, boy.  Wonder if I'll see him next year -- or if, truthfully, it would even be good for him if I did.

Partners

I talk with several people in France as part of my French practice. Four of them are verbal (over skype), two are text (also over skype, or email).  They're all good people - interesting, willing to accept my brand of French. I have a theory that people who are trying to learn another language, and use a tool like Conversation Exchange, self-select: these tend to be interesting people. ( Except me, of course!)

I like the people that I talk with. We're not close, but we get along well.  If several weeks goes by without talking to them, it's the opportunity to practice that I miss, not so much actually being in touch with them. I'd like to talk to them more often (greedily: if I don't speak French often, my confidence goes down.  Stupid, I know.), but if I don't, it's okay.

And it doesn't always work out. I've had partners who flamed out immediately - I get this I don't want to talk to this person again vibe -  while others just seemed to drift away.  Part of that is because they're actual working people, while I'm not; consequently, I have a lot of time to talk.  They have to juggle life.  I remember what that's like; sometimes, like today, when a plumber is coming out to the house on the same day that I've got a session with my mento, I still do. In any case, I'm a little sad when that happens, but I've grown to expect it.

There's two people that I do feel close to, though.  One's a retired woman who lives with her companion in Toulouse, and another is a man who lives with his family in Aix-en-Provence.  I'm actually going to visit them, this summer, for a couple of days each.  And a third: a woman who I text with fairly often, a pre-law student in Paris.  When we visit Paris, I'm finally going to meet her, too.  (I'm really looking forward to that.  I warned her that although I know it's not French, and I know that she really prefers a sort of hands-off approach to life, I'm probably going to hug her when I see her.)  I know more about these people, and their lives, which makes them a bit more 'real' to me.

And now, perhaps, one more.  Two nights ago, I spoke for the first time with a woman who lives somewhat south of Paris.  Normally, conversations are semi-rigid - we speak in French (mostly) for about half an hour, and then English (mostly) for a half hour.  Right around the hour mark, one of us makes a comment about the next time, and we look at calendars, and then we're done.

This new person, we spoke for three hours, the first time.  Granted, it was exceptionally easy for me, because about 90% was in English, and her English is very good.  Still, three hours!  And then the next day, yesterday, we spoke again, for two hours -- and afterwards she sent me a note to say that, in fact, she hadn't wanted to stop; I had misunderstood a phrase she used (this conversation was about 90% in French), so she was perplexed when I ended the conversation.  Five hours in two days with a new person!  And we meshed.  We like the same kind of music.  We disagree with the same prevalent thoughts about how best to learn a foreign language (and it still startles me, sometimes. to think of English as a 'foreign language').  We got along so well that immediately after, I sent her two links to music that we'd been talking about, and she sent me a link to music that reminds her of someone special to her who'd died, a few years ago.

I try hard not to notice, by the way, that she's very pretty, too.

Smart, pretty, interesting, willing to speak French with me -- at least for a while, I think I have a new best friend.

Music

I don't often say that things are awesome.

This guy is awesome.

Mrs. Kelly's Monster.

If you like articles about neurosurgery, you'll probably like this.