miscellany

This is a very well executed photo essay that brought tears to my eyes and sent shivers down my spine. The aftermath of Chernobyl is something I've not heard of for a long, long time. It's massive. It's heartbreaking. It's otherworldly.

The photo essay is disturbing, but I sometimes need to see disturbing things to gain some mote of understanding of what devastation people - real people - have experienced and live and die with daily.

The photo essay is about 10 minutes long and there is more content to explore afterwards. I spent about 30 minutes there. Much like when I saw Schindler's List and was so deeply affected by it as to choose never to watch it again, I will not view this again. I strongly encourage you to view it, at least as much as you will. It's something I think we all need to see/feel/experience. It needs to touch our souls. It's not penance; it's a lesson that mustn't be diminished by time.

Wired News: Kodak Focuses on Sifting Pix

The massive collection of photos available in Granny's picture drawer (I feel like I should trademark that - "Granny's Picture Drawer") and the photo albums and envelopes amassed by her, my mother and me are something I have wanted to tackle for awhile. Now the chance for some help in that arena is apparently drawing nigh. Some type of automated general organization of all these images would be a godsend. From there, I can sit with Granny and Jules and write captions and even record stories about the images. Granted I can (and probably should) do these things now. But, getting the jumpstart that Kodak's new technology seems to be about ready to offer would be awfully nice!

New hardware and software still in development digitizes old snapshots and extracts information from photos in order to automatically organize them.

...

Along with digitizing the images, the scanning software also assigns each image a tag based on the decade in which the photo likely was taken.

How does the software figure that out? Photographic paper styles have changed over the years, and the software gauges the size and shape of a print to guess when the image was made. It further narrows down the date based on whether the print is color or black-and-white.

The scanner also reads the backs of prints and eventually should be able to pick up watermarks such as "Kodak Paper" and handwriting such as "Uncle Jimmy 1957" to help identify photos.

Kodak is also looking at the fronts of pictures, with a technology called "scene recognition." The first phase, on display Tuesday, can analyze a face in a photo and find other pictures of that person in a collection.

Wonderful discussion going on in the comments to this letter to the editor. Give a look!

YouthAgainstBush emailed me today, inviting me to stop by his new blog: Empires Fall. This fellow has an active blog with numerous posts already, even though the blog is only 23 days old. I look forward to perusing it further.

The above video is also on his site with several comments. I have to agree with him in questioning why this film has been retired in schools. (I don't know for a fact that it has, but I surely didn't see it when I was in school in the 80's.) Though it's a little longer than most videos I watch online, it was definitely worth my time for the civics lesson. Yes, I know we are not a democracy; we are a republic. Still, our republic is in great danger. If a voter backlash doesn't happen soon, our nation will continue moving down the scale to despotism. Now is the time to address this, for soon it will be too late for the citizenry to regain full control of our country. The rich and powerful people, corporations and politicians are in control of too much. When public servants do not serve the public, they must be removed from power. Their positions are not God-given, are not for self-serving purposes, and are not equivalent to winning a lottery. Their positions are priveleges and they hold these postions at our leisure. Many of them apparently want us to forget that or never even to know it.

Thanks for reading samiam, YouthAgainstBush, and for emailing me. You've an interesting blog. Keep up the good work!

Also, over at BuyBlue, there's a lot of new content, including a post that relates to our decline into despotism. The post is here. Here's a snippet of it:

On this day, April 19th 100 years ago Teddy Roosevelt said:

Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to befoul the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics is the first task of the statesmanship of the day.

In a follow-up to my post on the mass arrests of illegal aliens and illegal employers, ALIPAC's (Americans for Legal Immigration PAC) site has an article from the Charlotte Observer stating that many of those arrested have already been released and told to appear before immigration authorities in another state.

From an ALIPAC email:

Over 95% of the illegal aliens they are catching are being released with a notice to appear in court. This is the same useless Catch and Release technique they are using at the border. 90% of the illegals caught and given orders to appear never show up!

From the Charlotte Observer:

Authorities also arrested 1,187 IFCO employees in raids at 40 plants in 26 states.

Officials said the 44 arrested at the company's west Charlotte site are immigrants from Mexico and Guatemala. Most were released and told to appear before immigration authorities in Atlanta.

All were in the U.S. illegally, according to agent Jeff Jordan of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Charlotte office. Two of the 44 had prior deportation orders. They are in custody and will be deported, he said.

...

Nearly half the Carolinas' estimated 390,000 illegal immigrants hold jobs. But fines have been rare. Across the country, immigration officials filed only three "notices of intent" to fine employers in 2004.

I don't remember exactly who turned me onto DonorsChoose, but thanks again. I linked to DonorsChoose some time ago and just received an email from them thanking me for the link and telling me of a new program they're trying, called BloggersChoose. I'm giving it a spin and asking you to help. Click on the link above to go to their site and contribute some $$$ (small contributions are very welcome!) to helping teachers in public schools acquire resources for lessons.

I've set my first challenge at only $100 (I'll make my contribution when I finish this post.) and have chosen a marine science project to get my feet wet. (Yeah, I know... Bad pun, Sam! You can chastise me if you contribute...) I loved wading in the sound at Fort Caswell when I would get to go there with my grandparents. I also got to wade in the sound at Emerald Isle just a few years ago. Hmmmm... Come to think of it, I'm gonna have to plan a trip where I can wade in a sound again sometime soon!

Anyway, this teacher takes his students to the Bogue Sound where they catch all kinds of critters and learn about marine life and the environment. I know I would have loved that kind of field trip when I was in school. So, if you've got a dollar or two you can give, stop by the site and help out. You can also browse through tons of teachers' requests and help them out as well or instead. My understanding is that you'll get a thank you note from the teacher, too. Nice touch!

Great news from CNN on a major series of busts of illegal immigrants AND their illegal employers! Snippet below; read the full story here.

They will announce the new strategy aimed at employers and disclose the results of the enforcement actions targeting IFCO Systems.

Customs officials said agents made more than a thousand arrests in nearly 40 locations including Houston, Texas; Cincinnati, Ohio; Phoenix, Arizona; and Albany, New York.

A customs official said federal authorities checked a "sample" of 5,800 IFCO employee records last year and found that 53 percent had faulty Social Security numbers.

"They were using Social Security numbers of people that were dead, of children or just different individuals that did not work at IFCO," Immigration and Customs agency chief Julie Myers told CNN.

"The Social Security Administration had written IFCO over 13 times and told them, 'Listen, You have a problem. You have over a thousand employees that have faulty Social Security numbers. And we consider that to be a big problem.' And IFCO did not do anything about it," Myers said.

Myers said a yearlong investigation revealed that IFCO managers had induced illegal immigrants to work there, telling some of them to doctor W-2 tax forms or saying that they did not need to fill out any documentation at all.

...

Immigration legislation pending in Congress would increase penalties for companies that employ illegal immigrants.

The strictest immigration measures proposed have spurred a series of demonstrations by opponents nationwide in recent weeks. On Wednesday, hundreds of high school students protested at the Colorado Capitol in support of illegal immigrants, The Associated Press reported.

As public concern over illegal immigration has grown, federal law enforcement officials have sought to tighten enforcement of laws against employment of illegal immigrants. The charges include money laundering, harboring immigrants, illegal immigrant employment and wire fraud.

Mark Morford, over at SFGate, is one of my favorite columnists. I like in-your-face well-spoken people presenting well-thought ideas and he records his thoughts very well. I just read his article on the newly(?) discovered Judas gospel and, though his choice of wording is a bit venomous at times, I agree with what he says.

It's the prevalent, simpleminded ideology: God somehow spoke in perfect English through some sort of giant megaphone (the original podcast), which was then beamed straight into a number of deep believers, whose myriad stories were then perfectly transcribed by some honest and devout and in no way corrupt or politicized or sexually frustrated bishop's pen about 2,000 years ago, and there is no debate don't you dare question its legitimacy and motives lest you be cast into the hellpit of Sodom. Or maybe, you know, San Francisco.

These are the Bible literalists, those who blindly take the Bible as the exact word of God (of whom our president is one, as are many of his fundamentalist minions), and they only look at discoveries like this new gospel and stare numbly, uncomprehendingly, as fluid divinity swirls around them like some sort of frustrated mist.

The truth is, the Church was formed to serve people just like this, those who are unable to grasp nuances and unable to think beyond a certain scope, those who are unwilling or unable follow what is perhaps the singlemost powerful and significant of all Christ's (and Buddha's, and the Tao's, etc.) teachings: that is, to seek God within. Not in a priest. Not in a building. Not in an organized institution. Within you.

I learned of Gnosticism (Google's cache of Wikipedia's entry; Wikipedia was down when this was posted.) about a year or so ago and, of what I've been exposed to, I like it. To me, it is truly about spirituality and not about dogma. In my understanding, it describes dogma/church/religion as being for people who cannot think for themselves but still want spirituality. Rather than finding God* within themselves, they think they find God (and perhaps they do) in the trappings of religion.

*I found long ago that, rather than trying to explain my perception of the Order within my spirituality, saying "God" suffices in my general conversations. Though the listener will apply their own interpretations of the word to their understanding of what I am conveying, the gist of my thought remains mostly the same.

If you're interested in a quick little project that will produce an excellent writing instrument, check out this project on instructables.com.

Save $200 in 2 minutes and have the worlds best writing pen
Transform a $3 pen into a $200 pen in just seconds. Mont Blanc pens are the worlds finest writing pens but they make specialized refills so you must buy their $200+ pens to use their amazing ink...until now. This is the easiest hack/adaptation to give anyone the king's writing ink.

Step 1: Go out and find a Mont Blanc pen...
Go out and find a Mont Blanc pen you like. Ask the salesperson to let you write with it...nice, huh? Now ask the price. When you've gotten over the sticker-shock, leave and go back to your good old G2. Remember what life was like before G2? The pens were cheap and the ink was like cheese. G2s were the best thing since clickable mechanical pencils. Even after we all had G2s, I still admired the uber-extravagant Mont Blanc people. Their pens were so smooth, they nearly wrote by themselves. Alas, at $200-$2000 a pen, that miraculous ink was out of the reach of the common man.....until now.

I imagine many of you are already familiar with Google's map service. It's the first map service I turn to when need to find my way. When providing driving directions, they show this disclaimer, "These directions are for planning purposes only."

Well, now they've gone and mapped Mars. Actually, I suppose NASA did the mapping, but Google has made it available in the same format as their Earth maps. Perhaps they should include a similar disclaimer there, too. I know, geek that I am, I'd certainly have a smart-ass disclaimer on it.

It would seem that my recent experience with poor customer service at Home Depot is becoming the norm.

Military-Style Rule at Home Depot

BusinessWeek spoke with 11 former executives, a majority of whom requested anonymity lest the company sue them for violating nondisclosure agreements. Some describe a demoralized staff and say a 'culture of fear' is causing customer service to wane.

A couple of weekends ago, Nancy and Tiffany helped Greg demolish the wall that was down the middle of our garage. It had been erected by the previous owners to use the garage as two bedrooms. We really need to write down the story of the previous occupants. One of our neighbors told us some interesting things about the living arrangements there. Anyway, here are a few shots of the demolition crew hard at work. THANK YOU NANCY & TIFFANY FOR HELPING TEAR DOWN OUR WALL! (I was the official photographer 'cause I was on the tail end of a nasty illness and was still puny.)

Making the email rounds:

If you are ready for the adventure of a lifetime, TRY THIS:

Enter Mexico illegally. Never mind immigration quotas, visas, international law, or any of that nonsense.

Once there, demand that the local government provide free medical care for you and your entire family. Demand bilingual nurses and doctors.

Demand free bilingual local government forms, bulletins, etc.

Keep your American identity strong. Fly Old Glory from your rooftop, or proudly display it in your front window or on your car bumper.

Speak only English at home and in public and insist that your children do likewise.

Demand classes on American culture in the Mexican school system.

Demand a local Mexican driver license. This will afford other legal rights and will go far to legitimize your unauthorized, illegal, presence in Mexico.

Drive around with no liability insurance and ignore local traffic laws.

Insist that local Mexican law enforcement teach English to all its officers.

Good luck! You'll be demanding for the rest of time, because it will never happen. It will not happen in Mexico or any other country in the world except right here in the United States, land of the naive and stupid, idiotic politically correct politicians.

If you agree, pass it on. If you don't, go ahead and try the above in Mexico.

Hat tip to Greg

The song I wrote about here has a pretty powerful video, too.

Caught in the spam filter at work...

I'm sure he wasn't laughing at the time, but upon reflection, I bet he chuckles. Don't you know he and that poor (lucky?) fireman caught major ribbing from friends and such?

Greg and I picked up my new Chrysler PT Cruiser convertible on Saturday. I love it! I have driven five convertibles and for the past year I've been driving the Saturn Vue you see behind the Cruiser. I have truly missed driving a convertible!

Wouldn't ya know it?!? It rained almost all day Saturday! The only time I had the top down was while it was still owned by the dealer and that was parked! Oh well. We got to take it down yesterday when we went to the auto show at the Lowe's Motor Speedway. They had the exact same car there!

Though it was a bit chilly at first, we got used to the temperature very fast. I have been and plan to still be a diehard convertible driver. If it's 60 degrees or warmer, the top will be down. Sometimes, when it's even cooler! It's so nice to have a convertible again! Can you tell I like convertibles?

I may post a better picture or two, but I've never been much of a car show-off. I just like to drive them! Still, the camera-phone snapshot is pretty bad...

Check out this real life "The Simpsons" intro playing beside the original. The production is great. The director, actors and production crew did a lot of work on this. You can also view it alone here.

Here's a cool video digest of lots of Japanese "Rube Goldberg" type machines. It's about 13 minutes and almost all of the machines are pretty cool. Give a look!

Congressman Henry Bonilla is a common sense hero for America. Congressman, thank you for drafting, promoting and pulling through a bill that protects private property from being stolen through eminent domain and handed over to another private party for development that yields more tax revenue. It's an out and out shame that such legislation even needs to be considered. Apparently, in this day and age, we must specifically legislate against all possible abuses of power. Morals and ethics must now be laws... Ridiculous. If that's the case, may all of them as thoroughly punish those abusing government power as this one will.

From the press release:

The Private Property Rights Protection Act of 2005, H.R. 4128, will prevent governments from taking property from one private party and giving it to another private party. When abuses occur, the Act will prevent localities and states from receiving federal economic assistance on ALL economic development projects, not just those upon which abuses occur. Today's legislation is a mirror of Bonilla's original bill, the Strengthening the Ownership of Private Property (STOPP) Act, HR 3405.

"The most important difference between my legislation and others offered is that we are penalizing ALL economic development projects, not just those upon which abuses occur. By subjecting all projects to penalties, we are removing a loophole that localities can exploit by playing a funding 'shell game' with projects," said Bonilla.

Hat tip to Terry.