The 31st b-day

I just had my 31st b-day. It was a lot of fun. The plan of gathering at Gorden Biercsh in San Jose worked great. I wasn't sure how many people would make it, so I didn't want to get locked down to any reservations. My g/f and I got to GB early enough to get claim a couple of patio tables. Two of my cuzins and their b/f's showed up...with a couple of other new friends too. Miriam showed with her victim for the evening. Most amazing is that my roommate and his g/f and rock group buds showed up! We had a great time till about 11 when we headed to this bigass house party. I had a great time. I'm leaving out a bunch of details for particular reasons that public just doesn't need to know about. lol

Turning 31

Ok, I'm 31 today. Just a short note about that. :) Thangs have been going pretty good. Work is work, as always. I'm getting a chance to spend a lot of time with me friends. I've stopped blogging for a few days to get off my political trend. I don't mind venting once in awhile, but I can't go on and on about it and be happy from it. So I gave myself a break to get this blog off politics for awhile. :)

I screwed up my thumb last week, which prevented me from sailing on Sunday. That sucked. Instead I spent the day playing Civilization III. That is always fun. :)

It's the point of our system...

Isn't it the point of the American system to allow no one to go around dictating to others what they should or should not believe, including being free from institutionalized discrimination? Why is modern religious conservatism so bent on enforcing their religious doctrines and discriminatory ideologies on our entire population? Isn't this the action in line with the Taliban? If you think it can't go that far, wake up. We are actually still recovering from a period in our history where it was taken that far. Not many people alive today remember when it was a "sin" for a woman to show her ankles in public. There was a time when it was illegal for women and non-whites to vote. How about the 1930's when discrimination against minorities was so accepted that it wasn't unusual to see anti-Catholic, racist signs like "Help Wanted, Irishmen need not apply." These archaic times are still fresh in our history. Yet, some among us still feel the need to enforce their beliefs (which have origins from these archaic times) on to others. These people claim to be Christian, yet ignore Christ's most important rule: Treat others as you wish to be treated. Do hardcore Christians really want to have religious beliefs of Islam or Hindu thrust on them? Do they really want to have laws in place telling them who they should and should not marry? Prolly not...no, definitely not. So, Christians should stop trying to force their beliefs on the rest of us. Live your life as your choose in the Lord. Let everyone else live their lives as they choose, in the Lord or otherwise.

Gay Marriages and the Constitution

By trying to define marriage as only a union between a man and a woman, confusion between a rights issue is made with some modern persons understanding of ancient religious texts. Those religions do not address transgender or full sex change. They certainly do not address hermaphrodites. Let’s remember, not everyone is born with an identifiable sex. Some people born this way have their sex chosen for them by their parents and doctor at infancy, though their bodies do not always agree with the choice as they grow up. (What about cases where the wrong sex is chosen for them?) Others are left to grow up with organs of both sexes. Will these persons be allowed to marriage as nature intended, or forced to live a life nature did not intend? The question is really this: Are we asking the Constitution to define what it is to be a man or a woman? We’d have to define the sexes in order to ask the Constitution to limit the definition of marriage. But, really, you can’t ask the Constitution to define sex because nature herself isn’t all that clear about it all the time. By trying to limit the definition of marriage, you are creating a second-class citizen, not only of homosexuals, but also of people not born with our ideal form of man or woman.

For the rights of all to be protected and equal, we must either defend gay marriage –or- eliminate all the benefits afforded to all married couples. Otherwise, we risk becoming a society that puts ideology above natural reality. That didn’t suit the German’s to well in the years leading up to War World II, and it doesn’t fit well within our own system based on freedom and equality.

I realize the issue of gay marriages goes well beyond the argument here, but this argument is enough reason to stop the madness of trying to dictate limitations on the basis of sexual orientation.

Free hot dogs at the Oakland Yacht Club

The race this past Sunday was pretty good, but again, mistakes made thangs easier for our competitors. We missed a mark. We were able to get around it, and hold on to the second place, but other boats in our class did pass us. We could have finished second boat-for-boat, but we did cross the finish line just behind another boat. We still beat them with the handicap (cuz their boat is faster by design), but it always feels good to just finish before them, period. :)

V-Day

To start off the V-Day weekend, Miriam, another friend, my g/f and myself meet up at the Tied House in downtown San Jose for a drink, then headed out to the Beehive Club. Yikes. Kinda funny, I'm like bringing in three girls into this getto-ass place, being the pimp daddy an all. LOL We ended up at the Agenda, who's crowd wasn't much improved. I hope this was because it was V-Day weekend, cuz if its this bad all the time in downtown SJ, I'm prolly not going to bother going back for dancing. However, it was a fun night.
The next day was perfect. First, I told me g/f that we'd meet up at her place around 11am. It ended up being more like 1pm cuz it took me longer than I thought to get everything together. To get her out of her house (and save time too), I asked her to get the food for the picnic I planned. So I get to her place while she was out and placed the vase I bought her on the dining table with a picnic basket and wine. She shows up a bit later. I surprized her at the door with a dozen big red South American roses and showed her the vase. She loved it all. She surprized me with a sweet card and a nice present.
We packed up the food for the picnic and head to this park next to Freeway 17 between Los Gatos and Campbell. It was romantically sweet and simple. After we ate, we walked around a bit, then got back to the car and headed to downtown Los Gatos for this little movie theater that's never crowded. We got tickets for the 4:45 showing 50 First Dates. Then we walked around, window shopping for about an hour.
Finally, we got back to the theater, but they were late in opening the room, so she went to the restroom. The place was pretty empty at that point. A bunch of younger teenage girls showed up for the movie. When my g/f got out of the restroom, she caught a glimpse of some of the girls "trying to hit on me." (her words). I don't think they were really trying to hit on me, but it's just funny saying it that way. :) The movie was pretty good. The room was only about half full. It made for a more laid back movie-going experience perfect for an easy going V-Day.
We headed to her place to get ready for diner at Scott's Seafood at 9:30pm. Diner was very pleasant, with good food and great company. ;) Later that night we feel asleep in each other's arms.

Finally, after a couple of months a long requests, Blogger has fixed a problem with my site

Arg. For the longest time, some of my pictures hosted on in my blogger.com ftp space weren't showing up. In the past, blogger.com technical assistance has been great, but now tech support seems to be in over their head. I had to repeatedly state my problem in over five separate help requests before blogger.com finally realized the problem was at their end. Finally, I had to do my own experimenting to identify the problem before they were able to figure it out and fix it. Lame. If blogger.com wasn't so convenient, I'd move my blog to another site right now.

Update for Treo 600 Sprint PCS

Finally, SprintPCS has fully functional SMS messaging. About time! Treo600sms is no longer necessary. I've compare the native SprintPCS SMS application with and without Treo600sms. It works much faster without Treo600sms now. So, to all Treo 600 SprintPCS users, you no longer need Treo600sms or any third party software for SMS'ing. Yah!

Three days in Vegas is a long time

Nuf said. lol

Las Vegas Vacation II

January 28, 2004 to January 31, 2004

With Jennifer Lydecker, Alice Leung and Miriam Melo visited Las Vegas, NV, including Las Vegas Strip, Star Trek: The Experience: Las Vegas, Hilton, Quark's Bar and Restaurant, MGM Grand Las Vegas, Virgin Hotels Las Vegas, New York - New York Hotel & Casino Las Vegas and Bellagio Las Vegas.  Original post/backup link.

I'm off to Las Vegas tomorrow!

Woohoo!

With this recent admission from the White House...

The White House is now backing down from it's claim that Iraq had stockpiles of WMD. As much as I didn't believe all of President Bush II's lines, I did believe some. None of President Bush II's statements about Saddam have panned out, and many have been refuted. Too many American and Iraq lives have been lost. U.S. Government credibility is shot to hell on the world stage. The lie that Iraq had WMD is too great to ignore. It's time to seek President Bush II's impeachment. :(

Essential Software for your Treo 600, update

To get the most out of your Treo 600, these additional software packages are necessary.

Adobe Acrobat Reader for Palm OS : Enables your device to view PDF files. The package also has a program that allows you to print from several programs to a fax machine, among other things.

pTunes or Pocket Tunes: Plays MP3 files from SD Cards. You can install various skins to change its look too.

QuickOffice : Open, view and edit Word, PowerPoint and Excel native formats.

Snappermail : POP3 email software that handles file attachments. This software package also includes a program for handling and creating ZIP files.

TreoSMS600 : For SprintPCS Treo 600 only, this allows full SMS functionality. Why does Sprint not allow this without third party software right now? I dunno. But given the fact that SprintPCS's CDMA network has twice the speed of GSM networks of the other carriers, I don't mind too much. Update: Sprint has fallen even farther behind schedule on getting their SMS fully functioning. So I continue to just use this application with flawless execution.

VeriChat : Enables you to chat on AOL, Yahoo, MSN and ICQ instant messaging all at once. It also allows you to keep these IM sessions open on standby 24/7.

Skinner 2.0: Let's you change your dialpad and favorites screens with different skins.

mLights: Let's you control screen brightness and disable keyboard backlighting.

Useful Palm OS and Treo links:

Handango.com
Palmgear.com
Treo600essentials

Woohoo! Nearly clean race

Damn, it felt good to have a nearly clean sailboat race with the Spitfire. We managed stay ahead of most of the fleet. The Spitfire is one of the slowest boats in the race, so for us to actually finish head of most of the other boats is very very bad for the other boats because of handicapping. This is a nice recovery from the previous race.

Car getting fixed or Man, I'm hairy!

Ok, so my car is getting fixed. It's been in the shop since last Thursday. That's great, cuz it's getting fixed finally, right? Well, I left my travel bag in the trunk of my car. In my travel bag, I left my electric shaver. So, I haven't shaved since the previous weekend. I'm looking like a redbearded santa claus right now. All this fur feels funny. I don't feel comfortable about fixing up my hear as long as I have this beard thang going on, so I've been wearing my cap the whole time too, grubbin. I might get my car back tomorrow evening.

Why don't I just use a razor? I tried, but my hair has already gotten too long and I don't have anyway of trimming it right now. Well, at least my car will be fixed up and looking nice. :)

Trouble with the movie Paycheck

Ok, the trouble with the movie Paycheck is that Ben Affleck was the leading actor. This man just doesn't know how to act. He's been acting since we was a kid. Check this out: Voyage of the Mimi. Why hasn't he learned? Oh well.
Paycheck was a great concept and even a good story. But the movie itself was dragged down by Ben's lack of performance. This movie would've been 100 times better if they had cast someone like Ethan Hawk or Colin Farrell or even made the leading role a woman. Oh, and the love story part of the movie was forced. As good as Uma's acting was, she's just too busy trying to be hot to be believable as a scientist. Remember Dennis Richards as the nuclear scientist Bond Girl? Well, Uma's acting makes her mismatched role only slightly better. Ok, I do know some scientists are hot woman in real life, but they are generally to busy and professional to spend their daytime trying to look hot while they are working. This movie is marginally good. It's redeeming qualities are the action and convoluted plot device that somehow works despite the miscasting.

Sailboat racin'

Damn it! Damn it! Damn it! This Sunday, the Spitfire crew had its first race in months, and of course, first race of the year. We were a bit rusty, but still doing pretty good...until we hit a literal snag. The Spitfire got hung up on a two lined buoy that caught around the keel. Damn it! What the hell is a buoy doing with two lines? It took us a ton of time to figure out what happened and them to get the Spitfire free. Amazingly though, once free, we practically caught up with the rest of the boats. We still finished DFL, but given our detail and how close we caught up, I think we have a chance of winning the series. Of course, this makes the second time in as many times that we ran into something during the race. arg.

Man, another crazy nite out

Ok, last night, more fun, this time out on the town. Miriam, a couple of her neighbors and I went out dancing at this one pub in downtown Mountain View around 10:30pm. No one was out on the dance floor so, at various times, we headed out to have our own fun. Miriam was attracting attention as usual. This one guy sent his friend over to get her number, but she's all, "Why doesn't he come over and ask himself?" and the friend said the guy wasn't sure if she had a boyfriend and didn't want to cause any trouble. Well, of course that didn't go anywhere in favor of that guy. Him and his friends were checking her out most of the night. Finally, Miriam heads out on a smoke brake and walks by that guy, stokes his shaved head and pulls his cap off...throwin it on the dance floor. She gives him an impish grin and walks on. All of a sudden, all these girls start congregating at the spot of the incident. Apparently, the guy's g/f was right there. The g/f's girlfriends then follow Miriam out to confront her. So, I hafta follow as well to front in case some trouble started. The girls finally settled thangs down after 15 minutes, but the guy's g/f never confronted Miriam herself. Finally everyone went back in. We started dancing again, but those girls were all trying to clown on Miriam, but not very effectively. Miriam and her neighbor started dancing all hot with either other in some lesbo style grinding, and I saw those other chicks trying to keep up, but couldn't. They took off finally, and Miriam had her victory. lol People wonder why I'm friends with Miriam. Well, cause sometimes it's just fun to sit back and watch her work her magic.

New Years and Spiced Long Island Iced Teas

This New Years was Crazy Crazy at my friend's place. I was making tons of Spiced Long Island Iced Teas As far as I know right now, it's my invention, but who knows. They are made with 2oz Vodka, 2oz triple sec, 2oz Morgon's Spiced Rum, 2oz Gin, 2oz Sour Mix and splashed with Coke. You should see the pictures I got of our friends' and neighbors' drunk-asses. lol Ok, no one was having sex in the living room, but... ::clears throat:: ... well, it was a great time! Man, I love my new digital camera. Anyways, I was too drunk to drive home from the party, so me and my g/f made a bed on her floor and passed out around 4am after everyone cleared out. My friend woke up with a nasty hang over, but as usual, I did not. ;) Damn fun.
P.S., yes, there definitely some mixed couple and girl-on-girl activities ...shhhh

Last Weekend

My g/f and I spent the weekend in Monterey. We had a great time, just the two of us. I loved being able to show her around places she hadn't been before. We also spend a day up in San Francisco at the beautiful Conservatory of Flowers and then the music played and played, a techno beat that hypnotized me ...me...me..me.. Oh, sorry, I'm on my friend's computer and she just started playing a techno CD that she just burned. Ok, back to the story. After perfect day in SF, we spent the afternoon in China Town and prolly did a bit more shopping that we needed too. :) It's great being able to spend some real together time with my g/f. My work is shut down between Xmas and New Years which certainly helped that.

Xmas Fun

Jingle Bells, Jingle Bells...I was treated well this Xmas season. But of course, I always treat my friends well. :) Spent time with my g/f's family, lunch and dinner, but also had an early dinner at my aunt's place. It was fun watching my little cuzins opening up their gifts. :)
This morning, I spent all morning with my g/f in my arms in bed, just cuddling (and utter stuff too hehe). Very sweet. "I wish this moment would last forever." It lasted 5 hours, almost as long.
I also saved dinner this evening. My friend Miriam invited me and my g/f over for a post holiday dinner, but forget the pasta sauce, so at the last minute I had to bring the sauce along to allow her to make her main dish. lol (I'm going to get shit for this...hehehe).

Hit and Run

Well, I was out having fun with Jenn and some other friends last night in downtown San Jose. We started off at this one classy rest'rant called Paolo's, hanging out and have some good laughs. Their was up to seven of us; two guys and 5 girls. We then headed on down to Toons on Santa Clara street. It's kinda a dive-bar of clubs in San Jose. Played some pool for a little while, but pretty soon everyone was on the dance floor just having a fun time til about midnight (this is a school night for most of us).

When we got out to my car parked on the street, I noticed someone had side swiped my car, screwing up my left fender, mirror, door and other parts. The mirror was just gone. I was bothered by this, but hey, it's done, so just hafta to deal with it. No sense bottling it up or exploding out my stress. Just best to just let it go and not lose any hair over the incident. Despite someone screwing up my car, I still feel the evening was great time.

New English

To use a term recently coined, I'm living in my very own gadget porn, and it just keeps getting better. lol

This Post goes under the "WHAA????" file

Some scientific group just published a study that suggests silver cars are safer than cars of any other color. "Silver cars were about 50 percent less likely to be involved in a crash resulting in serious injury than white cars," WHAT? There are so many problems with finding I don't even want to cover them. Then they go on the say that increasing the number of silver cars on the road would passively reduce injury from car crashes. Umm, hmm.
Ok, first of all I don't understand the results of this study. Silver cars pop up out of nowhere on you. You can't see them well on a cloudy day, dawn, or dust. I have one friend who drove a silver car tell me that he started leaving his headlights on all the time because he was cut off or almost hit so often because people just didn't see him. Maybe owners of silver cars are involved in more accidents, but have a lower injury rate cuz their cars are always in the shop (not on the road) for repairs from low speed accidents. lol
Secondly, to state a conclusion suggesting car color will save lives based on a study that is already using questionable science is just stupid. More creditable and serious work needs to be done on this hypothesis before action can be recommended on the data.
FCSuper mumbles, "Silver cars, whatever!"

Trouble tonight

Well, tonight's gathering turned out to be both a bit low key and fun. Mostly just drank at the nice rest'rant after Miriam's office Xmas happy hour party. Thangs started off pretty well, til everyone moved outside. The fun started with one of the heater gas lamps caught fire. It was like the fire was on fire, smokin up the place and looking pretty dangerous. We finally got smart enough to turn it off and try to use the other one, cep the other one wasn't working all that well.

Then, some of the girls started talking about starting up a phone sex hot line. I volunteered my sexy voice to the line too. Things proceeded quite rapidly and down hill after that. The tone went from PG13 to Mature in a matter of minutes. One of the women there had been drinking for 7 hours straight. She was not only drunk but highly horny and willing. Wearing a tiny red tank top that already showed her ample D cup cleavage and 2 sizes too small jeans she was the center of attention and she made it a point to keep it that way. She quickly got EVERYONE'S attention when she decided to flash her tits and her ass to the many senior citizens that were coming out of the NUTCRACKER play.

At that moment we all thought there would've been an indecent exposure complaint. But that wasn't the last time her bosom and her bum were exposed in the space of an hour. We saw it at least 6 times in a row, EACH! All in all it was an interesting night...mmmm D Cups!

Big night, first in awhile.

Well, looks like I'm going to be out a bit late this evening with Miriam and company. I'm not too sure on where we are going to end up. We'll see!!!

Technophile mood

My blog here tends to have moods. Sometimes, I'm telling stories. Other times, I'm ranting. At times, I recount events in my day. I even go into detail about my plans or recent decisions. Then there's the mood where I become a technophile. (Of course, two thangs I rarely talk about is the weather and this blog itself).

Currently, my blog is expressing its technophile mood. ...and here we go again!

The Canon Power Shot SD100 is a great little digital camera! Its very small footprint makes it easy to carry, handle and use. The detail of its photos is great! Navigation thru photos in memory is simple. One thang I hate about digital cameras is that most are just too complex. This one is very simple. The LCD screen on the Canon Power Shot SD100 is very clear and bright. Its voice recording is also clear. I love the fact it uses the SD card memory card to store its photos. This happens to be the same memory card used by my Treo 600 and my HP photograph 4x6 printer! So my camera, Treo 600 and printer can all exchange information within seconds! …and they can all do this without a computer! Overall, this is an enjoyable product to use.

Thank you Miriam

One week review of palmOne’s Handspring Treo 600

This review is slanted because I’m comparing my experience with the Treo 300 to the new Treo 600. I liked the Treo 300 for what it is, a PDA with an embedded phone. However, I love the Treo 600 for what it is, a phone with an embedded PDA.
The Treo 600 is intuitive. Its functions are easy to access and use.
-The new 5-way navigation adds to that easy of use. It is so useful; I’m amazed it wasn’t included on the Treo 300.
-The screen is backlit so well that you can view it in direct sunlight.
-The appearance of its size is more phone-like. It even has a thinner and shorter profile than many flip phones.
-Battery life is much improved. Normal usage without recharging during the day hasn’t drained the battery to the halfway mark. Normal usage is a few phone calls totalling an hour or so talk time, internet access thru out the day, playing games when bored, text messaging, taking pictures to play around, IMing etc.
-New Palm OS 5.2 is more stable.
-Internet access is twice as fast as dial-up.
-New keypad layout needs about a day to get used to, but once you are used to it, it works well.
-The device is highly customizable without the need for third party software.
-It can communicate in every from of electronic communication type available: Voice; SMS (full functionality requires TreoSMS600 on SprintPCS version); AOL, Yahoo, MSN and ICQ IM chat (with VeriChat); fully fuctional Internet; IR beaming of course; and can even send Faxes (using free Adobe Acrobat software). Additionally, Blue Tooth and Wi-Fi SD cards will likely be compatible with the Treo 600 shorty to add even more avenues to the internet in addition to PCS.
Ok, ok, I’m getting tired of listing thangs about the Treo 600. Just take my word for it, the list of qualities and thangs this device can do is at least 5 times longer than what I’ve included here. It’s a great, intuitive, flexible, and powerful tool that eliminates the need to carry around multiple devices, all in a relatively small package.

Essential Software for your Treo 600

To get the most out of your Treo 600, these additional software packages are necessary.

Adobe Acrobat Reader for Palm OS : Enables your device to view PDF files. The package also has a program that allows you to print from several programs to a fax machine, among other things.

pTunes or Pocket Tunes: Plays MP3 files from SD Cards. You can install various skins to change its look too.

QuickOffice : Open, view and edit Word, PowerPoint and Excel native formats.

Snappermail : POP3 email software that handles file attachments. This software package also includes a program for handling and creating ZIP files.

TreoSMS600 : For SprintPCS Treo 600 only, this allows full SMS functionality. Why does Sprint not allow this without third party software right now? I dunno. But given the fact that SprintPCS's CDMA network has twice the speed of GSM networks of the other carriers, I don't mind too much.

VeriChat : Enables you to chat on AOL, Yahoo, MSN and ICQ instant messaging all at once. It also allows you to keep these IM sessions open on standby 24/7.

Update on another cool program:

Skinner 2.0: Let's you change your dialpad and favorites screens with different skins.

Trouble with CDs and online music alike!

The people who are geared to selling music CDs just do not seem to understand that consumers' buying habits are changing rapidly.   Additionally, it is pretty obvious that CDs are way over priced. Too many customers have seen DVD movies (which have millions of dollars in production costs) selling for less than the average mundane CD (which often have production costs less than $100,000). How long do recording companies think they could hold their prices so high?!

The prices for music online are just as ridiculous! One dollar per song is just too much! At that price, the average albums would cost $8 to $15. There's no manufacturing cost to justify this price! This is just as high as the CDs!!! wtf??

The whole recording industry is lost right now. Here's my advice:

• Music CD's in the store should sell for $4.99 to $6.99, depending on the artist, quality, and number of songs on the CD. CDs will eventually be replaced anyway with online music anyway.
• Online music should sell for 15 to 50 cents per song, again depending on the artist and quality.

That's it.

Little cars are for old people

These little cars that car makers are selling right now, like the Toyota Matrix or the Scion XA are being bought more by older persons than by the kids they are trying to market too. I think the industry continues to push these cars on the wrong population. Just thought that needed to be said, is all...done with that. :)

49ers kick Cardinal ass

What a great game to watch in person! I'm glad this is the game I took my dad to see. Damn, it was fun to be a fan! 50 to 14. At some points, you'd almost forget that the Cardinals were on the field! Ouch! LOL Woohoo!0

49ers Game and this Turkey Day

I'm taking my dad and my g/f to a 49er's game at Candlestick againt the Cardinals on the 7th. This is the first time either of them will be at a football game, let alone a 49ers game. This is going to be fun. We have good seats in the lower reserve. this is under the overhang, so we don't get wet in case of rain. I'm working on getting prepaid parking pass too, to make the endeavor even more enjoyable by not having to worry so much about parking and getting in some good tailgating. :)
This Turkey Day was interesting. I met my g/f's parents on Thurdays. That worked out pretty good. But then I took my g/f to my parents place for Friday and Sat. Well, my mom likes my g/f now. Damn, poor thang, she got her ear talked off by my mom. lol

Bad Santa

Bad Santa is a great movie. Gross, funny, good twist ending (though traditional), lots of laughs that don't depend too much on sight gags, and enduring. To paraphrase once critic, once you watch this movie, you'll never believe in Santa Claus again. lol

This is in response to the act of holding U.S. Citizens and "enemy combatants"

There is no need to hold U.S. citizens as enemy combatants since we are already held to a higher standard. There are laws already in place that hold U.S. citizens who act against America accountable for their subversion. If federal officials really believe that a U.S. citizen is aiding our enemies, they need to use our legal system properly by filing charges against these people. Our federal system needs to stop being afraid of its own shadow, and take a stand. It is cowardice on the part of federal officials to attempt to treat U.S. citizens in ways that are clear violation of the constitution. Treating any U.S. citizen as though they are not a citizen threatens the rights of every American, and this new practice needs to stop. Grow some balls and take those who have worked with our enemies to trial! Keeping them detained as "enemy combatants" is a threat to our way of life.

Ramble

Today, I thought I'd just ramble here in my blog. The goal is to really say nufin at all for as long as I can while still making some sense. So ... well, I think I may have reached the end of this attempt. lol

Steel Tariffs are bad

Ok, note to President Bush: Please eliminate the tariffs of imported steel. How are we supposed to have a free market economy when we are putting up walls like this? Get rid of them. They only serve to threaten to take the economy down in the same way tariffs ended up causing the deepening of the Great Depression in 1930's.

More Movies Matrix Revolutions

Matrix Revolutions is a good movie and a great science fiction story. The point of the story isn’t the battles. The point is questioning the purpose of life itself, dealing with spiritual and religious issues. There’s a lot of subtext to the story. There is s a lot of battles and special effects too. It’s almost a sensory over load in two completely different ways. The movie does have some weak points which detract from it at times, like when it takes itself too seriously a couple times, and when it was intentionally corny a some other times. Over all, it is a good story with a very satisfying end to the Matrix trilogy.

More more Movies

Pieces of April is good movie. It feels odd saying this, but it is a Thanksgiving holiday movie. But it's not a traditional Hollywood or made-for-TV type story. It's funny, quirky, intelligent. It's also sentimental, but without one ounce of sappiness. I know, that's hard to imagine, but this movie pulls it off. It's not a great movie, but it will end up in my DVD collection.

Kill Bill vol. 1. Well, this is a violent, stylistic, clever, and inventive movie. It plays out like a modern live action comic book. It is enjoyable. It is extreme. I'm going to reserve further judgment till I see Vol 2, due out sometime early next year.

Season's First Rain

I woke up early at my friend's place today, and hadn't been home since the previous morning for various reasons. I left around 5:30am. The instant I walked outside, I felt the cold morning. It has been a long time since the last cool morning because our area had a very hot summer that ended abruptly just yesterday. As I walked to my car, the season's first rain started. A few tiny sprinkles landed on me.
On the drive home, the rain picked up a little bit. The wind shield was fairly dirty from a long road trip two days ago. The wiper fluid isn't persistent enough to really get off much of the built up road grim, so the rain was allowing me to really clean my wind shield with my wipers.
When I got home and stepped out of my car, the aroma of the seasons's first rain hit me. I filled my lungs with the sweet, rain fresh, crisp morning air. It's been too long since the last of such experiences.
I really enjoyed the long hot summer. I appreciate it more because it is going to allow me to enjoy the relief of a shout cool fall.

Dear Lord!

I just realized how busy I am this week. Some how I have to find time to move funds around for the purchasing payment on the rental property I'm buying, get my car's oil changed, be at work for important clients, go sign the paper work to finalize the purchase of the rental property (4 hour drive to and from), go out with friends friday and Sat evenings, and Sail in sailboat races up north outta town on Sat and Sunday during the day. Dang it, I just realized I need a hair cut to look good for the client and the weekend. arg This will likely be my last entry till next Tuesday.

49er's Vs. Bucs

Ok, I was casually checking out the 49er/Buc game in the fourth quarter this weekend. First thought in my mind when I saw the score of 21 to 7 was, "Eh, big deal." Most of my life, the Bucs have sucked ass. I know they are now a great team, but my instinctive feeling is still that they suck. Also, I don't pay much attention to football til about the 8th game in the season. So, here I was, for a good half minute thinking the 49ers where beating a lame team, so the game didn't matter much. Then it hit me. This is Gruden's Bucs! Last year's Super Bowl champions! Damn, what the hell was wrong with them? So, they had a bad day. Now the 49er's are all confident again. It won't last, of course. They aren't a first or second tier team right now. You can prolly call them King of the Third Tier Teams. lol If they make it to a Super Bowl in the next few years, they'd prolly lose it. So, let them build up into a better team, then get back to the Super Bowl as healthy as possible. 49ers are the only team to win 5 Super Bowls without losing a Super Bowl. Ok, this entry is done cuz I'm starting to ramble.

Trouble with Democracy

The trouble with Democracy is that an idiot's vote counts that same as a smart person's. LOL Just kidding.

Reggie Jackson Tried to Steal my Cab!

So, did I ever tell you about the time I met Reggie Jackson? This was back in the mid-1990's. He tried to steal my cab late one night at the Monterey Peninsula Airport. I had gotten in on a red-eye flight. I'm tired as hell. After getting my luggage, I walked outside to wait for a cab. Others from our flight did the same. After waiting about 15 minutes, I figured sumfin was up, so I went to call one of the cab companies to come on down. Within 30 seconds, three cabs show up. Apparently, the airport had a rule against cabs waiting for passengers, so they waited to be dispatched from a just a block away. Anyways, I let some elderly couples take the cabs. This left me stranded. I had to wait for the cabs to return, so I sat and waited. While I'm waiting, another flight gets in. Reggie Jackson comes out of the airport building and sits down a ways over from me. Finally a cab returns, and what does that Reggie try to do? He tries to steal it from me. He saw me waiting with my luggage, but he still walks right up to the cab and prepares to load up. I walked right up to him and looked him square in the eye with a rather unpleasant look on my face and just said with attitude, "Is that your cab?!" Well, he matches my look for half a second, then tries to play it off with something like, "Oh, this one's yours?" I'm like, "Yeah." LOL So, the cabbie recognizes him too and gets all excited. I load up my luggage and get in. The cabbie tries to get Reggie's attention to ride with us to, and I'm like, "Alright, fine, ask if he wants to share." Reggie goes to sit back down. At this point, I know he's not coming in this cab, so I tell the cab to just go. I didn't have all that far to travel, so riding with him woulda been pointless, even on better terms. Who knows, maybe the cabbie got back in time to give him a ride before another cab showed up. Whatever. I wasn't going to let anyone steal my cab that night.

Well, the recall election is today

I've done voted via absentee last week. My mind hasn't changed, either. I'm still not happy about having to vote over the recall, but oh well. I think the law should allow counter-petitioning (or would that be counter petition or counterpetition?) during the petition collection process. Actually, that's not a bad idea. That would mean that any petition would need to collect a more reasonable number of signatures instead of letting a very small percentage of the population trigger something like a recall.

Some week off this has been

I had intended on doing nufin for a couple of weeks in the evenings, to just relax and veg. This is cuz last month I was soo busy. Well, it's not shaping up that way. I've gone out Friday, Sunday, last night and today, plus tomorrow and Friday again. I'm having a good time, so I'm not goin to stop the spontanious flow of activity. I'll just need to make sure I take it easy this weekend cuz I'm goin to need to catch up on sleep.

Microsoft's Settlement Refund...umm, wow

This is turning about to be one strange turn-of-the-century. First, we start getting tax refund checks in the middle of the year without filing taxes yet. Now, Microsoft is throwing money at us too.

Basically, you get a settlement for any eligible Microsoft purchases you made during 1995 thru 2001. No proof of purchase is necessary if the total reimbursement is does not exceed $100. Microsoft even had two of my purchases already listed. The really really scary part about all this is that somehow, they knew to send the reimbursement form to my current work address. I've been working at the same company all along, mind you, but we've moved a couple of times since then. Well, it's a refund that I'm sure I deserve. :) Anyone else wanna give me some money? LOL

Updated Post, August 14, 2006

I finally received my Microsoft voucher

Updated Post, September 15, 2016
Microsoft Settlement Refund...umm, wow Part 2

My Vote

Besides the recall vote, there's two other items on the California 2003 special election: proposition 53 and Proposition 54. I've stated before that I'm a political centrist (as opposed to moderate). So here I am, faced with two highly political propositions. What's a centrist to do?

 
My viewpoint on Proposition 53 is that the last thing we need is more planned state government spending that takes money out of the budget. This proposition is giving our elected leaders no room to move when balancing the budget. I was very surprised to find that the Republican party of California is supporting this thing. Aren't these guys supposed to be against wild government spending? When I read the pros and cons, it just left a bad taste in my mouth to think this was even on the ballot. Yuk.

 
My viewpoint on Proposition 54 is that it is about time this issue is being addressed. I classify my race as American. Ethnically, that is what I am. It would be nuts to break down my family lines to choose just one of my origin ethnics as my own. The truth is that I represent none of these origin "races", or maybe I represent all of them. I am walking proof of the stupidity of claiming ethnicity. In a colorblind society, it wouldn't even matter. I am tired of being asked about my ethnicity by the government. I want this practice stopped. I read in the cons that this proposition will hinder health care collection of data. Well, it doesn't. Even if there is some loophole where this might occur, it would be fixed by the legislature next year anyway, so this is a moot point.

Economy starting to look to 1930's

Our country is running out of Economic Options. The policies of our government are running our economy the ground. Thangs are starting to look like the beginning of the Great Depression. I don't think we will have one, but we are being pushed in that direction more than we should because of some of the policies the current administration is perusing. This story by the USAToday says it well.

It is a myth that the U.S. has a Free Market Economy. We've never really have had a pure Free Market Economy. I'll rant more about this some other time though.

End of the Sailboating twilight Series

...And we lost Friday evening. We had a good start in the race, and were in the lead. Then another boat ran into us. No damage to the Spitfire, but it cost us 30 seconds. Our best competitor in the series caught up with us because of this incident with another boat. We did finish the race first, but with handicapping time, we still got second place by 19 seconds. That incident with the other boat cost us the race, and the series. Arg. Second place. Oh well. We finished the series with one 3rd place, three 2nd places and one first place finish. We got the winning gun three times but lost two of those races because our main competitor finished quickly enough behind us to over take us with handicapping.
It came down to the wire, so it was a fun series. Next time, first will be ours! :)