A Postmodern Desi

Asswipe on Fox News suggests Taliban should kill US POW.

Sun, 19 Jul 2009 22:57:48 GMT

Yesterday, we heard word that the United States Soldier was captured in Afghanistan recently. Some military analyst on Fox News suggested earlier today that the Taliban could save the United States the headache by executing a soldier that he strongly believes deserted his unit. Hooray for America's News Channel!

Listen asswipe, it doesn't matter *why* an American soldier has fallen into enemy hands. It didn't matter that Jessica Lynch's unit got lost in Iraq and blundered into the enemy, right? You think this American soldier was trying to freaking defect to the cave-dwelling Taliban? REALLY? This 23-year old Private is saying stuff on an enemy video ... you don't think he might have been coerced into doing so? What do you think of John McCain's videos made by the North Vietnamese?

One of ours is one of ours. How dare he pass judgement and speculate on television about circumstances he knows nothing about. Talk about giving aid and comfort to the enemy.

Ralph Peters, what a fucking cockroach.

Apollo 11 commemorative events in the Bay Area

Sun, 19 Jul 2009 07:22:30 GMT

http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_12869766

Whine.

Sun, 19 Jul 2009 06:26:25 GMT

I loved seeing eeyore_grrl and the Indigo Girls this evening.

But I'm in pain. Which sucks. As I was telling her, my sense of justice is offended: "I shouldn't be in this much pain! It's not my fault I was in a car accident!"

Life isn't fair, and there's no guarantee of fairness. But there it is anyway.

At least this pain will get better over time (the next few days/weeks). Still, no fun.

Jimmy Carter ftw...

Sun, 19 Jul 2009 00:42:28 GMT

Via joedecker and jeliza:

The words of God do not justify cruelty to women

America in the 1970s was a country that felt itself on the decline ... after the Vietnam War, the energy crises, and inflation, it was easy to see how Presidents could get tarred with all the ills of the day (that's what Presidents do, for better or worse, right?) Carter was a fundamentally decent human being who assumed that Americans had some common sense and could be rallied using rational discourse. Look at this speech of his on energy policy...

http://millercenter.org/scripps/archive/speeches/detail/3398

Now wonder where we would have been if the Nation had stayed the green course that Carter tried to put us on.

Jimmy Carter is a moral force in this world, and in many ways it is the equal of any work he did as President.

Keyboard Cat + Three Wolf Moon shirt = awesome.

Sun, 19 Jul 2009 00:32:00 GMT

When internet memes collide...

Threadless has it

Back broo-haha

Sat, 18 Jul 2009 22:28:14 GMT

So my back went into spasm yesterday morning, and that threw a monkey-wrench into the whole stinking day (and is still affecting me).

I didn't work yesterday.

I wanted to go to the Fire Arts Festival, but the idea of sitting in a car that long, and then walking around, and then sitting back in a car for the ride home was too much to bear. Went with cath to see a movie ("Public Enemies") instead.

Very sore (but more mobile) than yesterday. Taking ibuprofen like candy.

Concert tonight with eeyore_grrl in Saratoga. Hopefully tonight's concert will be far less eventful than the *last* Indigo Girls concert we tried to go to...

So...slow progress on the back, but dangit I'm angry because this is all related to the car accident and it shouldn't have happened.

Oh yeah, the car is fixed again and I'll pick it up on Monday.

Back went into spasm.

Fri, 17 Jul 2009 11:53:12 GMT

I was doing well post-accident, but my back went into spasm about twenty minutes ago and woke me up! I can't lay down comfortably, but I can sit at the silly computer.... grrrr

(meds are taken, and the chiropractor opens in a few hours)

The ax-man cometh.

Thu, 16 Jul 2009 18:52:17 GMT

Cisco cutting up to 700 jobs in San Jose
http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_12851881

(I'm ok so far)

It's business time.

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 16:44:06 GMT

H1N1 picture emerges.

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 15:42:15 GMT

Remember that silly flu thing a few months back? With some research, a pattern of behavior of the H1N1 virus is emerging...

H1N1 swine flu attacks the respiratory system in a more sustained way than the standard seasonal virus, research in animals shows.

Tests showed swine flu multiplies in greater numbers across the respiratory system, and causes more damage.

And instead of staying in the head like seasonal flu, it penetrates deeper into the respiratory tissues - making it more likely to cause pneumonia.

The University of Wisconsin study appears in the journal Nature.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8148709.stm

Most of the cases of the new flu have been minor, and there have been around 500 deaths. What will happen when the Northern Hemisphere flu season gets underway in earnest?

SpaceX

Tue, 14 Jul 2009 15:15:47 GMT

So Endeavour didn't go yesterday, but SpaceX were able to successfully put their payload in orbit...

Fight over krispy kreme doughnuts...

Fri, 10 Jul 2009 19:32:22 GMT

Yes, Mike told me about this one :-)

Tesla's birthday.

Fri, 10 Jul 2009 19:00:09 GMT

Google's logo today is awesome.

Cisco video: San Diego Fire response.

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 19:43:25 GMT

Cisco posted a new video on the corporate website that highlights our work during the San Diego Fires in October 2007. Because it's always better when the customer is happy with you :-)

http://www.cisco.com/web/strategy/docs/gov/vds_SANfirst_responders.html

The ironic thing about my headache...

Wed, 08 Jul 2009 05:11:02 GMT

We got called out today to a medical where the patient had to be fully CSPINE'd and backboarded for transport. I helped the AMR and fire guys package the patient up.

Then just an hour ago, the paramedics are assessing *me*.

Life is weird.

Massage fail.

Wed, 08 Jul 2009 04:51:50 GMT

My back had been sore for a few days, so I decided to take up tenacious_snail's suggestion of Massage Envy, since they're quite close to home (in the Pruneyard). Yay cheap introductory rates!

So I got my massage.

On the way home, nice and relaxed, I stop for the traffic light at Camden and Union.

Too bad for me, the guy behind me thought I really should have run the yellow.

So yeah, I got rear ended after the massage, which totally KILLS ANY RELAXED MOOD YOU'RE IN.

I felt pain as my neck snapped back - I have a small amount of whiplash.

Fire/AMR/PD shows up. The AMR guys give me a couple of icepacks and I'm on my way home after all the insurance stuff is exchanged.

So instead of having a glass of wine after my massage, I had to file a claim with the insurance company and I've got plenty of whine :-)

I'm ok
The car (not important) seems mostly ok too.

Life goes on.

Homeopathic Emergency Department

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 22:55:18 GMT

From the British sketch comedy "That Mitchell and Webb Look." Be warned, obnoxious laugh track included.

Jeff Goldblum interrupts Colbert: No, I'm not dead.

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 21:49:20 GMT

The Colbert Report

Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Jeff Goldblum Will Be Missed

www.colbertnation.com

Colbert Report Full Episodes

Political Humor

Jeff Goldblum

Happy 233rd Birthday, America!

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 08:06:45 GMT

The man who in times of popular excitement boldly and unflinchingly resists hot-tempered clamor for an unnecessary war, and thus exposes himself to the opprobrious imputation of a lack of patriotism or of courage, to the end of saving his country from a great calamity, is, as to "loving and faithfully serving his country," at least as good a patriot as the hero of the most daring feat of arms, and a far better one than those who, with an ostentatious pretense of superior patriotism, cry for war before it is needed, especially if then they let others do the fighting.

– Carl Schurz, "About Patriotism," Harper’s Weekly, April 16, 1898

Frankin.

Sat, 04 Jul 2009 00:55:48 GMT

Scary.

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 07:05:02 GMT

It's apparently time for a "Christian Revolution in America"

http://www.journalstandard.com/opinions/columnists/x737352329/From-the-Pulpit-Time-for-a-Christian-Revolutionary-War

Words I thought I'd never say...

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 04:36:47 GMT

"I've seen Tone Loc in concert."

I've been at Cisco Live!, which is the big annual conference/tradeshow for Cisco customers. We've had the truck on the show floor and I've been spending my days this week talking my head off to hundreds of people about emergency communications, IP mobility, and what the heck it is that my group does.

Every year, Cisco holds what they call a "Customer Appreciation Event" aka party one night during the conference. They bus attendees to some location for a themed party. Last night's CAE was on Treasure Island, and was themed "Party like it's 1989" (this year was the 20th anniversary of Cisco Networkers, the forerunner to the currently named Cisco Live!).

So we had live music. From the 80s. Apparently old bands don't die, they just play Bar Mitzvahs and Corporate Events...

(Devo on stage)

The B-52s
Devo
(one half of) Tears for Fears
Tone Loc (yeah, the "Funky Cold Madina" guy)
Flock Of Seagulls

Cisco tradition is that every year, a new hat is given out to Cisco Live!/Networkers attendees ... in the past, they've been quite unique and colorful and somehow tied to the theme from that year. (For example, the very first Networkers was about "The Network Engineer" and attendees got these striped railroad caps). This year, we got Devo Energy Domes. Here's mine...

Heh. Didn't we do this already?

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 03:42:41 GMT

A massive shell game.

Sat, 27 Jun 2009 23:18:06 GMT

The new report from the Deloitte Center for the Edge says that, "return on assets for U.S. companies has steadily fallen to almost one quarter of 1965 levels,at the same time that we have seen continued, albeit much more modest, improvements in labor productivity." Jon Taplin explains, "any productivity gains from the digital revolution have been more than wiped out by our corporate (as well as personal) addiction to debt. To understand this, it's important to grasp the difference between return on equity (the classic Wall Street measurement) and return on assets...By masking their absolutely dismal performance in the last 40 years in ROA, by taking on more and more debt to juice ROE, both Wall Street and America's corporate elite are engaged in a massive shell game, in which the average investor is the mark."

http://jontaplin.com/2009/06/27/americas-corporate-shell-game/

Via BoingBoing

(of course, my standard of living is pretty good, but look at the debt that we're all saddled with!)

Michael Jackson and CPR.

Fri, 26 Jun 2009 02:27:45 GMT

If you are feeling loss over the death of Michael Jackson, I invite you to do something with that grief and go get CPR/AED training from your local Red Cross or other learning center. You may be the one who saves the next victim of cardiac arrest.