I don’t even know if that’s a word. But this story has all the elements of a classic West Michigan story; 2nd-tier University, Lowell, and rednecks.
Raychel Swift was driving back to Lowell Friday afternoon when her pet boa constrictor, Mr. Cracker Basket Sassy Pants, sneaked out of a pillowcase and slithered its way into the car’s dashboard.
Take that Florida. Mr. Cracker Basket Sassy Pants. Man, I need to find a dealer around here.
I’m a conservative, that’s no secret. I support this administration when I can. I have issues with a few things they’re doing, but Ashcroft is out, so that’s one huge thing off my list.
Until today. This has got to be the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. In the event of a terrorist attack, the government could shut down the GPS system.
First of all, why? Is the huge barrier to sucessfully carrying out a terrorist attack knowing how to get out of somewhere? I’m pretty sure they were doing this long before Garmin had a handheld unit. Not to mention, the event that would trigger a shut down of the system is the very event the shut down is meant to prevent. You see the logical black hole created with that last sentence? Yeah, that’s where this idea emerged from. Hopefully, it looks around, sees the idiot telling people (with a straight face) about possible implmentation scenarios, and then heads right back into that logic hole.
Doing some work at home, I stumbled across .gov sites with block- and tract- level maps of almost every county in the country. They’re FTP sites, but the PDF maps are current from 2001. Wonder how long before this gets pulled down to save us from “the terrorists”?
Block maps (FTP)
Tract maps (FTP)
County voting districts (each 000.pdf is an index)
I wonder how long before they get sued over this. I have money down for three weeks.
Blockbuster Video is implementing a plan on 1 January to allow you to keep your video an additional week beyond the due date without penalties. However, if you keep it beyond that week, they charge you for the full movie, minus the rental fee.
I have two problems with this:
Plus, don’t video stores pay hundreds of dollars for the videos they rent out? Are they going to charge customers for the video they actually rented, or are they going to charge consumer retail prices?
Well, it’s official; I’m a Wolverine. I think we’re actually required to say that as new employees of the University of Michigan. I’ll read through the hundred or so dead trees I was handed today during orientation.
Nothing too spectacular today; your basic sign-here, date-here, smile, sign-here kind of day. And then I got to lunch when I got to my office. You know that standard easy day you get when you start a new job? Find the bathroom, find the coffee, decorate your cube? Yeah, not me. I’m in it head-first. Thank God I have a vacation over Christmas.
I’m working on the MPRIME project. A very cool and worthwhile project; should be a challenge and a blast. Can’t be any worse than what I tossed at my last employer.
Anyway, light posting for a while until I get to a) breathe and b) figure out what I can and can’t do at the U.
Go Blue (sorry Dad; I’m not required to cheer for the football team so, take heart!)
For anyone who doesn’t live in Ann Arbor (A2 to the initiated), this town has one, ok two, huge problems. The first one is that residents (which around here means “non-students”) don’t like the University. Oh sure, they love football and being able to say they live in Ann Arbor, Home of The University of Michigan, but they really, secretly, hate the damned University. All that traffic, all those students, all that lost tax revenue. It’s enough to drive a socially-over-conscious-fiscal-conservative mad.
The second problem is related to the first. See, residents outwardly love the University so much, more and more students keep coming here. From everywhere. And (and this is the worst part), some of them aren’t rich. I know, it’s awful. So, some people in the city thought if they build affordable housing, more students will not only come here, but maybe talented people will stay or come and work here, too. I know, it’s crazy, but they’ve been told that it works elsewhere.
Enter the residents again. In order to build affordable housing, you have build affordable housing. Somewhere. Which leads to the NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) scenario. Ann Arbor is Overrated (it’s a blog and a statement) has one of the best quotes ever to sum up everything that is wrong with A2.
What could happen if their concerns [on development issues] are overlooked? “What happens is that more and more affordable housing keeps coming, and the risk is that you could just create a ghetto of some sort,” [Judith Marks, the president of the West Liberty Homeowners Association] says (emphasis ours.)
Lovely. Someone in A2 has actually found a way to turn a liberal buzzphrase into a euphemism for “projects”. Read the comments being left on AAiOR for the reaction from some business owners about why the fight the neighborhoods are putting up is futile and ultimately counter to their desires. It’s a beautiful switlie to the collective snooty head of this town.
I didn’t know this, but they have made a new version of the Merchant of Venice (trailer at apple.com).
Stars Al Pacino as Shylock, Jeremy Irons, Joseph Fiennes, and Lynn Collins. Opens 29 Dec 04.
Official site (gratuitous use of Flash)
It will be curious to see how the play gets treated in this ultra-sensitive, politically-correct world. Even in the best of times, the play has had its critics and apologeits; the loonies that come flying out of the woodwork with an all-star-cast movie should be entertaining.
Interesting aside; there is an open-source stock trading program at Sourceforge call Venice.
And it looks really cool. Note that this is not a commnet on the movie itself, just the visuals, but they are awesome. Check it out at Yahoo!.
In the vein of yesterday’s post on insulting cultual icons, I present McSweeny’s second look at some of the best films.
Here’s a list of way too many board games (yeah, they still make them). This list is heavily skewed towards fantasy/risk-type games, but it’s got a lot of other. Definately won’t find many of these at Meijer’s.