May 3, 2007

Yesterday I read one of the best posts ever from Wil Wheaton: The Butterfly Tree. Having gone to a private Christian school from kindergarten through eighth grade I think that this story really hits home.

In ongoing school issues in America: a Chinese student at Clements High School was arrested (but not charged as they had nothing to charge him with) for creating a three dimensional model of his high school. The school is refusing to allow him to return to school and a hammer was taken from his home that he used to fix his bed because, apparently, all people of Asian descent living in America are now potential terrorists. This is a clear case of racial discrimination. If making a model of the school is illegal then the builders would all be arrested for having the blueprints. Fire escape plans would be confiscated. This is a school lashing out against an American student because of hatred. He is not a foreign national living in the US but an American. Apparently more American than the school board who are clearly not acting in the interest or within the laws of our country. It is acts like this that make terrorism so simple to accomplish as hatred fuels terrorism. With so many people like this in positions of authority is it any wonder that Americans are hated globally? Some people, like the Clements High School School Board, do everything that they can to justify the belief that Americans are horrible racist. This is truly sad and disgusting.

In Australia scientists have a new fuel cell concept that is expected to go into production very soon. This new fuel cell technology produces electric energy from brewery waste (a major byproduct in Australia.) The energy is produced by bacteria consuming the sugar and other byproducts left over from the beer making process. This is a great way to make energy because the fuel is waste that we are already producing and everything is environmentally friendly. This isn’t going to power a city by any means but all the supplemental power that we can generate the better. Milwaukee, St. Louis, Utica and Rochester will be glad to hear about this development. Ireland and Germany could become major global energy exporters! 😉

A week of infrastructure fires continues after earlier this week a fuel tanker overturned in the San Francisco Bay area melting an overpass and closing two highways in one of the country’s most congested cities. Today we learn that a homeless man with a cigarette managed to start a two alarm blaze that shut down a train line and brought down the Internet2 link from NYC to Boston.

I got home around four yesterday afternoon and walked over to the post office and did an address change as the house is now sold. Unfortunately it will take a day or two before the address change gets processed which means that my paycheck (which I changed over a month ago but discovered today was not actually changed) is still going to go to that address which is a bit of an issue.

I was home early enough that I managed to relax for almost an hour at the apartment before having to head up to Wallington to pick up Oreo and then meet Dominica. I left the apartment at five and got Oreo from daycare. Then we drove down to Famous Footwear and met Dominica there. The timing was perfect. Oreo and I arrived just five or ten minutes before Dominica did. She put in a long day today making up an hour and a half that she will be taking off next week. At this rate we are very close to getting to take our mini-vacation without taking any time off of work at all between us. It Dominica didn’t have to take her A+ certification exam next week we would make it for sure.

We managed to find me a new pair of sneakers which I need so that I have something to wear in Disney. The shoes that I wear now are, I believe, the same ones that I wore the last time that we were in Disney World. They are doing okay but I should have two pair with me in case one gets wet which often happens down there.

After shopping we went to the Shannon Rose for Irish. We both got fish and chips which is the only reason to go there. This time we knew enough not to sit inside and got a table outside. That was much better. We could actually hear each other and it was much cooler.

After dinner we just came home, watched a little WKRP in Cincinnati and went to bed.

This morning Joel Spolsky talking about some very interesting new elevator technology that is in use at 7 World Trade Center here in NYC. Hopefully this new technology will make elevators more efficient which is a major problem in large high rise buildings today.

Today was a slow morning in the office. I had a chance to start getting caught up on little things that get missed here and there when things get busy. Things have been so busy recently that a lot of stuff was getting missed. I don’t like have gaps in things so I am working on filling stuff in before things get really busy again.

The plan for today was for Dominica to leave Oreo at home so that he could get some rest and for me to leave after working most of the day from the office and work the last bit of the day from home with Oreo. Otherwise Oreo will be totally exhausted and won’t be any fun this weekend. He really needs to only go to daycare for four days a week. Five is just too much for him. Normally I would be home today but because I am covering the early shift this week I am at the office all five days. Next week I am going to come in and work early on Thursday to make things easier for flying out that evening from Newark. It is so nice having a job with flexibility.

Dad got the Mazda 6 back from the shop today. Everything is done with it. Runs great. It is really sad that we have to sell it but it is just so impractical to be paying for another car. It is costing us way too much to keep as a “pleasure” vehicle. The RX7 is supposed to be going into the shop soon. Dad is calling today to get that scheduled. It is going to cost us $225 just to have them look at it (after towing and a new battery get put in) but hopefully it will be back on the road soon and we can actually get some use out of it. I love that car.

After yesterday’s “copyrighted number” issue, today we have found that there is a new crack for the AACS HD-DVD encryption system that they believe cannot be revoked. In fact, those that discovered the crack are so sure that it cannot be stopped that they have divulged the details of their crack.

The Japanese have discovered and documented an illegal copy of Disneyland in Beijing that is run by the Chinese government. Of course, illegal is a loose term in China. The park doesn’t look very good though. It appears to be Disney themed but full of things like ferris-wheels instead of interesting rides.

I went home at a little after noon and spent the afternoon with Oreo.  He is loving today – bright sun for him to sleep in.

Dominica left right at the end of the day but ended up getting stuck in a traffic jam and taking quite a while to get home.  She got home and we went right over to Food for Life for a quick dinner.  We had been hoping that Food for Life would move into 1180 Raymond but we found out that the retail space is almost all leased out now and that there is not anything big enough left for them to go into.

We came home and it was a quiet evening.  Dominica did some studying for her A+ exam that is just a week away.  Less than a week in fact.  I did some light Linux work and some simple FileMaker stuff and then it was off to bed.

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