Saturday, October 9, 2010
Friday, October 8, 2010
Clearly I'm Racist
I know I've already stated that I forgot that Jerome Iginla as actually the first black NHL captain, not Mike Grier. But, lets look at the following pictures and see if we can understand why I might have had this mental lapse:
 |
| Mike Grier |
 |
| Jerome Iginla |
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| Token White Guy (probably famous, but I don't recognize him) |
Life in the Sticks
I read articles of righteous indignation and am rarely surprised. I find myself unsurprised by the professionally-outraged nor by the inevitable and eminently predictable comments such articles spawn.
What makes it all so inevitable and predictable? Ignorance. The professionally-outraged earn their sheckles by being outraged. The commenters are generally people seeking to be outraged so that they can vent their righteous indignation and bile. None are really seeking to think or do anything beyond feeling a knee-jerk emotion. And, invariably, the articles and commentary are based on a very limited view of the outrageous situation.
Life in unencorporated areas carries risks. Heavy on the risks are lack of proximity to EMS. Often times, what EMS there is is either purely voluntary or, as in this case, "subscription" based. Again, that's if there's any EMS to be had, at all. It's been this way since before the founding of the country. What works in cities, suburbs and commuter-communities "in the country" just doesn't work in areas of extremely low population densities. It works even less well as the cost of providing EMS goes ever skyward.
Firetrucks and ambulances typically cost six-figures for used equipment. Training for staffs can only be ammortized over a small groups of citizens. Insurance costs, which our litigious society has made increasingly necessary and ever more costly, have to be born by a much smaller pool of contributors.
And, speaking of the issue of insurance, providing service to people who haven't paid their "subscription" can be grounds for an EMS unit losing their insurance coverage - either by straight-up revocation or because their rates became untenable after doing so. So, yeah, it was "heartless" of those mean firemen to standby and do nothing. However, it would have been even more "heartless" for them to have done something that would have cost their entire services-subscribing community from losing their fire services.
Do I think Glen Beck & Co. are utter douchebags for kicking the Cranicks while they are down? Yup, sure do. Do I think the fire department did wrong? Nope: not under the conditions they have to operate under.
What makes it all so inevitable and predictable? Ignorance. The professionally-outraged earn their sheckles by being outraged. The commenters are generally people seeking to be outraged so that they can vent their righteous indignation and bile. None are really seeking to think or do anything beyond feeling a knee-jerk emotion. And, invariably, the articles and commentary are based on a very limited view of the outrageous situation.
Life in unencorporated areas carries risks. Heavy on the risks are lack of proximity to EMS. Often times, what EMS there is is either purely voluntary or, as in this case, "subscription" based. Again, that's if there's any EMS to be had, at all. It's been this way since before the founding of the country. What works in cities, suburbs and commuter-communities "in the country" just doesn't work in areas of extremely low population densities. It works even less well as the cost of providing EMS goes ever skyward.
Firetrucks and ambulances typically cost six-figures for used equipment. Training for staffs can only be ammortized over a small groups of citizens. Insurance costs, which our litigious society has made increasingly necessary and ever more costly, have to be born by a much smaller pool of contributors.
And, speaking of the issue of insurance, providing service to people who haven't paid their "subscription" can be grounds for an EMS unit losing their insurance coverage - either by straight-up revocation or because their rates became untenable after doing so. So, yeah, it was "heartless" of those mean firemen to standby and do nothing. However, it would have been even more "heartless" for them to have done something that would have cost their entire services-subscribing community from losing their fire services.
Do I think Glen Beck & Co. are utter douchebags for kicking the Cranicks while they are down? Yup, sure do. Do I think the fire department did wrong? Nope: not under the conditions they have to operate under.
Did Not Look Good
I like icehockey. Specifically, I like the Philadelphia Flyers. But, I live in the DC Metro-region, so, Caps are always available to watch on local TV/Cable. The Flyers weren't playing tonight (else, I'd be watching via NHL Center Ice), any way, so, I decided to watch the Caps game.
Less than five minutes into the game, play had to be stopped. The Thrashers' goaltender, Ondrej Pavelec, collapsed away from the play. When they finally got the camera on him, his eyes were closed and he was scary-still. Watching it play out, all I could think was "aneurysm" (or, that it had to have been some kind of neurological or cardio/pulmonary event). None of the things that sprang immediately to mind to explain the bizarre situation were good. That he appeared to not move, not even a twitch, between when he collapsed and they gurneyed him off the ice, only reinforced that. About the only (potentially) good sign was that they'd not given him CPR. So, either he wasn't in that level of distress or he'd died on the ice and was obviously not savable (even then, I think they'd have rendered CPR just to show that "they tried").
Hopefully, he recovers. Hopefully, he's not another Jiri Fisher situation.
Less than five minutes into the game, play had to be stopped. The Thrashers' goaltender, Ondrej Pavelec, collapsed away from the play. When they finally got the camera on him, his eyes were closed and he was scary-still. Watching it play out, all I could think was "aneurysm" (or, that it had to have been some kind of neurological or cardio/pulmonary event). None of the things that sprang immediately to mind to explain the bizarre situation were good. That he appeared to not move, not even a twitch, between when he collapsed and they gurneyed him off the ice, only reinforced that. About the only (potentially) good sign was that they'd not given him CPR. So, either he wasn't in that level of distress or he'd died on the ice and was obviously not savable (even then, I think they'd have rendered CPR just to show that "they tried").
Hopefully, he recovers. Hopefully, he's not another Jiri Fisher situation.
If You're a Defenseman, It Means You Should Play DEFENSE
So, will the Capitals' Mike Green actually know how to play DEFENSE, this year (let alone not be an embarrassment on PK)?
Always Seats Available for an Atlanta Game
Has an Atlanta-based pro sports team ever had a home sellout (with all seats actually full)?
Fickle Stomachs
I love colds: I feel hungry, yet, at the same time, the thought of eating something turns my stomach. Grr...
Apologies...
I post identical content to a number of sites: Blogger/BlogSpot, Tumblr, TypePad, WordPress, Xanga and LiveJournal. I do this by posting through the Posterous meta-poster service. It's not so much that I'm trying to spam the internet with my drivel as much as I'm trying to ensure that if any given service dies, I have "backups".
At any rate, Posterous is a fairly decent service. It allows me to easily accomplish my goal of providing redundancy for my content and it offers me two main avenues for doing so: web-based and email-based submission.
I generally do web-based submission rather than email-based. Both methods have their shortcomings. The web-based submission lacks any kind of "draft" or "preview" functionality. So, once you hit that "post" button, it's sent out to all the sites you've designated for replication. If, after doing so, you notice an error, you have to go track down all the scattered posts and manually correct each.
The email-based submission isn't a much better proposition. Posterous's email-submission engine pretty much sucks ass. It sometimes seems to do really random parsing/formatting of long posts. Worse, just because things look perfect in your mail client doesn't mean they'll look anything like that at the various sites the posts get sent to.
As a "ferinstance", a post I submitted this morning had the entire first three paragraph's worth of text was randomly set to a different color and font. on several sites, it made the text invisible as that randomly-set color was the background color used on the destination-site. Even more fun, when you italicizes some text, it will take what should be a simple i-tagWORDi-tag sequence and converts it to a SPAN sequence. Worse, it will sometime embed a line-break before or after the SPAN sequence (I'd have better represented what I meant, but, BlogSpot's editor is kind of rubbish with forcibly exposing tagging).
Oh well, the price of automated formatting is that it gets botched. Even Google fucks it up, at times.
At any rate, Posterous is a fairly decent service. It allows me to easily accomplish my goal of providing redundancy for my content and it offers me two main avenues for doing so: web-based and email-based submission.
I generally do web-based submission rather than email-based. Both methods have their shortcomings. The web-based submission lacks any kind of "draft" or "preview" functionality. So, once you hit that "post" button, it's sent out to all the sites you've designated for replication. If, after doing so, you notice an error, you have to go track down all the scattered posts and manually correct each.
The email-based submission isn't a much better proposition. Posterous's email-submission engine pretty much sucks ass. It sometimes seems to do really random parsing/formatting of long posts. Worse, just because things look perfect in your mail client doesn't mean they'll look anything like that at the various sites the posts get sent to.
As a "ferinstance", a post I submitted this morning had the entire first three paragraph's worth of text was randomly set to a different color and font. on several sites, it made the text invisible as that randomly-set color was the background color used on the destination-site. Even more fun, when you italicizes some text, it will take what should be a simple i-tagWORDi-tag sequence and converts it to a SPAN sequence. Worse, it will sometime embed a line-break before or after the SPAN sequence (I'd have better represented what I meant, but, BlogSpot's editor is kind of rubbish with forcibly exposing tagging).
Oh well, the price of automated formatting is that it gets botched. Even Google fucks it up, at times.
Poor Word Choice?
The bio for @lisaloeb4real says she "loves food and cats". I'm really hoping she means separately.
Finally Got My FiOS Fixed
Well, it only took three trips for them to do it, but, finally, my FiOS appears to be fully fixed. I just did a test download of RedHat 5.5 DVD ISO and got 2.2 MB/s (not Mb/s) for the entire download. Previously, I'd start at about 1.5MB/s for the first few tens of MB, but then the transfer would slow and slow and slow and finally stall.
Dunno why it took three trips to fix, though. Numerous breakdowns in the customer service process...
When I originally reported problems in late August/early September, it was because I had no connectivity at all (and, trying to use my cell phone's browser to find the FiOS tech support number was a rather painful experience). Internal networking was fine and I still had video service. Unfortunately, the FiOS WiFi router wasn't able to pull an IP from its upstream router at the PoP. Once I finally got a VZ tech on the phone, he had me run through the usual script. Wasn't until he discovered that he couldn't remotely reach my ONT that it became evident they'd need to send someone out to address it. Unfortunately, as part of the troubleshooting, they'd had me fully de-power the ONT since they couldn't remote-reboot it. This action not only hadn't fixed the problem, but resulted in me losing video. The ONT eventually reset itself five hours later, but, as of bedtime, that night, it was still offline. Worse, VZ couldn't get a tech to my house for two days.
Donna was NOT happy at the prospect of no video or internet for two days.
As I noted, previously, it finally (sort of) fixed itself sometime in the five hours between going to bed and getting up for the day. We had TV back and basic internet. So, Donna wasn't quite so freaked about the two days to get someone out to look at it. I was relieved to not have to listen to bitching for two days.
Later that afternoon, VZ called to indicate they had a FiOS tech free that day and would I want him to come out. "Happily," I replied. Dude showed up and looked at things, but didn't have any parts to replace the faulty ONT, but did replace the coax-splitter. He indicated that he'd note the problem in the case and someone would be dispatched the next day with parts.
It was rolling up on 1600, the next day, and no techs had either called or arrived. So, I contacted VZ. Apparently, the ticket had been closed by the prior tech. WTF? I was still experiencing slowdowns on long downloads, so, I asked that they open a new case and send someone out to do the parts replacement work.
As with the first phone call, no techs were going to be available for the next day, so, I'd have to wait another day for a tech to come out. Whatever: video was working and internet was mostly working (I could send/receive email, just not download large files).
The tech came out two days later. I was expecting that he was going to replace the ONT that the first tech was supposed to have replaced. Instead, he noted there were problems on the coax line. So, he replaced the splitter (two in two visits). The connectivity was still weird, even though the line was showing "normal" on his diags. So, he replaced the router. He then rolled out.
At this point, we're two splitters and a router (and two tech-visits) into the fix process. Still, I'm having issues with long transfers and, since Halo: Reach came out, I noticed that I'm also having stability issues with XBox Live. Given that I was trying to make achievements in online multi-play, this kinda sucked.
So, this week, I called to see if, maybe, finally, we could get the ONT replaced as was originally expected with the first visit. As with prior calls, tech-dispatch was gonna take two days. Whatevs. So, I agreed to an appointment for Friday, October 8th, 2010 between 08:00 and 12:00. They indicated the tech would call when he was on his way.
It was rolling past 11:30 and I had yet to hear from the tech. So, I went online, found the FiOS tech support number, navigated the call tree and got in the hold-queue. Ten minutes into this process, I got a call from the tech. He was letting me know he'd be here in 15 minutes. So, I hung up on the lovely FiOS hold-music and waited for the tech to show up.
The tech was prompt. He said he'd be here in 10-15 minutes. He got here in 11 minutes. Given the vagaries of traffic in NoVA, I was just happy to see him within 30.
I described the problem and the ongoing issues with getting the device replaced. He asked to see the unit, so, I took him to the basement. He popped the case and noted, "wow, this is an old one". I was kinda like "*BOGGLE*" as it had just been installed in February or March. But, whatever: not really relevant. He asked if it was ok to pull the unit so he could replace it. I noted that I wasn't immediately using the connection and could get/send email from my phone if it was critical. He popped the unit, took it out to his truck, brought back a replacement and popped it in. He tried to do some remote-office work on his VZ laptop, but, the cellular-wireless card in his laptop wasn't getting good signal in our basement. So, he excused himself to his truck so he could take care of the administrative details to get the unit to come online.
He said it'd be about 10-15 minutes, so, I walked him to the door and sat in front of my blank TV and useless laptop and waited. About 9 minutes later, video signal came back on the TV. I then noticed that my laptop had just noted the arrival of new mail. So, I figured, cool, shit's back online. So, I hit up RHN to establish a test download. 2.2MB/s.
Tech came back in about five minutes later. I let him know that things were looking good. I had video and was running a download that was holding speed and had done so at a higher rate and for a longer time than any recent ones had since prior the ONT replacement. He gave me his contact info and headed off.
So, at this point we look good. Took a while, but, we got there.
The FiOS experience has been interesting. Within the first month, I'd had to replace the HD-DVR set-top box. Then, this whole fiasco with an (apparently old yet newly installed) ONT failing that resulted in the replacement of two co-ax splitters and a WiFi router before finally replacing the faulting ONT. I've had FiOS for a little over half a year. That's a LOT of hardware death. Oh well. We're good, for now.
Dunno why it took three trips to fix, though. Numerous breakdowns in the customer service process...
When I originally reported problems in late August/early September, it was because I had no connectivity at all (and, trying to use my cell phone's browser to find the FiOS tech support number was a rather painful experience). Internal networking was fine and I still had video service. Unfortunately, the FiOS WiFi router wasn't able to pull an IP from its upstream router at the PoP. Once I finally got a VZ tech on the phone, he had me run through the usual script. Wasn't until he discovered that he couldn't remotely reach my ONT that it became evident they'd need to send someone out to address it. Unfortunately, as part of the troubleshooting, they'd had me fully de-power the ONT since they couldn't remote-reboot it. This action not only hadn't fixed the problem, but resulted in me losing video. The ONT eventually reset itself five hours later, but, as of bedtime, that night, it was still offline. Worse, VZ couldn't get a tech to my house for two days.
Donna was NOT happy at the prospect of no video or internet for two days.
As I noted, previously, it finally (sort of) fixed itself sometime in the five hours between going to bed and getting up for the day. We had TV back and basic internet. So, Donna wasn't quite so freaked about the two days to get someone out to look at it. I was relieved to not have to listen to bitching for two days.
Later that afternoon, VZ called to indicate they had a FiOS tech free that day and would I want him to come out. "Happily," I replied. Dude showed up and looked at things, but didn't have any parts to replace the faulty ONT, but did replace the coax-splitter. He indicated that he'd note the problem in the case and someone would be dispatched the next day with parts.
It was rolling up on 1600, the next day, and no techs had either called or arrived. So, I contacted VZ. Apparently, the ticket had been closed by the prior tech. WTF? I was still experiencing slowdowns on long downloads, so, I asked that they open a new case and send someone out to do the parts replacement work.
As with the first phone call, no techs were going to be available for the next day, so, I'd have to wait another day for a tech to come out. Whatever: video was working and internet was mostly working (I could send/receive email, just not download large files).
The tech came out two days later. I was expecting that he was going to replace the ONT that the first tech was supposed to have replaced. Instead, he noted there were problems on the coax line. So, he replaced the splitter (two in two visits). The connectivity was still weird, even though the line was showing "normal" on his diags. So, he replaced the router. He then rolled out.
At this point, we're two splitters and a router (and two tech-visits) into the fix process. Still, I'm having issues with long transfers and, since Halo: Reach came out, I noticed that I'm also having stability issues with XBox Live. Given that I was trying to make achievements in online multi-play, this kinda sucked.
So, this week, I called to see if, maybe, finally, we could get the ONT replaced as was originally expected with the first visit. As with prior calls, tech-dispatch was gonna take two days. Whatevs. So, I agreed to an appointment for Friday, October 8th, 2010 between 08:00 and 12:00. They indicated the tech would call when he was on his way.
It was rolling past 11:30 and I had yet to hear from the tech. So, I went online, found the FiOS tech support number, navigated the call tree and got in the hold-queue. Ten minutes into this process, I got a call from the tech. He was letting me know he'd be here in 15 minutes. So, I hung up on the lovely FiOS hold-music and waited for the tech to show up.
The tech was prompt. He said he'd be here in 10-15 minutes. He got here in 11 minutes. Given the vagaries of traffic in NoVA, I was just happy to see him within 30.
I described the problem and the ongoing issues with getting the device replaced. He asked to see the unit, so, I took him to the basement. He popped the case and noted, "wow, this is an old one". I was kinda like "*BOGGLE*" as it had just been installed in February or March. But, whatever: not really relevant. He asked if it was ok to pull the unit so he could replace it. I noted that I wasn't immediately using the connection and could get/send email from my phone if it was critical. He popped the unit, took it out to his truck, brought back a replacement and popped it in. He tried to do some remote-office work on his VZ laptop, but, the cellular-wireless card in his laptop wasn't getting good signal in our basement. So, he excused himself to his truck so he could take care of the administrative details to get the unit to come online.
He said it'd be about 10-15 minutes, so, I walked him to the door and sat in front of my blank TV and useless laptop and waited. About 9 minutes later, video signal came back on the TV. I then noticed that my laptop had just noted the arrival of new mail. So, I figured, cool, shit's back online. So, I hit up RHN to establish a test download. 2.2MB/s.
Tech came back in about five minutes later. I let him know that things were looking good. I had video and was running a download that was holding speed and had done so at a higher rate and for a longer time than any recent ones had since prior the ONT replacement. He gave me his contact info and headed off.
So, at this point we look good. Took a while, but, we got there.
The FiOS experience has been interesting. Within the first month, I'd had to replace the HD-DVR set-top box. Then, this whole fiasco with an (apparently old yet newly installed) ONT failing that resulted in the replacement of two co-ax splitters and a WiFi router before finally replacing the faulting ONT. I've had FiOS for a little over half a year. That's a LOT of hardware death. Oh well. We're good, for now.
Odd Sounds
So, this year, the NHL's holding a series of preseason and regular season games in Europe. Right now, Versus is showing the Carolina Hurricanes vs. Minnesota Wild game. The Versus commentators are doing their thing in English, but, the arena-announcer is doing his thing in (presumably) Finnish. Any time there's a penalty, goal or other such event of note, it sounds like the Martians have invaded.
Subliminal Message
Ok, so, today on Price is Right (shut up: it's a guilty pleasure and one of the benefits of telecommuting) they were doing "Check Out" as one of the pricing games. One of the products to be priced was "Flipz" chocolate-covered pretzels:
Now, is it just me, or does it look more like their name is "Hipz"? I mean, it seems like it's trying to subliminally say, "ladies, you eat these and they're going straight to your hips."
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| Flipz Chocolate Pretzels |
Quit Yer Bitchin'
So, in recent weeks I've frequently seen the nofoodtaxes.com commercials, and, this morning, a news story came on about how NYC is asking that Food Stamps impose nutritional restrictions on their use.
Now, to start, I am not a fan of the government telling me how I should or am to live my life. So, I can understand people being against nutritional value-based taxation to encourage good eating habits. At the same time, the government of this country has been imposing "sin taxes" on things like alcohol, tobacco and other deleterious items pretty much since the founding of the country (hell, Kentucky bourbon might not have come into existence had it not been for such policies).
I get that people love their sodas, snack cakes, etc. However, much like cigarettes and other industrial consumables, these products have been optimized by their makers to make you crave more of them. So, of course if you eat or drink them you want to be able to continue to eat or drink them. But, whatever. More power to you if you want to eat or drink yourself into the grave.
At the same time, with what NYC is asking, it's not quite the same as seeking to tax bad nutrition out of existence. All it is is saying, "not on my dime". You, as a Food Stamp user are free to buy what you want ...with your own money.
People that have been on WIC have been faced with these restrictions throughout their participation period. It's part and parcel of the program's goals (to promote good nutrition).
People that are receiving Food Stamps are also almost exclusively receiving their medical care through government subsidized/paid medical programs. As such, nutritional choices they make that negatively impact their health directly increases their need for using that assistance. So, by allowing Food Stamps to pay for bad nutrition, tax-payers end up paying twice: first for the foods bought and again for the medical care used to treat food-related health problems (e.g., diabetes). And, if you want to be REALLY honest, tax-payers are getting hit three times when you factor in the farm subsidies allocated to the food industry to produce cheap, calorie-dense things like HFCS. But, I digress...
At any rate, it just "makes sense" to put conditions on "help". If my goals are to help you survive and/or thrive, I'm not going to want my help to be self-sabotaging. I don't want one helpful act I've undertaken to create a requirement for another helpful act. WIC is basically an example of how it can be (philosophically) "done right". Perhaps the Feds should just be consistent and put the same/similar restrictions on Food Stamps that they do on WIC.
Now, to start, I am not a fan of the government telling me how I should or am to live my life. So, I can understand people being against nutritional value-based taxation to encourage good eating habits. At the same time, the government of this country has been imposing "sin taxes" on things like alcohol, tobacco and other deleterious items pretty much since the founding of the country (hell, Kentucky bourbon might not have come into existence had it not been for such policies).
I get that people love their sodas, snack cakes, etc. However, much like cigarettes and other industrial consumables, these products have been optimized by their makers to make you crave more of them. So, of course if you eat or drink them you want to be able to continue to eat or drink them. But, whatever. More power to you if you want to eat or drink yourself into the grave.
At the same time, with what NYC is asking, it's not quite the same as seeking to tax bad nutrition out of existence. All it is is saying, "not on my dime". You, as a Food Stamp user are free to buy what you want ...with your own money.
People that have been on WIC have been faced with these restrictions throughout their participation period. It's part and parcel of the program's goals (to promote good nutrition).
People that are receiving Food Stamps are also almost exclusively receiving their medical care through government subsidized/paid medical programs. As such, nutritional choices they make that negatively impact their health directly increases their need for using that assistance. So, by allowing Food Stamps to pay for bad nutrition, tax-payers end up paying twice: first for the foods bought and again for the medical care used to treat food-related health problems (e.g., diabetes). And, if you want to be REALLY honest, tax-payers are getting hit three times when you factor in the farm subsidies allocated to the food industry to produce cheap, calorie-dense things like HFCS. But, I digress...
At any rate, it just "makes sense" to put conditions on "help". If my goals are to help you survive and/or thrive, I'm not going to want my help to be self-sabotaging. I don't want one helpful act I've undertaken to create a requirement for another helpful act. WIC is basically an example of how it can be (philosophically) "done right". Perhaps the Feds should just be consistent and put the same/similar restrictions on Food Stamps that they do on WIC.
Thursday, October 7, 2010
How to Annoy Me
I write quite a lot of publicly-accessible material. Still... I AM an introvert. People trying to engage me should read this article.
(Yet More) Dead Ringers
I'm pretty sure that the Pittsburgh Penguins' Tyler Kennedy...
...Is the bastard son of Henry Waxman:
So, when he's done with hockey, maybe Tyler can cash-in and become a corrupt politician?
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| Tyler Kennedy |
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| Henry Waxman |
So, when he's done with hockey, maybe Tyler can cash-in and become a corrupt politician?
History Repeating Itself
So, if you're the Penguins, your strategy is to lose your arena-opener to ensure longer-term good fortune?
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