weepy

I just watched Barack Obama's reply to the state of the union (link) and got weepy at the end. A few seconds into the weepies I thought "please don't kill him". And then wept some more.

I wonder. Are things still that fucked-up? Are the forces of right-wing heinousness still as crapularly heinous as they were when JFK, RFK, and MLK were gunned down? (Though I now wonder about the biographies of those who killed R-F, and M-L. ) (I doubly wonder about the identity of whomever shot J-F. Damn sure wasn't Oswald.)

connect the DOOOTS

Greg Palast: "Catch Greg Palast on PBS’ top current affairs program.

WATCH THE REPORT HERE

‘NOW’ furthers the story Palast first busted open for Britain’s BBC Newsnight, the scheme to attack voters of color - the ‘Blue’ ones.

For Bill Moyers’ capable successor, David Brancaccio, Palast lays out the latest evidence never before televised."

the dots:

1. use of choicePoint data to drive the 2000 and 2004 voter purges
   
2. firing of US attorneys for not being with the purge program
   
3. MORE surveillance and data mining you know "for kids" .. I mean, to protect us from the bad people who hate us for our freedom.
   

so on the "who cares about surveillance if you have noting to hide" front, a perfectly cromulent answer is

1. mine the data to find out if you hate america
   
2. mine the data to find out when you're on vacation
   
3. send a registered letter while yr gone
   
4. go to a hand-picked-and installed-under-patriot-act-rules judge and take away yr bleeding-heart commie-scum vote
   

How to install Airport Utility 5

apple guy was over and says "you know... you should update the software on your airport express" .. turns out that apple fucked up and made it so that software update doesn't work .. .unless you have the current version of "Airport Utility" (which replaces "Airport Admin Utility") , but they give no direct download for it.

long story short, here's a link to the remedy:

How to install Airport Utility 5

this is a fucking manta ray

it's fucking giant. and has a very distinctive shape.

for whatever reason
(a) the wife calls skates and regular rays "manta ray"
(b) she gets upset if I say anything about that
(c) when she gets upset she leaves

this upsets me. she has approximately no coping skills. I mean, jesus fuck, what happens if anything genuinely bad is happening and we have to deal with it?

hardware store moment

I'm having a bit of a "hardware store moment" .. I know there's something that I was supposed to look up, but I can't remember what the heck it was.

related: something or other that I was going to write about.

though I could write about household temperatue....

AHA! it was not-just-figuratively a hardware store moment. The item I was supposed to be looking for was a dimmer socket. Now to see if I can find one for a not-outrageous price.

spynocular update

oh, it is nice to have good binoculars. even the jump to the low-end Nikon Action 7x35 was fantastic.

it made me want MORE. so I went to try and trade up to the Nikon Monarch 10x42, but found out that ritzCamera wanted too much money for them. now, recapping, I find out that, yes, that is what they cost.

*sigh*

asshattery confirmed

hartfourd courant has an update on my best-buy asshattery story.

"As a company, everything we do revolves around our customers' needs and desires. It is never our intent to mislead them as their loyalty is incredibly important to us," the statement said.

Then they threw in this interesting line: "Although we have an intra-store web site in place to support store operations (including products and pricing), we are reminding our employees how to access the external BestBuy.com web site to ensure customers are receiving the best possible product price.

their "secret internal website".

dickweeds.

it's time for spynoculars

Binocular Advisor, by Michael and Diane Porter
time for the wifeykins and me to get at least one nonshitty pair of binoculars. 'cause we're gonna go be nerdy and look at birds and whales. Hoot!

items to consider:

• Eagle Optics Triumph 8x25reasonably priced, but not waterproof


• Eagle Optics Ranger SRT 8x42waterproof, pricey


• Celestron Noble 8x32 waterproof, slightly less pricey


• Nikon Monarch Binocular 8x36



• Vortex Spitfire 8.5x32 Binocularwaterproof, reasonably priced



• Audubon Equinox 8x42 Binocularwaterproof, mid-priced


• Audubon Equinox HP 8x42 Binocular(better optics)



le sigh.