Category: Miscellaneous Musings

I got to test-drive my brother and sister-in-law’s new Prius today. (It’s probably more hers than his, since most of his drive time is in a more macho Dodge Cummins 2500). They finally got it a couple of weeks ago after about a 6-month wait. The technology is intriguing. There’s a lot of interesting engineering… Continue reading I may be a technophobe

From Baghdad, Chris Albritton describes the kidnapping and release of his friend, John Martinkus, an Australian reporter. Martinkus was released after persuading his captors that he was not American, a fact which they apparently confirmed by Googling him. (Wasn’t the accent enough, or do Australians and Americans sound alike to Iraqis?) Besides the Google angle,… Continue reading Google Saves a Hostage?

This morning’s tranquillity was disturbed by an unusual amount of aircraft traffic overhead. Wandering outside to check out the source of disturbance, I spotted a squadron of light aircraft flying in formation overhead. After recent reports of Federal stormtroopers shutting down Independent Media websites, I wondered if maybe Ashcroft had escalated the action and was… Continue reading Up Up and Away

MTV’s The Real World (one more “reality” show I’d never heard of) was holding casting calls in Lexington yesterday. Their 18-24 age range naturally attracted college students in sufficient numbers to earn front page coverage in the Kernel, the campus newspaper. The editor’s choice of headline stirred some evil thoughts in the mind of a… Continue reading Taste of the Real World? Starship Fans?

Thanks to an incompetent IBM business partner, I’m in Chicago this week. Actually, some might consider his bumbling a stroke of blind luck. A few weeks ago, I thought I was going to be spending this week on the University of Miami campus. Mid-September on a Florida campus has to be even better than it… Continue reading A Week in the Windy City

It has probably been 10 or 15 years since I’ve been to the WEBN fireworks, one of the most spectacular annual fireworks shows in the country, sponsored by a Cincinnati radio station. So, when a contact in the Kerry campaign offered access to a prime riverfront viewing location, in exchange for a couple of hours… Continue reading Political Fireworks

In case you missed the last brief entry, my father and I are headed to Germany to drink beer and visit my brother Lockhart. It’s about 10 PM Friday at home, and 4 AM in our destination of Frankfurt. The in-flight display shows our location is somewhere over Newfoundland, so I’m guessing it’s probably 11… Continue reading A Week in Deutscheland

A coworker of German extraction tells me that “Ein Bier, bitte” is all I need to know for the next week. My father and I are headed over to the land of serious beer to visit my brother. He’s been living there since December, and has planned an intersting tourist itinerary for us, from a… Continue reading Ein Bier, bitte

My boss frequently passes along valuable advice that he finds. Today, I got email from him that said Beer can be good for you MODERATE consumption of beer helped protect the liver from cirrhosis and other diseases, a Spanish researcher said yesterday. When I followed the enclosed link for more information, it turned out to… Continue reading Beer Good, Condoms Bad

There was some exciting weather in these parts Thursday night. I haven’t really gotten a full picture of what went on, but it included major winds and possible tornadoes that did a lot of damage in some residential areas, mainly in the Northwest part of Fayette County. I’ve seen reports of some houses being total… Continue reading Safe and Sound