Vitamin supplements may increase risk of death!
Link: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/apr/16/medicalresearch
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Saturday, April 12, 2008
Do We Fly or Drive On Our Next Vacation?
So, in the last week or so we've heard:
"American Airlines Cancels More than 300,000 travelers were left stranded by American Airlines in one week..."
"ATA Airlines shut down operations and stranded thousands of travelers..."
When airlines go under, fliers find that they have few protections
And a personal story about a mistake in SouthWest's reservation system leading to a sneaky $66 charge for a flight change by The Strobist
Plus our own luggage being lost by American Airlines 6 months ago and the lack of effort as far as getting our luggage back to us in a timely manner so we could enjoy our vacation.
And the decision is easy -we're taking an extra few days off to drive to Canada this year instead of fly. With the fair increases, it should be no more $ than flying even including the gas, hotels, etc. Besides, this way we don't have to worry about lines, getting stuff packed so we can get through security with our various electronic devices and camera gear. Oh, and we know that the $1k plus that we'll pay for an airline ticket won't be simply lost if we're one of the growing number left stranded at the airport when these airlines go under while their already well-paid executives are reportedly doubling their salary. Ridiculous. We'll drive, thanks.
"American Airlines Cancels More than 300,000 travelers were left stranded by American Airlines in one week..."
"ATA Airlines shut down operations and stranded thousands of travelers..."
When airlines go under, fliers find that they have few protections
And a personal story about a mistake in SouthWest's reservation system leading to a sneaky $66 charge for a flight change by The Strobist
Plus our own luggage being lost by American Airlines 6 months ago and the lack of effort as far as getting our luggage back to us in a timely manner so we could enjoy our vacation.
And the decision is easy -we're taking an extra few days off to drive to Canada this year instead of fly. With the fair increases, it should be no more $ than flying even including the gas, hotels, etc. Besides, this way we don't have to worry about lines, getting stuff packed so we can get through security with our various electronic devices and camera gear. Oh, and we know that the $1k plus that we'll pay for an airline ticket won't be simply lost if we're one of the growing number left stranded at the airport when these airlines go under while their already well-paid executives are reportedly doubling their salary. Ridiculous. We'll drive, thanks.
Thursday, April 03, 2008
Backup Exec 12 - Inability to Overwrite Media
First thing you notice after installing Backup Exec 12 and setting up your first job, is that you can't select anything but "Keep Data Infinitely - Do Not Allow Overwrite". Great :-\
"Help" and Google tells you to manually erase the media, relabel it (which effectively erases it), or move the media to scratch. But if you're looking to continuously overwrite your media, this is a big pain. I think I have it figured out, though:
I went to Tools > Options > Media Management and set the Media overwrite protection level to "None" and no Prompting.
Then I went to "Media" and right-clicked on "Keep Data Infinitely - Do Not Allow Overwrite", went to "Properties" and set the overwrite protection to 3 days.
Neither of the above immediately gave me the ability to choose "Overwrite" on the backup job, but after the job ran for the first time it now gives me the "Overwrite" option. -I guess I'll have to wait and see if it actually works next week. What an odd piece of software...
"Help" and Google tells you to manually erase the media, relabel it (which effectively erases it), or move the media to scratch. But if you're looking to continuously overwrite your media, this is a big pain. I think I have it figured out, though:
I went to Tools > Options > Media Management and set the Media overwrite protection level to "None" and no Prompting.
Then I went to "Media" and right-clicked on "Keep Data Infinitely - Do Not Allow Overwrite", went to "Properties" and set the overwrite protection to 3 days.
Neither of the above immediately gave me the ability to choose "Overwrite" on the backup job, but after the job ran for the first time it now gives me the "Overwrite" option. -I guess I'll have to wait and see if it actually works next week. What an odd piece of software...
Backup Exec 12 install
I've just finished upgrading our backup software from Backup Exec 9 to Backup Exec 12 and I must say that the documentation, for all it's length (over 1600 pages in the pdf!), it wasn't much help. If this gets any google juice, maybe it'll let someone else avoid reading and re-reading the docs over again because Symantec decided to leave out some key information:
1. Grab the CD (or download folder) and run the Browser
2. Run the Environment Check or Start the Install (the install runs the Environment Check, so if you're ready to install, just run the install).
3. Fix any issues the Environment Check finds -mine warned me about using Terminal Services for the install, but I had no issues with it. As long as you are not using a mapped drive you should be good. Also, it'll warn you about Symantec Endpoint Protection & Endpoint Protection Manager -we ignored those as well as we didn't need whatever functionality they provide. YMMV.
4. Enter all your license numbers -all of them. Including any agents you've purchased such as SQL or Exchange.
5. Complete the install. In the process you'll have to decide on an existing or new account for Backup Exec to use that has privileges to all the resources you're planning to backup.
6. If necessary, UNinstall any old Remote Agents on the machines you'll be backing up.
7. Install the Remote Agent on the machines you plan to back up. You can either push it out from within Backup Exec (in the "Tools" menu) or run the install from each server from the CD or download folder by clicking on "Browser", then selecting "Start the Backup Exec Remote Agent Installation".
Now here's the issue I have with the doc's. They don't tell you that there's no separate agent needed for Exchange or SQL. By installing the Remote Agent, you'll have access to all the functionality of the Exchange and SQL agents (and whatever other ones there are) as long as the licenses for them are installed on the backup server.
So, once that generic "Remote Agent" is installed on all the machines you plan to back up, you're pretty much done.
The remote agent install does not require a reboot, but one of my servers prompted for a reboot after UNinstalling the old Backup Exec 9 Remote Agent.
We moved from one backup server to another, so we didn't actually upgrade -it was more like a new install, so I'm not sure if you were to install 12 on the same server as you had previously had 9 on, if you'd still have access to your old jobs, etc.
1. Grab the CD (or download folder) and run the Browser
2. Run the Environment Check or Start the Install (the install runs the Environment Check, so if you're ready to install, just run the install).
3. Fix any issues the Environment Check finds -mine warned me about using Terminal Services for the install, but I had no issues with it. As long as you are not using a mapped drive you should be good. Also, it'll warn you about Symantec Endpoint Protection & Endpoint Protection Manager -we ignored those as well as we didn't need whatever functionality they provide. YMMV.
4. Enter all your license numbers -all of them. Including any agents you've purchased such as SQL or Exchange.
5. Complete the install. In the process you'll have to decide on an existing or new account for Backup Exec to use that has privileges to all the resources you're planning to backup.
6. If necessary, UNinstall any old Remote Agents on the machines you'll be backing up.
7. Install the Remote Agent on the machines you plan to back up. You can either push it out from within Backup Exec (in the "Tools" menu) or run the install from each server from the CD or download folder by clicking on "Browser", then selecting "Start the Backup Exec Remote Agent Installation".
Now here's the issue I have with the doc's. They don't tell you that there's no separate agent needed for Exchange or SQL. By installing the Remote Agent, you'll have access to all the functionality of the Exchange and SQL agents (and whatever other ones there are) as long as the licenses for them are installed on the backup server.
So, once that generic "Remote Agent" is installed on all the machines you plan to back up, you're pretty much done.
The remote agent install does not require a reboot, but one of my servers prompted for a reboot after UNinstalling the old Backup Exec 9 Remote Agent.
We moved from one backup server to another, so we didn't actually upgrade -it was more like a new install, so I'm not sure if you were to install 12 on the same server as you had previously had 9 on, if you'd still have access to your old jobs, etc.
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Things That Will Kill You: Tap Water
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/P/PHARMAWATER_I?SITE=PASCR&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
Monday, March 10, 2008
Cloudy fish tank / how I killed my fish
Right after I got rid of the ick, just a day or so after reducing the copper medication, salt, and beginning to reduce the temperature back down to normal, my fish tank's water began to get cloudy. After 24 hours it was bad. After 48 you could barely see the back of the tank. For the next 3 weeks I did water changes every other day trying to get rid of whatever was in it.
According to the searches I did, I first needed to decide if it was white or green. Well, it looked white from the front, but greenish from the side. So, I decided to try one of those medications that make the particles in the water stick together so that they can be filtered out easier. At the same time I turned 1/2 of my lights off in case it was algae. It didn't work.
I posted to a couple of forums for some help and ended up getting useless responses like "it must be a fungus from your driftwood" -mmm no. The driftwood's been in there for over a year. "Then it must be because you have too much gravel" or one of many other excuses, no real help.
So, I was left to sort it out for myself. Although it started right after the medication was stopped, I was pretty sure the biological filter was okay because the ammonia, nitrate, and nitrite tests were fine, so it wasn't cycling. I've also been very careful about not overfeeding, so an algae or bacterial bloom didn't seem right either. I decided to clean out my filter instead. I found an improperly installed foam pad, and hoped that would fix it. It did not.
Again, I posted for help (on a different forum), but again I only got answers from people who didn't even read the post -they blamed how long I left my lights on in my tank (12 hours) even though they've been on like that since December without any issues, so again I dismissed the advice.
I had one last idea -I pulled all of my plants out of the tank thinking that the dead leaves may have been feeding a bacteria bloom. I put the plants in a bucket and waited. I thought it had improved a bit, but I was still having to do water changes every 3 days.
Then last week on Wednesday I started another "every other day" water change by draining 75% of the water out of the tank. The cichlids were all at the bottom kindof stressing out as they had been doing while I was doing such big changes -but they had to be done or I couldn't see anything at all in the tank! So, I started refilling the tank and then I noticed that I was out of water conditioner. I had a choice to make -leave the fish stressed out in a tiny bit of water while I ran out for more or just go without it. I figured all it did was get the chlorine out, so I kept filling, but made sure the water was really splashing upon entry to try to aerate it more so the chlorine would diffuse out faster on its own. Then Ed came home and we went out to eat. When we came back all but one fish was dead, and the remaining fish was on the bottom breathing hard.
I removed the fish and put him in a quarantine tank that I was readying for some new cichlids, but it was too late -he died soon after. So, I killed all my cichlids in about an hour by not using water conditioner. The plecos were okay, we ran out and got water conditioner and added it to the water right away.
A water test from before adding the conditioner revealed 2ppm of ammonia! The water conditioner cut that down to zero. I tested the tap water straight and it was 4ppm! I don't know if this is temporary or if it's always been like this, but I'll definitely keep an eye on it from now on and I won't ever do a water change without water conditioner again!
Oh, and on Saturday I got 12 new cichlids. And on Sunday I picked up some Algaefix to give that a try to remedy the cloudy water and as of Monday night the tank is clear again! -I'll have to see if it comes back. If it does I'll have to cut the lighting back to see if that helps. I definitely don't want to continue the algaefix forever -my pleco's would starve!
According to the searches I did, I first needed to decide if it was white or green. Well, it looked white from the front, but greenish from the side. So, I decided to try one of those medications that make the particles in the water stick together so that they can be filtered out easier. At the same time I turned 1/2 of my lights off in case it was algae. It didn't work.
I posted to a couple of forums for some help and ended up getting useless responses like "it must be a fungus from your driftwood" -mmm no. The driftwood's been in there for over a year. "Then it must be because you have too much gravel" or one of many other excuses, no real help.
So, I was left to sort it out for myself. Although it started right after the medication was stopped, I was pretty sure the biological filter was okay because the ammonia, nitrate, and nitrite tests were fine, so it wasn't cycling. I've also been very careful about not overfeeding, so an algae or bacterial bloom didn't seem right either. I decided to clean out my filter instead. I found an improperly installed foam pad, and hoped that would fix it. It did not.
Again, I posted for help (on a different forum), but again I only got answers from people who didn't even read the post -they blamed how long I left my lights on in my tank (12 hours) even though they've been on like that since December without any issues, so again I dismissed the advice.
I had one last idea -I pulled all of my plants out of the tank thinking that the dead leaves may have been feeding a bacteria bloom. I put the plants in a bucket and waited. I thought it had improved a bit, but I was still having to do water changes every 3 days.
Then last week on Wednesday I started another "every other day" water change by draining 75% of the water out of the tank. The cichlids were all at the bottom kindof stressing out as they had been doing while I was doing such big changes -but they had to be done or I couldn't see anything at all in the tank! So, I started refilling the tank and then I noticed that I was out of water conditioner. I had a choice to make -leave the fish stressed out in a tiny bit of water while I ran out for more or just go without it. I figured all it did was get the chlorine out, so I kept filling, but made sure the water was really splashing upon entry to try to aerate it more so the chlorine would diffuse out faster on its own. Then Ed came home and we went out to eat. When we came back all but one fish was dead, and the remaining fish was on the bottom breathing hard.
I removed the fish and put him in a quarantine tank that I was readying for some new cichlids, but it was too late -he died soon after. So, I killed all my cichlids in about an hour by not using water conditioner. The plecos were okay, we ran out and got water conditioner and added it to the water right away.
A water test from before adding the conditioner revealed 2ppm of ammonia! The water conditioner cut that down to zero. I tested the tap water straight and it was 4ppm! I don't know if this is temporary or if it's always been like this, but I'll definitely keep an eye on it from now on and I won't ever do a water change without water conditioner again!
Oh, and on Saturday I got 12 new cichlids. And on Sunday I picked up some Algaefix to give that a try to remedy the cloudy water and as of Monday night the tank is clear again! -I'll have to see if it comes back. If it does I'll have to cut the lighting back to see if that helps. I definitely don't want to continue the algaefix forever -my pleco's would starve!
Monday, February 25, 2008
Shopping: LTO Tape Drive
Our LTO tape library took a dump a couple weeks ago, so I need to find a replacement. These are my notes while I look into the drives available to see what I'll recommend:
First, I started with a search for all LTO tape libraries sorted by lowest price first on CDW.com.
My requirements (in no particular order):
First, I started with a search for all LTO tape libraries sorted by lowest price first on CDW.com.
My requirements (in no particular order):
- At least 100GB/200GB capacity
- Backward compatible with our Ultrium 1 100GB/200GB tapes (in case we need to restore data from them)
- We have about 12 hours to back up about 250GB of data, so we need a minimum of 6MB/sec but we'll double that to make room for expansion, so 12MB/sec. -Shouldn't be hard.
- It's a small company, so price is a factor.
- Our old library had a Ultra 160 connection, so that'd be the easiest to go with this time around although it (does/does not) have room for a (what kind?) card if we want to go with something better/faster.
- Holds at least 7 or 8 tapes at a time.
- HP StorageWorks 1/8 G2 Tape Autoloader Ultrium 232:
- Ultra320 SCSI
- 100GB/200GB Ultrium 1 tapes
- web interface to manage the drive remotely
- 16/32 MBps
- $2,895.99, or $3,099.00 -for the bundle which includes the rack mount kit, 8 tapes, and a jumpered power cord.
- HP StorageWorks 1/8 G2 Tape Autoloader Ultrium 448:
- Ultra320 SCSI
- 200GB/400GB LTO Ultrium 2 tapes
- backward compatible with Ultrium 1 tapes
- web interface for management
- 24/48 MBps
- $3,049.00, or $3,049.00 -for the bundle which includes the rack mount kit, 8 tapes, and a jumpered power cord.
- The rest of the models aren't backward compatible with our Ultrium 1 tapes, so I guess our decision will be between these two.
Thursday, February 14, 2008
Debt
Watching it doesn't work. Worrying about it doesn't work. Only paying it off without adding to it works. So, starting a couple days ago I've cut my ties with my credit cards!
It's just too hard to tell that you're debt is growing when you see yourself plunking down $1500 a month towards it -I figured I must be making progress. But since I used it every day to pay for meals out, groceries, gas, etc and after a few trips and big purchases as well, it's really not all that surprising to hear I was in a loosing battle -I should have known better. I blame denial -I don't think I really wanted to know. I worried about it enough as it was.
So, I'm on a fairly easy debt-diet. No more credit cards. Everything will be paid for in cash or with my debit card. I'm now on an allowance. When I run out of money, I get to wait until I get paid again. Remember that from college -yeah, I survived it then and surely I can do it again. I should be paid off in about 11 months without doing anything else, but I'm looking for good balance transfer incentives to use with my one $0-balance credit card to see if I can save a bit of money on interest and maybe even get it paid off a bit sooner.
Details on how I figured out what to do:
I took my monthly salary and subtracted the total amount of my bills per month. This tells me how much I really have to spend each month.
Then I took my last year's worth of credit card statements (from Discover's website since I've used that one card to pay for almost everything I've bought in the last year) and I added up the "New Purchases" total from each and divided by 12 to get my average monthly expenses for food, entertainment, gifts -basically everything I buy.
I subtracted my average monthly purchases from the amount of money I have after bills each month and found out that I have a surplus of only $483.42 a month. So, without changing my spending habits at all, I'm still ahead of the game. But...
I then used an online credit card calculator (Google "credit card calculator" -without the quotes) to figure out that at my current interest rates it'd take about 2 years to pay my bills off at that rate and I'd spend about $1772 in interest in the process. Not good.
So, I went back to those credit card statements and took out the "big months" -turns out that most months I got away with spending about half of what my average ended up being. I used that number instead (which should be completely doable) and found that if I curb the big purchases and trips I could have more like $983.42 in surplus, which means I could be paid off in 11 months instead. Much better!
So, that's the goal. We'll see how I do. I've set up an automatic payment to both cards for just after the first of the month since I don't have any bills in that half of the month. This way, my payments are just like another set bill and happen by default. Less effort = less chance of me fudging the numbers to get a new turbo or something. In other words, this makes it harder to cheat than to keep going with my new plan. ;-)
It's just too hard to tell that you're debt is growing when you see yourself plunking down $1500 a month towards it -I figured I must be making progress. But since I used it every day to pay for meals out, groceries, gas, etc and after a few trips and big purchases as well, it's really not all that surprising to hear I was in a loosing battle -I should have known better. I blame denial -I don't think I really wanted to know. I worried about it enough as it was.
So, I'm on a fairly easy debt-diet. No more credit cards. Everything will be paid for in cash or with my debit card. I'm now on an allowance. When I run out of money, I get to wait until I get paid again. Remember that from college -yeah, I survived it then and surely I can do it again. I should be paid off in about 11 months without doing anything else, but I'm looking for good balance transfer incentives to use with my one $0-balance credit card to see if I can save a bit of money on interest and maybe even get it paid off a bit sooner.
Details on how I figured out what to do:
I took my monthly salary and subtracted the total amount of my bills per month. This tells me how much I really have to spend each month.
Then I took my last year's worth of credit card statements (from Discover's website since I've used that one card to pay for almost everything I've bought in the last year) and I added up the "New Purchases" total from each and divided by 12 to get my average monthly expenses for food, entertainment, gifts -basically everything I buy.
I subtracted my average monthly purchases from the amount of money I have after bills each month and found out that I have a surplus of only $483.42 a month. So, without changing my spending habits at all, I'm still ahead of the game. But...
I then used an online credit card calculator (Google "credit card calculator" -without the quotes) to figure out that at my current interest rates it'd take about 2 years to pay my bills off at that rate and I'd spend about $1772 in interest in the process. Not good.
So, I went back to those credit card statements and took out the "big months" -turns out that most months I got away with spending about half of what my average ended up being. I used that number instead (which should be completely doable) and found that if I curb the big purchases and trips I could have more like $983.42 in surplus, which means I could be paid off in 11 months instead. Much better!
So, that's the goal. We'll see how I do. I've set up an automatic payment to both cards for just after the first of the month since I don't have any bills in that half of the month. This way, my payments are just like another set bill and happen by default. Less effort = less chance of me fudging the numbers to get a new turbo or something. In other words, this makes it harder to cheat than to keep going with my new plan. ;-)
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Making sure the ich is gone.
As of last night I couldn't stand how dirty the tank was any more. I did a 50% water change (I figured while I was at it I'd get rid of as many ich organisms as I could). After filling the tank back up I added a 1/2 dose of CopperSafe and 1/2 of my salt back in to replace what was taken out with the water. One hour later I tested both the copper levels and the salinity and found I needed a tad more salt, but the copper level looked good.
Still no signs of ich. My plans are to continue to treat with a full dose salt and copper as well as a temperature of 85*F for at least another week. After that I may begin lowering the temperature and decreasing the copper and salt via water changes (ie: change 25% of the water and not add back the salt and copper afterwards).
For some background: I got the ich originally from PetSmart with a batch of pictus catfish and rubbernose plecos. None of the fish survived it because I caught it way too late. I treated the tank with Aquari-Sol for 2 weeks after the last fish died, then added the cichlids and the large bristlenose pleco, which started showing signs of ich after about a week.
At the time of adding the cichlids I chose not to quarantine them because I had only one seemingly ich-resistant bushynose pleco in the tank at the time. But, even with having had the ich from PetSmart, I was fairly sure I wouldn't quarantine in the future either. The reason was that it is just so hard to set up a tank (including cycling) to run for 2-3 weeks, then have to break down and store it...
But after this round I'm done. All of the fish I purchase from now on will be quarantined!
Speaking of which, I may go get the other half of my planned cichlid purchase this weekend. That way, by the time I'm sure the tank will be completely cured of ich, the new cichlids will be done with their quarantine period, and then I'll be done for awhile! :-)
Still no signs of ich. My plans are to continue to treat with a full dose salt and copper as well as a temperature of 85*F for at least another week. After that I may begin lowering the temperature and decreasing the copper and salt via water changes (ie: change 25% of the water and not add back the salt and copper afterwards).
For some background: I got the ich originally from PetSmart with a batch of pictus catfish and rubbernose plecos. None of the fish survived it because I caught it way too late. I treated the tank with Aquari-Sol for 2 weeks after the last fish died, then added the cichlids and the large bristlenose pleco, which started showing signs of ich after about a week.
At the time of adding the cichlids I chose not to quarantine them because I had only one seemingly ich-resistant bushynose pleco in the tank at the time. But, even with having had the ich from PetSmart, I was fairly sure I wouldn't quarantine in the future either. The reason was that it is just so hard to set up a tank (including cycling) to run for 2-3 weeks, then have to break down and store it...
But after this round I'm done. All of the fish I purchase from now on will be quarantined!
Speaking of which, I may go get the other half of my planned cichlid purchase this weekend. That way, by the time I'm sure the tank will be completely cured of ich, the new cichlids will be done with their quarantine period, and then I'll be done for awhile! :-)
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Family
I can't describe what it's like being a member of a family who stops talking to each other at the drop of a hat, but I can describe the events surrounding it to some degree.
Some background first: My Aunt and my Grandma had a very close relationship throughout my childhood. I believe they went to church together every Sunday, then spent the rest of the day together as well. But...
About 20 years ago a decision was made. My Aunt's house was said to be too small to hold the entire family for Xmas. So, Xmas was moved to the clubhouse at my Grandma's condo instead. From that year on my immediate family also stopped visiting my Aunt, Uncle, and Cousin.
10 years ago or so the first steps were made to re-establish communication with them. The step was small, awkward, and behind my Grandma's back. From that point on written communication continued in a polite way, but in-person visits did not.
Skip ahead to my Grandma's 90th birthday party. I wasn't told that my Aunt was going to be there. But, as I stood talking to a group of people, I saw her face outside the window. I couldn't believe it. My chin hit the floor. What was she doing here? Was the feud over? ...When they entered my Aunt said "Erica?" and I said "Yes" and went over and hugged her. My Uncle and Cousin looked elsewhere around the room obviously not looking to be next in the hug line... Then my Aunt asked where my Grandma was, I pointed her out, and that was it. For the rest of the evening we didn't talk. I felt like I was the one that angered them and caused the feud...
What kind of family cuts ties for 20 years? And what kind of family has such a cold reaction after not seeing each other for so long?
The end of the ich?
As of Sunday Ed and I noticed that the big pleco who I doubted would survive this round with ich was pretty much free of the ich dots. The water chemistry looked good (about 10ppm of NitrAte, no ammonia, no NitrIte), so I skipped my Saturday water change since the levels of copper and salt seem to be right-on for getting rid of the ich.
...but as of yesterday the tank was disgusting. I really, really want to do a vacuum in there. I think I'm going to do it tonight...
In a week or so I'll consider the ich gone and I'll stop adding copper and salt when I do a water change, and I'll start lowering the temp back down to 80*F.
Now I just have to watch out for fungus and bacterial infections since the fish will be healing from the ich now... I hope I'm out of the woods with this, though...
...but as of yesterday the tank was disgusting. I really, really want to do a vacuum in there. I think I'm going to do it tonight...
In a week or so I'll consider the ich gone and I'll stop adding copper and salt when I do a water change, and I'll start lowering the temp back down to 80*F.
Now I just have to watch out for fungus and bacterial infections since the fish will be healing from the ich now... I hope I'm out of the woods with this, though...
Friday, February 08, 2008
Ich continued...
So, I still have ich in my tank. The new pleco's been getting worse and worse in fact today I noticed that his eyes are now cloudy and the right one looks like it's peeling -ew!
The cichlids are still active. The acei may have fewer spots on them, but all-in-all they are looking fairly good. The original pleco, for the past couple days, has looked like it's been breathing fast. I'm a bit concerned (paranoid?) about that because everything I'm doing to combat the ich is reducing the oxygen levels in the tank as well, so hopefully I don't kill them with the treatment...
But Wednesday I ran out of Aquari-Sol after adding a 1/2 dose in the morning, so after work I went to pick up another bottle and some salt to add as well. Unfortunately, they didn't have Aquari-Sol... So, I spent about 20min looking at all my different options. It seems Machalite Green is the medication of choice, but I'm pretty sure I've used that before and it turned all my decorations green. It wasn't a big deal back then, but now I have a big, expensive piece of WHITE limestone holey rock in my tank that's too heavy to take out and I'd really rather not have it turn green... So, I was left with copper-based meds (similar to Aquari-Sol) or Formalin (formaldehyde). I decided to stick with copper meds and ended up choosing Mardel CopperSafe based on dosage since I have a large tank and the Aquari-Sol's dosing of 12 drops per gallon meant I had to count out 12 x 72 drops a day >:-P.
I didn't notice until I got home that the instructions on the CopperSafe say 1tsp for every 4 gallons treats a tank for a month. Call me skeptical, but... a month!?! That actually creates a problem for me -when I do a water change, how do I know how much to add back in? ...So, tonight I went back to the store and bought an Instant Ocean copper test kit and I also got their hydrometer as well to test the salt level. The copper tested out at about 0.20 and the salinity came out to be about 5 or a specific gravity of 1.002. So now I know.
I'll do a water change this weekend with a good gravel vac. Last weekend I did an over 50% water change, I'll probably do the same again this weekend. Other options are dips (I'd rather not) or maybe setting up my 10gal as a quarantine tank for at least the big guy and treating it bare-bottomed with the stainy green stuff to see if I can get rid of it before he dies (or kill him in the process, which almost seems merciful at this point).
All I know is that instead of my tank being relaxing, fun, or pretty to look at, I can't even look at it anymore. I go out of my way to capture spiders in the house and take them outside instead of killing them and here I am causing pain and suffering to these fish with my ineptitude. And to make matters worse the information online is contradictory and generally unhelpful. ...blah.
The cichlids are still active. The acei may have fewer spots on them, but all-in-all they are looking fairly good. The original pleco, for the past couple days, has looked like it's been breathing fast. I'm a bit concerned (paranoid?) about that because everything I'm doing to combat the ich is reducing the oxygen levels in the tank as well, so hopefully I don't kill them with the treatment...
But Wednesday I ran out of Aquari-Sol after adding a 1/2 dose in the morning, so after work I went to pick up another bottle and some salt to add as well. Unfortunately, they didn't have Aquari-Sol... So, I spent about 20min looking at all my different options. It seems Machalite Green is the medication of choice, but I'm pretty sure I've used that before and it turned all my decorations green. It wasn't a big deal back then, but now I have a big, expensive piece of WHITE limestone holey rock in my tank that's too heavy to take out and I'd really rather not have it turn green... So, I was left with copper-based meds (similar to Aquari-Sol) or Formalin (formaldehyde). I decided to stick with copper meds and ended up choosing Mardel CopperSafe based on dosage since I have a large tank and the Aquari-Sol's dosing of 12 drops per gallon meant I had to count out 12 x 72 drops a day >:-P.
I didn't notice until I got home that the instructions on the CopperSafe say 1tsp for every 4 gallons treats a tank for a month. Call me skeptical, but... a month!?! That actually creates a problem for me -when I do a water change, how do I know how much to add back in? ...So, tonight I went back to the store and bought an Instant Ocean copper test kit and I also got their hydrometer as well to test the salt level. The copper tested out at about 0.20 and the salinity came out to be about 5 or a specific gravity of 1.002. So now I know.
I'll do a water change this weekend with a good gravel vac. Last weekend I did an over 50% water change, I'll probably do the same again this weekend. Other options are dips (I'd rather not) or maybe setting up my 10gal as a quarantine tank for at least the big guy and treating it bare-bottomed with the stainy green stuff to see if I can get rid of it before he dies (or kill him in the process, which almost seems merciful at this point).
All I know is that instead of my tank being relaxing, fun, or pretty to look at, I can't even look at it anymore. I go out of my way to capture spiders in the house and take them outside instead of killing them and here I am causing pain and suffering to these fish with my ineptitude. And to make matters worse the information online is contradictory and generally unhelpful. ...blah.
Tuesday, February 05, 2008
Election Day!
**UPDATE:**
For the November 2008 election I've gone back to documenting candidates on my other site here:
http://ericasworld.logic.net/politics
I've been so busy following the Presidential Primary that I lost track of time and failed to research what other offices are being voted on! So, here's my notes on who's running where I'm at and whatever I find about the candidates until I figure out who I'm voting for:
FYI: Blue is the candidates who are only on the Democratic ballot. Red is the candidates who are only on the Republican ballot. Purple are the candidates who are on both ballots.
Presidential Primary:
...I think we'll skip this one. If you don't know by now, you probably shouldn't vote.
Senator:
1. Shall DuPage County be authorized to impose a public safety tax at the rate of $0.0025 upon all persons engaged in the business of selling tangible personal property at retail in the county on gross receipts from the sales made in the course of their business?
2. Shall the Fox Valley Park District in Kane, DuPage, Kendall and Will Counties, Illinois, acquire and protect land for nature areas, open space and for park and recreation purposes, including along the Fox River; improve and develop trails and fishing access; improve and renovate neighborhood and community parks and playgrounds, sports fields and facilities, and Blackberry Farm; and issue its bonds in an amount not to exceed $44,850,000 for the purpose of paying the costs thereof?
For the November 2008 election I've gone back to documenting candidates on my other site here:
http://ericasworld.logic.net/politics
I've been so busy following the Presidential Primary that I lost track of time and failed to research what other offices are being voted on! So, here's my notes on who's running where I'm at and whatever I find about the candidates until I figure out who I'm voting for:
FYI: Blue is the candidates who are only on the Democratic ballot. Red is the candidates who are only on the Republican ballot. Purple are the candidates who are on both ballots.
Presidential Primary:
...I think we'll skip this one. If you don't know by now, you probably shouldn't vote.
Senator:
- Dick Durbin -Official Site, On the issues,
- Steve Sauerberg -Official Site
- Andy Martin -Official Site?
- Mike Psak -Official Site
- Scott Harper -Official Site
- Judy Biggert -Official Site, On The Issues, GovTrack,
- Sean O'Kane -Official Site, VoteSmart, (Supported by the Christian Coalition)
- There are the same number of delegates running to vote for each candidates as the number you are supposed to pick and since I don't know or care about the delegates, personally, I'm moving on...
- Linda Holmes -Official Site, CBS voter guide, Vote Smart,
- Terri Ann Wintermute -Official Site,
- Dennis Grosskopf
- Tom Cross -Campaign Site, Illinois Issues, Vote Smart,
- Chris Kachiroubas
- Bob Grogan
- Pete Siekmann
- Fred Bucholz
- Joe Birkett
- Joseph MArtin "Joe" Wozniak -Daily Herald (profile), Daily Herald (budget question)
- Gerald A. "Gerry" Cassioppi -Daily Herald (profile), Daily Herald (budget question)
- James D. Healy -Daily Herald (profile), Daily Herald (budget question)
- Carl Schultz
- Rick Stock -Official Site, Daily Herald (Profile)
- Blanche Hill Fawell -Official Site, Daily Herald (Profile)
- Dorothy French -Official Site, Daily Herald (Profile)
- John J. Kinsella -Daily Herald (Profile)
- John W. Demling -Daily Herald (Profile)
- No Candidates!?!
1. Shall DuPage County be authorized to impose a public safety tax at the rate of $0.0025 upon all persons engaged in the business of selling tangible personal property at retail in the county on gross receipts from the sales made in the course of their business?
- Yes
- No: Beacon Article
2. Shall the Fox Valley Park District in Kane, DuPage, Kendall and Will Counties, Illinois, acquire and protect land for nature areas, open space and for park and recreation purposes, including along the Fox River; improve and develop trails and fishing access; improve and renovate neighborhood and community parks and playgrounds, sports fields and facilities, and Blackberry Farm; and issue its bonds in an amount not to exceed $44,850,000 for the purpose of paying the costs thereof?
- Yes
- No
Sunday, February 03, 2008
Ich! (or "Ick")
I keep recording my fish stuff in various notebooks, then I loose them or they get wet and it's no longer usable or congruent. So, why not record it here on the blog that changes week-to-week. Will I forget and go back to my notebook tomorrow? Who knows, but for now I'll pretend like this will be permanent...
So, after Xmas I lost my fantail goldfish and was left with 2 goldfish and a pleco in a 72 gallon tank. It seemed like a waste, so I got some pictus catfish and a couple more plecos to try to battle the algae problem that's developed since I got a stronger light system (for my real plants). A couple days later my goldfish started getting really listless and the one who's had fin rot for quie some time was doing really poorly, so I moved the goldfish back into their original 20 gallon tank and started treating them with Maracyn II and then Jungle All-In-One. They started getting better, but the new catfish and plecos started dropping one-by-one. I didn't figure out why until late (they had ich), so my treatment (Aquari-Sol) was late and I lost every one of them. I then had only the one original pleco in a 72 gallon tank.
I continued treating for ich since I knew the parasites were still in there. I treated for 1 week solid, then a half ("maintenance") dose for another week. At the same time I researched cichlids and decided to get some once the tank was clear. After 2 weeks, I figured I'd be good, so I picked up a 4-inch bushynose pleco and 6 cichlids -all juveniles: 2 yellow labs, 2 acei, and 2 Pundamilia nyererei. For a week they were fine, but starting yesterday I'd see them brushing up against the rocks to scratch an itch and I also started seeing the tell-tale little white dots on them (it looks like salt).
So today I did a water change, increased the temperature from 27.2*C to 29.4*C (by 1 degree an hour), and started the Aquari-Sol treatment as well. The new pleco is the worst off as far as I can tell -he's got dots everywhere (but they are spaced out) and he's been leaping to the surface and getting air (although they say plecos do that, he had't been before). Not sure if that's an ich thing or because of the temperature increase, but so far it's only been increased 1 degree C, so...? Other fish have only a few dots that I can see, but like I said, they've been scratching, so they are definitely infested. I really hope I'm treating early enough this time! :-(
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
Genesis, Chapter 1
Watching atheist videos on YouTube leads you to believe that the bible is a horrendous book that defends all kinds of immoral acts. The reaction videos made by christians explain away each accusation by saying it was taken out of context. So, I decided to find out for myself. I bought my very own bible and began reading it recently.
First, on the subject of buying a bible. Which one of the 3,395 versions does a person pick up? This reminds me of a quote from a book my Dad and I really loved while I was growing up called "Touch The Earth". The quote:
So, after some research and reading reviews, I picked up The King James Study Bible: King James Version (KJV), hardcover by Thomas Nelson Inc ISBN-13: 9780785211631. (CHECK.)
Wow. What a mistake!
This version of the bible has about two-thirds more footnotes than actual bible content, and that wouldn't be a bad thing if it wasn't so heavy-handed and overt in trying to hammer home the points in the bible that contradict (and therefore prove wrong) the theory of evolution. Yep, much of the "help" they give you is not about trying to sort out translation issues and context of the age when the book was written, but is instead helping you translate it in a way that makes their case against science. This is turning me off of this book and translation really fast. What translations did they stretch and/or massage (doctor) in the actual text to make their case? I don't trust it.
So, now what? Well, it's not as convenient as having it in paper, but there is biblegateway.com -I think I'm going to start reading it there instead. The upside to reading it this way is that I can look at several different translations side-by-side to help me decide what was meant by a certain part of the text. The downside is the loss of the footnotes that did point out important translational nuances, the context in relation to the time it was written, etc. But I guess I have the rest of the internet for that.
Which brings me to the point of this post. Genesis 1. I already don't quite know what to make of this first story. Apparently god made a dome over the earth with water (on the earth) below it and above it (???). Not to mention the fact a number of lesser scientific issues that the chapter contains: the moon being a "light", there being days and nights before the sun was created, the sun and stars being affixed to the "dome in the sky". Although, writing this, I suppose it could be suggested that the universe and everything we can see beyond it could still be inside the big dome in the sky... But, I've heard that coming up in future stories is the fact that it rains when god opens up the windows of that dome, which wouldn't really work if the dome was so far away... but that's for a future time when I actually read that part I guess.
Anyway, the way I see it, if it's literal it makes no sense given our scientific knowledge of the day, and taken as a parable, well I don't see the point. So, I decided to rely on Google for more info. I chose "genesis 1" as my search terms soas not to inject bias into the search. Results 1-5 were just online versions of the bible.
Result 6 was: http://www.christiananswers.net/bible/gen1.html Which contained the bible text along with the question "Does God expect us to read Genesis 1-11 as a record of authentic historical fact, or is this simply a collection of parable-like stories?" in the margin. The answer in one word is yes, it's meant to be taken literally.
The 7th result was: http://www.asa3.org/ASA/topics/Bible-Science/6-02Watts.html which dives deeply into the text and how exactly it's reasoned out, but comes to the conclusion that no, the text is not meant to be taken literally and that the purpose of this chapter was just to say that the earth was "fine-tuned with human existence in view" (quote from link above).
The 8th result: http://www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v19/i1/days.asp attempts to answer whether the days described were 24hour days or if they may have been longer. The answer, defended by the Hebrew word chosen for "day" among other contextual clues is that the earth was in fact created in six 24-hour days.
The 9th result is the skeptic's bible, which is hilarious, but not really helpful or authoritative in trying to interpret the story.
And the 10th result was just another site with the text of the bible. So, as it sits now we have no idea if this story is to be taken literally or figuratively, but I'm moving on anyway. Maybe this story will become clearer later on?
First, on the subject of buying a bible. Which one of the 3,395 versions does a person pick up? This reminds me of a quote from a book my Dad and I really loved while I was growing up called "Touch The Earth". The quote:
"Brother, you say there is but one way to worship and serve the Great Spirit. If there is but one religion, why do you white people differ so much about it? Why not all agreed, as you can all read the Book?" (Red Jacket)
So, after some research and reading reviews, I picked up The King James Study Bible: King James Version (KJV), hardcover by Thomas Nelson Inc ISBN-13: 9780785211631. (CHECK.) Wow. What a mistake!
This version of the bible has about two-thirds more footnotes than actual bible content, and that wouldn't be a bad thing if it wasn't so heavy-handed and overt in trying to hammer home the points in the bible that contradict (and therefore prove wrong) the theory of evolution. Yep, much of the "help" they give you is not about trying to sort out translation issues and context of the age when the book was written, but is instead helping you translate it in a way that makes their case against science. This is turning me off of this book and translation really fast. What translations did they stretch and/or massage (doctor) in the actual text to make their case? I don't trust it.
So, now what? Well, it's not as convenient as having it in paper, but there is biblegateway.com -I think I'm going to start reading it there instead. The upside to reading it this way is that I can look at several different translations side-by-side to help me decide what was meant by a certain part of the text. The downside is the loss of the footnotes that did point out important translational nuances, the context in relation to the time it was written, etc. But I guess I have the rest of the internet for that.
Which brings me to the point of this post. Genesis 1. I already don't quite know what to make of this first story. Apparently god made a dome over the earth with water (on the earth) below it and above it (???). Not to mention the fact a number of lesser scientific issues that the chapter contains: the moon being a "light", there being days and nights before the sun was created, the sun and stars being affixed to the "dome in the sky". Although, writing this, I suppose it could be suggested that the universe and everything we can see beyond it could still be inside the big dome in the sky... But, I've heard that coming up in future stories is the fact that it rains when god opens up the windows of that dome, which wouldn't really work if the dome was so far away... but that's for a future time when I actually read that part I guess.
Anyway, the way I see it, if it's literal it makes no sense given our scientific knowledge of the day, and taken as a parable, well I don't see the point. So, I decided to rely on Google for more info. I chose "genesis 1" as my search terms soas not to inject bias into the search. Results 1-5 were just online versions of the bible.
Result 6 was: http://www.christiananswers.net/bible/gen1.html Which contained the bible text along with the question "Does God expect us to read Genesis 1-11 as a record of authentic historical fact, or is this simply a collection of parable-like stories?" in the margin. The answer in one word is yes, it's meant to be taken literally.
The 7th result was: http://www.asa3.org/ASA/topics/Bible-Science/6-02Watts.html which dives deeply into the text and how exactly it's reasoned out, but comes to the conclusion that no, the text is not meant to be taken literally and that the purpose of this chapter was just to say that the earth was "fine-tuned with human existence in view" (quote from link above).
The 8th result: http://www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v19/i1/days.asp attempts to answer whether the days described were 24hour days or if they may have been longer. The answer, defended by the Hebrew word chosen for "day" among other contextual clues is that the earth was in fact created in six 24-hour days.
The 9th result is the skeptic's bible, which is hilarious, but not really helpful or authoritative in trying to interpret the story.
And the 10th result was just another site with the text of the bible. So, as it sits now we have no idea if this story is to be taken literally or figuratively, but I'm moving on anyway. Maybe this story will become clearer later on?
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Religious rambling
I've been spending a lot of time on YouTube lately surfing the atheist vs christian debates. They raise some interesting questions and philosophical debates. I've been wishing I had a video camera to participate, then I decided to try recording myself on my cell phone to see if it'd come out well enough to upload, and I chickened out. I hate seeing myself on camera. Blah.
For those who haven't seen the videos, they are a constant back and forth (as I'm sure you can imagine) where the atheists regurgitate Dawkins and Hitchens ad nauseum while the religious people regurgitate Kirk Cameron or one of those other creationist people. Of course, just like in real life no one ever convinces the other person and the debates quickly end up stuck in one circular argument or another.
But they tend to come down to a handful of questions. One of them is: "If we don't get our ethics from religion, where do we get them from?" See -interesting.
The last video I saw was a christian going over the 10 commandments. He said that a rule against adultery could only have come from god because humans have such a hard time obeying it that we would never have come up with that on our own. Funny. I think most cultures have come up with the idea of marriage which includes hinduism, islam, as well as indigenous cultures on most continents. This means that non-christian as well as christian countries and cultures came up with the idea of being faithful (although several cultures, including christianity include in that polygamy, but we'll skip that for now). Many of his other arguments for the divine origin of the commandments such as "thou shall not kill" or steal, etc were that "well, if that was allowed we'd have anarchy". True! And because that's so obvious and can be reasoned out, that's why we never needed god to come up with such rules!
So, I started thinking about a small group of people from different cultures (races, religions, whatever). If you were to take them and put them in a house (reality tv style), they'd soon have to come up with a set of rules to determine how they'd get along with each other in the house. They'd start out with what's acceptable and unacceptable behavior -what rules would you come up with? How about "Leave my stuff alone and I'll leave your stuff alone." Seems reasonable. Or "If you cook, clean up after yourself." Simple, easy stuff right? These are rules that should be easily understandable and agreeable to people no matter what their background. That's because it's all based on a negotiation -I don't want you to do "X" to me, so I won't do it to you if you promise not to do it to me.
Let's assume, then, that our group of people make up a list of rules to live by. Now they need punishments for breaking the rules. Would "an eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth" be such a stretch for anyone? No. Is this because god made us this way or is it evidence that humans wrote the Bible? Depends on which side of the debate you're on.
But look outside of ourselves at other cultures with other religions and you'll see that all cultures consider stealing, rape, murder, etc as being wrong. These ethics do not belong solely to the christians! It's a simple matter of "I cannot be secure in my possessions if it's ok for others to take them, so in order to protect myself, I'll support a law against stealing." It's simple logic, so I think the argument for basing laws off of a religion is way off base.
With laws based on logic, we can reason out exceptions (like murder by accident or for self defense) or determine if they cause more harm than good such as laws against gay marriage when allowing them would not do harm. If we were to base laws on the Bible, it is clear from reading it (which I'm doing right now) that slavery is endorsed, beating slaves is ok (as long as they don't die right away), rape is ok if they are a slave, stoning is a reasonable punishment for blasphemy, etc.
Am I over exaggerating? Well, no -it's all there, but I'm sure most people wouldn't endorse such laws. But I'm just trying to show that it's not that easy. Who do we trust to draw the line? And how many people who don't believe in christianity are prevented from living freely by some of the laws that are already in place?
An example of a religiously based law that many states and counties have adopted are those that legislate against selling cars, liquor, etc on Sundays. Why should those of us who don't believe in the need to rest on Sunday be prevented from carrying on as normal? There's no reason for it. Is it ethical? No. Repealing such laws would give non-believers back their freedom without causing the religious any harm. If you choose not to buy cars or alcohol on Sundays, just don't. Or if it's about having to work selling either, then that's a scheduling issue that you can negotiate with your employer like any other retail job would have you do. So, anyway, it's an unethical law, and I can assume we'd only have more if this christian movement to gain politcal power goes any further.
For those who haven't seen the videos, they are a constant back and forth (as I'm sure you can imagine) where the atheists regurgitate Dawkins and Hitchens ad nauseum while the religious people regurgitate Kirk Cameron or one of those other creationist people. Of course, just like in real life no one ever convinces the other person and the debates quickly end up stuck in one circular argument or another.
But they tend to come down to a handful of questions. One of them is: "If we don't get our ethics from religion, where do we get them from?" See -interesting.
The last video I saw was a christian going over the 10 commandments. He said that a rule against adultery could only have come from god because humans have such a hard time obeying it that we would never have come up with that on our own. Funny. I think most cultures have come up with the idea of marriage which includes hinduism, islam, as well as indigenous cultures on most continents. This means that non-christian as well as christian countries and cultures came up with the idea of being faithful (although several cultures, including christianity include in that polygamy, but we'll skip that for now). Many of his other arguments for the divine origin of the commandments such as "thou shall not kill" or steal, etc were that "well, if that was allowed we'd have anarchy". True! And because that's so obvious and can be reasoned out, that's why we never needed god to come up with such rules!
So, I started thinking about a small group of people from different cultures (races, religions, whatever). If you were to take them and put them in a house (reality tv style), they'd soon have to come up with a set of rules to determine how they'd get along with each other in the house. They'd start out with what's acceptable and unacceptable behavior -what rules would you come up with? How about "Leave my stuff alone and I'll leave your stuff alone." Seems reasonable. Or "If you cook, clean up after yourself." Simple, easy stuff right? These are rules that should be easily understandable and agreeable to people no matter what their background. That's because it's all based on a negotiation -I don't want you to do "X" to me, so I won't do it to you if you promise not to do it to me.
Let's assume, then, that our group of people make up a list of rules to live by. Now they need punishments for breaking the rules. Would "an eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth" be such a stretch for anyone? No. Is this because god made us this way or is it evidence that humans wrote the Bible? Depends on which side of the debate you're on.
But look outside of ourselves at other cultures with other religions and you'll see that all cultures consider stealing, rape, murder, etc as being wrong. These ethics do not belong solely to the christians! It's a simple matter of "I cannot be secure in my possessions if it's ok for others to take them, so in order to protect myself, I'll support a law against stealing." It's simple logic, so I think the argument for basing laws off of a religion is way off base.
With laws based on logic, we can reason out exceptions (like murder by accident or for self defense) or determine if they cause more harm than good such as laws against gay marriage when allowing them would not do harm. If we were to base laws on the Bible, it is clear from reading it (which I'm doing right now) that slavery is endorsed, beating slaves is ok (as long as they don't die right away), rape is ok if they are a slave, stoning is a reasonable punishment for blasphemy, etc.
Am I over exaggerating? Well, no -it's all there, but I'm sure most people wouldn't endorse such laws. But I'm just trying to show that it's not that easy. Who do we trust to draw the line? And how many people who don't believe in christianity are prevented from living freely by some of the laws that are already in place?
An example of a religiously based law that many states and counties have adopted are those that legislate against selling cars, liquor, etc on Sundays. Why should those of us who don't believe in the need to rest on Sunday be prevented from carrying on as normal? There's no reason for it. Is it ethical? No. Repealing such laws would give non-believers back their freedom without causing the religious any harm. If you choose not to buy cars or alcohol on Sundays, just don't. Or if it's about having to work selling either, then that's a scheduling issue that you can negotiate with your employer like any other retail job would have you do. So, anyway, it's an unethical law, and I can assume we'd only have more if this christian movement to gain politcal power goes any further.
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Google Reader
I just started using Google Reader and I'm finding the ability to save and share the stuff I find interesting kinda cool. My shared stuff is here and updated frequently:
http://www.google.com/reader/shared/02489598110106339821
http://www.google.com/reader/shared/02489598110106339821
Wednesday, January 09, 2008
The Presidential Primary
Right before the holidays I started researching candidates. I usually take elections quite seriously, and this one even more so since I have to avoid making the same mistake I made in 2000 when I voted for Bush the first time. So I printed out each candidate's "On the vote" page and hauled the 30 page monstrosity with me to Canada with the intention of reading it on the plane or something. Well, that never happened. It seems the internet has made me lazy, I've done most of my research this time around on YouTube. But my mind's not made up yet. All I know is that if Huckabee becomes president I'm moving out of the country. That man scares me -a lot!
On the Republican side, unfortunately, the front runners seem to be nutjobs -in fact they're all pandering to the religious right and as an atheist I can't exactly support someone who wants to make laws based on religious principals. How about ethics, logic, and morality (without cheating by looking it up in your Book) instead? No, stem cell research, abortion, and gay rights mean I can no longer vote for these Republican puppets for the Evangelical Church.
Except for McCain and Ron Paul. McCain... I voted for him in the primary when Bush ran the first time. I liked him a lot back then. Since that time he's been on TV a lot and I've been left with a bad taste in my mouth. I'd definitely like him over Romney or Huckabee though. In fact if Huckabee becomes president, I'm moving to Canada until this country gets back on track. We aren't the "land of the free, except for the Patriot Act". It's the "land of the free and home of the BRAVE!" and yet all it took was 2 planes and 2 buildings and we ran to Washington and signed our rights away in exchange for perceived security. I'd call it unAmerican if it wasn't for all the ribbons and flags on the cars of people who support such tactics. Yikes.
Ron Paul, or should I say "RON PAUL!". Yeah, he's a wacko too if you dig into his platform a bit. I wonder how many of his supporters realize he's pro-life. Anyway, he'd do much more good than bad in the Whitehouse and it's encouraging to hear him actually speak intelligently about the problems the country's facing when it comes to our economy and it's ties to the Federal Reserve, the Patriot Act and other unConstitutional laws that take away our freedoms, the IRS and taxes... At one point I was ready to vote for him on these issues because his vision of America is what I was brought up to believe in. Not only does his ideas make sense, he's a real guy -he talks like a real person, he tells people in the audiences where he speaks that he believes their position on X is wrong and he takes time to educate them on the topic and explain why he holds the view that he does. THAT'S what I think we all want to see in our candidates. But what we get instead is people who follow strict party platforms, evade questions, and otherwise live up to the "politician" stereotype we've all come to know. In that respect, Ron Paul is a breath of fresh air and I know I'm going to regret not supporting him, but I think the time for his ideas have come to pass. People in general have become more than just lazy when it comes to government run programs -we've come to RELY on them. I just don't see how the very American and actually "Free" ideas that he stands for can work in what has become a socialist country whether we like it or not.
On the Democratic side we have Hillary. **Shutter** I really can't put my finger on why I don't want to see her win. Her politics aren't that much different than Obama's (or anyone elses?), but she just rubs me the wrong way. That crying stunt from yesterday? Pathetic. Will she cry infront of leaders of other countries too? "**Sob** I'm sorry, but this trade agreement is just so personal too me!" Pah-leese!
Obama is inspiring, there's no two ways about it. He's got your average Democratic agenda, which makes my decision tough because they support some of my most important issues where the Republicans let me down (again: stem cell research, abortion, and gay rights), but their philosophy on other issues like the environment scare me. They just don't think about small businesses and the impact that their well-meaning legislation will have on them. Or, if they do, it means all kinds of red tape when there's so much already! But anyway, yeah, Obama is my #1 choice right now, but mostly because he's electable and is probably our best shot at regaining our country's reputation after "W" drug it through the mud.
Anyway, I'm off to research McCain. Luckily I have over 3 weeks left to decide!
On the Republican side, unfortunately, the front runners seem to be nutjobs -in fact they're all pandering to the religious right and as an atheist I can't exactly support someone who wants to make laws based on religious principals. How about ethics, logic, and morality (without cheating by looking it up in your Book) instead? No, stem cell research, abortion, and gay rights mean I can no longer vote for these Republican puppets for the Evangelical Church.
Except for McCain and Ron Paul. McCain... I voted for him in the primary when Bush ran the first time. I liked him a lot back then. Since that time he's been on TV a lot and I've been left with a bad taste in my mouth. I'd definitely like him over Romney or Huckabee though. In fact if Huckabee becomes president, I'm moving to Canada until this country gets back on track. We aren't the "land of the free, except for the Patriot Act". It's the "land of the free and home of the BRAVE!" and yet all it took was 2 planes and 2 buildings and we ran to Washington and signed our rights away in exchange for perceived security. I'd call it unAmerican if it wasn't for all the ribbons and flags on the cars of people who support such tactics. Yikes.
Ron Paul, or should I say "RON PAUL!". Yeah, he's a wacko too if you dig into his platform a bit. I wonder how many of his supporters realize he's pro-life. Anyway, he'd do much more good than bad in the Whitehouse and it's encouraging to hear him actually speak intelligently about the problems the country's facing when it comes to our economy and it's ties to the Federal Reserve, the Patriot Act and other unConstitutional laws that take away our freedoms, the IRS and taxes... At one point I was ready to vote for him on these issues because his vision of America is what I was brought up to believe in. Not only does his ideas make sense, he's a real guy -he talks like a real person, he tells people in the audiences where he speaks that he believes their position on X is wrong and he takes time to educate them on the topic and explain why he holds the view that he does. THAT'S what I think we all want to see in our candidates. But what we get instead is people who follow strict party platforms, evade questions, and otherwise live up to the "politician" stereotype we've all come to know. In that respect, Ron Paul is a breath of fresh air and I know I'm going to regret not supporting him, but I think the time for his ideas have come to pass. People in general have become more than just lazy when it comes to government run programs -we've come to RELY on them. I just don't see how the very American and actually "Free" ideas that he stands for can work in what has become a socialist country whether we like it or not.
On the Democratic side we have Hillary. **Shutter** I really can't put my finger on why I don't want to see her win. Her politics aren't that much different than Obama's (or anyone elses?), but she just rubs me the wrong way. That crying stunt from yesterday? Pathetic. Will she cry infront of leaders of other countries too? "**Sob** I'm sorry, but this trade agreement is just so personal too me!" Pah-leese!
Obama is inspiring, there's no two ways about it. He's got your average Democratic agenda, which makes my decision tough because they support some of my most important issues where the Republicans let me down (again: stem cell research, abortion, and gay rights), but their philosophy on other issues like the environment scare me. They just don't think about small businesses and the impact that their well-meaning legislation will have on them. Or, if they do, it means all kinds of red tape when there's so much already! But anyway, yeah, Obama is my #1 choice right now, but mostly because he's electable and is probably our best shot at regaining our country's reputation after "W" drug it through the mud.
Anyway, I'm off to research McCain. Luckily I have over 3 weeks left to decide!
Wednesday, November 14, 2007
A lesson on not judging people...
I just wanted to post about how wrong I was about the person I spoke of here -I saw her again at same Starbucks, but this time we sat sortof behind her. Ed pointed at her laptop and I said "yeah, I saw it" dismissively. But, he indicated again that I should read what was on her screen. ...okay, I was curious, so I looked -it looked like she was in a 12-step type program about "Coming Out To God" (and I think that's the title of a book she had beside her).
That lead me to think about how, based on her laptop which was covered in "gay stickers", I had previously assumed she was one of those "angry lesbians". How wrong I was! She is, instead, one of those hurt by the church's refusal to accept gayness as a trait instead of a choice. I totally sympathize with her now. -it's hard enough to accept on it's own without the church telling you your attraction is wrong or (at the extreme end) yelling "God hates fags!" as you walk hand in hand with your partner without thinking about the consequences.
How very sad for the world that this cannot be accepted (yet). It will. Eventually. And all you people who make us feel bad about WHO WE ARE... I hope you feel as foolish and apologetic as those who've defended apartheid, fought against women's right to vote, etc.
Oh, and I've learned my lesson not to judge people too :-( Sorry to you, whoever you are, Starbucks woman... I wish I had the courage to say something supportive to you then and there, but we're on way opposite poles as far as the religion thing goes, so I didn't even know where to start. You've got it WAY harder than I do.
...but what about those stickers? -I suppose I could admire the courage to display something so personal while you seem to be struggling for acceptance -even for/from yourself. But it seems that, in this case anyway, the root of it is just overcompensation, then right? Perhaps. But, I guess I don't really feel like making sweeping generalizations anymore... :-(
That lead me to think about how, based on her laptop which was covered in "gay stickers", I had previously assumed she was one of those "angry lesbians". How wrong I was! She is, instead, one of those hurt by the church's refusal to accept gayness as a trait instead of a choice. I totally sympathize with her now. -it's hard enough to accept on it's own without the church telling you your attraction is wrong or (at the extreme end) yelling "God hates fags!" as you walk hand in hand with your partner without thinking about the consequences.
How very sad for the world that this cannot be accepted (yet). It will. Eventually. And all you people who make us feel bad about WHO WE ARE... I hope you feel as foolish and apologetic as those who've defended apartheid, fought against women's right to vote, etc.
Oh, and I've learned my lesson not to judge people too :-( Sorry to you, whoever you are, Starbucks woman... I wish I had the courage to say something supportive to you then and there, but we're on way opposite poles as far as the religion thing goes, so I didn't even know where to start. You've got it WAY harder than I do.
...but what about those stickers? -I suppose I could admire the courage to display something so personal while you seem to be struggling for acceptance -even for/from yourself. But it seems that, in this case anyway, the root of it is just overcompensation, then right? Perhaps. But, I guess I don't really feel like making sweeping generalizations anymore... :-(
Monday, October 08, 2007
Dream: Threat on marriage cruise
Last night I dreamed we were on a cruise where Ed an I were to be married. Ed popped in and out of the dream, but I was mostly alone. This was kindof a sequel to similar dreams I had before we got married...
First, there was a flashback to the previous dreams where I was on IM in the cabin alone at night and some guy and I were having a conversation. But, when he found out where I was and why, he started threatening me -saying he was going to kill me, rip me to shreds, etc. Not too long after I found out that others on the ship were getting similar threats and 2 girls were already missing and one was found dead in "suspicious circumstances". So, I was scared. At night Ed wasn't there. When the threat became known throughout the ship, my brother stayed with me in the room.
...I think the threatening person may have been me? (I went to bed being angry with Ed...)
First, there was a flashback to the previous dreams where I was on IM in the cabin alone at night and some guy and I were having a conversation. But, when he found out where I was and why, he started threatening me -saying he was going to kill me, rip me to shreds, etc. Not too long after I found out that others on the ship were getting similar threats and 2 girls were already missing and one was found dead in "suspicious circumstances". So, I was scared. At night Ed wasn't there. When the threat became known throughout the ship, my brother stayed with me in the room.
...I think the threatening person may have been me? (I went to bed being angry with Ed...)
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