Patrick’s Rants

… not really but you get my drift.
This morning your car was parked in the area designated “No Parking, School Bus Loading Zone”. This morning you weren’t so lucky were you? There were three busses already parked in the loading zone. This morning I parked my bus beside you and shut off the engine. This morning you were blocked in. I opened the service door, stuck my head out and asked (rhetorically of course), “can’t you read?” It was then that I noticed your driver window was open a couple of inches. I pointed out the sign. You apologized because you were “running late”. Well, you were just that much later because you parked where I’m supposed to pull my 39′ 29,000 lb GVWR bus into to pick up kids. Maybe you’ve never done that before – heck you may never pull in there again, knowing that those big busses need that space. That would be fine with me.
While you’re at it, tell your friends not to park there either. Remind them that by ignoring the signs they are teaching their children to be insensitive, that laws only apply to “everyone else”, that it’s OK to endanger the lives of others since you’re only “going to be a minute”, or you’re in a hurry. Remind them that the children who ride on busses are not orphans, that their little lives are just as precious as the one they came to pick up and that their parents want them to school and home quickly and safely too.
Meanwhile, I’ll keep smiling. I’m not allowed to say aloud what you really need to hear, but every once in a while when things work out and you ignore the Busses Only sign because you’re late I’ll be right on time. And I just might have to make sure the kids all remember how to sit next time, checking that each child demonstrates proper seat to seat contact.

George W Bush stayed in Phoenix a couple of nights ago – to help campaign for John Kyle at a $1000.00 per plate fund raising dinner. The most amazing thing about the trip – aside from the fact that this has been touted as a record fundraising dinner even while Dubya experiences his lowest approval rating to date – is the hotel he stayed in, Phoenix’s Royal Palms Resort and Spa, managed to get a little publicity showing off the Pres’ room. A spokesman for the Hotel said that they tried to make the hotel like being back at the ranch, with photos of the Bush family throughout. Of course it would have felt much more like being at the ranch if they had handed Dubya his chainsaw, a sweaty T-shirt, thrown some dirt mounds and an old tree stump into the bathtub and invited Cindy Sheehan to pitch her tent in the hallway. Guess it was only “almost like home”.

In an article titled Why IP Owners Should Worry Melanie Wyne, whose bio reads ” Melanie Wyne is executive director of the Initiative for Software Choice, a global coalition run by the Computing Technology Industry Association.” tries to tell us why we should worry about open standards and choice. First, let’s look at this Initiative. From their website:

The Initiative for Software Choice is a growing global coalition of large and small companies committed to advancing the concept that multiple competing software markets should be allowed to develop and flourish unimpeded by government preference or mandate.The Initiative actively educates policymakers and regulators worldwide about the benefits of this approach.

Sounds fairly harmless right? Wrong. “advancing the concept that multiple competing software markets should be allowed to develop and flourish unimpeded by government preference or mandate. Boy, does that sound like it’s right up Bill Gates alley, “just let me sell software and don’t bother me about monopoly laws.”
Plain and simple this article is about trying to make free to read and edit in whichever software allows you to illegal. It’s about calling Microsoft Office the standard and you can use it as long as you don’t break patent and copyright laws or the DMCA to do it. Oh yeah, and upgrade when we tell you to because you won’t be able to read that new document with your old office suite – never mind that the suite is $800 a pop.
What Bill and Co. do is like making a “new” kind of paper that you can’t read with your “old” eyes – one that requires expensive eye surgery even when you have 20/20 vision. OpenDocument is a “new” standard, but it’s (almost) like the web; if your old program (browser) can read it why buy a new one when a few people change their web sites?

What do you get when you cross a couple of average college graduates, marijuana and the munchies? Harold and Kumar go to White Castle, that’s what. After lighting up, these two roommates decide that the only thing to satisify their midnight munchies is a trip to White Castle for a ton of those little burgers. The only problem is they have to hit the road to do it. In the quest to maintain the balance between high and hungry they make several detours: back to their old college campus to score more weed, constant head to head confrontations with the extreme sports bullies, a trip to jail, a detour through the hospital, a ride through the rainy night in a tow truck driven by a deformed little imp aptly named “Freak Show” and to top it all off they lose their car to none other than Dougie Howser – Neil Patrick Harris – who ends up driving around with a couple of topless hotties.
You will find yourself cheering on these two hapless heros, laughing at their plight all the while hoping they get to sink their teeth into those bite size morsels of meat, the White Castle Burger. And when the movie is over check out the special features on the DVD – there is almost as much time and thought put into the extras as there is the feature presentation.
This is a great funny movie.

According to a senior White House official who wished to remain anonymous, the Bush Administration is looking into the recent accident in New York where a parade float became entangled in a street lamp, causing pieces to fall and injure innocent bystanders.
The Administration is apparently looking into whether there were intelligence failures in this incident. Macy’s seems to have been planning “parades” for many years. There also appear to be ties to an outspoken anti-governmental group who have been called the “Pilgrims”. Unfortunately for the two ladies in New York, the Administration has only recently decided to look into the proliferation of these Weapons of Mass Inflation.
I can only hope that we are not mired down in years of seemingly endless occupation with our soldiers stranded so far from home as they try to bring freedom and democracy to Macy’s, fighting against “perfume bombers” to make to world a safer place.

Pat Morita, know to many as Mr. Migagi, dead at 73.
Full story: CNN

How to talk to a human – fast! Call any company and you get a slew of automated menus.
Now, to help you talk to a live human Paul English has collected a number of the fastest ways to cut through the menu clutter and talk to a human. This morning on NPR (National Public Radio) two numbers were tested on the air, Capital One (which sounded like the business services line) and Apple Computer. In both cases a few pushes of the buttons later a live human was on the line. In the case of Capital One, it was somewhere in India, the service rep was helpful and cheerful (without an overly thick accent) and answered the questions posed to him cheerfully. As for Apple, the phone was answered in Sacramento. The rep could have been a little friendlier, but hey it’s Apple.
More cheat codes can be found on Paul’s website, and when it comes back up more on the piece can be found on http://www.npr.org
http://www.paulenglish.com/ivr/
Update
Paul English’s site has been featured on Slashdot. What that means to those who don’t know, is that Paul’s site will go through a period of unavailability, much like NPR did when it aired the story. Over on Slashdot, this is known as the Slashdot effect; a spike in hits to a web site due to being featured on Slashdot leading to slow or even unavailable web pages.

Would you notice if someone changed the sign at McDonald’s? This guy did it and took pictures.

of the same bumber:
Clinton: Record budget surplus and bl-w jobs.
Bush: Record budget defits and NO jobs.

Save the Ozone
Grow Pot

…I was too busy practicing withcraft
and becoming a lesbian.