Life is a State of Mind : ideas, thoughts, rants

Finally heard Jim Webb speak in person

Erci and I finally got to hear Jim Webb speak in person at this morning’s Dulles Area Democrats breakfast session in Herndon at Amphora Diner. In person Webb is every bit as impressive as his many fans over at Raising Kaine have said. The great news is that both Harris Miller and Jim Webb will make fine senators, and I will be very happy to support the winner of the primary after next Tuesday (Reminder: get out and vote on 6/13). The tough news is that we have to decide which of these fine candidates to vote for in the primary.

A quick recap of Jim Webb’s breakfast talk at Amphora this morning:
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New Prius

Well, fate popped in and the Toyota dealer I pass every morning on the way to work called me back after this morning’s visit. They had a 2006 Prius, White with Tan interior, option package #6 available today!

I considered it a sign, and grapped that machine. I drove the Prius off the lot after accepting $7000 for my old Saab. Not what I wanted for the Saab, nor what it should be worth after only ~5 years, but I see the writing on the wall. It was becoming very unreliable and very expensive in repairs. The portents were reinforced; as I was pulling my junk from the Saab and putting it in the Prius, the Saab stalled again and was unable to start without a jump. At least the folks at the Toyota dealership know what they are getting.

Anyone need 4 winter tires (16×7.5) 5-110 lug pattern? I also have one mounted and new wheel and tire (225/45-17 with the same 5-110 lug pattern, wheel is fancy alloy, and tire is a Sumitomo HTR+ 90W I think).

I’ll add a picture of the Prius when I get one. I am thinking of custom stickers to make it look outrageous – perhaps tiger stripes or zebra stripes… perhaps giant sunflowers? Tropical fish? Suggestions?

2006 05 31 snolan Cars
Environment
Hybrid
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Car Troubles

Well, it is time to face the fact that my 2001 Saab 9-5 Aero Wagon has become a lemon as it has aged. The truth is I love the ergonomics of the car and especially the ventilated seats so much that I have poured far more money than is sensible into keeping this thing running, but system after system keeps failing. I cannot help wondering if the 1999 Saab 9-5 2.3T (Sedan) I used to own has failed any better through the ravages of time/age. I’d like to think it was a better car.

photo of my Saab 9-5 Wagon

My car has stalled and been unable to restart, or failed to start without serious efforts too many times now, so I find myself in the car market again prematurely. My next car will be the cleanest, greenest machine I can find, and as a bare minimum will be AT-PZEV rated in California. That limits the choices down to a small number (about 24 last I checked) of mainstream models. The Toyota Prius is at the top of the list because of it’s extraordinary light impact on the environment, and because I know my lovely HP Velotechnik Street Machine GT recumbent bicycle will fit in the back (something most of the allegedly bigger “SUV” light trucks cannot claim).

I am not sure how I will survive the heat of the Washington D.C. area without those ventilated seats, but I will figure out something (do the wooden beads work? what about installing my own fans?).

2006 05 31 snolan Cars
Hybrid
Personal
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Net Neutrality

There’s quite a lot of confusion over the issues of “Net Neutrality” versus “Hands Off The Internet” on the talk shows, news blogs, and a very confused mainstream media. Part of the problem is that both camps have chosen extremely poor names for their own causes.

In case anyone is wondering I am wholeheartedly endorsing the “Net Neutrality” side of the argument, and here is exactly why:

1) when I first heard about the cable and telephone industry attempts to lobby for additional fees that they’d charge content and web service providers, I wondered “Why?” because Google, Amazon, AOL, and CNN already pay for all the bytes they deliver with very high bandwidth consumption rated fees. As more and more consumers stream video from YouTube or CNN – their fees go up already. Continue reading ›

2006 05 23 snolan Computers
News
Politics
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Google Broken?

So this morning, all my attempts to use google are returning the strangest error, as if I were a spammer or hacker program trying to harvest their site for information.

The message reads:

“We’re sorry…

… but your query looks similar to automated requests from a computer virus or spyware application. To protect our users, we can’t process your request right now.

We’ll restore your access as quickly as possible, so try again soon. In the meantime, if you suspect that your computer or network has been infected, you might want to run a virus checker or spyware remover to make sure that your systems are free of viruses and other spurious software.

We apologize for the inconvenience, and hope we’ll see you again on Google. “

Perhaps this is because I visit their search engine site with cookies and java turned off?

I tried to switch to Teoma, but they suck now they they have been merged by ask.com. Update: Ask.com and Teoma did merge, but Teoma’s brilliant search engine is now in use, and this is wonderful.

Update: Turns out AOL’s employee networks were blacklisted by google, joy.
Update2: Two whole days and Google is still blacklisting AOL’s employee networks – I am switching to Teoma’s Ask.com, which turns out to be Teoma’s excellent search engine behind Ask.com after all. Sweet.

2006 05 22 snolan Computer Security
Computers
News
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Getting Organized

It has been almost a month since my employer graciously sent me to a Time Management class (April 25th). The class was contracted out through the FranklinCovey folks, and taught by an enthusiastic evangelist about their planner and organization system (aren’t they all?). I am personally convinced that FranklinCovey’s approach is no better nor any worse than any paper based day planner and organizational system, but the techniques are very useful no matter who you get them from nor which product you buy. You can even make your own completely custom planning system with free templates from DIYPlanner if you prefer (and I will augment my FranklinCovey with some DIYPlanner stuff as I customize and tune my own system up).

I have conscientiously applied the techniques from the training to both work and personal life.
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2006 05 22 snolan Personal Comments (0) Permalink

Miller versus Webb debate, WVEC 13

James Webb and Harris Miller had their first televised debate down in Virginia Beach and WVEC (Channel 13) has it online here (it is choppy and slow, and their site is loaded with cookies/java/scripts, but eventually plays out the show).

Many thanks to Virginia Centrist for pointing out the debate in his (or her) blog.
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2006 05 19 snolan Politics
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Expedition 360, Stevie Smith’s Adventure

Wow, just when you think you lead an extraordinary and adventurous life, you discover someone else if having even greater adventures. This afternoon the Kojo Nnamdi show on our local PBS affiliate covered the amazing story of Stevie Smith and Jason Lewis and their human powered journey around the world!

You can check it all out at Expedition 360.

Moksha, what a liberating concept. I can’t imagine being in that small a craft for 111 days, but it must be liberating. Your imagination must be one of the things that keeps you going.

2006 05 18 snolan Cycling
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WordPress and Akismet Anti-Spam Filter

So I had trouble figuring out how to activate the Akismet filters on my WordPress blog, because I could not find my own API Key – turns out you must register a WordPress.com blog to get that key.

This became more important recently because the amount of spam commentary showing up on my blog was increasing dramatically the last few days. We’ll see how well Akismet filters now.

2006 05 18 snolan Blogging
Computer Security
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MarsEdit or MacJournal or simple browser?

This is an experimental post with MarsEdit 1.1.2. Not sure I like it just yet.
I have used MacJournal quite a bit and I like the way I can use it to post to both LiveJournal and WordPress (or Blogger), but it lacks a few features that are available at the admin interfaces on LiveJournal’s website and my WordPress website.

Anyone know of an application that has all of the above? Heck, Ideally it would write to blogger, wordpress, and LJ with ease (I am maintaining several blogs now, each with it’s own id, password, and premise).

So it turns out MarsEdit does not allow me to quickly send the same draft to two blogs. Sigh.

2006 05 17 snolan Blogger
Blogging
Computers
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Life is a State of Mind