Barefoot Flying

If you've flown anywhere in the last few years, you've probably been instructed to remove your shoes and put them through the x-ray machine for carry-on baggage. This was the "new" process put in place after Richard Reid attempted to light explosives in his shoes aboard an airline flight.

So, everyone dutifully pulled off their shoes and walked barefoot in the security lines so that our shoes could be scanned for possibly explosives or other "items of interest". It has always been optional, but every airport I've been through requires it, even for thin little flip-flops. We've all learned to wear slip-on shoes. No biggie.

But, it's all been for naught, I discovered.

Washington -- X-ray machines used to screen passengers' shoes are unable to detect explosives, according to a Homeland Security Department report on aviation screening.

X-raying the shoes with the existing equipment simply doesn't have the ability to find explosives. They might find other items, but the main worry -- explosives in the sole of the shoe -- don't get caught.

And the TSA has known this since 2005.

In its April 2005 report, "Systems Engineering Study of Civil Aviation Security -- Phase I," the Homeland Security Department concluded that images on X-ray machines "do not provide the information necessary to effect detection of explosives"

Findings from the report did not stop the Transportation Security Administration from announcing Sunday that all airline passengers must remove their shoes and run them through X-ray machines before boarding commercial aircraft.

They haven't upgraded the equipment to handle the new requirements. Might this be because they have had their budgets slashed, and money quietly diverted from the actual security issues by Bush's war? As the latest terror plot revealed that this was certainly tried:

WASHINGTON Aug 11, 2006 (AP)— While the British terror suspects were hatching their plot, the Bush administration was quietly seeking permission to divert $6 million that was supposed to be spent this year developing new homeland explosives detection technology.

Congress stepped up and blocked this diversion, but Homeland security and it's control of TSA is more and more a joke -- a political exercise that does little to enhance actual security and grows into a bigger boondoggle every year.

Not to mention that the very phrase "Homeland Security" makes me cringe. References to "The Homeland" really grate on me, and sound somehow innapropriate in a country supposedly founded and run on democratic principles.

One Small Step...

The original recordings of the first moon landing -- including the famous "one small step for a man..." leap from Neil Armstrong, have gone missing. Apparently for more than a year. Iniitially, they were stored in the National Archives, but returned to NASA in the late 70s. They've been looking for them for over a year, and no sign of them has turned up.

The U.S. government has misplaced the original recording of the first moon landing, including astronaut Neil Armstrong's famous "one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind," a NASA spokesman said on Monday

Armstrong's famous space walk, seen by millions of viewers on July 20, 1969, is among transmissions that NASA has failed to turn up in a year of searching, spokesman Grey Hautaloma said

Not that they'd be playable, anyways. Like old movie reels, the film has degraded and would be unusable, unless the films had been stored very carefully. Mostly, it sounds ike they were stuck on a shelf and then misplaced. Oh, there are copies galore, but the originals have gone missing, perhaps permanently. Even though we haven't lost the iconic images and video (there are versions on NASA's website for download), losing the originals still is a loss.

Everyone remembers the grainy, black-and-white images of Neil Armstrong bounding like a kangaroo on the dusty moon surface, the stiff flag -- whether you saw them on TV "live" or if you saw them as archive footage much later. I was about three when they landed on the moon, and while I might have convinced myself that I remember them on television, I'm sure what I really remember is a much-later viewing in science class or part of a documentary.

But, one thing I didn't know was that the view we were used to was actually a film of the original recordings as displayed on a monitor:

Because NASA's equipment was not compatible with TV technology of the day, the original transmissions had to be displayed on a monitor and re-shot by a TV camera for broadcast

I compare those gray and murky shots with the crystal clear images from the latest Discovery mission and I am reminded once again that they got men to the moon the first time with the computing equivalent of a sophisticated Palm Pilot. My desktop computer probably rivals the computing power available to Mission Control when they first "slipped the surly bonds of earth."

Amazing.

Carryon Luggage

As I had hoped, the British have a pretty reasonable response to the hand-luggage bans.

The Home Secretary, John Reid, admitted that the checks at airports were not "indefinitely sustainable" as thousands of travellers endured a fourth day of disruption. And late last night, the government announced the security threat at UK airports had been downgraded from "critical" to "severe".

The downgrade will mean passengers will be able to carry one item of hand luggage for most flights, but would still be banned from carrying liquid onto flights.

The TSA has relaxed their screening just a bit, as well -- liquid medicines are allowed, lipstick is back on the 'allowed list', although gels (including insoles and baby teething rings) and other liquids are still not allowed.

There is still some sense that the US forced the hand of British authority and that the arrests were premature -- and the much-touted "link" to al-qaida is pretty damned thin. But that's the terminology that gets Americans all hot and bothered, so you can sure it's what is showing up on all the headlines. Ah. well.

I hope that we'll be back to "normal" soon.

Chapstick and Evian

From the AP:

Investigators have uncovered no signs of U.S.-based terrorists linked to a plot to blow up airliners headed to the United States, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said today.

"Currently, we do not have evidence that there was, as part of this plot, any plan to initiate activity inside the United States or that the plotting was done in the United States,"

I'm quite relieved, as are many people. This is what I figured was true -- this was a homegrown plot in Britain, and dealt with handily by the British and Pakistani authorities-- using intelligence, investigation, monitoring, and patience. Good on them.

So, does that mean that Bush, Lieberman, and the rest of the republican politicians and radio blowhards will stop using this as a way to stoke up the FEAR FEAR FEAR in the American public and stop trying to a) take credit for the operation -- which they had frankly nothing to do with and b) try to milk political advantage out of it?

I'm sure it won't.

Puppy Puppy Puppy

My sister and her husband recently lost their little pug dog, Hardy. Anyone who is a dog-person will understand just how empty the house can be when you're used to a dog being around, and won't be surprised that it didn't take long for them to start looking for a new puppy.


They love pugs (me, well, they're cute I guess -- in that 'so ugly they're cute' way) and so found a local breeder and last weekend brought Truman home.

He really is cute. He doesn't quite look like a real dog, more like a stuffed animal.

Lefties Rule!

From my MIL today:

August 11, 2006 · Congratulations to left-handed men! And not just because this Sunday is International Left-Handers Day, but because a new study shows southpaws are richer than righties, 15 percent richer for left-handed men who attended college, and 26 percent richer if they graduated. Researchers at Lafayette College and Johns Hopkins University can't explain the wage difference, and they don't know why women lefties don't have the same advantage.

Bah, humbug

I'm feeling bleagh today, so I'm spending a lot of time channel surfing and (obviously) posting on the blog. Obviously, the news is entirely focused on the thwarted terrorist plot.

However, I'm seeing the same clip of a stern-looking, but slightly gleeful, Bush today:

“this country is safer than it was prior to 9/11… We’ve taken a lot of measures to protect the American people, but obviously we are still not completely safe…. It is a mistake to believe there is no threat to the United States of America.’’

A few comments. Is the country really safer than it was prior to 9/11? I don't think so. I don't think any of the so-called 'safety measures' have addressed the real dangers, it's all just visible fluff to make people feel better. I find it amazing that we are constantly assured that the security measures will keep us safe...and yet every time there is a threat of any kind (bombs on busses, or the new liquid-bomb idea) we have to scramble to put new protections in place -- the current measures are never enough to catch these things. Things are never forbidden until there is some incident. The 'security experts' always seem so surprised.

I mean, wouldn't you assume that the government (ours and everyone else's) has smart people thinking of the possible threats so we can put preventive measures in place? Why are we always reacting to these things as if the idea hadn't occured to anyone but the attackers? We didn't ban lighters on planes (which I've always thought were a bit iffy) until we had an incident of someone trying to use one to light his shoe-bomb. AFter that, we can't have lighters (although we can still have matches!) and now our shoes have to be off and xrayed with everyone else. No one prior to this ever thought that bulky shoes could be used to hold something? That having a way to light an explosive was a possibility? Why does it take a "planned attack" for people to recognize that these are a realistic possibility?

And I've seen people all day say that these bans should be permament (ie, no carry ons, no liquids, ban laptops, etc). Shouldn't we be expecting TSA and the government to find a way to test these things so the 99.99999999% of people who are not terrorists can travel with some semblence of civility? We joke about 'Naked Air', but we're certainly heading that way. I just read that the UK has banned BOOKS from planes. Books. Why?

The primary reason I don't think we're safer now than we were is that the misguided war in Iraq and our ham-handed foreign policy in the middle east have generated a tremendous amount of hatred towards the US. Don't get me wrong -- this is in no way justifying or explaining the behavior of terrorists, but it does mean that there is a larger pool of people out there who might act against the US. We have created a terrorist training ground in Iraq -- a country that previously had very little association with known terrorist groups. Despite this, I still believe that we are no more likely to suffer a terrorist attack than we were before. 9/11 didn't "redefine the world" -- it just initiated the US into the arena the rest of the world has lived with for years.

"we are still not completely safe" -- well, duh. No, we aren't. We never will be. This is a misguided and ridiculous goal. We will never be completely safe and we shouldn't expect to be. But this is one of the things that the knee-jerk American response to terror plots fosters: if only we give up a little more, if we spy a bit on our neightbors, if we let the government into our private lives and let them listen to our convesations and read out mail...we could be safe. I don't want a Nanny state. No one should. The expectation that everything will be wrapped in cotton and bubble-wrap and we will be carefully shielded from anything that might hurt us is...infantile. There is inherent risk in everything we do. Roughtly 45000 people died in auto accidents last year in the US, yet we don't ban driving or require helmets to do so. Going out your front door is dangerous. Ride a bike? Take a bath? You are more at risk from these actions than you are from terrorists. Travel, especially air travel, will never be 100% safe. Expecting it to be so is naive.

" It is a mistake to believe there is no threat to the United States of America.’’" Again. Duh. Does anyone not believe this? How condescending and patronizing to suggest that we are so ignorant, so entirely out of touch that we believe we are not a target. Of course there is a threat to the US. Of course there are threats to other countries...that's the world we live in. Well, maybe Bush doesn't quite get it, but the rest of us are well aware of the risks in the world.

I'm alternating being shaking my head in disbelief at the wide-eyed surprise expressed by the news outlets and talking heads who can barely wait to talk in hushed and breathless tones about the incident, and being angry that once again, a terrorist group has impacted so many people -- they don't even need to actually complete an act...just the threat makes everyone jump to and run around like scared rabbits, slows down travel, slows down commerce, and impacts daily life for millions of people.

When? Where?

Some 30 percent of Americans cannot say in what year the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks against New York's World Trade Center occurred, according to the Washington Post.

But wait -- it gets better --

95 percent of Americans questioned in the poll were able to remember the month and the day of the attacks

Notes on Terror Alert

Britain arrested people suspected of planning (and nearing execution) of a plan to blow up airplaines from Britain to the US. It sounds like this is a legitimate threat, and that the plot included smuggling liquid explosives onto planes. Hence, British Airport Authority has currently banned anything liquid on board, and has pretty much limited carry on luggage to a ziplock baggie with your ID, passport, and wallet. Nothing else. No laptops, electronics, phones, books, etc.

Until they confirm that they have caught everyone (and the suspects arrested are British citizens and are of Pakistani descent -- aren't the Pakistanis on our side? Anyway...) these seem like annoying and invasive security measures, but are probably warranted. Most short-haul flights are cancelled, and the airports are chaotic. But, I trust the British to resolve things and get back to normal fairly quickly.

The US? Not so much. TSA has also banned "liquids" on flights, but so far has not banned other carryon luggate such as laptops or iPods. I wonder how long that will last? I travel often, and I require a laptop when I do, for business (class notes and presentations, etc, or even a work machine when I'm at a remote client site). What I want to know is, if they ban laptops as carryon luggage, how are the airlines going to guarantee that my laptop is a) returned at all and b) not damaged. I suspect they are going ot quote "national security" or "tsa rules" to absolve themselves of all responsiblity for damage or loss to anything in checked luggage. That's not going to go over so well.

Bush immediately starts spouting off about 'Islamic Fascists" -- which leads me to believe that he doesn't have the slightest clue what that means. The word he wants is 'fanatics' or 'zealots' -- and I"d like him to explain how this shows that we are 'safer here because we're fighting them over there'. Yeah, I can see how the War on Terra has made us safer. Yup. Fuckwit.

Can you imagine how much more successful we would be finding and breaking these plots if we weren't squandering money and time in Iraq? We might actually be able to circumvent terror plots instead of settling in as a long-term occupying force in a country that had nothing to do with our actual attackers. Think about it. Putting money into actual intelligence work (and paying attention to the results!) would be far more effective and cost a lot fewer lives.

The tinfoil hat sector has suggested that the hoopla around this incident (not the incident itself, mind you, just the rabid, frothing response) is calculated to play the FEAR FEAR FEAR card just before elections. At some level, somewhere, I'm sure someone thought of that. Over the weekend, there was a report that we were on Yellow Alert level -- I was bemused by this, since yellow is where we've been for the last three years and it's not news. Today, we're at Orange (or is it red now?) and the UK is on critical alert. The British discussed this with the US over the weekend, but did not act until yesterday -- when they were sure they could get the suspects.

Does it say something about me that I have 1000 times more trust in the British to deal with this in a competent and realistic way than anyone in the US government responding to this? The banners on the newschannels are really annoying "Terror in the Air!" crows Fox, and articles that this is a "reminder that we're at war". Oh, yes. Step right up and give up a little more of your freedom so that we can make you safe!

[From TalkingPoints Memo] Also a pretty stark reminder that President Bush's War on Terror, the way he's chosen to fight it, is at best irrelevant to combatting this sort of danger. These are homegrown Brits apparently trying to blow up planes over the Atlantic. Good thing we've got a 150,000 or so troops in Iraq to take the fight to them.

And more here -- a very good, critical view of why this is a condemnation of the War or Terra! and not a sign that we should redouble our efforts and "stay the course".

I'm glad I'm not travelling right now. But will any of this stop me from travelling in the future? Nope. I'll just be more annoyed by the security measures and pissed that I can't bring books on the plane.

Black Sheep

Anyone who has done tech work will understand the following joke (and may even think it's funny). Everyone else? Well, this is just going to confirm that we're weird.

A project manager, a developer, and a tester are riding on a train in Scotland. Along the way, they pass a black sheep grazing placidly in a field.

The project manager says, "Hey look! The sheep in Scotland are black."

The developer scoffs and says, "Nah, at least one of the sheep in Scotland is black. Maybe more."

The tester shakes his head and says, "To the best of my perception, there is at least one sheep in Scotland which is black on the side facing us."

OK, it made me laugh.

Take the Quiz

This was fun. The New Yorker has a quiz on Bush's Twentieth Hundred Days.

Including:

19. Which of these words were among the top ten responses in a Pew Research Center poll that asked voters for the first word that came to mind when they think about George W. Bush?

(a) “Decisive,” “charming,” “brilliant,” and “truthful.”

(b) “Booze,” “cocaine,” “failure,” and “smirk.”

(c) “Illegitimate,” “simian,” “hotheaded,” and “torture.”

(d) “Incompetent,” “idiot,” “liar,” and “ass.”

Actually, the quiz is pretty interesting, and you have to have been paying attention pretty well to who says what and reading the news (not just listening to it). It's still a sharp criticism of Bush, but it's a relatively intelligent one.

New MS Office

I admit, while I will always jump on a chance to dis Microsoft as the Evil Empire, I also am a dedicated user -- there is simply no alternative that provides the same breadth of functionality and integration.

I've used Wordperfect, and was forced to use the truly horrendous OpenOffice on several occasions. Despite thinking that Microsoft hasn't created a truly original thing in years, it's the defacto standard.

Anyway -- MS ha a new version of the Office Suite coming out (Office 2007) which is currently in Beta testing. However, they've offered something very different this time: the ability to see how things work by logging in to a remote desktop and actually running the applications over the web (technically, it's in Citrix, and requires a downloadable plugin to the IE browser, but it does run in the browser quite seamlessly). Quite cool. You don't need to install any applications on your machine, and you can see and tinker with all the new UI pieces.

People are Stupid

Ok, this really annoyed me. Five meerkats at the Minnesota Zoo had to be killed for rabies testing because some kid ignored the barriers, fence, rocks, and plexiglass partition and got bitten.

First off, the girl had to climb over rocks and circumvent a four foot plexiglass barrier -- which must have taken some time and where in the hell were her parents? Isn't a 9-year old girl old enough to understand the concept of "fence"? Or that you aren't supposed to actually touch the animals in the zoo?

And then,

The meerkats — two adults and their three babies born in spring — were vaccinated for rabies, but state health protocol required that they be killed and tested because the girl's parents didn't want her to undergo a series of six painful rabies shots.

Wah. The parents couldn't be bothered to actually watch their kid or teach her properly, and then demanded the destruction of the animals because it would be difficult for their pweshious baybee to have to pay the consequences for her actions. Give me a break.

The girl had to work to get her hand inside the enclosure. Zoo officials said she must have crawled over a driftwood barrier, climbed up more than 3 feet of artificial rock and reached over 4 feet of Plexiglas to get her arm into the exhibit.

Because meerkats stand just a foot tall on their hind legs, she had to have dangled her hand low for an animal to bite her finger, they said.

People are so f-ing stupid. I am reminded of people here in Colorado who approach buffalo or rutting bull elk to get pictures with their kids "because they're cute", or the aprocryphal tale of a parent smearing honey on a kids arm to get the bear to lick them.

Hey, people, take responsibility for your own actions.

Customization Run Amok

Did you know that you can get M&Ms with custom messages?

For around $12 for an 8 oz. bag (minimum of four bags, for $45) you can put up to sixteen characters on two colors of M&Ms. They even offer little tins or festive bags so that you could use them as party favors.

You've always been able to order bags of a single color, or get custom-mixed bags of M&Ms for special occassions, but I didn't know you could get custom messages put on them. Huh.

And, there are 21 colors available (way more than the normal bags contain). I could get a five pound bag of purple M&Ms for only $50.

Millionaire Voters

In a rather bizarre approach to getting people into the voting booths, Arizona is considering making general elections into 1 million dollar lotteries.

So far, it look slike this will be on the ballot in November.

Mark Osterloh, who has spearheaded the measure onto the ballot, says "it's just like religion: Sometimes incentives are necessary.

"What does God say? Do what you're supposed to do and I will reward you with eternal life in heaven," he said. "The only thing we're saying is do what you're supposed to do with voting and we'll reward you with a chance to win a million dollars."

Well, I for one think it's a horrid idea -- we have enough people who are uninformed and generally ignorant of political issues and candidates who are voting based on soundbites or whether they think one of the candidates is handsomer/prettier than the other. Do we really want the yahoos who would only be interested in voting if they nmight get something for it, to be voting?

There are arguments that it's patently illegal. Federal statues prohibit offering money or giftst to to someone to vote or to change their vote, or for taking money to do either of those things.

Frankly (and unfortuantely also illegally), I think that voters should have to show some basic understanding of the issues and candidates before voting. It should be an essay question, or something. If you can't actually summon a single fact about the person you're voting for, you should have to take a remedial course, or something.

It's hard to stay informed. There is no way you can be a passive receptor of news (from radio or tv) and actually be well informed. You have to actually invest the time and effort to look for alternate viewpoints and accurate information about the issues.

Miami Pirates..

In the last two weeks, we've gone to see Pirates of the Caribbean and Miami Vice -- both movies had wildly varying reviews, from "best movie ever" to "dreck!"

I loved the first Pirates movie, so I had high expectations of the sequel. Unfortunately, it suffers from the same malady of many 2nd movies...too slow, too long, and just not as engaging as the first. Dead Man's Chest is really just a two-hour trailer for the next movie (which, if Hollywood karma stays true, will be a good one). Oh, the movie is fun enough -- there are some amusing moments, the special effects are pretty good, Johnny Depp's Captain Jack Sparrow is as weird and oddly effiminate as ever.

But the new villains are just...gross. Seriously. I was actually squicked out by the bad guys -- they were just too icky and gruesome that it almost overwhelmed their actual role as bad guys. The skeletons-in-the-moonlight guys of the first movie were startling and fascinating to watch. The sea-mutants of this movie? Bleagh. Expecially for someone with a serious phobia about sea-creatures with legs.

It also confirmed my belief that while Orlando Bloom is lovely to look at, he doesn't have a whole lot of depth and Kiera Knightly doesn't actually have any facial expressions, just a weird hollow-cheeked protruding jaw thing going for her. None of them actually had much to do in the movie anyway: the choppy storyline never really gave them a purpose.

Miami Vice was a surprise. I liked it, but it's definitely an explosions-and-gunfire movie with only a passing relationship to the iconic television show. The movie is dark, grainy, and the whole things seems to be shot at night in smog. The bantering relationship between Crockett and Tubbs is not there (probably because you can't actually have Jamie Foxx -- who has an Oscar -- play a sidekick. Still, he seems to have only about thirty lines in the movie, most of which are devoted to professing undying loyalty to his partner.

The whole movie is more a modern interpretation of the series than an homag, and it's missing the spiffy clothes and Miami scenery (it's storming the entire time). The music is good, though, as we expected. The Adorable Husband enjoyed it (and the audience had a couple of "Yeah!" moments when the bad-buys bought it). Since Colin Farrel does actually get naked in the movie for a few moments, I was happy enough. Yes, I'm shallow.

I think we'll stick with watching Netflix movies downstairs. We can always fast-forward through the boring bits.

Far-reaching Hurrican Victims

More old news resurfacing, with an interesting twist..

Remember a few months ago when a WH advisor was caught "shoplifting"? There was some murmur that it was "someone else" (possibly his twin brother?), and that it was a mistake and all the rest of the normal platitudes of someone caught doing something wrong.

At the time, Mr. Allen denied the charges through his lawyer and said there had been a mix-up concerning his credit card. The accusations included at least 25 efforts to collect refunds on goods he never bought.

Lost control twenty-five times? Yeah, right.But it's his excuse that really made my jaw drop:

His excuse? He's a Katrina Victim. His job and his life were so stressful in the aftermath of the hurricane that he succumbed to the urge to steal. Mind you, he doesn't live in any place affected by the storm, he was in Washington and doing his job as an influential policy advisor. A position from which he has since resigned, thankfully. It's old news, but this surfaced again today in a New York Times article:

Former White House adviser Claude Allen tearfully pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor theft charge Friday, telling a Montgomery County judge that he lost his bearings after working 14-hour days and getting little sleep in the "tumultuous time" after Hurricane Katrina.

"Something did go very wrong," said Allen, who began crying during his remarks to the court. "I failed to restrain myself ... I did not appreciate what was going on."

How many of us have "failed to restrain ourselves" when faced with such urges? As a kid I stole a piece of candy from a local store. My mother marched me back and made me apoligize and pay for the candy and pretty much humiliated me. At seven, that had a serious impact on me. Apprently Mr. Allen never quite learned that lesson and his "control" is so weak that he has to steal. More than twenty-five times.

And it's not "shoplifting" -- let's at least be correct here: What he did was buy an item (from an expsensive DVD player all the way down to items costing less than five bucks), take it to his car, then return to the store with the receipt. There, he picked up another of the same item and returned it. This wasn't spur-of-the-moment theft, this was planned and executed fraud to the tune of roughly $5K.

There is still a theory that it really was his Evil Twin, and that he took the rap to keep his brother (who has a history of legal problems) from doing hard time. It's a story so odd it might actually be true.

BAD Travel Karma

That's its. I surrender. I don't want to travel anymore. ever.

I'm out in Chicago teaching a class today and tomorrow. I rather like doing this, so I signed on to do this several weeks ago. But, after the fiasco of driving in Boston, I should have learned. I should have known that travelling ANYWHERE was going to be a big mistake.

Let's start the beginning: I decided to travel in the evening (8:55 flight) . Why I decided to do this is entirely beyond me. I'm not billable at a client right now, I could have flown out at noon and spend a leisurely evening reading a book. But no, I decided to wait until evening to fly so Ic ould have dinner with the Adorable Husband. Mistake number one.

Then -- since he is on call and can't take me to the airport, I drove myself, intending to park in the ramp for two days. The ramps and close-in lots are FULL. So full, infact, that they have someone routing traffic around the entrance to them and aren't even letting people in to try. I usually ignore the LOT FULL signs because someone is always leaving. I might end up parking on the top floor in the last spot, but I usually ge ta spot. No go. So I go back out to the remote parking lot, about fifteen minutes away.

The lot is the size of Iowa and I end up parking waaaay out in the lot, about a block from the nearest shuttle bus pick up point. WHen I get there, it starts to rain. And I mean Inundation. It was actually hard to drive, my wipers couldn't keep up. I sat in the car with the rain pounding down and thought, "Well, I'll just wait until the rain stops. It never rains for long."

Twenty minutes later, sstill sitting in the now-fogging car, I realized that if I didn't get intot he airport, I'd probably miss my plane. So, taking one long, last look at the thundering rainstorm, I grabbed my bag and ran for it.

By the time I got to the bus stop, I was soaked through. COmpletely drenched, from head to toe. My shoes squelched, my hair was dripping, I had damp and clammy underwear.

As I was standing there squeezing four gallons of water out of my hair and out of my shirt...

it stopped raining.

Steaming gently, I stood in line to go through security -- which, at 8pm at night was half-closed and slower than I've ever seen it. I finally cleared security at 8:10, five minutes after my plane was supposed to start boarding. The train ride is about 5 minutes and I bolted for the gate...to discover that it was running just slightly late. Yeah!

A stop in the bathroom where I managed to at least change into a dry shirt and sort of towel-dry my hair. I look like a dead rat. My pants are still soaking wet, and I now have a rolled up polo shirt in my bag that is leaving wet spots on the outside as it drains.

Into the plane about 45 minutes late. Back away from the gate. Sit. There is Weather all over the eastern seaboard that is slowing traffic. My airplane seat is now wet and my damp underwear is getting mighty uncomfortable and chafing. We finally take off.

And circle for an hour in Nebraska, because of the weather. THe nie pilot comes on and explains that they have closed down O'Hare and Midway because of lightning and we're in a holding pattern. Fifteen minutes later...the holding pattern is broken so we can land in Rockford and refuel.

Two hours later -- after sitting on the tarmac in Rockford -- we take off and head into Chicago, landing at approximately 3:10am. Along with several hundred other people whose planes were delayed. People are sleeping on cots in the airport. At this point, too tired to even see straight, I head to pick up a rental car.

It is to laugh. The rental counter is closed. They close at midnight. There is NO WAY to get a car ( I called, and the rude person at Thrifty told me I should have arrived earlier). YOu'd think that if they close the aiport at 10 and reopen at about 1am that the car rental places would figure out that all those people who wanted cars were going to show up between 1am and 4am, right? They don't care.

I was so tired that I was flummoxed by the closed car rental place and called the Adorable Husband, waking him from a sound sleep to tell me what I was supposed to do. (I did apologize later!). "Get a cab, honey." Oh, oh yea! I can get a cab.

I have eighty bucks in cash, no ATM card (and the line at the ATM was about 30 people long) so I just get outside (into the incredibly hot and humid CHicago evening) and stand with 275 other people to a cab. Forty minutes later, after confirming that a ride should cost no more than 70 bucks (premium for after midnight, and premium for going ot the suburbs) I get a cab and a rather crabby gentleman who is a wee bit put out that I want to go to Lombard.

Handing over all of my cash to the cabbie at approximately 4:45 am, I check into my hotel room and lay down just in time for the Serious Thunderstorm that rattles the windows and sets off tornado warning sirens. I remember thinking that if there was a tornado, I probably woudln't have to teach, and falling asleep a bit after five.

The alarm went off about four seconds later (ok, not until 6:30, but it certainly felt like four seconds) and I dragged myself to the office to set up the class by 7:30. I can only hope that things will get better!

The Onion strikes again

Very funny article in The Onion today (If you don't know, the Onion is a SPOOF, a satire, a parody of the real news -- which often are mistaken for "real" news because they tend to be, well, plausible.)

In a decisive 1–0 decision Monday, President Bush voted to grant the president the constitutional power to grant himself additional powers

"As president, I strongly believe that my first duty as president is to support and serve the president," Bush said during a televised address from the East Room of the White House shortly after signing his executive order. "I promise the American people that I will not abuse this new power, unless it becomes necessary to grant myself the power to do so at a later time."

Sometimes, parody hits a little bit close to home.

Seller's Remorse?

Don't buy a truck from Bill Heard Chevrolet in Tennessee (or in any other state, for that matter).

Apparently, a gentleman names Kieselhorst bought a 2003 truck from the dealership, negotiated a price, signed a contract, paid cash plus his trade-in, and drove his new car home.

Just one day after he bought the truck, a salesman from Bill Heard called to say the dealership was having second thoughts about the deal.

He told Kieselhorst that if he wanted to keep his truck, he needed to fork over another $10,000 -- something he refused to do. After all, he says, they had a signed deal.

So the dealership STOLE THE TRUCK. As a matter of fact, after demanding another $11,000 on the second call, they have the truck for sale on the lot.

Let me get this straight: the dealership made the deal, accepted the cash, and then decided that they didn't like the sale price? So they demanded more money. And when they didn't get it, they decided to take the truck back. They claim they were "hoodwinked" by Keiselhorst's wife.

"This is the way this company does business," Calligan [reporter] says. "They really thought they would be able to pull a fast one on their customer."

After we tried to get their side for days, Bill Heard faxed us a statement just before air time, saying that Kieselhorst "should have known" that the deal he got was too good to be true

So far, they haven't returned his money, and the DA won't press charged because it is a "civil matter", because it is a contract dispute. Sorry, but if I have the paperwork and a signed contract, and someone -- anyone -- takes the car, it's THEFT. It's not like they even had the gray area of "financing didn't come through" or something like that. They just wanted more money.

Every talk radio station in the country picked this up -- our local station had call-ins from people who had had the same kind of experience here in Denver (including the threat of a felony lawsuit if they didn't pony up another $3K after the sale was finished). I doubt that Bill Heard Chevrolet expected the kind of publicity they got from this.

Of course, even a cursory search of the name in Google revealed that the "largest Chevrolet dealer in the country" has a long history of this kind of fraudulent behavior in other states as well. Hm.