The research can be long and arduous, but...

In this country, we at least have the chance to freely speak our minds and be represented. That's one of the things that makes this country great. To that end, it is sometimes useful to know what our elected officials are considering.

I stumbled across a virtual treasure trove of currently active legislation while going through the Senate's website. Click here (for the current session of Congress) to check it out. After that, all that is required is to contact your Senator or Representative with your thoughts. An easier way is to sign up for the occasional (supposed to be weekly) e-mail at congress.org's "congress.org to go" page. You'll receive an e-mail covering recent and upcoming votes by your Senators and Representative. That avoids a great deal of the legwork involved. However, it is much more brief. I still firmly believe that our style of government has a better chance of working correctly when people interact with their elected officials...

To all you moms out there...

Happy mother's day!

I'm sure that I still can't possibly fathom what kind of stress I caused my mother as a moderate hellion (at least after high school). Thanks for doing a great job...

Suzanne has gone to visit her great and vast ancestral lands in Boaz/Albertville with her dad today. They intend to visit cemeteries and remember relatives who have passed on. I intend to get some good sleep. I missed her before she left this morning because I was a few minutes late leaving work. C'est la vie!

Last week, I read a story in the news and then heard a story on NPR about a new project to catalogue and act as a reference for all of the currently known 1.8 million species of life on Earth. If this project eventually lives up to the hype, it sounds as if it will be an amazing piece of work. Check out some of the demo pages. You've got to love the internets! I do.

As always, y'all have a good day and be sure to come back!

I feel so energized this morning...

However, it's about time to make the attempt to crash. I'm not sure when the second wind hit me, but I was even feeling great at work this morning. Heck, one dude even told me to quit acting so happy. I can't! Besides, one more night and then I'll have a wonderful day off. I almost don't know what to do with myself on those days off...

Want an interesting set of completely contrasting views? One is from a psycho and one is from W. Check these two things out:

As-Sahab Video of Third Interview with Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri – 5/2007

President's Radio Address from 05/05/07

See y'all. I'm outta here...

Whewww!

Thankfully, the whole sleep thing worked out much better today. Yesterday it was only three hours. That's partially what led me to renege on the cigarette thing. My intention (road to hell and all) is that that will ONLY be for the time being. I feel bad about that, but my willpower lost out to the insomnia. I gave it the old college try and the next attempt is coming shortly. As Yoda would say, "No. Try not. Do... or do not. There is no try."

Well, shoot....

It's 10:30 AM here and I should be well into the arms of Morpheus but...

Here I am. The same thing happened yesterday. I'll probably surpass the sleep I got then or at least I hope so. I thought I had adjusted to the night shift fairly well. Perhaps my brain's not telling me to wind down enough. I suppose that something's changed...

Well, I guess that I'd better give the sleep thing another shot. Wish me luck, y'all.

As always, the day off was a great one...

I had some sweet downtime and we went to Outback and had a tasty dinner...

On a more serious note, let's not forget that four years ago today, the "mission" was "accomplished". As always, when I rant about that kind of thing here, it's not a slight to our military. It's a slight to the leadership of this country and their inability to grasp the reality of the situation at hand (particularly back then). They've done better recently by having more sober assessments of the way things are going.

Back to the grind tonight...

Mmm-mmmm good...

It's almost time for another day off. I tend to look for the good in things and I remember that we are well over halfway done....

Carlos Mencia had a great bit on his show last week (4-22). He usually has some great stuff on the show, but this tied right back to something I mentioned here. This one was also wonderful. I was especially fond of the "priest". At least I didn't have to jump through hoops to see the video. Some sites make life a total pain in the butt for people who use non-Microsoft products.

Y'all have fun! And don't forget the new episode of Gene Simmons Family Jewels tonight...

Yee-haaaaaw!

OK, it's been (as of about nine this morning) a week free of the nico-beast. I smoked about a carton a week. That's a little over thirty bucks. If you believe these numbers, that's about 2200 minutes I didn't take away from my life (at 11 minutes a smoke). That's the most important part to me...

Well, ladies and gents, it's time to run. We have to go catch our best friends (and their ever-enjoyable kiddies) for breakfast. Mmmmm, breakfast......

Y'all come back now....

For your viewing pleasure....

Here are the folks I was tied up in a classroom with at Browns Ferry from Jan. 2006 to Feb. 2007.



They were a pretty damn fine group of people. Hope none of them object to being put online...

Tonight I kind of got to wondering...

how these beasties are doing. I know about the cat. She has taken to meowing frequently...

All in all, just another average day...

Come home, see Suzanne for a very little bit, and attempt to crash...

Unfortunately, today's sleep was interrupted in the middle. Once I was up, I found other things to do for an hour. Heck, Steven Wright was on TV for a while. That guy cracks me up...

No cigarettes yet! In fact, it's getting easier. But as always, it will still be a long road ahead. Such is life...

Wow, Wal-Mart was NOT very exciting at 3AM...

At least I got everything I think I require for a few days. I'm actually happy to have gotten out of the house because jackin' around on the computer or checkin' out the boob tube just wouldn't have cut it. Boredom really makes my mouth yearn for some nicotine, but I haven't broken yet. I think I'm truly feeling all of the right motivation this time...

It's going on 2-1/2 days...

You might ask for what....

I've decided that it's high time that I made a real attempt at quitting smoking. I've half-ass tried a few times over the years, but this time feels different. It seems like I have much more desire right now. MUCH MORE! I haven't fired one up since Saturday morning. The crazy thing is that there's not a whole lot of withdrawal anxiety yet. It might come....

Tonight will provide an interesting test of my willpower because I will be absolutely bored most of the night (except for the planned 3AM trip to Wal-Mart). I think that it'll go just fine...

I can't remember the last time...

I slept for 6 hours and felt über-refreshed. I am satisfied...

Though at least a few people at work think I'm an odd bird (particularly for wearing a kilt)....

It's a ways off, but...

In future elections, a great thing to ask a candidate (legislative or executive) would be how they would prevent us from getting into a war that seemingly has no end. Though it's in the past, the Congress relinquished their power to declare war with their open-ended allowance for the President in 2002. I would love to be reasonably assured that the Congress will probe harder the next time. Hillary has been getting hammered for her vote a little bit on the campaign trail. The questioning should continue and grow for the incumbents who voted yea back in 2002...

I finally changed the CD in my car out. I was kickin' it to Prodigy on the way into work last night. I hadn't listened to Firestarter for quite some time...

I'm tired as heck so I'm out of here. Y'all have fun!

This is the worst part of having a day off during the night shift...

I am almost fully acclimated to the hours again, but finding something to do in the wee hours of the morning can be rough. At least there's interaction with other people at work. I do kind of miss (from my last plant, Quad Cities) the ability to work on my off night. Back then, I'd do eight hours so I could see Suzanne before I went in. We did have fun today. We met our best friends for a good dinner at TGIFriday's. One strange thing was succumbing to the sleepy monster around 11PM or so. I didn't figure that I would be able to sleep after I had a triple shot espresso beverage from Starbuck's around 9:30. Fortunately, it was a short nap....

I am still thoroughly captivated! VNV's CD has some awesome stuff....

My ennui led me to read some of the news. I thought that one cool story was about one of Scott McNealy's ventures. It's called Curriki. Another related concept is Open CourseWare. Very cool ideas...

In closing:

Words cannot express the sorrow I (and many other people) feel about the horrible events at Virginia Tech yesterday. I hope for the quickest possible healing for everyone involved.

It feels so good to be alive (not that it ever felt bad)...

I do believe that I'm finally getting into the groove of nights. It's about time. Concerning restfulness, yesterday and the day before were atrocious. I think I'm getting my vamp back on now...

April's been fairly cool so far (wetaher-wise). I haven't been following the weather from where we were in Illinois. I was kind of hoping that it would be consistently warmer here. We had a decent stretch of warmth in March. The heat will come...

Is it time for new internets? Some of these people think so...

http://cleanslate.stanford.edu
http://100x100network.org
http://orbit-lab.org
http://geni.net

Well folks, the time has come. See ya....

I'm obsessed!

Please click read more...

I suppose that it may have been inevitable given my nature. I find something that I absolutely love and become completely fixated. I have not listened to any other music (save for the country music radio that Suzanne made me listen to in the car the other night) since I purchased Judgement on Saturday evening. When I discover something of beauty (lest we forget, eye of the beholder), I focus on it to discover every nuance and analyze exactly what it is that I find so enthralling. I must be weird...

I'm hoping that my sparse amount of sleep today doesn't kick my booty around three in the morning. It's a strange day when I don't sleep well...

Well, if this first day is any indication (no, I haven't even gone in yet)....

I was correct in remembering just how much of a lifesucker the nights can be. Not in terms of sleep....

I actually slept very well. In fact, I got down just before Suzanne woke up. Therein lies the rub. I won't really see her until the weekend. She works here in the daytime. I'll see her on Saturday, Sunday, and my day off on Monday.

It could be worse. As I've told several people in the past, I tend to look at these things relatively. Unlike my time on an aircraft carrier, I still come home every day. There's a lot to be said for the sacrifice of military folks. And let's not forget those who support the military, either. Some of them have to be gone from home quite a bit as well.

I suppose I'd better get stirring now. I have to get ready. Y'all have fun....

I hadn't followed the Imus thing much...

In fact, today was the first time I heard any of the uproar. I would like to hope that I wouldn't have said something like that. But...

I'm guilty of helping to perpetuate a double standard regarding racially charged material. I frequently watched Chapelle's Show and I still enjoy Mind of Mencia. Over dinner on Sunday night, I was noting to Suzanne how Carlos Mencia wouldn't get away with some of the things he says if he was a white male. I've never heard Sharpton raise hell about Chapelle or Mencia. That's no excuse for what Imus said. But it's still a double standard...

Imus has apolgized. He will take a public flaying. However, in light of other racially questionable material that continues to air without a ruckus, I hope that Imus doesn't get the boot...