what a noble gesture!

CNN.com - Bush to return to Washington early - Aug 30, 2005

wow! bush is cutting his vacation short by two days to deal with the katrina disasters. I guess the 5 weeks wasn't enough. do you realize he's spent almost a year of his 5 in office in crawford? granted, i'm sure he's working while he's there, but please. he vacations more that the french ... who he seems to have such disdain for. he talks about america, american values, blah blah blah. well mr president, why don't you vacation like most americans, 2 weeks or less. we work more that the japanese, if you believe it

where can i get some grass?

Boston Red Sox : Fan Forum : Championship Sod

Ok, I think the owners are trying to squeeze just a little too much revenue from the stadium. What's next, the jock strap sale? "Get the cup Carl Everett grabbed in 2000 after homering against the Yanks!"

toyotas

why are toyota commercials consistently SO BAD? first there was the friggin guy who was on for like 10 years. then there was that friggin face on the tv. i absolutely hated those commercials. then they had all those summer ones this year with that song! (summer ... you can't be blue ... just be you, and dooooo what you do). i guess it worked since i know the words. that one pissed me off. people frolicking at the beach because they just got a great deal on a tacoma.

i still hate bob's discount furniture more though. what a fraud. "c'mon down and do bob's swivel dance ... " ask my sister about his "quality" furniture

don't tread on me?

wtf happened to 311?  this album kinda blows.  you know when they dedicate a song to the "old school fans" and they play "down" that you're in trouble.  no homebrew? lucky? my stoney baby?

the age of diddy is upon us

CNN.com - Now he's just plain 'Diddy' - Aug 18, 2005

the 'diddy' era is upon us. i think i can now measure how long i've been out of college by iterations of sean combs' name. when i used to frequent that same bar that barnesanova mentioned in his post today, he was puff daddy. then came 'puffy', followed by 'p diddy' and now of course, just 'diddy'.

i saw in another article that one of the reasons was that some fans were chanting "diddy" at his shows and some "p diddy" and it was just too confusing. i thought the troops in iraq had it tough.

get that man a sugar cookie (for all you chappelle fans)

the bomb

with it being early august, there's been a lot of stuff on tv about dropping the bombs on japan, especially since it was the 60th anniversary. when i was younger i didn't really think much about it, i just figured that it was something we did and it ended the war, not really putting too much thought into it.

even until this year i didn't really think about it too much until i started watching these shows. i keep going back and forth between whether or not it was a good idea. on the one hand, it killed a hell of a lot of people and set off an arms race that could mean the end of the civilization any minute. on the other hand, it probably saved the lives of millions of americans and japanese, both troops and citizens, and pehaps the country. the problem was that the line between soldiers and citizens was being blurred. the japanese were training the citizens, including small children, how to fight to the last man. an invasion of japan would have been very bloody. truman saw how hard it was to take iwo jima and okinawa, and wanted to avoid that on the mainland. he knew that it was "the most terrible weapon ever created," but decided using it was worth it.

it almost didn't end the war, the militarists wanted to fight to the last man, but in a rare moment of clarity hirohito knew the future of his country was at stake, and decided to surrender. the attitude of the militarists is probably more justification that it was a good idea.

i go back and forth daily on whether or not it was the right move. truman probably couldn't have predicted just how the arms race would go, though i'm sure he knew it would happen. if nothing else he had balls, and made a decision i think nobody would ever want to make. would prolonging the war and a much bigger loss of life have been worth not dropping the bomb? would it have stopped the arms race? probably not, as the bomb existed already and it was only a matter of time until other countries tried to catch up, and if we hadn't invented it, i'm sure someone else would of.

all things that i would never want to deal with, which why i'll never be president

rut

after feeling pretty good for a few months, i feel like i'm falling into a rut again, calling a lot of things in my life into question, like, where am i going, what am i doing, do i like my job, why did the summer go by so fast, and why did i basically do nothing, why am i unhappy for the most part, why am i gaining weight again?

i dunno, maybe it's just a phase, but i feel antsy. maybe it's the imminent season change, maybe that i still have a long road to go in my condo before i can move in (every 'little' project keeps giving more obsticles), or that i've not and have never really been comfortable in my own skin. good stuff

hey now ...

ok that was 2 serious posts in a row ....  back to reality

my ass absolutely stinks lately, like offendingly so.  i gotta figure that out.  i inadventantly bombed a customer out of her office i think...

success

granted i worked till 8:30 today, but it was one of those days where i felt pretty good about my work.  i'm definitely a work to live not live to work type, but occasionally i get into my work when it's interesting.  today was a day where we were able to accomplish a lot, and got some things working i never thought would work.

i've been at this job for over 6 years now, my first and only job out of college.  i've done a lot of interesting things, going to taiwan, travelling to several customer sites, going to conferences, teaching training classes, etc.  pretty standard job stuff for most people i would say.  every once in a while though i remember that my dad has never seen me in this phase of life.  unfortunately, he passed away about a month before i graduated college.  i had already accepted this job, so he knew i had it, but never to to see me working.  i think he really would have gotten a kick out of the machines i work with and the technology.  days like today are days i wish i could have called him and said "hey dad, guess what happened at work today ..."  i guess even to a lesser extent, i wish he could have seen a little bit of this phase of my life, my adult life.

old friends

i had someone i hadn't really talked to in like 3 years call me tonight.  unfortunately i couldn't talk to long, but it was cool nonetheless.  it's strange how it makes you feel though.  all of a sudden you start thinking about what your life was like when you last talked, what it's like now, and what's happened in between.  i also thought about when we first met in college, and what college life was like.  we even talked about how now we both feel old because we can't stay up past 11 anymore.  it seems that happened in an instant.  i held on to the college lifestyle long into my working years, having roommates, putting a movie in at 11 on a weeknight, going out on thursdays, but hen like a switch it stopped.  I worked till 8:30 today and I felt 90 when I left.