Is it a sign that I might be too geeky if I can check e-mail and browse the web in my house even though the power is out in my neighborhood?

Amusing quote about Pennsylvania: "Pennsylvania has been geographically described as Pittsburgh in the west, Philadelphia in the east, and Alabama in the middle." (On how Santorum manages to get reelected.)

And what's up with the Carl's Jr/Hardee's Paris Hilton commercial? I actually haven't seen it on T.V., but I did visit their Internet site to see what the fuss was about. Very effective commerical if you're trying to sell sex, cars, or car-washing equipment. The hamburger, though, was thrown in as an afterthought. It's almost like Carl's Jr was embarrassed to be associated with the commercial.

Not getting it. Then again, I don't get the appeal of Paris Hilton either. Skanky just isn't a turn-on.

I'm not smart enough...

... to be deciding who should be the judges, school board members, and coroner for my area.

Today was a primary election day in Pennsylvania. The most important parts, in my opinion, were referendums to eliminate some of the elected row offices here and allow the state to borrow $625M for environmental improvements.

However, there were also (in my district) various offices being decided. Now, of course I want the best people in those jobs. For a judge, however, that's a question of which candidates have a good understanding of and can apply the law fairly and won't bring the office into disrepute. I might be capable of deciding this by examining their criminal records and administering an exam written by the local bar association -- but all I have are their written statements. As for the school board, I'm happy with the way the district is being run and am content to leave well enough alone. Coroner? What the...? Do I look like a medical board? Does it matter whether the coroner is a Democrat or Republican?

Just how far do we want this to go? "Hi, I'm Dave Cuthbert, I'm a Republican running for Member of the Consulting Staff at Cadence Design Systems, I'm tough on software bugs, and I'd appreciate your vote today."

What's going on with my vision?

I don't really feel headache-y, maybe a bit tired, but I'm finding the light level in the office too bright. It's no brighter than normal, from what I can tell... but I'm still squinting like crazy. This is making it difficult to concentrate and get work done...

You know how various groups (e.g., Amnesty International) will recite the names of people killed or missing in certain events? (World Trade Center, Iraq war, political prisoners, etc.)

I propose that we get a group together to recite the numbers from A Million Random Digits With 100,000 Normal Deviates. Hmm... do you think we could get funding from the NEA for this?

Google has a job opening for a Software Engineer/Programming Instructor. A teaching position. At a company.

Joy!

Help.

I'm stuck in a telecon until 7pm, the people in San Jose are not talking into the phone, most of them have Indian accents, and they're talking about subjects I don't care about and using acronyms I don't understand.

On Thursday, I had both a letter and (nasty) phone call from the bank which holds my home equity loan, telling me they've turned it over to collections for non-payment, docked my credit rating, and will (eventually) initiate foreclosure proceedings.

WTF? Not only am I not late on my payments, I've been prepaying the loan and was paid up through July.

I called, and they looked over the records. Oh, they said, it looks like there might be an error from when they acquired the old bank back in October. But that's not their fault, they said, the problem lies in the old bank's records.

After much yelling with the asshole in collections, I got them to review the records. I later got a phone call stating that they did me a favor by correcting them. (Yeah, screw you, too.)

On Monday, I'm signing paperwork to transfer the loan to my normal bank (National City), where I keep my checking and savings accounts and where they actually know me. It'll cost me about $30 extra per month, and there's a chance I might have to pay some closing fees, but you know... it makes me feel so much better to not be doing business with an unethical bank.