For about $8.50, I bought a cable from Radioshack that enables me to connect my laptop or Ipod to my stero. I had been pining for this $150 dock that would have given me a remote control, Ipod charging and on my tv screen display. But, for $142, I figure I can get my lazy butt up and change songs on the Ipod itself.
It amazes me that pretty much any song I can think of can now be downloaded over my wifi network to my laptop and then playing over my stereo in a matter of minutes. That may be old hat to most people, but I think it’s pretty cool.
Psychology Today reports a source of happiness. Surely this effect isn’t just limited to women.
The finding that women who do not use condoms during sex are less depressed and less likely to attempt suicide than are women who have sex with condoms and women who are not sexually active, leads one researcher to conclude that semen contains powerful-and potentially addictive-mood-altering chemicals.
This calls for more research!
This post removed as being insensitive and inappropriate. I regret posting it.
Hopefully, I’m not being overly ambitious. First, I decided I needed new dining room furniture. So, a new table is on the way; the chairs are already here. Then I thought new bedroom furniture would be nice. So, a king size bed, mattress and box springs, bedside table and dresser are to be delivered in the next couple of days. In order to accommodate all that, I have to clean out the 3rd bedroom, currently being used as an office and get rid of stuff and furniture I no longer have space for.
After that, I decided that replacing the carpet in the living room and dining room with hardwood floors would be great. That, of course, means the existing hardwood in the entryway/hallway also has to be replaced so that it all matches. Then, I figured the counters in the kitchen would look better if they were granite and the floors would be improved if there were ceramic or travertine tile. Finally, I’m pretty sure one wall in the living room and all four walls in the dining room would look better in a different color.
But, there is no finally on things like this. I’ll probably decide that the granite counters would look better with a different type of sink, not drop in. And that will lead to a new faucet. Then the new dining room table will probably want a new light shining over head.
Oh, and in the mean time, I think I want screens for all the windows (the architect didn’t like how they looked and didn’t include them). Also, I have seven really high windows that bring in lots of light and heat. A 3m window film should shut out much of the UV rays and heat that is trying to fade everything they touch.
The worst part of all this is the decisions. Picking colors and materials can be a bit of a nightmare.
Here’s to hoping I can get the new bedroom furniture up the stairs and around the corners.
I wonder what it would be like if gays could serve openly in the military? If only we had someone else would try it first and tell us how it worked out. Of course, it would have to be a pretty decent military, not some sissy country like (insert your favorite sissy country here, I nominate France). Oh, wait. Some pretty good militaries have tried it. Back in 2000, the British military was forced by the EU to accept homosexuals serving openly. According to this NY Times story:
The biggest news about the policy, they say, is that there is no news. It has for the most part become a nonissue.
Nine of the nations which have sent troops to Iraq and 12 nations which have sent troops to Afghanistan allow gays and lesbians to serve openly in their militaries. (Report here.) Over twenty nations, including Israel, allow gays to serve openly. Why don’t we just ask them how its been going?
In the meantime, we should acknowledge that thousands of gays and lesbians are serving in our military. I personally am aware of several folks who have been on active duty in Iraq who were out to their squad or knew that someone they served with was gay.
It’s time to dump the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy for some common sense.
Some people shouldn’t be trusted with guns. On the other hand, at least this trooper wasn’t having sex with a porn star and using a camera from his cruiser to record it.
Happy Birthday to Me! So far, I’ve just been running errands, working and regretting that over the last three months I’ve wasted most of my hard work at the gym. Oh well. So many other changes are afoot that I can just focus on those for a bit.
Gov. Bredesen wants to add 40 cents to the taxes on a pack of cigarettes and earmark most of the money for education. As a selling point, he and his fellow Democrats argue that the tax increase will discourage minors from smoking. Baloney. Kids who smoke are already accustomed to dealing with additional hurdles in obtaining a product that is illegal for them to purchase. Making it slightly more expensive will add nothing to the challenge. And, 40 cents isn’t enough to discourage any one from purchasing cigarettes. The Exxon station near my house sells packs of Malboro lights for $2.79 per pack, when you buy two. Moving that price to $3.19 won’t discourage anyone from making the buy.
Cigarettes are a legal product which should be taxed at the exact same rate as every other product. The tax code should be there to raise revenue, not for back door social engineering. So called sin taxes are government at its worst. The nanny state shakes its finger in your face for doing something then profits off that very behavior. If the government wanted to end smoking without outlawing it, the feds would stop all tobacco subsidies and the state would raise the per pack tax to $100. Failure to take such truly decisive action shows that our elected officials only care about posturing and simultaneously pleasing opposing constituencies.
Let people make their own decisions, even if they are bad. Simplify the tax code. Return government budget surpluses to the people from whom the money was forcibly taken.
All of those folks expressing glee at the Rev. Jerry Falwell’s death should be ashamed of themselves. Didn’t their mothers teach them any manners? Rev. Falwell was in many ways a negative influence, in my opinion, on American politics. But, not everything he did was bad or done with malicious intent. Tap dancing on the barely cold body of a dead minister lacks class.
For as long as I can remember, my mother has had two pieces of wisdom that I’ve heard hundreds of times. The first one was, “You’ve got to make excuses for people. You never know why they act the way they do.” That has been a difficult nugget to hold on to. When people do stupid or mean things, or at least things I see as stupid or mean, I tend to want to call them on it and perhaps call them a few names. She would always suggest that they might be having a bad day or they might be distracted. Her patience with others is enduring.
The other bit of wisdom could follow when the first one didn’t pan out. “It takes all kind of people to make a world.”
How true.
