Musings from Brian J. Noggle
Friday, February 01, 2008
 
Another Fancy Headline Juxtaposition
Following the "coincidence" yesterday, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch identifies another suspicious bit of serendipity:

McCain, Foul Play in Chesterfield
Click for full size
I'm beginning to see a sordid pattern in the behavior of our elected officials and their visits to the Midwest.


- posted by Brian J. @ 9:09 PM   1 comments
 
So Who's Trying To Remove The Middle East From The Internet?
Third undersea Internet cable cut in Mideast:
    An undersea cable carrying Internet traffic was cut off the Persian Gulf emirate of Dubai, officials said Friday, the third loss of a line carrying Internet and telephone traffic in three days.

    Ships have been dispatched to repair two undersea cables damaged on Wednesday off Egypt.
Someone said boat anchors were doing it. Doing it effectively, I would say.


- posted by Brian J. @ 4:11 PM   0 comments
Thursday, January 31, 2008
 
Bring Your Own Handgun, Please
Police seek help in shooting of elderly woman

Doughnuts and coffee will be provided, though.

- posted by Brian J. @ 4:58 PM   2 comments
 
I Don't Think So
Rightroots has a lot of balls.

They're like the McCain callers who hit me sometime in 2005, it seems, demanding my support or I'd get a Clinton presidency.

Now, this Rightroots band has started the F7 program, seeking pledges that Republicans will send money to whoever is the candidate on February 7, 2008. Or else I get Clinton or Obama.

Setting aside the fact that there won't actually be a candidate until the convention this summer, but I don't care about any of the remaining candidate for the candidacy.

This is the best our remaining candidates can offer the bulk of conservatives. That they're not Clinton or Obama. To me, either one is as bad--or worse--on domestic policies and slightly better on foreign policies in that I don't think they'll gut the military. That's what has me "sold" on one of these Republicans in the White House in 2008. That's hardly a ringing endorsement or a call to action for me.

I won't sit out the election, but I'm not going to jump on the Not Clinton or Not Obama bandwagon with any sort of fervor.

In 2000, I sent money and I volunteered for the candidate for president; in 2004, I sent money. But I have quite enough reservations about the remaining candidates. I am sure enough not going to waste my money or time in support of a candidate or a party with which I no longer agree.

The Rightroots and the Republicans better learn that its previous constituency was not composed of fall-in-line simpletons.

Here's my pledge: Not on damn dollar or hour. Again.


- posted by Brian J. @ 3:29 PM   0 comments
 
Book Report: Ranting Again by Dennis Miller (1998)
Wow, is this book really 10 years old? Man, I read the original book, The Rants only....12 years ago, I guess. Funny how those years condense in memory. I'm reading another book whose predecessor I read in my old house, probably 3 years ago, and that doesn't seem so far back.

Regardless, let's get to the book in hand. It collects Dennis Miller's monologues from his old HBO show which he got right after he left Saturday Night Live. All those years ago. They're seasoned with his allusions, which you get enough of to think yourself smart when you get them. He takes on the normal topical topics, like kids these days (which are now kids those days and adults now), politics, government, and relationships. The titles are broad and the topic matter, too, is broad, and somehow, it saddens me and comforts me that the rants could hold up today, a decade later. Particularly if you just change the name "Clinton" to "Clinton." We haven't come very far in this decade, but we haven't gotten much worse.

Additionally, it's odd to note that Dennis Miller, before 2001, sounds more like an intelligent Bill Maher politically than he does now. He says, I think, that he changed in 2001. I would say so.

Good, interesting reading worth a look.

Books mentioned in this review:

 

- posted by Brian J. @ 9:34 AM   0 comments
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
 
A Tax That Doesn't Sunset? You Don't Say!
Stadium tax might live on after 2014:
    The amount of sales-tax revenue distributed in 2007 to the Miller Park stadium district increased by only 1.8% over the previous year, raising new concerns the five-county tax will not be retired as hoped in 2014.
Which raises the distinct possibility that the stadium will be empty because the Milwaukee Brewers become the San Antonio Migrants or the stadium will be replaced to keep the Brewers in town before the sales tax is retired.

But you're telling me that taxes with expiration dates are more likely to stick around than tax cuts with expiration dates? This is a stunning turn of events, indeed!




- posted by Brian J. @ 7:38 PM   0 comments
 
So We Meat Again
The Meatriarchy returns.

The next time I update my sidebar, he'll be back on it. Also, I'll remove the dead man, the dead candidate, and the dead paper link.


- posted by Brian J. @ 4:23 PM   1 comments
 
Juxtaposition from the Kama Sutra
Birds of a feather, er, flock together:

Together at last
Click for full size



- posted by Brian J. @ 4:19 PM   0 comments
 
That Must Have Kept The Mediums Busy
Iraq conflict has killed a million Iraqis: survey

After all, dead men fill in no scanatron forms with number two pencils.


- posted by Brian J. @ 2:46 PM   0 comments
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
 
Heather Likes Bridges
Here are 18 Stunning Bridges From Around The World.

(Link seen on Dynamist Blog.)


- posted by Brian J. @ 7:08 PM   0 comments
Monday, January 28, 2008
 
Book Report: April Evil by John D. MacDonald (1955, ?)
As you might know, gentle reader, I am a great John D. MacDonald fan, and someday I hope to own all of these paperback originals. This one, written in the middle 1950s, deals with a bucolic Florida town near Tampa that has an old doctor who grew rich from land sales but kept the money, in cash, in his fortress like home. Word gets out, and some out of town hitters come looking for it at the same time as distant shirt-tail relations show up to sponge a bit and the niece-by-marriage hatches a plot to have the man committed.

The book switches points of view and really develops the individual characters in it. It seems slowly, almost, but it's not; the book runs only 191 pages and really ramps up to a good climax as the individual storylines come to a focal point. MacDonald does this well in his paperback originals, some of which I've already reviewed in this space (use the search bar, I'm too lazy to do it for you).

This book is a good one in the set, and I'm eager for the next. Which will probably be in a couple of weeks.

Books mentioned in this review:


- posted by Brian J. @ 7:13 PM   0 comments
 
If It Weren't For Bad Taste, I'd Have No Taste At All
A joke on Deb's site that I shared easily with my mother and uneasily with my wife.

It doesn't have talking dogs, but it's funny never the less.


- posted by Brian J. @ 7:04 PM   2 comments
Sunday, January 27, 2008
 
Sunday Night Apple Reminiscing
As a public service, I present to you the Apple II Video Display Worksheet for Graphics (GR) Mode:

Apple II Video Display Worksheet for Graphics (GR) Mode
Click for full size


That should help make your design work go a little smoothly. Press your face against the screen. Can't you just smell the mimeograph ink?

Additionally, I post for your amusement, the beginning of the source code for a game entitled Spies. No non-disclosure agreement required!
Spies, page 1
Click for full size


It's not that we had to write the code by hand and put it through an optical scanner, you damn kids, it's that we in middle school only got access to a computer during seventh hour but spent much of the other six handwriting the code because it was so exciting.

And just so you know, the schools had the Apples, but my first computer was a Commodore, so that's where I turned off the path of geekanati and into the real world.


- posted by Brian J. @ 10:28 PM   4 comments
 
Want To Get Away?
Southwest Airlines commercial becomes reality in Milwaukee:
    After the opening, Weiland nearly lost the entire audience during the usual meet-and-greet interlude when he stuck his foot in his mouth and addressed the crowd "Chi . . . CA . . . go . . . " He was met with a barrage of boos.
Yeah, if you're playing a crowd in Milwaukee, you probably cannot go more wrong.


- posted by Brian J. @ 8:17 AM   0 comments
To say Noggle, one first must be able to say the "Nah."