Hitchhiker's
Finally went to see the movie version of the Hitchhiker's Guide. Not bad, but definitely lacked in oomph. That being said, I'm still a huge fan. The books are so fantastic. They are of course based on a BBC Radio series that was created by Douglas Adams who later turned the whole thing into a book. The BBC also made a TV miniseries which wasn't bad either. All in all, I love these stories and I think Adams did a good job by summing us all up as 'Mostly Harmless.'

A task for you all. The next time you go to a bar step up to the counter and say "Six pints of bitter. And quickly please, the world's about to end" and then laugh at the hilarity that will follow.

I had an interesting idea the other day. If one were to take the book of Revelations and analyze all of the signs of the anti-christ I think you could find a strong argument that Dubya fits the bill. Creepy.

Election Coverage
Today I'd like to show a little bit of what is wrong with America, the country that I love. When I opened the front page to the BBC News there is not one direct mention of the election campaign that is going on in the UK. To get the info you have to go to the UK section and find a few headlines. This is somewhat surprising considering that the BBC is a state run program. The issue is that the UK long ago realized that the news had to be truly independent and that meant sponsoring a news organization with public funds that was not answerable to any interests. Of course, this doesn't always work, people being people, but it does provide a way for the world public to get unbiased information. Todays headline is about a terrorist attack on tourists in Egypt, a country about to have its first free presidential election (fingers crossed).

Here in the US we have nothing close to an equivalent. The probable assumed national news organizations are CNN and Fox which both have headlines about a 'runaway bride' who had claimed to be kidnapped. Perfect. Fox of course takes it one step further by announcing "Jeb Bush's Health Care Fix" which in no way could ever be considered unbiased. Of course we know Fox is biased. For the whole scoop on this you should watch the great documentary Outfoxed.

The ESO, European Southern Observatory group, appears to have excellent evidence that they have found taken a picture of another planet orbiting a sun. The system is about 200 light years away. The current information is confirmation of their earlier finding but was necessary to show that the two objects moved together as a system. The planet is about 5 times the size of Jupiter. The sun is a brown dwarf and the planets orbit is about twice that of Neptunes, so it is a small diameter star and the planet is pretty far away, which is probably why we can see it.

NASA and the JPL rovers have captured pictures of dust devils on Mars. Nature has a cool story about them. I still can't believe we have a presence on another plant. I'll have to spend some time with my Caltech brothers at the JPL when I finally get to Pasadena.

Congress talking about ethics?
The House ethics committee has been debating whether or not to investigate the actions of Tom 'The Devil' Delay. This is crazy. Republicans had tried to change the rules so that this wouldn't happen. Their intention was to modify the current system so that a majority vote of the committee was required to start an investigation. The problem is that the committee is split 5:5 along party lines essentially meaning that no investigation would ever be done on any member of the House. It was definitely going to be done to protect Tommy and his cronies from investigations. More free vacations for TD. The ethics committee is a real collection of losers. Here you can follow some of the links to the reps homepages.

For example, republican Doc Hastings (rep from the conservative center of washington state - known affectionately as 'the sticks') is the committee chair. He is one of the authors of the bill that has removed the "Death Tax" because it is evidently taxing rich people twice. What it really does is help force people like Paris Hilton to share some of the wealth. Taxing a dead persons assets is a good thing. If they didn't want the money to help the common good they should have shared the wealth earlier.

Lamar Smith, from Texas (pronounced tay-has), is leading the way on the 'Family Entertainment and Copyright Act' which essentially gives anyone the right to edit and redistribute films without the director's permission. This is so stupid that it drives me nuts that this is even an issue before congress. I personally would have found Titanic offensive but I avoided that by not seeing it. These republicans are so bizarre. They seem to support the individual by taking away all their rights.

These are the types of people we are stuck with I guess. As long as the thinking americans don't get involved we really have no one to blame but ourselves. Oh, and Karl Rove.

Breaking news
Okay, not really posting now but this is important. Troops are having to fight a war untrained. 13 dead so far who were not trained for combat. That is crazy. Good job Boston Globe.

Michael Moore Is Not Crazy


Georgie is holding hands with Pudding Pie. Can you believe it? Holding hands... what a man's man. I mean, think about it. Georgie has cultivated this "Guy I'd have at my BBQ" image. Worked hard at it...and here he is holding hands with another dude. To me this speaks to the true power behind the throne. I mean, the Saudi leader made Bushie hold his hand. Only my father (when I was under his roof) could have made me do that. I'm not trying to imply that this is some sort of homosexual embrace I'm just saying that it goes against the image that he portrays to the trucker hat wearing America. He clearly must hate this but he obviously has no choice if he wants to keep that ranch of his financed into retirement. You can read about it yourself.

This is a funny relevant link. Thanks to Surj.

Okay, one of my real heros, sorry, zeroes of the day. Bill Friskie. He spoke at a conference organized to denounce Democrats as anti-christian. Well, I'm against christianity but, jesus christ, this is taking it too far. Remember, Friskie is the 'doctor' who diagnosed the dead woman in Florida by watching a video. Doesn't take a brain surgeon to know how wacked this guy is.

Want to feel better (or worse)? At least some people are trying to stop the Republican beast.

Back to basics
Today there is a decent article about Bruce Springsteen in the NYT. Sounds like the new album is pretty interesting. Hard to not have the sax though. He played a live concert for VH1 that I caught some of. He is still mesmerizing but it was distracting to have Patty make an appearance.

Yesterday my friend Ulu took us to the Gropius house which is evidently built in the German Bauhaus style. It was definitely interesting in the sense that I have no knowledge of architecture and learned quite a bit. The most interesting features of the house were the half-mirrored bulbs used in the bathrooms and other simple fixture places. I thought it was a pretty clever use of simple technology. I did appreciate the simplistic style of much of the house although I did find it to be a bit too oriented towards an upper-middle class professor with a servant than what I'd consider to be truly 'artistically, technically and practically balanced'. I did appreciate the Bauhaus style in terms of appliances and some furniture.

Rainy day, dream away..........

Apologies?
I'm still annoyed, but I guess it isn't necessarily a good thing to blast a person in cyberspace. Unless that person is the Pope, President, Senator, etc.... Actually, it is the point of cyberspace but then I probably shouldn't put things into my blog when I'm really angry. Upon reflection, I'm still annoyed, but it is a cumulative thing that has built up and it spilled yesterday. My cup can only fill so much. I'm generally not one to lose my temper but I really can't stand it when people don't consider the group before they consider themselves. But hey, I'm not perfect, I know that.

I had a fairly decent result in the lab today so I feel much better.

Shared space and people working in a group
Well I have to say that today I'm pretty annoyed ... (EDITED) ... it is funny how a few extremes can paint a picture for a whole group of people.

Actually, on this note, the lab here is pretty bad about shared space. Seems to have gotten a lot worse. I hate that.

This is now a good way to vent. Tomorrow I will have no comments about Germany....

Editors note...this guy isn't all bad. He just has the ability to drive a person insane.

Another arrogant bastard?!
Looks like I've found a fellow who has the courage to call himself the man. Too bad he spells his name wrong.


Speaking of German Cannibals. The Federal courts got a hold of this verdict (Manslaughter, 8.5yrs?) and overturned it. They agreed with me that killing and eating someone is grounds for life punishment. First, how does this guy get better? He is way too screwed in the head to be released. Second, he took another persons life. He had permission supposedly (was the other guy drugged?) but is that enough to kill a person who asks you to. If the victim had taken his own life it would have been suicide, no trial, no crime for eating human flesh. But...it didn't go down that way. He killed him first. He should be put away for a long time.

Silly Catholics, Religion is for kids
Okay, there is a new pope. That is great, but what is the deal with Catholics and their desperate need to see visions. I mean, why would the 'virgin' (Didn't she have more kids?) Mary appear appear on an overpass? I mean, come on. Actually, now I'm wondering if there is any money in this sort of thing. Religious people are pretty crazy. How else could Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell make so much money. Have you seen Regent University, Pat's baby? This place is pretty grotesque. I used to live near it and the money involved in building this modern day Golden Cow is crazy. Speaking of crazy, guess who is the newest member of their faculty. I'd give you a hint but it will ruin the pleasure of the surprise. Okay, I'll give a hint. He's Batshit crazy and I did mean to capitalize Batshit.

This actually reminds me of another 'virgin' Mary sighting that I actually had a chance to check out. This one was a tree in Salt Lake City that had a branch removed and the remaining stub oozed an image out of sap. It looked like this ---> which is a far cry from what the at-one-time virgin probably looked like. But hey, what do I know. Well I suppose I know that making an alter to a tree is just plain dumb. I guess the Rat's job may not be as hard as it seems with people like this in the world.

Hopefully in the next few days I'll be announcing my 'virgin' Mary sighting. Remember, cash only.



For the coffee folks, the sites of the Olympics