:: Life of Dave ::

:: Monday, July 31 2006 ::

Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do:

"In the game's 32nd minute, with the score tied 2-2, the local team's goalkeeper committed a foul against the President of the Republic that produced the injury to his nose," a statement from the president's office said.

You can read the full story of the president of Bolivia breaking his nose in a soccer match over at the BBC.
:: David (7:49 in Michigan, 13:49 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Sunday, July 30 2006 ::

We added the finishing touch to our car today - a tiny flying spaghetti monster. Since our car is all done up as a piratemobile, we felt it was OK. As you can see (you may need to follow the link to the larger picture), our car was dented by his noodley appendage when it was touched. Actually, that's where Sasha's dad tried to park a little too close, but I like the noodley appendage dent idea more.

I think that's all the pirate we're going to do for the moment, but there still exists the temptation to add at some later date a pirate flag to the antenna. We'll see.
:: David (19:03 in Michigan, 1:03 in Paris) - Comment - View Comments[4]

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Some of you may remember that I posted that my credit union was having a bit of a scuffle, basically involving questions of whether or not the Board of Directors were trying to convert the credit union into a bank so as to make money for themselves. Today I went to check my account, and got the following interesting 'message to members':

ACCESS TO DFCU BOARD OF DIRECTOR INFORMATION:

Some members have expressed an interest in examining the deliberative process that your Board of Directors employed to unanimously recommend that the membership consider a potential change in legal structure from a Federal Credit Union to a Federal Mutual Savings Bank. In addition to many hours of discussion and examination of the issues raised by such a conversion, the process included several reports and analyses by legal and financial advisors who are experts in the area. As you probably are aware, after further deliberation by the Board in response to member inquiries, the recommendation regarding conversion was withdrawn from member consideration on April 17, 2006, and no vote took place. The Board has no intention of revisiting this issue.

While there is no legal obligation to provide disclosure or access under these circumstances, nevertheless DFCU Financial Federal Credit Union is committed to proactive and open communication with its membership. To that end, and in an effort to eliminate any remaining questions or concerns, any member who has an interest in reviewing the materials associated with the Board’s deliberative process is invited to contact us at 313-322-8222 and arrange to review them at DFCU Financial's headquarters located at 400 Town Center Drive, Dearborn, Michigan 48126. To protect the interests of DFCU and the membership at large, members will be required to establish his or her membership in DFCU and to sign a confidentiality agreement before viewing this information. Inspection requests may be scheduled beginning August 1, 2006 and we will continue to make the materials available until September 29, 2006.

I am quite interested in the 'confidentiality agreement'. Given that the board determined that they can't be recalled, I am not surprised there are still some questions. I wonder if criminal charges are next - nothing would really surprise me at this point. Either way, so far as I know my savings are insured by the FDIC, so I'll ignore it. Of course, if one day I can't access my money I'm sure I'll be less sanguine....
:: David (14:10 in Michigan, 20:10 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Saturday, July 29 2006 ::

Well, I made it home around six this morning, and slept about eight hours. We then headed over to Jas and Weeze's place for a small get together, as Fin and Misty are visiting the state this week. We ate and chatted and played cards until late. We then headed to the Qwik Park, where I had abandoned my credit card that morning, after paying for parking. They had it, so it was an easy in, easy out operation.

It's bloody hot in this state, and humid besides. I think the whole country is overheated this week, but it's still unpleasant to have to put up with high temperatures in the evening.
:: David (23:46 in Michigan, 5:46 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Friday, July 28 2006 ::

I'm so glad I don't have a TV at home - I think I lost like three hours watching totally random stuff. If it weren't bedtime, I would probably continue watching this show on the creation of ice cream flavours (but why in the world is it on the History channel?!)
:: David (2:59 in Michigan, 8:59 in Paris) - Comment - View Comments[1]

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:: Thursday, July 27 2006 ::

I am very definitely running out of steam, here, but I've seen some very cool stuff. A guy from Mozilla talked about some of the features coming in Moz2.0 (i.e. the Firefox web browser), and some of the possible extensions in 3.0. I've also sat through a few less exciting presentations. I'm actually headed to another mozilla presentation after the break, all about developing in XUL. Should be entertaining.
:: David (18:46 in Michigan, 0:46 in Paris) - Comment

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Only at a computer convention would the men's room have a huge queue, and the women's be completely free. I can now sympathize with the people who pushed for additional women's rooms in large buildings!

Obviously, I'm back at the open source conference. We just finished the keynote speakers for the day, and now I'm doing another Ruby on Rails presentation - this one on integrating RoR to legacy applications.
:: David (13:43 in Michigan, 19:43 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Wednesday, July 26 2006 ::

Wil Wheaton just linked to another person's post about the band Journey and how an entire generation was born because of their music, which reminded me of that other 80's supergroup, Air Supply, who were in concert while we were in Montreal. Yikes! Amusingly, the sign told us that Hall and Oates were also coming. I'm fairly sure this theatre was not indicative of Quebeckers' musical tastes. Or at least I like to hope....
:: David (21:37 in Michigan, 3:37 in Paris) - Comment

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Another break. I headed over to the vendors again. By and large people trying to sell me stuff creep me out. I want to be shocked and awed by your product, not hard-sold. But they've moved the drink table into the exhibition hall, so what can you do?
:: David (19:06 in Michigan, 1:06 in Paris) - Comment

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That last one was pretty cool - it was all about unroll, which is basically a web-based monopoly game. The trick is that it is also multiplayer, and has all the makings of being able to make any turn based game a web-based app. Fun. Then some stuff about Ruby on Rails, and lunch. Now I'm doing another Ruby on Rails presentation.
:: David (16:47 in Michigan, 22:47 in Paris) - Comment

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Scored my first freebies at the break - a t-shirt and a pen. I needed the pen, didn't really need the shirt. But it amused me. Now I'm at the MMORPG session, which is packed. I'm curious to see what happens.
:: David (13:44 in Michigan, 19:44 in Paris) - Comment

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This stuff goes fast - I have several pages of notes. I don't know how much I'll retain (but isn't that always the case?)
:: David (12:51 in Michigan, 18:51 in Paris) - Comment

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Waiting for the keynote address of the open source conference to start in about five minutes. Today is a series of shorter sessions, somewhat like yesterday and Monday, only faster. I'm quite looking forward to my first session, which involves building a MMORPG. After that it gets even more tecchie. But first, a 'state of the industry' speech, and related informational goodies.
:: David (11:46 in Michigan, 17:46 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Tuesday, July 25 2006 ::

The afternoon is devoted to testing web applications. It's moderately interesting, although I'm not absolutely certain how much I'll end up using it - not because it isn't a good idea, but because I can very easily see all my time being used by other tasks, rather than testing. I'm experiencing something of a sugar/caffeine crash, as I finally made it to Coffee People to have my Black Tiger shake, which is ice cream and coffee beans. Yikes! It's going to be an interesting evening, also, as it seems I'll be sharing my hotel room with my boss this evening. He'd been hotel hopping to build up points on various member cards, and managed to find himself without a hotel room this evening. Whups!
:: David (18:40 in Michigan, 0:40 in Paris) - Comment - View Comments[1]

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I had a phone call with someone about the workshop I'm running next week at 6:30 this morning. This whole time zone thing is a killer! After breakfast, back to the conference, where I am learning this morning about deploying large scale web applications - things like tracking changes and rolling changes into production automatically, with integrated bug tracking at each step. It's fairly amusing, although possibly not the most exciting presentation I've ever been to (during the break, I met some people from colleges across the US who were singularly unimpressed with the teaching method being used in the session).
:: David (14:11 in Michigan, 20:11 in Paris) - Comment - View Comments[2]

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:: Monday, July 24 2006 ::

Dinner out at a brew-pub, and back to my hotel room before 8pm. I'm whipped, to be honest, and I just might turn in before 10pm, though the thought makes me crazy. The rest of the afternoon was fairly uneventful, although I did meet some interesting folks. At some point I have to get some work done, but I think anytime this week is fine, really - I can't be in two places at once, and I can't pay attention to the courses if I'm working on the servers. In the meantime, though, I might read a bit, and turn in.
:: David (23:20 in Michigan, 5:20 in Paris) - Comment

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After a pretty unhealthy burger lunch, I'm back at it this afternoon, learning about Rails. I know nothing about this stuff, so this is a little tougher than the morning, where I knew most of the stuff and was just seeing some new directions in using it.
:: David (17:04 in Michigan, 23:04 in Paris) - Comment

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OK - this may be more sarky than necessary, but when I walked back in to the meeting room after the break, it smelled an awful lot like a men's locker room. It may be my imagination, but I really don't think so....
:: David (13:42 in Michigan, 19:42 in Paris) - Comment

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The speaker was just reminded that we were supposed to have a break. Thank goodness! I thought I was going to be here for four hours straight!
:: David (13:19 in Michigan, 19:19 in Paris) - Comment

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Starting the first session of the morning, Scalable Internet Architectures. I'm not going to blog the sessions a lot, but I thought it might be interesting for some of you to know what I'm up to here in Portland...
:: David (11:30 in Michigan, 17:30 in Paris) - Comment

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I'm on the other side of the continent now, after a five hour flight from Detroit to Portland, Oregon. It was relatively uneventful, and now I am ensconsed in a fairly swanky hotel room close to the convention centre which will, for the rest of the week, host the O'Reilly Open Source Convention. With any good fortune, I'll learn lots of random things, and come back at the weekend with my brain all full.

We slept for twelve hours last night, upon our return - the drive back from Montreal must have been pretty darned draining. I'm not completely wasting that sleep, even though the time stamp on this post might seem to indicate that I'm staying up too late - in fact it's those darned time zones. It is just past 11pm, so hopefully I'll get a nice sleep and be all charged up for all that brain-filling stuff in the morning.
:: David (2:19 in Michigan, 8:19 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Saturday, July 22 2006 ::

Well, twelve and a half hours later, including stops, we made it back to Ann Arbor. It seemed easy enough, but now my brain doesn't work, so I guess my body objected at least a little bit. Tomorrow I'll wake up, sit around the house a bit, and in the afternoon head off to Portland, Oregon. Too much to do!
:: David (21:42 in Michigan, 3:42 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Wednesday, July 19 2006 ::

We made it to Montreal, and through the magic of wireless even have internet in the room. It was quite a drive, so we followed it up with quite a walk, all over the city. Nice place. We'll be here tomorrow and Friday, and Saturday head out to wherever we get to - the goal is to drive home on Friday, but we'll see how we do - it's twelve hours, and we aren't sure we can do that in a single day.
:: David (23:00 in Michigan, 5:00 in Paris) - Comment - View Comments[2]

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:: Tuesday, July 18 2006 ::

We visited the Ommegang Brewery today, and also got a hotel up in Montreal. Looking forward to spending some time North of the border, and perhaps seeing what sorts of tasty wines are available. Sasha also has a friend who lives up there, and with any good fortune we'll be able to meet up with him while we're there. Should be good fun. Hoping the cooler weather continues for the rest of the week.
:: David (15:21 in Michigan, 21:21 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Monday, July 17 2006 ::

We're in New York until Wednesday, then off to Quebec. Nothing exciting thus far, just lots of driving and downtime.
:: David (20:45 in Michigan, 2:45 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Friday, July 14 2006 ::

Well, I made it back, worked a day, watched a Pirate Movie, enjoyed it greatly, and came home. Now we're off on holiday for a week, to New York and Quebec. I'll be periodically blogging, but one expects not as much as usual.
:: David (0:30 in Michigan, 6:30 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Wednesday, July 12 2006 ::

How do I love airplane delays? Let me count the ways:

• Bad food
• Uncomfy chairs
• Harsh lighting
• Lots of noise
• Heavy bags that get carried all over
• Probably some other stuff I forgot

If all goes well I will get back into Michigan before 2:00 in the morning. I might even get to bed before 3:00!
:: David (23:45 in Michigan, 5:45 in Paris) - Comment

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Well, we made it out of the office before midnight. Barely. Another 16 hour day. Add in my trip home and I'll be on overtime before Thursday even begins. Crazy. But fun - I've enjoyed the whole experience, despite the crazy hours - I wouldn't do it continuously, weeks on end, but for a couple days it's been fun.
:: David (0:58 in Michigan, 6:58 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Tuesday, July 11 2006 ::

This was a relatively interesting piece of news. I was already planning to discuss salary with my employer, and the fact that Google will open a massive center in Ann Arbor, Michigan has just given me quite a little bit of leverage, methinks. Tee hee. It's also honestly quite tempting - working for Google would be a trip, I think, and I have very little doubt I could get in. We'll see what happens.
:: David (22:04 in Michigan, 4:04 in Paris) - Comment

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Another long day. It goes. Tomorrow I get to go home!
:: David (18:58 in Michigan, 0:58 in Paris) - Comment

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Well, we started at 7:30 with breakfast, and ended around midnight. There was lunch and dinner in there, but overall it was a long, long day. I'm not sure it's going to go as smoothly as one might hope, but at least it's going. And my French, which was the primary reason I ended up on this jaunt, is holding up nicely. Not great, but I'm getting by. I'll take it.
:: David (2:20 in Michigan, 8:20 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Monday, July 10 2006 ::

Ah, the USA Today. Most hotels have them - they slide under your door (or more usually, sit in front of your door until you open it to leave, at which point it's too late to read it) and give you pearls of wisdom. Today's pearl is actually a black one - it seems Johnny Depp's pirate movie broke all kinds of records over the weekend - biggest weekend take (132m), biggest two day take (100 plus m), biggest one day take (55m). Not bad.

I was also disturbed to discover they have a weekly roundup of reality TV. Disturbed because I have actually seen all three of the shows they cover. Amusingly, one of the shows is Meercat Manor, the television show that follows Meercats in South Africa. Who knew? They give you a best moment, worst moment, and what to watch for this week, and the combination of worst moments is certainly interesting - America's Got Talent had a bird caller, but Meercat Manor had a half-eaten giant millipede.
:: David (7:59 in Michigan, 13:59 in Paris) - Comment

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I always find about ten thousand things I want to blog about when I travel - I don't know if it's the fact that I read a lot while travelling, or if the mind-numbing boredom of travelling lets my subconscious chew on stuff better, or what. I suppose after eight hours I ought to have at least a few ideas - and that's how long it took, door-to-door. I think this was much closer to being a normal example of a two-hop flight across the midwestern United States, and it still wasn't very fast. That said, I wouldn't have wanted to get in to the hotel three hours later (which is the additional time driving would have taken).

Speaking of the hotel, what is it with American hotels not having 'singles'. There are two double beds in my room, and four sets of towels, as if the most likely occupants of the hotel room were two couples sharing a single room. That strikes me as unlikely. I wonder if newer hotels are being built with a more normal configuration? Or perhaps I am mistaken, and couples and individuals are not the most common occupants of hotel rooms...?
:: David (1:13 in Michigan, 7:13 in Paris) - Comment

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Talking to Sasha, I found out which player had done that incredibly stupid head-butt I saw on the television in the airport. I had been walking up to the bar where the TV was located, and saw the replay from quite a distance, and thought to myself 'wow - that player was really dumb'. And then they did the shootout, and I thought 'where's Zidane?' And then I found out that the head-butt guy and Zidane were the same person. To say I was shocked would be an understatement.

I'm also a little surprised by the French reaction - he did something stupid, he got caught, and instead of accepting it and saying 'well, that was dumb', they complain about the use of video replay to catch him, and how 'he must have been provoked'. Well, yeah, one certainly hopes he was. But there are probably better ways to deal.
:: David (0:58 in Michigan, 6:58 in Paris) - Comment - View Comments[2]

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There was a really apt comment made in the Financial Times this weekend that I wanted to pass along, about Japan:

People who write about Japan will, sooner or later, run into a problem marked 'Japanese exceptionalism'. No matter how tenaciously one clings to the notion that people are, beneath it all, the same, some aspects of Japanese society wriggle loose of western analysis, like water slipping through fingers.

To wish such differences away would be to miss something recognizably Japanese. Yet to treat Japan as inherently odd can quickly stray into stereotype, even prejudice. Just as bad, it can bolster the case of those who assert that Japan is unique, superior, and unknowable by foreigners.

The article reviews a book, a somewhat standard 'gaijin in Japan book', if the reviewer is to be believed, called Atomic Sushi, by Simon May. I don't mean to sound down on these books, because they do get read, and impart, one assumes, some additional tidbit of knowledge about Japan that the reader did not have before reading the book. However, at the same time they can as easily wrap the facts in so much fiction or misinterpretation that the sum total impact is not to make the reader more knowledgeable of Japan, but more misinformed, and worse, less aware of their own ignorance.

I kind of feel like Spock, in the fourth Star Trek movie (The Voyage Home) where he tells bones that they cannot discuss death, because, unlike Spock, Bones has never been dead. Bones retorts something along the lines of "You mean I gotta die, to discuss death?!" In the same way, on some level I feel like books about Japan require some actual knowledge about Japan, like having lived there, to separate the wheat from the chaff. This may not be the case, but sometimes it seems that way.
:: David (0:46 in Michigan, 6:46 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Sunday, July 9 2006 ::

Ah, airports - who doesn't love airports? I'm in Chicago's Midway airport this time, waiting for a flight to MSP (again). I had a very healthy meal, and have been drinking plenty of liquids (although admittedly all of them full of sugar and caffeine).

I watched the shootout between Italy and France on a TV in the waiting area of DTW. Sad, sad day. Too bad for Zidane, who will retire without a world cup win (though second place isn't so bad).
:: David (20:09 in Michigan, 2:09 in Paris) - Comment - View Comments[2]

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We had quite a day yesterday, zipping all over the state. First we headed over to Canton, (nearer to Detroit than we are), to visit the new IKEA they have built. We arrived at 10:00, which is when they open, and the parking lot was already substantially full, as was the store. We were meeting some friends, so the whole experience took quite some time. We then grabbed lunch before going our separate ways. I believe in future I shall avoid IKEA if I don't have $150 set aside, as we spent quite a bundle on things we hadn't really known we were going to buy.

After the IKEA shopping bonanza, it was off to Kalamazoo to see my family. I never really plan enough time for these things, which generally means Tammy and George get the shaft, as they are usually visited on my way back to Ann Arbor. Last night was no exception, in that our pseudo-plannned meet up for dinner became a midnight run. Happily they hadn't turned into pumpkins by the time we arrived, so the only thing missed was sleep. We made it back to Ann Arbor around 4:30 this morning. Now I have three hours to pack, eat, and get ready to fly to Minnesota.
:: David (11:05 in Michigan, 17:05 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Saturday, July 8 2006 ::

Our license plate came today (pictures to come), and to celebrate, we went to see Pirates of the Caribbean. Except it was sold out, so we went to see Superman instead. It wasn't really the same thing at all, but it was an evening's entertainment.

Also on the subject of our license plates, you may remember when we went to order them a young man borrowed three dollars, and I wondered if he would actually send a check. The little scamp actually sent a thank you card, and a five dollar check. Cute. And indicative, I think - generally speaking, people really are honest. Well, some of them, anyhow.
:: David (1:14 in Michigan, 7:14 in Paris) - Comment - View Comments[1]

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:: Friday, July 7 2006 ::

So here's a bizarre story, but one which I feel like sharing. A while back, one of the tech websites I read, The Inquirer, noted that Dell and Gateway had both picked up the same young woman to sell their 'back to school' computers. They wrote a fairly short, fairly amusing story and probably thought nothing more about it.

But the stories kept pouring in, and she became something of a fixture at the Inq. They managed to track her down and have her do a podcast, and even have a retrospective page showing the myriad places she has appeared.

As with most bizarre stories, a wikipedia entry was made, and now, just to top it off, the young woman herself has started a blog (chock full of adverts, which is a great idea on her part!), which includes a rather lengthy post telling the story of the photo shoot which would make her world famous, or at least world 'haven't I seen you somewhere before?'-ous.
:: David (10:06 in Michigan, 16:06 in Paris) - Comment

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If y'all were planning on getting me a birthday present, save your money 'till October and head on over to Christie's, where you can get me some original memorabilia at the big auction of star trek props that will be taking place, as Paramount cleans its closets!
:: David (0:26 in Michigan, 6:26 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Thursday, July 6 2006 ::

It looks like the US government is using the same careful screening process on bank transfers that they use on the no-fly list. Slashdot pointed me to a story from the Associated Press which says that people with Muslim sounding names are having cash transfers blocked. Western Union may be the fastest way to send money, but only for non-muslims, apparently. The article goes on to suggest that, like most of the US's actions after 2001, the blocks are serving to strengthen tools terrorists are more likely to use. "Treasury guidelines are sending more people to informal money transfer networks called "hundis" or "hawalas" that have been used by gangsters and terrorists because they circumvent such scrutiny".
:: David (17:22 in Michigan, 23:22 in Paris) - Comment - View Comments[2]

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:: Wednesday, July 5 2006 ::

ALLEZ LES BLEUS! The world cup final is France vs. Italy.
:: David (17:03 in Michigan, 23:03 in Paris) - Comment

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Justice served, or justice evaded?

Kenneth Lay, the former Enron chief executive and chairman convicted on fraud and conspiracy charges, has died. Mr Lay suffered a heart attack at his holiday home near Aspen, Colorado. He was pronounced dead in hospital shortly after 0300 local time on Wednesday.

The full story on the BBC website.
:: David (11:47 in Michigan, 17:47 in Paris) - Comment - View Comments[1]

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Well, Italy has done two rather exciting things recently. First, they made it to the world cup finals, where they will face France (with apologies to anyone who might support that other team). Second, they arrested an Italian spy in connection with the so-called 'extraordinary rendition' program:

A top Italian intelligence officer has been arrested in connection with the alleged CIA kidnapping of a terror suspect from a Milan street in 2003.

I went peering around, but it doesn't look like the American media can get past North Korea's missile launches (and can I just mention how dumb CNN's 'dramatic 'Nuclear Tension with Korea' banner' is?)
:: David (8:23 in Michigan, 14:23 in Paris) - Comment - View Comments[3]

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:: Tuesday, July 4 2006 ::

By the way - if you have an RSS link to the page, you probably saw the title of my last post, which was the name of an album I listened to a lot in high school and college by a local band called the Verve Pipe. The album was called I've Suffered a Head Injury, and although the version released by the record company wasn't the original, it was still a pretty good album, in a college-angsty kind of way.
:: David (11:50 in Michigan, 17:50 in Paris) - Comment

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Slashdot pointed me to an article in New Scientist which discusses the recovery of a man who was in the hospital for 19 years after suffering a head injury:

The team's findings suggest that Wallis’s brain had, very gradually, developed new pathways and completely novel anatomical structures to re-establish functional connections, compensating for the brain pathways lost in the accident.

The article goes on to suggest that the medical establishment needs to change the way it deals with so-called 'persistant vegetative state' cases, by periodically doing a thorough re-evaluation of the actual state of the patient.
:: David (11:37 in Michigan, 17:37 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Monday, July 3 2006 ::

The people at work were fairly excited by this video, which shows a presentation by Hans Rosling. He is the director of the Karolinska Institute, and founder of Gapminder, a non-profit that brings vital global data to life. The subject is the so-called 'developing world', and it shows what happens when you do a presentation with something a little more powerful than Powerpoint.

I am very excited to see what sort of tools will come out of this organization. I am more excited by the idea that they might help make a difference!
:: David (11:19 in Michigan, 17:19 in Paris) - Comment - View Comments[3]

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:: Sunday, July 2 2006 ::

I can't decide - either the house is being shelled, or the Americans have started celebrating Independence Day early. The cat appears to be leaning towards 'the house is being shelled', and has accordingly sought cover.
:: David (22:19 in Michigan, 4:19 in Paris) - Comment

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This is fun: Foreign Policy's blog pointed me to an article in the Times about how the World Cup is being used in Germany to slide through unpopular legislation:

Political conflicts have barely flickered on to German television screens. The Upper House of parliament reluctantly gave the go-ahead to a 3 per cent increase in VAT last Friday — with some heavy-hitting regional barons voting against or abstaining. Normally there would have been a nationwide howl of protest — indeed, the mass circulation Bild called it the “biggest single tax rise in German history” — but the critical article, as Frau Merkel, the Chancellor, had calculated, was buried under a mountain of stories on the German football team. The big tabloid revolt fizzled out.

The article continues by noting that the summer holidays will follow closely on the heels of the World Cup, and therefore outcry may be delayed further, or even avoided entirely.
:: David (2:04 in Michigan, 8:04 in Paris) - Comment

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:: Saturday, July 1 2006 ::

I'm feeling lazy tonight, so rather than blog about our night out last night, I'll let someone else do it. For those who wonder, I had the lamb chops and Sasha had the salmon.
:: David (22:19 in Michigan, 4:19 in Paris) - Comment

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I think by the end of the weekend I will have turned down more invites than I've had since I got back to the states. I'm making a big last-ditch push to complete some stuff before the summer holiday is firmly upon us, and since I have to travel for about a month straight starting in a week or so, it seems now, when I have an unbroken stretch of four days, is the perfect time to get this stuff completed. Except that everyone around here also has a long weekend, and want to make the most of it. I feel bad, but I'm just so looking forward to having this stuff done that I can't bring myself to let it go another week.
:: David (15:54 in Michigan, 21:54 in Paris) - Comment

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The New York Times has been running quite a number of stories on the Episcopal church, on the subject of long running disagreements with the Anglicans, which are now starting to bubble over. Ostensibly, the difficulty is the ordination of gay bishops, but really it's a split that goes far deeper - a split between the deeply conservative branch of the church and their fairly liberal American brethren. The most recent installment in the series examines the situation for those who don't want to take sides, but see the split becoming too great to stay neutral.
:: David (12:22 in Michigan, 18:22 in Paris) - Comment

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