What a nice birthday this year. Good food, good family get together and great gifts.
I got 2 games for the DS, a camera for my Zaurus, a really nifty automatic watch winder, a book I wanted, and some more things to come in the mail. Went to Tiff’s Mom’s today, got more gifts AND I will be getting yet another watch in a few weeks (when it is back in stock.) All in all a good weekend, for once.
This will be the next watch, another automatic. It is an Orvis Automatic Field Watch, a larger watch, but it should be easy to read. I think I will more or less retire my light faced Timex after getting this watch. My watch drawer is getting full! I should be getting it late this month, when it gets back in stock. This is actually a good sign, it is the only watch Orvis sells that is out of stock AND gets great reviews.
Feeling a little sick today, but I did get a great Birthday Gift, a new watch! (I just love watches, always have, probably always will.)
It’s an all black Seiko 5. It is my first PVD watch, which is a surface coating technology which allows metal watches (or anything else metal) to be coated black.
It is very nice on the wrist, heavy, but not too heavy.
I believe in most scientific theories, but I really don’t buy dark matter. It is supposed to make up 3/4 of the universe, but no one has detected it. It reminds me a lot of aether. It is just something thrown out there to explain why the observed universe does not match the theoretical universe. I think we are missing one or more of three possibilities:
- Our theories about gravity are a little off, unlikely, but possible.
- There is another long distance binding force holding the universe together.
- We live in a multidimensional universe where what we think is dark matter is just ordinary mass effecting other masses in a dimension we cannot perceive.
Yeah, it is a little esoteric for a blog posting, but I just wanted to write down what I thought.
I am just plain tired of it being cold. The temperatures in Chicago have been 20 degrees or more below normal. I haven’t been able to walk at lunch. I know, just whining, but it really puts a damper on activities. I really don’t like bringing Glenn out in -5 degree (air temperature) weather.
In other news, man, groceries and gas are getting expensive. They just keep creeping up. Between groceries and gas over $3.15 a gallon in February, inflation is pretty bad. I shudder to think what gas will cost like when the ‘summer’ blend starts selling. I think we will see over $4.00 a gallon this year. I find it very tricky that the Fed does not include Food or Fuel in the core inflation rate. Hello, most of your disposable income is spent on those two items. I am not buying a car or refrigerator every week. Very dishonest if you ask me.
Speaking of dishonest, I wonder how much longer we will occupy Iraq and Afghanistan? If McCain gets into power, we are looking at 100 to 150 years. Just what we needed. Some people say military spending boosts the economy, but as Dwight Eisenhower said:
“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired
signifies in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not
fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not
spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the
genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. This is not a way
of life at all in any true sense. Under the clouds of war, it is
humanity hanging on a cross of iron.”
And this is a Republican talking here, and more importantly, a general. Not just any general, the Supreme Commander of Allied forces in Europe in WWII. The man who planned and executed D day for goodness sake. He probably commanded the largest army in the history of humanity, yet he still warned against wasting money on war. He warned us about this in 1953. Is is more true now then ever.
I am a frequent reader of the Chicago Tribune Online. I stopped for a while after they endorsed George “I’m a fucking moron” Bush, but at least they are better than most online news outlets. I have to say one thing STOP CHANGING YOUR WEBSITE. Every time they do, it gets uglier and harder to navigate. Now, even the fonts are screwy, at least in Firefox. Another word of advice for every website out there. Stop trying to make your online edition look like your print edition and vice-versa. I am looking at you Wired magazine.
All right, I have made my peace.