This week's Photo Friday is "Best of 2005". This photo of a cactus on South Mountian is one of my best. I have a few others I could have picked but think this is pretty representative.

It's been a few months since I moved in and started working on the kitchen remodel so I'm glad to report that Stage 1 is complete. Stage 1 is what you see here, with half of the upper cabinets installed including the appliances. Every bit of it built by me. Stage 2 will complete the kitchen with the rest of the cabinets, paint and tiling.

When I first made the offer on the house I wasn't initially planning to remodel the kitchen. But after spending a few hours in it, it was clear that I was not going to be happy with the wear and tear that had been put on it for 20+ years. I used Home Depot's design service to do the design, which turned out to be a good deal. It's costs $100 for them to come out and do the measurements and plug everything into the computer. They give $100 off materials if you buy from them.

When choosing the materials for the cabinets I looked at both the lowest cost and highest cost cabinets. I'm pretty disappointed at the amount of particle board used in the construction of both version. The lowest cost is totally made of particle board except for the doors and are complete do-it-yourself. Where as the more expensive ones are about 50% particle board and are installed by someone else. I went with Mills Pride cabinets that Home Depot keeps on stock because of their much lower costs, significant in some cases. Despite the fact that they are made of particle board they are of pretty good quality and very easy to assemble. Well worth it for the money I saved. I would say it cost around $1000 for this section of cabinets (the maple doors were as much as the cost of the cabinet boxes, that's the real expense).

Stage 2 will involve taking down the wall on the right and putting in a cabinets along the bottom (this is where the refrigerator originally was). This will open it up to the living room more. I've never pulled down a wall before (just as I never did any of this kitchen work before). I will also probably pull out the original tile back spash and put different tile up. I will finish it up with paint, trim and what ever else will be needed. I figure it will cost about $2000 to finish it up (doing it all myself of course) but don't know when I will start it. In the mean time check out my Flickr photo set showing the stages of the remodel.

This is really giving New Mexico a good name.

Late last week, a Santa Fe District Court judge signed a temporary restraining order against talk-show host David Letterman alleging he has tormented a city resident for more than 10 years by using code words on his television program .

Apparently David Letterman is using his eyes and other gestures to send secret signals to this woman. The judge apparently agreed!

On Sunday night, Mr. President, you attempted to suck up to the American people with a TV address. I know this because the Simpsons were suppose to come on at 7pm when you came on. Thankfully Fox showed The Simpsons in it's entirety instead of trying to make up time. Thus I listened to your entire speal. thanks for keeping it under 20 minutes by the way.

You continue to insult my intelligence with your mixing of the 9/11 attacks and the Iraq war. I wish you would just admit that you were going to attack Iraq whether or not 9/11 happened. It seems that the majority of your speech was to get more support for Iraq, not about getting more power to take away American liberties. I certainly didn't want to hear about that.

This so-called war (so called because I don't think Congress declared war) has been ill-conceived from the start. You didn't know what you had, you didn't know what you were up against and you still haven't shown that you have a decent plan in place. Yet you are going up in front of America trying to build you case. In fact I actually agree with you, that would should finish the job we started and keep the troops there. I too fear if we pull out too soon the bad guys will take over. Yet I'm very concerned that your first priority is making sure Haliburton gets American tax payer money than ensuring the safety of our troops.

This week's Photo Friday is "Depth Of Field". This photo, entitled "wind chimes" was taken on Tybee Island, Georgia during a recent trip there. There were many colorfully wind chimes in a tourist trap along the main drag, while reviewing the pictures I thought this fit the subject quite well.

Let's not forgetthe real meaning of Christmas.

II. How Did Christmas Come to Be Celebrated on December 25?

A. Roman pagans first introduced the holiday of Saturnalia, a week long period of lawlessness celebrated between December 17-25. During this period, Roman courts were closed, and Roman law dictated that no one could be punished for damaging property or injuring people during the weeklong celebration. The festival began when Roman authorities chose “an enemy of the Roman people” to represent the “Lord of Misrule.” Each Roman community selected a victim whom they forced to indulge in food and other physical pleasures throughout the week. At the festival’s conclusion, December 25th, Roman authorities believed they were destroying the forces of darkness by brutally murdering this innocent man or woman.

Via Metafilter. Be sure to read some of the comments.

My faith in the US Senate has been restored , at least for now.

In a stinging defeat for President Bush, Senate Democrats blocked passage Friday of a new Patriot Act to combat terrorism at home, depicting the measure as a threat to the constitutional liberties of innocent Americans.

It's a sad, sad situation when you have animals and don't think of them after your death. It even worse when you died in your home with those animals and no one knows it. If your dead for a while and your animals have to eat, well I guess you can still provide for them.

Apparently that's what happened to a lady in Albuquerque with her 33 cats and 4 dogs. It's pretty likely that the animals were eating her after she died. Of course eating a decomposing body is probably not such a good thing for ones health.

Good news for New Mexico's space port. Virgin Atlantic has agreed to set up shop there being known as Virgin Galactic.

The first customer has been secured for the planned $225 million spaceport in southern New Mexico and state officials plan to announce Wednesday that construction of the facility will now move forward.

State officials, including Gov. Bill Richardson, also will announce tomorrow that London-based Virgin Galactic, a subsidiary of Britain's Virgin Atlantic Airways Ltd., will be the facility's first lease holder and plans to pay $1 million a year for the first five years of its 20-year lease.

I'm getting excited about this. I've always wanted to be a astronaut but I never had the "right stuff" (namely not being a Air Force pilot). This may provide me an opportunity to participate in the space race.

It is said that to have a popular blog one must post compelling content. Which means one must at least post. It's no wonder then that I don't have a popular blog because I haven't even bothered to post. Lets see if I can put a end to that.

So, what have I been up to?

I have been posting to Flickr quite a bit. You can check out a few of my sets from my trip to Tennessee.

Unfortunately iPhoto has crapped out on me, showing me only blank images for the 7000+ i've stored with it. Until I get that fixed no more will be uploaded.

Yes, I made a trip to Tennessee to visit family, I had not been back there in about 20 years. We also went to Savanna Georgia during the off season, which was very interesting. More about that to come late.

I plan to spend this winter working on the house and skiing with some other misc travel in between. As the house moves along I will be posting pictures. In fact I was thinking of starting a home improvement video blog dedicated to the house renovations, since I have quite a bit planned. What do you think?

I'll try to keep up the posting, I really don't have any excuse not to post.

If this really did last 10 days it would be great.

Men in Serbia are lining up to have electric shocks delivered to their testicles as part of a new contraceptive treatment. Serbian fertility expert Dr Sava Bojovic, who runs one of the clinics offering the service, said the small electric shock makes men temporarily infertile by stunning their sperm into a state of immobility.

I question how long it lasts because a man produces sperm constantly. The only way to be sure your sperm is sleeping is to zap it before having sex.

Thanks to rapper Young Jeezy angry snowman image from his single "Go Crazy", all snowmen are being discriminated against. Although not clear to the layman, the image is referring to the snowman as being the coke dealer since coke is often refereed to as snow.

A local private school is banning all images of snowmen and snow due to the drug references. The falling of snow near the children at school or home is also banned.

Home Depot was sued by a shopper from a Colorado store who claims he got stuck to a restroom toilet seat because a prankster had smeared it with glue.

The man is suing Home Depot because they ignored his calls for help. Eventually they called the paramedics and they had to haul him out with the seat stuck to his ass.

I try to avoid public restrooms in places like this, but when you gotta go you gotta go. I pretty carefully inspect the area before I sit down and put plenty of paper between me and the seat. I can't imagine that I would have not seen glue like this.

Microplane has invented a sort of very small planing system. They have applied it to everything under the sun including a foot scraper. Whatever. What I'm interested is the sand paper.

What they have created is a stainless steel sand paper that works with hook and loop orbital sanders (yes I have one) for wood. They say it cuts the wood instead of scraping and lasts longer.

Amazon has them for $12.95, which includes one fine, medum and course discs.

I've seen a new ski lift in the plans for the last few years at the Santa Fe Ski area. I wonder if this means that they actually built it over the summer. I look forward to a new lift but I believe in the rights of Native Americans. I don't really know what the right answer is here.

The pueblo filed suit in August against the U.S. Forest Service, which had approved the expansion of the ski area. The ski company, which was not named as a defendant, recently intervened in the case.The pueblo contends the new lift will give skiers access to the tribe's holiest shrines and locations, places where members conduct rituals and ceremonies that are necessary for the pueblo's survival. Skiers presence in the area increases the risk that important shrines will be tampered with or destroyed the lawsuit says.

24 things you can do with your laptop, some which relate to computing.

"My IBM laptop makes a great veggie squeezer!"

They are looking at everything but the real problem. What do they think, people are just sitting on the pot to avoid working? I've tried it, it gets old really quick. They should be happy their employees are healthy and regular.

In a memo that was distributed Tuesday to workers at Ford's Michigan Truck plant in Wayne, plant managers said too many of the factory's 3,500 hourly workers are spending more than the 48 minutes allotted per shift to use the bathroom. The extra-long breaks are slowing production of the Ford Expedition and Lincoln Navigator sport utility vehicles that are built there, the company said.

I know people who don't get a good signal, well within the network.

Ushering in a new generation of wireless public and government services, this city on the bank of the Rio Grande today completed one of the nation's largest municipal Wi-Fi networks. Built for Rio Rancho by wireless services firm Azulstar Networks, the metro network provides "laptop ready" mobile Wi-Fi access across more than 40 square miles and is already delivering never-before-available services to businesses, city agencies and some 70,000 residents.

Having moved to Rio Rancho, Comcast is not available. I signed up with CableOne, the provider in RR. So far I've liked what I've seen better than Comcast. My cable bill for Comcast was ner $60 a month, that was just for internet. Even thought I didn't want TV comcast forces you to buy it for $10 a month. Cable one has no such extra charge. Right now I'm paying $29 for 6 months.

I also get a nice strong wireless signal from Roadrunner Wireless. They charge $14.95 a month for Internet service. It's not clear to me how they handle multiple computer so I didn't sign up with them.

I should note that within 4 hours of checking my cableone.net email I already had spam.

Over on Coors rood north, past Paseo Del Norte, there's a gas station offering gas for $1.99 a gallon. Of course there's a line.

"It ain't over till it's over, and it ain't over." Our drought here in the west that is.

I still suggest the development of a national water pipeline. Much like a oil pipeline it would pump mass amounts of water from flooded areas to other area's of the country that need it. Water isn't as valuable as oil, so I doubt it would happen.

On September 29th I finally closed on my house, on September 30th I took possession. Since then I have been spewing cash from my savings getting the place ready to move in. My apartment lease is up at the end of the month, so there's not much time left. For those considering a foreclosed house, I have some advice for you.

Closing on a foreclosed house is nothing like closing on a normally private owned home. Keep in mind that a corporation owns it. If you work for a big company, think about what it would be like if they were selling a house. There's a bureaucracy involved. They have their legal requirements to ensure all the "i"s are dotted and "t"s are crossed. Not to mention that the individuals at the company have no personal interest to ensure that the process is speedy.

Next you add on items such as liens and other legal matters that have to be cleared up before the owning bank can sell it. In my case, there were liens that took longer than they probably should have to clear up. The State of New Mexico had s legal interest in the property so official clearance from the state had to be issued saying they weren't going to take possession of the property after the liens were paid. In this case, the state would only offer those documents via the US postal service, no fedex, no couriers.

The closing officer said my closing went pretty well compared to most. Sometimes liens can be near impossible to clear up, such as those from the federal government. Can you imagine what it takes to get a lien removed from the DEA? The closing officer also said my paperwork wasn't so bad, he had a guy in the day before with a literal foot high of paperwork to sign.

Take this advice if your looking for a foreclosed house.

• Be prepared to wait, wait and wait some more.
• Be prepared to be disappointed. I looked at several houses, a few that were foreclosed on before this one. In one case the previous deal had fallen through and the house was back on the market. We didn't understand the problem at first but now I can see how these things can not work out. Most of the hold ups on my house were on the owning banks side. Yet they had the nerve to say that if it wasn't funded by September 30th they were going to call the whole thing off. I had the approved loan, I was ready the bank needed to get their act together.
• Get a real estate agent. There's a ton of issues with this sort of house and the un-savvy can get very overwhelmed quickly. It's not going to cost you anything.
• Find a agent that will work with you. Some agents wont take the time and effort to deal with all the various issues especially considering how long it can take to close. I have to give mad props (as the kids say) to Paul Taylor. He was awesome though all this and took care of everything for me. I didn't have to deal with the idiocy of the sellers at all.

Link

It was a cold and rainy day in Albuquerque on Sunday. Las Cruces wasn't much better. Having drove from Arizona the day before, i wasn't in a mood for another drive. I eventually got my act together and made it to the event by 3 PM. It cost $6 to get in and about $80 in gas to drive there.

Don't be fooled by the name of the Las Cruces International Airport. It's a dinky little airport and they were able to completely close it down for this event. They had us park several miles down the highway at the fairgrounds and bussed us to the airport. The area was set up like a fair, with some dubious businesses in the tents. This makes me think this is for real and private space flight will happen for sure.

I missed Armadillo Areospace's launch of their craft. Despite the 20 mph winds, they were able to launch and control the craft. However on landing it 2 of it's 3 feet landed off the landing pad and it tipped over. It didn't explode but was damaged. Carmack and crew were out in the crowd showing off bits and pieces of their rocket. It's an impressive machine for sure, they are clearly thinking out of the box with their design.

I did get to see XCOR Aerospace fly their rocketplane, which I have on video. It's a impressive little craft and was flown as if there was no wind. There was lots of wind, the fact that it was blowing parallel with the runway helped.

Starchaser showed off it's rocked engine. I think it blew up after it was ignited since there was a big boom, but there was no announcement either way.

When I was leaving the event about 5, they only had 2X and 3X t-shirts. Have I mentioned the wind yet, the winds had picked up quite a bit by this time. There's nothing like 50 mph blowing sand getting in every orifice of your body. I had a handful of sand in my pockets!

I have pictures of the event on Flickr, and will post a video at some point.

My grandmother died last week, I am in Arizona for her funeral. She lived a long good life. Her Obituary was written by my Uncle Ted in a Springfield Ohio news paper.

SMITH, L. Ruth (Dibert) 90, died September 26, 2005, at 8:47 a.m. in Villa Jean Care Center, Chandler, Arizona. She was born October 5, 1914, in Clark County, Ohio, a daughter of Samuel and Alta May (Bishop) Dibert. She was a 1931 graduate of Terre Haute High School and a 1932 graduate of Westville High School, both in Champaign County, Ohio. She married Edward Donald Smith May 2, 1936 in Urbana, Champaign County, Ohio. She is survived by sons, Charles Edward [Sandy] Smith, Nelson Theodore [Lynda] Smith, James Richard [Sandy] Smith; daughter Betty Jean Richards; son-in-law, Robert Ray Jackson; 20 grandchildren; 26 great-grandchildren; brother, Charles Stephen [Mary] Dibert; sister, Mary Ellen Rowe; numerous nieces, nephews, cousins and friends. She was preceded in death by her parents; husband, Edward Donald Smith June 22, 1981; daughter Ruth Mae [Smith] Jackson August 21, 1996; son-in-law James Jerome Richards February 12, 1992; grandson Ryan Anson Jenkins and granddaughter Cassandra Marie Genco; two brothers and three sisters. Ruth had moved to Tempe, Arizona in 1957 and resided at 1806 Hardy Drive prior to moving to Villa Jean Care Center. She was a steadfast member of Tempe Nazarene Church for over 40 years and will be greatly missed by her many relatives, friends and acquaintances. Until the last couple of years she never missed sending birthday cards to relatives, family and church friends throughout the United States. A gathering of family and friends will be held Wednesday, October 5, 2005, at 1 p.m., on what would have been her 91st birthday. GREEN ACRES MORTUARY, 401 North Hayden Road, Scottsdale, Arizona will be the location of a funeral service at 3 p.m. with burial immediately afterward in the cemetery nearby. Pallbearers will be grandsons, Xan Smith, Gregory Smith, Anthony Jackson, Bobby Jackson, and grandsons-in-law, Paul Cruz and Chuck Genco. Memorial contributions may be made to VITAS Hospice, 3737 North 7th Street, Suite 203, Phoenix. Arizona 85014, or to Tempe Church of the Nazarene, 3929 South Rural Road, Tempe, Arizona 85282. Published in the Springfield News-Sun on 10/1/2005.

Sunday 9 October 2005 the X Prize foundation will be showing off the the ships for the next X Cup. Tickets are $6 for adults and $2 for kids. I will be there, will you?

Come meet the astronauts who will fly them and imagine yourself inside them, watching the earth turn below you. The future is closer than you think. We’re not talking about models. We’re talking about the real thing.

Last year the X PRIZE Foundation gave away $10 million for the first private spaceflight a history-making achievement that blanketed the front pages of newspapers across the globe. This year we’re unveiling a new generation of private spaceships at the X PRIZE CUP in New Mexico.

Bring your friends and family to the Las Cruces Airport on Sunday Oct 9th See six different spaceships currently in testing. Watch them fly. Meet the pioneers, pilots and astronauts who conceived them.

This is a great idea. All the states should do this.

Evacuees of Hurricane Rita will not be charged a fee to stay at any of New Mexico's 32 state parks. New Mexico State Parks Director Dave Simon says the usual 14-day limit on stays, electrical fees and charges for campgrounds will be waived for as long as neccesary.

This sounds like a story on The Onion. One guy is offended by the shape of a ice cream cone and Burger King caves?

The offending lid was spotted in a branch in Park Royal last week by business development manager Rashad Akhtar, 27, of High Wycombe. He was not satisfied by the decision to withdraw the cones and has called on Muslims to boycott Burger King. He said: "This is my jihad. How can you say it is a spinning swirl? If you spin it one way to the right you are offending Muslims."

Wow, if this really comes out I think it will be a excellent replacement for my T3.

The Tungsten T X (which could likely be a code name) will run Palm OS Garnet v5.4.9. It will have a 312MHz XScale processor, a 320x480 pixel display, 128MB of non-volitile memory, 802.11b WiFi, Bluetooth 1.2 and an SDIO expansion slot. It is also supposed to have voice recording and a digital camera, though the source could not confirm it. It will have a $299 USD MSRP.

I just noticed this, in Safari's RSS. A multi page interface. I've been using Safari's RSS since Safari came out and this is for sure the first time I've seen this.

Is it something that I just turned on by accident or is it part of the nightly WebKit builds using NightShift?

"Katrina exposed serious problems in our response capability at all levels of government, and to the extent that the federal government didn't fully do it's job right, I take responsibility," Bush said. "I want to know what went right and what went wrong."

As much as I don't like the Bush administration, President Bush is doing the right thing by admitting to the problem and taking responsibility. To have Michael Brown resign from FEMA is further good news that they are trying to address the issues of what when wrong. Lets see if they continue to do the right thing.

I enjoy reading Boing Boing and they were quick to point out all the problems, yet I haven't read a single post about the governments admissions.

What the...

The children, ages 1 to 14, were found locked in cages at their home in Wakeman, about 40 miles southwest of Cleveland, according to Lt. Randy Sommers of the Huron County Sheriff's Office.

Authorities said the kids were kept in wooden cages, less than 3 feet by 3 feet, without pillows or blankets.

Police said no charges had been filed against the parents.

"Basically, the parents thought they were providing for the protection of the children from themselves and from each other," said Sommers.

Why do you suppose someone was searching for these things on my site?

Tue Sep 06 18:03:47 2005 "broadcast-ownership"
Tue Sep 06 18:03:37 2005 "cross-ownership"
Tue Sep 06 18:03:26 2005 "diversity index"
Tue Sep 06 18:03:12 2005 "media monopoly"
Tue Sep 06 18:03:05 2005 "media convergence"
Tue Sep 06 18:02:58 2005 "media diversity"
Tue Sep 06 18:02:45 2005 "media consolidation"
Tue Sep 06 18:02:35 2005 "media concentration"
Tue Sep 06 18:02:24 2005 "media ownership"
Tue Sep 06 18:02:17 2005 "media ownership"
Tue Sep 06 18:02:04 2005 media ownership

This week's Photo Friday is "Massive". This is the inside of the Valles caldera, a massive volcano in Jemez Mountians. What you may not be able to see in this picture is the large number of deer heards.

The Jemez mountains are a volcanic field in north central New Mexico that overlies the west edge of the Rio Grande rift. Volcanism began 13 million years ago. The most recent activity was 130,000 years ago. Magma ranging from basalt to rhyolite in composition has been erupted. The volcanic field is best known for the Valles caldera which formed 1.12 million years ago and produced the Bandelier Tuff. The Valles caldera is the most studied caldera in the United States (and probably the world). The geothermal and hot springs systems are caused by flow of groundwater through the caldera. The water flows near the top of a subsurface body of igneous rock that still may be partially molten (it is certainly still hot). Some of the water rises to the surface to supply fumaroles and hot springs. Geothermal activity continues. Based on the long history of the Jemez volcanic field and past cycles in activity it probably should be considered a dormant volcano that will probably erupt again.

What would the New Orleans flood look like if it was in another city. Check out the impact.

"I felt her tooth go into my scalp," he said. "I thought, 'Oh, this is no good.' " Then he felt his scalp rip clean away.

The scary story of Johan Otter, who lured a bear away from his daughter. Besides the loss of his scalp he also had five broken vertebrae, three shattered ribs and other various injuries. The bear attacked his daughter anyways but didn't do nearly the that it did to him.

Brushed Metal: No? iTunes 5 is still on? Then why the fuck am I not there?

John Gruber's blog is annoying, but sometimes he comes up with some good stuff. Like this post on Apples not following it's own Human Interface Guidelines and the demise of the Metal interface in iTunes 5.

I have the worst view from my apartment, and it's not one the Sandia's. Apparently there were some lights up there last night that weren't suppose to be there. Let me tell you something, these sort of things are never aliens, they are always humans. Whether they are military or civilian.

Here's a Albuquerque Journal article on it. I'm copying the entire thing here because the ABQJ will take it away in a few days.

Wednesday, September 07, 2005

Sandia Lights Mystery Solved ... Maybe

By Bruce Daniels/
Journal Staff Writer
Will the Sandia Lights — a string of stationary lights seen along Sandia Crest Tuesday night — join the Taos Hum and the UFO Crash near Roswell as part of New Mexico's permanent museum of weirdness?
Apparently not. Just as the state's newest mystery was deepening, eyewitnesses told U.S. Forest Service officials Wednesday they had seen people on the crest Monday carrying large boxes with photographic equipment and again on Tuesday people setting up large "can-shaped lights" along the crest for some kind of photo shoot or photo experiment.
Phones were ringing off the hook at news media outlets and official agencies Tuesday night and Wednesday morning as a string of lights — some said five or six placed at regular intervals along or just below the Sandia Peak ridge — appeared between just after sundown until around 10 p.m. Tuesday.
Officials were just as baffled as the general public until people came forward Wednesday and told the Forest Service what they had seen.
"Someone saw a group of three people Monday afternoon carrying large boxes with photo equipment," District Ranger Jackie Andrew of the Sandia Ranger District said Wednesday. "They were told it was kind of a photography experiment."
Then, a person living at Sandia Peak's Crest House with Forest Service authorization told officials he had seen some seven or eight battery-operated lights, similar to those found at construction sites, lined up along the crest, Andrew said.
Whoever lined up the lights "took the photos and left," said Forest Service spokeswoman Karen Takai.
The explanation "wasn't terribly exciting," said Andrew, who earlier Wednesday had joked, "There were no reports of aliens on the crest this morning."
More likely, Andrew said before the Forest Service had the witnesses come forward, the lights had been caused by nighttime hikers placing lights at regular intervals along the trail, "a see-the-woods-at-night kind of thing."
Mark Chavez, spokesman for the Cibola National Forest, said the same thing. "We suspected it was a group of hikers hiking at night."
But, he added, "we're just as curious to find out what it was as everybody else."
A Bernalillo County sheriff's deputy was dispatched to the crest Tuesday night and found nothing, said BCSO spokeswoman Erin Kinnard. "The deputy cleared the call around 10:15 (p.m.) and said it was nothing."
In fact, the whole public uproar about the lights was much ado about nothing, Kinnard said.
"We got lots of calls," she said. "But we didn't spend a lot of time on it."
Sandia Peak Tramway manager George Boyden said the tram got "all kinds of phone calls" from newspapers, radio and television stations and the general public. "We still don't have any idea what it was," Boyden said.
The first light appeared shortly after sunset, around 7:30 p.m., Boyden said. Then five or six lights appeared at regular intervals, "all right along the ridge" between the Crest House and the tramway terminal, he said.
Boyden said the lights were visible from below the crest as he was driving home around 9 p.m. and were still visible around 10 p.m.
Boyden said he thought when the first light was reported was that somebody had gotten lost, but when more lights appeared he said he joked to coworkers that "maybe the UFOs had landed."
More likely, Boyden said, the lights could have been part of a promotional stunt — one that could well backfire if it was an organized activity that had failed to get a permit from the U.S. Forest Service.
District Ranger Andrew said that a check of the trail where the lights were set up didn't even find a footprint. But whoever engaged in the photo experiment or photo shoot should have checked in with the Forest Service to see whether a permit was needed.

I think I've got the worst of my front end issues resolved. When I had the springs replaced last year, there were still issues. I wasn't quite sure what was left but I figured it was something to do with the brakes. My neglect of the system paid off this week.

The sound of metal on metal scraping is almost as bad as finger nails on a chalk board. I wore down my right front brake pad to nothing, leaving the metal backing to scrape against the rotor. I'd been meaning to get it checked as it was getting worse and worse, i could feel it. The steering wheel would vibrate back and forth when I would brake, for example.

It turns out, I would have needed to replace the rotor anyways. In fact both the left and right rotors needed replaced. I did go 100,000+ miles on these, not too bad. I've got friends with brand new cars and have had them replaced under warranty more than once.

It cost me just under $600 to have the job done. Might seem like a lot but I was quite happy it was that cheap. It was fixed and running in under 3 hours. I could have done the job for probably $200 or less, but I'd risk the chance that it would still be up in the air a week later trying to figure out why I can't get it back together. This is a 4x4, which it makes it a magnitude of scale more difficult (aka a pain in the ass).

I did however replace the spark plugs myself this weekend. This is an easy enough job but still cost me about $75 in plugs and wires. It took me almost a day to complete because of all the crap I had to take off the engine to get to the plugs. Since I had never replaced them before, the wire boots were nice and baked onto the plugs. Let's see how good my mileage is now.

All that's left is a front end alignment and oil change. It's nice to have my wheels drive down the road, in a straight line, without a lot of annoying vibration. Ski season is right around the corner, so it needs to be in tip top condition.

I drove by the New Mexico Space Port a few years ago, it was a sign with a dirt field behind it. Apparently they are going to launch their first rocket into space next year. I will have to check it out again.

The first launch from New Mexico's Southwest Regional Spaceport is on -- and set for March 27, according to Gov. Bill Richardson. Richardson's office announced Tuesday that UP Aerospace, of Connecticut, will launch its SpaceLoft rocket on a sub-orbital flight from the New Mexico Spaceport on that date. The flight will carry seven experimental and commercial payloads for a variety of scholastic and business entities and, after traveling into space, the rocket and its payloads will land in the downrange area of the Spaceport, Richardson's office announced.

Ooohhhhh, now they're going to get it. Better yet, I liked the suggestion I heard to just fire everyone at FEMA (of course, I'm talking management here).

President George W. Bush pledged on Tuesday to review what went wrong in the initial response to Hurricane Katrina but resisted any immediate probe and lawmakers launched an investigation of their own.

I understand that he wants to place blame later, but he always looks like he's trying to cover something up when he avoids doing something like a "probe."

Gov. Bill Richardson and New Mexico Attorney General Patricia Madrid said Friday they will work to draft legislation to investigate and punish companies that engage in gas price gouging after natural disasters.

Richardson said in a news release about the proposal that most people will accept temporary gasoline price hikes in the aftermath of a natural disaster like Hurricane Katrina. But, he added, "it's getting more and more difficult to justify 20-cent, 30-cent, and in some cases, 40-cent increases practically over night.

I'm all for anti-price gouging, which should be illegal, but trying to prevent the free market forces from working is quite another thing.

The way the free market works, is if there is high demand for a product, then the seller can charge more because people are willing to pay more. Sometimes it works to our advantage, sometimes it does not. If we try to artificially keep gas prices down, we will become fat, lazy and complacent with our cheap gas. Then one day it will be gone.

The other thing a free market does is when something gets high in price, it gives alternatives a chance to compete. Hydrogen, fuel cells, vegetable oil-powered diesel hybrids all have a better chance at competing in this sort of market. Alternatives are always good, and competition keeps prices down overall.

I'm no economist, but I believe this to be basically how things work. I'm willing to take some pain now knowing that it's not the end of the world. It will require some adjustments but in the end we will be better for it.

I saw every episode of Gilligan's Island, at least 10 times. It was my favorite show as a kid. I made it a point to learn the lyrics, both versions, of the show. So it's quite sad to hear that Bob Denver (Willie Gilligan) has died today at the age of 70.

Unsurprisingly he died of cancer. Alan Hale Jr., known as Skipper, also died of cancer. Jim Backus (Thurston Howell III) and Natalie Schafer ("Lovey" Howell) have also died. The remaining cast including Tina Louise (Ginger Grant), Dawn Wells (Mary Ann Summers) and Russell Johnson (Roy Hinkley, The Professor) are still alive.

So long little buddy. If I had a flag pole, it would be at half mast just for you.

Azulstar has almost completed the city wide wireless network in Rio Rancho. Although I'm soon to be a resident of Rio Rancho, I probably wont subscribe to this network. Instead going with cable and my own router.

This might change later, especially if If the signal is as strong as they say it will be. The main issue is that I have multiple computer I want to have on the 'net at the same time.

Former TechTV nerd says he knows exactly what Apple will announce on Wednesday.

New Products:- Cingular will announce an iTunes compatible phone - the "Rocker"- New 2GB ipod called the "Nano" - it will sport a color screen and will be much smaller and thinner than a mini. Price = $199

No video ipod.. You heard it here first.

This was was spotted at the local pub, Turtle Mountain. I don't recall what it's name is, but I do recall it gets 30-40 MPG.

Stupid camera phone, i need to figure out how to clean the internal components.

Update 09/05/05 4:41 AM: It's a BMW Isetta. Tons more picture of this car on Flickr.

Google Maps has post Katrina satellite maps up. You can se the same area pre Katrina by pushing the "Satellite" button and back to the Katrina damage by pressing the red "Katrina" button.

I'm a littel confused as to what exactly all the troops are suppose to be doing in NOLA. First this.

The Pentagon said on Saturday it will carefully limit the role of 7,200 federal troops heading into chaotic New Orleans and other places hit by Hurricane Katrina to avoid violating a law barring them from domestic law enforcement duties. "They will not take on a law enforcement role nor have they been directed in any way to do so," said Lt. Gen. Joseph Inge, deputy commander of U.S. Northern Command, which oversees the military relief effort.

Then this.

“This place is going to look like Little Somalia,” Brig. Gen. Gary Jones, commander of the Louisiana National Guard’s Joint Task Force told Army Times Friday as hundreds of armed troops under his charge prepared to launch a massive citywide security mission from a staging area outside the Louisiana Superdome. “We’re going to go out and take this city back. This will be a combat operation to get this city under control.”

So they won't be police, they will be fighting a war.

This house was listed with the clause that the seller would "clean up debris and weeds". There was quite a bit of weeds and some "debris" but it wasn't so bad. When I made my offer I said I would would clean up the weeds and crap left behind. They accepted my offer and the rest is history.

On the final contract, they put back in that the Seller would clean up the weeds and debris. WTF? According to the seller's agent, it was "already scheduled". OK, whatever. Last week the people they contracted to clean up the place, and oh boy did they do a terrific job. Some of the debris had value to me, but the clean up costs vs the costs of the items more than likely even out. Check out these before and after pics.

Front of the house, not a lot of weeds here, but it was nice to have it cleaned up. Makes a difference in the look of the place from the road.

The partially finished storage shed. I think there was some interesting things in here I would have liked to have had. There was also a big wood pile next to it which was taken.

This is the back yard, showing the back 1/4 acre that hasn't been devleoped. I didn't expect them to clean up these weeds.

The vegetable garden. Again, will be a lot easier to get stuff growing here too.

The once grassy area in the back yard (sprinkler system is present). It will be a lot easier to get grass in now.

This was written in 2001.

New Orleans is a disaster waiting to happen. The city lies below sea level, in a bowl bordered by levees that fend off Lake Pontchartrain to the north and the Mississippi River to the south and west. And because of a damning confluence of factors, the city is sinking further, putting it at increasing flood risk after even minor storms.

I don't know, I away seemed to think that it was a bad idea to build a city in the bottom of a bowl near the sea.

There are some guys keeping their data center up and running in New Orleans, quite a amazing feat! But this blog entry is scary as shit.

The police are looting. This has been confirmed by several independent sources. Some of the looting might be "legitimate" in as much as that word has any meaning in this context. They have broken into ATMs and safes: confirmed. We have eyewitnesses to this. They have taken dozens of SUVs from dealerships ostensibly for official use. They have also looted gun stores and pawn shops for all the small arms, supposedly to prevent "criminals" from doing so. But who knows their true intentions. We have an inside source in the NOPD who says that command and control is in chaos. He reports that command lapses more than 24 hours between check-ins, and that most of the force are "like deer in the headlights." NOPD already had a reputation for corruption, but I am telling you now that the people we've been talking to say they are not recognizing the NOPD as a legitimate authority anymore, since cops have been seen looting in Walmarts and forcing people out of stores so they could back up SUVs and loot them. Don't shoot the messenger....

A a survey by Morgan Quitno Press has ranked all 50 states by how smart they are based on their education system. The top 3 smartest states are: Massachusetts, Connecticut and Vermont.

The top 3 dumbest states: Arizona, Nevada and New Mexico. Yes, New Mexico is the dumbest state. I not that surprised by how bad New mexico is doing, but I would have expected Arizona to fair a little better. After all I am a result of that public education system.

A study by UCLA shows that restricting calories may increase your life span, but not significantly. You would may live somewhat more, but you had to suffer by not eating. Is it worth it?

Severely restricting calories over decades may add a few years to a human life span, but will not enable humans to live to 125 and beyond, as many have speculated, evolutionary biologists report. "Our message is that suffering years of misery to remain super-skinny is not going to have a big payoff in terms of a longer life," said UCLA evolutionary biologist John Phelan. "I once heard someone say caloric restriction may not make you live forever, but it sure would seem like it. Try to maintain a healthy body weight, but don't deprive yourself of all pleasure. Moderation appears to be a more sensible solution.

I guess it doesn't get much worse than this. A giant oil rig broke loose and slammed into a bridge. Takes a lot of storm to do that.

As I understand the two things that are needed is cash and blood. You can donate cash via the Red Cross. I'd give some blood, but I think I'm still a month out before I can give again.

Macosxhints posts this handy script that will search your Apple Address Book and add any contacts with Gmail email addresses to your iChat jabber buddy list. I've reproduced the script here for easier reading.

--Open this script in a new Script Editor window.

tell application "Address Book"
    -- much faster with large Address books if you make a smart list called "Gmail'ers" in Address Book that has people who have "gmail.com" in their email addresses, and then use the following line instead of the one after that
    -- set contacts to (every person in group "Gmail'ers")
    set contacts to (every person)
    repeat with thisContact in contacts
        repeat with thisEmail in email of thisContact
            if value of thisEmail contains "@gmail" then
                set found to false
                -- do they already have the appropriate Jabber handle?
                repeat with handle in Jabber handles of thisContact
                    if value of handle contains "talk.google.com" then