Blog posts

.kerry { color: blue; } .bush { color: red; } So in the end we didn’t watch the first Presidential “debate” on Thursday night. If Martyn Joseph hadn’t been playing at Schulers there might have been some chance, but ongoing campaign fatigue would probably still have prevented us from breaking our TV fast. So it was a pleasant surprise on Friday morning to start reading the reports and begin gaining the impression that the next one might be worth watching. Word on the street seems to be that Kerry may have (for the first time) won a verbal victory over his smirking opponent. Let’s hope it’s a sign of eloquence to come. ...

I had heard that Michigan Association of Police were running a fund raising campaign at present. I had held out a hope that they’d phone me, but I didn’t expect them to. Particularly not on a day when only one in ten calls was for someone who lived here. Yet call me they did and I got the chance to ask my question. After agreeing with the contention that “in these troubling times” we should support the police force, that it was important that scholarshps be provided for those wanting to pursue careers in law enforcement, and that the families of officers killed in action should be supported, I was asked whether $25 or $50 would be my preferred donation. ...

Something British visitors to the United States in these pre-election months immediately notice is the yard signs. Outside an increasing proportion of homes (including ours) are small signs on metal legs proclaiming the residents’ candidate of choice. It’s something new to me; it’s encouraging as it shows a high level of involvement in the political process; it’s scary as there are far too many Bush/Cheney signs; and it’s the surest sign yet that this is a country divided. ...

Just as I was sitting down to work some more on the MoveableType bugs that were disrupting this blog I spotted that a solution had been posted on the support boards. Monthly archives aren’t yet building properly but everything else should now be back to normal. I may even write more this week. No promises.

As the more observant may have noticed, a few test entries appeared here today. I’m at It’s A Grind in Grand Rapids working some more on grwifi.net. I now have comments enabled, and this entry is mainly a test to make sure it works. It’s A Grind is a good place to get work done. The WiFi connectivity varies during the day and occasionally, um, grinds a little, but the service is friendly and it’s usually a decent connection. ...

Since upgrading to the latest version of moveabletype I’ve been experiencing a litany of issues getting this blog to rebuild properly. So far attempts to fix that have led to me ditching the previous template for this front page (hopefully it’ll be back soon) and now to making a slight change to the MoveableType code and switching off monthly archives. Right now, it seems to be working, but I’d rather like to get monthly archives back. And my old design. Hopefully within the next few days…. ...

When I’d visit Grand Rapids every few months and need ways to fill my days while Kari was at work, I kept an eye on Alan’s reviews of Grand Rapids WiFi Locations. It was great to have such a comprehensive list of locations that I could get online, get good coffee, and only pay for the latter. When Alan left Grand Rapids, Topher took over the listings and moved them to grwifi.net. And now they’ve changed hands again. I’ve just completed the first stage of a redesign/reworking of the site. Now with search functionality, polling and the promise of comment facilities and XML feeds. You can find it all at grwifi.net. ...

The refrain about WMDs and WMD programmes and *insert qualifier here* WMD *insert further qualifier here* is not just all too familiar, it’s ridiculously familiar. It seems that the US government, and the Bush junta in particular are not content simply to watch their hens come home to roost in Iraq, they’re looking for opportunities to be surrounded by still more poultry. I’m writing, of course, about yet another increase in rhetoric about Iran. Thankfully it looks as though the European powers have defused the situation for the time being (and I don’t think the US is likely to invade any time soon, troops are in too short supply) but this time the key thing that leapt out of this BBC coverage was the US government’s proposed deadline to Iran. ...

I try and refrain from blogging too much about the latest online tools/toys I’m playing with, but this one was just too good to pass up. It may be the biggest money saving device I’ve found this year and it all works from your bookmarks bar. What it is is a script that will let you generate a ‘bookmarklet’ (a useful script you can place in your bookmarks) that will take you from a book listing on amazon to the corresponding book on your local library’s search system. ...

For those who were enthralled by Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, Ying Xiong (Hero) is likely to be a must-see. We were certainly engrossed, with disbelief quickly suspended in the face of such fine cinematography. The film made an interesting juxtaposition with the trailer for Alexander that preceded it. That film’s tagline (The Greatest Legend Of All Was Real) not only drawing questions from me as to how “great” a man who destroyed Persepolis could be considered, but also as to Hollywood’s propensity for either/or dichotomies and the need for a “greatest” hero. ...