benpeek
Ben Peek |
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Wed, Jun. 19th, 2013 05:32 pm
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I have self imposed deadlines and imposed deadlines. The latter informs the former.
I have one year deadlines for each of the novels in Children, which seems like a lot--I have seen some authors with half that--but I rewrite a lot, and I'll need that time. Because of the way I work, I have divided up my larger deadline into smaller ones, and I have marks in the work that I have to hit every couple of weeks. If I haven't hit that, I fall behind, and that requires me to expend a bit more time in the day writing, or bail on a plan, or something similar. None of it is a particular problem, but it explains the blog silence over the last week and a bit. I suspect it'll happen here and there, as well, and I apologise if you come by and there's nothing new for a few days here and there.
In the meantime, I have been watching the Australian media devour itself in an attempt to prove who is or isn't more sexist. Most recently, I saw Piers Akerman attempt to validate the question made by Howard Sattler on Insiders ("Is your partner gay?") and then claim it to be a left wing, blogsphere conspiracy that was kicking up a fuss about it. Of course, Akerman, who has been brought up on sexual harassment charges, as well as assault charges against a female editor, knows nothing of sexism, and we're all just making a mistake suggesting that he's nothing but a spineless, weak willed, climate denying, homophobic, sexist piece of garbage.
Yes, a mistake.
Frankly, I have been amazed and saddened by how awful Australia has generally been acting in the last few weeks, not to mention the months and years of this. I thought equality was a thing we had all agreed upon as being good and important? I get that you might not like Julia Gillard, or another woman, but what, you can't mount a critique of their ideas? You can't be reasoned and informed? There's enough there to argue that Gillard's Labor has been unsuccessful at times (and successful at others) and you don't need to suggest her partner is gay, or write offensive menus where you refer to her vagina as a big red box. It's shameful--it's shameful to me as an Australian person who is a man that you are doing this. If I was in another country now, I would claim to be Canadian or some shit, rather than be associated with what you are doing.
I could go on, and on, but ultimately, it'd come back to not understanding why.
Why?
Why do this?
Don't you have mothers and daughters and partners, Australia? Don't you have female friends?
Do you all want to be known as a misogynistic, hate filled religious country without the obscenely conservative religious views?
It is sexist and it is degrading and it is shameful and it needs to stop.   
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drave117
Drave |
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Tue, Jun. 18th, 2013 11:55 pm
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I got another job callback today. For somewhere I applied a month ago. At least, I thought I was applying for a job. It turns out it was just another placement service. As with all the others, they want me to come in and meet them in person. They seem to be a slightly lower class version of the main one I am using. They have lower paying jobs, but I can't really afford to be picky at the moment. I'll even have to say yes the next time Stream comes after me. *sigh* At least this place is at the other end of the city from the other one, so maybe they'll have some different jobs. In the evening, BlackDotBug and I met up for our weekly dinner adventure. This time, we chose Raven & Rose. Here is their sign. As you can see from the bird on it, we are definitely in Portland.  I love how every restaurant printed out one of these little Portland Dining Month menus. They are all so cute! This is the first of our PDM adventures to offer any kind of choice.  The carafes here are not quite as odd as the other two places, but they are equally fancy. Even more fancy is the fact that this place gave us the choice of regular water or sparkling water! Naturally, we chose sparkling. As you can see, we are sitting at the chef counter, which I didn't know was a thing until just last week. The chef counter is fun because you can watch stuff being cooked.  Another absolutely delicious starting salad. This one is made with Humboldt Fog goat cheese, hazelnuts, and dried cherries. This particular cheese is interesting because it is made with a thin layer of ash down the middle, which you can spot on some of the shreds if you look very carefully. Normally, I like strawberries more than cherries, but I liked the cherries in this salad better than the strawberries in the last one.  This is what BlackDotBug chose. It looked pretty good, but I went with the other choice because I didn't want to eat pork three restaurants in a row. It's on a bed of spatzle, along with baby carrots and asparagus. I tried a little bite of everything, and it was all top shelf. Especially the asparagus.  And here's what I ordered! Grilled albacore tuna with baby artichokes, green olives, and agretti, on a bed of various white and green beans. The tuna was just a little rare in the middle, and nicely grilled on the outside. The vegetables all had excellent textures that complimented each other perfectly. Somehow, this meal managed to feel light as a feather and incredibly hearty at the same time. Perfect food for a mild spring day!  I swear we didn't do this on purpose, but our dessert was yet another variant of cake, fruit, and cream. This one had a much more interesting texture than the last one, and I think the cake itself might have been soaking in something delicious at one point. I secretly want whatever tins are used to make these little flower burst cupcakes! Another fine dessert, although I could have done without the almond slivers under the creme fraiche.  After dinner, I went back to BlackDotBug's place to borrow some books for 35 During 35. I've now got enough to get me through the next few weeks. After that, I think I need to start making better use of my local library. Anyway, to round out the evening, I watched a Star Trek episode. Episode 1.13 - The Conscience of the KingThis is a pretty interesting episode marred by some really ridiculous over-acting. In this one, a touring company of actors is performing Shakespeare plays on various colonies. One of the actors as suspected of being an infamous mass murderer twenty years ago. Kirk agrees to transport the actors to their next gig so he can try and figure out the truth about the actor. The plot is fairly ambitious, and with a decent amount of moral complexity. The dynamic between Spock and Bones is particularly good here, especially compared to the other early episodes. We also get to see an early example of Kirk exploiting his super sexy powers in pursuit of the truth. No crew deaths. No Saurian brandy mentioned, although the bottle that was used to represent it the last time makes another cameo, but they call it a different name. We do see the rec room again, which once again has 3D chess, 3D checkers, and the deck of round playing cards. Oh, and Uhura gets to sing another song, but it's not as good as the first one.  full Current Music: Katzenjammer - A Kiss Before You Go
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boingboing_net
Boing Boing |
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Tue, Jun. 18th, 2013 08:00 pm
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http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/rCo85R9ZZN8/story01.htm http://boingboing.net/?p=236919 The "other shoe" in the Edward Snowden NSA leaks has been the potential effect of all these disclosures on the Electronic Frontier Foundation's efforts to force the government to account for itself in court. Since 2005 -- when Mark Klein, a former AT&T worker came into EFF's offices with documentary evidence of a secret room at AT&T's Folsom Street switching center, where the NSA was effectively making a copy of all the traffic on AT&T's network without a warrant -- the EFF has been trying to get the government to explain to a judge why they think this kind of bulk surveillance is legal. But at every turn, the Bush and Obama DoJs have convinced judges that these questions can't be asked in court, let alone answered. The invocation of state secrecy has stymied all attempts to date at getting the government to square the circle on the Fourth Amendment and bulk, warrantless surveillance of every American's Internet traffic. As Wired's David Kravets notes, judges may be a lot more skeptical about state secrecy now that this stuff just isn't much of a secret anymore: First it was the President George W. Bush administration and then the President Barack Obama administration, which for years have been arguing in court that the state-secrets privilege shields the government from lawsuits accusing it of siphoning Americans’ electronic communications to the National Security Agency without warrants. But with the recent Spygate leaks, including one that all calling metadata of Verizon customers is being forwarded to the NSA, the government is hard-pressed to maintain that line with a straight face. “By contrast, the recent disclosures have greatly undermined the factual and legal basis for the government defendants’ separate and distinct state secrets motion,” the Electronic Frontier Foundation wrote in a recent court filing. The EFF’s lawsuit, which has had a tortured history through the courts, is based in part on allegations of internal AT&T documents, first published by Wired, that outline a secret room in an AT&T San Francisco office and others which allegedly route internet traffic to the NSA. Spygate Leaks Imperil State-Secrets Defense [David Kravets/Wired]    
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marlowe1
Tim Lieder |
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Wed, Jun. 19th, 2013 01:37 am
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Kickstarter didn't work for me for a few reasons. I didn't have a video on the page and I only promoted it to my friends. I got $35 from it, which didn't really make the cut. I was told that Indiegogo has a flexible funding which means that you get whatever is donated regardless of whether it makes the funding goal. So I started one - with a video - http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/king-david-the-spiders-from-mars-tales-of-biblical-terror/x/3483829And there I am looking all twitchy and fat. I REALLY hate speaking - officially or otherwise - especially when asking for money. I did shave my neck, I think. My friend who filmed me tried to be helpful, but I needed more rehearsal and less pep talk. Of course, no matter how much I rehearsed there was still going to be a lot of embarrassment in that video. I really hate watching myself talk. Also I am at 240 which I've been at for the last couple of years, but I still don't like it. I'm not gaining weight but I don't seem to be losing it either. This sucks even more considering that the last time I was shocked by a weight gain, I had reached 225 pounds. About 6 years ago, I was down to 210. The lowest I've weighed since the year of FUCKING HELL (aka the year my metabolism slowed down and I went from 150 pounds and couldn't gain an ounce to 215 within a year) was 190 but that came from being really poor and not all that happy from a breakup. The thing is that I start to lose weight, I get serious. I get to a place where I feel pretty good about myself. Then I get lazy and it goes back on. Must join Planet Fitness - it's one subway stop away and it's only $10/month. Doesn't help that most of my day is spent on a couch with a laptop in my lap. Oh yeah - and please contribute to the Bible themed horror anthology that I'm almost done editing.
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365tomorrowsrss
365 tomorrows |
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Wed, Jun. 19th, 2013 04:03 am
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http://365tomorrows.com/06/19/dis-country/ http://365tomorrows.com/?p=5120 Author : James Zahardis
Ambassador Xiao, with decades of political service and negotiation of the Nigerian Treaty still evoked an inauspicious “Is this the best we’ve got?” when it was Worldcast that he would be sent to Arizona. He was a paunchy sexagenarian, whom one would expect to find on the golf course–not stepping off a combat glider into a Red Zone.
Xiao saluted General Allistar who pointed to the monumental basalt a quarter-mile away. Xiao switched his aviator sunglasses to binocular mode and shut his eyes. The preceding week reeled before him: his office with its shadow boxes brimming with medallions; his cup of Masala chai that went cold; and the live-feed of the sky over the canyon lands south of Flagstaff, as spacetime was broached.
Xiao opened his eyes. Cathedral Rock encompassed his field-of-view. He walked toward the rock.
“You want backup?” the General asked.
“It’s best if I do this on my own.”
Within three-hundred meters of the rock’s base the invaders appeared. Xiao retained his composure despite their crab-like forms, and multitudinous, undulating feelers.
“We expected Grays–not creatures out of Lovecraft or Bosch…” Xiao thought as they approached. Intelligence suspected they were foot soldiers. A larger one had a ‘boom-tube’ strapped across its back: it looked like a flute, yet a pulse from it disintegrated a jet squadron. Several horseshoe crab-size aliens clamored at Xiao’s feet. He noticed a red glow near his breast pocket originating from a stylus-shaped object in the tentacles of one of the aliens.
“Scanning for weapons? A bio-analyzer?” he wondered.
The aliens vanished. A downdraft wafted an odor into the canyon that reminded Xiao of cheap plastic Halloween costumes.
An eight-foot tall monstrosity materialized in front of him.
“A chimera!” the ambassador thought, staring at the alien’s reptilian-looking body, humanoid posture, and tufts of tentacle in place of a neck. Its face was mouthless and covered with obsidian disks. A cat-sized, spider-like creature was at its feet. It strode forward and looped a chain around Xiao’s neck. The tentacles of the chimera undulated and Xiao felt an odd sensation in his brain.
“Qan-tho’manos, representative of Dis–sympathies for battle-fallen offered,” the chimera-like being communicated.
“I am here on behalf of the President of the Republic of Sino-America and the United Nations of Earth. We welcome you and regret our unfortunate initial encounter,” Xiao replied.
“Dis from fringes observed–great cruelty of your race did learn–darkly dream of your humankind Dis spawn and minds of artists poisoned–a relief over Qlz’drn City on Great Sky-Vault your races brutality depicts,” Qan-tho’manos communicated.
Qan-tho’manos paused. The ambassador saw his reflection, like tiny tadpoles in oily pools, in the representative’s obsidian disks.
“Blended all Dis from galaxy sentient creations–life-code sacred in mutability infinite–last war humans–soldiers bearing life-code corrupted–killing efficient–abhorrent–now Dis came must.”
“But we negotiated peace an–eh–”
The ambassador’s mouth fused together.
“War for generations Dis not have–this peace to you extend we.”
The ambassador fell to the ground. His arms and legs were contracting and his epidermis hardening.
“Myranx your race becomes–humility learn will–servitude to Dis.”
Xiao was now a crab-like creature with the vestige of a man’s face. His final human memory was of the Nigerian Conference, when he negotiated world peace and ended the deployment of genetically enhanced troops; his final human emotion was compunction, realizing it had come too late.
END
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jwz
jwz |
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Tue, Jun. 18th, 2013 09:39 pm
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| @Chris_Randall | Imagine a 70s sci-fi TV show director needing a band for some show set in, say, the year 2013, and coming up with Die Antwoord.
Die Antwoord are to pop culture as 190-proof Everclear is to alcohol: a distilled essence that is dangerous to ingest. | | @jwz | I know what you mean, but wouldn't it be great if they weren't... you know... terrible? | | @Chris_Randall | Well, there's that. On the other hand, it saves you from being emotionally affected by the inevitable disappointment
See also: Brokencyde. | | @jwz | | | @Chris_Randall | That Buck Rogers scene was exactly what I was thinking of before. | Mirrored from jwz.org. , music, retrocomputing, the future, tv
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maradydd
Meredith L. Patterson |
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Wed, Jun. 19th, 2013 05:59 am
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If you are one of the people that Georgia Weidman refers to here: Conference staff was originally very supportive. But then they went to hear his side of the story and they suddenly wouldn’t even look at me. I realize it’s a complicated situation, but what I hit myself in the eye? I asked an organizer point blank if he believed me, and he said he didn’t know. I don’t know what the guy’s story is, but from the police and the conference’s refusal to act, I assume it’s pretty convincing. Hotel staff pulled the security tapes. Someone I thought was a friend of mine watched them with hotel staff. The general jist I got from the interaction was because I was on the tape letting him into my room, walking in the hallway with him, etc. I must be lying. Where in any of that did I consent to unprotected sex, being hit, etc?
The interesting stuff is the reactions. The people who say things like, “This isn’t what I think of course, but I bet a lot of people don’t believe you because you flirt on Twitter,” or “Everyone saw you kiss so and so at this party, so of course no one believes you didn’t want to have sex with that guy.” then you are fucking terrible at incident response and should find a career field where you are not responsible for the safety of anyone or anything of more value than a common goldfish. Preferably not even yourself, because you're not even competent enough for that. I refer you to the following excerpt from slightly earlier: So I gave [the police] my driver’s license and after they left I tore the room apart looking for my passport. In all my passport, wallet, iPad, one of my test phones, one shoe, and my Tag Heuer Carrera watch were stolen. Anyone who is into watches will know my pain at losing it. He originally said he had nothing of mine when questioned by hotel security. Then he magically found my iPad and passport but nothing else. The phone was later found in the hallway of his floor of the hotel. The rest of my things were recovered the next evening from his room by conference staff. So let me get this straight. Because you have some uncertainty about whether a sexual assault occurred or not, therefore nothing else happened? What about the missing watch, the missing iPad, the missing shoe, the missing passport for crying out loud? Have we suddenly Quantum Leaped into a timeline where a person confessing to taking items of value and then returning them is, somehow, magically, not incontrovertible evidence of theft? Take your time. I'm not going anywhere. As infosec professionals it falls to us to recognise, as quickly as possible, any and all indicators of compromise, and prioritise our responses to them. If you are somebody who looks at Shaky Evidence For A and Irrefutable Evidence For B (Not Conditional On A), but decides that because A's evidence is shaky then B can't be true, then you fail at logic and should find a job that doesn't require it before your incompetence hurts someone. I don't care whether you have strong feelings about A or not -- taking a job in this field means committing to evaluating evidence objectively and taking action based on that evidence, and if your feelings about A cloud your ability to evaluate B objectively then you suck at your job. This goes for any A. If the Russians know that you have an irrational hate-on for the Chinese, and they hit you with one exploit that might be Chinese but you can't really be certain and another that is undisputably Russian, and your response is, "Those dirty Chinese, let's get 'em!" then the Russians win that round and you deserve to be mocked. Also fired. I mean, seriously. I believe Georgia completely, but for the sake of this discussion I will go so far as to stipulate a situation where not only no sexual assault occurred, but no physical assault occurred (so, like, they both walked into doors? a particularly vicious door that left him bleeding freely from the temple? OK, whatever you say). How, then, do you explain the bizarre assemblage of stuff he took from her room and subsequently returned? "She loaned me the watch, phone, and iPad" strains the bounds of belief, but "she loaned me one of her shoes" beggars it entirely. Stop straining so hard at those gnats, you'll hurt yourself. Not to mention the passport. I don't know whether any of you have ever been without a passport in a foreign country; I have. Mine was stolen on a plane from DC to Brussels last August, and I spent four days in a Belgian border detention center because of it. I have also been raped. If I were forced to choose between reliving either experience exactly as it happened originally, I'd pick the rape, no question. Granted, it sounds like Georgia had the support of the US Embassy, and could have probably gotten a replacement passport without a side trip through Club About to Be Deported, but that does not excuse the fact that taking someone's passport is serious fucking business. Keep in mind, a United States passport is not the property of the person to whom it is issued, but of the State Department. I am not a lawyer, and cannot credibly tell you whether a passport is the kind of "public record" that 18 USC 641 applies to, but if I were Fernando Gont -- the thief Georgia was reluctant to name, but said I could -- I would check with an actual lawyer and find out just what my actual liabilities might be, at least before stealing another fucking passport again. But back to you, the people I'm addressing. I believe it to be the case that this community is one that does not countenance rape or assault. Perhaps the evidence of assault in this situation is too tenuous to meet the burden of proof for that, which is why I spotted you that point to begin with. I also believe it to be the case that this community is one that does not countenance theft, and what else can you call "taking physical objects that aren't yours and not returning them"? Gont didn't wake up the next morning with a throbbing headache, find a mysterious passport and iPad among his belongings, and take them to the hotel staff saying "Dear me, I appear to have come into possession of Georgia Weidman's passport and perhaps this iPad is also hers," they had to question him -- and at first he lied about it. Then the conference staff had to recover the rest of her things that he'd taken. Including her shoe, let me remind you. Who takes a shoe? What the fuck is wrong with this guy? What the fuck is wrong with you for not being as repelled as I am by this demonstration of his apparent get-hammered-and-steal-shit-from-people proclivities? Keeping on our physical-security toes is all well and good, but if people are wandering around conferences getting plastered and going "oh I like that, it's mine now," then maybe those people don't need to be drinking. Or maybe they don't need to be at our conferences. Or is someone going to try and rationalize theft away now? Note, please, that I'm not saying "if you accept that Gont stole Weidman's and the State Department's property, you must also accept that he assaulted Weidman"; rather, if you accept that Gont committed crimes of property, one of which is probably a federal felony, why would you just handwave a thing like that away? I'm waiting. , couldn't make it up if i tried, cut that shit out, stuff that got dropped in my lap, this is why we can't have nice things
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marlowe1
Tim Lieder |
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Tue, Jun. 18th, 2013 11:39 pm
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I thought I had done this already. But apparently I hadn't. Anyhow I am doing the write-up for the Indiegogo campaign for King David and the Spiders from Mars and I went over to Queens because my friend offered to let me film videos for the official page. Of course, in the videos I look fat and twitchy and I lose my place and it looks like my shirt is too small to button all the way to the top. Anyhow, this is the Table of Contents for King David and the Spiders from Mars:
Moving Nameless by Sonya Taaffe
The Chabad of Innsmouth by Marsha Morman
Three Young Men by Romie Stott
The Chronicle of Aliyat Son of Aliyat from the Chronicles of the Kings of Ashdod by Alter Reiss
Good King David by Jeff Chapman
The Sons of Zeruiah by Megan Arkenberg
God Box by Lyda Morehouse
I am going to try my hardest to get the book out by December. Basically that means that it has to be finished by August (then four months to send it out to reviewers)
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jwz
jwz |
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Tue, Jun. 18th, 2013 08:17 pm
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Dental Phantom So many highly relevant previouslies: Previously, previously, previously, previously, previously, previously, previously, previously, previously, previously, previously, previously. Mirrored from jwz.org. , robots, teeth Current Music: Icky Blossoms -- Sex to the Devil
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boingboing_net
Boing Boing |
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Tue, Jun. 18th, 2013 03:17 pm
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http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/ZMQ37PS5INQ/story01.htm http://boingboing.net/?p=236747 Composed by Edward Elgar between 1898 and '99, Variations on an Original Theme for Orchestra ("Engima"), Op. 36, has long been my favorite piece of classical music. In addition to being beautiful music there is enough mystery packed into the Variations to keep every conspiracy theorist in the house busy for years. The work is comprised of a theme and 14 variations. Each variation is dedicated to a friend but the enigma remains hidden. What is the common theme? Is it played or is it conceptual? Some insist it must be music, some it must be a feeling. Blogger Robert Padgett offers theories, identifies hidden puzzles, strongly offers solutions and proof on his blog Elgar's Enigma Theme Unmasked A comprehensive analysis of the Enigma Variations conducted over five years revealed the existence of at least nineteen different ciphers. While seemingly extraordinary, such a high number is entirely consistent with a reigning feature of Elgar’s psychological profile – an intense fascination for ciphers. More importantly, their decryptions are significant because they provide the answers to key questions concerning the Variations. What is the secret melody on which the Enigma Theme is a counterpoint?    
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boingboing_net
Boing Boing |
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Tue, Jun. 18th, 2013 03:14 pm
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http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/8QerucivYrA/story01.htm http://boingboing.net/?p=236903 Molly sez, "I wrote this short essay over at iO9 on what the future of civil disobedience could look like. Though in the past civil disobedience was enacted in the streets, with people placing their bodies in harm's way for their cause, now online activists can engage in digitally-based acts of civil disobedience from their keyboards. I lay out three major lines along which digitally-based civil disobedience is developing: disruption, information distribution, and infrastructure. The future of civil disobedience online lies in affinity groups combining these three styles of activism, and using a diversity of tactics to support a common cause." Infrastructure-based activism involves the creation of alternate systems to replace those that have been compromised by state or corporate information-gathering schemes. In other words, if the government is snooping on the internet, activists build a tool to make it harder for them to see everything. Tor, Diaspora, and indenti.ca are some examples of these projects, as are the guerrilla VPNs and network connections that often spring up to serve embattled areas, provided by activists in other countries. Similar to living off the grid, these projects provide people with options beyond the default. Open source or FLOSS software and Creative Commons use a similar tactic: when the system stops working, create a new system. The challenge is to bring these new systems into widespread use without allowing them to be compromised, either politically or technically. However, these new systems often have to fight network effects as they struggle to attract users away from dominant systems. Diaspora faced this issue with Facebook. Without being able to disrupt dominant systems, user migration is often slow and piecemeal, lacking the impact activists hope for. The Future of Civil Disobedience Online    
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cmpriest
cherie priest |
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Tue, Jun. 18th, 2013 08:18 pm
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Holy crap, you guys - it's been a week. First of all, our mystery guest of awesomeness came to visit for a few days, wherein he performed MANY SNUGGLES upon both Greyson and Spain the Cat ... and altogether we went to the Writing Excuses retreat - not because we were proper attendees, but because we were in the neighborhood. We did BBQ and podcasts, and shenanigans occurred. A marvelous good time was had by all! Shortly after our mystery guest departed (within hours, actually) ... we had new guests! My dad and stepmom appeared, along with Duke and Daisy - their recent adoptees from the Dane Crazy Great Dane Rescue outside Nashville. Really, you guys. Four adults, three dogs (the smallest of whom was 85 pounds), and a very pissy cat in a folk Victorian bungalow for a few days. IT WAS AWESOME. And even if Big G hadn't recently been clipped for summer, he still would've looked like the teeny baby of the bunch.  Daisy is a slender young lady about Greyson's age, underweight in the wake of a bad abandonment situation ... but they've put a good 25 pounds on her, and they're stuffing her full of fancy kibble and cookies to bring her up to speed. Duke is 5 years old and 130 pounds, every ounce a gentleman. He was surrendered when a family lost its home, and at his age, he was difficult to place ... despite his awesomely easy-going disposition, slow and gentle demeanor, and tendency to sit on your lap, just because he's feeling cuddly.  [Note regarding that pic: I am 5 ft. 5 inches tall, and weigh somewhat less than 130 pounds.] Anyway, as mentioned previously, it turns out that my dad and stepmom are kind of big fat suckers. Which has worked out very well for these two newly spoiled pooches - much to Big G's personal delight. Daisy was a playmate he could spar and wrestle with, and Duke was a freelance nuzzler with a cinder-block-sized head to deliver kisses on demand. Besides: BONUS DOG GRANDPARENTS. Seriously. Best dog week EVER. But the week got a little weird when we loaded up the dogs and trekked them out to a big old cemetery for a happy-go-lucky big dog walk ... for we soon learned we were not precisely alone. No, not ghosts. CATS. Out from the woods sprang two tiny kittens - who pounced upon the dogs as if they could eat them (and had EVERY INTENTION of doing so). The dogs are all wildly pro-cat, thank God; and the kittens received no damage apart from a serious drool-spa combined with an excessive tongue-bath. And then, because I also am a big fat sucker (it runs in the family), I scored a box and stuffed the kittens thereunto. There was exactly zero chance that I could hang onto the little stinkers, given our overstuffed household situation (never mind our cat-hating elderly feline matriarch); but I knew a safe place where I could take them.* The little black one with the teeny white paws is a hellion. I drove all the way to the shelter with the box fastened shut, my heavy ol' purse sitting atop the box, the seatbelt strapping the whole thing shut, and one hand holding the lid secure ... and he(she?) STILL managed to repeatedly get a paw through the cracks in order to flip me the bird. Both kittens are hella-sweet, VERY dog friendly (I was joking, above), and happy to be held, cuddled, and cooed at. The black one (who I've dubbed "Killer") just took offense at being stuffed into a box, that's all. His(her?) sibling, the stripey little "Spook" was the adventurer of the pair - the first one to accost the dogs and to accept the subsequent damp snorgling that ensued. Killer was somewhat more dubious, but still willing to fling him(her)self into the mix in case backup was required. You guys, I SERIOUSLY, and furthermore DESPERATELY want someone to adopt these two. I'm reasonably confident that they were dumped, as they're about 6-8 weeks old, very healthy, all alone, and we have NEVER seen or heard kittens in the cemetery despite daily walks there with Big G. This is, by the way, the cemetery in which my husband took the baby fox picture - so we know good and well that there is a robust community of predators lurking about the city of the dead. These babies hadn't been there long; they were VOCAL and hungry...yet fiercely lovable. They are not feral. They are comfortable with people - nay, pitifully desperate for people. They came to me when I called them, literally running into my hands. If you are in the Chattanooga area - and/or might be willing to drive there - and you'd be interested in adopting these two ridiculous cutie-pies ... please contact the McKamey Animal Center at (423) 305-6500 and ask about the cemetery kittens admitted there by yours truly. They have plenty of paperwork from me under yes, this name [points at the URL] because it is my real name; I had to fill out a bunch of stuff to surrender them, and I felt awful about it the whole time. But it was better than leaving them for fox chow. In the rain. Did I mention it was raining? WHO THE HELL DUMPS KITTENS in the CEMETERY in the goddamn RAIN??? I don't even want to know. So. Yes. Please consider adopting, and please spay and neuter, and please make room in your hearts and your homes if you can.
McKamey Animal Center
4500 North Access Rd.
Chattanooga, TN 37415
(423) 305-6500
* Not the shelter from whence we acquired Greyson and Spainy - but that one is always, ALWAYS full. When they have openings, they cull critters from shelters like McKamey. McKamey IS a kill shelter and I hate that, but their kill rate is low, and they perform a major amount of adoption-driving and fund-raising to spay and neuter throughout the land. The shelter manager lives in my neighborhood, and he's been very helpful with regards to rescue, sterilization, and rehoming of stray and unwanted critters. It's a good place to take vulnerable kittens, but it's not without its risks, and I very much would like to see them elsewhere.
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boingboing_net
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Tue, Jun. 18th, 2013 01:06 pm
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http://feeds.boingboing.net/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/yS0zdQElaiY/story01.htm http://boingboing.net/?p=236973 
Rogue archivist Carl Malamud sez, On November 1, Public.Resource.Org released a new service which put 6,461,326 US nonprofit tax returns on the net for bulk download, developers, and search engines to access. We offered to give the working system to the government, and also sent them a few suggestions on ways they could better meet their mission and save themselves a boatload of money. Since then, we've been frantically trying to get the government's attention to take decisive action, but to no avail. The way the government makes the nonprofit tax returns available to the public is broken in many ways. The IRS insists on selling the tax returns as a monthly feed of DVDs costing $2,580 per year. Each month, I get a stack of a dozen DVDs, each one has 60,000 1-page TIFF files on it. This is just so lacking in clue, and even simple suggestions like using Dropbox instead of mailing us DVDs have been ignored. In terms of breakage though, the truly big problem is the deliberate dumbing down of tax returns for large nonprofits in order to avoid what an IRS official actually said to us would be "too much transparency." All the big nonprofits have to e-file their tax returns. E-filing means they submit actual machine-processable data encoded in XML. The way the IRS releases that information is mind-boggling. They image the data onto tax forms and then release them as 200 dot per inch TIFF files. So, instead of having a computer program extract the gross revenue, or the CEO salaries, or whether or not the nonprofit operates a tanning salon on premises (an actual question on the form!), you get something that is so bad that OCR is difficult. Nonprofits are a $1.5 trillion chunk of the U.S. economy, yet we're deliberately dumbing down data that could make that sector more efficient and more vibrant. That's dumb. Since November, we've been trying to get the IRS and the Obama Administration to release this information, but they've refused. We've met with all sorts of IRS officials such as Lois Lerner and Joseph Grant of Tea Party fame, and we've also met with a ton of boldface names in the White House, such as Todd Park (the President's CTO) and Steve VanRoekel (the Federal CIO). Nobody will release the data. The IRS is worried the big nonprofits will be upset if information such as multimillion-dollar CEO salaries is more readily available. Since discussion hasn't worked so far, we've retained the services of Thomas R. Burke, an eminent First Amendment attorney at Davis Wright Tremaine and he's been working with our own counselor David Halperin. Today, they filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. One reason we picked the Northern District because they have a requirement that the parties try and work out their problems out of court using what is known as Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR), which includes techniques such as mediation and arbitration. The ADR rules in this District Court require each party to bring to the mediation an official who has the authority to resolve this issue. So, I'm reaching out to my good friends Todd Park and Steve VanRoekel, the architects of the President's great new machine-processable data directive, and I'm personally asking them to help us resolve this dispute with the administration. We're all on the same side here, let's work this out and get on with the real job at hand! Links:
Our complaint in district court
Copies of our letters back and forth to the White House and the IRS
Sunlight Foundation: Nonprofit E-file Data Should Be Open
Think Progress: How the IRS Could Make it Easier to Track Dark Money, Right Now
Forbes: IRS: Turn Over a New Leaf, Open Up Data    
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They are filled with sensitive nerve endings, which help them detect distances and changes in their surroundings. When tigers hunt, they go for the kill shot: the carotid artery located in the neck. After the tiger’s canines have pierced the artery, the whiskers move forward, encircling the prey’s neck, and determine if the prey’s pulse is gone. 
