John Scalzi finally went to the Creation Museum. Essay AND a photo set with snarky comments!

My favorite part is “vegetarian dinosaurs.”

This is one of my favorite Calvin & Hobbes cartoons.

I kinda take it as life guidance.

The 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month

“It is well that war is so terrible; else we would grow too fond of it”
— Robert E. Lee

“A man’s country is not a certain area of land, of mountains, rivers, and woods, but it is a principle; and patriotism is loyalty to that principle.”
— George William Curtis

It is the common fate of the indolent to see their rights become a prey to the active. The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance; which condition if he break, servitude is at once the consequence of his crime and the punishment of his guilt.
— John Philpot Curran Speech upon the Right of Election (1790)

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.
— Martin Luther King, Jr.

The Department of Veterans Affairs Veterans Day Web Page

The Origins of Veterans Day from the VFW

The Great War

WWII Memorial

Korean War Memorial

Vietnam War Memorial

Digital Memorial for those killed in Afghanistan and Iraq

Data on Veterans from the US Census Bureau

Michael: If you want, we can get you a new sewing machine.
Michelle: I’d rather have a new laptop.
Michael: And that’s why I love you.

I just realized that the time on my recent posts is off by an hour. I wasn’t actually on the computer at 12:30 this morning. And I was on my computer at 7 AM Thursday morning.

Time to go poke around the guts of the website.

Poke. Poke. Poke.

Just got back from seeing Nickel Creek for their Farewell for Now tour.

As always their show was excellent, but I have to say a part of me longed for the first show I saw: they played in the Mountainlair Ballrooms, there weren’t a ton of people, there was plenty of space to get up and dance, and they played for more than two hours–loose sets that they made up as they went along.

But it was a fantastic show, and you should see them if you have the chance–before it’s too late.

Pat White is still my favorite–possible all time favorite–WVU player.

Announcer: Pat White just did a somersault on the sidelines, trying to convince Coach Kearns he was okay to go back in the game.

My dreams last night involved walking up hill, all night long. It was if Eighth Street took over the entire world.

Many of my answers were, “well… it depends”
(more…)

You know those days where you feel like you’re busy all day long, but have very little to show for all your activity?

Today was one of those days for me.

The worst part was dealing with multiple, futile, network issues.

One of my laptops is missing the certificates needed to get onto the encrypted network. Apparently, there is no easy way to remedy this problem, although I did spend an affable 30 minutes at the Help Desk talking to Matt as he searched for drivers and certificates. Eventually I abandoned my laptop and headed back to my office. They were going to keep looking and see if anyone else knew a possible solution. (Let me make one thing clear, I love our Help Desk guys. They’re nice, funny, and will find an answer to your problem, even if it takes awhile. Compare that to other help desks (ahem) and I think you’ll agree with me. So I’m not saying this was a failure on their part. I’m jsut saying this is how my day went.)

The second network issue was trying to figure out how to get my PDA on the wireless network. A couple months ago I tried, and then gave up since what I really needed it for (a calendar program that could sync with GroupWise) was working perfectly. And I have a perfectly good laptop. So I just dropped it. Unfortunately, my boss has been getting a ton of PDA questions, and one recurring question is “why can’t I get wireless in HSC?” So I picked up that abandoned task and ran with it. And I learned several interesting things. Apparently, OIT policy for PDAs is they will not support them. If you can get your PDA on the wireless, that’s fine. But if you can’t, too bad for you. So I again sauntered back down to the Help Desk. After several guys going, “I can’t get it to work either, but if you figure it out, can you let me know?” I ended up talking to one of the guys in Networking, who apparently didn’t realize there was a problem, and told me he’d work on it and get back to me. So again, a solution is in the works (and this solution will be helpful to other people as well, which is good) but as a task, I’d have to say my success rate was pretty low.
But on the bright side, I was able to help several people, so that’s always a good feeling. So I suppose the day wasn’t a total loss.

If you sometimes read the book portion of my website, you may remember that in July I read and recommend Elizabeth Bear’s book New Amsterdam.

Did you go pick it up and read it then? No? Too bad. I just looked on Amazon, and copies are selling for $75.

After hearing this, Michael suggested that I sell my copy.

I may have to hide my copy from him, until he forgets this, because New Amsterdam was definitely a keeper. (And here I was waiting for a sequel. Lets hope that outrageous price means the book will go into reprint–and a new book about Abagail Irene is in the works.

I had two packages waiting for me when I got home. A mystery I’ve been waiting months for, and Alice Medrich’s newest book, Chocolate Holidays: Unforgettable Desserts for Every Season

After a few seconds of indecision, I grabbed Chocolate Holidays and curled up on the sofa.

Yum!

(via Neil Gaiman)

So today is stock making day. I bought all the veggies last week, but, what with Michael being busy all weekend, never got around to making it. So that was part of today’s plan (after going to the Mountaineer Week Craft Fair). As I was chopping things up and dumping them into the stock pot, I realized that this is about it for my herb garden. The basil is dead, and the oregano is down to the ground, where it will wait out the winter.

But there are some herbs that are still good.

So, if anyone is in town and interested, feel free to come decimate my herb garden. I’ve got multi-color sage, which will die back to the ground over the winter, and insane amount of parsley that won’t last much longer, a gorgeous rosemary plant (that almost certainly won’t last the winter) some thyme, chives (which will probably last the winter, but I do have plenty), and some marjoram, which was okay for stock, but I’m not sure how great it would be for anything else.

In a week or two I’m going to cover it with leaves (maybe that will let the rosemary survive, but I’m not counting on it) and that’ll be it for the year.

Let me know if you’d like to take some of these off my hands. I certainly can’t use them, and it’s a shame to waste them. So I’m begging you: if you’re in Morgantown, please get in touch with me and help clear out my herb garden before everything dies for the year.