Month: February 2002

Categories
Technology

De-centralization

Recovered from the Wayback Machine.

Julian talks about a rant at the de-centralization mailing list at Yahoo. What he says is right on — specifically:

There’s another couple of truisms here that “standards are useless without implementations” and so “There are only de-facto standards”. Everything else is just academic (mutual) mind games.

If a standard isn’t implemented in the real world, it’s nothing more than a theoretical wanna be wrapped up in pretty white paper, tied with a standards group approval bow.

BTW, I used to go out to the de-centralization group and read the postings regularly, until I found one day that the whole exercise irritated me…badly. As much as I admire some people in the P2P community, there is no one in the field who is either God or the Ultimate Answer Person.

I took a look at the group after Julian’s posting. You know what? I found myself getting irritated all over again. And discouraged.

Categories
Travel

Trip home

Only a few pics from this trip. I’m saving one for a story I’m trying to write. Photos were from Kansas (which can be both pretty and interesting if you look at it the right way) and Colorado. I didn’t even try and get anything from New Mexico or Arizona — both of which are just too beautiful for words.

Perfect weather all across the trip. Vistas like you wouldn’t believe. There was a sunset over Gallup, New Mexico, that sprayed Mercurochrome pink and violet and orange all over the sky. On I25 through Colorado, deep rust meets brilliant blue skys and cool green and pristine white of snow, lavendar of moutains. You can literally wrap yourself in the color. North of Santa Fe the Rockies meets the Grand Canyon — two worlds mixing.

If you’ve taken I25 or I40 or there abouts, you know what I’m talking about. If you haven’t, then get off your butt right now and plan your trip.

I’ll be your tour guide.




Categories
Weblogging

Weblogging Feb 23 2002

Gone for a few days and Jonathon gets comments, and Rogi is off in Ireland and Lisbon. Cat postings, paintings, and what have you are making the rounds, each posting the weblogger’s equivalent of “take that, Dvorak!”

And Mike wasn’t kidding — he was going to talk about blogrolling next. As for my blogroll buddies, these are all people with things to say, and who are usually kind enough to stop by and sit a spell, leave a comment here and there. They are all interesting people.

-earlier-

Hey.

Well, didn’t we all get down and have a wild party on one of my postings. I going to have to add more categories for higher numbers of comments. Perhaps something along the line of “40 mice got together and beat the shit out of the bird”, or to that effect.

I still have to unpack and do laundery and try and recover from my first — and I promise you — last time crossing the Bay Bridge during a rush hour. However, I have a great story to tell you, which I need to work on and will post later. I have a few pics, but didn’t even try to capture the scenery on this trip. I will say that this is one incredibly beautiful country.

More later.

P.S. White Castle is a part of Americana, as with Route 66 and the classic diner. Arby’s is just “McDonald’s does roast beef”.

Categories
Just Shelley

A dog with no name

 

Dog with no name

The picture is of a dog with no name.

Outside of Albuquerque, New Mexico, I entered a gas station and saw a dog, lying on the cement in between the pumps. My first reaction was “Oh my God! This poor dog has been hit!” However, at that point, she rolled over and looked at me, thumped her tail a couple of times, and went back to sleep.

In the “trading post” attached to the gas station, I asked the lady sweeping the floor about the dog. According to her, it showed up one day: limping, hungry, and very afraid of people.

At first, the folks at the station didn’t know what to do with the dog. They called the animal control officer, who tried to trap the her in a humane trap, but the dog was too smart and managed to avoid it. The owner of the gas station also tried to take her home, but she wouldn’t get in the car. All of them believe that she has puppies around the station somewhere and won’t leave them.

The dog with no name has a bad limp, as if her leg had been broken and then not set. She wags her tail when you talk to her, but if you approach to pet her, she cringes and ducks as if she’s afraid of a beating. The folks at the gas station think she was badly treated and abused, and eventually abandoned in the New Mexico desert when she was expecting puppies.

However, before you think this is a story about the worst in people, think again: this story is about about the best. We just need to turn the page.

You see, others, like myself, driving through from one place or another also asked about the dog. And each would leave food for the dog, stopping by to give her a kind word — from a distance so as to not frighten her. They, as with me, were the recipient of a gentle, loving look and the same soft thump of her tail. In her own way, and in her own time, she’s made the home she’s comfortable with.

It’s not a home as you or I think of it, but it is the home she wants. Since her first appearance, the dog with no name has gained weight and health. However, she’s also gained something far more important: thanks to the kindness of strangers, she’s gained the peace of a sunny afternoon and a nice nap on warm cement.

Categories
Political

Bush on Korea

Our beloved President, Bush, has decided to take his “we’re peaceful and if you don’t believe us we’ll beat the crap out of you” diplomacy to Korea. I imagine that his continued use of the word “evil” when discussing North Korea is going to win us even more friends throughout the world and in Korea — both North and South.

Normally I don’t repeat politics or news events in this weblog — I leave that for the mainstream journals — but I grow concerned that Bush’s popularity is so heavily tied into war, fighting, terrorism, evil, and enemies. I keep hearing about this new security agency and that new patriotic policy and these new laws, and it seems as if the constitution becomes dustier and less used all the time.

It’s ironic, but before I got into weblogging, I wouldn’t have questioned Bush’s comments about North Korea. I wouldn’t have questioned much of what he and Ashcroft are doing — I would have just got along with the public reaction to the events of 9/11. Not because I’m stupid or dense or unconcerned; but because the US reports focus so much on what impacts us, what’s important to us, our security, our economy, our everything. After a while, it’s easier just to accept the patriotic cocoon and to let the government take care of me as it sees fit, because the continued reports of terror become overwhelming.

Now I hear the voices of other peoples and I can’t participate in this isolationism. Worse (better?), I’m starting to see more of a threat within the government than without.

I wonder when Ashcroft will decide that weblogging is anti-patriotic?