"Anything that is too stupid to be spoken is sung." - Voltaire (1694-1778) "

WORDS ARE FREAKING EASY! Words only have as much power as you give them. It is impossible for someone to insult you. It is impossible for someone to upset you. It is impossible for someone to make you angry. Only you can do those things to yourself! If you don’t like what someone has to say on JU, don’t read what that person writes. Don’t visit that person’s site. Don’t read their comments. Blacklist them from your site. It is very easy. There are a number of people on JU w...

A couple from Minneapolis decided to go to Florida for a long weekend to thaw out during one particularly icy winter. They planned to stay at the very same hotel where they spent their honeymoon 20 years ago. Because both had jobs they found it difficult coordinating their travel schedules. It was decided that the husband would fly to Florida on a Thursday, and his wife would follow him the next day. Upon arriving as planned, the husband checked into the hotel. In his room there was a ...

A couple from Minneapolis decided to go to Florida for a long weekend to thaw out during one particularly icy winter. They planned to stay at the very same hotel where they spent their honeymoon 20 years ago. Because both had jobs they found it difficult coordinating their travel schedules. It was decided that the husband would fly to Florida on a Thursday, and his wife would follow him the next day. Upon arriving as planned, the husband checked into the hotel. In his room there was a ...

The Tampa City Council has a habit of starting each meeting with an invocation. But this tradition caused half of the council to walk out Thursday when Michael Harvey stepped up to the bat for a turn at inspiring the council to acts of wisdom. In fact, Councilman Kevin White called for a vote to either replace Harvey as the speaker or to skip the invocation altogether. What caused such division among the council? Well, it seems that Harvey is an atheist, and many council members objecte...

“Belladonna: In Italian, a beautiful lady; in English a deadly poison.” Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914) - The Devil's Dictionary, 1911

“The President has kept all of the promises he intended to keep.” George Stephanopolous , Clinton's aide speaking on Larry King Live

Lately here in Colorado we've been having some scetchy weather. We've been in a drought for 11 years, and we are supposed to get over 300 sunny days a year, but the last three weeks we've had cloudy and rainy weather. This is a good thing, since like I said we've been in a drought. But it can put a dampener on some weekend activities. Well, this morning when I opened my garage I was greeting by a beautifully sunny blue sky and a fair temperature (around 70 degrees F). It felt like a re...

“A ship in harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are built for.” John A. Shedd

"If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it's free." - P.J. O'Rourke"

Radley Balko is one of my favorite political writers. Of course, being a Libertarian I am most likely inclined to appreciate the work of the Policy Analyst of the Cato Institute. A short while ago Balko wrote an article listing questions he would ask of Dick Cheney and John Edwards. I thought his questions were important and insightful. Well, now Balko has listed some questions for Bush and Kerry. These questions are every bit as important has his previous queries, and probably a g...

I was listening to my Franz Ferdinand CD on the way to work this morning and it struck me how much I like their music. The vocals are kind of raw in some places and amazingly gentle and warm in others. Their lyrics are simple and repetitive, but they either have an awesome sound engineer or they play their instruments like geniuses. And while their lyrics may be simple, there are some lines that just hit me between the eyes. I really like the last line of this segment from the song “Mat...

A few years ago I was asked to write up a Statement of Work (SOW) for a contractor that had a 3-D Animation system. This was supposed to be a one-time activity, since this type of work was not part of my job description. I was asked to provide high-level requirements that would tell this company what we wanted animated, and how we wanted it presented. The result of this would be a 3-D digital movie that we could use at tradeshows and in proposals to potential customers of our product, whic...