Holiday Shopping

Just in time for the holidays: SHOPPING! As you may know, for retailers, the day after Thanksgiving (called Black Friday as in profits) is a highly orchestrated affair. According to the New York Times, prices are scientifically slashed, down to the penny. Sales begin at dawn. And glossy circulars containing the well-laid plans are distributed just a day or two ahead to give us gullible shopper something to drool over. Can you tell how I feel about this subject?!?
This year there are serveral online services, such as BF2005.com, where you can view leaked advertisements weeks in advance. So far this year, sources have leaked advertisements to him from Kohls listing 7" Portable Widescreen LCD TV regularly $169.99 for $119.99, Toys "R" Us showing the Barbie Fashion Show Mall, regularly $99.99, for $29.97, or Ace Hardware which is advisering a Skil 12-volt drill regularly $44.99, for $24.99.
Sites like BF2005.com say their motive is to educate consumers. But retailers are furious, arguing that the site jeopardizes their holiday business, and they have threatened legal action. Micheal Brim, who runs BF2005.com, hopes that by these online sites that "even the average Joe can become a professional bargain hunter." Here is the New York Times article.

We Aren't the Only Ones

Europe's first space mission to Venus was launched successfully. The Venus Express lifted off on a Russian rocket last Wednesday. The spacecraft will orbit Venus to study its atmosphere, which has experienced runaway greenhouse warming. Scientists hope the two-year mission will shed further light on the mechanisms of climate change on our own world. "Initial checks are ongoing and everything looks good," said Paolo Ferri, deputy flight operations director for Venus Express. You can find a couple of the news articles at BBC News and CNN.

I say more power to the Europeans! Here in the US we Americans think we're the only ones who can launch spacecraft. Lately Europe has made tremendous progress in the "space race". They or China may beat us to Mars. Maybe this will knock a little wind out of our sail and wake our government up.

Dog Gives Birth To Green Puppy

A golden retriever puppy, one of four, was born to a dog in California last week. He was born with green fur. Veterinarians said that it's possible for a newborn's fur to be green because the placenta,
which is green, sometimes rubs off at birth. His owners have named him Wasabi. To me the dog looks more grey than green but to see for yourself visit this news link, TheBoston Channel.

Blogger Code?

Ok. I admit it. I don't get it. I surfed across Blogger Code today and participated in the blogger code survey and received my "blogger code". I suppose it's short-hand code to describe me but I wonder how many people will know what it means, I sure don't. So, if you want to read my blogger code then see below.

B1 d- t- k- s-- u-- f- i o++ x-- e l- c+

New IPod

A student told me about the new iPod Nano. I have to say it's really cool, but why so expensive? I have a 40GB ipod that I use for file storage as well as listening to podcasts and I love it. My professional and personal life would be screwed up if I lost it (yes, I have backups). But why so pricey? I just saw a competitor mp3 player that was $109 and it held 5 gigs of data vs. the 4 that one of the Nano versions hold. It's not as small as the Nano, but it's close. I like Apple and their products but should I pay $140 for style?

In the beginning...

If the Bible had been written today would start with "In the beginning was the blog"? Hi! Welcome to my blog. Thanks for stopping by. Why start a blog, especially when everyone else is blogging to? No, I'm not jumping on the copycat parade with everyone else. I started this blog for two reasons, I enjoy writing and I was curious about the technology. Huh!?!!
As corny as it sounds writing is therapeutic for me. It allows me some time to myself and a way to release my pent up thoughts and feelings. I have always enjoyed writing, not because I want to publish it for the masses or to read later, but for the mechanics of putting words to paper. If I or nobody else reads this I don't care I've had a few minutes to myself and have let go a piece of myself to the cosmos. In the past I've always had trouble with my writing endurance, my follow through. I'd start writing, maybe in a new journal or digitally, and then I stop because it's not worry it or something came up. Hopefully writing a blog will motivate me to keep writing.
I was interested in the technology behind blogging tools, php; css; xhtml; databases; etc., and I thought that by writing a blog I would be more motivated to learn about the "science" behind it. By trying to add something to my blog, such as my photo, I'll have to muck around with the code and will, hopefully, learn something about it.
Well, that's it. I hope to add to this weekly so please check back. If you have any comments feel free to add them under the comment link. Red