Yoplait, et al and their 'philanthropic' promotions
If Yoplait is so interested in funding research for breast cancer, why do I have to send in the lid from my yogurt? If you want to impress me just donate the money - a nickel for every tub sold or whatever. Tell me about it all you want. You can have the same huge ad campaign, print the same self-congratulatory slogans on your lids, and have the same or greater impact on cancer research.
If you want to generate some mail you could even ask your customers to match your contributions. I'd be more inclined to do that than to send you back the lid from my yogurt. Yuck.

Another Falling Woman bit
I hadn't seen the sculpture - just references on Instapundit and other sites. So I finally made an effort to find an image.
The first link I found to it was blocked by our corporate filter (Websense) with the category of offensive site designated 'tasteless'.
If I were inclined to apoplexy it would have been ugly.
I understand (but don't necessarily agree with) the company's desire to keep me from visiting porn, or gambling, or hate-related sites. But I'm a little upset that my employer is now going to audit my 'taste' in the workplace.
Natch, I didn't let this stop me and had relatively little trouble finding an image I could get to. I Googled for 'falling woman statue', I think.

Ben and Foster
Foster and Ben are bonded. We just laugh. The dog tolerates the rest of us - the kids more than Gerri and me - but he just adores Ben.
Now that the kids are back in school, Foster spends most of his day looking for Ben. Gerri said she's sure if he could talk he would just repeat, "I can't find him. Have you seen him? Where is he? I can't smell him. Can you help me find him?"

Carlin
Watching George Carlin on HBO. Omigod, he's a riot. The really scary thing is a lot of times he makes perfect sense. At least to me.

His solution for ending the 'drug problem': capital punishment. Not for the dealers or the users - kill the bankers who launder the drug money.

Darndest things ...
I just got back from lunch and had the following message on my voicemail from Gerri.

"Maia told me to call and tell you that the next time she gets on your motorcycle she wants you to put her car seat on it so she doesn't fall off and get an owie. And don't laugh about it."

Looking back

I've been looking at some of the re-posts from year-ago blogs. Interesting that a couple (that I've seen) of the stars of the blogosphere(Eric S. and Instapundit (look for 'Tom Clancy')) saw immediately that the biggest danger facing our country post 9/11/01 wasn't Osama or Saddam, but our own (over)-reaction to the attack.


I don't mean the military stuff. I'm down with that. I'm talking about the way we couldn't wait to give up our freedom and privacy. Judicial review for wiretaps? We don't need no stinking judicial review. Big Brother keeps us safe. Big Brother is our friend.


Politics is opportunistic. And there's been a lot of opportunity, lately, to wreak havoc on the founding ideals of this nation.

9/11 Rant
I'm a little fed up with the tributes to the victims and heroes of 9/11.

I realize this is an unpopular position, but what irritates me is that every day in this country and around the globe people die tragically and act heroically. How many people starve to death every day? How many are tortured, maimed, abused? How many people save others from burning buildings, perform CPR, defend their homes from criminals or their countries from enemies?

The World Trade Center is gone along with several thousand people. We can do nothing for those people or those buildings or those airplanes. But there are other tragedies occurring right now that we can actually do something about.

How about instead of another tribute or memorial for the events of 9/11/2001 we do something a little more constructive.