Its quite a feat to get a bill into committee and onto the floor for a vote. Its amazing the sponsors of HB 2892 got as far as they did. Sadly, once publicity of the bill reached the lobbyists from a certain law-evading megacorporation, the bill was thwarted. Significant campaign donations seem to mean more that public interest.
2 years of Seti
Questions
Some questions need to be asked.
Now its Snowing
Thirty minutes after posting about the rain, quarter-sized flakes of snow started falling. Amazingly, the snow started accumulating on the ground. Less than four hours later, my place of employment announced it would be closing. Snow Day!
Rain has started
With the strong winds, days upon days of rainfall, and leaves clogging the storm drains, it’s safe to say that time of year is here again. There’s no visual signal that its time to get up, and walking the dog means getting soaked and cold.
This doesn’t seem to bother Barley though. In fact, I’m pretty sure he was enjoying the giant puddles, piles of leaves, and trenches full of water. I’ve just dried him off after walking him. The towel is soaked, and so is he. It wasn’t so much a walk as me being pulled by a maniacal water fiend. He pulls as hard as he can to run up and down any small collection of water, be it puddle, stream, or lake.
PBJ
Its been a long time since I’ve had a peanut butter and Jelly sandwich. If it hadn’t been for the somewhat dry wheat bread, it could have been great. Oh, and Adam’s Peanut Butter? Are you supposed to stir that pool of goo on top back into the butter, or do you drain it off?
Ben’s Memorial Service
There will be a memorial service for Ben at 11 a.m. on November 22nd at Keith and Keith Terrace Heights Chapel.
The guest book on Ben’s site is also quite a memorial. A wonderful soul with amazing reach. He touched all those he met, and many more through his photography and writing.
Ben Manfredi
The Cascades lost one of their biggest and most active friends this weekend. Ben Manfredi died while kayaking the Elwah River. Those who knew him knew of his thirst for adventure, and his love of the challenges that its peaks, slopes and rivers offered.
The surprise of this news is somewhat hollowing. Ben was usually the calm one, the calculated one, the one who had the luck. I knew the day would come when one of our friends would be taken, but I never expected it to be Ben. He usually carried a precision and grace with him. I think he had fear. Its what made him challenge himself. He also knew the odds. He’d helped dig up avalanche victims. He’d watched friends disappear into the swirl not knowing when they’d resurface. I guess that part of the territory.
Ben had a great sense of humor known to few. He was quite shy, and didn’t speak much around strangers. When he did open up, a thoughtful and funny person joined the conversation. His boldness showed in his action however, as you’ll see from the photographs he’s taken over the last several years.
Our thoughts and prayers are with you and your family Ben.
The Joy of X
I’ve been working with Solaris 9 for x86 at work, and with a couple different Linux distros, predominantly Red Hat 9, Mandrake 9.1, and Slackware 9.1. With all the small hurdles, I can’t be happier to come home to my Mac. Its nice when things just work. And act the way you expect them to.
Neighborhoodies
I don’t usually use the breakroom at work because I usually don’t need to heat up anything. Since the recent retirement of one employee, there’s never any new magazines or newspapers in the break room. All that was available today was a copy of the Portland Mercury. Great, a magazine full of fun things to do and places to go that are all on the “cool” side of the river.
One advertisment caught my eye though. It was for a shop that does hoodie sweatshirts with your neighborhood’s name emblazened on the front. Once again, Great, I live in a neighborhood that lacks a name. What are they going to put on the sweatshrit? Southwest? That’s like a gigantic combination of lots of neighborhoods with mostly lame names. Still, my interest was piqued so I checked it out, and yes, the neighborhood of choice is “Southwest.” Well, at least its not “Indian Subcontinent”… no, seriously, that’s an option for a neighborhood of Bombay (Mumbai).