/dev/zero

It’s an election year. There’s lots of politicking going on.
My brother has been writting quite a bit on this subject the last few weeks. I’ve been wanting to make some observations of my own, but haven’t taken the time to sit and type it out. Since I’m sitting here with a laptop and no net connection, I have no distractions. (No trackbacks or other references right now, since I don’t have net access. I’ll edit later to fix that.)

Same-sex marriages have become a hot issue in the last few months. Vermont passed it’s “civil union” law. The Massachusetts supreme court declared same sex civil unions to be legal. Dubya announced his proposed constitutional amendment “Defense of Marriage Act” (DOMA) in the state of the union this year. The city of San Francisco has been issuing same-sex marriage licenses since just before Valentine’s Day, despite the passage 4 years ago by the voters of the state of California declaring marriage to be between a man and a woman. Lot’s have friends have been posting “Yay! San Francisco is sticking up for the rights of queer couples!” in their blogs. Arwen has posted a link to a friend who set up a donation system to send flowers to random couples waiting in line in San Francisco. At last check, it was up to over US$6,000.
Meanwhile there are some of us who aren’t quite so sure. I’m all for gay rights. Personally I think when it comes to consenting adults, with whom one chooses to have a relationship, romantic, sexual or otherwise, is entirely one’s own business and the state should keep it’s nose out of it. I support legislation that prevents discrimination baed on sexual orientation. One’s sexuality simply should not be a factor in hiring decisions, benefits, medical coverage, service at restaraunts, etc. I’m all for laws allowing for civil unions, or whatever term you want to give it, that gives the same legal status to a relationship between a homosexual couple as a relationship between a heterosexual couple. It should be the right of every person to decide for themselves who should inherit their estate upon death and be the beneficiary of their life insurance policy, who has the right to visit them in the hospital, to include their lover under the spousal provisions of their health coverage plan, etc.
I think society needs to seperate the word “marriage” from the concept of a committed relationship between two people (some would argue, “between people”, but I won’t go that far.) The concept of spousal benefits is a legal construct. “Marriage” is not. Marriage is a societal / religious concept. The state has no business defining what is and is not a “marriage”. They have no business defining who can “marry” whom.
My good friend Stav wrote an excellent defense of regligious beliefes on the subject. Not so much defending any specific religious viewpoint on the subject of homosexuality, but rather, defending the idea of HAVING a viewpoint based on one’s spiritual values.

I’m sitting in my car at a Chevron station waiting for a tow truck. They estimate it’ll be about an hour before the flatbed truck can get here, so I Have some time to kill. I don’t have anything else to do and I have the laptop with me, so I can take some time to catch up with my journal.

Why am I waiting for a tow truck?
Several months ago, shortly after I arrived here in Texas, Dad observed that my left front tire was starting to come apart. It was cracked and the tread was starting to separate from the rest of the tire. We took the car to a discount tire shop and had a “new” used tire mounted on the wheel. Dad also bought me a used spare rim, since I didn’t have a spare tire, and mounted a “new” tire on it as well.
When the shop people went to mount the wheel on the car, they cross-threaded one of the lug bolts. Attempting to fix it, they ended up stripping the hole. (My car, a 1990 BMW, is one of the type where the bolt passes through the wheel into the hub, rather than having bolts sticking out from the hub, on which you put nuts.) The shop had to tap new threads into the hole, then struggled to get the bolt in. We had them make a notation to that effect on the receipt.
Two days ago I took my car to Sears to have the breaks serviced. They told me they couldn’t do it, as it requires a special procedure and recommended I take it to a dealer or BMW specialist. While I was there the mechanic observed that the “new” tire I got at the discount place was a directional tire, and it was mounted in the wrong direction. It was rolling backwards. So I had them rotate my tires so it would be rolling the right way. I had them change the oil while I was at it.
While they worked on my car, I went shopping. They called to let me know they had some trouble with the lug bolts on that wheel and would be unable to rotate my tire. They were afraid if they twisted any harder, one of the bolts would snap before it came off, and that would require sending out for replacement parts. At that hour they wouldn’t be able to get them from their supplier and it would be costly anyway. I told them I understood and just leave it be then.
When I got back to Sears, they decided to try it anyway and the bolt had in fact snapped. The wheel was now held on by only 3 bolts. I told them I’d take it to the discount tire shop and have them fix it.
Last night, I was driving to the grocery store when the car started behaving badly. At first I thought I had a flat tire (I’d observed that one tire was low and was going to stop at a gas station at the first opportunity to fill it up.) It got progressively worse as I drove (I was about a block from the station). As I pulled into the station, the wheel was jerking pretty hard and it was making bad noises. I got out and checked the tire. No, it was fine. Curious, I looked at the left front wheel to check it’s bolts.
There was only 1 bolt left, and the wheel was at an odd angle to the hub. The wheel had nearly come off while I was driving!
So this morning I’m having it towed to that “discount” tire place to demand they fix it and pay all the costs. This probably means they’ll have to have it sent to a dealer, as I doubt this tire shop can properly fix a stripped lug hole (probably more than one at this point)
I’m lucky the wheel didn’t actually come off while I was driving. Also lucky it didn’t happen while Han Sol, an 11 year old family friend, was in the car yesterday. I just hope the people at the tire shop don’t try to argue their way out of this too hard.
This is a pain in the ass. I’ll make Sears cover whatever part of the repair the tire shop won’t cover, since obviously they didn’t tighten those remaining bolts down properly when they put the wheel back on.

I haven’t posted much lately. There may actually be some out there who have been wondering where I’ve gone.
Sadly, the answer is “nowhere”. I’ve been right here. Just haven’t had much to say. Or rather, I’ve had plenty to say, I just haven’t bothered. What with being busy at school, usually when I’m at home and on the computer I just want to play, so I don’t feel much like having to think. And typing up the things I’ve been thinking about requires an additional amount of thought and effort to which I didn’t want to go.
However I hate being so silent. There are a number of subjects about which I’ve WANTED to say something, I’ve just been too lazy. The curse of being a typical American I guess. I have opinions about politics, but can’t be bothered to do anything about them.
Anyway, with the new laptop and all it’s tools, I’ll probably start posting a lot more.

Feel free to play around with my new Wiki, http://andrew.pure-chaos.com/pmwiki/

Pretty neat stuff.

In case you missed it, Randy Cassingham at thisistrue.com has prepared a Flash animation of Janet’s, er, “flash” at the SuperBowl. Judge for yourself: http://www.janetjacksonflash.com/

The Flash object is supposed to be embeded at the top of the “News” panel on the right, but it seems to only work on Win/IE (possibly OSX as well). For those of you, like me, who aren’t using Windows or IE, the URL is http://www.janetjacksonflash.com/images/janet.swf.

I agree. Seeing it in slow mo, there was no way it was a “wardrobe failure”.

These are the winners of a New York magazine contest in which contestants were to take a well-known _expression in a foreign language, change a single letter, and provide a definition for the new _expression.

HARLEY-VOUS FRANCAIS
Can you drive a French motorcycle

EX POST FUCTO
Lost in the mail

VENI, VIPI, VICI
I came, I’m a very important person, I conquered

COGITO EGGO SUM
I think, therefore I waffle

RIGOR MORRIS
The cat is dead

RESPONDEZ S’IL VOUS PLAID
Honk if you’re Scottish

QUE SERA SERF
Life is feudal

LE ROI EST MORT. JIVE LE ROI
The king is dead. No kidding.

PRO BOZO PUBLICO
Support your local clown

MONAGE A TROIS
I am three years old

FELIX NAVIDAD
Our cat has a boat

HASTE CCUISINE
Fast French food

VENI, VIDI, VICE
I came, I saw, I partied

QUIP PRO QUO
Fast retort

ALOHA OY
Love; greetings; farewell; from such a pain you would never know

VISA LA FRANCE
Don’t leave your chateau without it

AMICUS PURIAE
Platonic friend

L’ETAT, C’EST MOO
I’m bossy around here

COGITO, ERGO, SPUD
I think, therefore I yam (OK, more than one letter)

VENI, VIDI, VELCRO
I came, I saw, I stuck around (OK, another exception)

ICH BIT EIN BERLINER
He deserved it

ZEITGEIST
The Clearasil doesn’t quite cover it up.

E PLURIBUS ANUM
Out of any group, there’s always one asshole