Thursday, September 27
In response to Linda's media critique, check out this issue of The Onion, including their slogan. Remember, it is satire.
Wednesday, September 26
Dewey got his last kitten shots today. He gained 3/4 pound in three weeks, and is getting his big boy teeth. The vet again commented that he is all muscle -- he is very athletic and can perform terrific mid-air turns. He is going in Monday to be neutered (my idea) and declawed (Ed's idea).
Tuesday, September 25
I went to another fun baseball game last night, again comp tickets from a vendor (Saturday's were from Microsoft, last night's were from Maxim Group).
If, like me, you are getting a dozen e-mails a day spreading a terrorist rumor, here is a direct link to Snope's urban legend site's 9/11 page. Remember people, THINK (and maybe even research) before you hit that Forward button.
We received this one (scroll down to the last image) yesterday; of course we tested it and found that it was a lie. One of my friends lent me a '70's Nostradamus documentary. Ed had a copy of Nostradumus' writings that belonged to his grandfather. We watched the show (beware the Russians!!!) with book in hand and were appalled with the liberties taken with the translations.
Never believe any of the Nostradamus stuff. Never.
Sunday, September 23
My boss gave me tickets to the Astros game last night. It was a good game, sold out. The seventh inning stretch was a little different...they played God Bless America before Take Me Out to the Ballgame, but the eight inning stretch was the same as it usually is. Here they play Deep in the Heart of Texas while they show film of stampeding longhorns. Everybody sings along.
It felt good to be in a crowd of 44,000 people, believe it or not.
Friday, September 21
It's fall. We've actually had a cool front come through, so although it was in the 90's earlier, it's in the 70's now.
Hope everybody is well.
Thursday, September 20
We've just restarted our network following some weather. What am I to make of this report distributed by the Emergency Broadcast System: "Tornadoes spotted in the Galleria area at 7PM headed northeast at 15 mph hour"? I left my office in the Galleria area at 7PM and headed to my house northeast of that area. My typical commute in rain is 15 mph. This can't be good. But the storm has blown over. We were told to abandon cars and mobile homes and find a small interior room on the first floor, so we gathered in the powder room with Dewey in his cage. Eventually he protested and so was set free, and the rest of us followed. All is well now.
Tuesday, September 18
Last night I went to my friend Ted's parents' house to work on a freelance project we're doing. Ted's mother, who is Chinese, cooked us Chinese food for a snack, then we watched Chinese news on the satellite dish. After the news a Chinese soap opera came on. Ted's mom only likes American soap operas, but Ted and I were impressed that this one included warriors a la Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon along with modern business women with lust in their hearts.
Ed admitted yesterday that he is suffering from post-traumatic stress syndrome following the WTC attack. He's been acting surly for a week, and became downright anxious yesterday. I called him from Ted's, and was glad to hear he was playing darts and watching the Simpson's, but by the time I got home he had the news on. He is extremely angry. His first job out of college was in the World Trade Center...he worked there for two years. On the day of the attack, he went in to work early to finalize a deal insured by a company in the WTC (the deal has now fallen through, although I think the people from the firm were okay). His brother worked at the top of one of the towers for several years. Ed dealt regularly with firms there, and is now just realizing that he knew many people who worked in the building. On top of that, his business has pretty much ground to a halt now since people just want to "wait and see" rather than commit money to exports/imports. Today he drove to Dallas for a luncheon, and I think that helped.
Meanwhile, if handing over thousands of dollars to my dentist will stimulate the economy, then we're all going to be okay. I had four teeth worked on today, inlays, onlays and one filling. And I'd reached my dental limit with the root canal I had last month, so at least I wasn't a drain on the struggling insurance industry.
Just doing my part for America.
Monday, September 17
Ed came across an incident yesterday involving over a dozen police cars on 11th St., but we couldn't find any mention of it in the paper or on the news. Another case of overreaction?
Today was busy, which was good. I spent too much of last week checking news websites and talking with friends.
Sunday, September 16
Has anybody tried to buy a flag this week? I want to hang one vertically from our porch roof, but I hear they're sold out everywhere. So I tried Amazon. Rats. Guess I'll have to make one!
Nextira was mentioned in a New York Times article this morning (bottom of article).
Saturday, September 15
These links are pretty ubiquitous, but I'd still like to put them here. You can donate to the Red Cross on-line using their site, PayPal, or the Amazon Honor System. I've used PayPal and Amazon for this type of thing before, and they're both easy to use (especially Amazon if you're already a customer). They're waiving their usual cut for this one.
I already had an appointment to give blood next Tuesday at our monthly blood drive at work. I have a feeling this time it will be more crowded than usual.
Friday, September 14
Happy birthday, Daddy!
Thursday, September 13
I didn't realize until today that Salman Rushdie was speaking in Houston Monday evening. He is trapped here for now. I would have liked to have seen him speak.
My boss was due to fly home yesterday from a business trip in Ft. Lauderdale. He called yesterday and said his flight had been postponed until today. He called this morning and said he was packing the rental car and driving back to Houston. He didn't think his flight would get out before Saturday.
Ed and I had planned to fly to Miami tomorrow. His stepbrother's 50th birthday coincided with a Dolphins-Bills game (the stepbrother, also named Ed, lives in Miami now). A lot of his family members planned to attend. Obviously we're not going now.
I heard about this plane on the news just now. I thought the plane looked like Herman's, so I looked to the Internet for more details. The age is close, but not quite, and the plane is a different make, I think, so I guess not.
Wednesday, September 12
We went to work today, but it wasn't exactly a normal workday. I work on the 31st floor of a 64 floor building made of glass. I can't say that I was nervous, but I know I would have been yesterday. The people who did come in (only to be sent home) said that nobody could stop looking out the windows at the horizon. This morning I had to show photo ID to get into my parking garage!
We have had a very sad situation in my group building up for awhile. For a couple of months, owing to a combination of mishaps, miscommunications, changing policies and the economy, one of the contractors reporting to a supervisor reporting to me has not been paid regularly. He is a Mexican national on an H1-B visa. His mother had been ill with cancer and last week acquired an infection in the hospital during treatment. We spent last Thursday and Friday trying to get him funds to go home. He elected to wait until this Friday. Yesterday his mother passed away. We had a sobbing voice mail from Andres left last night, telling us that since no planes were flying, he was driving to Mexico City. We haven't heard from him yet. We were able to get $3,000 dollars wired into his bank account this morning, and I spent this afternoon trying to figure out the legal nuances of paying him directly what he is owed (rather than paying the contracting company, which has declared bankruptcy). Andres is a certified Oracle DBA, extremely talented, shouldn't have a money problem. All we have wanted to do is hire him as a permanent employee, but that process has now dragged out too far. My biggest fear was that he wouldn't get to see his mother again, and now that's happened.
Ed and I went for a walk this evening, just to stop watching the TV. Normally in our neighborhood, we can see a SouthWest Airlines plane go over every 15 minutes or so -- not so low that we hear them, but we can see them. Tonight nothing but very high-flying military planes. But it was nice to see people out with strollers and babies.
We're still watching coverage, and they've just shown a video of the first plane hitting the World Trade Center, and new footage of the second plane which is much better than what we've seen all day. Both appear to be amateur videos, but I can't yet find them on-line. I think that by tomorrow these two clips will be the definitive ones.
Tuesday, September 11
I don't post for a week, and the whole world goes to hell.
Ed and I are at home watching coverage of the terrorist attacks. I'm not telling anyone reading this anything they don't know, but since I use this as a journal of sorts for myself, I'll record that it now appears that four hijacked planes were used in attacks on Manhattan and Washington, DC. The World Trade Center is completely gone.
Ed left before me this morning. Minutes after he left, he called from his car to tell me that a plane had hit the WTC. At that point I thought it was an accident. I turned on the TV, and watched live coverage of a second jet hitting the second building. I decided to continue watching instead of going to work right away. As the attacks spread to the Pentagon (another jet) and the State Department (car bomb), I started thinking about not going in at all. I work in a very prominent skyscraper here which towers high above everything else in the area. And George Bush, Sr. lives a few blocks away. Sure enough, my office closed, as did Ed's downtown office.
Since it seems that CNN has had to strip down their website due to the huge bandwidth demand, here is a link to BBC videotape . The BBC site itself, while struggling, is still up at last attempt.
Wednesday, September 5
The Compaq buyout has been the big news in Houston for the past two days. I know two people who work there.
I took Dewey to the vet today, who proclaimed him beautiful, healthy and "very muscular". I guess that comes from constantly running around like an idiot. He was tested for leukemia and FIV since his mother was a stray, and thankfully was negative. Then he got his shots. He would rather not go back, although he enjoyed watching the dogs in the waiting room, and he found a puppy treat in his cage, which we're borrowing from Miranda (who gave him to us). The vet also specialized in birds and exotic pets, but all we got to see was a bunny and an anesthetized rat today. We'll be back in a few weeks, though.
I don't think I told the full story of Dewey's mother. Miranda's neighbor came home from work one day to find that a cat had given birth to kittens in his garage. Unfortunately, she had crawled under his (closed) garage door to do so, removing all the fur from her head and back. They all survived that expererience, but it's hard to imagine.
Monday, September 3
Ed finally got around to installing the hardware and software need to create digital videos. His first experiment (this is 1.7 Mb, sorry) is a little clip entitled ......(you'll see). Make sure you wait for the credits.
Sunday, September 2
Ed just realized he graduated from college with Eileen Collins, the first female space shuttle pilot. He'd heard of her, and she narrates some of the films at the Space Center, but he never knew she went to Syracuse, let alone graduated in '78, until he got a local alumni club newsletter. Obviously he never met her in college.
Today we had a little sun - it's been raining for a week. Everything is soggy but lush. Ed and I went to the Houston Garden Center today. We went last year and were appalled at how dead it looked. This year it looked good, with blooming roses and everything. Roses don't usually bloom much in the summer in Houston.
