Lately I have had to further develop and hone what had become a somewhat latent skill. I have nearly perfected the skill of discreetly wasting time. Case in point: I am composing this blog on my Pocket PC while waiting to see a patient in clinic. One of my choice new responsibilities in the lab is enrolling patients in a rather mundane and boring study. This means I get to sit in a room while men fill out a huge questionnaire that details their symptoms. Fascinating. Or not. What...
Growing up my father had, what I thought, was a very odd habit. I never really understood it, and together with my mother, I would tease him ceaselessly about it. He always took the teasing well. It just never seemed to bother him that much. And now, years later as I find myself adopting the same habit, I understand why. You see, my father (and I) read in the bathroom. As life has become more complicated, with children, school/work, my sweet wife, church responsibilities and frien...
Suddenly it hit me. I had just written my 201st article. It was interesting to realize that. I recall quite vividly my planning out carefully just what I was going to write for my 100th article. It seemed like such a landmark for me. Interesting that 200 was a nonissue. I have been wondering what changed over the course of the last hundred articles, and I think I have it figured out. It took me a good portion of my first 100 articles to feel like I was "settli...
For my first year here on JU I avoided using the blacklist. To be honest, it is largely because I don't attract the attention of some of the more contentious factions of our cyber-community here. But it was also out of some sense of having a high level of tolerance, of being able to "deal with it" or tolerate any behavior that might come my way. Last night, as my wife an I sat in another training session for our new role as therapeutic foster parents we had an interesting discussion abou...
Society is taking a turn for the worse. Many turns for the worse if you ask me. There are nearly countless ways in which society as a whole is declining, and I could write blogs and blogs about each one. Today is not the day though. There is one particular aspect that I find most disturbing and has disastrous ramifications for our future. Abdication of responsibility. The current societal mindset would censure anyone who emphasizes responsibility and accountability for our own act...
Are there any known problems with the RSS feeds here lately or is it just me? I ask because even though Blog Navigator is successfully pulling in new articles from many of the other news sites I have it set up to get articles from, I am not getting anything new from JU. The most recent articles I am getting from here are dated Jan 31, even though I know there are folks who have written since then (and are set up in Blog Navigator as feeds to be checked every few minutes). Just wondering i...
It seems that every so often I simply become uninspired. Perhaps my mind slows down. Lately that isn't something we can discount. Perhaps I get involved in other tasks. Again, we better include that possibility. Perhaps I am getting a little bored with the whole exercise. Hmm, add that to the tally. Whatever it is, lately I just haven't been able to crank out a decent blog to save my life. I have had moments I suppose (with my brother returning from his mission), but overall I just do...
So recently I have been toying around with Blog Navigator. I like it (though there are some features I really would like to see in it - spell checker!!!), and I like being able to gather a bunch of RSS feeds into one spot. Great program. Trouble is, I never used RSS feeds too much in the past, so I don't have many feeds. I would like to collect some more, so I am asking for suggestions. What are you favorite RSS feeds? So far I have a collection of blogs from here, news links from C...
The commercials looked bizarre. And after my disappointment with last week's episode I went into this one a little apprehensive. No need. It was a good one and a lot of fun to boot. The episode starts off with a man, speaking Russian, watching some guards and a truck pull up to a facility. Suddenly his car comes racing out of hiding, running one guard over, his automatic weapon taking care of the rest. From the back of the truck he removes a highly technical lo...
Those who have read my articles for a bit now probably know I am a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Mormon). I make no excuses, never try to hide it, and don't mind if anybody knows that. We take seriously the call of the Savior to "go into all the world" and preach the gospel. Not because we are trying to brainwash people, not because we are trying to shove our beliefs down other people's throats. We do it because we have found something that has brought us so m...
Sometime during the last year or so I changed. It wasn't something I planned, it wasn't something I was looking for or hoping for. It sort of snuck up on me and I still am not sure how it happened. But lately the signs have been unmistakable. I am a gamer no more. In the past I would spend the majority of my net time browsing game websites. I read every new review for PC games at Gamespot, Gamespy, and the Adrenaline Vault. I was one of the top posters in the Adrenaline Vault forum...
Loyal denizens of JU, I come to you this evening with a call of the utmost importance. Okay, so this may be a bit of a letdown. Actually I am just asking the good people here to help me and extend a hand of friendship and welcome to my dear sweet wife who, somewhat against her own designs, started a blog this evening. I have been inviting her for a while now, but she has used the shield of self-conciousness to ward off my deft attacks. She is a formidable foe I tell you. Nevertheless, ...
SPOILER ALERT!!! The following will discuss plot points from this last week's episode of Alias. If you don't want to read, the leave. To be honest, this weeks Alias (that again I had to watch later) did really do anything for me. It was okay, but I thought it was one of the weaker episodes. A confused man walks through a bazaar, repeating loudly "My bird is missing". After repeating this a couple of times Weiss walks up to him, looking irritated as only Weiss can do, and says "It'...
Untitled Some folks don't understand rants. They think that they serve some greater purpose. In my (few) rants I have had comments about how my "whiney" article wasn't going to make a difference, how it wasn't accomplishing anything. To them I dedicate the following: You are stupid. Sometimes the very act of ranting and getting it off of my chest does make a difference and accomplishes quite a bit in helping to maintain my sanity. Remember, no one forced you to read it, so de...
Note : This article is something of a follow up to one I wrote yesterday regarding our societal celebrity worship. All too often we hear about someone famous doing something stupid. We all do stupid things (though I can't help but think celebrities are more stupid prone), but most of ours don't get broadcast all over the place. When questioned about their actions many spout the popular refrain "I'm not a role model". Wrong. But perhaps they are for the wrong reasons. Whethe...