in Prague

just wanted to let everyone know that I made it to Prague just fine. sitting at Starbucks trying to talk to Cyndi.

at the airport … again

once more I find myself at the airport. but today I am flying instead of just picking a person up. though I discovered that you can’t check in at lhr until 5am. arg … a 20 min wait and the good coffee shop is behind security!

at the airport

I’m waiting at the airport. wonder how much of my life has been spent like this?

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A Hotter Pepper

Chilli-ScotchBonnet-0073

Cyndi tells me that I’ve killed my tastebuds because I put hot sauce on my food.  I’m sure the guys at Subway think I’m crazy when I ask for more jalapenos on my sub 3 times.  I just like my food to taste.

When I moved to the UK, my view of British/English food was that it was fairly bland.  That was reinforced when I went to an indian takeaway for curry.  I asked for it to be made hot…Isaac could have eaten it and not batted an eye.  It was so not hot at all.

Today though, the BBC has an article about a new record-breaking chilli.  And it is grown in the UK.  I can’t believe it!

Image from graibeard via flickr

Wisconsin

Wisconsin Teachers Protest

One of the blogs I read fairly regularly is BoingBoing.  Usually, they have one neat post every other day or so.  Sure, they are liberal (boy that’s an understatement) but I find the trade-off worth it.  Last week, they made this post comparing the protests in Wisconsin to the protests in Egypt.  I let it slip by, but as the week went on, it nawed (knawed?) at me.  I’ve come to the conclusion that they are not the same thing and I’ll explain why.  However, I do think these protests are like other protests…I’ll also explain this.

First, let me say that I am assuming the protests in Egypt were to overthrow an oppressive government as reported by the media.  I know there are people who think otherwise, but the democratic revolution idea makes sense to me since Egypt didn’t let the people govern themselves.

01_29_2011_Egypt_Protest_061

Is the government of Wisconsin oppressive?  Does it need democratic reform?  I don’t think so.  Heck, they just had a free election in November.  From what I can tell, the protests in Wisconsin are against a bill submitted by the new governor there.  The teachers unions are upset that the bill would remove most areas covered by collective bargaining.  The governor is saying these cuts are necessary because his state doesn’t have money to continue this.  To me, it looks like the unions are wanting to keep getting their “fair share” (as defined by them).

It sounds like the protests in Wisconsin are more like the protests in Greece 2 years ago.  Or the student uni fee protests in London 2 months ago.  Similar protests also happened elsewhere in Europe last summer.  In these cases, the governments have had to make cuts because money simply doesn’t exist.

I think Greece (and the other PIIGs protests have finally come to the US)

So, what do you think?  Which is it?

Image attribution:
Top image from wxmom via flickr
Middle image from messay.com via flickr 
Bottom image from RobW via flickr 

Truecrypt Error

After MountToday, I was trying to mount a truecrypt volume on my ubuntu machine.  Even though truecrypt wasn’t running, it kept telling me that truecrypt was already running when I tried to open it.  I found this article on the Ubuntu forums talking about the same problem.  The solution?  Simply delete the .TrueCrypt-lock-username file in my home directory.  It worked just fine.

Want to know what truecrypt is?  Want to know how to use it?  Take a look at these articles about creating a truecrypt volume and email encryption. I also have a HOWTO on encrypting your e-mail.

[Update 2012-12-26 15:25:23] Some of my links were bad.  I’ve updated them.

Image from hherbzilla via flickr