9/10/03

I'm feeling a funny vibe right now. We'll see how it wiggles over the course of the day. I hope it settles down into something good.

Berkeley Breathed has a new strip with Opus... I hope it's better than outland, and at least half as good as bloom county

Simon and Garfunkel to reunite for a tour (warning, E-online has audio commercials), also, The Pixies.

Wow... I'm getting quite a brood! Want to be part of the vampire family? I'm sire to 33 other active vampires, right now. If any of my vampire spawn are reading this, give a friendly wave! I'd really like to draw up a family tree. (And not burn who knows how much celerity doing so)

7:28 am

I have just a twinge of anxiety this morning... Been carrying it since yesterday's early hours. There are good vibes, too, and the combination is striking an odd chord. Sort of a "bongos & violin" concert. Both as individuals have merits, but make for a dissonant harmony at best.

8:03 am

prop4 on time?! (interrobang) first time by my reckoning, and we have to wait for Kahuna to arrive with the new keys. D'oh.

Today's Bulkier Elements to deal with= PowerPoint, ebay, logos, Kiwanis, Broward SO

Noon

All trepidation has passed.. The office is empty, save for Prop2 and Rhode Island. They celebrated both September birthdays with a carrot cake today, and are comfortably enjoying a little sugar-bliss. I'm accomplishing a lot, and surprisingly, three ebay items are already bid on. It just might raise some bucks, yet. I'm in a good mood, and thinking good thoughts. The girls think I'm a loony for refusing carrot cake on the basis of my not knowing the points.

4:02 pm

Office closed for the day, as the skeleton crew are all early-bouncers.

4:30 pm

My appointment with the Neurosurgeon as been approved... Morning appointment in a couple of weeks. A positive end light in sight.

end palm update.

Must be the season... folks are removing/renaming Live Journals in droves. Yesterday, three evaporated like condensation on hot pavement. I wonder if/when they'll be back? a few other folks going on hiatus...I wonder what sets that to rolling in September? Is it related to Lj's load balancing issues?

I'm bushed...going to try to hit the sack early tonight.

The Mind World Map is evolving a map of the world a pixel at a time, according to user votes.

found via - The New York Post has scored a coup and made an increasingly reviled trade association look even worse than it did even yesterday. Yes, the RIAA is suing a 12-year-old girl named Brianna.

September 9, 2003 -- The music industry has turned its big legal guns on Internet music-swappers - including a 12-year-old Upper West Side girl who thought downloading songs was fun.
Brianna LaHara said she was frightened to learn she was among the hundreds of people sued yesterday by giant music companies in federal courts around the country.

"I got really scared. My stomach is all turning," Brianna said last night at the city Housing Authority apartment on West 84th Street where she lives with her mom and her 9-year-old brother.

"I thought it was OK to download music because my mom paid a service fee for it. Out of all people, why did they pick me?"

The Recording Industry Association of America - a music-industry lobbying group behind the lawsuits - couldn't answer that question.

"We are taking each individual on a case-by-case basis," said RIAA spokeswoman Amy Weiss.

Asked if the association knew Brianna was 12 when it decided to sue her, Weiss answered, "We don't have any personal information on any of the individuals."

Brianna's mom, Sylvia Torres, said the lawsuit was "a total shock."

"My daughter was on the verge of tears when she found out about this," Torres said.

The family signed up for the Kazaa music-swapping service three months ago, and paid a $29.99 service charge.

Usually, they listen to songs without recording them. "There's a lot of music there, but we just listen to it and let it go," Torres said.

When reporters visited Brianna's home last night, she was helping her brother with his homework.

Her mom said Brianna's an honors student at St. Gregory the Great, a Catholic school on West 90th Street.

Brianna was among 261 people sued for copying thousands of songs via popular Internet file-sharing software - and thousands more suits could be on the way.

"Nobody likes playing the heavy and having to resort to litigation," said Cary Sherman, the RIAA's president. "But when your product is being regularly stolen, there comes a time when you have to take appropriate action."

At the same time, the RIAA offered amnesty to file-swappers who come forward and agree to stop illegally downloading music over the Internet.

People who already have been sued are not eligible for amnesty.

Brianna and the others sued yesterday under federal copyright law could face penalties of up to $150,000 per song, but the RIAA has already settled some cases for as little as $3,000.

"It's not like we were doing anything illegal," said Torres. "This is a 12-year-old girl, for crying out loud."

Reportedly an honors student at her Catholic school who lives with her mom in the projects no less, Brianna is among the batch of 261 people slapped with lawsuits by the RIAA in recent weeks... What's next in their campaign to deter file-sharing? Will the RIAA start torturing kittens? Tripping blind people? Punching babies?

Dutch baffled by 'baboon noses'

Dutch authorities are trying to track down who left a foul-smelling suitcase at Amsterdam's Schiphol airport containing up to 2,000 suspected decomposing baboon noses. The gruesome discovery was made by security guards during a routine patrol last week.

Officials say the bizarre shipment was brought from Nigeria and was destined for the United States.

Baboons are protected under international conventions and their body parts cannot be exported without authorization.

They are listed as an endangered species by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, or Cites.

"The stench from the luggage drew the attention of the security staff," Louis Steens of the Dutch Agriculture Ministry's Inspection Service told BBC News Online.

Sniffer dogs were used to locate the suspect suitcase in the packed left-luggage area, he said.

"It's not unusual to find animal organs, such as eyes and brains or plants in baggage from Asia and Africa - whose people use them as ingredients of their traditional medicines for healing purposes," Mr Steens said.

But, he said, they had never come across such an enormous number of what they identified as baboon noses.

"It's weird! It's a health hazard too," he said.

The Dutch authorities say they have contacted their counterparts in Nigeria and Cites to assist with their investigations.

The suspected noses, weighing a total of around 30 kilogrammes (66 lbs), have now been destroyed.

Yet another RPC vulnerability

Why We Are Issuing This Update

A security issue has been identified that could allow an attacker to remotely compromise a computer running Microsoft® Windows® and gain complete control over it. You can help protect your computer by installing this update from Microsoft.

Let the patching begin, again. A sysadmin's work is never done. Link goes to Microsoft info about vulnerability. Windows update should have the patch.

Today's Eats


I'm due to make my own meals again.. getting too dependant on the nuke-box and cold machine.

Points: 35.0 Adj: 0 Act: 0.0 Rem: -1.0
Bank: 24.5 Adj: 0
Bank Max: 35 Point: 0 Act: 0
Bank Method: Start on Monday
Vitamins: Yes

Breakfast: 8.0 points
8.0: Croissan'wich w/ Egg & Cheese

Lunch: 7.3 points
0.0: Soda; Low calorie; other than cola or pepper; w/aspartame
3.1: Rice; white; glutinous; cooked
0.0: Mixed grilled veggies
2.1: Candies; ALMOND JOY Candy Bar
2.1: Candies; ALMOND JOY Candy Bar


Dinner: 10.7 points
3.1: Chik patties - morningstar
3.1: Chik patties - morningstar
3.1: Chik patties - morningstar
1.4: Peas sweet; 1 can; solids & liquids

Snack: 9.0 points
4.8: ice cream ; low fat fudge ripple - 1 cup
2.1: Cereals; LC OATS 1 cup
2.1: Cereals; LC OATS 1 cup