The complexity of computers and their operating systems has increased to the point that there's no way to know what, exactly, is going on inside them. The guys who build the chips and the other guys who write the OSes for the things make them a certain way, and they expect certain behaviors from them--and during prototyping and beta tests these expectations are checked and refined--but once they're done, who the hell knows?
There is no way for me to know why I, this morning, could access any link in my bookmark file I cared to try except for Atomic Fungus. There's no way to ever know, because reproducing the error is all but impossible, except for random chance: was it something specific to this computer? Was it a cosmic ray temporarily scrambling a couple of bits of RAM? The alignment of the planets? Who the hell knows?
In the DOS days, something would generally either work or not work. If it didn't work, you had a chance of figuring out what made it not work, even if the problem was in software. Having something spontaneously stop working, and start working again after a reboot, was usually explicable without needing the FBI's computer forensics department.
*sigh*
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Stupid reporter apparently thinks she's above the law. Oh, sorry, not "reporter" but "news anchor".
After her equally stupid boyfriend yelled at a slow-moving unmarked police car, and the police identified themselves, this tower of intellect yelled, "I don't give a f--- who you are, I'm a f---ing TV reporter, you f---ing dyke!"
See, this is what's wrong with the press: police aren't there to keep them in line; oh no. The police are there to keep other people from committing crimes. When a reporter breaks the law, well, the police are supposed to ignore it because a reporter is important!
The dumbass's lawyer says that the dumbass "respects" police. No...no, I'm pretty sure she doesn't.
Say "goodbye" to domestic automakers.
Bumping the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standard to 35 MPG is going to hit the Big Three with another complication just when they can't afford one. Not that the Congresscritters give a rat's ass about that.
The bill doesn't just slam our domestic auto companies, though. It mandates a sixfold increase in the use of ethanol, which is going to drive food prices through the roof, because when you make ethanol you use food to do it--most of the ethanol we make today comes from grain, which means we will essentially be burning more food.
Not to mention the fact that it takes around a gallon of fossil fuel to make a gallon of ethanol. Ethanol is not an energy source. We're not going to save squat by using it.
It also requires "increased efficiency standards" on all sorts of things.
...I'm just too damn tired to explore the implications of this stupidity. The short form is, "conservation" is all well and good, but it won't prevent an increase in demand for energy as our economy expands.
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I got most of my Christmas shopping done Tuesday morning. I did it all in one swell foop, after work.
I ended up staying until 7:30 AM, and then decided to get my shopping done. So I punched out, and ambled around the empty store with a cart for a while; once the store opened at 8, I paid for my purchases and went home.
There are a few minor things remaining, but I can take care of those on Thursday or even Saturday. No worries there.
It's only a week until Christmas--where the hell did the month go? I'd swear it was Thanksgiving, like, last week....
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So far I have used the four-wheel-drive in the Jeep about three times--for a total of maybe 45 seconds--to get the thing unstuck from piles of snow. Each and every time the use of the 4WD would have been unnecessary if it had a limited-slip differential.
I could have gotten it out without using the 4WD, too; it just would have taken longer and made more noise, and involved more tire-spinning. But what the hell--if you've got it, you might as well make use of it.
I still can't believe we got eleven inches of snow Saturday night. I also can't believe that I didn't see or hear anything about it before it arrived.
And that's it for now. I was going to post the third and final "Asa-chan's Ultimate Attack" here, but I'll put it in a seperate entry.