Project Insomnia: 01/01/2004

Project Insomnia is many things, but in this context it is simply a "braindump" of whatever I happen to be thinking/reading/watching/doing at the moment. Parental guidance suggested.

Friday, January 23, 2004

Posting from the road

And I do mean "from the road"... Jennifer is driving and I am on the laptop as we drive down I-5 on our way to our cruise.
At some point I am going to have to post the tutorial on how to use a Sprint LG 5350 PCS phone as a mobile broadband modem.

|| Andrew, 7:48 PM || || link

Thursday, January 22, 2004

Google wisdom

Type the phrase "miserable failure" into The World's Greatest Search Engine
Click "I'm Feeling Lucky"
Enjoy

|| Andrew, 1:54 PM || || link

Wednesday, January 21, 2004

Disputed Lost Dog Returned To Its Owners

KTVU is reporting that Bella, the lost two-year-old Golden Retriever, was returned to her owner today.

"At approximately 3 p.m. today, Bella was returned to the Humane Society and was reunited with her owners, Niki and Peter," Benninger said.

The couple that had adopted Bella earlier this month returned the dog following the extensive media attention the case has received and after being assured that Karanastasis was the rightful owner of the 2-year-old golden retriever.

The linked story includes a video clip.

|| Andrew, 7:24 PM || || link

Tuesday, January 20, 2004

Pete Ellis Dodge

Long Beach Freeway, Firestone exit, Southgate
Sorry.

|| Andrew, 4:00 PM || || link

Valley barking over tale of lost pet

More on yesterday's story of the lost dog subsequently adopted by someone else even after the rightful owner tried to claim her.

The new owners of Bella, a 2-year-old golden retriever, say they're keeping her. And the Humane Society insists there is nothing it can do.

``We continue to side with the law,'' said Laura Fulda of Humane Society Silicon Valley. ``You can't just say `Anything goes.' ''

When owner Niki Karanastasis showed up at the agency's Santa Clara shelter Jan. 8 -- hours after the dog's adoption was arranged -- Fulda said, officials called the new owner. But she was not interested in giving up the dog. Later, a friend of Karanastasis' appealed by phone, but to no avail. The new owner took Bella home the next day.

What's it going to take for this person to give the dog back? Honestly. What kind of horrible person would keep a member of someone else's family?

|| Andrew, 2:46 PM || || link

Monday, January 19, 2004

Mean people suck

This AP article tells the sad story of a woman whose dogs escaped from her back yard a couple of weeks ago.

Niki Karanastasis was ecstatic when she found Bella at the Humane Society, but she was devastated to learn that her 2-year-old dog had been adopted by a new owner just hours earlier.

Humane Society officials said their hands are tied because they're required to put stray dogs up for adoption five days after they're picked up if they don't have ID tags. Tagged animals are held for 10 days, but Bella didn't have one.

She offered to buy the other party a new dog, but was turned down. The AP article doesn't identify the person who adopted the dog, which I think is too bad. It would be easier to shame this person into releasing the dog back to its rightful owner if her name was known.

|| Andrew, 11:47 PM || || link

Sunday, January 18, 2004

I shouldn't be doing this

Posting from work, that is. Though I suppose technically I'm on a break.
I'm going to be very busy when I get home tonight—publishing tomorrow's site and doing a build so QA has something to test while I'm still asleep tomorrow morning.

|| Andrew, 8:34 PM || || link

Saturday, January 17, 2004

Yay me

My transfer from "seasonal" to "regular" employee at B&N was effective today, along with a smallish raise. The district to which my store belongs is trying to increase their membership conversion rate, and as my numbers beat anyone else in the store by a mile I was asked to take a new position as trainer for membership sales. They're still working out the details of this progam but it sounds intruiging.
If I could make a living doing this I'd be very happy.

|| Andrew, 10:05 PM || || link

Thursday, January 08, 2004

"Awww..." photo of the day

A little lower, please ... ahh! Two denizens of the Budakeszi game park near Budapest, Hungary, MTI/Mate Nandorfi

rub each other the right way.

From the Day in Pictures, of course.

|| Andrew, 8:55 PM || || link

Where the hell is Andrew?

I know I've been negligent in posting here over the past ... month, and I apologize. In case you're interested, here's an abridged list of what I have going on in my life right now:

Work [yes, still]

Work [did so well through December that they asked me to stay on--two weeknights and one weekend day]

Work [Publisher for January in addition to the usual System Engineer and Administrator duties]

I'm a Director of my Homeowners Association, and am (slowly) working on establishing a Web presence for the Association. Monthly meetings with irregular conferences in between.

and I'm sure there are a few
more
things I've temporarily forgotten.

I do this all the time--take on too much and get overwhelmed. The real problem comes when I have so many things competing for my attention and respond by completely closing myself away and ignoring all of them.
Updating my Web site falls somewhere in there as well, so without meaning to proffer excuses, you can see why updates here have been few, far between, and mostly lacking in content.
In better news, though, Jennifer and I are taking a cruise at the end of this month, to belately celebrate our fifth wedding anniversary. Applications are now being accepted for the temporary position of cat-sitter.

|| Andrew, 2:27 PM || || link

Friday, January 02, 2004

That's "Sir Tim" to you, mate

CNet News.com is reporting that Tim Berners-Lee, who combined HTML with URLs and came up with the World Wide Web, has been knighted.

|| Andrew, 10:14 AM || || link

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Project Insomnia