It begins . . .

For 1st Woman With Bionic Arm, a New Life Is Within Reach – washingtonpost.com

Today, the first woman gets a bionic arm to replace one she lost.  Sooner than you think, a plastic surgeon is going to amputate the arms of a rich bored kid to replace them with metal arms as a fashion statement or a “body upgrade”.

I think it’s great that people without limbs have this available – a partially thought-controlled replacement arm.  I know how difficult it can be to do normal tasks when I’ve just jammed a wrist or something – I can’t even imagine losing a limb.  And while this technology isn’t perfect, I imagine an imperfect arm is better than no arm.

But it’s a new world out there, and it’s only a matter of time before this is cosmetic surgery.  It remains to be seen whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing.

I will get to the bottom of this

I’m tired of this madness.  Every morning, I drop my wife off at the Metro and then drive to work.  Every morning, I think I’m in the correct lane to get where I want to go.  Every morning, someone in another lane thinks they have a right to be where I am.  I have to find out who’s correct.  Some woman flashed her high beams at me this morning in anger, and I’m almost positive I was right and she was wrong.

The intersection in question is Seven Corners, one of the most poorly designed sections of road I’ve ever seen.  The engineers responsible should never work in this field again.  If you leave the East Falls Church Metro down Sycamore/Roosevelt, then turn left onto Wilson, you arrive at a light.  Two lanes go right.  You turn onto what appears to be Leesburg Pike West, which has four or five lanes.  The two left lanes lead to a left turn yield.  This left turn takes you to Leesburg Pike East, which has four lanes.  Now, here is where the problem is.  If I see two lanes turning left into four, and I want to be in the lane second from the right, it makes sense that I get in the right lane before the turn, right?  There is no sign, and no line on the road to suggest anything.  And I seem to be the minority.  But if I get in the left lane, no doubt I will find myself again in the minority.  Because there are always fewer people who agree with you on matters like this, I’ve found.

In any event, if I was high-beamed in error, I’m very offended.  If I screw up and you flash your lights at me, I’ll take that.  I might even wave an apology.  I can admit when I’m wrong.  But I won’t stand for unwarranted high-beaming.  I just won’t stand for it.

I’m going to contact the DMV today and see if I can get to the bottom of this.

Perfect timing

Blogwise – Blog directory I just registered Complaint Hub with Blogwise, although it will take some time for a real person to verify it.  Perfect timing, I say, because I’m in a bit of a posting slump right now.  But I won’t be forever.  Maybe a flood of readers from Blogwise will arrive at the same time I break out of my slump with a half-dozen brilliant posts, sure to turn the casual blog browser into a lifelong fan. Or maybe not.

I seem to be numb

Nothing I read seems to inspire me to post since I got back.  I’m reading the same amount of junk online, but nothing catches my eye, saying, “Hey, jerk, blog about me”.  Nothing at all.  It can’t be that I’m tired of complaining, because that certainly isn’t true.  And it can’t be that nothing stupid is happening in the world, because that isn’t true, either.  I’m not still jet-lagged, since it’s been a week.

So I can’t explain my lack of posting.  I can just apologize to my legions of fans, and pledge to try and get inspired again soon.

Montgomery County doesnt want you to vote

Voting Delays at D.C., Md. Polls – washingtonpost.com “It was simply an unfortunate human error,” [Montgomery County] spokeswoman Marjorie Roher said. “We’re getting the cards out there as quickly as possible.”

An unfortunate human error?  Voting machines can’t be used without voter authorization cards.  Forty-five minutes before polls were scheduled to open, someone happened to check to see if those cards were there.  They were not.  I’m not one for conspiracy theories, but that seems unbelieveably incompetent.

It’s happening more and more (Or at least making the papers more and more) that we as a country seem to have a hard time setting up the means to vote.  There are few countries more technologically advanced than we are, and yet we aren’t capable of making a secure voting machine that keeps a record in case of any problems?

What about Jamie Foxx?

NFL.com – Minnesota at Washington Game Recap Big things are expected of the Redskins this year, a confidence reflected in an attendance of 90,608 that set a new record for the largest stadium in the NFL. Even Hollywood made an appearance: Actors Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes were guests of owner Dan Snyder, who has recently entered into a partnership with Cruise’s production company.

Okay, let’s focus on the total whack job who hasn’t made a good movie in years instead of the recent Academy Award winner who visited the booth to, sort of, hang out with the fans.  I didn’t like Ray, although I thought Jamie Foxx did a great job.  I liked Tom Cruise a lot in Top Gun and in Top Gun II (on the ground) – Days of Thunder.  But that was before he took the path of Michael Jackson and Mel Gibson and forgot that he lived on Planet Earth with the rest of us.

It is nice that 90,000 fans showed up for the game.  Not so nice that our brand new offensive genius decided that the screen pass to Santana Moss needed to be run three times.  I wish Moss would stop breaking those for 15-20 yard gains so they’d realize that it’s really a terrible, terrible play.  If it works, and he makes 6 guys miss, he gains 20 yards.  If it doesn’t work, best case scenario is he loses five yards.  Worst case is it’s picked off, which is an almost guaranteed touchdown for the other team because there’s no one back there to catch the guy.

We still can’t run the ball, and Portis seemed pretty healthy.  If he wasn’t, Ladell Betts is a perfectly adequate backup.  The game was close from beginning to end, so there’s absolutely no excuse for running the ball only 18 times.

Anyway, it was a pretty disappointing game.  And I lost my fantasy football game, as well.  And our flag football game.  Everything football-related for me this past weekend was bad.  At least Virginia Tech won, but that was pretty much a given.

Five years ago yesterday

On September 10th, 2001, I moved to Northern Virginia.  I was a few months out of college and unemployed, looking for a job in computers, and some friends were renting a place in Fairfax, so I went along with them.  I brought a bed and some odds and ends.  On the 11th, I was heading back to my parents’ to pick up more stuff.  I had arranged with a friend to help me load my truck.  I had just left the house when I heard from Howard Stern about the WTC towers.  At first I thought it was a joke until the WHFS morning show confirmed it.  My roommates were both off at work, and we didn’t have a landline, and of course my cell phone wasn’t working because of all the stress on the system.  My dad worked in DC at the time, and I had no idea how far he was from the Pentagon.  And I couldn’t get a hold of anyone.  I finally managed to get through at the pay phone at Wendy’s (Although the calling card I had and rarely used decided not to work.  Luckily by that time I had memorized my dad’s calling card number).

It was an interesting welcome to the DC Metro area.  And now, five years later, where are we?  We’ve destroyed the beauty of much of Washington DC with jersey walls and iron fences.  We’ve made flying in and out of the US completely ridiculous.  We’ve given our President an excuse to spy illegally on our citizens and to deny basic human rights to prisoners of war because we’re calling them “enemy combatants” instead.  The site of the WTC is still a big hole.  We haven’t found those responsible for the attack.

It’s been a great five years, huh?  I hope this will be the legacy of the Bush administration.  They were quick to put a nice bandage on the wound cause by 9/11, and tell everyone that things would be okay.  But then they embezzled insurance money for expensive plastic surgery, and accused those who complained of being unpatriotic.  Patriotism is not a flag sticker on your car and blindy supporting every action of the President, no matter how misguided or illegal.

And football is back

NFL.com – Miami at Pittsburgh Game Recap

After the World Cup and watching a little Australian Rules over in Melbourne, the game seemed a little slow, but it feels really good to have football back on tv.  The Orioles are all but eliminated, so it’s time for a little Redskins action.  I watched the first half of Miami-Pittsburgh last night, mostly to make sure my dogg Hines Ward got in the end zone for my fantasy team, which he did.

I think I’m going to finally bite the bullet and invest in High Def cable.  After the third time I thought the Dolphins had faked the punt snap because I didn’t see the ball, I’d really had enough.  My only problem is that I already send over $100 to Cox Cable for tv and internet, and I hesitate to send them any more.  I mean, their service isn’t really that good.  But I can’t take it any longer.  Until Verizon gets around to offering their fiber tv/internet service in my area, Cox will continue their localized monopoly and have zero incentive to provide me with better service.