Sunday, 2006-10-08 – Clare and Mayo
I won’t say that I was precisely dreading the flight to Ireland, but I knew it would be a long one, with connections in Chicago and Boston. I can rarely sleep more than a few hours on a long flight, so it was with great relief that I looked out the window and saw the green fields of Clare around Shannon airport. I hadn’t realized that Shannon was such a tiny airport, and by 9:00 am we were walking across the road to our rental car.
After a pleasant stay in Maynooth, near Dublin, we are heading toward Adare in the county of Limerick today. I doubt we will have Internet access before we get home.
While at Worldcon (and on my way there and back), I really thought that I would have more Internet access. Oh well.
Fountain Care discusses the maintenance of table top fountains.
Treat an abscess first thing in the morning, and nothing worse will happen to you all day, at least until you have to treat it again in the evening.
While I was busy straightening out the maitre’d at the Margarita at Pine Creek that we needed a table for three (for Jack, my mother, and myself) instead of a table for five, I looked over my shoulder and saw my sister and brother-in-law, just flown in from California to help celebrate my fiftieth birthday.
We are hosting my sister-in-law’s dogs, Lily and Lightning, this weekend. They earned the name “The Furry Golden Horde” when they first visited years ago, and actually did constitute a two dog invasion. (After the first visit, I went around muttering for weeks, “She ate my hat. I can’t believe she ate my hat.”) Lily (yes, she has the same name as my mare, but we can usually tell whether we are referring to the horse or the Golden Retriever) no longer destroys things, though she does like to carry soft objects around in her mouth. Lightning likes to bark at the horses, but is otherwise an exemplary Sheltie. The two are getting along with Lody and Mia quite well, and it is very entertaining to watch them try to figure out the hierarchy thing without doing anything so uncivilized as growling.
I’ve barely got used to the $20 bill, and I find out that there is a new design for the $10 bill. This government site has pictures of the new money.
Bruce Schneier: in Wired News: The Eternal Value of Privacy
Too many wrongly characterize the debate as “security versus privacy.” The real choice is liberty versus control. Tyranny, whether it arises under threat of foreign physical attack or under constant domestic authoritative scrutiny, is still tyranny. Liberty requires security without intrusion, security plus privacy. Widespread police surveillance is the very definition of a police state. And that’s why we should champion privacy even when we have nothing to hide.
