Assassin

Yesterday, despite the pressure of Passover cleaning, I decided it was time to change my tires from winter to summer tires. This involves removing the winter wheel/tire combinations, and putting the new ones on — it's similar to changing a flat tire.

Three Orthodox Jewish neighbors noticed me. The first one, a man from down the block, asked if I needed help; he thought I had a flat tire. The man from across the street asked if I had a flat tire.

The woman who lives next door said, "I didn't realize you were so frum."

( explanation behind the cut )

I need suggestions for a new cellular carrier, immediately.

I ran over my minutes for this month -- shared minutes, etc. -- and I owe 45 cents per minute, which turns out to be a lot of money.

The T-Mobile business model is quite clear: charge an outrageous amount for minutes outside your monthly allotment, in order to encourage you to sign up for more minutes than you need.

I'm not interested, and I'm not interested in a new plan that will -- surprise! -- require me to commit to another two years of T-Mobile service.

If anyone has any ideas -- a better provider -- please let me know ASAP. I have an Android phone, so unlimited data is a big incentive.

The book opens well enough, with an interesting premise; the problem is that Reynolds can't avoid brushing the world with a thick layer of disgust (including a simile that I shall endeavour to forget as hard as I can; I can really do with some brain bleach).

The book then opens up into a wider scope, but at page 130 or so all we've encountered is shaggy dog stories; it's the Lord of the Rings problem, namely that the wider important quest (assuming there really is one in Reynold's book) is obscured by encounters with (apparently) irrelevant monsters. I gave up; not enough plot to keep me turning another 350 pages.

Managed to salute the Google Street View car as it zoomed down my street. Let's see how long until my street has a view, which it currently does not. I'm guessing tomorrow.

I challenge you to read this product description without laughing.

Oh, and I'm trying to figure out how to store 100+ bottles of wine right now.

• I lost my venerable Swiss Army knife to a thief — stolen from my checked luggage at O'Hare at the end of May. I've replaced it with more-or-less the same knife, what's now called a "Champion Plus."


• After meeting tezliana  in Rhode Island, and witnessing her Fenix flashlight in action as we walked stooped over in a tunnel underneath an old Army fortress, I got a bad case of tech envy. I now own a Fenix PD30, which in "turbo" mode puts out 285 lumens, enough to burn out your eyeballs. (As an aside, I agree with her that standardizing on the same AA batteries I use everywhere else would make more sense, but I simply couldn't pass up the higher power and smaller size of the CR123A sized cells.)


• And for those long road trips, a modern radio in my car with a USB connector for a flash drive and a bluetooth interface for those pesky phone calls.

For my next trick, I "need" a custom ring made to hold a fragment of my home planet safely away from the elements.

It's been 475 years, but some of us have not forgotten.

(I made an announcement and sang the ballad at the pub on Tuesday night.)

The basic point of the bin Laden assassination seems to have been missed by every commentator that I've read so far.

The assassination sends a very clear message: no sanctuary. In the past, terrorist organizations found sanctuary and support from states such as Iraq, Iran, Syria, Libya, the Soviet Union, and the like. The Israelis don't respect sovereign sanctuaries — hence their strike in Dubai, the most recent public example — and that model has served them well.

Now we see that the US will strike against terrorists, not only by invading hostile countries that shelter them (Iraq, Afghanistan) but by strikes inside the territory of putative allies. States that shelter terrorists face punishment, up to and including outright war; terrorists face sudden death no matter who sponsors them. That's the message of the bin Laden assassination, and I believe it's an effective one.

I was dismayed to discover on Saturday that many of my otherwise-sensible friends spent time enjoying the spectacle of the royal wedding in England.

Why dismay? Because the entire concept of royalty is so utterly un-American, so corrosive to the notions of liberty we cherish here in the US, that I would expect anyone to find the entire affair repulsive beyond belief. Instead they're discussing the finer points of hats, dresses, uniforms, and titles of nobility.

The second task of the seder is to wash your hands. My nieces and nephews brought me a cup of water, a towel, and a bowl over which to wash my hands.

I was distracted, answering a question from someone, as I grasped the cup. I looked at the bowl which my nephew held over my lap. I looked again and noticed that there were decorative clear spaces around the bottom of the otherwise blue bowl.

Then I noticed he was actually holding a colander over my lap.

Everyone claims that they would have stopped me if I hadn't noticed in time, but...