In Flanders Fields the poppies grow...
Topic: Opinion

Smalltown Football vs. The Internet
Topic: Fun
In October of 2006, the town of Snohomish, WA made the news: A Junior ROTC student whose leg was blown open in a grisly accident when the traditional cannon used to blast off a football game exploded on him. Townspeople, with their Traditional Values, sent him heartwarming messages such as "Stay quiet about this or we'll break your other leg."

The story made the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, then the internet, then Fark.com.  After several months of internet ridicule, an arrest had been made and the town apparently is trying to clean up its tarnished reputation for being heartless hicks.

Farkers not only sent emails and phone calls to the town and the high school complaining about their poor treatment of the boy, but also had other kinds of fun while they were at it.

First, they went to the high school's football website (!?) and all voted, repeatedly, that they "will not be attending any games" in the on-line poll. At one point, a town that has about 8,000 residents had an on-line poll showing over 20,000 people will not attend any games.  I mean, according to the (now legitimate again, see below) wiki, the team last won a state championship in 1978, so a lot of my fellow Farkers didn't see why the town was so damn proud of the team to begin with.

And then Wikipedia got involved. Wikipedia, "the encyclopedia anyone can edit", enjoyed extensive free editing for the Snohomish Senior High School entry until an administrator wised to the Fark and locked the page down and cleaned it back up. While it was going on though, it was great times . No, really, it was bleedin' fantastic.  Compare the two wikis; I'm still laughing.  

A little hike won't kill us... will it?
Topic: News
Hard-core hiking trail up a mountain in China:

http://mb14.scout.com/fvanderbiltfrm10.showMessage?topicID=3846.topic

Hah! I knew it, now there's proof.
Topic: News

Office queen bees hold back women’s careers

From the Article:

FORGET “jobs for the boys”. Women bosses are significantly more likely than men to discriminate against female employees, research has suggested.

...

The findings, based on experiments carried out among more than 700 people, suggest that the “queen bee syndrome” of female rivalry in the workplace may sometimes be as important as sexism in holding back women’s careers.

“Female and older participants showed more prejudice against the (idea of a) female leader than did male and younger participants,” said Rocio Garcia-Retamero, a psychologist at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Berlin and lead author of the report.

...

The study says: “Female participants had a stronger tendency than male participants to view the female candidates as less qualified than the male candidate . . . they also thought that the female candidate would fare worse in the future in her job than the male candidate.”

 

 

AP Polls have all bases covered
Topic: News
AP Poll: Americans see gloom, doom in 2007
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061231/ap_on_re_us/2007_predictions_ap_poll?feck

AP Poll: Americans optimistic for 2007
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061231/ap_on_re_us/optimism_ap_poll

Topic: News

The son-in-law of the President of Taiwan have been convicted, along with his father, of insider trading. Going to jail for 6 and 8 years respectively. It's the most severe sentence for such crimes ever handed down.  The entire nation (and some expats) have been following this, as it's such a clear case of special-privilege and corruption that the only surprise is how long it took for the dirt to hit the fan. The judge in the case quoted chapter and verse from the Analects of Chuang Tzu, a Taoist scholar who lived in the 4th Century BCE, as part of his sentencing:

"Those who steal a fishhook are common criminals; those who steal a nation are rulers; such does the downfall of virtue and honesty from the doors of those who rule."

Expanding on this, the judge pointed out in his ruling that those in power have come to expect to escape the reach of the law, and it is no longer acceptable; he also implies in his writing that the defendants' abuse of power have contributed to further the unjust gap between the haves and the have-nots in society, to the detriment of the nation beyond simply a criminal act.  He further writes, quoting from classical sources, that the elite defendants have "purchased power with money, and extracted money using power" He called the defendants 'arch-typical elite criminals' who expect to be above the law.  The ruling document ran to 297 pages, over 230,000 words.

Sounds like the judge in this case had a Classical Education.  I mean, I totally agree with him and I feel a sincere respect for the classical scholarship, but jeezus, a 297-page ruling? Surely to read that is a sentence in itself.

Topic: Fun

"We will need to postpone the start of Christmas by at least two weeks due to changes made during the plan checking process. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause. However, a proper design will ensure a successful project."

 

 

Topic: Cute
Pelican blown off course rescued in Vancouver

Will he survive, the poor pelican? You bet the helican!

You know why? He's a pelican, not a pelicant !

"The Pelican"
written in 1910 by Dixon Lanier Merritt

A wonderful bird is the pelican,
His bill will hold more than his belican.
He can take in his beak
Food enough for a week,
But I'm damned if I see how the helican.

Topic: Personal
Getch and I got into a snowball fight when we came back from the bowling, but it wasn't a fair fight! I couldn't get the snow to form into tight enough balls - it was too powdery - so I just basically threw handfuls of loose snow at him, and he nailed me good several times with these tightly formed, non-breakaway ice-balls (they were too hard to qualify as snow-balls). Ow. I have no idea how he did it and he wouldn't tell me other than that he just knows more about snow.  I staggered into the kitchen with a ringing in my right ear from being hit, and he just complained that I snowed up his jacket.

You may ask what was Sheven and Milly doing all this time, they basically announced that they were not involved in this and did not want to be hit in the crossfire (Getch and I were attacking each other while walking up the driveway with the girls between us). I can't believe they won't back me up! Surely the three of us can take him down easily :-)

Topic: Personal

Backyard of the Poole house

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Milly, Sheven and Connie

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The Pooles. From Left: Beverly, Steven, Sheven, Getch, Willy

 

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Steve's Garden Cathedral. Can you believe that thing's supposed to be a storage shed? It's got a gabled roof and a skylight, for god's sake. He said that the view from the top of the shed is great and he's considering putting a deck on the roof. He was only half-kidding, too.