Monster Under Bed Is Real
=================================
For a 2-year-old Treemont toddler, the monsters she heard go bump in the night in her room this week were not the product of an overactive imagination. Instead, the monster she told her mother about was actually a burglar who had broken into the family’s home – an intruder who was still hiding in the shadows when her mother came to console her.

Terrorist Attacks Fake Ducks
=================================
A dispute over hunting territory has landed a Muscatine man in jail on terrorism charges…

The argument ended with Roggenbauer pointing his shotgun at the other hunters in a threatening manner and then shooting at their duck decoys, Matthews said.

The Source Of Every Crazy’s Letter, Consultants
=================================
KPMG, an international business consulting firm, prides itself on its “e-business” savvy, and it charges companies boatloads to improve their Web-based businesses.

But this week several website owners were wondering whether KPMG’s Internet acumen was really worth anything at all, as it announced a policy that seemed to breach the most basic freedom on the Web — the freedom to link to any site you want to.

In a letter to a consultant in Britain who runs a personal website that has not been especially nice to KPMG, the company said it had discovered a link on his site to www.kpmg.com, and that the website owner, Chris Raettig, should “please be aware such links require that a formal Agreement exist between our two parties, as mandated by our organization’s Web Link Policy.”

The letter added that Raettig should feel free to arrange this “Web Link Agreement” with KPMG, but that until he has done so, he should remove his link to the company’s homepage.

heh… I put a link to it before, but it’s funny that wired picked it up.

Comic Strip Pulled For Sucking, Not For Espousing Religion
=================================
Beginning Monday, the B.C. comic strip no longer will appear on the daily comics page, though it still will run on Sundays.

The Johnny Hart strip has been the object of more comic criticism than any other. The chief complaint: Mr. Hart not very subtly uses it to espouse his religious beliefs, which readers would prefer he keep private.

It’s not the controversy, however, but the lagging quality of the jokes that led to the move, said Ms. Tuckwood. “We didn’t kill B.C. because of Johnny Hart’s occasional religious cartoons. We don’t mind controversy. What we don’t enjoy is comics that aren’t funny, and B.C. seems to be slipping, so we’re giving it a rest.”

Florida Simply Can’t Count
=================================
Fort Pierce’s closest-ever city commission election isn’t over yet.

A manual recount of ballots will begin at 9 a.m. today at the request of the two losers in Tuesday’s election.

Tuesday night Coke led 865-864, but Wednesday’s recount changed it to 866 for Coke and 863 for Kramer.

“Based on the closeness of the vote and the change in totals, we request a hand recount,” Wallace T. “Toby” Long, Kramer’s campaign treasurer, told commissioners.

Snowboarder Loses Clothing Sponsor; Thinks She Has To Compete Naked
=================================
An Austrian snowboarder who failed to secure a sponsor for her competition gear this season has decided to throw caution to the wind and compete in just a pair of panties and bra.

“Without a clothing sponsor there is nothing else I can do,” the one-time World Cup race winner Sabrina Blassnig told the Austrian extreme sports Web site expeditionzone.com.

Monster Under Bed Is Real
=================================
For a 2-year-old Treemont toddler, the monsters she heard go bump in the night in her room this week were not the product of an overactive imagination. Instead, the monster she told her mother about was actually a burglar who had broken into the family’s home – an intruder who was still hiding in the shadows when her mother came to console her.

Terrorist Attacks Fake Ducks
=================================
A dispute over hunting territory has landed a Muscatine man in jail on terrorism charges…

The argument ended with Roggenbauer pointing his shotgun at the other hunters in a threatening manner and then shooting at their duck decoys, Matthews said.

The Source Of Every Crazy’s Letter, Consultants
=================================
KPMG, an international business consulting firm, prides itself on its “e-business” savvy, and it charges companies boatloads to improve their Web-based businesses.

But this week several website owners were wondering whether KPMG’s Internet acumen was really worth anything at all, as it announced a policy that seemed to breach the most basic freedom on the Web — the freedom to link to any site you want to.

In a letter to a consultant in Britain who runs a personal website that has not been especially nice to KPMG, the company said it had discovered a link on his site to www.kpmg.com, and that the website owner, Chris Raettig, should “please be aware such links require that a formal Agreement exist between our two parties, as mandated by our organization’s Web Link Policy.”

The letter added that Raettig should feel free to arrange this “Web Link Agreement” with KPMG, but that until he has done so, he should remove his link to the company’s homepage.

heh… I put a link to it before, but it’s funny that wired picked it up.

Comic Strip Pulled For Sucking, Not For Espousing Religion
=================================
Beginning Monday, the B.C. comic strip no longer will appear on the daily comics page, though it still will run on Sundays.

The Johnny Hart strip has been the object of more comic criticism than any other. The chief complaint: Mr. Hart not very subtly uses it to espouse his religious beliefs, which readers would prefer he keep private.

It’s not the controversy, however, but the lagging quality of the jokes that led to the move, said Ms. Tuckwood. “We didn’t kill B.C. because of Johnny Hart’s occasional religious cartoons. We don’t mind controversy. What we don’t enjoy is comics that aren’t funny, and B.C. seems to be slipping, so we’re giving it a rest.”

Florida Simply Can’t Count
=================================
Fort Pierce’s closest-ever city commission election isn’t over yet.

A manual recount of ballots will begin at 9 a.m. today at the request of the two losers in Tuesday’s election.

Tuesday night Coke led 865-864, but Wednesday’s recount changed it to 866 for Coke and 863 for Kramer.

“Based on the closeness of the vote and the change in totals, we request a hand recount,” Wallace T. “Toby” Long, Kramer’s campaign treasurer, told commissioners.

Snowboarder Loses Clothing Sponsor; Thinks She Has To Compete Naked
=================================
An Austrian snowboarder who failed to secure a sponsor for her competition gear this season has decided to throw caution to the wind and compete in just a pair of panties and bra.

“Without a clothing sponsor there is nothing else I can do,” the one-time World Cup race winner Sabrina Blassnig told the Austrian extreme sports Web site expeditionzone.com.

You know what I think would be keen? If right in the middle of the Lord of the Rings movie, Skeletor and Hordak suddenly attacked… and then the Masters of the Universe had to come in and save all those hobbits’ sorry butts.

http://www.mariesworldtour.com/

Now, *that’s* a great idea for a journal.

I should make one invoving a trip through Magonia, and it’s environs.

My Squid Suit Brings Isolation, by Brad Eberhard.

If you received a message in your e-mail about your account expiring today, please ignore it.

During the maintenance job to expire old accounts, a glitch hit the system which set the expire times on everyone’s accounts minus three years. That caused every paid member to get an expiration notice… oops. Sorry. We’ve fixed things for now and will stamp out the bug ASAP so that it never comes back.

In the course of studying up on all things reptilian I was looking up the Hopi legends of Lizard People.

The Hopi are thought to be descendants of the mysterious Anasazi people. Among the more advanced Native Americans, they were also builders of Pueblos.

They believe that as a people, they migrated from a series of previously-extant “worlds,” usually interpreted as “ages” or “epochs;” but these are also seen as subsequent cavern-worlds, each one lower than the next, each one eventually abandoned and destroyed in turn.

This seems to link with K’n-Yan of the red- and blue-lit caverns. Well, the Serpent People also have a history in K’n-Yan, where they dabbled in biotech and created new life forms to serve them.

According to Hopi legend, around 3,000 B.C. after a fire or meteor (or war?) nearly destroyed the Lizard People, they built three undergound cities along the Pacific coast. The capitol city was built under what is now Los Angeles, another was built under Mount Shasta. No one knows where the third one is.

OK, so far we have Serpent People underground in Oklahoma in the multi-level city of K’n-Yan. They experimented with genetics and produced servitor races. They also, naturally, kept up with their sorcery.

But, Serpent People didn’t start out in K’n-Yan, they moved there from Valusia when their previous empire receded. This is not to say that there were no Serpent People already on the continent. Let’s say that there were already Serpent People on the frontier, the empire of the Serpent People was at one time the dominant race on Earth and there is nothing that says they didn’t have colonies and plenty of indications that they would. So, let’s postulate a Serpent People colony in the American Southwest, and as the empire collapsed those that could moved to the frontier and took over K’n-Yan.

The Lizard People (let’s make that distinction; Serpent People from the old empire in K’n-Yan, New World Lizard People on the surface) on the surface got peppered with meteors or flying polyps or something and decided to make some bomb shelters, so they move west and do so.

Now, let’s look at some Serpent People on another continent. In India there are legends of the Nagas, a race of serpent-people or lizard-men who make their homes in two major underground cities (or civilizations) named Patala and Bhogavati. Bhogavati is said to be under the Himalayas. The Well of Sheshna in Benares (and read up on that city some time) is said to contain an entrance to Patala.

The Nagas are described as a very advanced race, with a highly-developed technology. Now, here’s where the gun starts smokin’. Nagas are said to abduct and interbreed with human beings, and this interbreeding has led to a wide variety of forms, ranging from completely reptilian to nearly human in appearance.

It gets better. Legends say they fly disk-shaped aerial craft called “vimana.” These craft are described at length in many ancient Vedic texts, including the Bhagivad-gita and the Ramayana. They are also said to possess “death rays.”

OK, ready?

Newspaper accounts in the state of New Mexico in the years before the beginning of World War II indicated that the Germans were “all over” the state exploring caves and mines, buying up land, and engaging in other activities suggestive that they were preparing for something big. There is a very famous cave complex in New Mexico called Dulce. Heard of it?

Now, Mi-Go have been here for awhile. They cultivate isolated groups of people to dink with and to provide protection for their mining operations.

Since the Mi-Go arrived some time during the Jurassic period, the isolated groups of people they would have dealt with would include Serpent People.

It’s beginning to look as if the Grey facade was inspired by Nagas and their flying saucers, or Serpent People were working for Mi-Go and using Mi-Go equipment. Perhaps it also explains some other flying disks with swastikas on them. Greys could be clones of Nagahuman hybrids. The glyphs in the Bucket might be Serpent tech rather than Mi-Go tech.

What do you think, sirs?

Gorgeous computationally-generated Flash thingies can be found at Levitated.net. Even better, they’re open source.

life is thick
with the feast of the senses.
the pond,
bosom of life
homes the heron in our souls
safe from the hunter of the night.
amid the wisdom of the lotus buds
blooms our understanding
of all things,
like moonlight
penetrating the virgin pond;
all secrets seen clearly

I am a Fish with a Bicycle. My poetry kills cows, but only with an acute sunset. Four score bald men take their coffee for a walk with my conveyer belt. Death pays those who interfere with my green amusement. Are your giraffes on fire? The Utterly Surreal Test

turbid (TUR-bid), adjective:
1. Muddy; thick with or as if with roiled sediment; not clear; — used of liquids of any kind.
2. Thick; dense; dark; — used of clouds, air, fog, smoke, etc.
3. Disturbed; confused; disordered.

Turbid comes from Latin turbidus, “confused, disordered,” from turba, “disturbance, commotion.”

That describes my thoughts lately… some scattering and obfuscation. I need some cob-sweeping, and a little reorganization of the processes that go there…Some elements need to either solidify, get folded and put in a drawer, or be chucked out. Thinks were much the same for me this time last year, similar stresses and work struggles… they passed then, and they will pass now, too.

Also, a year ago today….

The McNoggin.

KPMG is a big company that doesn’t like anyone linking to them. KPMG! KPMG! KPMG! KPMG! KPMG! (spread the link around. It’s fun!)

and now, back to my regularly scheduled doomaflobbie.

One of my Christmas-times on my own, in a tiny efficiency apartment in Boca…

I was called into work, to take care of a few problems that were going on, but got home early… My mother was in Brazil with her new husband, my brother was in Hawaii, I think.

People in my circle of friends were all very busy, and at the time, I didn’t want to see anyone for what I thought of at the time as a “mercy dinner”, but instead dressed down to my most comfortable clothes, a pair of sweat pants and an oversized T-shirt with Spider-Man on the front, grappling with the Green Goblin, and a pair of very comfortable white leather high tops. I had fairly short hair then, and a neatly trimmed, but full beard… In some of the best shape I’ve ever been in, since I’d been attending sports therapy for my back.

I went outside, and the weather was brisk enough to make me return for a sweatshirt…Grey, with Miskatonic University Printed across the front… amazingly comfy, suitable for jammies, really. I walked a long way that day, wanting to get as far away from civilization as possible. Time compressed for me, I honestly don’t know how long it took, but I eventually ended up at Red Reef Park, on the long boardwalk they have.

I remembered the time I didn’t have a place ot live and slept there at night, checking out my old haunts…I didn’t see any signs of anyone else staying there. I took a seat, and just thought to myself a long while, seeking a balance, finding where I was before, and what I was then. I came to the realization that even though I was not in the best place in the world, that things were good, better than the times before. I was feeling poorly at the beginning of the day, and stuff was getting better and better as time went on.

I think it was the first time in maybe years that I knew that things were good with me, and that my world was not so bad after all.

This means you! 🙂

Cloning laws in Japan to allow human-animal mix
Will Japan become The Island of Doctor Moreau? As long as it’s not the Brando version… eegah.

And now, off to work.

Time is the coin of your life. It is the only coin you have, and only you can determine how it will be spent. Be careful lest you let other people spend it for you. -Carl Sandburg

furphy (FUR-fee) noun

A rumor.

After the Furphy family of Victoria, Australia, manufacturer of Furphy carts, for water or trash. These carts where used during World War I, around which troops gathered and exchanged gossip. This word was formed in much the same way as scuttlebutt, the word we got from nautical terminology. A scuttlebutt was an open cask of drinking water, a favorite meeting place of the crew to swap stories.

Lots of work today. a great deal of effort was made to keep an even keel, and maintain balance, and fortunately, it paid off… got my stuff mostly covered… on schedule, anyhow… Dale’s duties are handily covered, despite some fastballs and unforseen stumbling blocks put in our path by the client. multiple files, nonstandard formats, horrid deadlines, all defeated.

I want to sit back tonight, and unwind.. have a long talk with my sweetheart, and just relax. ‘Tis the season for stress it seems… it’s a real shame when the winter holiday spirit gets twisted into gloom, anger and impatience. I’m going to make a point of trying to make the holidays a nicer time for everyone, and not in the chirpy way that bothers some folks. Just a little smile, a soft word, and good thoughts for folks… I think that can maybe do the most good. There are a lot of people that could do with a little kindness and softness, and it’ll make me feel like a better person, too.

It’s time for me to regroup my thoughts about Christmas prezzies, too. My list this year is a small one… I’ve got a list, and it’s been checked once over now, so I’m halfway there.

A few ideas are in place, but I’ve got a couple of holes in my shopping to work with. Saturday also has a possible longer gig with Women/Children in Distress (a spousal/child abuse center), writing some software for the remote council to add to a master database… shouldn’t take too long and it’s for a good cause. I’ll find out more details as the weekend draws near.

Finished editing my portion of the LOTR project, and sent off the revised galleys to the chief this morning, so I have a work slot open.