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If you're reading this, my domain name transfer went successfully. For the last 6 years binaryfusion.net has actually been owned by my (very very) old web hosting company, and it wasn't until yesterday that I officially got it put into my name. The biggest reason being that the web hosting company didn't exist anymore and none of the contact information worked to renew the domain name. But through some internet detective work and such, I was able to contact one of the people who could get to my domain, so I could change the information, and now I don't have to worry about it anymore. I also discovered in all this that binaryfusion.com was available at one point. Back in the day when when I registered binaryfusion.net (6 years ago now, wow), it was being used by some sort of tech company in India. Now it's been bought by a company that buys up unregistered domains to sell them at inflated prices to the people who want them. So binaryfusion.com could be mine for the low low price of only $3,000. Yeah.....
I turned 23 last Saturday, went down to 6th street to celebrate and got a T-shirt out of the deal. Only two more years to the last significant birthday (25, when you can rent cars and get insurance far cheaper) until I hit 40. I would feel old except that my roommates are 26/27 so I still feel like the youngster kind of. Except when I'm hanging out with some of my Freescale interns who are still 20.
In a somewhat related note, I LOVE that Austin has a law banning smoking in any public building. So you can go out at night and not come back smelling like smoke. It's yet another thing I really like about Austin, and yet another reason why I think there's a very good chance I'll be moving here once I graduate. I'm not sure if I'll stick with Freescale or not, but with dozens of tech companies all around the Austin area, I don't think I'll have to worry too much. It's got all the crunchy coolness of Portland, but without having rain 9 months out of the year. The only thing I really miss is Portland's light rail train, you pretty much have to have a car here, and if I end up living downtownish then if I was in Portland I could just read the paper on the way to work instead of dealing with traffic. But I suppose you can't have everything. I also don't like the idea that my vote for president is pretty much useless since the rest of the state is red, but at least Austin has some common sense. (See the blue dot in the middle of Texas? That's Austin)
America=Police state? A bit biased yes, but still gives you some stuff to think about.
Only in America would you find the beer cooler scooter. With optional attachment to tow another cooler for your dog to sit in.
Fingerpainting, on your computer. One of my creations is my current desktop background. I only wish you could pick the colors yourself, as many a painting has been ruined by getting crappy colours at the wrong times.
So having had a car for over a month, and driving on Austin roads during that time, I just have one thing to say: Austin drivers are the slowest drivers I've ever met. The speed limit on Highway 183, which is a major highway that pretends it's an interstate with exits and on ramps, has a speed limit of 65. Going all of 68, I end up passing just about every single car. The average speed on it, and without exaggerating at all, has to be about 60 MPH. I just don't understand, but for the first time in my life I'm the "fast" car. Also Texas has what's called service roads which mean that to get anywhere you pretty much have to make a U-Turn at some point. All the stores, instead of being lined up along streets, are lined up against the service road, which is a one way street one each side. So the same quarter mile trip in Florida turns into a 2 mile trip in Texas if the store is at a particularly bad location. It's really annoying most of the time, except when traffic is stopped on the main road and you can just take the service road instead.
UF is getting video replay screens for the O'Dome! I suppose that's what happens when you win a national championship and donations increase dramatically.
Remember that link in the last post about America being a police state? A single vote prevented a form of that from happening. It just amazes me that somehow these Senators believe that restricting free speech is patriotic. Apparently they conveniently forget the first amendment, that little bit about "Congress shall make no law [...] abridging the freedom of speech..." I've written on here about this subject before after first becoming interested in after doing a paper on Texas v Johnson, and while I personally have no interest in setting fire to an American flag, I believe very strongly that it should be a protected form of speech. A symbol should never be above human rights and our American rights to distasteful and unpopular speech. Instead we try to become more like Cuba and (former) Iraq. Many veterans feel the same way.
Senator John H. Chafee (R-RI) in a 1999 statement for the Senate Judiciary Committee said, "In its more than 200 years, the Constitution has been amended only 27 times -- one time was acknowledged a mistake, and repealed. The amendments have reaffirmed and expanded individual freedoms. This proposed Amendment would not expand the list of freedoms. This Amendment for the first time would limit individual freedom."
Of course what the Senate and House are really after is to get the hardcore Conservative base to come out to the polls since they have nothing else to go on for the Fall elections. Because obviously the two most pressing problems in America are not the Iraq war, health care, poverty, or global warming, but gay people in love and the handful of people who burned a flag last year. Sigh.
And speaking of global warming, I saw Al Gore's movie An Inconvenient Truth the other night and must say it was really good. My favorite fact: Out of 928 peer reviewed scientific journal articles, exactly ZERO denied that it was man-made. However in stories in the mass media, 53% made the claim that global warming is unproven. Yet again reporters, pundits and politicians pretend to know more than scientists. And the media is biased to the left? Yeah..... Just because some people believe that invisible little pink men in tights grab onto to objects and bring them down to the earth instead of gravity doesn't mean that it has to be mentioned in every news report to be "balanced". Sometimes truths are truths, which is what the movie tries to point out.
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