Twitter

Well, I succumbed to the twitter thing. Again. I'm not really sure why because I don't really need yet another social network, but we'll see. My big problem is that right now there aren't a ton of people I know on twitter. So if any of you are considering dabbling in social networking, give twitter a try. It's not terribly intense like Facebook or MySpace, but it's still sort of cool. Plus you can be among the group of people that knew within SECONDS of Lance Armstrong's latest crash that he had a broken collar bone but otherwise was fine. Which is kind of cool.

So if you try twitter and want to "follow" me, I'm "djb_rh". Look me up. I'm in the book.

I can't help it, but more politics.

No, I wasn't going to "pile on" with the rest of the Republicans with the news that Obama's current budget proposal would send the deficit spiraling toward four times what the GW Bush administration sent it to, but then I read another article on the same news page. It made me cringe. Do these people even know what they're really going out canvassing for??? I think I just threw up a little bit in my mouth.

How do you do this?

Facebook has something on the order of 100 million users. 100 million. Now, I do question how it can ultimately make much money, but with 100 million users and advertising on each page, it's definitely making a few bucks. So why in the devil would they roll out a new home page for users that's so, err, stupid? What do I mean? Well, for those of you who aren't Facebook users, let me explain one major thing. The whole point is your "status update." You type in what you're doing if you want your friends to know about it, and they see it. For example, the top of my home page used to say "Donnie" and had a text entry box after that. Anything I typed appeared as my status. So if I typed "is going to play basketball", the thing everyone sees is "Donnie Barnes is going to play basketball." Simple. Now what do you have? This:

Now, the problem here is the question. "What's on your mind?" Well, one could be confused into thinking that you should now just type what's on your mind. Like "I'm craving pancakes." But if you do that, what everyone sees becomes "Donnie Barnes I'm craving pancakes." That's right, the action is the same as before, but the labeling has changed. So now people think the action may have changed to, so until people get the hang of it, you see a lot of status updates that aren't grammatically correct nor even close.

What I don't get is how someone running a site with 100 million users couldn't see this coming as a bad thing?

Go to jail part two!

So Bernie Madoff hosed investors out of as much as $65B. That's sixty-five billion dollars. He did it over more than twenty years, and his marriage pre-dates that time. In fact, he and Ruth have been married over fifty years now, which means everything he's done successfully in life is half hers. What I want to know is why her liability, at least financially, is any different? But let's revisit that.

First is the question of jail time. I honestly have no idea if she should be in jail, too. We may never know, because one thing you can respect Madoff for is that he's trying to take the entire fall for this thing himself. That's where the respect ends, obviously, but hey, it's something. But we don't know if she knew anything. If not, fine. It's definitely possible that she didn't. People in her world can make that kind of money legitimately over that kind of time. I get that.

But here's my rub. She and him built a life together. It sounds like she wasn't a "working" wife, but who cares? If they were to divorce (before all this happened), she'd have gotten a big old settlement that kept her insanely wealthy forever. Why? Because they built it together. In many states, it's half. And with good reason. I'm not going to question that. But now that we know he robbed all those people of more money than he (and her) are currently worth, why is she entitled to anything? To me, if your joint fortune is built together illegally, even if one party has no idea, well, that party with no idea is just another victim. Want part of the pie? Get in line with everyone else who got robbed and take your fair share just like they will. I'm pretty sure that fair share isn't $69M. Unless, of course, it's proven that you DID know what was going on. Then go directly to jail, do not collect $200.

Holy Smokes!

So this woman embezzled $10M over six years. She was the bookkeeper for a large cabinet making company, and her husband was a cabinet installer. What did she spend the money on? Shoes, clothes, purses, and remodeling a bathroom into a walk-in closet to hold all her loot that was complete with a big TV, among other things. She did it simply by paying her personal bills with company funds! So she obviously wasn't the sharpest knife in the drawer.

And now that it's been uncovered and she's busted, supposedly her husband is "not suspected in any crime." Say what? A bookkeeper and cabinet installer are living large on ten million spare dollars over six years and he had no idea something might be fishy? He can't be considered, oh, an accomplice? Or at least an accessory? No, not a purse, a criminal accessory. Seriously? Sounds like a district attorney needs a spine here. Or some education. Or something. But this guy should go to jail and should most definitely NOT collect $200.

It's true, we're spoiled.

Okay, I got this via email and it started out "you know I NEVER forward stuff, but..." and so what the heck, I checked it out. Glad I did. It's a good "perspective changer" that I think a lot of us need, myself included. Check it out (and thanks, Michelle!).

Don't you blow in that dog's face!

Hanging out at Alan and Jane's house the other night and playing with their lab, Kiwi, reminded me of a story. My Dad is gonna hate me for this, but we've told it plenty of times already, so here goes...

A good many years ago now, my Dad bought my Stepmom a miniature schnauzer named Truman. He's pictured here. He was one of the coolest dogs ever, but died a few years ago. He lived a full and happy life. We all miss that one.

He was a puppy was when I was still in high school. I used to do crazy and annoying things when playing with him, like putting one end of one of his toys in my mouth and letting him get ahold of it. We'd then play tug of war. Yeah, gross. Anyway, another thing I would do was to blow in his face. Just a quick puff. He's snap at you. I was pretty quick, though, and he never got me. But for some reason, Dad hated me doing that. Any time I did it with him around he'd yell at me..."stop that, don't blow in that dog's face, he's gonna bite you!" And if I didn't listen I'd get in trouble. But I'd do it occasionally anyway and he'd admonish me.

Our living room couch was very long. It was the couch that got me addicted to long couches, in fact. I could lay down on it in between the armrests fully stretched out comfortably. And so could Dad. That particular couch was also somewhat low.

One day my Stepmom and I were both in the living room and Dad was laying on the couch. On his stomach. With his head turned out to the room. Truman came into the room and around the corner of the couch. For reasons we've never quite determined, a very odd thing happened. As Truman went by Dad's face, Dad blew. A nice little puff. Problem is, when you're laying like this, well, you have no real recourse to move quickly. And Truman snapped. And Dad couldn't move. So Truman bit him with those tiny sharp puppy teeth...RIGHT ON THE NOSE. Dad let out a pretty good yelp, Truman bounded backwards, and Cathie and I absolutely lost it. Yes, my Dad can have a bit of a temper, but this was too much. We were both in tears laughing. Dad was in tears of both pain and embarrassment. I think we must have laughed for a full minute. As we got our breath, Cathie couldn't help it...she just said "Ronnie, you shouldn't blow in that dog's face." And we lost it again, though this time I could swear Dad smiled. Just a little.