Saturday, I went to the Orioles v Angels game. Here are some of the shots I got:

This month’s Linux Format Magazine had Linux Mint as one of the Linux distros on the DVD.  I’ve been hearing a lot of people talk about this Ubuntu-based distro.  So Mint is based on Ubuntu which is based on Debian.  Why not just base Linux Mint off of Debian?  Ok, so given that it’s based off of Ubuntu and Ubuntu is becoming synonymous with Linux because it’s so easy to use, why would you want to use Linux Mint?  I check out tout the Linux Mint About Page and I’ll sum it up here.  Basically they appear to be focused on making things even MORE user-friendly than Ubuntu.  It appears that they intend to do this in in two ways - by having the media codecs and firmware available and by having some better user interfaces.

Back in May I reviewed Puppy Linux along with a bunch of other lightweight Linux distros. This month Linux Format Magazine included Puppy Linux 4.0 on their disc and I thought I’d check it out. I’m mainly focusing on how things have changed and improved or gotten worse since Puppy 3.01. I burned the disc and put it into my test rig computer.

The first time it Kernel Panicked. So I told it to go completely in RAM like last time. Then it had some kind of “bread failed” kernel error and paused for 60 seconds. It tried to use UnionFS and kernel panicked again. I gave it one more shot with loading completely into RAM and ACPI off since that can sometimes wreak havok with Linux. It finally worked! Interestingly, when I rebooted, I had a hard time making that work again. Sounds like something the Puppy devs need to fix. However, I guess it could be something wrong with my burned CD.

I am now done with the entire story of the hobbits.  Overall, I have enjoyed the books more than the movie.  Here’s what I have to say about The Return of the King:

I found the characters in the book seem a lot more hopeless than in the movie.  I mean, the movie does a good job of showing the despair of the city Minis Tirith, but the book really shows it much better.  I found myself at times forgetting that I already knew the ending and that most of the characters would be fine.  Speaking of already knowing the story, I kept waiting for the part where Gollum tricks Frodo into thinking that The Fat Hobbit has eaten the bread.  It’s not in the books - they added that for the movie.

Wrote this over the course of a few days as a creative exercise.

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“¡Carajo Coño!”  he muttered under his breath as he ran.  His wife had just started to get into the mood when the call had come in.  It was on the mobile that he never turned off, not even during moments of planned intimacy.  He’d had no choice but to answer and, despite her threats of finding electromechanical means of satisfaction, he was forced to bolt out the door.  “¡Coño!” he wagered to utter a little louder, he had left so quickly he only had the small pistol that was always in his right pocket.  He hoped it wouldn’t matter.

Today I consider whether or not TV Stations as a distinct programming lineup have become obsolete.  More or less since the beginning of commercial television there have been TV Stations to tune in to.  (eg ABC, HBO, TNT)  These stations create and broadcast original programming or buy the rights to broadcast programming created by others so that I can pick it up on my television.  Every year they decide which television shows will play throughout the day for the next year.  This show should play on Thursday at 2000 because that’s when such and such an age group will be watching.  That show should be on at Monday at 2100 because otherwise it might have to compete with a show from another network.  Some shows have nearly literally lived and died based on the timeslot they were shown in.  Sometimes shows are moved around to follow other shows to benefit from the inertia of the viewers of the previous show to carry this one until it either proves itself or fails.

A lot of websites have funny page-not-found (404) and maintenance pages. I got a good chuckle out of Plurk’s maintenance page.

[caption id=“attachment_1387” align=“aligncenter” width=“300” caption=“Plurk Maintenance Page”] [/caption]

I finished up The Two Towers a week or so ago and I have to say that “Trudging” no longer describes my experience (for the most part). While I preferred the first movie to the first book, I mostly feel exactly the opposite about the second book/movie. The only annoying thing was that we didn’t get to Frodo and Samwise until page 208 of a 352 page book. I can’t remember exactly, but I think the movie goes back and forth a lot more instead of doing like the book and telling each person’s day and then backing up to tell the next person’s day (if the party has been separated).

There’s been a lot of news for the past 3-6 months about the new FISA bill and how it provides immunity for the telecommunications companies.  A lot of people including the Electronic Frontier Foundation are opposed to this provision of the bill (if not bill in its entirety) because they say the telcos have acted illegally by assisting the Executive Branch with their warrentless wiretapping of phone calls.  The reason they argue this is illegal is that the original FISA bill, as written in the 1970s (and ammended throughout the years) requires a warrant for all wiretapping of US Persons.  That includes foreigners who are physically in the United States.   As the New York Times revealed in 2005, the Bush Administration started acting against this law in 2001 because of opinions written by some radicals in the Justice Department (such as Yoo).