I managed to send Little Elvis into an uproar yesterday by downloading a bunch of TV shows from iTunes. When you have little or no hard disk space, the last thing you need is too much new data. Fortunately at some point I remembered the raw podcast files, and cleaned up five—count ‘em, 5—gigs of space, and the problem was solved. A new Airport base station arrived yesterday, adding another joy to the electronic life of the chez, but I didn’t install it yet. I need to extend the network to the upper forty; it seems a simple enough deal according to the Mac support docs, add to which the ease of doing, well, almost anything on the Mac versus doing that same thing on the PC. Of course, maybe everything is peaches and cream on the PC side now that Vista is out there. (That’s meant to be a humorous statement, if you were wondering.)
Things are pretty quiet on the forensics front, of course. NatNats is over, although I gather a few coaches stayed behind to actually enjoy Las Vegas without the handicap of minors transported across state lines distracting them from the city’s main attractions. I admit I enjoy Las Vegas for the gestalt of the place, which can pretty much fill your brain for three or four days before you even realize it. I like to gamble, but I don’t, much, because aside from statistical deviation, you are guaranteed to lose your money, which is not all that much fun. And on a more level playing field, so to speak, I’m not a good enough poker player to attempt it against strangers (although I’m intrigued by the idea of a backroom game some day against JV and maybe a few other sly dogs). I do like shows, however, where the spectacle outweighs the content (i.e., 17 different iterations of Cirque de Soleil). And who doesn’t want to get beamed aboard the Enterprise? And there’s plenty of good restaurants, unlike the olden days where it was all $1.99 buffets featuring all the filet mignon you could eat (most of which tasted as if you had gotten it from a $1.99 buffet, if you could get to it after pushing all the senior citizens out of the way, which isn’t easy because those walkers give them an extra purchase on their chosen turf). The first time I went to Las Vegas was in the 50s, so I’ve seen it change many, many times. And vice versa. Anyhow, as soon as they announce a debate tournament there for coaches only, I’ll be the first one to sign up.
I have been chiseling away at the Hillary Duff. Some of it was in better shape than other parts of it. I’ve also got some other projects I’m working on of a non-debate nature, so the evenings are filling up pretty quickly. Summer is always so short. I mean, it’s already practically over. The 4th of July is next week. That’s about half of it. And then, well, it’s September. Whew. That was fast. Damn. I didn’t get half of the things done that I needed to do. On the plus side, all that time elapsing so quickly means that there’s that much less time remaining in the Bush presidency. So, there’s a positive side to everything.
This whole Zimbabwe story, while sad, is fascinating. It’s got everything: freedom, tyranny, racism, globalism, violence. The Policians have studied Africa at great length, which is something we haven’t done in LD (or in Pffft, at least on topics I recall, but my experience there is more limited). I fed (feeded?) a story yesterday demonstrating growth of nations, and I was listening last night to an interview with Fareed Zakaria, author of The Post-American World. We see growth on the globe everywhere but Africa. Why is this? Why has this one continent missed out on so much? It is, as I say, fascinating, but also sad. And I don’t see any big change coming in the short term. Or, for that matter, the long term. Maybe the growth of China, and their need for resources, will ultimately make the difference. I have no idea.
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