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three_weeks_for_dw kicked off yesterday! W00t! And I see a lot of contests and stuff already! ... Too bad I don't have anything to contribute. (But if you have any ideas, please don't hesitate to let me know.)
1a. There are, however, some contests I'm sponsoring over indwrocks, so at least there's that. Not much response yet, but one can hope.
2. Had niece and nephew over for the weekend. That was fun. Playing with the kids is just the best.
3. Got some house guests staying over with us. Old family friends. Hoping I get along with them better than I did with last week's old family friend house guest. Don't think that should be a problem, though.
4. Guests at the Ritz-Carlton in Naples, FL allegedly asked the hotel not to be served by anyone with dark skin and/or a foreign accent. And, according to a lawsuit filed by a Haitian employee, the Ritz complied. By telling him his services wouldn't be required for the day. The couple who are said to have made the request are British. Does that mean they have "foreign accents"? Or does that mean that everyone in the hotel who speaks American English has a "foreign accent"?
5. A strip club in Detroit hired a 14-year-old topless dancer. They claim they thought she was of legal age. Apparently, they also thought she had a valid dancing license, which is required by local law. I don't even know what to say to that.
6. Dude! The next James Bond video game looks awesome! ... Wait, what do you mean that's not a video game trailer? That's a CGI demo for an actual product? Being made in Russia, you say? So is there a reason that the fighter jets shown in the video appear to be FA-18 Hornets? Because that's a US design, you know. I kind of thought we were past this stage in US/Russian relations. Also, I wonder how many of those things Blackwater will be ordering.
7. A tweet from the geek arm of the US government. I so love that we have one of those now.
8. Did you hear about those pro-tax protesters in Illinois? See? I'm not the only one who has voted to raise his own taxes.
8a. We could use more of that spirit here in New Jersey, actually, where state funding for libraries has been slashed by 3/4. Though there's definitely something to be said for thousands of students protesting the similar slashing of the public school funding. I know, money's tight. And states can't just dive into deficit spending like the federal government. Which is a good thing. But this kind of severe slashing of such vital community resources? It's education. If it's not too cliche, it's our children's future. Our future. Our high school and our public library are the two things in this town I'm most proud of. The actual numbers are even worse than the Democrats' web site set up for the purpose said they'd be. And we're stuck with this guy. Why did he get voted in? And, worse, what will he do to the health care insurance consumer protections we've got in place? He said during the campaign that he was in favor of deregulation. The relatively weak reforms passed on the federal level don't even kick in for another few years.
9. A Utah death row inmate has opted to be executed by firing squad. It's a rarely-used option which was finally taken off the books. In 2005. Go Utah. But the conviction occurred before 2005, so he still gets to make the choice.
10. It's oak pollen season here. I'm highly allergic, a fact we discovered only after moving into a house surrounded by oak trees and literally around the corner from the town's biggest park. It's also been raining a lot. So there's lots of humidity in the air, too. Walking across the room pretty much leaves me out of breath.
11. Speaking of breathtaking... I'll end on a positive note. In honor of the Hubble Telescope's 20th anniversary (Holy crap, the Hubble is 20 years old! How'd that happen??), NASA released this image. It's a vast nebula (the pillar shown is reportedly three light-years tall) wherein stars are being born.
three_weeks_for_dw kicked off yesterday! W00t! And I see a lot of contests and stuff already! ... Too bad I don't have anything to contribute. (But if you have any ideas, please don't hesitate to let me know.) 1a. There are, however, some contests I'm sponsoring over in
dwrocks, so at least there's that. Not much response yet, but one can hope.2. Had niece and nephew over for the weekend. That was fun. Playing with the kids is just the best.
3. Got some house guests staying over with us. Old family friends. Hoping I get along with them better than I did with last week's old family friend house guest. Don't think that should be a problem, though.
4. Guests at the Ritz-Carlton in Naples, FL allegedly asked the hotel not to be served by anyone with dark skin and/or a foreign accent. And, according to a lawsuit filed by a Haitian employee, the Ritz complied. By telling him his services wouldn't be required for the day. The couple who are said to have made the request are British. Does that mean they have "foreign accents"? Or does that mean that everyone in the hotel who speaks American English has a "foreign accent"?
5. A strip club in Detroit hired a 14-year-old topless dancer. They claim they thought she was of legal age. Apparently, they also thought she had a valid dancing license, which is required by local law. I don't even know what to say to that.
6. Dude! The next James Bond video game looks awesome! ... Wait, what do you mean that's not a video game trailer? That's a CGI demo for an actual product? Being made in Russia, you say? So is there a reason that the fighter jets shown in the video appear to be FA-18 Hornets? Because that's a US design, you know. I kind of thought we were past this stage in US/Russian relations. Also, I wonder how many of those things Blackwater will be ordering.
7. A tweet from the geek arm of the US government. I so love that we have one of those now.
8. Did you hear about those pro-tax protesters in Illinois? See? I'm not the only one who has voted to raise his own taxes.
8a. We could use more of that spirit here in New Jersey, actually, where state funding for libraries has been slashed by 3/4. Though there's definitely something to be said for thousands of students protesting the similar slashing of the public school funding. I know, money's tight. And states can't just dive into deficit spending like the federal government. Which is a good thing. But this kind of severe slashing of such vital community resources? It's education. If it's not too cliche, it's our children's future. Our future. Our high school and our public library are the two things in this town I'm most proud of. The actual numbers are even worse than the Democrats' web site set up for the purpose said they'd be. And we're stuck with this guy. Why did he get voted in? And, worse, what will he do to the health care insurance consumer protections we've got in place? He said during the campaign that he was in favor of deregulation. The relatively weak reforms passed on the federal level don't even kick in for another few years.
9. A Utah death row inmate has opted to be executed by firing squad. It's a rarely-used option which was finally taken off the books. In 2005. Go Utah. But the conviction occurred before 2005, so he still gets to make the choice.
10. It's oak pollen season here. I'm highly allergic, a fact we discovered only after moving into a house surrounded by oak trees and literally around the corner from the town's biggest park. It's also been raining a lot. So there's lots of humidity in the air, too. Walking across the room pretty much leaves me out of breath.
11. Speaking of breathtaking... I'll end on a positive note. In honor of the Hubble Telescope's 20th anniversary (Holy crap, the Hubble is 20 years old! How'd that happen??), NASA released this image. It's a vast nebula (the pillar shown is reportedly three light-years tall) wherein stars are being born.
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Are the colours real, or is this photo recoloured?
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