Thoughts of the Day (Week?)

Good question! Besides fighting blog burnout, we have passed the stomach virus around the family twice now. Sports schedules for kids never get better I guess, and then first thing you know they're gone. That's still a ways off for us, but boy is it going to be quiet. The HillGirl's principle asked if we wanted to think about her skipping a grade and I immediately said "No way!". We've only got her for six more years as it is - I'm not going to shorten that!

The kid's teams are losing, and now my Dallas Mavericks are losing. Woe is me! I blame the officials for the game two loss. I'm not a good loser. After a while it affects my outlook.

OTOH I'm reading Gibson's "Pattern Recognition." WOW. It is brain candy! I don't know what mainlining a drug is like, but I this is mental mainlining. I'm forcing myself to read just a little at a time so it will last longer. I just finished Orson Card's "Shadow of the Giant". Its a good series , but nothing like Gibson, or Neal Stephenson for that matter. It was a one day read. And speaking of good books, what is the matter with Robert Jordan? Why won't he finish the Wheel of Time Series? He's killing me. And don't even get me started on George R R Martin.

Ok, enough ranting. Just send me some more good books and I'll snap out of it.

Editors? Fact Checkers?

I was still in high school and my older brother was already out of college and working. He started a carpet cleaning business on the side. At the end of his first year of being an entrepreneur, he told me that he had made more money in his business that year than General Motors. It was true - GM lost money.

In a similar way, I , and most of you who blog, are clearly superior to the MSM in our reporting of the news and events about which we write. I have never fabricated a story. Even without editors, fact checkers and layers of review, I have remained honest. There really was a deer in my pool, and everything else I have written about.

A story which ran in the Boston Globe, however, about a baby seal hunt, was completely made up. How can this happen? They have procedures that they follow sometimes, but obviously not all the time, which is worth what? Not much, since we have no way of knowing whether the rules were followed on any particular story. A hint: the more anti-conservative, the greater chance it's false. Sheesh. Maybe they can have a little smiley face next to stories that are true, and a sad face next to the ones they don't really know about, since it was, like, too hard to check out. :)

The Dogs Who Ate The Sausage

Guess we should have shot and field dressed that deer in the swimming pool after all. Then we could have fed the dogs venison sausage instead of what would have been delicious Smokey Moe's sausage. Can't a man leave his meat on the table anymore? Now I remember why I said those dogs were going to live outside - how could it have slipped my mind? But the HillWife says no way, outside dogs are old school - these dogs belong in the house.

Ok, you decide! A 80 lb rottweiler and a 70 lb half rotty/half lab. Inside or out during the day? We keep them on the "living" side of the house during the day, and they sleep in the kids rooms at night. They've got about four acres inside their Invisible Fence perimeter, a combination of trees and clearings, and quite a lot of wild life around; deer, roadrunners, squirrels, bunnies, jack rabbits. And a swimming pool!

Let the vote begin!

Now We're Talking College Football Playoffs!

Sen. Jeff Wentworth, R-San Antonio has introduced a bill to spur the NCAA into setting up a Division I playoff system for football. If this bill was enacted in several key states, the effect would be a boycott by major universities unless a playoff were held. The networks would panic at not having top teams in bowl games and the NCAA would have to finally do the right thing. The networks, the college presidents, and the NCAA could all blame the state governments and every one would be happy!

Thought of the Day

Well I'm back to a little blogging. I will try to post something every day, but who knows. Maybe its partly that there isn't alot going on in the news, relatively speaking, or that things are going too well in the world, relatively speaking, but I not feeling the need for a soapbox too much. Of course that could change anytime.

On the Hill, I have found the idea of catching up and having more time to have been an illusion. Silly me. So of course I've added teaching a weekly Bible study on Philippians to my schedule. And somehow the book continues to languish. I'm in real trouble with summer coming on since I can't get anything done writing wise with my noisy and rambunctious kids around.

This weekend typifies the life here. HillGirl- first select basketball tournament Saturday and Sunday in East Austin. HillBoy - 10U baseball tournament in Cedar Park Saturday and Sunday.
Me - Leading Worship Team at church in Burnet Sunday morning. HillWife - supposed to be playing keyboard in worship band but will be trying to get both kids to respective tournaments on Sunday. Saturday is easy as we just split up. I should get to see one game of HillGirl's team Saturday night. But its a good life!

I've mentioned a new blog site before. It's still coming. :) We paid for a design and then wanted to do a few things to it. It took a few hours, then days for the HillWife to find software she liked to work on the site. Then she started finding lots of errors on it. She is a real pro - and old school. This is a woman nominated for the Design of the Year award for PC Magazine for her 12 mhz 386 computer at Compaq. Guess the year on that! So she has spent a few hours, spread over several days going throught he code, fixing stuff, and incidentally learning PHP as she goes. I hope to announce the site next week. Cross fingers. Its not like its supergreat or anything, but I just had so much trouble with Blopspot I had to do something.

News Flash! I'm going to start another blog. I don't know if I'll link to it from here or not. But it will be strictly Christian stuff there. I might be completely anonymous. One ramification is that I'm dropping the Anselm thing on this site, or at least on the new site, I mean the new Hill Country Views site. I get confused about who I am. Just kidding. I think. Ok its getting late, I'm really rambling now. Out. Courage. What's the frequency Kenneth?

Texas Bloggers Unite

Just when it looked like common sense would prevail, the bill that would keep local governments in Texas from setting up community wireless networks slipped back in as an amendment to other legislation. I'm a pro-business guy, but this is plain bought and paid for politics aimed at limiting competition to telecoms. Check out the series of articles by Bill Gurley at Above the Crowd for details and get the word out - we don't need the legislature taking power from the local governments to protect big business.

The Run Down

I haven't read any blogs for a week. Nice break. But now as I prepare to resume my own blogging, I'm catching up with some of you. Here are some good posts I've read today:

From the Rantin' Raven some comments about Sandy Burgerler and one of my own favs, Jerry Pournelle.

How do we know this story at GOPInsight.com is true and not an urban myth? If its true, then whether you're liberal or conservative or in between, you've got to think this is wrong, don't you? But without sourcing ... isn't that what the net is supposed to do for us?

Not sure what to make of Master of My Domain's take on global warming and airplanes, and pollution, but it sounds like something right out of Michael Crighton's "State of Fear".

An excellent post on the tragedy of Zimbabwe and Africa in general by someone with first hand experience. It seems that Tom Carter has been everywhere.

Facing the Inevitable

I'm going to have to take a week or so off from blogging. Not that I've done much the last couple of weeks. Too many irons in the fire. Perhaps I can get caught up on everything (laugh) and organized (LOL,ROTF) . So anyway, check back next week and see if I'm alive. Of course if I really get hot about something I may have to do a post or two even while I'm on hiatus.