Smoking.

You gotta know it's tempting to just tell the story, but there's a problem, I don't remember most of it. I was heavily sedated much of the time and am rapidly forgetting the rest of it.

Now a bit of advice. If you smoke, consider stopping before you have to get surgery to clean up the mess it creates. I am now an ex-smoker. I want to say that in public. Of course I still really want to smoke.

I figured something out in the hospital. I'm the kind of person who likes to solve problems by smoking. How do I know this? Because every time my mind encounters a problem it says "OK, I'll just have a cigarette then." I bet a lot of other cigarette smokers deal with problems the same way. Now that I don't smoke, I still have the idea that smoking will help me deal with problems. It's funny, one part of my brain has figured out that this is wrong (in fact smoking causes more problems than it solves) but a deeper part of my brain still believes it. This leads to some funny arguments inside my brain. But so far so good. I got to go through the worst of the withdrawal in a hospital where there was no possibility of smoking, and now the craving seems manageable. No doubt other people have smoking stories to tell. I was one of the lucky ones, I survived to tell my story. So far so good.

[Scripting News]

My father died because of smoking. It was very sad. I used to smoke, but, strangely, was never addicted. I could quit cold turkey any day. Even now I smoke a cigarette once in a while (less than once a year, the last one was on 9/11) and don't need it anymore. I hope Dave gets well, and is able to keep working, for many, many, many years... I've a selfish reason... I like his software...

1:25:54 PM  What do you think? ( Thoughts) Who linked? []   

When the light turned green, the car ahead of me just sat there. I gave it a good five seconds (i.e., 2 seconds) and then blasted my horn. "What did you do that for?" asked my wife. "The light is still red."

So it was. I hadn't noticed the righthand turn light.

So, how do I apologize to the driver ahead of me? We lack a gesture by which we beg forgiveness. I propose the following:

Use it often. [JOHO the Blog]
10:22:36 AM  What do you think? ( Thoughts) Who linked? []   

This is the image we will remember of this World Cup. Players and trainers of the real powers of football being eliminated by corrupted referees. They'll say it was mistakes, but we will know better.

Amazingly enough I have been reading FIFA wrong. I was accusing Blatter of the cheating. Blatter will actually side with Europe in the strongest protest there will be against FIFA. The person responsible for the referees is Blatter enemy Zen-Ruffinen, with his co conspirator Codesal. This information comes from my anonynous source, presumably inside FIFA, who still insists Korea won't be in the final. We shall see. There will be a big revolt in Europe, including threats to separate UEFA from FIFA. What would you watch an European Cup Championship or a World Cup without Europe? Will the brazilians and argentinians join the protest, leaving FIFA without stars?

If Germany is eliminated it will threatened to stop support for Blatter, unless he sides with Europe. A united Europe will dominate FIFA completely leaving little chance for the small countries to receive favors.

The first thing that will happen is that the refereeing will improve, leaving out referees from countries without strong football tradition. The professionalization of referees will be emphasized, as has been done in Italy

Expect the ugliest consecuences of The Dirty World Cup.
7:24:56 AM Google It! What do you think? ( Thoughts) Who linked? []   

[From El Pais]

Corea está en semifinales gracias a Gamal Ghandour, como antes estuvo en cuartos de final gracias al ecuatoriano Byron Moreno. La historia se repite y los organizadores vuelven a ser favorecidos por los árbitros.

FIFA is thinking of suspending Ronaldinho for two games! Are they really going to favor Korea until they are World Champions? Who would believe that a team that has done nothing in previous World Cups can use Home Advantage to lift the cup? What a farce. Bold Prediction: mark my words Korea performance in 2006, would make France performance in 2002 look good. This is the Dirty World Cup.
7:00:43 AM  What do you think? ( Thoughts) Who linked? []   

Hackers could phreak voice calls using Wi-Fi LANs.. So clueless it's funny. [Hack the Planet]

I don't find it so funny. I waste a lot of time with people that read these articles and then start worrying about this nonsense. The worst part is how hard it is for me to make them worry about the really dangerous stuff...shit!.
5:39:30 AM  What do you think? ( Thoughts) Who linked? []