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Sunday, October 12, 2003 |
I got a call from my Dad yesterday and didn't have a chance to respond to his voice mail. So I called him today. Mom answered and put Dad on the phone. It seems that he's scheduled for yet another back surgery in November. This will make three since we've moved here to Colorado, and he's had at least a couple of surgeries previous to that.
Apparently he's broken one of the titanium rods that was inserted in one of the previous surgeries. (Yes you read correctly he broke a titanium rod. My dad's amazing feats also include never having pitched an inning of Major League Baseball and yet has had Tommy John Surgery. Go figure) So my folks are off to Chicago for the months of November and December for this ordeal. Dr. Michael Shaffer (sp) the Back and Dr. for both the Cubs and Bears will be doing the surgery. It's a small world as he is the one who performed my mom's back surgery in 1986.
Other than the fact that my Dad is 83 and all of the hazzards and dangers associated with back surgery in general and then to add his age on to it makes it difficult. Also they are needing a place to stay for two months while my dad has surgery and then for the six weeks of recooperation. Hopefully we'll find something in the North Suburbs, Northbrook, Glenview, Wilmette or near public transportation, Chicago and Northwestern, or the "L." If you know of anything or anyone contact me here.
1:44:30 PM  |
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Homeland Security folks with way to much time on their hands.
Dan Hughes sez,
This just hit the wire about
my brother, who works *for* Homeland Security, and his fiancée who was
incarcerated on Yom Kippur last week *by* Homeland Security. The story broke on
the front page this morning.
Beate (Bay - ah - tah), Trevor's fiancée, was returning to the US from Germany.
She had interviewed with career diplomats at the American Embassy just weeks
before and was granted a 6-month visa. Nevertheless, when she landed in Atlanta
she was interrogated for six hours, led away in handcuffs with criminals,
booked into the Atlanta prison system (finger prints, mug shots and a group
cell) and the next day was placed in solitary confinement in a white room with
nothing save a toilet. She was left without food for 20+ hours and finally
deported to Germany. The whole time being told that she was not a criminal, nor
suspected of any crime!
Link
(Thanks, Dan!) [Boing Boing]
11:28:51 AM |
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10:32:59 AM |
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10:29:16 AM |
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If you want to know what's really going on, check with the kids.
...is going trick or treating as a telemarketer.
She says that since they're not allowed to call anyone at home any more, she's got no choice but to go door to door.
Miller is 12. [ Seth's Blog]
9:40:02 AM |
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I followed a link today and found an amusing story about a bar in Hamburg Germany that offers "Daycare for Men." For about $12 a woman can drop her man off at the bar while she goes shopping in central Hamburg. For the $12 the man gets two beers and a meal while hanging out with other men. They're planning home improvement workshops and miniature car races.
What a brilliant idea! With the proper sense of humor the concept of a enjoyable waiting experience for men cast as a daycare center could be a real winner. A lot has been written about the relationship between the length of time a shopper is in a store and the amount of money they spend. The longer someone is in a store the more they spend (theoretically.) Without an eager to leave man steering her towards the door a woman is likely to relax and shop awhile.
Chairs are a basic. So many stores fail to offer or fail to offer them in the right places. Men don't want to wait at the front of the store by the checkouts. That just reminds them that they should be leaving. Men want to sit in or near the section where their significant other is shopping. This is obvious. The women might have a question or want an opinion on something she's considering. The Man Lounge should be in the center of the store or near the fitting rooms if relevant. Step one is the chair. Step two is the occupation of the male mind. At worst a few man-gazines. These shouldn't be lad magazines like Maxim or FHM but they should be magazines that men might be interested in. (i.e. Popular Science, Fast Company, Golf Digest, etc.) Just because you're a woman's clothing store don't think you should stock the man lounge with Good Housekeeping, Cosmo, or other woman focused magazines. Women are shopping in your store not sitting and waiting. Better than magazines how about a television with sports or financial programming. On a given Sunday a leading cause of man hurry is getting home to watch the game or the race.
Well duh!
[ Thinking]
9:35:38 AM |
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This looks cool and a progress of the technology. I've not had enough coffee to figure it out yet though.
Here it is a new online service in English (and also in French) based in France:
blog2mobile (beta 1.0). Just click on the UK flag for a version in English. With this tool, you can create an account (login/password) and read any RSS feed via a mobile phone or a PDA connected to the Internet. This tool is also Wap and Imode compatible.
See the FAQ there. [ Smart Mobs]
9:25:38 AM |
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I'm a visual guy and this is a great visual.
In the days of plastic money, it can be easy to forget just how large certain sums of money are, so this page will help you get a feel for just how big $87 billion is. $87 billion is the amount of money that Dubya wants to the US taxpayers to pay towards rebuilding Iraq.
It goes on to show you how big $166 billion is, which is the total amount of money spent in Iraq and Afghanistan by this time next year. That's $568 for every man, woman and child in the US, or nearly $28 (£17) for every person in the world as a whole.
With the whole pullava about the lack of WMDs (other than that vial of Botox, nothing), the number of troops and civilians killed and now this, I'm really starting to think that this war was a very, very bad idea. Think what kind of state-run healthcare system you could set up in America with that kind of money. [ Neil's World]
9:17:10 AM |
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