Listics

Jess at hüdwnkdnoted this week that in the field of cake baking her asshat/talent ratio is high enough that if she was rude to you a slice of her cake would make you forget.

Is there anybody out there to whom I owe cake this month?

Joy goes on trial July 9th for her participation in this demonstration of conscience. Joy says, “Seven of us were arrested in the Hart Senate Office Building one hour after the Senate voted to give Bush $100 billion in supplemental funding to continue the war. We will use the trial as another opportunity to speak out against the war.”

There is a party in Madison on the 7th, a send-off celebration before Joy goes on trial.

Technorati Tags: first joy, Joy First, how many more must die, arrest cheney, arrest bush, arrest feinstein, illegal war without end

Daylight come and me wanna go home.
I bought my first Palm Pilot many years ago. It’s in the bottom of an old briefcase somewhere, useless, with a battery that’s probably corroded. I know it’s not charged. Power handling turned me off from the unit when the unit turned off for me. I mean, when that particular model was in its cradle, it drew power. Dead batteries became a way of life. Rechargeables could be used of course, but the unit didn’t have a recharging option. It was poorly conceived, and quickly replaced in the company’s product line by a better model. I didn’t upgrade. I waited for the best to arrive.

Well, the best ain’t coming. This whole Apple iPhone hoot got me thinking. Apple of course is the little tech company that sells underpowered and overpriced consumer grade computers to a dwindling market of rabidly sectarian users, a market largely comprising students and educators and the advertising industry. The “first one’s free” schoolyard marketing model helped the company develop market share through the early days, and some combination of Bay Area chic, ease of use, and design appeal helped them hang onto that market share in the face of commodity pressure during the Wintel years. Now that Vista is signaling the end of Microsoft as we knew it, it’s anybody’s guess whether Apple will flexibly adapt to a new market or snap in the winds of change.

Clearly the iPhone will require some nurturing and some deep pockets if it’s to become a viable product. AT&T has deep pockets, but they aren’t my cell phone service provider.

I had heard about the iPhone for months of course. Apple is great at generating buzz. I heard that it had the power of 14 remote control units in one tiny module. I heard that it would replace every handheld in your life… your iPod, your phone, your PDA. I heard that it would be the best thing since the Magic Bullet. I heard that there were battery issues that make the iPhone more of an upscale toy like an iPod than a useful tool like PDA/cellphone combo.

I looked at tha specs for the Apple iPhone. I looked at the specs for the Palm Treo755P.

I bought the Treo. With rebates it cost me about half what the iPhone costs, and I renegotiated the service plan to save some money there too. Then I went wild and bought about $175 worth of accessories (including a car charger, a nice Plantronics bluetooth headset and a 2GB memory card) for $135, and I still got out of there way cheaper than I would have with a new iPhone and an AT&T service plan.

Plus, the Treo has a nice useable qwerty keypad.

Technorati Tags: eat me ma bell, Treo 755p, Steve Jobs strikes out, is that an iPod in your pocket or a TV remote

A lot of what I write is voiced like it was spoken by my dear Aunt Hentic. That’s because I’m as simple as she is. Auntie waxes eloquent below in a comment about preparing brown bag lunches. But is that what it’s really about? I don’t know.

Last night I dreamed my boss was my dentist, and at the end of a recent visit she had neither floss nor toothbrush to send away with me. Instead, she gifted me with a half gallon container of upscale hair product. I hugged her in thanks but she was a little stand-offish. Hanging from her wall was a miracle of taxidermy, a stuffed five foot diamond back rattler. I looked at it and thought, “This is very symbolic.” It looked back at me.

When I woke up this morning I thought I might contrive a quick post about that dream. When I got to my desk I found email to the EGR list about a dog story. Coincidence? Perhaps.

Technorati Tags: snakeskins or sheepskins, gel for the combover, hard boiled yegg, snake eyes, synchronicity

It’s James Roberts’ birthday. Stop in and wish a him a good one. I did, and I found out about the new Gibson novel! Thanks jr!

Technorati Tags: jr, James Roberts, duly noded, pretty pictures, william gibson, spook country

I received a letter today from the Chairman of the Sociology Department at the University of Wisconsin. It said, among other things,

Dear Mr. Paynter:

On behalf of the Department of Sociology of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, I would like to offer an invitation as an Honorary Fellow in our department from July 1, 2007 through June 30, 2008.

…. The status of Honorary Fellow gives you access to university libraries as well as some other privileges.

More than shameless bragging here, this post is my expression of delight that I’ll be privileged to work at the university this year with some brilliant and principled people as I attempt first to understand the drivers that influence racial disparities in criminal justice administration and how these disparities affect us culturally and personally, and second how public policy formation may proceed to achieve dramatic changes for the better in the current situation. My purpose will be to share my deepening understanding more widely with the general public and to organize a modest movement for social change around that shared understanding.

(Friends will smile as well at the fact that I have been given a key to the gate in the JSTOR wall.)Wish me luck.

This from Jim Zellmer today…  strangely appropriate in the absence of Mandarin 1.0.

House of Mandarin

It’s been a year since she left us.  Here are the patches from her quilt.