I have decided to move all the noisier things (about sports and other trivialities -- what Noam Chomsky would call the real opiates of the people) to another blog, namely So Much Depends... and I'll keep this one for "more important" (at least more important-looking) issues.
Also, now that google has assimilated blogger, I'm going to try the e-mail posting route again -- there used to be a several-days' turnaround between things I e-mailed and having them show up. Quite unacceptable.
Some of the issues that have concerned me most, in my 24-time-zone village.:
- Turkmenistan's self-absorbed "Father of the Turkmen", who spent insane amounts of money erecting gold-covered monuments to himself passed on over Christmas, and for just a moment or two, I hoped the Turkmen would get a more sensible leader. Imagine my dismay when I read that the new leader said he would continue the policies that had resulted in so much more greatness for Turkmenistan under his wonderful forebear.
- DOJ v. Microsoft is being replayed in Iowa courts these days (groklaw, as usual, is covering it...), among other things, once again covering "Embrace, Extend, Extinguish" and other such joys.
- My youngest niece and nephew are about to turn two. She lives twenty minutes drive away, he eight time zones. Elly has been a careful, cautious person with her affections, taking some time even to accept her siblings' affection. I think she finally likes me. Nothing is so precious, on a personal level, as the confidence of the smallest that you are a safe person to be with -- nothing in human relations deserves such careful guarding and preservation.
- I sincerely hope that Ethiopian military adventurism is conducted, over the long haul, in a saner fashion and with more peaceful, stable outcomes than that of other countries. Oh, let there be peace in Somalia, no more warlords, no more blackhawks, no more political strife outside the ballot box and legislative chamber...
