Mike: So, does Limewire do torrents?
Me: I think they have some now, but not everything on Limewire is a torrent.
Mike: Will this really take three days?
Me: It shouldn’t.
Mike: [asks ten other questions about torrents]
Me: …You know, Google is your friend.
Mike: No, because I live with you, and Google is not my friend, Google is your bitch.

Hey… the man speaks the truth! :)

I tried eating a grapefruit for breakfast, only to realize: I don’t think I know how to eat grapefruit.

Today, the SCOTUS heard the oral arguments in the DC v. Heller case. (If you don’t know what DC v. Heller is, you’re living under a rock and/or didn’t come to my blog via the “guns” part!)

I am hesitant to make any predictions, considering the SCOTUS has - in all-too-recent memory - turned out cases like Kelo v. New London… but I still think things sound favorable.

That said, there was a lot of talk about “reasonable restrictions” - and the lawyer for our side didn’t exactly do us any favors on the topics of automatic firearms, licensing, or campus carry - so I’m thus concerned about the possibility of a side-step in the form of acknowledging the 2A’s reference to an individual right that can be “reasonably restricted.” 

Apparently we can expect a ruling by June at the latest. Here’s a link round-up with all the goodies you want/need about the case:

Transcript of today’s oral arguments (.PDF)
Audio/video feed of oral arguments, via C-Span (RealPlayer format)
Index of SCOTUSBlog’s Heller coverage
SCOTUSWiki entry on Heller, including summaries, links to amici, news coverage

This goes to the senate state affairs committee tomorrow:

House Bill No. 606

STATEMENT OF PURPOSE

This bill would prohibit the Idaho Transportation Department from
implementing the provisions of the federal Real ID Act of 2005. It
finds that the Real ID Act was passed without proper debate in the
US Congress, that the Act is an attempt to commandeer the political
machinery of the States and to require them to be agents of the
federal government. This is in violation of the principles of
federalism contained in the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution.

Real ID constitutes an unfunded federal mandate, and that Real ID’s
requirements will put the personal information of Idahoans at risk
to criminal identity theft. It also finds that 17 states passed
legislation against the Real ID Act in 2007, with seven of those
states passing statutory bans against implementing the Act. Idaho
passed a memorial last year, HJM 3, resolving not to comply with
Real ID. This bill would codify that resolution.

On January 10 of this year, the Department of Homeland Security
issued final regulations for implementation of the Real ID Act.
While the Department did reduce the cost of implementation
somewhat, they failed to fix the majority of problems and brushed
aside many of the states’ legitimate concerns. To date, the US
Congress has appropriated for the states less than 1% of the total
estimated cost of implementing Real ID. No federal money has been
appropriated to implement the on-going costs of Real ID.

In its regulations, the Department of Homeland Security offered
states an extension of the May 2008 statutory deadline until
December 2009. Idaho applied for, and received, that extension in
order to assess whether the state should comply with the law.
Because of the federal government’s repeated failure to fix or fund
the Real ID Act, it is time for Idaho to send a clear message to
Washington that the Real ID Act will not be implemented in its
current form in Idaho. This legislation will send that message,
while protecting the privacy of Idahoans and saving our state from
significant expenditures.

Huzzah!

Just checking in… sorry I’ve been MIA, we spent the better part of spring break in Californiastan, and since half the stuff I enjoy doing is illegal there, I didn’t have much to post. ;)

I’ll try to post something interesting tomorrow - which, incidentally, is the second-best holiday of the year. So by “try to post something interesting tomorrow” I really mean “try to post something coherent before I hit the Guinness.”

I got the wireless to work on Ubuntu, too!

Compiling is fun!

And since I’m posting about geekery again, I’ll just answer the “Why?” questions here:

The #1 reason I’m doing all this, with full knowledge OS X is Unix-based anyway, is… because I can. I kind of like doing things the “hard” way sometimes. I like knowing how to do things that most people don’t know how to do. I also am a strong supporter of open source, philosophically, as well as being a cheap bastard. :)

I like that OS X just works, straight out of the box. But, “just works” doesn’t give me the same satisfaction as having to manually make my wireless function. It’s fun!

Well, boys and girls, I finally did it. Yesterday I decided the day had come for my inevitable descent into Linux… This was largely prompted by Mike reformatting the iMac and installing Kubuntu. I’m the geek in this household, dammit, and I shall not be out-bashed.

So off I ran to pick up the external hard drive I’ve been putting off purchasing forever. Two hours later, I finally had it partitioned with an HFS+ sector for backing up OS X, plus two FAT32 sectors for shutting files around between OS X and Linux. (I would have preferred to avoid FAT32, but see that part where I said “two hours later”? I spent that two hours fighting with Kubuntu’s /etc/fstab file to make it write to a non-journalled HFS+ partition, but it refused. I finally got mad and settled for FAT32.)

That done, I backed up all my important OS X data, documents, and media, and booted from the OS X install disc. There, I created an HFS+ (journalled) partition for a fresh install of OS X, a HFS+ (non-journalled) partition for a shared area, and left a small free space to mess with Linux later. I then installed a fairly skeletal version of OS X.

After that, I booted from my Ubuntu 7.10 liveCD, and used it to partition the free space into a sector for Ubuntu and a small swap. I installed that without incident, and then installed rEFIt to give myself a nifty little boot menu. Then came the hard part: Convincing both OS X and Ubuntu to use the shared partition as their /home.

It actually went fairly well, though the tutorial I was following told me to use chpass to mod the UID on the Ubuntu user file to agree with the OS X user file, and bash didn’t recognize the command. Because I’d already edited Ubuntu’s /etc/fstab, I wound up with some “unable to locate /home” errors - I had to use the safe mode terminal to fix that. I eventually figured out how to usermod the file I was after, and it worked perfectly after that.

So, I am now dual-booting OS X and Ubuntu. They’re sharing that middle partition, which is awesome, and rEFIt is awesome, and still being able to play World of Warcraft without using WINE is awesome, and I am awesome because I didn’t have to bug my geek friends a single time to get it all set up.

The only major borkage I’ve experienced was with my email… reimporting them into OS X mail created a mess of epic proportions. I think everything is there, it’s just kind of all piled in one place. Not good.

That said, I’m planning on using OS X mail basically as an archive, and starting over fresh in Ubuntu. I had 700+ emails in my inbox at the time of reformatting, which made me want to cry. I do still need to answer some of those, though, so if I owe you an email… don’t give up. Yet. :)

March 17 = St. Patrick’s Day, when I simply must have corned beef and cabbage.

March 22 = Lent ends at sundown.

The problem?

For Lent, I gave up soda… fast food…  AND MEAT!

What kind of self-respecting Irishman has a vegetarian St. Paddy’s Day?!  At least I’m eating fish/seafood… There must be some kind of hearty chowder or cod dish I can make to redeem this travesty.

US Dollar Goes to Pot

A choice excerpt:

Second, it is essential that we peg our currency to some commodity that is universally recognized as valuable. Sure, gold or silver would work, but the fact is that precious metals are a little old school. After all, we’re running a 21st century economy here, not a pirate ship. We need a commodity that is sufficiently rare, and yet considered valuable by today’s sophisticated and educated citizenry. We suggest marijuana.

I LOL’ed at the pirate ship part!

Alright you wonderful band of miscreants… I know I just hit you all up to buy $125 lowers in support of Cavalry Arms, but it’s beg time for something else. :)

I’m participating in the American Cancer Society’s Relay for Life at UI on April 4th. I’m actually organizing a team from my work - the whole thing was prompted by the recent news one of our co-workers has been diagnosed with Lymphoma. Her prognosis is good, but I felt like the Relay was something we should do to show our support for her as well as the countless others we all know who have been affected by cancer.

Anyway, our team fundraising goal is $1400 - $100 for each employee. I think we can do way better than that as a team… But I know I can beat $100 as an individual. That’s obviously where y’all come in.

Now, when Kit fundraises for the Missoula Grizzly Dip for Special Olympics, she bribes everyone with footage of her plunging into freezing cold water in February - in a bikini. Unfortunately, as far as I know, the Relay for Life does not involve freezing, water, or bikinis, so I can’t totally rip off her fundraising system. I would, however, like to give some sort of a “reward” to everyone who donates at least, say, $20 - and then a bigger and better something-or-other for the overall high donor.

I’m open to suggestion, so throw some bribe ideas my way - what, other than the goodness of your little hearts, will get you to pony up for the Relay for Life? (The only “rules:” It has to be legal, not too scandalous, and something I’m physically capable of accomplishing. Yeah yeah, sorry to spoil all the fun!)

If you’d like to donate right away, here’s my fundraising page! Otherwise, stay tuned for my “official” beg post in the next couple of days, complete with bribery details.  ;)

Thanks guys!