Dog And Pikachu
[NSFW] I saw this about four years ago, and it still makes me laugh.
Sioux leader vows to open Planned Parenthood Clinic. I have a vision of the future, and it goes something like this: Our government, backed by lobbying groups, and with a ruling of the Supreme Court, is able to overturn Roe V. Wade and ban abortion in the United States. Because nature always finds a way (and our current government doesn’t value science or education), women will still get pregnant. Indian reservations across the country will open Planned Parenthood clinics on Reservation land, right next to the casinos, cheap filling stations, and nontaxed cigarette and liquor stores, so we pious, Puritan Americans can take care of all our vices with one car trip.
Seriously, right on for the Sioux leader mentioned the story. The reasoning behind the ban, and the details, are just incomprehensible to me.
…There were, however, no exceptions for victims of rape or incest. [Governor Mike Rounds]’ actions, and the comments of State Senators like Bill Napoli of Rapid City, SD, set of a maelstrom of protests within the state. Napoli suggested that if it was a case of “simple rape,” there should be no thoughts of ending a pregnancy. (via)
I don’t think this measure will stand in court, which is good, but the fact that it actually passed is a sobering and chilling portent of the future. (Link to donation information in comments)
”If they are going to outlaw abortions [they should] put more money into sex education and pregnancy prevention. It’s fine to tell people to abstain from sex. Adult people in our country expect young people to abstain when they don’t abstain,” she said.
I couldn’t agree more. Abstinence needs to be followed up with honest, factual education and prevention. Birth control needs to be available and inexpensive. Simple solutions do not lend themselves to complicated problems.
I Hate Prepress.
I don’t have any idea how to do it, but this probably helps.
Classic BMW for sale on Craigslist. I don’t have a motorcycle license, but this is the bike I’d ride if I did.
Update: I’ll link you to a Google image search of some pretty bikes. And another link to the BMW Airheads Club, a site about all things air-cooled.
We’re having some issues with our collection of fonts this week, so I’ve done some research. Here’s a list of handy font reference material:
Font Doctor, for fixing conflicts and repairing bad fonts. So far, our experience has been good. If it’s doing what it says it’s doing, we have approximately one BILLION fonts with conflicting ID numbers. It’s a nice little app, and it’s busily humming away while I type this.
How Fonts Really Work In OS X and Font Fatigue: Pruning Excess Fonts in Mac OS X go into detail (for 10.2) on where fonts live in OS X and how to deal with them. Both were written several years ago, but I think the information is probably relevant for today as well.
Font Locations, via Apple. Additionally, Using and Managing Fonts In OS X are also 10.2 specific, but full of good information. (Who knew that fonts live in six different places on OS X? This is not normally a problem until you load 10,000+ fonts into Suitcase—then you’re going to have some headaches.)
Finally, a Apple Forums article which goes into exhaustive detail about pruning fonts and then how to reset your system (essentially, prune the system, trash your font manager’s preferences, and reload everything) so that Quark doesn’t shoot you the finger when you try to use Helvetica. This is good information.
I’m still giving Linotype’s Font ExplorerX a thumbs-up, even though we’ve had some conflicts between its auto-activation feature and inDesign, forcing a retreat to Suitcase to get some things to work. I’m thinking this is an overall font conflict problem and not a Font ExplorerX problem, but stay tuned.
Speechless.
If this story is actually true, I think it’s probably just time to impeach Shrub and start the War On Terror all over again.
System 7 Today.
Resources for the folks who feel like running System 7 in today’s environment. I have at least three machines which qualify.
Between a meeting in Columbia that went on longer than I bargained (and went better than we hoped), various computer woes here at the Lockardugan Command Center, and a surprise obituary posting for a pseudo-client this evening, I didn’t get to do anything frivolous today. So tonight I posted the P entry for the Alphabet Project to make myself feel like I got something accomplished.
In more exciting news, my good friend Rob talked a little sense into my head this weekend. He asked why I was waiting around to put all my money into the body of the Scout and not just fixing those parts that are broken and enjoying my truck? (Rob is the man who talked sense into my head about finally taking out a home equity loan and having the kitchen done professionally. So when he talks, I listen.)
I had to stop and think about this for a minute. I’ve been assuming, because the “B” pillars are all so shot, that I can’t drive my truck anymore because the doors won’t open, and that I need to focus all my energy on raising the money for a new fiberglas tub. Rob’s point was simple: Why open the doors at all? He suggested fixing the engine problems, having a new exhaust put on, pulling the top off, and driving it as an antique, which avoids any of the inspection/emission issues I’d face otherwise. This suddenly made a ton of sense to me, and I wondered why I wasn’t thinking like this before.
So, to clean up the cobwebs in my head and organize the plan, here’s the task list for the Scout:
- Drop the steel fuel tank and replace it with a new poly tank. ($175)
- Replace the dead battery ($50)
- Clean out the fuel lines/filters
- Replace the plugs, wires, filter and oil
- Install a brand new exhaust (major ducats)
- Resolve the current registration issues (it’s suspended because of emissions)
Maybe, with a lot of scrimping and saving, I can get the Scout back on the road this year.
VHS to DV to DVD.
Gotta keep this one in mind for later.
Winged Cars.
More specifically, the RoadRunner/Charger winged race cars of ’69-70. You may call them ugly, outlandish freaks (and the inspiration for a million winged rice rockets of the current day) but I find the subject fascinating. Also, check out Cars in Barns.