Minneapolis Opossum?

Jeannette and I saw an opossum on the Greenway in Minneapolis on Monday night. We had one of the best nights that night. The weather was nice enough to go on a long walk, so at 7:00 we left to go to Punch for pizza, then to Ben and Jerry's for a sundae. The weather was great, we saw two rabbits, and this odd opossum sitting on a fence, just staring at us. No matter how close we got, it didn't move. We didn't get THAT close, like three feet away, but it was fun anyway.

DST, hockey and popes

The Gophers lost last night, and it was painful to watch the 3rd period. On a better note, the Daylight Saving Time change happened as expected, and nothing appears out of sync at work or home. Most of my little gadgets have set themselves correctly.

The Pope and the Witch was acted very well, but the story didn't flow very well. It seemed written backwards. How can we create a situation where the pope distributes drugs safely and cheaply, allows the use contraception, and changes the church's view on abortion. Here's how, insert a Bantu witch doctor. Throw in some goofy physical humor, cell phone jokes, and strange musical numbers, and you have yourself a play. The comedy didn't seem smart enough. For example, one of the better lines was "Sir, we don't have time for fables right now!" The pope replies, "A pope should know as many fables as possible, God knows I tell enough of them."

The Pope and the Witch

Last night Bjorn and I saw the Pope and the Witch. It was a pretty solid performance. However, I was disappointed there wasn't more satire. It wasn't "satireless". There was a point made early on in the play that Bjorn and I discuss often. The issue is hypocrisy and the power of man. The pope and his council are discussing the evils of contraception. The whole argument is that it isn't natural, and is condemned by the bible. Someone brought up the fact that there was a point in history where vaccinations weren't considered natural, but it was decided that there wasn't technically anywhere in the bible that said it was o.k. There is so much nit picking of the bible by Christians it is ridiculous. Many Christians see horrible things in the bible, such as the issue of homosexuality, and use that as an excuse for bigotry. However, when it comes to other issues, they say"well we don't believe in that". This point leads me to believe that the only real Christians are the fundamentalists, who take everything literally. I was raised Lutheran and to be "good" people we were taught to follow the bible. The crazy fundamentalists seem to be the only ones that do that in entirety. The second point is the whole issue of deciding. When it comes down to it, most things are controlled by man, including religion. Man wrote the bible. I believe man came up with the concept of God in the first place (feel free to disagree). How can man say that limbo existed, than centuries later say it didn't. Even man decided the dates of holidays. In 325 the council of Nicea decided the date of Easter.
What am I getting at? Maybe nothing, I admit sometimes I just rant. But remember, our fellow man is important. We are what makes the world.

300

Jeannette and I saw 300 at a midnight showing at Southdale last night. I think they had it playing at 5 screens, and it looks like all were sold out. I don't think I've ever seen so many people at a midnight showing before. The movie was good, and it strongly appealed to a male demographic of 18 to 24 year olds. There was plenty of blood, and gore, and nudity and sex. Yes, there was a tiny message about fighting for freedom in there but that's overshadowed by a 2 minute scene of a naked teenage girl writhing about on drugs as the oracle. I think this movie will make a lot of money.

Jesus Camp and TechNet

Last night, Jeannette and I saw Jesus Camp. I thought it was really short, poorly produced, and the message wasn't clear. It's really easy to pick out crazy fundamentalists, and make a movie about a handful of them. I don't know if it was supposed to be more striking because these were children. One thing I felt from the movie is the attachment of social conservative values into services. This is where I believe the power of the conservative movement comes from, tying your emotional response to one issue, and you're roped in. For example, the abortion issue. If you are pro life, it's like you have to vote republican. The republicans don't even have to take that issue seriously, they can introduce bills now and again, which will fail, just to prove to the masses that they are working for the cause. Then they are sure to win votes, no matter how much money they waste on pet projects, send people to war, or eliminate civil liberties, the most important issue to these people is saving unborn babies. As a guy, I don't feel like my opinion matters much, but I believe the decision rests with the woman on what to do. As long as it's within the first trimester. I also think that counseling should be mandatory, and all options should be discussed beforehand. I'm by no means "pro abortion" in that I don't want every unwanted pregnancy to be terminated, but I think it as an option, within reason, and throughly though about, is the safest option. I do think abortion should be rare, but not illegal.

Anyway, on a completely different note, I attended a TechNet event in Eden Prairie this morning about Office 2007, Exchange 2007, and Vista. It seems like all three platforms are a huge shift in technology. All products will require significant training for anyone who plans to use them, even if they are familiar with their previous versions. Office has an issue with opening old versions of files, and older office applications can't open the new files without a converter. Yes, the converter is free, but that's a hassle. Exchange 2007 can't upgrade a 2003 box, you must perform a full migration. The migration isn't too hard, but the management is totally different. Also, Exchange 2007 must be installed on a 64 bit server. I don't have any extra servers around for that upgrade, and certainly none with 64 bit processors. Vista does have good features on the back end that make for better management. For example, Microsoft bought an Anti Virus company, and will be offering AV for servers and workstations. I think it only covers XP and Vista, which stinks if you have 150 Windows 2000 workstations like I do. There are some new features, like Network Access Protection. This can keep a computer off of your network, or provide limited access if the AV on the client is out of date, or security patches aren't applied. There's also policies to control devices, like USB drives. With that, you can keep your staff from plugging in a drive, and anonymously copying files off to do whatever they want to later. One thing I thought was interesting was the evaluation questionnaire. In it, they asked twice about linux, about what you are using currently, and if you plan to implement linux soon. I think with this large shift in technology, the cost to upgrade becomes the same between the two platforms. If you have to spend time training anyway, do it with the less expensive software. Granted, linux is more secure, but only if you know how to admin it. It's the same with Windows, if you know how to properly secure your systems, you can save yourself from vulnerabilities. If you're a novice with linux, you'll make the same mistakes a novice on Windows will make regarding security. By the way, the annoying Cancel or Allow crap was recommended as mandatory by the presenter. People in the audience wanted to know how to remove it. It's UAC, or user access control. It's an annoyance, and provides no additional security. If a user has admin rights, they shouldn't be alerted each time they open a control panel. If a user doesn't have admin rights, then it's ok to prompt for authentication of an admin. This does nothing but annoy the user at their desk. It does nothing to prevent a script from running in the back ground. That's where your vulnerabilities are, from a script accessing your kernel files, scripts don't click on boxes, and don't interface with the GUI at all. Well, from the technet presentation, I am far less likely to deploy any of these technologies right away. I'll wait until they mature, and wait until I can upgrade hardware before I do anything. Only half of our workstations can run Windows Vista Business, and most of our computers are under four years old.

Oh, I also won Microsoft Flight Simulator X Deluxe Edition. So, now I think everything Microsoft makes is great, yay Microsoft!

And another thing, Jeannette and I signed a 12 month lease with the same place we are at now. We really can't move out until Jeannette has a good job, and the soonest that would happen is in December of this year. The new property management company has a no winter move out policy, because they can't rent rooms from november to feburary, so you're stuck where ever you are for four months. I did get to explain some of the problems in the building, like the parking lot having a pot hole, and the laundry room sucking, and they are going to fix what's wrong.

Doctor

I went to the doctor, a regular checkup, and I'm healthy, all for not having a functioning pancreas. I did gain a pound since last November, but it's not such a big deal. Early on in the diet craze, Jeannette and I both obsessed about what we were eating, how many calories it had, fat, carbs, etc. It became too much of a hassle, and we both were hungry all day because we felt too guilty to eat. This resulted in us both having very few calories each day, way under what we should eat, but feeling awful. I think our food situation isn't so bad, it's the exercise that is lacking.

On another note, I donated platelets for the 7th time on Saturday. It is two hours of sitting in a chair with needles in your arms, but it's well worth it.

Webcam

We now have a webcam featured on the page. We'll see how that goes. My car was towed on Friday. Everyone got out of work early on Thursday, except for me and a handful of other people, who worked until 4. Friday was canceled too, so I thought I'd go in to get some stuff done while no one was around. I left work around noon, and I parked in front of my building. There were other cars there, so I thought it was alright. I would have parked in the back, but there was a garbage truck in the alley blocking it, so I skipped it. Well, at 4, I rebooted a server remotely from home, but it didn't come back. It was our main database server, so it needs to be up. Well, it didn't come back, it shut down instead. So, I told Jeannette we should go to work, turn the server on, then go to a movie in Rosedale. I looked out, at my car was missing. I figured it had been towed, so I called 311, and it was. I printed out the bus route we needed to take, and hopped out. We started the adventure around 5. We got to the impound lot around 6, got to the car around 7, and got pulled out of the spot we were stuck in around 8.A helpful tow truck guy named Buzz pulled us out. I offered him some money, because it took him about 15 minutes to yank us out of snow that the last truck driver dumped us in. He didn't take the money. So, all in all, things went fine. If I hadn't come home at noon, I would have never been towed, if I was only one hour later, I could have parked after the plow went through. Ah well, it was my fault for not checking into things myself, and relying on the other people on the road to be right.