newer log
A reader of Plurp writes (in Plurp):
Give Dave a rest so he can post, eh?
I first read that as "Give Dave a reset", which has a nice ring to it. (I dreamed last night that I had a socket in the back of my neck, and another in my forehead. The one in the back of my neck was for a strange spiral cable that put me directly in touch with the Net; very transcendant. The one in my forehead was some obsolete older technology that I rather regretted having up there. A Jazz drive or something.)
This unannounced mini-hiatus we've been having isn't entirely Steve's fault (although I have noticed that things have begun falling out of his overstuffed calendar and landing in mine). The weekend was all busy with family things (I'll probably start regaling you with Heartwarming Stories of a Happy Suburban Family pretty soon, as summer's coming and all), and then there was this sudden wedding anniversary, and then this afternoon I was on the way home all primed for a nice big log entry when...
Well, I'll let my (slightly redacted) detailed notes tell the story (feel free to skip ahead once you've gotten the idea):
Wednesday, June 12, 2002
Roughly 6pmDriving north on the Taconic State Parkway. A heavy rain had just ended, still raining lightly. On the bridge over the Croton Reservoir, probably just past the border into the Town of Yorktown, the green light truck ahead of me stopped suddenly. I stopped suddenly, skidding on the wet road but briefly avoiding a collision. The car behind me attempted to stop, but skidded into the rear of my car, forcing the front of my car into violent contact with the green light truck ahead of me. In the moment after the crash, the front end of my car was making a loud rattling sound; I turned off the engine.
The driver of the car ahead of me, the car behind me, the two cars behind that, and I all got out to inspect the damage. The two cars behind the car behind me had apparently had some minor contact, but the car behind the car behind me did not appear to have touched the car behind me. The light truck ahead of me appeared to be undamaged.
There was reasonably extensive damage to the front of my car, including the front bumper, the hood, and that bar thing protecting the radiator. The hood still opened, and still latched. The rear of my car had some visible damage to the bumper. There may have been other front and rear damage that I did not notice.
The green light truck ahead of me was driven by Jose' A-------, telephone number (---) --------. I gave him my name and telephone number, and he later drove off. I know nothing more about him or his vehicle. The two cars behind the car behind me also drove off.
The car behind me was a red sport sedan, NY license -------; I did not get the make or model. The driver was Rosa A-----, telephone number ------------. Her driver's license gave her address as "------ ---, S-----, NY". Her car was insured by State Farm Insurance, policy number --- ------------. The hood of that car was seriously crumpled, and the grill and front bumper were damaged.
The Highway Emergency Local Patrol truck arrived, and at the driver's instructions I drove my car (still making a loud front-end rattling sound) off the bridge and onto the shoulder of the highway past the bridge. The truck pushed the red car off of the bridge and onto the same shoulder. After a short time, two flatbed tow trucks from the Hill Top Service Station arrived. A patrol car from the New York State Department of Environmental Protection (the reservior police) also arrived, make sure there were no injuries, and took the driver's licenses from Ms. A----- and me to check. The DEP officer said that the State Police should eventually arrive, but were probably stuck in traffic.
At some point an ambulance or small fire truck or some other emergency vehicle pulled up, but on being told that there were no injuries they drove off.
The tow operators loaded the two damaged cars onto their trucks (they were able to drive mine onto the ramp; I think the red car had to be pushed). The tow operator said that once he turned off the A/C, the rattling sound stopped, so it was probably the A/C fan. The DEP officer returned our driver's licenses, and we rode in the trucks back to the service station. Tow cost is 45$ (I think), plus $2.50 per mile (or per mile past the nearest exit?). They are open to have the car towed somewhere else from 9am to (not sure).
No injuries to anyone at all, and the car looks (I say "looks") only slightly more damaged than (sigh) last time. But it means hassling around with rental cars and body shops and insurance companies and renting a car and/or time-sharing M's, and all sortsa "good for the soul" stuff. Character building. Like that.
The other day Steve referred to us as "those more learned than we", on the subject of the famous "S. 1618" that spammers are always quoting to prove that they aren't really spammers, or at least shouldn't be clapped in irons. As some of Steve's other readers were quick to point out, not only did the bill called "S. 1618" not actually pass, it wouldn't have blessed the vast majority of this spam even if it had (link, link). Which just goes to show (film at eleven): spammers are slime.
Megnut points out that MSNBC has started some blogs on its website. More of the world conquered.
Last names; lots and lots of them. In decreasing order of how likely you are to find yourself sitting next to someone with the same one.
Darn straight:
"If calling people enemy combatants is another way of holding American citizens indefinitely, it's extremely troubling. If they can charge him with a crime, they should try him."
(Usual "fubar/fubar" still seems to work on nytimes.com.)
Why isn't it causing more of a furor that the Executive Branch has started locking up citizens (citizens) on no more than the President's saying they're bad guys? Good summary of the problem from the MeFi thread:
If only we had a means of testing evidence and weighing facts before stripping people of their rights... Wait, we do! They're called courts! Whoah, wait until the Attorney General hears about those!
More tidbits: Steve draws cute pictures, and various (oldish) mentions of the other American (citizen?) being held by the military: CNN, Pilotonline, CincyPost editorial.
Would Bush really be pilloried if he were to suspend habeas corpus? Would enough people even know what it meant that he'd get in serious trouble? Or could he get away with it by invoking September 11th often enough?
On an entirely different subject, here are some NSA Security Recommendations for things like Windows systems and Cisco routers. One wonders why they aren't on NSA.gov. Perhaps just the agency tradition of inscrutability.
So there! Maybe I'm now back in the habit...
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