She called on the land line and while she and Eileen were chatting I installed the google plug-in and we ended up doing video/chat via that. The sound was garbled a bit on our side but at least the dang thing worked. I left feedback for Skype which is about as effective as my emails back and forth with my Republican representative Bill Huizenga about his opposition to Health Care. The House of Representatives is voting on this today, I think.

Like I said to Eileen I don’t think Huizenga is all that bright. He’s a politician, ferchrissake. But I do suspect him and our governor of being pretty sincere in their views however mistaken.

I asked him to at least urge his Republican colleagues to put forth an alternative to the Health Care program something they are reluctant to do.

I did manage to get some organ practice in yesterday. Ran in to the guy who subbed for me and had a nice chat with him. Treadmilled.

This is all I have time for this morning.

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Kim Jong-un Appears With Disney Characters on North Korean TV – NYTimes.com

Apparently, Kim John-un released cool propaganda video of him conducting music. Some things you can’t make up.

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Grandmothers of Buranovo Give Russian Village New Life – NYTimes.com

This is as inspiring as fakey American Idol can be, I guess. I watched their videos on YouTube. Charming people doing lousy music.

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Let’s Draft Our Kids – NYTimes.com

Interesting ideas. I like his three options for drafting young people. He is aware that something so sensible has no chance of being implemented any time soon. But still, it’s good stuff in my opinion.

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Emily Dickinson Search Results | The Online Books Page

Links to  lots of Emily Dickinson online.

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Since it was already a late flight, we got home in the middle of the night, around 3:30 AM.

Late hours for an old geezer like me.

Eileen and I figured out how she could loan me a Kindle book she bought. The rules are 1) the publisher must allow loans; 2) the loan is only for 14 days and 3) a book can be loaned only once.

Sheesh. It seems like a very old style approach to the free flow of information and ideas. Just a tiny leak in an area where so few people really participate (i.e. reading and thinking).  But a leak it is.

So I’m reading Eileen’s Kindle Book copy of Scorpio Races.

The book seems directed at a young reader audience. The main characters, Puck and Sean, are in their teens. I am reading it because Eileen read it. Even though a death begins the book it doesn’t pick up until about half way through when the plot starts to develop. The interesting thing to me is the idea of capaill uisce. This phrase roughly translates from the Irish as “water horse.” It seems there is a legend that this author has made real about fierce flesh eating horses.

There is an annual race where these killer horses are caught and raced. This is the background of this book. I cannot tell how much of the legend is connected to fact, but it makes for a mildly interesting read and helped me pass time with the many waits I had yesterday flying back from California.

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The Drone Zone – NYTimes.com

On the ride home last night, Eileen and I heard a BBC report about CCTV technology the British are looking at which would allow software to monitor the overwhelming number of cameras the government uses to watch the population. There are so many cameras trained on the citizens that there is a surfeit of trained observers.

I was particularly taken aback when one person who was selling the tech said that one has two options: either to be monitored by software or spottily monitored by other humans.

My gut reaction was “Wait a minute. Those aren’t the only options. What about whether a society wants to trade (as the British society seems to want to do) privacy and dignity for safety (false safety in my opinion).

I thought more than once about the true reason the USA has such weird security measures in its airports: to lull the traveling population into thinking the government is making it safe to fly when indeed it is not. Perception seems to trump reality over and over these days. Just my exhausted morning after opinion, I guess.

Pass the drone.

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‘How Should a Person Be?’ by Sheila Heti – NYTimes.com

Recognized this author but wasn’t sure why until I realized she co-wrote Chairs are the people go.

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