Thieves broke into my car between Sunday night and Monday morning.  They went through my glove compartment and the compartment between my seats.  They took my binoculars.  Yesterday, I found out they hit our entire block.  We were the least hit.  In fact, the neighbor across the street returned my binoculars because the thief left my binoculars in his vehicle.  They were looking for a Honda to steal.  They found one and bungled the job.  Then they found another and succeeded.

Like the recent break-in at my office, it made me realize that there is very little real protection against having my property unlawfully lifted.  I reported it to the police so that they could have a more complete profile of what happened in my neighborhood.  This was definitely not "kids" out experimenting, this was person or persons who make their living or supplement their income this way, have done it before and will do it again.

Like the recent break-in at my office, knowing that others were also hit made me feel like less of a target.

Our hot tub spa is on order and should arrive between the end of September and mid-October.  Tom completed making the platform that he wants it to sit on.  The rest of the deck will wait till next spring.

Getting old sucks.  I tried to save a tooth for many years.  I took the best care of it that I could, but I finally needed it pulled.  It is even effecting the way I talk.  I am so unhappy with (inevitable) physical degeneration.  And I'm so unhappy with having increased my exercising (I'm running 3/4 of a mile several times per week) and still not dropping any pounds.  And, for a long time, I've been so disappointed with people in general:  this world could be a much better place, in particular, collectively, there is so much we can do in the USA, and more than half the citizens who voted, voted for Bush.  Some still don't know any better.  I lost one person I thought was a friend when I realized he was willing to give up almost the entire bill of rights, including freedom of religion, freedom of the press to keep the "right to bear arms" which he IMAGINED (or should I say believed Republican propaganda) that the Democrats were trying to take away from him.  And this stupid person is in Mensa!

The question we need to ask ourselves is what is going to make the future collectively better for all people and all groups of people (to avoid tyranny of the minority by the majority) and then take any action we can in those directions.

I've been very disappointed in both life and people.  I've expected better by now.  In fact, the only thing that hasn't disappointed me has been technology, which is probably why I enjoy it so much.  As difficult (for some) as our technology is, I can at least see it going in the right direction.  In fact, there have been many advances that I didn't forsee and many that I did forsee but never expected in my lifetime.

As for medicine, I left that field because it disappointed me.  Once a doctor receives his/her license, there is nothing to compell the doctor to keep current with new information, nothing to compell him/her to examine whatever he/she does that is less than best practice, nothing to compell him/her to examine the mistakes of his/her own profession.  The best doctors might be poor, and are often discouraged about making good choices for each patient because either the insurance won't support those choices or because other medical doctors haven't become smart enough yet to know those are the best choices and so would generate a bad reputation for the doctor when patients go for a second opinion; and wouldn't support those choices in a lawsuit.  Doctors who are mediocre practitioners but good salesmen are the ones who get rich.  That isn't what medicine always was, but it is what it has become.

I certainly hope technology never becomes dominated with the attitudes that sully medicine.  The open source movement is such an important part of keeping technology from becoming stifled like medicine.

Nada.  Been busy.

The boss is supposed to go to Dutch Harbor next week, so he and I will be able to install the new firewall together.  That should work well.

I STILL haven't done anything about my ISP and Majordomo major headaches with SeattleLinuxChix.  I need to call tech support but I need to have some time when I can do it.  That hasn't happened yet.

Tom and I will be visiting the Northeast soon.  We've got a trip planned that includes Salem, Massachusetts, upstate New York and New Jersey.

I'm running 3/4 of a mile at least 4 times per week.  Last night after work, Tom and I took a bicycle ride to the brewery, had dinner and biked back.  It was dark and cold on the return trip.  I don't think we're going to do many after-work trips between now and May.  Maybe some.  I'll need better lights.

It seems as if a switch was flipped on September first to end summer and begin autumn.  I know that summer officially ends today, but it hasn't felt summery for 3 weeks.  As I look at my bathing suit hanging in the bathroom (I want to wash and dry it one more time before I put it away for the winter), I'm wondering when it was ever warm enough to go swimming; or wear shorts and sandals.

This week I have seen craneflies try to get into our house.  I've also suddenly seen many raccoon road kill.  An Anna's hummingbird showed up at our feeders last weekend.  That probably means some of the summer flowers she prefers are gone.

Our sunflowers are blooming, but we never got even one pumpkin this year.  The junkos are starting to fly by our feeders again.  Next time I fill them I'll have to include millet seed.

We know it is time to go apple stealing and nut picking, but I don't know when we'll find time this autumn.  Maybe this weekend?