I forgot

I was gonna pity Microsoft, as they have been having a rough time of things these days. I mean, it seams like very few people voluntarily made the move to Vista, big news there. The Zune has not taken off as it was expected to, and the X-Box is the least reliable piece of gaming hardware in the history of gaming hardware (I think)
And then these two gems:
"NEW YORK (Reuters) - Users of Microsoft Corp's Sidekick mobile phone may have permanently lost data such as contacts, photos and calendar entries due to the failure of a Microsoft server computer."
Ouch!
But that's not all:
"SEATTLE (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp said on Monday that passwords belonging to some users of its Hotmail email service were exposed on an Internet site, but had since been taken down.

The company did not say how many users were affected, but some reports suggested that passwords to more than 10,000 accounts were exposed."

Something tells me that Microsoft is suffering from G.M. itis, where a company gets too big and spread out too thin trying to make a buck in too many places that balls get dropped. No problem if the balls in question are for ping pong, a much bigger concern if they are for bowling...

Sick Again!

I swear to God, the only time I ever seem to write in this thing is when I'm sick. And I'm getting sick of it!
But seriously, it's true. So write it down, October 13th, 2009 I took a day off from work to stay in bed and work. Sore throat, heinous cough, no voice, all that good stuff. Rest and chicken soup (provided by the always awesome Ms. Hiromi Libby- thank you very much indeed).
So the good news is that I probably don't have the flu. Seasonal or otherwise, but then is that good news or bad news? I suppose it would be best if I could get it during the holidays, when I don't have to miss work. My son Shingo got the H1N1 last month and said that it pretty much kicked his butt for 5 days. That does not sound like fun, but I suppose it beats dying of it, as some do.
Anywho, using this down time to put up a website for our students and prospective students, as all we have up currently is the lowdown for prospective teachers, which is of course only half of the equation...

What's this!?

I just woke up from a dream.
I was in India.
I was getting fitted for a mall security uniform.
The scary thing was,
I didn't mind.

Wolverine

I watched that new X-Men movie about Wolverine's origins the other day. I didn't think it was nearly as bad as many people said it was. In fact, I rather liked it. Of course, I'm not as into comics as a lot of people, I just want to be entertained, and I was.
Funny thing was, when the group gets together and heads off to Lagos in search of adamantium (which, to me, sounds like something Adam Ant should be made of...) the fly off in this funky looking jet, which I thought was some Hollywood creation (ala the jet from IronMan) but then I saw this photo today:
and I thought; "Hey, that's the same plane! Apparently it made it's debut last year at an English airshow, even though it was used in the movie back in the 70s sometime...

STS 127 continued

Looks like someone read this. The shuttle launched was (thankfully) delayed due to a hydrogen leak.
But I still think they're planning on having 13 people up there...

STS 127

I don't want to wish any bad vibes on anybody, but something seems wrong with this upcoming shuttle mission.
The space shuttle Atlantis is scheduled to lift off from Cape Kennedy within the next 24 hours. It will be launching on June 13. The main gig this time around is to finish building the Japanese science module 'Kibo', but the merry crew will also board the International Space Station, joining the party animals already there. This will mark the first time that 13 people will be on the ISS.
Apollo 13 launched on April 11 at 13:13, and 2 days (April 13) later suffered a near fatal accident. Don't these good rocket scientists at NASA think about these things before they plan them? Seems like they're just tempting fate if you ask me, and you haven't...

Latest Swine Flu Madness

This just in from Reuters:
"GENEVA (AP) — The World Health Organization has told its member nations it is declaring a swine flu pandemic — the first global flu epidemic in 41 years.
The move came Thursday as infections climbed in the United States, Europe, Australia, South America and elsewhere.
In a statement sent to member countries, WHO says it decided to raise the pandemic alert level from phase 5 to 6, meaning that a global outbreak of swine flu has begun. The decision was made after the U.N. health agency held an emergency meeting on swine flu with its experts."
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jTkkEKE5LtPih_5Jcc-3MpD0gOYQD98OH0U00
As of this writing the official toll is 27,737 cases in 74 (75 if you include Taiwan) with 141 deaths worldwide. According to th WHO "Increasing the alert to Level 6 does not mean that the disease is deadlier or more dangerous than before, just that it has spread to more countries."

Where does the music come from?

I have been asked, time and again, a question that I routinely ponder myself; Where does music come from? What comes first, the music or the lyrics? The simple answer is: It depends. Or, I don't know. I am always amazed that any group of musicians can agree on anything as personal and subjective as music enough to complete a song.
Of course the story would be different if it were one songwriter working alone, or at least making all the decisions her or his self, but when a band is required to agree to create a piece of music together and all the parts eventually come together and it works, it's amazing. It's mystifying. It's a wonderful thing to be a part of, and yet, after twenty something years, I'm still no closer to understanding how or why it works when it does. Or why sometimes everything clicks so effortlessly for one song, perhaps one that at first blush seemed like it would be so hard to write, but other times, and more often than not the songs that appear to be walks in the park end up being akin to trips to the dentist.
I suppose it's the mystery that makes the magic, and if we fully understood it, it might not make it so special after all.