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Tuesday,  12/22/09  08:58 PM

Working on deadline today, a big project which has to be done by year-end...  and so we celebrated the winter solstice with one of the coldest days of the year, freezing with a bitter breeze.  I marked it with one of my faster Rockstore rides, 1:43, not bad considering my teeth were chattering :)

*Still* buzzed from Avatar; can't wait to see it again.  But first, a filter pass...

Ole Reads ITesting, testing.  A crummy headline for a great article, the best defensive of the current health reform plans that I've yet read.  I'm a skeptic; it seems to me that these plans don't hit at the core of why healthcare is so expensive, and I am always opposed to government solutions.  But the analog to how government solutions helped farming become more efficient in the U.S. - something of which I was entirely ignorant, previously - is compelling.  I was happy to read this because it gives some reason for hope; it looks like some version of one of these plans is going to be passed... 

Ole Reads IIHanukkah Stories.  This is absolutely hilarious.  You must read it, but please put down any hot liquids beforehand. 

The incomparable Onion: The Top Stories of the Past 4.5B Years.  My favorite: Sumerians Look On In Confusion as God Creates World.  "According to recently excavated clay tablets inscribed with cuneiform script, thousands of Sumerians - the first humans to establish systems of writing, agriculture, and government - were working on their sophisticated irrigation systems when the Father of All Creation reached down from the ether and blew the divine spirit of life into their thriving civilization."  I love it. 

I totally agree with this: Apple is a Bad Example.  Using Apple - or Microsoft, or Google, or Facebook - to make a point about startup companies generally doesn't work.  There is only one Apple, and what works for them does not work for everyone else. 

Not the Onion: Darth Vader opens New York Stock Exchange.  Wow, who could have imagined?  (I wonder if Jake Sully will be next?) 

Ford's Wired Fleet: WiFi Hotspots on Four Wheels.  I'm confused about this; seems like WiFi in a car has a pretty limited usefulness, considering everyone can just use cellular modems.  Give us more drinkholders instead! 

ZooBorn of the day: a baby Beluga.  Yeah we've had one before, but man are they cute!