Who ya gonna call?

Begin rant

If words weigh a milligram each, there surely have been metric tons of them dumped on and around Sony BMG by now over their misbegotten effort to manage our music at any cost. Maybe they will find out that "any cost" is more than even they can afford. But I doubt it. If I had infected millions of computers around the world with spyware, I would be up to my ears in FBI agents. Sony may get away unscathed.

There have been a few more tons heaped on the anti-virus vendors like Macafee and Symantec and on Microsoft's anti-spyware tool, since it took them a year to admit there was something wrong and longer to address the issue. Did they sell out to Sony? Want to place bets?

This means something more to me, though. It means that "trust but verify" isn't enough. My world has devolved simply to don't trust. From Enron to Sony, we can't trust the vendors. We can't rely on the security firms we hire to protect us. We can't trust our government not to lie to us or to keep their hands out of our pockets. Some of it is obvious. I watch discussions on current issues in wonder that two people can loudly proclaim opposite interpretations of what seemed simple observations. But much of the funny dealing is hidden behind National Security Letters and the FISA court.

I look at the Medicare drug benefit our congress and our president have offered us. They tout choice; let the individual decide. But the choices run into the hundreds, the web sites they offer as help don't work. Phone calls to advocacy organizations are answered by a machine and no call back happens. The formularies reject all meds a person takes. Whole classes of drugs are excluded despite the law that says they must not do that. I have degrees in math and business administration, but I find it all hopelessly confusing, obscure, and often self-contradictory. How could the generic wheelchair bound innocent cope with this stuff.

In a world where we are inundated with information, finding any that is trustworthy is getting harder and harder.

End of rant

Politics unusual

I find the stuff going on in Washington (and Juneau) to be scary. Maybe I scare easily, but I'm old enough to remember scary times and not want to see the signs in my own country. There is all this talk of a cabal (Cheny and Rumsfeld) manipulating the administration and the president. We seem to have secret police who kidnap folks and spirit them away to places where they can be tortured in secret prisons. The senate wants to establish rules for interrogation which exclude torture, but Cheny speaks for an exemption for the CIA. Cheney's lieutenant is indicted on multiple counts of illicit activity. We are in a war of questionable virtue and which may well be unwinable. A former presidential candidate is demanding we bring home 20,000 troops by Christmas, regardless of the military merit in the non-plan.

Bush says he is in charge and on top of everything, but I'm not alone in doubting that he is really in control. The premise that he is the not very bright figurehead fronting for some shadowy group is no longer far fetched.

Now we uncover signs that our government has been misleading us into war at least as far back as Viet Nam. Confidence in the president is down below 40% and still dropping. He is met by riots and challenges in South America. His second supreme court nominee was a bad joke and the new one seems to want to make law from the bench. Defenders of Bush simply say everything is fine and bluff their way onward.

I don't think everything is fine and my confidence in our government is at an all time low. Has anyone else noticed?

Filed in: politics

Shy and retiring

Make that retired. I retired from the rat race some years ago, a bit early, but it was necessary. (Why is another story for another day.) So of course I spend my time here on the beach, Margarita pitcher at my side, faithful dog chasing gulls or sneaking sips, and admiring the wandering wonders that pass my chair.

Oh. That was in my last novel. Never mind.

So what I am really doing is hitting rehearsals for three hours a night with the first performance of Bye Bye Birdie two days away. Maybe we will get through the whole thing tonight.

It's really fun to work with a house full of amateur singers, dancers, actors, stage handlers, managers, and musicians like me. In theory we all build our parts individually, then bring them together in ten days or so of rehearsal with cast and orchestra. In practice, that really seems to happen, but it's a little hard on the nerves when the cast is reblocking with two days to go. Or when we add a piece -- same schedule. Fortunately, Fairbanks is well endowed with musicians and artists who are capable of pulling this off, amazingly so for a town in this location and of this size. These things are always a hassle, so much so that I swear off after every one. I seem to swear back on each fall. Too old to learn, I guess, and I enjoy the challenge. After all, what else is retirement for?

Tomorrow night is the goes-on-forever til done final dress rehearsal. One show Friday, two on Sunday. Then a similar schedule next weekend and we've done it again. Fun -- at least in retrospect. Beats practicing scales.

Bones

Collaborative writing applied

A new experiment takes shape. I want to develop some sense of who my distant relatives are. Distant, in my case means 350, 1,500, or 3,500 miles away. None of this down the block messing around for us. So I have remote grandchildren. I've been inviting them to visit, one a year. (Remember that I don't live at the end of the earth without a reason.) The latest invitee is from the east coast of America, hasn't been to Alaska, doesn't go camping, and doesn't expect to find moose in the back yard in the morning.

Trying to pry out of a youngster a clue to what interests them is always difficult. When that youngster lives far away, doesn't send letters or email, and is one of those mysterious girl-things, about which I know nothing, it gets downright scary. So in my true geekish spirit, I put up a Writely collaborative writing board, seeded it with words about next summer's trip, and invited the young lady, her parents, and her grandparents to, well, collaborate in planning a trip.

Now if I can just keep my finger off the keyboard long enough to let someone else make a change, maybe good things will occur.

Waiting to see,
Long lost Lewy