On This Day: May 18

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Since I’ll hit 20 years of blogging this November, this year I’m posting a daily list of anything I published on this day in the past.

There are 26 posts previously published on May 18th

  • 2023
    • Year 50 Day 16 Gave two presentations today for Global Accessibility Awareness Day (GAAD). ➡
  • 2022
  • 2020
  • 2018
    • Well, this is a horribly depressing statistic: More people have been killed at schools this year than have been killed while serving in the military. ➡
    • ‘No Way To Prevent This,’ Says Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens: Santa Fe, TX, 5/18/18. Parkland, FL, 2/14/18. Sutherland Springs, TX, 11/5/17. Las Vegas, NV, 10/2/17. San Bernardino, CA, 12/3/15. Roseburg, OR, 10/1/15. Charleston, SC, 6/17/15. And on, and on, and on… ➡
  • 2016
    • Playing with a new image editing app. Obviously, I need to come up with wittier words. (139/366) ➡
  • 2015
  • 2014
    • My not-infrequent “it’s almost bedtime and I haven’t posted my daily photo yet” pose. Go me! ➡
  • 2010
    • Links for May 14th through May 18th Sometime between May 14th and May 18th, I thought this stuff was interesting. You might think so too! • Mount St. Helens, 30 Years Ago - The Big Picture • Lost Has Already Given Us More Answers Than Battlestar • The Geek Alphabet • Adobe, You Brought An Advertisement To A Gun Fight • State Patrol Warns: Tickets on Cell Phones Begin June 10, No Exceptions ➡
  • 2006
  • 2005
    • Back again… No clue why, but for some reason my DSL modem apparently froze up somewhere around 3pm this afternoon. I've reset it and we're back up and running, but it looks like my site was effectively down for about two hours. ➡
    • Top 12 Things A Klingon Programmer Would Say Seeing as how old school programmers think like Klingon programmers, I believe that it can be reasonably assumed that all old programmers are Klingon. ➡
  • 2004
    • Battling the blahs There's a certain odd irony in that spring, when the days are getting longer, temperatures are getting warmer, and the world is getting greener also tends to be something of a difficult time for me. (Warning: long, rambling, self-indulgent, and quite possibly slightly whiny babbling follows. You've been warned...) ➡
    • Moving towards reinstating the draft It may not be much longer before the draft is back in action — inactive Army reservists are getting notified that they're next on deck to be called back to service. ➡
    • White House clearing national policy with apocalyptic fundamentalists It was an e-mail we weren't meant to see. ➡
    • Spitting Image returning? One of the best discoveries I made when visiting England during the mid-80's (sometime around 1985 or '86, I think) was Spitting Image, a BBC political satire show using latex puppet caricatures of political figures. Now it looks like Spitting Image may be coming back! ➡
  • 2003
    • ACLU report on post 9/11 suppression of dissent I haven't read this yet (it's pushing 2am, and bed is sounding better and better all the time), but the ACLU has released a report on the suppression of dissent in the US since Sept. 11th, 2001. ➡
    • Howard Dean interview There's a good interview with Howard Dean over at LiberalOasis. Dean continues to talk a very good line — I only hope that if elected, he follows through. So far, I've yet to see anything to convince me he wouldn't, but it's quite hard to tell at this point. ➡
    • Almost perfect This babble brought to you courtesy of the fact that as I've been posting rather sporadically for the past week, I need some filler posts on the main page so that my site doesn't look too tweaky. ➡
    • The Matrix has me! I've been in complete Matrix mode for most of this weekend — saw the sequel Thursday night, watched the original yesterday with Prairie, and then went back to see the sequel again tonight. ➡
  • 2002
    • More fun with conspiracies So -- here we have conclusive evidence that the US knew about the 9-11 attacks not just weeks or months, but years before they happened -- there are hidden pictures of both the Pentagon and World Trade Center attacks hidden on the new $20 bill! ➡
  • 2001
    • Off to Fairbanks! Well, my rides on the way. Don't know if I'll be updating at all while I'm in Fairbanks, so this may be my last post for a few days. If so -- see y'all (whoever you may be) when I get back! ➡
    • How Hollywood sees us ...all of you are just simple-minded dumbasses with tiny brains and limited exposure who are so used to 'checking your brains at the door' that your gray matter has devolved into a state of gummy disuse. ➡
    • I can’t chicken out now… More and more it looks like my target date for leaving really is going to be June 15th -- I'm (quite intentionally) making sure I've got all my loose ends tied up here, and that it's difficult for me to back out, just in case I get a last minute case of the heebie-jeebies. ➡
    • Getting things ready Most of my time when I'm not at work has been caught up in two pursuits: sorting through everything I own and determining what to keep, what to get rid of, and what to try to sell; and kicking back for an evening of watching DVD's when I can't deal with my room. ➡

Difficult Listening Hour 2020.05.16

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Week thirteen of my unplanned, unrehearsed, seat-of-the-pants goofing around. As a way of getting back into practice and doing something regularly, I’ve started doing regular Twitch broadcasts, now on Saturday mid-mornings. These are the results. Anything goes.

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📚 twenty-three of 2020: Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 1968 Hugo Best Novel

A neat blending of western SF sensibilities with the Indian pantheon of gods; enjoyed this one more than I expected given that I didn’t much like Zelazny’s prior Hugo winner.

On This Day: May 17

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Since I’ll hit 20 years of blogging this November, this year I’m posting a daily list of anything I published on this day in the past.

There are 24 posts previously published on May 17th

  • 2023
  • 2020
    • 📚 twenty-three of 2020: Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 1968 Hugo Best Novel A neat blending of western SF sensibilities with the Indian pantheon of gods; enjoyed this one more than I expected given that I didn’t much like Zelazny’s prior Hugo winner. ➡
    • Plague Puzzle Four Monday Friday Saturday Sunday Tuesday Thursday ➡
    • On This Day: May 17 Recognizing 20 years of blogging, here are my past posts from May 17 ➡
  • 2018
    • “A Republican lawmaker on the House Science, Space and Technology Committee said Thursday that rocks from the White Cliffs of Dover and the California coastline, as well as silt from rivers tumbling into the ocean, are contributing to high sea levels globally.” No. No, no, no. ➡
    • Mystery fruit flavor! We’re thinking it’ll probably be durian. ➡
    • Sometimes people use 'respect' to mean 'treating someone like a person' and sometimes they use 'respect' to mean 'treating someone like an authority' ➡
  • 2017
    • First Full Star Trek: Discovery Trailer First thoughts (copied from a Facebook post, with minor edits): I'm looking forward to seeing more! ➡
    • Linkdump for April 27th through May 17th An automatically generated list of links that caught my eye between April 27th and May 17th. • The Case of the Stolen Source Code • JSON Feed: Announcing JSON Feed • Let's discuss the Linguistic & Pragmatic use of the ["N-word"] • The neural network writes the episode list for next season’s Dr. Who • What we really need is an adaptation of the original 1740 The Beauty and the Beast ➡
  • 2016
    • Staying out of the way while glass workers replace a large window on the second floor of our house. There’s no window in our window right now! (138/366) ➡
  • 2014
    • Waiting for Prairie to pick me up after the final #nwc37 meeting. On to #nwc38! ➡
    • The second of two particularly nice roses from the #nwc37 post-con onions and roses boards. ➡
    • One of two particularly nice roses from the #nwc37 post-con onions and roses boards. ➡
  • 2007
  • 2006
  • 2005
    • AdSense for Feeds Looks like the inevitable intrusion of advertising into RSS feeds just gained a major player, as Google's Adsense for Feeds program has just been announced. ➡
  • 2004
    • Surf like it’s 1994! This may be the last CSS-related post for a while — though I'm considering a writeup of how I implemented the stylesheet switcher into my TypePad setup, so there may be more yet to come. We'll see. In the meantime… ➡
    • Shades of Gattaca More and more, I think that in the coming years, the movie Gattaca may be seen as far more prescient than it was recognized as at the time it came out. ➡
    • Nick Berg conspiracy? Those of you who've read this site for a while may know that I have something of a fascination for conspiracy theories. Sometimes they interest me because they're so patently ludicrous, sometimes because they're convincing enough to be nearly frightenting, and sometimes they end up somewhere in between. ➡
    • Powell on Meet the Press Here's something you don't see in today's political arena very often these days. Colin Powell was on Meet the Press Sunday night, when one of his staffers attempted to cut off the interview in the midst of one of Tim Russert's questions. Powell was not pleased, going so far as to rebuke the staffer on-air, and had the camera brought back in order to finish the interview. ➡
    • Manly Pink #2 There's now a second pink-toned stylesheet available for your viewing pleasure, courtesy of Shari Hes (who actually sent it to me last week, but it needed a few slight tweaks to get it to behave under Internet Explorer). ➡
  • 2003
    • Good Dean article Tough Guy, Howard Dean is the ultimate muscular Democrat. He's not afraid to take on George W. Bush, and in the process Dean is reminding Dems what it feels like to have a spine. But can he win? ➡
  • 2002

On This Day: May 16

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Since I’ll hit 20 years of blogging this November, this year I’m posting a daily list of anything I published on this day in the past.

There are 20 posts previously published on May 16th

  • 2024
  • 2023
    • Year 50 Day 14 We’ve got summer weather, so I can break out some of my summer shirts. ➡
  • 2022
  • 2021
    • 📚 20/2021: You Died: An Anthology of the Afterlife ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ A really strong collection of short comics about death, the afterlife, and how we cope with it – from either side of the experience. A few of these got me a little misty-eyed. Excellent selections all around. ➡
  • 2020
  • 2019
    • Book thirty-four of 2019: Sex Machine, edited by Amanda Lafrenais. ⭐️⭐️⭐️ The latest in the Smut Peddler series of erotic comic anthologies, which are always entertaining. If you’re into stories about getting it on with artificial beings, this is for you! ➡
  • 2018
    • Here’s an interesting looking project on Kickstarter: Unlocking the Magic: A Fantasy Anthology. “Mental illness isn’t magical. Back these stories that take an honest look at mental illness and portray it compassionately in fantasy.” ➡
    • I really wish it didn’t look like Twitter will be #breakingmytwitter. But I’d rather give up Twitter than be forced to use the their native iOS app or the website (since they don’t even have a native Mac app anymore. Third-party app ecosystem support is crucial. ➡
    • Ramadan Mubarak to my Muslim friends, acquaintances, and those of you I don’t know! For everyone else, CNN has a quick Ramadan etiquette guide for non-Muslims. ➡
  • 2017
    • Book thirty of 2017: StarCraft: Evolution, by Timothy Zahn. 🌟🌟🌟 ➡
  • 2016
    • Binge watching X Files is never a bad way to end a day. (137/366) ➡
  • 2015
    • Some of the local quail have added our backyard to their regular route. ➡
  • 2014
    • About an hour ago, waiting for Prairie for our weekly Friday lunch date. ➡
  • 2008
    • My Desk with my New Toy When Prairie asked me what I wanted for my birthday this year, I just couldn't come up with an answer. There really wasn't anything that was jumping to mind -- I've got tons of music, tons of books, a good selection of work and school clothing.... We batted ideas around for a while, until I mentioned that I'd occasionally dreamed about updating my little Wacom Graphire2 3.5x5 tablet. ➡
  • 2007
    • Overheard in Seattle I'm on my way to my brother's to pick up weed, and them I'm going to get a cat at the Humane Shelter. ➡
  • 2006
    • Wisteria Spirals Until I looked at them from this angle, I never realized that the flowers grew in a spiral around the central stem. ➡
  • 2005
    • Enterprise No More Tonight I finished Enterprise off, watching the end of the two-part arc following the derailment of the first effort at laying the foundation for the future United Federation of Planets, then following that up with the final episode of Enterprise. (SPOILERS in this entry...if you care....) ➡
    • Seattlest Something I meant to mention a bit ago, but spaced -- I've recently become one of the contributing authors to Seattlest, the Seattle-centric group weblog run by the Gothamist empire. ➡
  • 2004
  • 2003
    • Firing blanks? The rescue of Jessica Lynch is making the rounds again, only this time with more details — according to one of the doctors at the hospital, the troops entering the hospital were firing blanks. ➡

On This Day: May 15

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Since I’ll hit 20 years of blogging this November, this year I’m posting a daily list of anything I published on this day in the past.

There are 24 posts previously published on May 15th

  • 2024
    • Mirror Dance by Lois McMaster Bujold 📚: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️: An excellent exploration of the differing personalities of the Vorkosigan brothers in the midst of military adventure and political maneuvering. ➡
  • 2023
  • 2020
  • 2019
    • Book thirty-three of 2019: A Case of Conscience, by James Blish. ⭐️⭐️⭐️ 1959 Hugo Best Novel Kept my interest, though I’ve read other SF dealing with the intersection of religion and SF that I enjoyed more. Almost two separate stories; the first section was the better. ➡
  • 2018
    • Signs I’m concentrating on work: iTunes makes it four full tracks into an album of Christmas music before I realize what I’m listening to and frantically lunge for the “next album” button. 🎄😲😂 ➡
    • Okay, this is a horrible clickbait-y headline, but: “Science news: Octopuses came to Earth from space as frozen eggs millions of years ago”. The journal article being sensationalized is here. I, for one, welcome our new alien cephalopod overlords! ➡
  • 2016
    • Ah, the joys of spring housecleaning, as I tackle the skylight that we’ve ignored since we bought the house. (136/366) ➡
  • 2014
    • Goofing around on a walk through Seattle’s arboretum in 2005. I think I was pretending to be a moth. #throwbackthursday ➡
  • 2009
    • I Did Some Wonder Loaf I love Joe Cocker's version of 'With A Little Help From My Friends,' but in all honesty, I've _never_ been entirely sure just what he's singing. I know what the lyrics are, or at least what they should be...I just don't think Joe did. ➡
  • 2007
    • Photo Drop Photo Drop is a slick little Dashboard widget -- actually, one of the first that was slick and potentially useful enough for me to download and toss in to my Dashboard, which isn't exactly the most-used OS X feature on my system. ➡
  • 2006
    • First Time in Five Years Every few years I actually get up the nerve to see just how goofy I look without the beard. The last time was five years ago (and no photos exist of that round), so I figured it was finally time to give it another shot. ➡
    • Mother’s Day It's late in the day, so most won't read this until the day after, but...happy Mother's Day to all the various moms I know (and, for that matter, all those that I _don't_ know). ➡
  • 2005
    • Bittorrent trackers? Anybody know of any other good trackers out there? My Google-fu did me no good whatsoever, and as long as Season Four of Enterprise has been a bit more watchable than prior seasons, I'd kind of like to see how it all wraps up. ➡
    • Pop-Lock Is there any real difference between what's now called 'Pop-Lock' (or 'Pop-n-Lock', as I've generally heard it) and what used to be called 'The Robot' back in the 80's heyday of breakdancing? I can't really see much difference at all, if any. ➡
    • Uptime? What uptime? Prairie and I were in the midst of getting ready for dinner and a movie on Saturday evening when suddenly all the power in my apartment went out. Power outage? The building across the street still had power.... Crud, it's just me. ➡
  • 2004
    • Manly Pink: The photos I got my friend Jessica to wander around with me today and play photographer so that I could fulfill my earlier promise of posing in pink t-shirts, kilt, and boots in return for assistance with the redesign of my website. So, without further ado: me in pink! ➡
    • The Incredibles Is it just me, or does this guy (I'm assuming it's the Villain) look a lot like John Lithgow's character in the Sylvester Stallone movie Cliffhanger? ➡
    • Spam attack! I have no real idea if any of my readers (other than myself) subscribe to either my 'full posts with comments' feed or my 'comments only' RSS feeds, but if you do, my apologies for the spam dumps of the last few days. ➡
    • Metric vs. American paper size Slashdot recently posted a link to this fascinating (in a geeky sort of way) rundown of the Imperial (Metric) system and how it relates to paper sizing. Some of what followed in the discussion thread I knew, some I didn't, but it was one of the more interesting threads I've read on /. in a while. ➡
    • Protect the Baby Squirrels Technologically or politically, some people always feel the need to keep others from 'kicking the baby squirrels'. ➡
  • 2003
    • The Matrix: Reloaded In short, I'm _quite_ satisfied with what I was presented with. At the same time, I can certainly understand why so many middling to flat out bad reviews have been popping up in the last few days. ➡
    • Zero matches on Google Today's Foxtrot cracked me up. ➡
  • 2002
    • Avast, ye maytees! This should be a blast -- according to an article in the Seattle PI, this August there will be a fleet of sailing ships coming to Seattle, including a cannon duel on Lake Union! ➡

On This Day: May 14

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Since I’ll hit 20 years of blogging this November, this year I’m posting a daily list of anything I published on this day in the past.

There are 25 posts previously published on May 14th

  • 2023
    • Year 50 Day 12 Showing off a small portion of my Star Trek shelves. ➡
    • 📚 Interference by Sue Burke Really neat explorations of how cultures change and adapt, how those changes influence communication and understanding, the biology of plant life, and alien intelligences. ➡
  • 2022
  • 2020
  • 2019
    • Sad to see the news that Tim Conway has died. He was always an incredibly funny man, and this has long been my favorite outtake from the Carol Burnett Show. If you’ve never seen this, you’re in for a treat; if you have seen it, it’s worth watching again. ➡
  • 2018
    • Today’s stupid humor. Blame an overly tired brain in the middle of the night. ➡
    • Book seventeen of 2018: Deadhouse Landing, by Ian C. Esslemont. ⭐️⭐️ ➡
    • I wish I knew where this image was sourced from (it was found on Facebook without any other information), because that’s a wonderful typo. Someone was in a bit of a hurry to get this edition out, I think. :) ETA: This came from the Star Democrat of Easton, MD, on page A10 of the ... Read more ➡
  • 2017
    • I think we need a new nozzle. ➡
  • 2016
    • A real collapsible/pop-up top hat that my friend Flower got me ages ago. Sadly, I have so few opportunities to wear it that it’s only ever lived in its box on a shelf, taken out every few years when I’m on a cleaning binge. One of these days…. (135/366) ➡
  • 2014
    • It is really nice to work at a place where kilts aren’t frowned on as work attire. Especially on 80 degree days! ➡
    • This is basically a test to see if I’ve found a way to mirror my Instagram shots to Facebook, Twitter, and Flickr simultaneously without double-posting anywhere. Good thing this guy was in a good mood and willing to pose for a portrait. ➡
  • 2009
    • Links for May 7th through May 14th Sometime between May 7th and May 14th, I thought this stuff was interesting. You might think so too! • Dell Launches 'Della,' a Women's PC Site • Star Trek Movie Annotations • Home Is Still Where My Eyes Are • A History of Klingon, the Language • With a Private MiFi Hot Spot, Be Online Wherever You Like ➡
  • 2008
    • Woody Allen interviews Billy Graham Y'know, it's really sad that this kind of polite, civil, and amusing discourse is so rarely seen these days. Two people on _very_ different sides of an issue who, rather than loudly proclaiming their absolute certainty that they are _right_ and the other is _wrong_, are able to amiably chat and joke with each other about the differences in their viewpoints. ➡
    • Where to Find Me in the Digital World It's been a while since I've done one of these posts, so I figured it was worth doing it again. With the number of online sites I'm part of, sometimes it's difficult to keep track of all the ways to find me. So here's a current rundown as of today. ➡
  • 2006
    • Tiny Yellows Yet more in the 'flowers-I-can't-identify' ongoing series. ➡
  • 2004
    • MovableType 3: License updates and clarifications Funny the difference a day or so can make — and never let it be said that people (or corporations) can't learn from their mistakes. Six Apart has posted updates and clarifications to their licensing options that make things look much more reasonable. ➡
  • 2003
    • Shaolin Soccer Thanks to Jimmy for pointing out Shaolin Soccer, a movie I'll definitely be seeing when it hits stateside (not until August, unfortunately)! Looks to be a lot of fun. ➡
    • My Big Fat Greek Wedding Thoroughly enjoyable! Not really a lot to it, all told (Greek-American girl meets American boy, boy has to cope with her very proudly Greek family), but a quite pleasant and silly movie. ➡
    • Speeding things up If all has gone well, I should have just sped up my site when processing new comments or trackback pings, thanks to Sean Willson's mt rebuild type modification. Technical details follow (Kirsten, you'll want to look at this one…) ➡
    • It's real! No, it's a hoax! Wait… Well, later on the 13th, Wired published an update to the story, where MS admitted the iLoo wasn't a hoax. ➡
  • 2001
    • No more home theater For years I've had three 'boy toy' areas that were important to me -- my music and DJ'ing equipment, my computers, and my home theater. It may not have been much of a home theater, but I was pretty proud of it, and considering the budget I'd put it together on, it was pretty decent. ➡
  • 1996
    • [From the archives: 5.14.96 1406] You know, I just do not pay enough attention to this fool page. (grin) Anyway, another Woody is up at Web Wide Woodys, and I've finally started updating my Club Events Schedule again. (shrug) I'll get back on the ball one of these days... ➡

On This Day: May 13

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Since I’ll hit 20 years of blogging this November, this year I’m posting a daily list of anything I published on this day in the past.

There are 19 posts previously published on May 13th

  • 2023
  • 2021
    • Wormhole – Simple, private file sharing: “Wormhole lets you share files with end-to-end encryption and a link that automatically expires. So you can keep what you share private and make sure your stuff doesn’t stay online forever.” ➡
  • 2020
  • 2019
    • Hear what a genderless AI voice sounds like—and consider why it matters. This is really neat, both in the science of how it was created, and in its potential for broader applicability if the companies behind voice assistants adopt it. ➡
  • 2016
    • Book twenty-one of 2016: Raiders of the Lost Ark, by Campbell Black. ⭐️⭐️⭐️ (134/366) ➡
    • Found three more! Now we’re just missing Donald, Mr. Incredible, Buzz, and Peter Pan. ➡
  • 2015
    • It’s been raining almost nonstop since Monday evening. It’s like living on the Westside again! :) ➡
  • 2014
    • Our apricot tree has tons of little fruit growing! Hopefully the birds don’t discover them before they’re ready for us…. ➡
    • From lunch today. Blue skies, 70 degrees, and a light breeze – perfect for wandering over to the local park for lunch in the sun! ➡
  • 2007
  • 2005
    • Disneyland Memorial Orgy It was one of the most notorious images on the 'net when I first got online back in '91, one passed around in various low-resolution copies, found here and there in various directories of 'naughty' images -- a black-and-white drawing of many of the classic Disney characters involved in a mass orgy. ➡
    • Blog Definitions blog |bläg| / noun / a weblog : blogs run by twenty-something Americans with at least an unhealthy interest in computers. ➡
  • 2004
    • Why I won’t be upgrading to MT 3.0 This should come as no surprise to anyone who's been following today's firestorm, but it all boils down to this: it's too expensive. ➡
    • Mojo needed I'm not going to link to her out of respect for her privacy, but a good friend of mine could really use some good mojo and wishes sent her way right now. ➡
    • MovableType 3.0: Ouch So SixApart revealed the pricing structure for MovableType 3.0 today. One word. Ouch. ➡
    • Should’ve bought a new printer So now I've blown $70 on ink, and if I actually want to print anything at home, I need to buy a new printer. I really should have skipped the whole buying ink stage, and just treated it as a 'disposable.' ➡
  • 2003
    • Signs First and foremost — creepy. Extremely so. Shyamalan excels when it comes to creating unsettling moods, and he uses that to full effect throughout the movie. Unfortunately, after ninety minutes of buildup, the end is something of a letdown. ➡
    • Kevin's back! My little brother Kevin, who's been visiting his fiancee Emily in Africa for the past four months (she's finishing up a 2-year stint in the Peace Corps) got home recently. When he left, he had dreadlocks down to his butt — but since he shaved them off at some point during the trip, dad was kind enough to post a picture of the 'new look'! ➡
  • 2002
    • Got 5 minutes to kill? For me, the Holy Grail of Star Wars toys was the AT-AT. Kevin and I didn't have one. The Burns kids did. I can't entirely vouch for Kevin, but I can definitely say that I was jealous. ➡
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While there’s never a good time to have an internet outage, in the midst of a pandemic when both people in the house work from home and depend on ‘net access for both work and socializing is a really, really bad time.

In other news, after two days down, we’re back online!