Oct. 28 - Ghost of a Flea celebrates his Second Blogiversary. Go thank him for his wonderful contribution to the blogosophere. Right now!

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Oct. 26 - Another legend has passed on, baritone Robert Merrill. One of my favourite recordings of La Boheme is with him as Marcello (it was a record set which I had wisely copied to tape cassettes.) It also featured Jussi Bjorling and Victoria de los Angeles.

Robert Merrill, Roberta Peters and Beverly Sills were names I cam to know as I was exposed to and learned to love opera. (The biggest influence, though, remains dear Leonard Bernstein.)

Although I couldn't find a mention of it, I am pretty sure Merrill once appeared on The Odd Couple TV series and TV Tome has these listings for him.

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Oct. 25 - Donald Sensing has posted some joyous news about the Graduation Day of a Marine.

There are some other posts at One Hand Clapping, including one about the probable impossibility of stopping nuclear proliferation.

I don't know if the good Reverend plans to begin posting daily to his blog, but I certainly hope so.

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Oct. 24 - Jack should be recuperating, but you just can't keep a newshound down. Jack says "only one entry today" but that one entry is full of links and commentary.

Jack doesn't wish Arafat "well" and has an amusing recollection on the last sighting of "bin Elvis."

Welcome back, Jack. You've been missed.

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Oct. 24 - I've done some additions to the blogroll lately:

A while ago I added:
A Chick Named Marzi,
Musing,
Blog Iran,
Cicada,
Highway 99,
No Pasaran!,
Ubique Patriam Reminisci, and
Yankee from Mississippi.

Now I've added:
The Diplomad,
A Western Heart,
Where the Hell Was I?,
INDC Journal,
The Truth About York,
The Last Amazon,
The Red Granger,
Taylor & Co.,
Spiced Sass, and
The Sundries Shack

Also, (sound the trumpets) I finally got the script around the Shotgun button fixed so it actually links to the Shotgun blog.

Lastly, there's been some scuttlebutt that bloggers should identify party affiliation and how they intend to vote.

For the record, I am registered as an Independent voter in the State of Georgia, and I already voted for President Bush by absentee ballot.

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Oct. 20 - So raising children isn't a "real job"? Well, I guess that's true, in a sense.

Read jobs have fixed hours. Real jobs pay real money. Real jobs have real vacations and honour statutory holidays.

Even had Teresa H-K been correct and First Lady Laura Bush never held a job as a schoolteacher or, let's be honest, as First Lady, she would still be among the millions of mothers who are on duty 24-hours a day, 7 days a week, with no time off for our kids' good behaviours and even in the soundest sleep being alert for the kinds of sounds that mean "sickness" or "trouble" from the kids' rooms.

We do get statutory holidays and vacations, of course. It means spending more time (on the job) with our kids.

But not having a "real job" has one, unequalled perk: we love our not-real work, our very real and often rambunctious charges and, hopefully, our co-worker(!)

And maybe that's why Laura Bush is "calm" and has a "sparkle in her eye."

Note that Teresa H-K has retracted her comments, yet she still missed the point that Laura Bush's life and experience is much closer to the norm than that of a millionairess.

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Oct. 20 -

TI estimates that the amount lost due to bribery in government procurement is at least US$ 400 billion per year worldwide.

A total of 106 out of 146 countries score less than 5 against a clean score of 10, according to the new index, published today by Transparency International, the leading non-governmental organisation fighting corruption worldwide. Sixty countries score less than 3 out of 10, indicating rampant corruption. Corruption is perceived to be most acute in Bangladesh, Haiti, Nigeria, Chad, Myanmar, Azerbaijan and Paraguay, all of which have a score of less than 2.

According to the table here (scroll down,) the three least corrupt countries are perceived to be Finland, New Zealand and Denmark, and the three most are Nigeria, Bangladesh and Haiti.

Australia is ranked 9th least corrupt, the UK 11th, Canada 12th, the USA ties with Ireland at 17th, and France and Spain tie at 22th. Russia is far down the list at 90th.

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Oct. 15 - Some quick hits before I go to work:

The voice of another American abroad! Greg writes what I think may be the best statement on the critical need for religious tolerance from his perch in Denmark.

Silicon Ninja catches Teresa Heinz-Kerry in a mistatement and points to actual, proven links of Saddam-era Iraq and terrorism in $72 million is not zero.

Paul reports that Teresa Heinz-Kerry has a dandy remedy for arthritis pains.

The fact that Heinz-Kerry is graceless woman if not a barking moonbat outspoken didn't really affect my vote: Sen. Kerry failed to win support by his own lack of merit. Nevertheless, she has provided some comedy relief in this campaign. (You go, girl! Go anywhere but to the White House ... should Kerry be elected, I predict an historical Congressional vote to duct-tape the First Lady's mouth by the end of February. When Bill Clinton promised two for the price of one I don't think this is what he had in mind ...)

I got side-tracked with this game (thanks to Flea.)

(Note that some of the following links go to blogspot so you may have to hit the refresh button to get the page to load properly.)

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Oct. 13 - I meant to start posting when I got home this morning but ended up sleeping - for a solid 9 hours. Not to be utterly selfish, but the cooler weather and kids being at school (and thus making their wonderful noises far, far away from my bedroom window) does makes it a lot easier to sleep during the day.

Anyway, I slept soundly for a glorious 9 hours. (Okay, I already mentioned that.)

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