my excuse for not posting

no, the dog didn't eat my work. much more creative: I was in the hospital for nine days and at home in bed for two weeks after that. I've finally got enough strength to get back into the groove -- tried a few days of work last week part time but was too tired and sick to really make a go of it. anyway, here's what happened...

what you're lookin' at there is a healed up case of "severe cellulitus". starting at my elbow, most of my arm swelled up to twice normal size. I was running a fever of usually 102, but it peaked at 105. when I eventually went to the ER, they admitted me into the hospital and said "you're not going home tonight". cause was unknown - I didn't get bit or scratched. suspicion was that it was MRSA and for a while, possibly flesh eating bacteria. luckily, whatever it was slowly was defeated by some heavy duty IV antibiotics: vancomycin and about four other expensive brews.

the good news is I seem to be making a complete recovery (just taking a long time). the bad news (for you) is that these nasty germs are out in the community now and there's not much you can do to prevent the same thing from happening to you.
apparently these infections are occurring quite frequently now...

Bush's "plan" to "save" social security...

I say "plan" because he doesn't really have a plan (not publicly available anyway) in the sense that people normally would define "plan". what he has is a list of talking points about the problem and calls for help for a solution:

"...I'll tell you this: If this federal government doesn't act, your bill, your payroll taxed are going to have to go up a lot in order to pay the promises made to me. Or the government is going to have to slash the benefits. Or the government is going to have to make dramatic cuts in other programs. And so I see a problem. I think the math is clear. And so now is the time to get something done.

And so I stood up in front of the United States at my State of the Union address and said to the Congress, here's the problem. And I'm going to put some ideas on the table, ideas that I didn't necessarily think of...good ideas about different ways to permanently fix the problem. And that's what Congress must do; it must permanently fix the problem..."
"And so now is the time to bring people together from both parties to have a permanent fix. And all ideas are on the table. And I'm looking forward to discussing any good idea with a Democrat or a Republican."
-- Bush's "plan" speech 4/15/05

OK George, I'm putting this on the table for you: cut medical benefits, keep drug costs high, increase subsidies to the junk food and tobacco agribusiness. sick Americans won't live long enough to soak up our precious trust fund! instead of pay-as-you-go, we'll call it "pay-till-you-go" :)

the GOP website says it's the Democrats fault. oh, that's constructive :p

what does the liberal media establishment say?

"...Eyeing the failure of President Bill Clinton's health care plan in 1994, which sank in part from its complexity, Bush has avoided laying out a specific plan whose details would be open to attack. But this has caused problems for its supporters, who say Democrats have filled in the blanks. "It's one thing to say, 'No, that's not what the plan does,' " said David John, a private-account supporter at the conservative Heritage Foundation. "It's another to say, 'We don't think that's what the plan does, but we don't know for sure.' "
--SF Chronical 3/4/05

so that's why there's no plan!

can this be true? let's check the whitehouse web page. yep, there's no plan there!
ok, a little more searching and I found the SS website
does show somebody with a real plan -- it's congressman Paul Ryan of Wisconsin. here he separates fact from fiction. hmmm, maybe? good luck dude!

credits to
habitatgirl, Pursuit, and gothamimage.
they have done good writeups on the subject, generated plenty of responses and made me wonder. what is W up to?

test your prejudices...

"Happily Blind with 20/20 Vision
Here's an interesting (and possibly controversial) test hosted at Harvard's website: Implicit Association Test. The theory is that we subconsciously have prejudices and preferences, whether racial, age, gender, or some other category that divides us into groups."

thx to The Slacker Shack for the info.

that reminds me. I wonder if Harvard Pres. Lawrence Summers would be willing to take the test? you heard he hates women right?