T. G. I. F.

It should mean Thank God I'm Free. Let's face it; there isn't one high and mighty schmuck born in this country that has an iota of what it's like to live in a repressed country. And it may not be much longer that anyone can say that.

The recent sting that captured the six men who were going to storm Fort Dix in New Jersey and kill as many of our fighting men as possible makes me wonder. The weeks after 9/11 brought on a paranoia that threatened the lives or at best, the health of anyone who looked like an Arab. Forget the fact that they were born in this country and so were their parents.

Everyone here should thank God we have organizations like the ACLU. They'll never allow the wholesale roundup of possible insurgents like happened to the Japanese/Americans during the second World War.

I agree in part with the tenets of the NRA. Every man or woman should be allowed to own a pistol or a shotgun if they wish but no one in their right mind should be allowed to own an assault weapon; collector or not. This is where the NRA needs to bend. Assault weapons should be banned 100%.

George Orwell's book, 1984, reflected a world where everyone was watched and had no privacy. A world where wrongdoers were severely punished. Judge Dredd came from a world where wrongdoers were judged and condemned instantly by judges on motorcycles. No lawyers allowed.

Are we headed this way? Seems unlikely to me. But there is always the threat of Star Chamber justice by law enforcers who are just fed up with the criminal element perverting the law to give them an unjust advantage.

Think about it!

T.G.I.F. and thank God I live in a free country.

Rules Men Wish Women Knew...

1. If you think you're fat, you probably are. Don't ask us.

2. Learn to work the toilet seat: if it's up put it down.

3. Don't cut your hair. Ever.

4. Birthdays, Valentines, and Anniversaries are not quests to see if he can find the perfect present, again!

5. If you ask a question you don't want an answer to, expect an answer you don't want to hear.

6. Sometimes, he's not thinking about you. Live with it.

7. Don't ask him what he's thinking about unless you are prepared to discuss such topics as navel lint, the shotgun formation and monster trucks.

8. Get rid of your cat. And no, it's not different, it's just like every other cat.

9. Dogs are better than ANY cats. Period.

10. Sunday = Sports. It's like the full moon or the changing of the tides. Let it be.

11. Shopping is not sport.

12. Anything you wear is fine. Really.

13. You have enough clothes.

14. You have too many shoes.

15. Crying is blackmail. Use it if you must, but don't expect us to like it.

16. Your brother is an idiot, your ex-boyfriend is an idiot and your Dad probably is too.

17. Ask for what you want. Subtle hints don't work.

18. No, he doesn't know what day it is. He never will. Mark anniversaries on a calendar.

19. Yes, pissing standing up is more difficult than peeing from point blank range. We're bound to miss sometimes.

20. Most guys own two to three pairs of shoes-what makes you think we'd be any good at choosing which pair, out of thirty, would look good with your dress?

21. Yes and No are perfectly acceptable answers.

22. A headache that lasts for 17 months is a problem. See a doctor.

Web Comics in 3D

Web comics have been around for some time now. I myself am working on one that will be up soon. The quality of these comics runs from okay to why hasn't this person been offered a job in the industry. The artwork and story are excellent in most.

What is becoming even more popular are comics rendered in 3D. Software is becoming rapidly less expensive and much more powerful and intuitive to the renders needs. While the rendering software is great you still need other software such as Photoshop or Illustrator to do color changes, special effects and touchups and to add lettering.

Web sites like Drunk Duck and Comic Space and many others are filling up with a wide variety of 3D comics. These run from Comedy to Science Fiction to Drama series that are long running and are building a following.

It's doubtful that these 3D comics will rival and/or replace the current crop of print comics in the near future but I do see them showing up on CD with enough popularity to urge the distributors to list them in their sales catalogues or available through the likes of Amazon, Ebay or through PayPal.

Will there be a day when a young student props his Ipod up behind his textbook in study hall and tunes in to his favorite 3D comic? One can only surmise.

Happy reading.

Inexhaustible fuel source

With the rising price of crude oil comes a rising cost in everything downstream from it: gasoline, heating oil and electricity. There's a way to exploit an inexhaustible source that will be here long after all the oil deposits are depleted.

Ask yourself this: what powers the space shuttle? Hydrogen and Oxygen. And what is water made of? The same thing. So what's the problem? It takes a lot of energy to separate Hydrogen from Oxygen but if industry would put their shoulder to the wheel they could come up with less costly ways to separate the two.

Think of it. A power station on the banks of a river drawing water from the source, separating it into it's two components then feeding it into a furnace that creates super-heated steam that runs turbines that create electricity. And what do we get from the combustion? Distilled water and no pollutants. The combustion chamber would have to be a closed system. Drawing in outside air with it's various gases would create another pollution we don't need.

As the system evolved and was made more efficient I can see the power company selling off excess distilled water instead of separating it again to be re-fed into the furnaces. And there's no way we could ever run out of fuel.

Also, consider this. Power companies keep standby generators ready to help out when the demand for power is high in the summer when air conditioners and fans are sucking up a lot of energy. These standby generators are driven by electric motors. A percentage of the energy from the turbine driven generators is drawn off to power these motors that are connected by a shaft to the generators that produce the extra energy when needed.

Consider this; why can't the generator be plugged into the motor that is running it? It's illogical to think that 100% of the energy produced would be needed to run the drive motor. In theory we would have nothing but free energy. I'm no expert but I'm sure the experts could figure out the whys and wherefores in making it work.

Why aren't the Government and industry pursuing the research that would bring all this about?

The simple answer is we aren't desperate enough. We're not in danger of running out of oil in the near future and even when that runs out there are thousands of cubic miles of coal underground that could be turned into fuel. The Germans were doing it over 60 years ago. Only when they've fouled the air so badly and we're dying of various lung failures will someone think there must have been a better way.

But then, this is just IMHO.

Take a deep breath for me, won't you?

Huh!

Not too long ago I was standing before a vending machine trying to make up my mind which row of useless calories I wanted to waste my hard earned buck on. I was curious as to the raised bumps on each of the numbers on the keypad. Then it hit me... braille. Braille? Of what earthly use could this be to a customer who couldn't see the product in the first place? I was pleased that the machines manufacturer was making the products as handicap accessible as possible but this leaned toward overkill. Not a well thought out idea. It was amusing in an ironic sort of way.

Have a good day.

You're No Longer Cool When...

I got this from a friend some months ago who got it from somewhere on the web who got it from somewhere and so on and so on and so on... Anyway I doubt there's any copyright infringement here. Enjoy.

You find yourself listening to talk radio.

You daughter says she got pierced and you look at her ears.

The pattern on your shorts and couch match.

You fondly remember your powder blue leisure suit.

You think Tragically Hip is when a middle-aged man gets a new sports car, hair piece and a 20 year old girlfriend.

You criticize the kids of today for their satanic suicide-inducing music, forgetting that you rocked to Alice Cooper and Black Sabbath.

You call the police on a noisy party next door instead of grabbing beer and joining it.

You turn down free tickets to a rock concert because you have to work the next day.

When grass is something that you cut, not cultivate.

When jogging is something you do to your memory.

Getting a little action means your prune juice is working.

All the cars behind you flash their headlights.

You remember the "Rolling Stones" as a rock group not a corporation.

You bought your first car for the same price you paid for your son's new running shoes.

You actually ASK for your father's advice.

You don't know how to operate a fax machine.

When someone mentions SURFING you picture waves and a surf board.

Why?

Why do people ask questions they don't want answers too?

I've been to all kinds of forums where members can post their writing or artwork or pictures, even music. They ask the membership for critiques and when they roll in and if they aren't favorable they become defensive and reply, "How dare you..." or words to that effect.

I discount the sadistic types who just like to bash everyone's work. They're evil incarnate. But why jump all over the honest person who feels you need a serious edit of your stuff? That's why you asked for the critique in the first place; to make your stuff better than it was. And why belittle the person who just wants to help with the an asinine "doh!" Homer's become a part of our everyday language. How droll; how sad for all of us.

Why do women who complain about men staring at their breasts wear a T-shirt with several lines of type emblazoned on it?

This always confounds me. They place a novel on their chest and you have to walk by them several times to get to the punch line or in desperation, stop them and hold them still till you can finish the prose. And they have the nerve to complain. God help us when they start producing those shirts in braille.

Why do women who say they only want a nice guy run off with bad boys?

I'm a firm believer that women only want bad boys no matter what they say to the contrary. They must equate nice guy with dull. Bad boys are unpredictable: they lie, cheat, bend the law, make women feel like property and ultimately break their hearts. Do they think they can tame him? Get real. Ain't gonna happen. If it's just the thrill they get out of it it'd be safer psychologically if they stood up while riding a roller coaster. And if they did tame the guy then they wouldn't want him. Go figure.

Why do men who dump women get jealous when they find new boyfriends?

Let it go Ace! You cut her loose so you could explore new territory; let her do the same. If you want more than one woman in reserve all I can say to you is move to Utah.

Why: if soft chewy cookies turn hard when you leave them out to go stale and hard cookies turn soft don't they revert to their original state if you leave them out longer?

Points to ponder IMHO.

Have a great day.