From CNN.com:

Heavy snow kept a mountain stretch of Interstate 5 closed Thursday, as several hundred vehicles were stranded south of Bakersfield to north of Santa Clarita, the California Highway Patrol said.

I’ve driven this pass, also known as The Grapevine, and it’s hairy even under good conditions. This happens every once in a while, and because they’re not equiped to deal with this sort of thing, the traffic grinds to a halt for hours (I’ve been stuck there for hours due to severe fog in the central valley!).

From Motivational Quotes of the Day: “No man is justified in doing evil on the ground of expediency.”

From Slashdot:

E5Rebel writes “Microsoft will spend $235m in schools worldwide over the next five years, part of a plan to triple the number of students and teachers trained in its software programs to up to 270 million by 2013….[of course] If you don’t use Windows you don’t get the cash.” Microsoft has long been interested in the education of children.

Is this what it’s come down to?

• Windows is so hard to administer that they’ll pay for the IT
• Windows is losing market share to both Mac and Linux, and their willing to pay people to continue to use it?

if you’re a school, don’t get suckered by this ploy. It’s nothing more than a way for them to develop more Microsoft Monkeys.

With his recent rant against Kelly Tilghman, Al Sharpton tried to set himself up as the racial champion for professional golf. Instead of highlighting real racism, he just created a problem where there wasn’t one and called attention to himself, rather than the real problems of racism in our society today.

The real champion for racial equality in professional golf goes back more than half a century to a little known, but heroic nontheless, golfer named Bill Spiller. In 1948, the year after Jackie Robinson, he attempted (and eventually succeeded) in getting the rules changed for professional golf, clearing the way for the likes of Charlie Sifford, Lee Elder, and eventually [[Tiger]].

Sixty years ago, in January 1948, Bill Spiller and Ted Rhodes traveled to Richmond, Calif., to play in the Richmond Open. They had finished in the top 60 in the Los Angeles Open two weeks earlier and, according to tour regulations, were automatically qualified into the field at Richmond… After finishing a Tuesday practice round at Richmond CC, [they] were told by George Schneiter, the PGA’s on-site tournament representative (and himself a competitor), that they would not be allowed to play in the tournament. The reason? They were not members of the PGA of America, a requirement for competing in tournaments it co-sponsored. Catch-22! Spiller and Rhodes could not join the association, because a clause in its constitution allowed membership only to Caucasians. Spiller had heard through the rumor mill of this blatantly racist restriction but had never seen it in writing or in any other official form. He went to Richmond to find out if it was indeed the case. By virtue of his resolute curiosity, this well-kept secret was made public for the first time.

Spiller went to court, was placated, but still not allowed to play due to back room dealings (similar to the Gentleman’s Agreement in major league baseball). He never gave up, and eventually got the rules changed, and in 1961 the caucasian only clause was removed from the PGA of America’s constitution. Like Robinson, he risked everything to fight an injustice, but unlike Robinson, was never really able to enjoy the fruits of his labor.

Al Sharpton really needs to learn some lessons from Spiller, and pick fights to solve problems rather than to just himself into the spotlight.

Thanks to Wil Wheaton for posting this on his blog.

I’ve been playing jazz for 20+ years, and a fan of Paul Desmond and the Dave Brubeck Quartet for at least that long. I never understood (and still don’t!) how Paul could make what he plays in his improvisations sound so simple yet be some incredibly complex. Talent is the answer I guess. Take a look here as the quartet plays the classic Take Five:

And how about Joe Morello on drums! Have you ever seen a drummer do more with less?

I think there’s a lesson here for all players: work hard to master your instrument. Don’t try to play it cool to impress people. If you play from the heart with the talent you have, it’ll shine through.

Amazing!

From CNN.com:

A former congressman and delegate to the United Nations was indicted Wednesday as part of a terrorist fundraising ring that allegedly sent more than $130,000 to an al Qaeda and Taliban supporter who has threatened U.S. and international troops in Afghanistan.

The former Republican congressman from Michigan, Mark Deli Siljander, was charged with money laundering, conspiracy and obstructing justice for allegedly lying about lobbying senators on behalf of an Islamic charity that authorities said was secretly sending funds to terrorists.

Yet another reason the [[Republicans Are Dead to Me]].

It’s not always the Republicans… but right now it sure seems to be. Sure, over the years, the Dems have had their share of corruption, but right now it’s always the Republicans.

From CNN.com:

Remember how excited everybody was just a short while ago that this presidential campaign was the first in 80 years to be wide open, without a president or vice president in the campaign?

Dobbs is absolutely correct. They should stop calling themselves politicians, and start calling themselves pandericians ™. It really is pathetic. Is it even possible for them to actually come up with an original thought, or is that all they can do is try to out-poll the other guy and say what they think the most voters want to hear.

At least Ron Paul clearly didn’t give a damn and just said what he believed. I respect him a lot for that, even if it means that he doesn’t have a chance (and a lot of his ideas are really good, BTW).

From Slashdot:

Apple made four announcements at MacWorld Expo: the new MacBook Air, new features for the iPhone and iPod Touch, and movie rentals via iTunes from a TV without a computer involved. The new portable gets most of the attention. It is 0.76″ thick at the thickest part, tapering to 0.16″. It weighs 3 pounds and has a 13.3″ screen and full-size, backlit keyboard. Its Intel chip is the diameter of a dime and the thickness of a nickel. The MacBook Air will cost $1799 and up. Its storage is either 80 GB disk or 64 GB solid-state drive. 2 GB of memory. It has no optical drive (an external one is available for $99) and features a way to wirelessly use the optical drive of any nearby Mac or PC with the proper software installed.

This is a very cool, future looking macintosh. I’d love to get one, but the $$$ just aren’t there at the moment. But, I’ll be looking at one the next time I’m in a store. Kudos [[Apple]].

From Slashdot:

BlueMerle writes “Ars Technica is running a story about how EMI is disappointed with RIAA and ultimately they (RIAA) may disappear. ‘Is the RIAA as we know it about to disappear? As rumors continue to swirl that EMI will pull its funding from music trade groups like the RIAA and IFPI, an IFPI spokesman tells Ars that the group is in the middle of a major internal review of its operations.'” I wouldn’t bet the farm just yet.

God willing, eh? The RIAA is literallly destroying music. As far as I can tell, it only exists to make record companies money. It does absolutely nothing for music or musicians. It needs to just go away.

From Slashdot:

KDan writes to share an article he has written about what some of the key factors in recognizing a good programmer. “It’s not as easy as it sounds. CV experience is only of limited use here, because great programmers don’t always have the ‘official’ experience to demonstrate that they’re great. In fact, a lot of that CV experience can be misleading. Yet there are a number of subtle cues that you can get, even from the CV, to figure out whether someone’s a great programmer.”

So, are you a good programmer? I read the list, and I’d have to say I agree completely with everything he says. To summarize:

• Passion
• Self-teaching and love of learning
• Intelligence
• Hidden experience
• Variety of technologies
• Formal qualifications

So, if you’re a software engineer, how do you rank yourself?