About sp34n119w
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When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle. - Edmund Burke
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Tropical Blogs
Tropical Weather Stickers®
Personal Weather Stations
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Chapman Farms
Santa Paula, CA
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| Elevation: |
239 ft
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| Température: |
59.0 ° F
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| Point de rosée: |
52.8 ° F
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| Humidité: |
80% |
| Vent: |
Calme |
| Rafale de vent: |
0.0 mph
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Updated: 23:10 PDT le 20 mai 2013
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APRSWXNET Santa Paula CA US
Santa Paula, CA
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| Elevation: |
291 ft
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| Température: |
62.0 ° F
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| Point de rosée: |
54.0 ° F
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| Humidité: |
75% |
| Vent: |
Calme |
| Rafale de vent: |
0.0 mph
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Updated: 22:49 PDT le 20 mai 2013
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RAWS ANACAPA ISLAND CA US
Port Hueneme, CA
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| Elevation: |
276 ft
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| Température: |
61.0 ° F
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| Point de rosée: |
57.0 ° F
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| Humidité: |
86% |
| Vent: |
15.0 mph
from the NNO |
| Rafale de vent: |
18.0 mph
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Updated: 22:23 PDT le 20 mai 2013
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Page: 1 | 2 — Blog Index
First I would offer the following statements as axiomatic:
1. Languages evolve.
2. The purpose of language is to communicate.
So, if you wish to communicate with a few stodgy old pedants, you need to learn Latin and figure out what petitio principii means. If you're talking to anyone else, i. e. most speakers of American English, I think that you would do well to take the expression "begs the question" at face value.
Otherwise you run the risk of sounding like the techno-weenies who speak entirely in acronyms. Their attitude seems to be that, if you are in with the in crowd, then you will know and understand all the acronyms. All other members of the audience can safely be accorded ridicule and disdain.
Inappropriate acronym usage could become a second paragraph in my "I Hate When That Happens" lament and the offenders aren't limited to techno types. When the entire audience can reasonably be expected to understand the acronym then it is a great time saving shorthand; otherwise, it is just counterproductive and rude.
Allow me to illustrate my inclination to completely abandon a corrupted term with another example.
As a fellow computer professional you may already know the term but for those who don't here is an excellent description of the original concept: "Yak shaving" is a programmer's slang term for the distance between a task's start and completion and the tangential tasks between you and the solution. If you ever wanted to mail a letter, but couldn't find a stamp, and had to drive your car to get the stamp, but also needed to refill the tank with gas, which then let you get to the post office where you could buy a stamp to mail your letter - then you've done some yak shaving.
There are now two usages of the term with a nearly opposite meaning - yak shaving - Wiktionary. There is the original concept of "apparently unrelated but necessary" vs. "apparently related but unnecessary" rendering the term worse than useless for purposes of communication.
It was on Friday, I only went on Saturday.
Right now we have you alls left over weather front. Not much rain yet, but good gosh it's windy. If my toy anemometer reads 11mph it is probably close to thirty. The higher the wind speed the more the accuracy degrades.
Happy Equality Day! :)
Looking at the various rain gauges hereabouts, I'd say we received just over an inch of rain with that storm. Also, it is cold.
There was some snow on the top of the Topa Topa mountains yesterday - very pretty.
Karen - yep, cold! That's a respectable amount of rain for a spring storm. I didn't see any of the promised lightning, either, but that's okay. Still fun and some nice cloud formations on Sunday.
Glad to hear you had a good time at dinner and hope the party went well, too :)
gg - wah! I wish I could've been there with y'all, any of the days! I'm glad you had fun and I saw your trophy this morning - what a riot! :)
Knitters can be very nerdy, I'm learning, LOL
LC - Thank you! I feel validated!
Thanks, too, for the rain update. It has been a disappointing season and it was nice to be surprised, even if it was less than a miracle.
That's an interesting example of language drift within a community (if I saw that term I'd think of shearing for spinning yarn, but, whatever) and reminds me of another. You know I've been on this kick to learn about biology for a few years and it turns out that that's another community where that kind of difference occurs. I guess the various sub-disciplines end up using similar terms in very different ways, sometimes with totally incompatible meanings. Also, for a long time, biologists were isolated from each other – didn't meet or read each others' papers, especially if they were in different countries, but even if in different areas of the same country. Weird, huh? So, nowadays, with the internets and all, there is occasional confusion (and outright outrage) over terminology. Fascinating.
Bogon - Language does change over time. Language is for communication.
Latin is not English. It's a different language. If someone speaks Latin/Russian/ Arabic/Tagalog/etc. to me there will be little communication between us. Using a word/phrase from a different language is entirely different from using an English word (or phrase) incorrectly.
"Banding grubs he ulterior fecund ask trill forth dished poultry."
Perfectly good English words in a sentence. My spellchecker likes them all just fine. I used my own grammar rules but, that's not important – you can figure it out. Right? ;)
Acronyms are also a separate issue. I agree that they can be used to obscure meaning but they are also useful shorthand for the in-group. It doesn't bother me so much. If a group does not want to be understood by me then I probably don't care what they're saying, anyway. If I do, I'll look up the acronyms myself (which is what I would do for other-language words that I want to know the meaning of). This is all fundamentally different from taking a phrase with a known and very specific meaning and using it to mean something else entirely.
What is the "face value" of the phrase, "begs the question"?
It isn't that folks know what "begs the question" means but have decided that the phrase can have a better use with another meaning, a meaning that is needed. It's that they don't know what the phrase means to begin with, they are guessing at what it means, so use it incorrectly by accident, and the phrase that they really want ("raises the question", usually) is perfectly useful in itself. They are making a mistake, not changing the language to increase communication. This misuse of the phrase actually decreases communication.
It's like Spanglish for Spanish speakers.
Favorite example: The Spanish word for bookstore sounds like the English word for library (both derived from Latin, of course) so people call the library a bookstore. Then, the Spanish word for library sounds like it could mean bookstore (Latin, again) so that's how it's used. It isn't correct and if a Spanish pro writer used those words in those ways (outside of quotes) s/he would be rightly condemned for failing to communicate meaning.
Just felt like ranting today, Bogon - it's not about you and I appreciate your input. I do see a distinction but could be totally wrong here :)
So, it was either going to be a rant about this phrase or about the pro-death movement. Figured my wufriends would prefer this.
…..
Enough with the ranting ...
Spend a moment thinking about our place in the sun on this day when the whole world gets to see (approximately ;) ) the same amount of our star's life-giving light.
From urban dictionary:
This definition seems more tractable.
I also checked on the etymology. Sometimes the history of a word can serve to break a tie when mutually contradictory meanings are possible.
In this case the available evidence doesn't seem to help much.
sp - By "face value" I meant the meaning of the phrase you would get if you parsed each word naively, with common knowledge of English words but without specialized knowledge of the history of logic or rhetoric.
Bogon - well, I guess that skit helps in that it did seem pointless ... LOL
Still makes me think of yarn, though.
Okay, but, the meaning of "begs" in the phrase "begs the question" is not synonymous with the meaning of "raises" in the phrase "raises the question", which is how it is most often mis-used. That's all I'm saying. No more ranting ;)
.....
I am also not ranting on yet another State's Bill of Death but, finally, saw a doctor's take on all this (where the heck are all the doctors, anyway? The AMA? Helloooooo) at, of all places, Whatever. There are over 600 comments and he'll be turning them off later this evening. I haven't read any of them so can't vouch for the wu-safety level but Scalzi's pretty good with the banhammer.
Anyway, it's a call to action that I feel doctors should implement - I don't know why they aren't talking about it. Maybe I've just missed it?
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How about an Evil Scientist for today's fun? Try Victor Stenger at HoPuff from his talk in Orlando.
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Lovely day here! Warm-ish and sunny and not too breezy, for a change. They say rain again on Sunday! And marine layer tonight, I think.
I'm drinking the most marvelous tea, right now. It is from the Republic of Tea, called Ginger Peach, and the jam of the same name is also very good. Normally I don't like flavored teas - they tend to give me a headache no matter how tasty they are - but this is really nice.
I guessed Ylee's mystery webcam last night and dug around to confirm. Got the right country pretty easily but not the town, of course. I don't want to ruin it for anyone else so I'm not saying ;)
I installed Firefox a few days ago, and ABP. Why didn't anyone tell me how awesome it is?!?! What kind of friends are wu, anyway?!?!?
Done rambling. For now.
Happy Middle of the Week!
sp, I must have a false memory of urging you to try Firefox to see how you liked it. :^/
Like shooting fish in a barrel ;)
And twice in one blog - w00t! LOL
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I came to see if the goes thingies were updating, yet. Nyet. Maybe tomorrow and hopefully before STORMWATCH time :)
I recommend Ubuntu. The interface will feel very familiar to a Windows user.
You can run Ubuntu within your current system with the Windows installer (Wubi). That way, you can install and uninstall Ubuntu in the same way as any other Windows application. It's simple and safe.
Yes, LC, your (oft repeated) recommendation to try Firefox was finally heeded ... but, Linux, again? I suppose I'll eventually run out of interesting hobbies to try ...
harhar ;)
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I was actually perfectly happy with IE7. Then I started having trouble several months ago on some sites so decided to move to IE8. I hate IE8. I can't even articulate why I hate IE8, only that I do. I honestly think it has more to do with HTML5 (whatever the heck that is) or some other new webby stuff but IE8 definitely wasn't handling it effectively, whatever it is.
Firefox is nice and smooth, for sure.
More, there is a website that I've been avoiding because of really insanely stupid crazy-making ads, and abp (used with Firefox) makes that site accessible. Yea, more time-wasting! lol
FTR: I have no real issue with ads - I'm happy to have content providers make money - just don't want to see jiggly fat or rotten teeth when I'm reading or watching something online. Honestly, I have mirrors in my house.
Well, now I see no ads, unless I specifically say it's okay. Who wins? Not the jiggly fat people. Not the content providers who are stuck with the jiggly fat people.
So it goes.
.....
Speaking of ... GOES is back on track and we can see our next swirly in all its spinny goodness. Wonder what happened?
Our doppler radar (LOX) is meant to be out of service some time soon. The newspaper didn't provide a date and I haven't looked elsewhere, but, they said it would be for 10-12 days for a software upgrade. I wonder if it will make my rain show up, for a change.
I'm looking forward to more rain this weekend but not the cold :(
It's good to have a week between rains - the ground is wet but, of course, not anywhere near saturated, and the next little bit should soak in nicely.
Okay, nothing else random today ... except that Firefox also has a built-in spellchecker so I can't pretend that a word like "spinny" is for real, anymore. The Red Squiggly Line calls me out.
*sigh*
Equinox geometry interferes with geostationary satellite communications:
One effect of equinoctial periods is the temporary disruption of communications satellites. For all geostationary satellites, there are a few days around the equinox when the sun goes directly behind the satellite relative to Earth (i.e. within the beam-width of the ground-station antenna) for a short period each day. The Sun's immense power and broad radiation spectrum overload the Earth station's reception circuits with noise and, depending on antenna size and other factors, temporarily disrupt or degrade the circuit. The duration of those effects varies but can range from a few minutes to an hour. (For a given frequency band, a larger antenna has a narrower beam-width and hence experiences shorter duration "Sun outage" windows.
Sulphur Mountain radar is VTX. LOX is the NWS Forecast Office for Los Angeles/Oxnard.
Didn't even do that one on purpose, LOL!
Pretty sure I knew the other info, too, but I'm obviously having a bad brain day. Thanks for making up for it, LC :)
GOES loops are all caught up now. Pretty streaming clouds over the mountains. I have high hopes for that big spinner.
Think I'll go seek some brain lubricant ...
Happy Weekend! :)
I have Ubuntu loaded on my secondary HD as a backup in case Win7 bites the dust. Considering downloading Win8 beta(If it walks like a beta and talks like a beta, it's a beta) but with 1.5mps DSL, it's like a 3-4 hour download! :P
Hope your weekend is going well!
And, I see you finally downloaded Firefox! I've been using Firefox for years. I love the built-in security features and I also use ABP. Love the fact that it has a spell checker built in. Of course, it still doesn't recognize things like unusual screen names, but at least I am able to get the obvious.
My school district has installed Firefox on all our computers. Of course, the bad part of it (well, it wouldn't really matter if it was IE), is I have to sign onto the computer as myself to do any updates. Teachers and students - when they are signed on as themselves, or our generic student log on - can't do any updates. So, about every couple of weeks, I have to sign on as me (at least on all our lab computers - over 60), to complete the updates. That goes for Adobe and Java as well.
I'm trying to create a maintenance schedule for the teacher's laptops, and have a grade level bring them up to me at every Tuesday staff meeting so I can update theirs. It takes a while! It's funny though, since most of our staff meetings are held in the media center, I'll have 5-6 laptops set up on my counter, and I'm trying to update all at the same time! Whew!
So - send some more rain down here. As long as I'm housebound, might as well get some good from it!
Ylee - I guess I figured your readers deserved more time and, if they are like me, they'd have read the comments and had it ruined before getting the chance to think about it! I needed a puzzle that eve and appreciate the challenge :)
Then Sandi got it by the time I went back to brag, LOL
Regarding operating systems - what I need is more computers to play with. I can't stand the thought of messing this one up and not having it to use!
WTS - looks that way, so far! On radar it looks like you are about to get some but I haven't even checked to see where it's going. The discussion has been pretty vague on the track leading up to today.
They had been saying for a few days that south facing slopes would get some extra and, though we are not technically a south facing slope, that usually does mean more for SP. Hurray!
Hope it makes it there - you and your lovely flowers need it!
Karen - see above, lol
Funny, I haven't noticed any unusual wind, but I just turned on the weather stations layer in WunderMap and the wind barbs are pointing every which way. From the water vapor loop it looks like our spinner has made the turn and is aiming to come onshore quite nearby - and that may bring you some rain! Sure hope so. We're agreed that if it's going to be gloomy and cold it dang well better be raining!
Is there no way to network those computers and do them all at once? That seems like a lot of extra work for you! Wait ... maybe that's a good thing :)
.....
I am happy to have an excuse to stay in today. Have some things on the dvr that are of interest to more than just me so might get those done. That would be nice - so hard to find the time!
Happy Sunday, Happy Weather :)
LOL
Looking around the gauges it seems we have received more than 1.5" and it is raining again.
Only bad news I've seen so far are some trees down, so that's good.
The discussion says another front on Tuesday but probably no rain this far south.
Crazy, man. Crazy :)
Woodland Hills received over 1¼" so far with more coming down right now.
That's okay - lots of rain! Happy you got your share, LC :)
Hope teh doggies managed okay.
My garage cat decided to spend the day out yesterday and the sneaky little thing got enough food (when I wasn't around to close the door) that he stayed out until after midnight. Came in all wet and bedraggled and yelled at me like it was my fault!
Now it's nice and sunny so what's he doing? He's curled up on his pillow! Stoopid cat.
Well, he did go out for a bit this morning to check out the birds - they were making quite a bit of noise while enjoying the after effects of the rain. They were as loud as SBKaren's (she has a video in her new blog of shore birds going nuts).
I'm about to go out and enjoy the after effects myself :)
Happy Monday!
I don't have the heart to drag her when she looks so happy so I stay and sun myself too.
Thanks to an evening break in the rain and radar that allowed me to anticipate it the doggies got their long walk without having to get their fur wet.
Also the Cowania Mexicana or Cliff Rose is all in bud. They have a very sweet smell to them when they are in bloom.
I don't think it got cold enough to hurt the buds on my cactus. Only got down to 30 last night. All my cactus are in bud, a good month early.
Here is a pic of the Cowania Mexicana
Roxie, too :) So happy you are all out enjoying Spring!
The rest will fall into place.
LC - Glad the doggies got their walkies! Radar is awesome. How did we get by without it? Carried umbrellas, I guess, LOL
Things do look greener and I'm thinking the hills, anyway, will get some wildflowers worthy of a hike. The brown should turn to mulch, at this point, and today's green will become fire fuel. Same ol' same ol'.
calpoppy - you came in while I was typing - but I see you!
I think you've got a shot at some flowers, don't you?
The Joshua trees ... do they hang onto water for awhile before blooming?
How do you know the name of that plant? Those are common and I've never heard the name. So I went to wiki - Purshia mexicana and also found Purshia stansburyana - and ended up thinking that I would be a poor Botanist.
Love the flower, though! :)
Are they related to Manzanita? Doesn't it kind of look like it? Let me just ... oh. No. Not even close, LOL Back to "not-a-botanist"!
I don't know why that grabbed my attention - probably because I've got stuff to do and am procrastinating - but, thanks for bringing it!
And keep us posted on the wildflower watch :)
.....
This is kinda funny - I was checking youtube to see if a video has been uploaded yet. It hasn't but there is a static picture where the video should be - they tried to upload it and it didn't work and they haven't fixed it so there is a non-video in place. Weird, huh? That's not what's funny. What's funny is that the non-video has 793 comments! Plus 42 likes and 23 dislikes LOL! That's probably more than they'd have if it had uploaded properly.
'k, I did say "kinda" funny. Just hadn't seen that before.
Done procrastinating!
Data source: Los Angeles Pierce College Weather Station
Graphs created with LibreOffice, a free download.
In answer to possible questions by those who didn't know:
As a result of the fork of OpenOffice.org into LibreOffice, and the resulting loss of developers, Oracle announced in April 2011 that it was terminating the commercial development of OpenOffice.org.
The graphs really show how weird this season has been!
So, OpenOffice is going away? I'll read up on it - thanks for the links.
calpoppy - one plant was described as a "tree" and the other a "shrub" so maybe that's the difference? In pics they seem identical, but, for me, that's often the case! It may be that the name Cowania Mexicana or Cliff Rose is so well known that it's easier for suppliers to call them all that. Who'd know? lol
Now I have a hankering to stop by the native plant shop in Ventura and see if they know.
It's catching, this "need to know" stuff.
.....
Nothing random today. Just stopping at WU to lurk and to say hello before I head out. Hello! :)
Hopefully, calpoppy, you get an answer - I'm plumb out of avenues.
I hadn't been through there before - it's right next to a place I do shop so I see it from the parking lot - and they have some really nice native plants. Lots of color and variety of sizes and shapes. Makes me wish I had a yard to grow things!
Until I consider the effort required, LOL
That was my adventure today :)
The current version of LibreOffice, 3.5.1, was released 2012-03-15.
Oracle Corporation donated OpenOffice to the Apache Software Foundation where it is in the Apache Incubator. That basically means the OpenOffice project is still working out how to get things done within the Apache Software Foundation framework.
LibreOffice was created from OpenOffice by members of the OpenOffice project. Development of LibreOffice is progressing much faster than OpenOffice and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future (- The Bright Future of LibreOffice | PCWorld Business Center).
I made the switch when I found LibreOffice offered better compatibility with Microsoft Office 2007 and 2010, Microsoft XML files (.docx, .xlsx and .pptx) and support for .svg image files.
Here are the features and improvements of LibreOffice.
.....
Weather is back to dull - cloudy but pleasant enough.
Let's play random!
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The Rock Beyond Belief event at Fort Bragg, NC, is this Saturday and Sgt. Griffith is getting excited and nervous.
Yesterday he had a post about how the brass won't let them collect food for the homeless. Never mind that the evangelicals collected money for themselves at their own event on base. Collecting food for the homeless is and "illegal fundraiser". Anyway, he has some interesting stats on homeless vets and the source is linked there AND that's why I put the link here. The rest of the post may not interest you but, really, if you've got any sense that "support our troops" means more than slapping a yellow ribbon sticker on your SUV, you should read those stats.
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TSA screening at airports - it's a hassle but it keeps us safe from terrorists. Right? Nobody believes that but we don't do anything about it, either. 7 Billion of our dollars.
Found at PZ's blog pharyngula, an old (2008) article wherein a journalist tells us how to get around security easily.
The guy who helped him do that is in a debate with the head of the TSA over at the Economist and oh, my, that's good stuff.
.....
That's enough, I think. Have a great day! :)
I just heard of Where's George? and it looks like a lot of fun and would be interesting to do with kids, I think. You can track your money - with help from others.
I saw the name on a bill some months ago and had no idea what it was so I just spent it, lol Next time, I'll enter it!
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A few moments ago I was walking past the TV and heard about keepamerica.com which purports to be a list of all things made in America. The site is slow loading, right now, and I expect that has to do with the fact that it is on TV, right now. Also, I'm not sure what it's all about but the main page is a contest and I can't get past it.
Okay ... finally got in. Going to give them the benefit of the doubt on the sluggishness because of the free ad time on TV and check it out. Let me know if you do and what you think.
[And now I'm getting a security warning!]
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The Delta 4 launch looks like it might go but I won't get a view through the fog :( Well, maybe, when it gets up to ... right in front of the sun! I'll keep my eyes peeled but not going to travel specifically to watch for it.
Launch time = 3:38 PM local
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Weather is blah. Not too cold and not windy and overcast most of the day.
Happy Thursday :)
DELAY. Launch of the Delta 4 rocket has been pushed back to Monday, April 2. The extra few days will give engineers more time to complete an assessment of the Delta 4's second stage engine, according to United Launch Alliance.
Liftoff on Monday will be at 4:04 p.m. local time (7:04 p.m. EDT; 2304 GMT).
http://www.spaceflightnow.com/delta/d359/status.h tml
The computers are networked but they can't push out updates, because I've noticed that not all computers update at the same time. I have a desktop and laptop at home, and I'll get update notices at different times. Weird huh?
Unfortunately the extra work does not mean more time for me, it just means I have to squeeze in whatever I have to do in the time I have. :(
This was a week to remember....or not. Nothing terrible happened, just very unusually busy. I'm so glad that today, Thursday, is my Friday!
I was talking to my two aides this week and saying that I could stay quite busy just taking care of tech issues on campus and not teach a bit. But I do teach. Unfortunately, I know my hours will never grow because I am parent funded. But - because I am parent funded I am not dependent on the budget. I know - weird!
Well said and I could expand on that but I won't in a comment on your blog. ;^)
I did read those stats and as a small but important gesture along those lines our Senator Boxer introduced a bill that encourages the President to issue a proclamation each year designating March 29 as “Welcome Home Vietnam Veterans Day.” By sheer coincidence I spent half of yesterday to visit one of the traveling Walls.
.....
Karen - because you are parent funded I'm thinking it's good to be busy - not that they don't know how valuable you are, already, only that it adds to your essentiality :)
Hope you are enjoying a rest this weekend!
LC - well, yes. Always more to say on that and it should be said whenever possible, I think.
Thanks for mentioning the wall and, elsewhere, your thoughts on your experience with it.
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It's a TED talk on liquid metal batteries! What could be more fun?!?!
It's the Reason Rally in a nutshell! No speakers - just a nice voice-over and video.
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Hope WU all are having a great weekend! :)
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