Thanks, Dad

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Last night, I came home and found several boxes waiting for me. One contained a new clock radio, to replace the one that could only wake me up with staticky renditions of Burl Ives singing annoying Christmas music. And it plays CDs and will lull you to sleep with background noise like the sound of ocean waves breaking on the beach or running streams. (Last night, I fell asleep to crickets chirping in the forest.) In another box was a Star Trek DVD - the entirety of Season Two of TNG. Very nice - I watched the episode last night where Counselor Troi gets impregnated by an alien and Wesley Crusher decides to stay on board the Enterprise instead of leaving to go hang out with his mother at Starfleet Medical.

And then there was a new backpack. Just in time. It replaces the old ratty one with the torn straps that I got at the IAB conference a couple years ago. It's really nice and it has padding to accommodate my monster 17" Toshiba laptop. It's even got a little holder on the front for my Treo. Very nice.

Thanks, Dad.

Let's Change The FCC's Name

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Since the vast, vast majority of the FCC's enforcement of indecency standards result from complaints from the Parents Television Council, I propose we change the name of the government agency in order to more accurately reflect what it is that they do. Perhaps we should call the FCC "the enforcement arm of the PTC" and make this the preferred term by which bloggers refer to it...

The MediaWeek story I reference above makes claims that FCC Chair Michael Powell might have been unaware of the source of the deluge of complaints. In that case, he deserves to be the permanent keeper of the Invisible Conceptual Idiot Baton. If it turns out he did know about this sad fact, he should resign (and quickly).

Pull!

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skeet.jpg
Pull!

Broke away for a few hours on Sunday to do some skeet shooting with Craig, Dennis and Rob. This is becoming a fairly regular ritual. A while ago, we got a trap from the local sporting goods store, but the legs of the base proved too flimsy to handle the torque of the thrower, so Dennis took the destroyed legs off of it and welded the launcher to an old tire. Works great now.

Dennis bought a new Mossberg, same as Craig's. I'm still sticking with my Winchester automatic. We stocked up on clay targets at the range's store, and Wal-Mart is still selling the Federal and Winchester target rounds very cheap. All in all, I'd say we went through 2 1/2 boxes of targets between the four of us.

Craig was off for most of the day. Dennis was looking good, hitting the overwhelming majority of his doubles. I'd never been shooting with Rob before, but his Daddy obviously taught him right. He's got a great stance, terrific technique and he follows all safety precautions to a T. I did well, starting off slow but I was hitting all my doubles by the end of the day.

One of these days, I'd like to get a trap that can throw birds and rabbits simultaneously. They're not very expensive, but you get burned on the shipping because the sit-down models weigh so much.

We may start looking into some club memberships in the area. I'd like to do some pheasant or quail hunting at some point.