Thursday, July 31, 2003

It bugs me that when a news organization, such as Fox News Channel, talks about the Air Marshal program they run stock video of US Marshals in their raid jackets roaming the airports (usually Reagan National here in the DC area).

We’re not the same.

1. Air Marshals are part of the Department of Homeland Security.

2. US Marshals are part of the Department of Justice.

Wednesday, July 30, 2003

Brian Regan, spy, was one of ours too. We’re the spy district - comes with being in the Nation’s Capitol.

Turns out he buried a lot of the intelligence information that he stole and sold. And the Feds are now trying to locate it based on a map they found on Regan when he was arrested. This ought to be good.

[via adam at the blinding white light of the church of stupidity]

Responding to reader mail, LT Smash explains (again) why we went to war in Iraq.

UPDATE: Sgt. Hook has some similar thoughts.

There’s an irate fella at the window who apparently can’t get a new driver’s license because DMV won’t accept his Social Security card and California won’t give him a copy of his birth certificate.

How this is my problem is a mystery. I tried to explain that the Social Security Administration handles the card, etc. He went on about how he “just wants to do to the government what they’ve been doing to him.” OK…

When he asked to speak to “the highest person in this office” my first thought was “yeah, right!” I promptly went to get the acting ops supervisor, because this is way above my pay grade. The supervisor is “talking” with him now in the foyer area, so I can’t hear the conversation. I can’t wait to get his recap when he comes back in.

Somehow, because I’m not as diligent about checking the numbers in my stats counter rather than just checking who’s been visiting, I missed when I turned over the 15K mark. (I’m looking at the Sitemeter stats, not the pMachine ticker - sitemeter is the more accurate count because I can ban my own IP address to keep me from padding the numbers.) That’s pretty good for a year of blogging…

Which leads me to the second milestone missed - my blogaversary. I keep meaning to check my old blog archives to see what the exact date was of my first post. I can’t check at work because of my browser - the links for the archives don’t show on the page for some reason. I think it was July 27 or 28, 2002.

So to the many readers who’ve visited (and stayed) with me since those early days, many thanks - you’re real troopers. And to the newer readers, thanks to you as well. I hope to keep you entertained and informed for the next year as well.

UPDATE (8:35pm): I had the date wrong - July 24, 2002 was my first post. Click here to read that awkward inaugural attempt at blogging.

Tuesday, July 29, 2003

One last thing before I go to bed.

I was almost home when on my commute I noticed a spiffy little Honda in the left lane. The guy driving was wearing a baseball cap, but from what I could tell he looked to be in his mid to late 20s. As he pulled ahead a little I noticed his vanity license plate read “Jedi ***” (***=his name). Surrounding the plate was a plastic frame that read, “May The Force (on the top) Be With You (on the bottom).”

He’s proclaiming his Jedi-ness and blessing us at the same time. Is he a nerd or cool or both?

It just kind of amused me after a long day and drive.

Yesterday, LW and I went up to the Big Toe™ for sandwiches. At the door to the deli is a rack with various kinds of chips.

We noticed a guacamole flavored option from Lay’s - curious we bought a bag to share. They were really good, kind of barbeque-y with a hint of guacamole.

Then today, my boss came in with a loaded baked potato flavor, also by Lay’s - he offered us a sample. They were also really good. In one bite I got a hint of sour cream, then the next was cheesy with a little bacon. Very tasty. And when we went to The-Deli-in-the-Back™ (a deli in the building behind ours that has a real name, but that’s what we call it) to get better sandwiches, they had the loaded baked potato kind. So we shared a bag again.

If you like potato chips, give these flavors a try.

< /commercial >

I’m dubiously proud to have made the cut for the Bonfire of the Vanities for last week. I’m in very good company.

Kevin, I painted my toenails on Saturday morning. Actually, it was a touch- up really, not the full works.

We just discovered that with some personnel changes in the office recently there have been some things missed regarding the timesheets, codes, and my role in doing the payroll. I’ve been assured that it’s not my fault (it’s not), but I’m the one who’s going to have to go back several months in our system and make too many code corrections to count. It needs to be done because it impacts our overall budget.

I’m not happy.

And after all of the discussions, it’s now 4pm and I’m not even halfway done with this pay periods stuff, despite working on it for the past 2+ hours.

I’m not happy.

I just bought Oreos - this makes me a little happy.

UPDATE (5:45pm): I just transmitted the data. The Oreos helped. There’s going to be a “meeting” tomorrow to discuss the snafu. This oughta be good.

I’m going home now.

Two

Three things:

1. Our office’s former IT guy is Army Reserves. He was called up last winter and has been in the Middle East since before Christmas. He sent us a postcard (the cardboard backing of an MRE - chicken breast fillet with rib meat, chunked and formed, breaded in tomato sauce with cavatelli) a couple of weeks ago.

2. We have a deputy who moonlights as an artist. He’s amazing. He drew artwork for t-shirts for a buddy’s family reunion - the details he included were very cool and specific to various family members. He’s drawn a couple of great little things over the year I’ve been here, including one today that he sketched out in about 30 minutes (see #3).

3. We decided to send SSG IT-Guy a card. MD got one of the HUGE cards for everyone to sign, and the deputy artist took it away for a half an hour. When he came back, added to the messages was this pretty cool picture.

Following up on the Lentz conviction

dismissal, here’s the latest:

ALEXANDRIA, Va.—One week after overturning his capital conviction, a federal judge ruled Tuesday that Jay Lentz could be released without bond in 48 hours. U.S. District Judge Gerald Bruce Lee gave prosecutors that much time to appeal his decision to toss Lentz’s conviction on kidnapping resulting in the death of his ex-wife. Lee also said it would take that long to make arrangements for releasing Lentz, 44, who has been jailed since his arrest 27 months ago. Lee said it could take as long as six additional months for the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond to rule on the case.

Some of us aren’t too happy with this development, as you may imagine.

Jaboobie is trying to help women and/or entrepeneurs with this link. I say it’s a terrible idea.

Let me reference my own recent post on a similar, yet different (read: better) product.

I posted a comment, just as an FYI, over at Clarity Amidst Chaos - I was having problems opening his page at work because of the script for wander-lust.com. I didn’t expect this response, I just wanted to let Bryan know why I wasn’t visiting him during the day anymore.

Anyway, thanks, Bryan…

Now, go visit him!

I just got an email from HQ that is a law enforcement-wide memo. The info is law enforcement sensitive, so I can’t tell you about it, but I have to say that it’s very cool information about something bad guys are using that we’ve figured out. There was video attached to the memo that showed what they found and it’s pretty slick.

Don’t ask me to tell you about it, I can’t. But I had to say something about it.

Today is payroll day, so I’m going to be busy this afternoon getting us all paid.

And I just picked up about 10 pieces of civil process that needs to be logged and distributed so the deputies can serve it upon the unfortunate folks who are either being sued or being asked to testify in a civil suit. This one has a large set of documents to be served, so I may have to read the complaint on this one. I usually don’t bother because it’s all the same kind of stuff:

1. Someone discriminated against someone else - usually housing that evicted a tenant.

2. Someone was rude to someone else - usually a customer in a store that was yelled at by a clerk.

3. Someone was discriminated against in the workplace - I don’t have an example to give, but you know the options here anyway.

I could go on, but I won’t bore you.