Month: February 2006

Sticking it to China

Being someone who hasn’t let the fact that china has the world’s fastest growing economy distract me from the fact that it also has one of the most repressive systems of goverment*, I am mighty pleased to see this article in slashdot, which talks about a new piece of software which passes encrpyted packets to allow people in china (and other countries that monitor internet activity of individuals who want to read about such subversive ideas as “freedom” and “democracy”) to read pages that would otherwise be blocked by government firewalls, and to read them in a way that is theoretically undetectable.

Here’s hoping it works, and that it inspires others to release other pieces of subversive software to encourage freedom of information.

*which of course sets me apart from numerous other people, companies, organisations and governments who seem happy to turn a blind eye if there is a profit or advantage in it for them (microsoft, google, US government, we’re looking at you…).

Jack likes downhill

We had the Winter Olympics on last night and they had the downhill skiing on, and it turns out that Jack is a huge fan.

Well.. he likes intently watching the skiers and pouncing at the TV screen when it looks like the fast moving brightly coloured skier was coming close.

It really was most delightful to watch. The concentration was so amusing, and the leaping and jumping was a real hoot.

We really are terrible fur parents. Always talking about our little kiddy.. I mean kitty.. 🙂

A cat of simple tastes

AKA Fun with household items
In spite of us buying jack a fair number of not inexpensive toys, and having recieved even more toys from assorted family friends and well wishers, Jack seems to continue to delight in directing most of his attention to playing with inexpensive things that can be found around the house.

  • The duster
  • Paper from the office rubbish bin
  • The office rubbish bin itself
  • Socks
  • Just about any item of clothing hanging from a coat hanger within pouncing height
  • My computer cables
  • Toes
  • Towels
  • Toes again
  • The kitchen and front door mats

Given that he’s so easy to amuse it makes you wonder why we buy him toys at all…

A tapestry of lacerations

I knew I was missing something not having a cat all these years, and now I remember what it was: Cuts. Scratches. Gashes. Perforations.

Jack is a very lively little kitten, and much of that energy seems to be expended on tearing around the house climbing, scratching and scampering down just about anything he can find (with humans proving to be ideal climbing frames and scratching posts).

And the funny things is that I don’t really mind it having a few kitty scratches. It reminds me what a nice thing it is to have fuzz therapy around again.

The feline F1 skill

Since getting Jack I have been reminded of cats’ uncanny ability to always step on the F1 key whenever they walk across my laptop’s keyboard.

Jack mainly does the walking across the keys simply as a way of getting my attention, but still he almost always hits F1 and causes the help screen to come up for whatever program I am currently using.

What would be funny would be if I could re-program the computer the launch a little window with jack’s picture in it and caption that says “Pay attention to me!!!!” instead.

But money can buy you happiness

Now everyone knows the old saying that money cannot buy you happiness, but at the moment at least I disagree with that.

With my first pay I went out and bought a fedora hat, which I have wanted for quite some time, and the first season of Deep Space 9 on DVD, which I have been happily watching.
Frankly it’s just nice to be in the situation for the first time in many years of being able to say “I want that” and just getting it, rather than having to wait, save or find justification for buying yourself treats.

Stroke ignorance

All the TV coverage of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s hospitalisation after his stroke has been something of a depressing reminder of the general ignorance within the average population of health matters.
Journalists, politicians, and well-wishers alike have been commenting on his condition and recovery progress as though they expect him to be back leading the country in a few weeks or months.
What they seem blissfully clueless about is that people who have major bleeds into their brains (and Sharon has had at least two from what I can tell from the new reports) are generally lucky if they return to being able to tie their own shoelaces, let alone leading a country.
The statistics on stroke alone are depressing enough: 1/3 die in at the time of the stroke, 1/3 die within 1 month, and overall only 10% return to living at home.

Death of a Dodo

Well, I’ve finally sorted myself out, and set up a proper permanent web host.

We can now be found at www.ramsayfamily.org .

I won’t be adding anything new onto this Dodo site, so wander on over to the new site and see what goodies are up over there.