The fine folks over at io error have compiled a great set of Homeland Security anecdotes. Just makes you feel real safe, doesn’t it?

I’m sitting in the waiting area for my flight to Cincinnati. Apparently, I’m travelling too often. The guy at the check-in counter recognized me.

Fortunately, this is my last trip until ApacheCon.

Two images that made me chuckle.

First of all, the worst possible name for someone trying to get you to buy a house. Think about it for a moment. It’ll come to you. (Note: If you’re not a native English speaker, this may be a bit challenging. Feel free to email me.)

Second, I saw this on the floor in the restroom on the 3rd floor of my office. Clearly, the problem was discovered by a programmer. He chose to document it, rather than fixing it.

This morning, when, presumably I could sleep in, I was up at 0530, just like always.

*sigh*

Last night at reading group, we were talking about the phenomenon that, growing up in Kenya, we were taught British history, rather than the history of the country we were actually living in. The book we were reading – Decolonizing the mind – asserted that this was a conscious and intentional effort to stamp out the cultural identity of the colonized people.

While it may be possible that some people actually thought about that as a goal, I think that the truth is simpler, and, probably worse. It wasn’t that they were actively trying to stamp it out, it’s just that their arrogance didn’t permit them to see that there was anything there.

I remember asking a history teacher (I think it was a Turi, but it may have been at NA) why we were learning British history, rather that the history of the land in which we actually lived. There were two answers that I got on various occasions which stuck with me. One was a sort of perplexed “well, there’s no record of African history, so there’s nothing to teach.” The other was the more arrogant one, something like “British history *is* the history of the world.”

It was, if this makes any sense, a rather humble arrogance. It wasn’t beligerent, it was a simple congnitive assent that British culture was the most important, correct, and relevant view of the world. They weren’t so much saying that other cultures were unimportant. It was far worse than that. The other cultures simply didn’t register to them at all.

And, now, of course, this is apparently the US attitude to most of the rest of the world. I’ve long joked that US foreign policy can be summed up as: “What?! There are other countries?!” We assume that folks in other places are either just like us, or at least really want to be. And the ones who don’t are somehow suspect.

Sort of a “L’etat, c’est moi”, but at a global scale. “Le monde, c’est nous.”

It really was pretty good. And the folks with whom I went to see it were very fun. The acting, although very wooden in parts, was *hugely* better than Episode II. Although where the plot would eventually end up was inevitable, the path that it took to get there was somewhat unexpected, and so the whole thing was very enjoyable.

Fortunately, I didn’t take it nearly as seriously as certain of my friends no doubt will. 😉 I think that would likely take a lot of the pleasure out of it.

Discover® called me. They were concerned that I was not using my credit card very much. They wanted to know what they could do to get me to use my credit card more.

Speaking for just myself, I’m convinced that credit cards are a fundamentally bad idea, and I hope, as much as is possible in this economic setting, to completely eliminate their use. Presumably I’ll still need to keep one for things like, say, plane tickets for which I will be reinbursed later, or perhaps for “emergencies”, whatever that may mean. But I will be overjoyed when I can pay off and cut up the last of my credit cards.

So, Discover®, what can you do to get me to use my credit card more? Well, nothing at all comes to mind. Although, certainly, the usurious interest rates don’t help your case any. And sending me “Instant Cash!!!” checks, and then refusing to honor them, causing me great embarassment, fines, interest, and frustration, also wasn’t that great a selling point. But, short of zero interest, nothing at all comes to mind that will persuade me to use my credit card more.