Nonsensical statement involving plankton.

And I'd be ecstatic to have that. The problem is that my upload is limited to 1 mbps right now.

Lucas told me it was midichlorians!

Milwaukee has a number of parallels to Detroit, but just enough differences that we are not, and will not be, the "next Detroit." Milwaukee is on the upswing. The city has a growing population once again, following its decline during the era of deindustrialization and urban-to-suburban flight. Milwaukee still has good bones, and as more people come here, they find it has a real vibrancy to it. We're truly blessed with a number of great local coffee roasters, including Anodyne, Stone Creek, Sven's, and Valentine, in addition to the ubiquitous Colectivo (formerly Alterra). Pabst, Schlitz and Miller made Milwaukee a beer capitol, and now we've got fantastic microbreweries, Lakefront Brewing, Milwaukee Brewing Company, St. Francis Brewery, and the crowdfunded Brenner Brewing Company. There's five colleges and two major universities within city limits, and a great publicly-owned international airport.

Milwaukee's Green Corridor along S. 6th Street is our sandbox for sustainable development. Among many attributes, it has the world's largest slab of water-permeable concrete, which was made part of the stormwater containment system that runs a beautiful stream and provides water for the on-site community gardens. A food hub is being developed just across the street from there, and we're showing true green development is replete with benefits.

The 20th century saw Milwaukee's first apex, and we're building toward a larger, more sustainable one right now. I'm thrilled to be part of it.

sithtingduck?

Yes. I have to wonder what the three-year-old daughter of the man thinks. The three-year-old daughter of the now-dead man. It's utterly shameful that this happened. Especially the way that it ended the man's life.

Nelson Mandela is a hero to many, myself included. May he rest in peace as we honor and mourn him, though we never shall forget him.

Before Hurricane Katrina, fuel prices followed a predictable rhythm, where gas was cheaper in the summer and diesel was cheaper in the winter. After Katrina, it all went to hell, and pretty soon everything was US$4 a gallon. Diesel has crept back up to that or higher, so even though I still get 42-45 mpg, it still costs plenty to fill up. And I think it blew away the ROI calculations.

About eight years ago, I was addicted to the idea of biodiesel. Loved it loved it loved it. Got a VW TDi just to eventually be able to run biodiesel in it. The mileage was great. Still is great, as I still have the car. But the cost of maintenance has lessened my interest in having it.

To be fair, part of it is problems that I've brought upon myself. I didn't listen when they said "after doing this upgrade, UPGRADE THE FUEL INJECTOR AND THE EXHAUST, or you will pay thousands in repairs." To be fair, I wanted to verify their claim. Which proved to be true.

If that weren't enough, part of it for me will be the cost of repairing body damage, which was not caused by the upgrade in HP/torque that I had done a few years back, but rather a side-effect of the car crash that I was in thirteen years ago (as seen on Slashdot!), which shredded my left eye and wrecked my depth perception. (Tight turns in and out of my garage are a bitch.)

That's got nothing to do with diesel vs. hybrid. It's all about my vision, or lack thereof. But take into account that at least with the TDi, you need to get synthetic oil, and religiously have it changed. You'll need a new fuel filter each year -- North American/European ppl, do this in October. And there at long last, the infamous VW ,,Elektriksystem nicht funktioniertin" problem is creeping in on my car. Or maybe the right headlight really is burned out. Either way, it's getting time to move on.

So now, I still want a car with great mileage. And I'd like get an American car, a UAW car. The Ford C-Max hybrid is of interest, as it satisfies both interests. Even if the mileage may not be all that it's billed to be. And the looks aren't all that great either. But, what can you do? Perhaps -- maybe -- deal.

...in a great fireball of self-wrought annihilation brought on by the inherent and overwhelming contradictions of running vim inside Emacs?

Looking at the image on the NASA page, it jumps out at you: it's a fractal. To quote Marathon 1, "They're eveywhere!"

I was elected a Milwaukee County Supervisor in April 2011. It is a non-partisan office. This was done in the 1930s (possibly the last time the two big parties worked together) to destroy the Milwaukee Socialist Party, which had dominated the mayor's office and the city council for a few decades in Milwaukee. By making municipal candidates non-partisan, there was no easy way to pick out the Socialists from the Republicans or Democrats. Between the Cold War and the non-partisanizing, it worked. And contrary to what you may think about socialists now, the Milwaukee Socialists ran the most efficient and cleanest government we've ever seen. They got elected because they promised to run a clean government, which they did. (The previous mayors had been friends of the brothels and casinos!) New Haven, CT also had a socialist mayor, though I don't know anything about that administration. The lakefront bridge connecting Bay View to downtown Milwaukee is called the Hoan Bridge, named in honor of Daniel W. Hoan, the city's third socialist mayor, and arguably the best. So there you go!

Okay, only two of them were contested, but... I am now the Milwaukee County Supervisor for the 14th district on Milwaukee's South Side, an area that includes a bit of Bay View, Mitchell Field (GMIA), Humboldt Park, Wilson Park, and eight other county parks. (People that knew me in my LinuxPPC days may be astonished to see a photo of me wearing a suit. Aye, I've traded t-shirts for ties much of the time, though I've now got a framed xkcd comic ("sudo make me a sandwich") in my office that I puzzle people with. County supervisors are elected to four-year terms, although I won a special election to serve the last year of my immediate predecessor's term. This meant that I had to run for re-election just eight months later. Fortunately, I was unopposed the second time around, meaning that while I did vote for myself in the primary and general, my victory was virtually assured. And indeed, I'm in. So now I am trying to drag the County into the late twentieth century, technology-wise. We may even make it into the early twenty-first! Inertia has been our major opponent; things were done as they were done for decades. Some departments, such as the county clerk's office, still rely entirely on paper forms; there is no digital input option. That is going to become a major project of mine as far as the technology committee goes. It's a lot of work, for sure, though I usually enjoy it, even love it. I'm up for re-election in April 2016. We'll see!

Yeah. What I typed up there about a "minimum of... dorkiness"? Yeah. That was me. NOT LOGED IN. Dork.