A friend of mine went to Cuba on vacation and noted that pretty much every cabbie, hotel maid, and bus driver had at least a Master's degree. Largely courtesy of two things: free higher education and a lack of jobs to keep people out of school.

On the plus side, I hear that Cuban doctors are pretty good.

You forgot the part where the other half of the working population gets offshored to China.

Oh that's nothing. I spent more time than that changing my newborn's diapers and/or clothes. Just today.

Now, I'd have to admit that we have free internet (I work for an ISP) but our internet bill would be around $30 a month if we didn't.

We used to pay about $80 for cable before we gave it up. Since I live in Canada, I don't really have access to Hulu.com, but CBC has all their content online, with all of the other stations (including most of the premium cable channels that we actually cared about) having about half of it, and growing.

The only thing I used to miss was Mythbusters, before discovery.ca started posting this week's episode. And if we really wanted to (and we have in the past) we could buy it on DVD. Most of the content we actually *want* to watch is available online, and we can watch it whenever we have free time - which is at a premium with a newborn and a 3-year-old. All without having to sign up for scads of crap that we're not in the least bit interested in.

The fact that the cable companies have never been interested in providing only the content that the customer wants has always been a sore point for me, as I hardly ever watched any of the basic cable channels.

Uh, excuse me? What does telephone service have to do with TV over the internet?

Not me. My wife can already run circles around me when it comes to "persistent sexual arousal."

And the worst part is that she's been out of action since her C-section 4 weeks ago. When the doctor gives her the OK, I'm *so* dead.

Not that I mind *too* much. ;)

Funny things happen in a democracy.

Like how for example, that sort of thing wouldn't wash without the support of the majority.

I think it's safe to say that in this day and age, the majority white Americans don't think it's cool to marginalize black Americans. This is a huge cultural shift from days past when it *was* okay, and even expected. It's also pretty much standard these days to think that it's not cool to do that to people of other races either.

In America's past, I would say that this was a very real danger, and in fact it has happened. These days, even suggesting something like that is a great way for a politician to lose her job. Actually changing those words into action is even more impossible. Nevermind there being certain laws against it.

You know what? I think it was about 10 years ago, possibly more, when I said "ICQ? *Why*? It's like IRC, but starts when you turn your computer on. I can do that with mIRC."

Apparently you haven't gone through this phase in your life yet. Here's a hint though: you're missing the boat. Stop being a curmudgeon at the age of what, 28?

Yes, I wanted to point that one out too. I suspect that it also has a lot to do with how Gran Turismo aims to be a driving *simulator* and not so much a game. Most game designers drop a certain level of realism from their games to make them more fun, but the designers of GT are a) car nuts and b) totally of the mind that driving race cars is plenty of fun all by itself, thankyouverymuch.

To prove his point, and to prove that not only is GT realistic, but works well as a racing trainer, Gran Turismo's director Kazunori Yamauchi competed in the Nurburgring 4 hour race and won his class, with no other training but 1,000 laps in Gran Turismo (and any futzing around he may have done in his own cars). It was the first time he actually raced on the track, and it's worth noting for those not in the know, that the Nurbergring Nordschlief (the full course - in this particular race it took Kazunori 10 minutes to complete a single lap) is the world's most difficult race track.

That aside, the original article is pretty funny.