I'm on Verizon too, I feel your pain.

That's the way my county does it in Florida, they had the foresight to replace their punch cards with optical scan machines a few years before the 2000 election fiasco. Sometimes I think I live in the only county in the state that's not entirely corrupt and incompetent.

Youtube is already blocked

In a country like China, where everybody has mobile phones but not everyone has computers, a service like Twitter can be immensely useful in helping the free-flow of information. For me, Twitter is a way for me to let friends and family know what I'm up to while I'm living halfway around the world from them, and it's a handy way to keep up with breaking news, but not having it isn't a big deal, I've got plenty of other sources of information. For my friends in China, losing Twitter is losing an important connection to the outside world.

This seems like something that should be nothing but a joke, but it looks like it is going to be around after the first. I suppose this is where I should whine about websites messing with a good thing.

When I worked retail, I'd volunteer to do the early shift because the people who came in the first few of hours we were open were a lot easier to deal with--they were the black friday veterans who expected crowds and knew they might not get what they came for. The people who came later in the day were the real jerks, they'd come after the specials ended or after they sold out and try to bully you into giving them something worth twice as much.

Then again, I worked at a medium to high end department store, we didn't get the bottom of the barrel crowd like Walmart.

That said, I was really glad to spend this Thanksgiving knowing black friday wasn't hanging over my head, even if it was because I'm now living in a developing country and ate Thanksgiving dinner at KFC.

In crowds like that, I start getting nervous and looking for easy escape routes. No matter how someone may act in normal life, crowds start to take on a life of their own.

This whole bar stool thing seems to be a very *unstable* sport with lots of *crashes* likely. (Maybe Microsoft can become the corporate sponsor.) We geeks need something more *stable* and with more *freedom* in a non-computerized activity...like maybe crocheting keyboard cozies.