380 Tons of Non-Election Issue

I've been purposefully silent on this election cycle. A lot of it is unimportant to me, and a lot doesn't make sense. Add the fact that I can no longer completely sympathize with either party and I'm not exactly happy with either candidate and I decided to keep quiet. (That said, I'm voting for Kerry)

However, what really is pissing me off is the way Iraq is getting spun by both sides. The Kerry campaign jumped on the story of the missing explosives in Iraq like a bulldog on a sirloin. They are trumpeting how this lapse of security is an example of President Bush's bad policy and lack of planning in the Iraq War. Bullshit.

Shit happens. That is especially true when people are shooting at each other.

At this point we don't even know when the RDX/HMX disappeared. There are rumors that it was trucked out prior to the fall of Baghdad. There are even reports that the Russians helped the Iraqis move it to Syria (as well as disperse other weapons). The point is, no one knows for sure.

Keeping that in mind, I'm pretty sure that President Bush didn't say "Uh guys? Let's not worry about those explosive stockpiles." And if he didn't so that - and does anyone really think that's what happened - then the lose of these explosives is best explained by the fog of war. And unless he really was actively negligent why is this an issue?

Good... Bad... I'm the one with the cash.

I've got more side work flowing in. I'm almost to the point where I am working two full time jobs, but I'm sure that is a temporary condition. I will say that it feels good to get a second contract from the same client so quickly. They had stated that they were very happy with the first project outcome, and I guess they meant it.

I also know that I enjoy the sideline coding a lot more than the day job. There are no 'headaches' associated with side projects. One client, straightforward timelines, no admin work - just programming and database design. If I could get them to switch from ColdFusion to C#, I'd be in sheer heaven.

All this is a good thing because stability in my primary job is a shaky as ever. We're still cash poor, and basically living from moment to moment. It's not a pleasant thing. If something breaks for us in a positive way, we'll be fine, but the the opposite is true as well. Hopefully be the first of the year things will have settled down some.

Well. That's Bad.

I'd like to point out first that I have a private pilot's ticket. Granted, I haven't flown in over a decade, but I do have a little experience actually flying airplanes. That said...

The NTSB has ruled that pilot error is to blame for the crash of American Airlines Flight 587 in New York in November of 2001. The Airbus A300-600 took off from JFK International bound for the Dominican Republic. The co-pilot, Sten Molin, was at the controls when the aircraft encountered turbulence immediately after takeoff. In an attempt to stabilize his a/c, and following the training provided him by American, Molin used the rudder to correct his attitude. What he didn't know was that he was putting more stress on the tail of the aircraft than it could withstand.

The loud *bang* heard on the cockpit voice recorder (following the Captain's futile instructions to 'Hang onto it, hang onto it') was the tail section separating from the aircraft. Seconds later, the a/c hit the ground in NYC - killing 265 people.

Now there is an argument as to whether or not American Airlines was made aware by Airbus that the aircraft's rudder could exert more force than the structure could withstand.

A previous incident in 1997 almost resulted in crash in West Palm Beach. One passenger was seriously injured when pilots of American flight 903 used the rudder to steady their a/c on approach. After that incident, Airbus claims it stated that abrupt rudder movement could "lead to a rapid loss of controlled flight". American contends that given that, no one specifically told them that excessive rudder movements could cause the tail to be ripped off.

At first glance, this seems insane. This is an aircraft that can, essentially, tear itself apart very easily. And while that thought is scary, what really confuses me is why anyone sitting in the cockpit wasn't 100% aware of that fact. I'll be the first to tell you that flying an aircraft is not like driving a car. You can very easily do things in a plane that may be perfectly safe in some conditions, and cause a 'departure from controlled flight' in another. But that is part of being a pilot - knowing these things. The fact that American may have put pilots at the controls of these aircraft with insufficient warnings, and even a simulator that trained them wrong, is inexcusable. Add to that I don't feel Airbus did enough to alert its customers of the issue. Why do I think that? Because a crash occurred because of it.

In the end, the official blame in the accident landed on Sten Molin. It may not seem fair - he wasn't told he could kill himself and his passengers by simply using the rudder - but that's the way it plays out. As I was told when learning to fly, "Unless the damn wing falls off on a cloudless, calm, sunny day, it's always pilot error." This is one of those cases where that axiom seems particularly unfair.

In closing, I'd like to pay my respects to First Officer Sten Molin, his passengers, his crew, and their families for a tragedy that probably could have been avoided.

All Your Data Is Belong To Us

I've installed Google Desktop. I read all the hoopla about 'security concerns' and I installed it anyway.

I love it.

I am the only authorized user of my laptop, so the multiple user, single logon 'flaw' of GD is of no concern to me. If someone is ever in a position to use GD against me like that, I have bigger issues.

So I installed it, let it index, and I've slowly begun to use it. It rocks. By far, the biggest benefit for me is the lightning quick searches of my Outlook folders. The built in search in Outlook is anemic, and this is a huge improvement. The integration with Google.com searches is interesting to me as well. If you go to Google and search for 'paintball' for example, at the top of the search results page is a short summary of related files on my local machine. That's pretty cool. Google says it performs this function without sending any data to Google, using what is probably a type of web service. They also state that the index information cannot be accessed remotely - and that's been tested by third parties.

The only remaining concern would be spyware or a virus written to exploit GD once it infects a computer with GD installed. That could be interesting. GD allows access from the local machine over HTTP, so theoretically, malicious software could access that data via that vector. Of course, the spyware/virus has to get installed first. This is difficult against a savvy user running updated anti-virus software (as I do).

Overall, if you are the only user of your machine, I recommend giving this a try. It's fast, effective, and free - what more do you want?

It Pains Me

I've decided to put my D20 Modern campaign on hiatus for the time being. I'm finding it very difficult to find time to prep, between work, family and other hobbies. That's the crux of it right there. I'd rather work on my paintball gear, play Unreal Tournament or Battlefront or Halo 2 (well, soon...) than write plots. It's a tough call, but I've got to put something down and Modern is the easiest choice.

Maybe I'll pick it back up after the holidays.

Seven Years

Today is my seven year wedding anniversary. And no, I didn't forget. Just wanted to let everyone know. Hi hon! Love you!

Scenario Bug

It's bad.

I've been planning for a while getting back into scenario game paintball, but last week the bug really hit. And what's odd is that I haven't played in a big one since 1999, but I'm itching to get back to it. How much of what I remember will be the same? Or how much have I romanticized?

I had planned on a small game in October and another in November, but schedule conflicts arose on both dates. So I've decided to head to Wayne Dollack's' The Grand Finale in December. I've played in two Grand Finales before - and they are always an awesome thing to behold. Last year, they reported had 1700 players. That a pile.

So as I get more time to write coherently (I see the light at the end of the tunnel at work) I'll start talking about getting ready here.

Check Six!

Holy crap

It would seem that every time I start to really get into working on this site, my job blows up. This time, one of our developers, through a really bonehead move, created a security vulnerability that was then exploited by.... a reporter. The resulting mess has gotten all my attention since last Wednesday.

I'm hoping that by Friday I'll be done with all the audits, reports, policy re-writes and Senate hearings (Florida, not U.S., but still) and can finally take a deep breath. I've been wearing a coat and tie so much the past few days, I can hardly take a breath. I hate ties.

Anyway watch this space (or Narthex's) for my take on the X Prize, Campaign '04 debates, the state of television, the new dog (yup, a new piss machine), and the role of Information Security Officer for a small IT firm (my latest hat).

Got to get to bed - on the road for a physical site audit tomorrow. Fun fun.