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I got a new camera. It takes some interesting pictures.

I saw “Lord of the Rings: Return of the King” last night. It was okay. I’d say it was worth the price of a matinee.

It took me a second to figure out what was, um, interesting about this picutre .

We will given him a fair trial and then execute him . Okay, that’s probably what’s going through a bunch of peoples mind, both those for and against the US. My personal feelings on the death penalty aside, ultimately he will be “found guilty” and executed. Despite the US assurances that he will have a fair trial, he won’t be found not guilty. This is as much because of the overwhelming evidence against him, but also because the US will push for his conviction on multiple counts.

Of course, I would love to see the hoopla caused in the governments if he was found not guilty .

I send in a lot of rebates. I mean a lot of rebates. I currently have about $400 in outstanding rebates waiting to come in because I don’t like to buy technology unless it has some sort of rebate attached to it.

On each rebate that I file, I automatically have to agree to the terms the company lays out, including “lost rebate” and “the company can change the rebate at any time” clauses. I accept these as par for getting my money back. But each time I do, I have to wonder about the integrity of the company and the ability for them to have a “intentional mistake”. Case in point, I recently submitted an $80 rebate for a cable modem I bought (driving the final cost of the modem to -$.05). After waiting about a month, I checked the status online and saw that the rebate had been rejected due to an “incomplete submission”. One thing I am careful about is submitting all of the information required, some of which is buried in the text of the rebate legalese instead of the standard “list of required items” most rebates provide. Tuesday, I called up the company and asked why the rebate had been rejected and they said that they needed the MAC from the modem. Checking the rebate form again, I told them that it doesn’t list that as a requirement for the rebate. Further, the receipt that I provided had the MAC on it. After a bit of chat between us, I agreed to submit the needed information on the soon to arrive form letter and hung up. Yesterday I got the letter, filled out the information, and mailed it off. I should see my rebate in 8-10 weeks (assuming it’s not lost again)

This got me thinking about the entire situation. It seems to me that a company that offers a rebate can benefit greatly from these types of mistakes, given on average, the amount of the rebate equals the percentage of people filing for the rebate ($5 = 5%; $40 = 40%, to a limit), it behooves a company to make these types of mistakes or to hire people inclined to make these mistakes in order to maximize their profits.

Then today I read an article on the New York Times griping the same thing and giving figures to back it up and I have to wonder, are corporations really evil . Ah well, I gotta go fill out another rebate ($5).

How do they know that the guys on “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy” are actually gay?

While I wholly agree that spam is bad, I wonder if the CAN-SPAM bill will have any real effect. A good portion of the spam I receive comes from areas outside of U.S. domain (i.e. China). This bill will not stop those messages. Further, this bill could be used to punish companies by sending spam without the company’s permission. For instance, if someone has a grudge against Amazon.com, they could potentially spam thousand’s of people with a promotional, unsolicited e-mail that violates parts of this bill and forge the source of the e-mail as a amazon.com address. In that case, Amazon.com will have to prove they didn’t send the spam. Further, this bill doesn’t address other forms of spam, such as the recent rash of blog comment or Instant Message spammers.

There is a lot of debate on whether homosexuals should be allowed to “marry”, instead giving them the right to have a civil union. Is there really a difference between the two? What rights are afforded a married couple that wouldn’t be afforded a couple engage in a civil union? It seems to me that if there are no differences, then they are the same thing (a rose by any other name…) and that people are trying to give homosexuals the same rights to commit their life (and assets and rights) to another person that is currently given a married couple, but without calling it a marriage. My basic belief is that a marriage is a religious act, one performed by a church (or equivalent entity). The state should only recognize the civil union as a legal way of granting the rights afforded a couple in an efficient manner. Therefore, people can give the “marriage” rights to another person, regardless of sex or race (it wasn’t too long ago that inter-racial marriages were not allowed) or belief system.

I hate these people. More importantly, I wish my life was more like theirs .

Is it that hard to trim e-mails before forwarding them? I receive a small barrage of e-mail from family and friends that are forwards of e-mails they received, which in turn are forwards. I get e-mails that are in the forth or fifth forward, and I know this because people leave the headers on. Take the time to trim the messages down. Better yet, take the time to compose a message with just the important part.