Get Me Out of Here

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Planet Nelson points us to getmooh.com, an automated service designed to help you escape a variety of situation by "…calling you automatically on your phone at a pre-specified time and playing you a recording which will either instruct you on what to say to elude your tormentor(s), or which will simply give a convincing sense of you being on an important call."

Wouldn't this make a great iPhone app? Simply program the phone to call at specified time… or you could simply reach in your pocket, press a button … and get the call 5 min later

Bruce Sterling’s Distraction

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If you’re looking for an interesting read over the long weekend, may I suggest Distraction, by Bruce Sterling. I read this book in October of 2004, long before my political awakening. Here’s a short review on Boing Boing:

Distraction is the story of an America on the skids: economy in tatters, dollar collapsed, unemployment spiked, population on the move in great, restless herds bound together with networks and bootleg phones. The action revolves around Oscar Valparaiso, a one-of-a-kind political operator who has just put his man — a billionaire sustainable architecture freak — into the Senate and is looking for some downtime. But a funny thing happens on the way to the R&R: Oscar and his “krewe” (the feudal entourage who trail after him, looking after his clothes, research, security, systems and so on) end up embroiled in a complex piece of political theater, a media war between the rogue governor of the drowned state of Louisiana, the Air Force, the newly elected president, and a weird, pork-barrel science park in its own glassed-in dome.

I’d love to know how many books and screenplays about the 2008 campaign are in the works.

Thanksgiving with Henry

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DALLAS, TX: Becky is making her mother’s chestnut stuffing recipe.  She had Chris scoring the chestnuts before roasting (actually baking).  Chris cut his thumb (as it turns out not seriously).  Then Becky over roasts the chestnuts so when she takes them out of the oven, one explodes into her eye while she’s holding the hot pan (no permanent damage to the eye).  I tried to take the pan from her but the rag I have doesn’t completely cover the pan, so I burned my finger. My finger still hurts.  This better be good dressing is all I can say.  We miss you here. — Barb

Henry and Lorna invited me to join them and their family for dinner. All the TG basics, topped of with Lorna’s special pecan-with-just-a-little-rum pie. Yum. It was a very pro-Obama crowd so there were toasts to the new president. Sammy and Pete were clearly thankful to be part of the Domke family. Here’s Petey in post-dinner repose.