Category: ramblings

ramblings

Quote of the Day

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”It’s so interesting to me that people talk about late-night comedy being cynical. ‘What’s more cynical than forming an ideological news network like Fox and calling it ‘fair and balanced’? What we do, I almost think, is adorable in its idealism. It’s quaint.”
– Jon Stewart, on his program “The Daily Show.”

ramblings

Feliz Anos Nuevo

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Here’s to a year where hopefully we’ll see (in chronological order):

  • Health, happiness and prosperity for all my friends, family and their various entourages
  • The end of all spam (spam, comment spam, splogs, etc)
  • Something actually getting built at Ground Zero
  • A clear policy introduced and implemented on how to bring our men and women home from Iraq
  • MP3 digital downloads available by all for use in any player
  • A huge US medal count along with the hockey gold in the Winter Olympics
  • Many incredibly improbable World Cup victories that, when strung together, end with the US holding the trophy
  • The NY Yankees winning their 27th title
  • Election results based on common sense, moderacy and respect for all instead of close mindedness, greed and fear mongering
  • All those important items that I’m forgetting right now

One can hope.

ramblings

NYC Transit Stats

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I learned 2 very interesting stats during the recent transit strike. The NYC mass transit system moves 7 million people a day. To put that number into perspective, it is greater than:

  1. The total populations of North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Montana and Wyoming combined.
  2. The total populations of Los Angeles and Chicago combined.

In strike related news, I’ve been on a biking kick lately as I biked to work on Tuesday and Thursday due to the strike. Then, yesterday I rode to work because, well, I was used to it. This morning, when the weather was nice, I biked again in Central Park. I love biking and had not been out for a spin in a long time before this strike nonsense. I guess the strike was a good motivator.

ramblings

Nicest Commute Ever

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Today, I enjoyed one of the most pleasant commuting experiences ever. Bundled up, I simply rode against non-existent traffic down Madison Avenue from my apartment to my office. Due to the transit strike, the NYPD has closed 5th and Madison so that emergency traffic can get around town. So, it was me and almost no one else cruising down Madison. Aside from my fingertips getting a tad chilly (I had on bike gloves that look like they are 80’s breakdancing gloves), it was so nice that I’m thinking of doing it more often. I was afraid that I would get to work too sweaty and while that may true in the spring or summer, today everything ended perfectly. I think I sweat more riding on the subway believe it or not.

As for the strike itself, I think the union is shooting themselves in the foot. They are going to lose a lot of money via lawsuits for their illegal strike (see NYS’s Taylor Law) and the pension plan that they are fighting over is ludicrous. The idea and implementation of pensions as a whole in this country needs to be revamped because we’ve seen lately that the old model is not sustainable (see Delphia filing for bankruptcy, GE’s recent round of 30K layoffs, etc). The TWU’s inflexibility will only hurt their future workers, not help them, because its setting up a situation where the entire pension “house of cards” will come crashing down at some point in the future instead of proactively managing the change that invariably needs to happen.

I for one am off tomorrow but in a way I hope they keep striking so I can ride traffic-free again on Thursday.

ramblings

Snip Snip

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What a great ad. It was spotted by my B.I.L’s F.I.L in Savannah, GA. In the “Question to Ask the Mohel” section of the Rabbi’s web site, I learned the answer to the question What items do I need to purchase or supply for the bris? which is,

“The most important one is a male baby. Besides that, please have a table, two chairs, a sleeping pillow, a talis (prayer shawl), a spare diaper and wipes, and a bottle of Manischewitz grape wine ready.”
Its good that he has a sense of humor.

Via Amos

ramblings

Turtle Braces

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I wish this wasn’t true. Hermie the Turtle is getting braces for Christmas. Oy vey. After the jump, read all about it courtesy of the Associated Press.

Via Jessie.

Christmas Miracle: Turtle Gets Braces

By the Associated Press

Filed at 11:27 a.m. ET, 12/16.
Hermie the Turtle’s little defective beak made meal time a struggle. Unable to close his mouth completely, the tiny 20-gram reptile’s very existence was at stake.

But today, this map turtle has a new lease on life thanks to the work of two doctors who outfitted young Hermie with braces. Now, some are calling the orthodontic work a Christmas miracle.

”I’ve worked on animals before but nothing this small,” said Dr. Peter M. Virga, a Watertown dentist who along with veterinarian Jeffrey G. Baier performed the unique procedure.

After receiving Hermie in May, zookeepers at the New York State Zoo in Watertown’s Thompson Park noticed the turtle was having difficulty eating. Medical exams then showed Hermie’s lower jaw growing downward.

”He may have adapted to eat like this, or he may have not made it,” Baier said.
Turtles, who are toothless, use their beaks to break food down before grinding it with the plates in their mouths.

After Baier injected Hermie with two anesthetics Wednesday morning, Virga inserted four pins into the turtle’s jaws, according to the Watertown Daily Times which published an account of Hermie’s ordeal Thursday.

During a meeting with reporters, the doctors placed the immobile turtle, believed to be between 2 and 3 years old, on a table. As Baier held Hermie’s head, Virga placed two rubber orthodontic elastics — the same kind used by children with braces — on the pins across the turtle’s mouth.

While Hermie recuperates, zookeepers will remove the rubber bands once a day to allow the turtle to eat. In keeping with the spirit of Christmas, the doctors chose red and green rubber bands for Hermie’s beak.

”It’s very exciting and I was glad to help,” said Virga, who’s performed root canal surgery on dogs.

Baier’s wife, Angela, the zoo’s executive director, said she was thrilled such a small zoo could take part in such a rare procedure.

”Miracles happen this time of the year,” she said. ”Hopefully his beak will be fixed.”