100 years ago tomorrow since the Iroquois Theater Fire of 1903. This link to the Eastland Memorial Society of Chicago has an informative website on this terrible tragedy that took the lives of 602 people.

There was a lot of music in the 80's that I couldn't stand. For some reason it has now become tolerable, and in some cases, even likeable. Of course, there were lots of songs back then that I did like, but writing which was which is beyond the aim of this post. Here are some of my favorite songs from my 80's directory of mp3's on my home computer:
Peter Murphy: Cuts You Up
Brian Setzer: The Knife Feels Like Justice
Madness: Our House
Simple Minds: Don't You Forget About Me
Peter Schilling: Major Tom
Big Country: In a Big Country

Maybe later I'll post the whole directory.

So I started up AudioCrusher to rip a CD, and had forgotten that an AOL installation CD was still in the drive. AudioCrusher accessed CDDB to get the disc info, and although it showed it as a data CD, it still decided that it was something called "Symphony Sexualis" by someone called Sleep Chamber. So first I had to look them up and see who they were, and then when I tried to find something by them on Kazaa, out of 546 million plus files available, there was not a single thing from Sleep Chamber. Oh well. Fortunately their website has some sound files which I'm about to download.

I may be way past 25, and maybe it was only a one-hit wonder, but I still think "What's Up?" by 4 Non Blondes is one of the coolest songs ever written.

Who cares what I got for Christmas? Well, I can't think of anything else right now, so here goes.

1. I finally got a big 12-cup drip coffee maker. I've had a small 4-cupper for years and I still use it to make my going-to-work coffee during the week, but for weekends it just wasn't cutting it anymore.

2. A pair of hiking shoes. More comfortable than my army surplus combat boots, and as I said when I opened the box, "I can still kick dogs with them." To which my small son asked, "Do you kick kitties too?" I don't kick either one, really, but my son hasn't yet figured out my sense of humor. Besides, his question was a lot funnier than my original statement. (I frequently encounter recalcitrant canines during my work day).

3. Three pairs of all-cotton boxers: the Grinch, the Cat in the Hat (the real one, not the unspeakable abomination from the recent movie), and Spongebob Squarepants.

4. A halogen work lamp.

5. A set of John Deere tractor coffee mugs with assorted coffees.

6. Plenty of good holiday food and a couple of days off.

Today I ate at Rudy's Country Store & Barbecue. This is the best barbecue place at which I've ever eaten. Plenty of black pepper on everything, even the turkey. Besides turkey, I got to sample sausage, ribs and brisket, all smoked. Their huge "kitchen" is a completely separate building from their eatin' place. And best of all, you eat it right off a sheet of butcher paper. I ate at the location on IH10 West, in the hill country northwest of San Antonio, but there is one other location in the area also, at Westover Hills Blvd. & SH 151.

I guess I should explain each link that I add to the links section at least once. Panicware makes several useful products--my favorite being their freeware Pop-Up Stopper. Visicom Media has freeware versions of their AceHTML and AceFTP programs. The "Pro" versions will cost you, but the free versions do everything I need, and probably a few things I've never needed. Your only cost for the freeware versions are a couple of nagscreens.

Quatloos! -- Cyber-Museum of Scams and Frauds... "is a public educational website covering a wide variety of financial scams and frauds, including wacky 'prime bank' frauds, exotic foreign currency scams, offshore investment frauds, tax scams, 'Pure Trust' structures and more." This is a great site for educating yourself (or someone else) on all kinds of scams and frauds. Be sure and check out The Brad Christensen Exhibit, in which Mr. Christensen yanks the chains of numerous Nigerian (or 419) Scam artists.

One of the stations that I listen to during the day (when I'm working) is KRTU 91.7 FM - Jazz for San Antonio. They have "alternative" programming from 10 PM to 5 AM, and it looks like something I'd enjoy according to their music logs (also available at their website), but their signal is too weak to hear well at my house and my Internet connection can only handle either streaming or surfing, but not both. So I haven't heard any of their night-time programming yet. Their jazz programming is real jazz, not that "soft jazz" junk. San Antonio actually did have a commercial "soft jazz" station for a few years, but it didn't last.

...and then there are, well, these guys. I only list this here because I find these tracts enormously amusing as well as deeply disturbing. These little bundles of weirdness are often found lying atop urinals or gas pumps, on bus benches and tucked onto shelves in libraries. But you can avoid the hassle of hunting them down by reading them online!

For a great Cthulhuian spoof of Chick Tracts, check out this Cthulhu Chick Tract.

Rhetorical question. Here's Barbie & Ken as Arwen and Aragorn. But does she have pointy ears?

Have you ever actually purchased a Bible on CD-ROM? If so, you were probably disappointed at how limited it was. I know I was (although, hearing it read by James Earl Jones was a plus). But, the spirit of charity is alive and well at e-Sword. This freeware Bible has more add-ons than you will know what to do with. Read parallel versions, add-on commentaries and dictionaries. No, I don't get anything because I told you this. I just think this is great software.