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Happy New Year everyone!

May your 2009 be prosperous, rewarding and full with all the blessings that life has to offer (never mind the recession) ;-)

Ingredients:

1 cup water
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup brown sugar
4 large eggs
cup nuts
2 cups dried fruit
(750 ml) bottle tequila (Jose Cuervo or your other favorite brand)

Directions:

1. Sample the tequila to check quality.
2. Take a large bowl; check the tequila again to be sure it is of the highest quality.
3. Pour one level cup tequila and drink.
4. Turn on the electric mixer.
5. Beat one cup of butter in a large fluffy bowl.
6. Add one peastoon of sugar.
7. Beat again.
8. At this point it's best to make sure the tequila is still ok, so try another cup just in case.
9. Turn off the mixerer thingy.
10. Break 2 leggs and add to the bowl and chuck in the cup of dried fruit.
11. Pick the frigging fruit off the floor.
12. Mix on the turner.
13. If the fried druit gets stuck in the beaters just pry it loose with a drewscriver.
14. Sample the tequila to check for tonsisticity.
15. Next, sift two cups of salt, or something.
16. Who geeves a sheet.
17. Check the tequila.
18. Add one table.
19. Add a spoon of sugar, or somefink.
20. Whatever you can find.
21. Greash the oven.
22. Turn the cake tin 360 degrees and try not to fall over.
23. Don't forget to beat off the turner.
24. Finally, throw the bowl through the window, finish the quetila and make sure to put the stove in the wishdasher.
25. Cherry Mistmas.

Great for New Year's day too. :-)

Merry Christmas to everyone!

May the spirit of the love and sharing be with everyone not just this holiday season, but all year round.

My apologies for the lack of updates. The long vacation has a way of turning one's brain into mush. :-)

Underneath is a brief position paper I wrote a few months back about how telecommuting could be instituted in government service. I gave a copy of this paper to my superior and even sent a copy of this to the Civil Service Commission. Frankly, I haven't been getting that much enthusiasm regarding telecommuting, but I think as a work arrangement, the time is right to try it out in government.

INSTITUTING TELECOMMUTING AS A
VIABLE WORK ARRANGEMENT IN GOVERNMENT SERVICE

Work is something you do, not something you travel to.

- Leonhard, Woody, The Underground Guide to Telecommuting

Business leaders in the Philippines now trust their employees to work remotely, according to a survey commissioned by business communication applications provider Avaya Inc. The study shows that 75 percent of Filipino managers now trust their staff to telecommute and 68 percent believe that allowing employees to telecommute improves their productivity.

- CIO.de

I. Introduction

With today’s spiraling fuel, electricity and transportation costs, combined with deteriorating traffic conditions, and with internet access and mobile telephony as pervasive as it is now, it may be a good time to evaluate the potential benefits and advantages of instituting telecommuting as a viable work arrangement in government, at least for certain positions and functions compatible with it.

First and foremost, for those who may not be familiar with the term, just what is telecommuting?

Wikipedia defines telecommuting as:

Telecommuting, e-commuting, e-work, telework, working at home (WAH), or working from home (WFH) is a work arrangement in which employees enjoy limited flexibility in working location and hours. In other words, the daily commute to a central place of work is replaced by telecommunication links. Many work from home, while others, occasionally also referred to as nomad workers or web commuters utilize mobile telecommunications technology to work from coffee shops or myriad other locations. Telework is a broader term, referring to substituting telecommunications for any form of work-related travel, thereby eliminating the distance restrictions of telecommuting.

What this means, is that certain employees, particularly those whose outputs and objectives lend themselves to minimum supervision, can opt to work outside the office, logging in via some remote electronic manner, and forward their respective outputs to their immediate supervisors via e-mail or some other electronic method.

As a work arrangement, telecommuting has been used with considerable success in the private sector, so it begs the question, why shouldn’t it be applied in government as well? This is the question which this paper attempts to answer.

II. Why telecommute at all?

There are several reasons why telecommuting may be desirable:

Reduced Expenditures:

• Since the employee does not always have to show up personally at the place of work, he or she spends less on fuel and/or transportation;
  

• Since there are less employees working in person in the place of work, the Corporation stands to save on:
  
  - Office and parking spaces;
  - Office supplies;
  - Office furniture and equipment;
  - Electricity and water;
  - Janitorial and security services;
  - Network bandwidth;
  - Internet access.

More efficient time usage:

• Employees can perform work virtually immediately; less time is devoted to going to and fro from the workplace. This wasted travel time can be as little as 30 minutes to an hour for those who reside near the office, to as much as 4 hours or more for those who live some distance away. Added up, these represent hundreds, perhaps even thousands of man-hours wasted away in traffic;
  

• Supervisors can concentrate more on employees whose functions require close supervision;
  

• Provides the employee with flexibility when it comes to actual working hours, which is particularly advantageous to those with domestic responsibilities, such as working parents, single parents, etc.
  

• Improves productivity;
  

• Reduces absenteeism and its associated non-productivity.

Environmental benefits:

• Reduced emissions due to less reliance on public and private transportation;
  

• Widespread adoption of telecommuting could reduce traffic congestion.

III. Technology

The technologies which make telecommuting possible are inexpensive and readily available. Broadband internet access is virtually 100% available in any developed urban area, whether through cable, DSL, Wi-Fi, or 3G. Despite its obsolescence, dial-up access connections are still available to those who have no other means to access the internet. PCs and laptops have ceased from being highly expensive specialized equipment and are now mere inexpensive commodities, to the point that an average middle class individual can readily afford them. High-speed broadband mobile phones which support 3G and video calling are now common and inexpensive, and cell phone coverage more or less covers the entire country.

In short, the technologies which make telecommuting possible are inexpensive and readily available.

IV. Who can telecommute?

This is where things get to be a little complicated. Obviously, not every position lends itself to prospect of being done via telecommuting. Here are some possible qualifiers (As described by Telecommuting 101, by Kate Lorenz on CareerBuilder.com):

• The job must be suited, at least in part, to performance at a remote location;
  

• The capabilities and personal characteristics of the employee must be appropriate to working with little or no direct supervision;
  

• The employing firm must accept telecommuting as a legitimate and desirable activity, provide necessary support and have appropriate information technology in place;
  

• The supervisor or manager of the employee must accept the concept and practice of telecommuting;
  

• The employee must feel comfortable with telecommuting in terms of its suitability to his or her personal work habits and style, its effect on social interactions and on advancement and career;

Many of the jobs that are ideally suited for telecommuting are professions with “information” or “knowledge” worker positions. These jobs can range from accountants and analysts to lawyers and paralegals, to programmers, software engineers and technical writers.

Other considerations can be:

The job should be output based, and the manager concerned, output-oriented.

The job should only deal with non-mission critical/non-confidential information. It should also not cover jobs which involve the handling of finances.

The job should not be a frontline function. Obviously, jobs which require personal interaction with our members are not prone to being done remotely.

Certain back-room functions, on the other hand, are quite ideal for telecommuting. This may include any sort of technical writing, programming, data analyses, research, canvassing, etc.

V. What does the law say?

The governing rules when it comes to government office hours are contained in the Omnibus Rules implementing Book V of Executive Order No. 292, specifically Rule XVII. It is worth noting that there is nothing in this rule which can be construed as specifically prohibiting or otherwise frowning upon the concept of telecommuting.

SECTION 1. It shall be the duty of each head of department or agency to require all officers and employees under him to strictly observe the prescribed office hours. When the head of office, in the exercise of his discretion allows government officials and employees to leave the office during the office hours and not for official business, but to attend socials/events/functions and/or wakes/interments, the same shall be reflected in their time cards and charged to their leave credits.

Note: “Prescribed office hours” need not necessarily refer to a fixed time period, such as 8 AM – 4 PM, or 9 AM – 5 PM. It is submitted that the head of department or agency has the authority to determine what the prescribed office hours are, and where the place of work should be.

SECTION 2. Each head of department or agency shall require a daily time record of attendance of all the officers and employees under him including those serving in the field or on the water, to be kept on the proper form and, whenever possible, registered on the bundy clock.

Service “in the field” shall refer to service rendered outside the office proper and service “on the water” shall refer to service rendered on board a vessel which is the usual place of work.

Note: The use of a bundy clock in recording the attendance of an employee is not an absolute necessity. A telecommuting employee will still be required to log on for work, albeit remotely, and not necessarily at the office. For all intents and purposes, a telecommuter may be considered as “in the field”.

SECTION 5. Officers and employees of all departments and agencies except those covered by special laws shall render not less than eight hours of work a day for five days a week or a total of forty hours a week, exclusive of lunch. As a general rule, such hours shall be from eight o’clock in the morning to twelve o’clock noon and from one o’clock to five o’clock in the afternoon on all days except Saturdays, Sundays and Holidays.

Note: Telecommuting does not entail a reduction of the required eight hours of work a day or forty hours a week. It only covers the location where the work is to be performed and not the duration. It worth noting that the office hours of 8-12 and 1-5 are only set as a general rule, and it is possible to set up exceptional circumstances which lead to their adjustment.

SECTION 6. Flexible working hours may be allowed subject to the discretion of the head of department or agency. In no case shall the weekly working hours be reduced in the event the department or agency adopts the flexi-time schedule in reporting for work.

The provision further emphasizes the discretion given the head of department or agency in setting working hours.

The bottom-line is, while the law does not specify nor contemplate the concept of telecommuting, it does not outright prohibit the implementation of any telecommuting scheme. Applicable laws are not necessarily incompatible with the concept of telecommuting.

VI. Other considerations

A government agency may require that the employee applying for a telecommuting work arrangement have his/her own desktop/laptop computer and internet access, so as to save the itself the expense of having to procure a laptop and internet connection for the employee.

For days spent telecommuting, management may reduce the transportation allowance or any equivalent stipend (if any) accordingly, pro-rated to the number of days the employee personally worked at the office, not counting days wherein the employee telecommuted.

VII. Conclusions and recommendations

Telecommuting is a work arrangement which has been adopted successfully in various private enterprises, including high-profile ISO certified multinational companies. Given its success in the private sector, there is no reason to believe that telecommuting, if applied sensibly and responsibly, would be any less successful in the government sector.

Clearly, it is not suitable for all types of positions, but for those which it is suitable, it may very well prove to be a boon, beneficial to both the agency itself and its employees.

Of course, some legal issues may arise, considering that current rules and regulations don’t really address it or recognize it, so it is humbly suggested the Civil Service Commission study the matter and perhaps come up with guidelines which may be applicable to the entire government sector.
Telecommuting is rising in popularity, not only because of rising fuel and energy costs, but due to demand for increased efficiency and better time management. The fact that technology has matured to the point that an employee is almost never totally out of reach of the office, using inexpensive technology has made telecommuting a viable work arrangement.

It may well be time to reexamine traditional, and perhaps, antiquated work practices in government. Given the pros and cons, and successes telecommuting has had in the private sector in other countries, it may well be worth it to consider how, if ever, it can implemented here in the Philippines.

Reflection off an extremely well-polished cylindrical pillar at The Podium.

After almost a week of having no wired internet access at my home, I'm finally back online, with a new ADSL modem and faster speeds to boot.

Being able to browse the internet at up to 1 Mbps almost makes the aggravation worth it, but to be perfectly honest, I still think PLDT's service still stinks.

It was around two months before they really took action on my request to migrate my account from legacy DSL to IPDSLAM, and it involved quite a number of phone calls before they really did anything. There's lack of coordination between their customer service representatives and technical personnel, field technicians wouldn't arrive when they said they would, or they would arrive unannounced, and no one even bothered to mention that my internet connection would be dead for a few days to a week while the migration was in progress.

Well, at least my connection is up and running again, and for that I'm thankful. As for their service and tech support, I would give PLDT a C-. While I appreciate the effort and the fact that they did manage to deliver as promised, their response times (Two months to act on a request? Six days with no internet connection?) definitely need improvement.

Of course this is PLDT we're talking about. I shouldn't really be expecting too much from them. And probably neither should you.

It's been six days, and I still don't have internet access at home, no thanks to PLDT's excruciatingly slow process of migrating my legacy DSL account to IPDSLAM (Internet Protocol Digital Subscriber Line Access Multiplexer).

It all started in the last week of September, I forgot exactly when. I visited PLDT's office in SM Megamall and requested that my DSL account be migrated to IPDSLAM since I was only getting half the bandwidth I was supposed to be getting, based on their P999 plan. My request was promptly entered into their system, I was given a service order number for future reference, and I was reassured that the migration would be seamless, and I would notice an increase in my bandwidth allocation after several days.

After more than a month with no perceptible difference in browsing speeds I called up PLDT's customer service hotline (171). On my first call I was told their system was down so they were unable to follow up the status of my service request. After a few days I called again, and this time I was informed that my service request has already been acted on on October 15. I was a bit puzzled, since up to that time I was still getting only about 512 Kbps of bandwidth, but I gave them the benefit of the doubt and said that I would just monitor my connection if there was any improvement.

Surprise, surprise, after a week or two of observing my connection speeds I was still getting the same old slow speeds.

I made another call to PLDT's customer service, and the customer service representative seemed surprised that my connection was still sluggish, since according to their system, the problem has already been fixed. He relayed my situation to their tech support, and reassured me that they will check on the problem.

Okay, I thought. Let them do their work.

Within a few days a PLDT technician dropped by my house to check my connection. No change though, I was still stuck at around 512 Kbps or thereabouts. He tried to explain away the slow speed as a network loss, that some bandwidth would unavoidably be lost through the system, a claim that I took with a grain of salt. I told him that a 10-20% bandwidth loss would be somewhat acceptable, but there was no way that I would believe that 50% of the bandwidth I was paying for was being sucked into nothingness, much less than they couldn't actually do anything about it.

Figuring he couldn't talk his way out of this situation, he called up his office following up on the status of my prior service request. Later on he informed me that the service request I made was, to use his words, a "ghost request" since it was reflected in their system, yet no information could be retrieved regarding its status. Nonetheless, he promised to look into the situation.

A few days later, the DSL indicator light on my DSL modem turned off, and I haven't seen it light back up for the past six days.

I made some more follow-ups, and I got weird suggestions from the customer service representative that I chanced upon that the problem was on my side, and that they would sent another technician over.

What the f...?

How can it be on my side when I was getting stable (albeit slow) connections and there have been no changes whatsoever to my home setup?

I asked the guy on the phone if this was connected to my speed increase request, to which he replied that it may be related. Apparently, he wasn't sure himself. What the hell is wrong with these people?

Another call made two days later and he sort of acknowledged that the problem was on their side, and that it wasn't unheard of for IPDSLAM migration to take a week or so, something that I later on confirmed on internet forums.

It's been almost a week, yet my internet connection is still dead. Well, at least I have my Sun Wireless Broadband as backup. Oddly enough, I'm consistently getting faster connection speeds using my wireless broadband modem than my DSL connection. Go figure. I'm already a bit annoyed given the long downtime, but I'm still hopeful that the inconvenience is worth it, as long as I get the additional bandwidth and therefore more bang for my buck.

That being as it may, it probably goes without saying that PLDT still has a lot more room for improving its services and turnaround time for service requests. Given the sheer number of providers in the market competing for the business of getting you online, shoddy service just doesn't cut it anymore, and won't get you far in this industry.

For now, I'm only hoping that that DSL indicator LED lights up soon.

Several weeks ago I bought a new notebook computer to replace my aging Asus A9Rp. The Asus, while tough as nails and as reliable as a Toyota, was starting to get a bit long in the tooth, and compared to its contemporaries, getting to be a bit of a dinosaur.

While the Asus A9Rp is by no means a cutting edge notebook computer even when it was brand new, it was perfectly adequate for most computing purposes such as word processing, internet browsing, watching DVDs, and even gaming thanks to its built-in ATI Radeon™ Xpress 200M graphics. Where it does fall short, is in its size, and weight. It has a 15" screen with a 4:3 aspect ratio, so it's not widescreen. Not being widescreen, the notebook itself occupies a fairly big squarish footprint which inevitably makes it heavier than average at about 3.26 kilograms (7.17 lbs). With today's notebooks (and netbooks) sometimes weighing less than half that, I decided it was time for a change...and this time, other than price, weight was going to be factor.

The notebook computer I chose was a Compaq Presario CQ40-107AU which was quite a steal at only P27,500.00 at Villman, P2,000.00 cheaper than the A9Rp which was also purchased new at Villman less than two years ago. Spec-wise, it runs rings around the Asus.

The CQ40-107AU is built around AMD's Puma platform, which combines an AMD dual-core Lion 64-bit processor with AMD's M780 chipset with integrated ATI Radeon HD 3200 graphics. In this particular model, the processor is an Athlon X2 QL-60 running at 1.9 GHz. Note that this is not a desktop Athlon X2 installed in a notebook. It's a true purpose-built mobile processor based on the K8 (desktop Athlon X2) with power-saving features from the K10 (desktop Phenom) built on a .065 micron process, running at a peak thermal design power of 35 watts.

Granted, this is no match for an equivalent Core 2 Duo notebook as far as raw processing power is concerned, but it will definitely outperform any entry level Core 2 Duo-equipped notebook when it comes to 3D gaming thanks to the built-in ATI graphics. Then there's the price. The cheapest Core 2 Duo notebook I could find was an MSI Megabook S1313 which was being sold at P30,999.00. I was all set to purchase it, attracted by it's 13.3" widescreen footprint, never mind the sluggish Intel X3100 graphics. Of course, when the good folks at PC Express Virra Mall took almost an hour to figure out how to crack open the case to add another stick of RAM (and actually not even succeeding), I passed, not wanting all that hassle just to add another gig of memory. The next cheapest Core 2 Duo equipped notebook I could find was an Acer worth P36,900.00, which almost ten grand more expensive than the Presario. Clearly a no-brainer, particularly for a cheapskate like me.

Of course the Presario wasn't the only AMD-based notebook I considered. For a moment I also liked the Acer Aspire 4530-801G16Mn, which boasted a 2.1 GHz AMD Turion Ultra X2 ZM-80 processor and Nvidia GeForce 9100M graphics for P33,600.00. However, concerns about the questionable durability of mobile Nvidia GPUs scared me away, more so if you searched for horror stories on the web, of which there are a lot. Apparently Nvidia has not been very forthcoming about the extent and prevalence of the defects, and they seem to span a very wide range of mobile and even desktop GPUs. Coincidentally, earlier this year I lost an Inno3D GeForce 6800LE AGP video card which showed symptoms basically identical to those exhibited by defective mobile GPUs, (weird columns of evenly spaced dots on Windows startup screens, crashing on 3D apps) and my GPU is a desktop model. And I've never had a video card break down on me before. In fact, I still have perfectly functioning Voodoo 2s, TNTs and even some ViRGEs lying around. Therefore, at this point in time, for me at least, I'm staying away from anything made by Nvidia.

So...the Compaq gets the nod. And here it is:

Key features include the aforementioned Athlon X2 QL-60 and M780 chipset with an integrated ATI Radeon HD 3200 GPU, a 14.1" widescreen display, 1 GB of RAM, a 160 GB Western Digital hard drive, a SuperMulti 8X DVD±R/RW with Double Layer Support and Altec Lansing speakers. Other features include virtually everything else you'll need, such as Wi-Fi, three USB 2.0 ports, LAN and modem ports, Bluetooth connectivity, a 5-in-1 card reader, video out and HDMI ports, and a built-in webcam and microphone, all in a package which weigh only 2.29 kilograms (5.038 lbs).

Like any other notebook, it does have its quirks. The first unit I received had a defective optical drive which wouldn't open. It was promptly replaced, even when the store was already closed (hats off to Villman Katipunan for the quick response, though I told them that if they didn't replace it immediately I would demand a refund).

Secondly, the CQ40-107AU only comes with FreeDOS, which is virtually useless, unless you insist on running, say, WordStar. It also does not "officially" support Windows XP. While there are ways of making XP run on this thing, some functionality does get lost, among others the function keys which adjust volume, brightness, etc. Not wanting to have any non-functioning controls I splurged and bought an OEM copy of Windows Vista Home Basic. It doesn't have the Windows Aero interface, but then again, I am a cheapskate. Vista or otherwise, it doesn't come with a driver CD, so you have to download the drivers from Compaq's website yourself. While not a big deal, it's somewhat a bit of a bother, when almost every other notebook manufacturer includes a CD with the drivers.

The standard 1 GB of RAM is pretty skimpy, especially when running Vista, so I upgraded it to 4 GB using a pair of 2 GB DDR2667 Kingston ValueRAM SODIMMs. And unlike the MSI S1313, you can upgrade the memory in matter of minutes. Unfortunately, I can't access all 4 GB due to the limitations of a 32-bit OS. In fact, I can only use 2,812 out of 4,096 MB. I guess have to save up for a 64-bit OS if I want to maximize the use of my memory.

The top of the notebook is in a smooth, glossy, piano-black finish which is pretty upscale in appearance, but collects more fingerprints than the NBI and PNP combined. The unit comes with a silicone-impregnated cloth to wipe it clean with, though.

Lastly, the CQ40 runs fairly hot. It does not really overheat mind you, the QL-60 just appears to run hotter normally than most other CPUs, idling at 60+ and working hard at around 80+ degrees C. A good notebook cooler is therefore a must for prolonged use in hot environments. And don't use it on your lap, unless you're willing to risk broiling your testicles...or unless you're a girl. :-)

In conclusion, the Compaq Presario CQ40-107AU is a cheap but feature-rich notebook, even though I had to pay extra for the OS and RAM upgrade. It's not the most powerful notebook, but it is a very well-rounded one, and it will do pretty much anything you ask it to do. I'm pretty much satisfied with it, and it will probably serve my needs for the next year or so. Well, at least until quad-core notebooks become mainstream...or in my case, affordable.

So, another impeachment attempt is dead. So what else is new?

I guess it doesn't really matter. No one really expected the impeachment to gain ground in a House of Representatives dominated by allies and partymates of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

Even with the damning revelations of former Speaker Jose De Venecia Jr., considering he was once the President's chief lieutenant in keeping the House and its members in check.

It's been four years in a row, and hardly any impeachment attempt ever made it to first base, thanks to the sheer number of congressmen loyal to Malacañang. I guess it's our fault as well. We "technically" voted these people into office. They supposedly should represent the collective will of the Filipino people, and if the past four impeachment attempts are any indication, it would appear that the people do not want President Arroyo to be impeached.

Of course, we may never really know. Elections in this country, except for rare instances, have never really been successful in reflecting the sentiments of the citizens of the country.

The determination of the sufficiency of the filed impeachment complaint in form and substance was never meant by the Constitution to be the determinant of the President's guilt or innocence. That would be the Senate's job, and yet, Presidential allies have been quick to vote against the complaint which has detailed accounts of President's misdeeds, thus derailing any opportunity for the Filipino people to learn the truth over accusations which have remained unresolved all these years.

From allegations of cheating in the last Presidential elections, to violations of human rights, to the fertilizer fund scam, to the botched NBN-GTZ agreement, to accusations of vote-buying in the House, Congress has collectively made the determination that there is no probable cause to warrant a full blown impeachment trial...which is frankly, a lot of bull.

The message it sends is that the most powerful person in the country can do virtually anything illegal without fear of being held accountable for her actions.

I'm disappointed, but hardly surprised.

Don't get me wrong. I do not hate the current President or administration, but I do find it very disturbing that they absolutely refuse to answer the accusations of wrongdoing which clearly point to at least some level of accountability and responsibility on their part. I also find the way they corrupt existing legal processes for taking the President to task highly distasteful. The provisions of the Constitution should not be used to perpetrate injustice in any form, and yet that is precisely what is happening.

And now, there is talk about the elections in 2010 being postponed, terms of office extended, and even charter change, which further creates a bitter taste in my mouth.

Alas, when former President Ferdinand E. Marcos declared martial law and for all intents and purposes consolidated the powers of the three separate branches of government into his office, there were hardly any pretensions as to what his ultimate objective was. The current President on the other hand, keeps trying to maintain an image of being subservient to the law and the Constitution, when her actions and the actions of her administration clearly show otherwise.

No one should be above the law, but when you're in power, the law appears to be nothing more than an optional formality.

We claim to be a country of laws and not of men. It's just too bad that when faced with the opportunity to put this maxim to action, we fall short...each and every time.

1. When I was born, I was given a choice - A big dick or a good memory. I don't remember, what I chose.

2. Your birth certificate is an apology letter from the condom factory.

3. A wife is a sex object. Every time you ask for sex, she objects.

4. Impotence: Nature's way of saying 'No hard feelings...'

5. There are only two four letter words that are offensive to men - 'don't'
and 'stop', unless they are used together.

6. Panties: Not the best thing on earth, but next to the best thing on earth.

7. There are three stages of sex in a man's life: Tri Weekly, Try Weekly, and Try Weakly.

8. Virginity can be cured.

9. Virginity is not dignity, its lack of opportunity.

10. Having sex is like playing bridge. If you don't have a good partner, you'd better have a good hand.

11. I tried phone sex once, but the holes in the dialer were too small.

12. Marriage is the only war where you get to sleep with the enemy.

13. Q: What's an Australian kiss?
A: The same thing as a French kiss, only down under.

14. A couple just married were happy with the whole thing. He was happy with the Hole and she was happy with the Thing......

15. Q: What are the three biggest tragedies in a mans life?
A: Life sucks, job sucks, and the wife doesn't.

16. Q: Why do men find it difficult to make eye contact?
A: Breasts don't have eyes.

17. Despite the old saying, 'Don't take your troubles to bed', many men still sleep with their wives!!

From my inbox.

Last November 4 marked a memorable moment in United States history. For the first time ever, Barack Hussein Obama II, an African-American, was elected to the most powerful political position in America, and arguably the most influential position in the world...the office of President of the United States of America.

Who would have thought that we would live to see it happen? In a country where black Americans have been classed as "inferior" from the days of slavery up to the civil rights movement in the late 1960s, to sporadic incidents of racial discrimination up to the present (the Rodney King riots, the O.J. Simpson murder case), the election of an African-American as President of the United States of America represents a watershed in modern history.

In a span of less than 150 years or six generations from Abraham Lincoln's monumental Emancipation Proclamation, black Americans have slowly but surely worked themselves up from being slaves to becoming prominent leaders and members of society, finally culminating in one being elected to the Presidency.

Am I happy to see a black man become President of the United States?

Definitely. No question about it.

Am I happy to see Barack Obama become President of the United States?

To be honest, I'm not so sure.

Am I happy to see the Democrats retake the White House, and for that matter, the United States Senate and Congress?

I'm not so sure either.

Of course, I'm not deluding myself. In the grand scheme of things, my opinion in these issues hardly matter. I'm not an American, much less a Democrat or a Republican, but nonetheless, I have been closely following the campaign and the election, close enough to actually feel as if I have a personal stake in it. Of course, with the global impact of the current economic recession, I probably do, even in the far off backwater country I call my home.

Being 36 years old, I'm old enough to be actually capable of relating to the conservative ideals the Republican party stands for, even if John McCain, or his campaign, didn't seem conservative enough. At 36, I'm also still young enough to retain some of my idealism and desire for change, and Barack Obama, if nothing else, is a living, breathing paragon of change, not only for American politics, or for the United States, but for the whole world.

Truth be told, the world is not the same place we used to know. Globalization has made possible the rise and fall of economies if there is even just one weak link in the chain. We live in a post 9/11 world, where terrorism knows no bounds. The threat of global warming is ever present, thanks to humanity's uncaring attitudes toward the environment. Simply put, it's a mess out there.

While conservatism may have its place, the present doesn't seem to be the right time for it. It's no longer about simply maintaining the status quo but changing the way we think, the way we do things, the way we plan for the future, and truth be told, the Democrats are far better at espousing change than the Republicans, probably because the Democrat's leanings towards social liberalism, what I tend to call "soft" socialism.

Barack Obama may not necessarily be the best man for the job. He may not necessarily have the best qualifications (Hillary Clinton, to my mind, is more qualified), or the most experience (John McCain without a doubt has more experience), but he was at the right time at the right place. Many talk of the race card as being an important issue in the elections and it is, but the most likely scenario is that Obama won because he is black, and not in spite of his being black.

It begs the question: If he was white, would he still have won? Frankly, if he was white, he probably wouldn't have been in the running for President as he would very likely have lost the primaries, and America would have had its first woman President, Hillary Rodham Clinton. History would have been made as well, and Democrats would probably still end up controlling the Senate and Congress, thanks to widespread anti-Bush sentiments.

The bottom line is simply that Americans want change, are desperate for it really, given today's difficult times. Unfortunately for John McCain, Sarah Palin and the rest of the Republicans, change is something the Republican Party can't seem to seriously offer.

If you think about it, nothing seems to represent change in America better than a black man being President, and as the last week's headlines will tell you, the American people got it, and got it in spades.

President-Elect Obama has made a lot of promises, and he will be hard-pressed to keep those promises, not to mention the eyes of the entire world will be on him, hanging on everything he says and does. He certainly has the potential to be one of America's greatest Presidents, but of course he also has the potential to be one of its worst, if he fails to live up to expectations.

It's a time for change, and with Obama leading the United States, change may very well be on the horizon. Will it be for the better, or for the worse? Only time will tell.

At this very moment I'm sitting here in Starbuck's sipping a sugar-free, skim milk caffè latte, when I should be in my office. Lately it seems as if no matter how early (or late) I get to the office, I always find myself without an available parking space.

You know, it's kinda ironic.

I can take the office politics, the back-biting and back-stabbing, the office gossip, being passed over for promotion, being floated, etc., but somehow not having an available parking slot when I get to work has a strange bitterness unique to itself.

One day you realize you only have a job and not a career. It is no longer a calling which gets you out of bed in the morning, more often than not just an alarm clock which you don't hesitate to put into snooze mode when it blares out the opening salvo in the daily grind that you call your life.

You get dressed, brave the morning rush hour, in the process avoiding a number of rushing buses who would soon run you over rather than allow a competing bus to get first dibs on waiting passengers, and after everything has been said and done, you find yourself in your place of work, without a place to park your ten-year-old clunker. Is there no justice?

Even if you resign yourself to your fate of being nothing more than a salaryman, fate sometimes deals you a hand so inane in its triviality, yet hitting right where it hurts.

Yet, I choose not to blow my top. What's the use anyway?

I go to the nearest Starbuck's, fire up my laptop, and over sips of a low-calorie, sugar-free, caffeine-rich brew, I type this post to help maintain my sanity over what seems to be an insane world.

I guess I should be thankful though. A lot of more experienced and more qualified individuals have lost their jobs, thanks to the global economic crisis. I may not have a career, but I still have a job, and for a lot of unemployed people, I'm on easy street. On the flip side though, a lot of no-skill, no-talent, no-common-sense people have been able to weasel themselves into high-paying corporate jobs, and for no other reason than having the right political connections. C'est la vie.

It still bugs me though, but I'll live.

What I want though, is to do a Datsusara, but that will come in its own time. For now, all I can hope for is an available parking slot when I get back to the office.

One day, a young man was cleaning out his late grandfather' s belongings when he came across a bright red envelope. Written on the front were the words, "To my grandson." Recognizing his grandfather' s handwriting, the boy opened the envelope. A letter inside read:

Dear Grandson,

Years ago you came to me for help. You said, "Grandpa, how is it that you've accomplished so much in your life? You're still full of energy, and I'm already tired of struggling. How can I get that same enthusiasm that you've got?"

I didn't know what to say to you then. But knowing my days are numbered, I figure that I owe you an answer. So here is what I believe..

I think a lot of it has to do with how a person looks at things. I call it 'keeping your eyes wide open.'

First, realize that life is filled with surprises, but many are good ones. If you don't keep watching for them, you'll miss half the excitement. Expect to be thrilled once in a while, and you will be.

When you meet up with challenges, welcome them. They'll leave you wiser, stronger, and more capable than you were the day before. When you make a mistake, be grateful for the things it taught you. Resolve to use that lesson to help you reach your goals.

And always follow the rules. Even the little ones. When you follow the rules, life works. If you think you ever really get by with breaking the rules, you're only fooling yourself.

It's also important to decide exactly what you want. Then keep your mind focused on it, and be prepared to receive it.

But be ready to end up in some new places too. As you grow with the years, you'll be given bigger shoes to fill. So be ready for endings as well as challenging beginnings.

Sometimes we have to be brave enough to move from the familiar to the unfamiliar. Life isn't just reaching peaks. Part of it is moving from one peak to the next. If you rest too long in between, you might be tempted to quit. Leave the past in the past. Climb the next mountain and enjoy the view.

Dump things that weigh you down emotionally and spiritually. When an old resentment, belief, or attitude becomes heavy, lighten your load. Shed those hurtful attitudes that slow you down and drain your energy.

Remember that your choices will create your successes and your failures. So consider all the pathways ahead, and decide which ones to follow. Then believe in yourself, get up, and get going.

And be sure to take breaks once in a while. They'll give you a renewed commitment to your dreams and a cheerful, healthy perception of the things that matter the most to you.

Most important of all, never give up on yourself. The person that ends up a winner is the one who resolves to win. Give life everything you've got, and life will give its best back to you.

Love always,
Grandpa

From my inbox.

A couple of weeks ago I upgraded my entire PC...well, at least most of it, after my video card failed.

To be honest, I was quite happy with the performance of my old Athlon 64 rig, but after being faced with the prospect of a defective video card, it didn't seem right to invest in a new mid-range AGP video card, considering that PCI-Express is now the de facto video card interface, and AGP is on its way to extinction.

It started innocently enough. For no apparent reason my PC started crashing, and the startup screens started showing columns of weird checkerboard patterns. Strangely enough, I could run the PC perfectly fine when the video card was in VGA mode, but when I installed GeForce drivers and rebooted, nothing happened. Literally. The PC would just sit there, with the monitor blacked out. I could reboot into safe mode, but that was about all that I could do.

The symptoms my two-and-a-half year old Inno3D GeForce 6800LE showed seemed strangely similar to the symptoms exhibited by defective NVIDIA mobile GPUs. In fact, some screenshots of defective GPUs posted on the web showed virtually similar artifacts as my 6800LE. I can't help but suspect that NVIDIA's defective chips extend significant further than the mobile 8400M and 8600M GPUs which they have originally claimed to be the only ones affected, and that the problem extends to other GPUs as well, including those used on desktops. Well, suffice it to say that I'm avoiding anything with an NVIDIA brand name for the foreseeable future, at least until these defects get sorted out.

Well, going back to my rig, I ended up buying a new case, motherboard, processor, memory, video card, power supply, and an optical drive. I reused all my older hard drives, my sound card and speakers, my monitors, keyboard and mouse. The processor and video card were selected not only on the basis of performance and cost, but also on the basis of power consumption.

After assembly, this is my completed system:

Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo E7200 (Wolfdale core, 2.53 GHz, 3MB L2 cache, 1,066 MHz FSB)
Motherboard: Asrock Wolfdale1333-GLAN R2.0
Memory: 2 x 2 GB Apacer DDR2-667 Unbuffered DIMM (4 GB total)
Video: PowerColor PCS HD3650 512M GDDR3
Sound: Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy Digital Entertainment SE
Hard Disk: 2 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.7 ST380011A (PATA interface, 80 GB 7,200 RPM), 2 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.7 ST380011AS (SATA interface, 80 GB 7,200 RPM)
DVD-Writer: Samsung Super-WriteMaster SH-S223Q
Mouse: Logitech MX600 Laser mouse (Logitech Cordless Desktop MX3000 Laser)
Keyboard: Logitech MX3000 (Logitech Cordless Desktop MX3000 Laser)
Speakers: Logitech Z-640 (5.1)
Monitor: 2 x 17" Samsung SyncMaster 740N
Power Supply: hec Raptor R500 (500W)
CPU HSF: Stock
Printer: hp LaserJet 1010

This rig should be upgrade-proof for at least a year, longer if I'm lucky.

I also upgraded my 15-month old laptop. I'll tell you all about it in a future post.

Happy 12th birthday son! :-)

This blog is almost four years old.

It's no longer as popular as it once was, as I haven't been updating as regularly as I used to.

I don't really blog hop that much anymore either, so I haven't been getting many visits from my peers and contemporaries anymore.

Yet I still write when I have the chance.

There aren't as many people I can talk to as before as I sort of gave up slowly on some of my friends during the past few years, and the few friends that I still have, like most people, are busy with the humdrum of their own lives.

So blogging ends up as a form of catharsis for me, a chance to commit my thoughts to keyboard, to get my ideas in order, and free my mind of things that haven't really been sorted out, never mind if my posts are hardly read anymore. It was never really the point of this whole thing.

I started this blog for myself, and I have stayed true to that all these years.

A lot of my fellow bloggers, particularly those whom I started blogging with, have either quit blogging altogether or abandoned their blogs, perhaps due to a loss of interest, lack of time, or maybe have simply quit just because blogging is no longer the "in" thing to be doing on the web.

One of the fastest growing sites on the web is Twitter. In it, you can post updates, snippets, anecdotes, or one-liners, without the hassle of maintaining a blog, or having up to come up with an essay of sorts in order to come up with a viable blog post. Everything has a shortcut nowadays. Self-expression via the express lane. Why bother blogging when you can use Twitter instead?

Alas, in a world where everything can be made to go, I have still chosen to keep blogging. It works for me, so why bother changing?

For me, blogging is a very effective outlet, and I foresee it to continue serving that purpose even as I grow older. As more and more people around us seem to get more shallow and superficial, it is nice to be able to express some depth once in a while, even if no one reads, much less understands my posts.

I've often asked myself this question, though I could never really come up with a sensible answer.

It's a good question to think about though, seemingly contradictory in its inanity and its poignancy, yet, try as I might, I could never seem to rationalize where this question came from, or where it leads to.

We're all alive right now, here, in the present. If you follow a religion, any religion, chances are you share a belief in a life beyond this one, that the death of our physical bodies would lead us to a place of eternal peace and happiness...that is, if we are deserving, based on the actions we perform in this life.

Not to be blasphemous or anything, but I have always had a hard time dealing with that concept, even when I was very young. For one thing, I have sort of turned into a moral relativist over the years, and I have come to accept that it is not always proper to label one action "good" or another action "evil". It depends on the circumstances surrounding the action. For example, killing a person per se is bad, but killing a person in self defense or in defense of others is good. And yet, most religions, distilled to the very essence of their teachings, seem to favor absolutes. Exodus 20:13 - You shall not murder. No ifs, no buts, no qualifications.

So how can you judge the worthiness of a person's soul to be granted eternal peace and happiness using as basis absolutes with virtually no room for interpretation?

Of course, this has not stopped countless people from proselytyzing their own interpretations over these absolutes for the past thousands of years. Who among them are right? Only God knows.

Speaking of God, in the end, it is only Him who can really decide who deserves salvation and who doesn't. Tradition and our own meager understanding of God as a concept, as a Supreme Being, has attributed him with omniscience, omnipresence and infinite wisdom. It is only He who can best judge whether our actions make us worthy of eternal bliss or eternal damnation. Yet somehow, in His infinite wisdom, he doubtless knows that we are imperfect beings, and it hardly seems fair that imperfect beings are judged on a scale of perfection.

Which leads us back to the question at hand. Is this life real? Or is it just some illusion conjured up to test the limits of our humanity, to see where we belong in the next life?

Begging the question...is there even a next life?

Frankly, I don't know. In fact no one really knows, and anyone who claims otherwise is probably lying. Know one can no for a fact what lies beyond our own deaths, and still be alive. We don't know. But we believe, and for some people this is enough.

As for me, ashamed as I am to admit it...sometimes I have my doubts.

The reasons why an infinitely powerful being would deliberately create an imperfect race and then test them for perfection, then reward or punish them accordingly is way beyond the comprehension of this mortal mind. Perhaps the truth may not be as simplistic as I have described it to be, but there is no escaping the fact that none of us are really aware of the answer, much less if an answer even really exists.

We live life, applying our own standards of right or wrong, and hope for the best whenever judgment day arrives, whenever that is. We all believe what we want to believe, and we try to keep the faith over things which we have assured ourselves to be the keys to our own personal salvation. We can't really do anything much more than that.

But sometimes it's nice to think about it...and we can leave it at that.

So who is not to say that our very lives as we live them today are nothing more than illusions, dreams, figments of imagination. What is the true measure if something is truly real or not? Are our five senses sufficient in separating reality from fiction?

In a few more days it will be Halloween. And in the days following, All Saints' Day and All Souls' Day.

Just something to ponder over the weekend.

For those of us outside the United States who have no idea how their elections work.

Note:

Turn off the background audio first at the bottom of the page before clicking the play button.

patronus922. My CABAL Online character, a level 136 Force Shielder. Dual Transcender. Name is Latin for "guardian". Favorite skills: Shield Break, Shield Splinter, Blade of Judgement, Storm Crush. Just one of the diversions I turn to in my solitude.

A few days ago, a senior official of the government agency I work in summoned me to her office. There, I was told in not so many words that in view of our office’s poor performance when it comes to implementing information technology thrusts, she was planning to propose to top management the hiring of a Chief Information Officer (CIO), more than likely a consultant, to oversee IT development and deployment. She subsequently asked me if I would be willing to act as a special assistant/liaison to this proposed CIO.

While I did not refuse the assignment (in the grand scheme of things, I’m not in a position to refuse anyway), I found myself somewhat disturbed and somewhat revolted by the idea.

Of course, there is nothing inherently wrong with hiring a consultant for a particular task...virtually all large corporations do it at one time or another. In fact, large corporations do it all the time. It just got me thinking; just what is it about consultants that seem to give people the impression that they hold the answer to everything?

I’ve worked with a lot of consultants in my time, and unfortunately, in the greater part of cases, the experience hasn’t all been that fruitful. I'm inclined to think that this negative assessment is fairly commonplace, especially regarding consultants employed by the public sector.

A large paycheck + recommending power + no accountability almost always = a big fat 0.

Our office has had a lot of consultants in its 12 year history, and truth be told, the vast majority of consultants have hardly contributed anything worthwhile to the corporation. Well, nothing dramatic or even noticeable at the very least.

To be fair, it is not always the consultants’ fault. At the end of the day, the essence of a consultant can usually be distilled down to the recommendations he or she submits to management. Whether management chooses to implement the recommendations or not is another issue altogether.

But on the other side, there are consultants who merely suck up funds from corporate coffers who hardly contribute anything, if any. These are the types who typically has some poor schmuck in the office make up some fictional account of alleged outputs in order to justify the paycheck. Almost always, that poor schmuck earns less than half, maybe even a quarter of that consultant, yet he gets stuck with the unenviable job of justifying the consultants continued employment.

What does it take to be a consultant anyway? The quick answer is probably age and experience, though it seems oxymoronic to apply the same in the IT industry, where technology rapidly shifts from one paradigm into another.

Take me for example. At 36, I’m not exactly spring chicken anymore. My IT experience and/or training range from COBOL to Java, From AppleSoft BASIC to Visual Basic, from dBase III+ to Oracle, from Z-80 and 6502 processors to MicroSparc and UltraSparc, to quad-core x86-64, from various flavors of UNIX to LINUX, from CP/M to DOS to Vista, from Netware to TCP/IP, from 14.4 kbps modems to leased lines and 3.5G HSDPA. Hell, you could even consider my journeys from VisiCalc to Lotus 1-2-3 to Excel, and from WordStar to Word. Would that qualify me to be a IT consultant?

The irony is, a well established and reputable IT consultant is, more often than not, nothing more than an expensive repository of information of how to apply obsolete technology. So how do they get their reputations in the first place? Let’s just say that they were fortunate (lucky?) enough to have bet on the right horse, that is to say, technology, at the start of their careers, making them authorities on the subject. In retrospect, I seem to have bet on the wrong horses in the past. Thin clients and Java haven't really lived up to all their hype ten years ago.

But the question is, with information technology advancing at the pace it’s at, do we really want a consultant telling us how to use technology which may no longer be viable?

Hell, if being a consultant involves nothing more than telling people what to do without you caring whether they do it or not and get paid big bucks at the same time, then I’m obviously in the wrong line of work.

Kidding aside, I guess I’m a bit peeved over the way management...at least our management...almost always assumes that consultants possess a panacea for whatever ails them, even at the expense of the careers of highly qualified organic personnel.

Nonetheless, there are exceptions. There are a number of good consultants who not only have the foresight to advocate the right technology at the right time, but also have continued to learn and grow at the same pace as the industry. It is unfortunate that these consultants are few and far in between. Besides, they get good track records by avoiding clients whose IT projects end up as white elephants, and white elephant is almost synonymous with government.

In the event that a consultant is really needed, I’d prefer that our agency instead engage the services of a consulting firm rather than a solitary freelancing consultant. At least that way, there’s a measure of protection from obsolescence given that you’re dealing with a pool of people instead of an individual, and a firm has a corporate reputation to maintain and preserve, ensuring some level of accountability for any crappy ideas it chooses to recommend or implement. It’s obviously a more expensive proposition, but at least you’re almost guaranteed to get something out of the deal.

Consultant = big paycheck + recommending power + no accountability

Consulting firm = bigger paycheck + recommending power + industrial accountability

Organic personnel = small paycheck + recommendations not taken seriously + full accountability

See what I’m getting at?

As for the assignment I was talking about at the start of this post, I’ll probably find a way out of it. Not that I’m trying to avoid work, but because I’d rather not be involved in any endeavor which in all likelihood would end up as a white elephant. And with my office’s track record when it comes to consultants, it’s a safe bet this situation would not be any different.

As for being a consultant...I probably don’t have it in me.

I’d much rather have right opinions which other people may not take seriously instead of wrong opinions which everyone believes. Call it naivete, call it blind idealism, I call it sticking to my guns.

I've always been the prophet of doom at our office. The devil's advocate with the uncanny ability to predict projects destined to failure from the very start. No one believes me though, even though time and time again my predictions were spot on. Well, what can I say. If management would rather believe idiots then that's their call.

Adolf Hitler would have been a good consultant.

Just recently upgraded my laptop's memory to 2 GB. Somehow 1 GB doesn't seem to cut it anymore, and memory is cheaper than it ever was, so might as well. Hopefully, disk grinding should be significantly reduced. And if it still isn't fast enough? Maybe I should just spring for that new Intel Core 2 Duo laptop. :-)

Always check your softdrinks bottle before drinking the contents, especially those using recycled glass bottles. You never know what else could be in there. In this recent example, you can clearly see an empty instant coffee sachet floating inside.

nemesis922. Level 14x POW Swordsman. My first character. Nemesis means "an opponent which cannot be beaten or overcome". Nemesis in Greek mythology is also the goddess of retributive justice or vengeance. Favorite skills: Vacuum Slash and Tornado Slash.

amicus922. Level 12x INT Swordsman. Amicus in Latin means "friend". Favorite skills: Tranquility, Lightning Strike and Crescent Slash.

medicus922. Level 13x Full Support Shaman. Medicus is Latin for "doctor" or "physician". Favorite skills: Gift of Life, Resurrection and Spear Guardian's Wrath.

bellator922. Level 13x INT Brawler. Bellator in Latin means "warrior". It also means "warlike" and "courageous". Favorite skills: Blood Lust, Force Roar and Force Push.

vesta922. Level 13x Attack Support Shaman. Named after Vesta, the goddess of the hearth and domestic life. Favorite skills: Petrify and Infernal Punishment.

curio922. Level 10x Attack Support Shaman. Curio means "herald" or "crier", or a Roman priest. Favorite skills: Serpent's Venom and Petrify.

I'm more or less retired from this game now, though I still play on occassion. It was a good run, full of ups and downs, with lots of friends made along the way. That being said, 2 years is an eternity in the world of online games, so I guess it's as good a time as any to move on and do something else.

Lord God, the creator of all, and fount of all knowledge and wisdom, I implore you to guide me in my undertaking to become a lawyer.

Open my mind to absorb, remember and live the principles of law and justice distilled in my readings and in the lectures I attend.

I beseech you to illumine the thoughts of the bar reviewers so they could be your instruments in guiding me.

Fill me with your grace, so I would have a clear mind in identifying the issues raised in the bar questions. Give light for me to discover the correct, just and ethical answers to the bar questions so I could pass the Bar.

Finally, grant me the serenity to accept whatever is thy will and show me the correct path to take for your greater glory.

AMEN.

(This is a non-sectarian prayer written by Prof. Abelardo T. Domondon)

Good luck to all bar examinees!

Next year it'll be my turn again. Hopefully it will be my last.

Here is the full text of Alaska Governor and Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin's speech made during the Republican National Convention held earlier today in St. Paul, Minnesota.

I have to say I was impressed. And I'm not even a Republican. Hell, I'm not even an American. John McCain is certainly lucky to have her as his running mate.

All in all, while Sarah Palin's speech may not necessarily be enough to prove that the has what it takes to be Vice President, much less that she's the best candidate for the position, it certainly establishes her as someone who doesn't pull punches and who's not afraid of a good fight. This will definitely makes the race a lot more exciting, and perhaps a lot closer than previously thought.

It's unfortunate we don't have politicians of her caliber here in the Philippines.

Mr. Chairman, delegates, and fellow citizens: I am honored to be considered for the nomination for Vice President of the United States...

I accept the call to help our nominee for president to serve and defend America.

I accept the challenge of a tough fight in this election... against confident opponents ... at a crucial hour for our country.

And I accept the privilege of serving with a man who has come through much harder missions ... and met far graver challenges ... and knows how tough fights are won - the next president of the United States, John S. McCain.

It was just a year ago when all the experts in Washington counted out our nominee because he refused to hedge his commitment to the security of the country he loves.

With their usual certitude, they told us that all was lost - there was no hope for this candidate who said that he would rather lose an election than see his country lose a war.

But the pollsters and pundits overlooked just one thing when they wrote him off.

They overlooked the caliber of the man himself - the determination, resolve, and sheer guts of Senator John McCain. The voters knew better.

And maybe that's because they realize there is a time for politics and a time for leadership ... a time to campaign and a time to put our country first.

Our nominee for president is a true profile in courage, and people like that are hard to come by.

He's a man who wore the uniform of this country for 22 years, and refused to break faith with those troops in Iraq who have now brought victory within sight.

And as the mother of one of those troops, that is exactly the kind of man I want as commander in chief. I'm just one of many moms who'll say an extra prayer each night for our sons and daughters going into harm's way.

Our son Track is 19.

And one week from tomorrow - September 11th - he'll deploy to Iraq with the Army infantry in the service of his country.

My nephew Kasey also enlisted, and serves on a carrier in the Persian Gulf.

My family is proud of both of them and of all the fine men and women serving the country in uniform. Track is the eldest of our five children.

In our family, it's two boys and three girls in between - my strong and kind-hearted daughters Bristol, Willow, and Piper.

And in April, my husband Todd and I welcomed our littlest one into the world, a perfectly beautiful baby boy named Trig. From the inside, no family ever seems typical.

That's how it is with us.

Our family has the same ups and downs as any other ... the same challenges and the same joys.

Sometimes even the greatest joys bring challenge.

And children with special needs inspire a special love.

To the families of special-needs children all across this country, I have a message: For years, you sought to make America a more welcoming place for your sons and daughters.

I pledge to you that if we are elected, you will have a friend and advocate in the White House. Todd is a story all by himself.

He's a lifelong commercial fisherman ... a production operator in the oil fields of Alaska's North Slope ... a proud member of the United Steel Workers' Union ... and world champion snow machine racer.

Throw in his Yup'ik Eskimo ancestry, and it all makes for quite a package.

We met in high school, and two decades and five children later he's still my guy. My Mom and Dad both worked at the elementary school in our small town.

And among the many things I owe them is one simple lesson: that this is America, and every woman can walk through every door of opportunity.

My parents are here tonight, and I am so proud to be the daughter of Chuck and Sally Heath. Long ago, a young farmer and habber-dasher from Missouri followed an unlikely path to the vice presidency.

A writer observed: "We grow good people in our small towns, with honesty, sincerity, and dignity." I know just the kind of people that writer had in mind when he praised Harry Truman.

I grew up with those people.

They are the ones who do some of the hardest work in America ... who grow our food, run our factories, and fight our wars.

They love their country, in good times and bad, and they're always proud of America. I had the privilege of living most of my life in a small town.

I was just your average hockey mom, and signed up for the PTA because I wanted to make my kids' public education better.

When I ran for city council, I didn't need focus groups and voter profiles because I knew those voters, and knew their families, too.

Before I became governor of the great state of Alaska, I was mayor of my hometown.

And since our opponents in this presidential election seem to look down on that experience, let me explain to them what the job involves.

I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a "community organizer," except that you have actual responsibilities. I might add that in small towns, we don't quite know what to make of a candidate who lavishes praise on working people when they are listening, and then talks about how bitterly they cling to their religion and guns when those people aren't listening.

We tend to prefer candidates who don't talk about us one way in Scranton and another way in San Francisco.

As for my running mate, you can be certain that wherever he goes, and whoever is listening, John McCain is the same man. I'm not a member of the permanent political establishment. And I've learned quickly, these past few days, that if you're not a member in good standing of the Washington elite, then some in the media consider a candidate unqualified for that reason alone.

But here's a little news flash for all those reporters and commentators: I'm not going to Washington to seek their good opinion - I'm going to Washington to serve the people of this country. Americans expect us to go to Washington for the right reasons, and not just to mingle with the right people.

Politics isn't just a game of clashing parties and competing interests.

The right reason is to challenge the status quo, to serve the common good, and to leave this nation better than we found it.

No one expects us to agree on everything.

But we are expected to govern with integrity, good will, clear convictions, and ... a servant's heart.

I pledge to all Americans that I will carry myself in this spirit as vice president of the United States. This was the spirit that brought me to the governor's office, when I took on the old politics as usual in Juneau ... when I stood up to the special interests, the lobbyists, big oil companies, and the good-ol' boys network.

Sudden and relentless reform never sits well with entrenched interests and power brokers. That's why true reform is so hard to achieve.

But with the support of the citizens of Alaska, we shook things up.

And in short order we put the government of our state back on the side of the people.

I came to office promising major ethics reform, to end the culture of self-dealing. And today, that ethics reform is the law.

While I was at it, I got rid of a few things in the governor's office that I didn't believe our citizens should have to pay for.

That luxury jet was over the top. I put it on eBay.

I also drive myself to work.

And I thought we could muddle through without the governor's personal chef - although I've got to admit that sometimes my kids sure miss her. I came to office promising to control spending - by request if possible and by veto if necessary.

Senator McCain also promises to use the power of veto in defense of the public interest - and as a chief executive, I can assure you it works.

Our state budget is under control.

We have a surplus.

And I have protected the taxpayers by vetoing wasteful spending: nearly half a billion dollars in vetoes.

I suspended the state fuel tax, and championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending by Congress.

I told the Congress "thanks, but no thanks," for that Bridge to Nowhere.

If our state wanted a bridge, we'd build it ourselves. When oil and gas prices went up dramatically, and filled up the state treasury, I sent a large share of that revenue back where it belonged - directly to the people of Alaska.

And despite fierce opposition from oil company lobbyists, who kind of liked things the way they were, we broke their monopoly on power and resources.

As governor, I insisted on competition and basic fairness to end their control of our state and return it to the people.

I fought to bring about the largest private-sector infrastructure project in North American history.

And when that deal was struck, we began a nearly forty billion dollar natural gas pipeline to help lead America to energy independence.

That pipeline, when the last section is laid and its valves are opened, will lead America one step farther away from dependence on dangerous foreign powers that do not have our interests at heart.

The stakes for our nation could not be higher.

When a hurricane strikes in the Gulf of Mexico, this country should not be so dependent on imported oil that we are forced to draw from our Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

And families cannot throw away more and more of their paychecks on gas and heating oil.

With Russia wanting to control a vital pipeline in the Caucasus, and to divide and intimidate our European allies by using energy as a weapon, we cannot leave ourselves at the mercy of foreign suppliers.

To confront the threat that Iran might seek to cut off nearly a fifth of world energy supplies ... or that terrorists might strike again at the Abqaiq facility in Saudi Arabia ... or that Venezuela might shut off its oil deliveries ... we Americans need to produce more of our own oil and gas.

And take it from a gal who knows the North Slope of Alaska: we've got lots of both.

Our opponents say, again and again, that drilling will not solve all of America's energy problems - as if we all didn't know that already.

But the fact that drilling won't solve every problem is no excuse to do nothing at all.

Starting in January, in a McCain-Palin administration, we're going to lay more pipelines ... build more new-clear plants ... create jobs with clean coal ... and move forward on solar, wind, geothermal, and other alternative sources.

We need American energy resources, brought to you by American ingenuity, and produced by American workers. I've noticed a pattern with our opponent.

Maybe you have, too.

We've all heard his dramatic speeches before devoted followers.

And there is much to like and admire about our opponent.

But listening to him speak, it's easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform - not even in the state senate.

This is a man who can give an entire speech about the wars America is fighting, and never use the word "victory" except when he's talking about his own campaign. But when the cloud of rhetoric has passed ... when the roar of the crowd fades away ... when the stadium lights go out, and those Styrofoam Greek columns are hauled back to some studio lot - what exactly is our opponent's plan? What does he actually seek to accomplish, after he's done turning back the waters and healing the planet? The answer is to make government bigger ... take more of your money ... give you more orders from Washington ... and to reduce the strength of America in a dangerous world. America needs more energy ... our opponent is against producing it.

Victory in Iraq is finally in sight ... he wants to forfeit.

Terrorist states are seeking new-clear weapons without delay ... he wants to meet them without preconditions.

Al Qaeda terrorists still plot to inflict catastrophic harm on America ... he's worried that someone won't read them their rights? Government is too big ... he wants to grow it.

Congress spends too much ... he promises more.

Taxes are too high ... he wants to raise them. His tax increases are the fine print in his economic plan, and let me be specific.

The Democratic nominee for president supports plans to raise income taxes ... raise payroll taxes ... raise investment income taxes ... raise the death tax ... raise business taxes ... and increase the tax burden on the American people by hundreds of billions of dollars. My sister Heather and her husband have just built a service station that's now opened for business - like millions of others who run small businesses.

How are they going to be any better off if taxes go up? Or maybe you're trying to keep your job at a plant in Michigan or Ohio ... or create jobs with clean coal from Pennsylvania or West Virginia ... or keep a small farm in the family right here in Minnesota.

How are you going to be better off if our opponent adds a massive tax burden to the American economy? Here's how I look at the choice Americans face in this election.

In politics, there are some candidates who use change to promote their careers.

And then there are those, like John McCain, who use their careers to promote change.

They're the ones whose names appear on laws and landmark reforms, not just on buttons and banners, or on self-designed presidential seals.

Among politicians, there is the idealism of high-flown speechmaking, in which crowds are stirringly summoned to support great things.

And then there is the idealism of those leaders, like John McCain, who actually do great things. They're the ones who are good for more than talk ... the ones we have always been able to count on to serve and defend America. Senator McCain's record of actual achievement and reform helps explain why so many special interests, lobbyists, and comfortable committee chairmen in Congress have fought the prospect of a McCain presidency - from the primary election of 2000 to this very day.

Our nominee doesn't run with the Washington herd.

He's a man who's there to serve his country, and not just his party.

A leader who's not looking for a fight, but is not afraid of one either. Harry Reid, the Majority Leader of the current do-nothing Senate, not long ago summed up his feelings about our nominee.

He said, quote, "I can't stand John McCain." Ladies and gentlemen, perhaps no accolade we hear this week is better proof that we've chosen the right man. Clearly what the Majority Leader was driving at is that he can't stand up to John McCain. That is only one more reason to take the maverick of the Senate and put him in the White House. My fellow citizens, the American presidency is not supposed to be a journey of "personal discovery." This world of threats and dangers is not just a community, and it doesn't just need an organizer.

And though both Senator Obama and Senator Biden have been going on lately about how they are always, quote, "fighting for you," let us face the matter squarely.

There is only one man in this election who has ever really fought for you ... in places where winning means survival and defeat means death ... and that man is John McCain. In our day, politicians have readily shared much lesser tales of adversity than the nightmare world in which this man, and others equally brave, served and suffered for their country.

It's a long way from the fear and pain and squalor of a six-by-four cell in Hanoi to the Oval Office.

But if Senator McCain is elected president, that is the journey he will have made.

It's the journey of an upright and honorable man - the kind of fellow whose name you will find on war memorials in small towns across this country, only he was among those who came home.

To the most powerful office on earth, he would bring the compassion that comes from having once been powerless ... the wisdom that comes even to the captives, by the grace of God ... the special confidence of those who have seen evil, and seen how evil is overcome. A fellow prisoner of war, a man named Tom Moe of Lancaster, Ohio, recalls looking through a pin-hole in his cell door as Lieutenant Commander John McCain was led down the hallway, by the guards, day after day.

As the story is told, "When McCain shuffled back from torturous interrogations, he would turn toward Moe's door and flash a grin and thumbs up" - as if to say, "We're going to pull through this." My fellow Americans, that is the kind of man America needs to see us through these next four years.

For a season, a gifted speaker can inspire with his words.

For a lifetime, John McCain has inspired with his deeds.

If character is the measure in this election ... and hope the theme ... and change the goal we share, then I ask you to join our cause. Join our cause and help America elect a great man as the next president of the United States.

Thank you all, and may God bless America.

I just created a Twitter account just to see what the fuss is all about...

But so far I'm not following anyone else, nor is anyone following me.

If you have a Twitter account, please feel free to follow me at http://twitter.com/ronallan (that is, if you're interested in following the life of what is perhaps the most boring person on the planet), or leave your Twitter address/e-mail address so I can follow you.

Who knows, you may find my life exciting. I sincerely doubt that though. :-)

There was this couple who used to go to shop in the beautiful stores. This was their 25th Wedding Anniversary. They both liked antiques and pottery, especially teacups.

One day in a fine shop, they saw this beautiful teacup. One said, "May I see that? I never have seen one quite so beautiful," and the lady handed it to him. As she handed it to him, suddenly the teacup spoke.

"You don`t understand," it said, "I haven`t always been a teacup. There was a time when I was red and I was clay. My master took me and rolled me and patted me over and over and I yelled out, `Let me alone.` But he only smiled, `Not yet.`

"Then I was placed on a spinning wheel," the teacup said, "and suddenly I was spun around and around and around and around. `Stop it! I`m getting dizzy` I screamed. But the master only nodded and said, `Not yet.`

"Then he put me in the oven. I`d never felt such heat! I wondered why he wanted to burn me. I yelled! I knocked at the door. I could see him through the opening and I could read his lips as he shook his head, `Not yet.`

"Finally the door opened, he put me on the shelf and I began to cool. `There that`s better,` I said. Then he brushed me and painted me all over. The fumes were horrible. I thought I would gag. `Stop it! Stop it!` I cried. He only nodded, `Not yet.`

"Then suddenly he put me back into the oven, not like the first one. This was twice as hot and I knew I would suffocate. I begged. I pleaded. I screamed. I cried. All the time I could see him through the opening nodding his head, saying, ` Not Yet.`"

"Then I knew there wasn`t any hope. I would never make it. I was ready to give up. But the door opened and he took me out and placed me on the shelf.

One hour later, he handed me a mirror and said, `Look at yourself,` and I did, and I said, `That`s not me, that couldn`t be me, it`s beautiful. I`m beautiful!`

"I want you to remember then,` he said, `I know it hurt to be rolled and patted, but if I just left you, you`d have dried up."

"I know it made you dizzy to spin around on the wheel, but if I had stopped, you would have crumbled." "I know it hurt and it was hot and disagreeable in the oven, but if I hadn`t put you there, you would have cracked."

"I know the fumes were bad and when I brushed and painted you all over, but if I hadn`t done that, you never would have hardened. You would not have had any color in your life, and if I hadn`t put you back in that second oven, you wouldn`t survive for very long because the hardness would not have held."

"Now you are a finished product. You are what I had in mind when I first began with you."

That`s life, friends. That`s my life and it is your life. Some of you are in the oven, screaming, hollering, "Let me out of here!" Some of you are getting painted and the fumes are bothering you and driving you crazy. Some of you are spinning around and you don`t know where you are. You`re saying, "What`s going on? It`s a mess here," and the Master keeps looking and saying, "Not yet, not yet." You see, you`ve got to trust Him.

From my inbox.