Deep Throat -- The Reviews Are In

Vanity Fair does its share of real reporting these days. So, it was interesting to see them unmasking Deep Throat. More interesting to me, though, was the reaction of various people involved directly at the time. Take that criminal now bible thumper Chuck Colson:

"When any president has to worry whether the deputy director of the FBI is sneaking around in dark corridors peddling information in the middle of the night, he's in trouble," said Colson, who founded Prison Fellowship Ministries after leaving jail. "There were times when I should have blown the whistle, so I understand his feelings. But I cannot approve of his methods."

Or Nixon's speechwriter and today's talkshow gadfly, Patrick Buchanon:

Speaking last night on MSNBC's "Hardball," former Nixon speechwriter Patrick J. Buchanan labeled Felt a "traitor" for having worked with reporters on stories that did severe damage to the administration.

Personally I'm a big fan of protecting whistleblowers. I see Oracle even had one recently. After all of the Deep Throat disclosure, it comes as an ironic conclusion to find out that the guy's motivation was to protect the FBI (as this 13 year old article in the Atlantic shows). More funny that John Dean, the guy who has been making his living off of Watergate for 30 years now, got it wrong.

Ratfeeder

Ratfeeder
Originally uploaded by sgh2002.

As I'm sitting outside enjoying the balmy Memorial Day weekend and the activity of the birds on our feeder hanging from the mimosa tree, I see this little fellow skulking in the shadows. It seems the high tech birdfeeder, specifically designed to shut itself when a fat squirrel descends on it, is just fine for rats. Yech. I hate rats. They are very common out here, especially when you have fruit trees. I remember before we moved into the old house on Thornhill, I crawled up into the attic to inspect it. I could see the evidence of roof rats (which I guess this one would be classified as). When I told the guy, he said, "I didn't have the heart to poison them." That isn't a problem for me.

Freakonomics

A rogue economist explores the hidden side of everything. You all may have read this or seen it reviewed somewhere. The review I read prompted me to buy it . After reading the introduction I thought I may have made a mistake. I pressed on and found it to be very interesting on several levels. Most of you bloggers here have been or are currently engaged in reasearch of some sort so you may find it boring. I don't do much reasearch proffesionaly so to me the methods used to anylize their subjects was probably the most interesting part of the whole thing. The subjects were interesting also but the comparrisons used were unique and funny ie; your real estate agent and the KKK or School teachers and sumo wrestlers. In the end it validated some of the things I already knew and provoked a little thought on things I never really thought about. I also got a few parrenting tips, that is if we ever have another child, according to this book its to late for Dan.

Thomas at 1 Year!

Thomas at 1 Year!
Originally uploaded by sgh2002.

Since I have yet to goad Ursula to post, I will just have to do my uncle-like duty and post this picture. Wish we could have been there.

Speaking of big fish

Yahoo! News PhotoI regularly catch blue catfish in the river near my house. My personel best is 11 pounds, a far cry from 124.

Death of the Joke

For a long time I've lamented that I never hear any good jokes. I have never been sure what to blame it on. It seems to me that someone was always saying "Hey, I heard a good joke today" when I was growing up, but I just never hear anyone saying that any more. Funnily enough (pun intended), there was an article about it in the Mercury News today.

In case you missed its obituary, the joke died recently after a long illness, of, oh, 30 years. Its passing was barely noticed, drowned out, perhaps, by the din of ironic one-liners, snark and detached bons mots that pass for humor these days.

Among comics, the most cited culprit in the death of the joke is so-called "political correctness" or, at least, a heightened sensitivity to offending people.

The torrent of e-mail jokes in the late 1990s and joke Web sites made every joke available at once, essentially diluting the effect of what had been a spoken form. While getting up and telling a joke requires courage, forwarding a joke by e-mail takes hardly any effort at all. So everyone did it, until it wasn't funny anymore.

I suspect all of these things contributed, but in the end, I think the conclusion is right: the era of telling a good joke is gone. Sad. Maybe the pendulum will swing the other way one day.

Bad News Birds

I read Laurie Garrett's book, The Coming Plague, several years ago. It is enough to scare the bejesus out of you when it comes to deadly viruses. The basic densely footnoted message is: it's coming, it's only a matter of time. If you want a more thriller-like narrative that is also non-fiction, try The Hot Zone. Anyway, these stories of bird flu are getting really scary. This is especially true when coupled with China's totalitarian regime's attitude about not wanting any bad news to taint the rosy picture (I will leave the analogies here at home to the reader) praising their economic growth potential. We shall see. I don't know what any of us can do about it, except encourage CDC and WHO funding. It looks like holding our breath will just not work.

Prom

Prom
Originally uploaded by sgh2002.

Here are Jody and Garrett on the way to Jody's prom in Ottawa, courtesy of Jody's father Stanley. We plonked down the frequent flyer miles to get Garrett there, and he's supposed to be back early next week. He also passed the GED with flying colors!

Bus Blocks Car

Bus Blocks Car
Originally uploaded by sgh2002.

See the edge of a car behind this bus? That was ours in the parking lot at Mysore palace. After about 20 minutes of fretting, we rounded up a group to lift the car on the left around so that ours could escape.

Tipu's Summer Palace

Tipu's Summer Palace
Originally uploaded by sgh2002.

Tipu was the last moghul emperor. He was eventually killed, but not after kicking a lot of British ass. Since the moghuls were muslims, there were lots of muslims visiting. I was kind of sorry to be reading Ghost Wars at the time. Book review one day.

Hindu Temple on the Way to Mysore

Hindu Temple on the Way to Mysore
Originally uploaded by sgh2002.

No photos allowed inside, or you could have seen Lakshmi, goddess of wealth among many others.

Construction India Style

Construction India Style
Originally uploaded by sgh2002.

A construction project outside my hotel room in Hyderabad. I thought Keith would like to see the way they hold the floors up and the different levels of flooring (which nearly made me fall on my face at the office occasionally). They also hand carry buckets of concrete up -- no pumping here when labor is so cheap!

Room with a View

Room with a View
Originally uploaded by sgh2002.

From my fourth floor room balcony, looking down through the trees to the pool and courtyard. Each balcony had lantana hanging from it. There were five restaurants. An oasis of calmness behind the chaos of the street.

911 Call

Who you gonna call when a camel sits on you? If you're in West Virginia, it's 911. I passed up an opportunity to take a camel ride in India. I'm not sure they would have taken my 911 call there anyway.

Assateague is kind to this guy

52-Pound Reward For 5-Year ObsessionI will always remember our family vacations on assateageu. Everything about them seemed bigger and more exciting than anything I did as a child. I think this guy would agree with me. We never bothered with the record books or pictures but I,m sure we caught something that big..didn't we. Those fish always grow with time. Kirsti Dan and I visited Chingoteague on our now famous R V vacation as a pure coincidence it was on pony roundup weekend. It was great fun and everyone really enjoyed it. I was surprised at how little the Island had changed, it was just as we left it 35 years ago, same family establishments, docks, and even the Gus bang clanc bridge still remained. Next time I go I'm going to be a little more serious about surf fishing.

How Class Works

I thought this "graphic" from the New York Times was interesting. The subject is interesting in itself. There is a larger series of articles. The one I got sucked into was on religion and the Ivy League, because of Kyla's experience with the visibility of religion at Yale. Of course, the article is about how the Ivy League is a bastion of secularism.

To continue to counter the sports discussions with the geeky discussions that nobody cares about, the graphics on this thing are quite cool. It's a new style of graphics that is more interactive. Things change as you drag your mouse over them, similar to the Google maps experience I was pointing out before. This is something you'll be seeing more of over time. The downside of it is that the way you use things online becomes less structured, requiring you to poke around and explore more to try to understand how to make it work.

Try Harvard

I thought Kyla might enjoy this advertisment, courtesy of The Onion.

An update at last...

It's been a long time since I posted, but here I am finally. England was amazing as you all heard about from Mom. We definitely need to go back some time to make a more thorough and less hectic visit. We finished out the polo season at regionals the weekend after we got back (an unfortunate loss), but then had some fun playing a mixed level tournament amongst ourselves and the beginners - my team reigned victorious in the "Fool's Cup." In other polo news I was elected captain for the team next year which mostly means I take on extra responsibilities and duties. The school year also finished out well. I now know more than any of you probably care to know about US military history, but that was definitely my favorite class this semester. I'm now back home for the summer, working in the same corn lab I worked in last summer, playing polo with the Stanford team again, and finally getting my drivers license!

Duty Humor

They Do Know Squat About ArtSince some of those exotic E-Bay auction items seemed interesting to some of you I thought you might get a laugh out of this. I guess the world of modern and expensive art is something I'll never understand. I did take a little comfort knowing the most offensive piece was "passed" a term used by the auction house for no sale. In the paper they showed an interesting computer generated photo I may have given 10 to 20 bucks for but it doesn't show up on the web article. Besides the info on art and auction houses it is a tresure trove of duty-humor, something evryone can appreciate.

Home Sweet Home

Man that is a lot of time in an airplane, especially when you're going against the jet stream. But I am back. Not sure what I am doing blogging since it's the equivalent of 4AM in India, and my head is definitely still on Indian time. Best to quit while I'm ahead.

Great trip report

The most exciting days on my job don't come close to your last week! That sounds like quite an experience along with a hefty dose of culture shock. The sites you describe sound like one of those things your glad to have seen and really glad you don't have to live with. I bet conducting buiseness over there is a little strange, with all the differences between Indian and American culture not to mention language and religion I can imagine it takes some effort to get busy together. I took interest in the reference you made to that allergy you have to shopping, it must be heriditary because I suffer from the same thing, I have never been formaly diagnossed and I always went on what Kirsti told me "symptoms brought on by spending money" Now I know it is shopping that is the culprit and not the spending. Anyway welcome home, now go have a steak drink an american beer and wash that stupid dot off your forhead.

Shopping in India

I start to break out in hives right after Thanksgiving, and the welts don't settle down until New Years. The reaction starts whenever I am within a quarter mile of a major shopping mall. You can imagine the zeal with which I undertook my first shopping trip in India. The driver was used to dealing with Americans, and had it all planned out. He told me he'd take me to three stores. I wasn't to buy anything at any of them until I'd seen all three and compared the pricing and merchandise. Then, we'd go back to the one I wanted to buy from, and he'd help me deal with any bargaining if I wanted.

Each place was some variation on the "cottage crafts" theme. Each had guards at the front and wolf-like salespeople waiting at the door. Whoever draws the long straw tracks you throughout the store, explaining everything, trying to get you to decide on things. You're encouraged to sit down while they serve tea and bring things to you. When you warn them you won't be buying anything, they get a hurt look on their face, like you've personally insulted their mother or their integrity. They all seemed to have similar mixtures of carpets, silk, crafts, and jewelry. All offered a Sunday discount right up front, with hints of more. Saying "No" is very difficult. At the place I finally bought stuff, they pulled the old car salesman routine of "I can make you an offer to get you to buy right now, but I need to consult with my manager." Oh well. I am done. Time to take the antihistimine to get the hives under control.

The Fool in Jewel in the Crown

I'm not sure I'm going to be able to keep up these EM Forster and Paul Scott puns.

Traveling on domestic air service here was interesting, but not bad. They didn't check ID once, although they were quite serious about baggage checks. Hyderabad seemed like much more of a real city. They have lines in the streets and dividers, and the traffic is less chaotic. At the hotel, I ended up booked at some fancy rate that came with my own personal butler who said he would show up within one minute of pressing a button. The whole being-waited-upon scene here takes some getting used to. For example, at each of the business meetings we had, there was someone to serve coffee and drinks and to make sure you were resupplied if you ran out. By the time we got back in the evening, I was really dead exhausted.

Today we went on a jaunt to see the palace at Mysore. Along the way, we stopped at a Hindu temple and at the summer palace of the last mogul king before the British took over. The temple was strange, since we were the only white visitors and for everyone else it is a religious experience. From what I understand, there are three Hindu gods (Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva), but there are something like 330 million ways they show themselves. And each of these deserves some kind of shrine. As you walk barefoot through the temple, there are many shrines with holy types taking donations and ready to bless you. Around the temples are people selling trinkets -- and I mean selling, selling, selling, won't take no for an answer without coming back over and over to try again and again, shoving it in your face selling. The summer palace and gardens were beautiful. The palace at Mysore reminded me a bit of Hearst castle, if only WR Hearst had more money.

The drive out to these places was an experience all in itself. Not for the faint of heart. Some of the things I saw: an elephant, people plowing fields with oxen, rice paddies, beggars of many varieties (pitiful looking children, legless men, old women), a totalled bus seemingly left in the road as a reminder to be more careful, dozens of close calls as we passed people and people passed us, farming under palm trees, a train so packed with people they were hanging out the doors, a motorcycle with a family of four on it. After a while it starts to feel like normal, sort of.

To top the experience off, we had the driver drop us downtown so we could eat at a restaurant my colleague had been to before. It was closed. So we walked back to the hotel. I am sure that I breathed in the equivalent of two packs of cigarettes in the 20 minute walk, except that if I had smoked filtered cigarettes it would probably have been a net plus on the health scale compared to the walk. The sidewalk population, mostly just normal folks out to have a good time on a Saturday night, was so large that it made New York look deserted. And to get back we had to cross the street (Mohatma Ghandi Drive). You really need to have some kind of death wish to cross the street around here. But, I am at the keyboard to prove I made it.

Bangalore Observations

I figured if the nun at the baggage carousel couldn't find her luggage, I didn't stand a chance. As it turns out, someone had removed my bag, but I found it in their pile before it wandered off. We have a driver wherever we go, and if you could see the streets and traffic, you'd understand why. No lines in the roads, the guiding rule seems to be that whoever is bigger has the right of way. That leaves the bicycles, motorcycles, mopeds, motorized rickshaws, and the occasional horse at a bit of a disadvantage. They compensate with constant horn honking. The hotel here is an oasis of luxury, and you would not want to walk the streets surrounding it. Coming back this evening, I wondered what the dense smoke was in back of the hotel. Turns out it was smoke (and presumably insecticide) they were using to fume for mosquitos. I'm glad about eliminating mosquitos (although I am up to speed on the malaria pills!), but I wonder whether my lifespan was reduced by eating Thai food outdoors there shortly afterward.

There really are cows in the street every now and then, although most of them seem to be more interested in nuzzling through piles of garbage. I often think that the malling of America has left almost anyplace you travel in the US looking the same. Apparently there is a mall near the office that has your typical Gap, etc, but I doubt you'd mistake it for a mall in the US. It's an interesting Caribbean-like mixture of dirt poor and luxury, high tech amidst the squalor. Tomorrow evening I am off to Hyderabad, so I might not report in until Friday night my time.

Uncle Ned Never Got This Kind of Attention

For only $1.2M, we could snap up Daniel and Rebecca Boone's burial spot in Missouri.

But in 1845, 20 years after Daniel Boone's death, the couple's remains were supposedly reburied at Frankfort, Ky., in the state that Boone helped open to settlers.

Some believe, though, that another man's bones were exhumed instead, the result of deliberate misdirection by the farm's owner and Rebecca Boone's cousin, David Bryan.

I don't know about you, but I'm thinkin' maybe Dan'l is in Frankfort, and Uncle Ned is still back on the farm. I'm just sayin'.

This could be our year

I know some bloggers have no interest in sports but I feel I have a responsibility here to bring it up now and then. I think Dad may be able to appreciate this more than most ,but have you picked up the sports page lately ! Wizards advance to the 2nd round of the playoffs for the 1st time in 23 years. The Orioles have a firm hold on 1st place in the AL east. And maybe most impressive of all is the Nationals 1.5 games back in a very tough NL east. The Redskins are the only local team that has much respectability and that has faded over the last decade. Its not like that yankees,Giants,Nicks,Rangers thing where a playoff berth is practically guaranteed and anything short of a championship is a dissapointment but we are on the cusp of something great I can feel it!

A Painted House

That is what I hope to have by the end of the summer. It is also a book I just finished by John Grishm. I am particularly fond of this author and thought I have read all his books till I found this in my Library/laundry room. Its practicaly the only book of his that isn't a legal thriller and he prooves he can handle another setting as well as those legal dramas he is so good at. You guys have probably all read this so I won't bother with the details but the setting of rural Arkansas and the time late 1940's early 1950's was really interesting to me. The main character Luke was a little older than me but not by much. The way the story was told through the eyes of a 7 year old and the insight of an adult was really well done and quite funny at times. Mom if you havn't read this I think you would find it very entertaining, being from Arkansas I'm sure it would bring back some childhood memories. I'm sure you wern't that poor but some of this stuff transends money, particularly the religious upbringing, the adult to child interactions of the time, and the small town setting. For me a very enjoyable book.

My Passage To India

I'm leaving Monday, the day before Kyla gets home, and I'm returning on the 18th, the day after her birthday. Lousy timing on all sides. I don't have many people working for me there, but it seems nearly inevitable that I will have more over the coming year. I'm also visiting various Indian companies who are partners to us. It's hard to build a coherent group in a place you don't have any firsthand knowledge of, so I was going to have to visit some time. In any case, it shouldn't be hard to come away with better insights than the ever-insipid and mind bogglingly shallow Tom Friedman.

It's 12 1/2 hours in terms of time difference and about 20 hours of time in the air to get there. Who the hell ever heard of a timezone on a 1/2 hour slot --just one more indicator of how different things are over there. I've had my Hep-A shot, I'm done with my Typhoid pills, and my malaria pills start today. I skipped the Hep-B, which I will only regret if I'm planning on exchanging bodily fluids or sharing needles. Neither activity is on my to-do list. The doctor told me that if I needed a blood transfusion, I should leave the country. That advice will be hard to follow, I'm sure. Other helpful hints from the travel service we use:

Do not rinse your mouth or toothbrush with tap water, and do not open your mouth in the shower.

It is considered impolite to point with your finger, to whistle and to position your feet in the direction of another person.

Always use your right hand to accept or pass food. Never offer another person food from your plate.

It is advisable to be punctual to appointments. However, your Indian counterpart may be late.

In the New Delhi area, criminals known as "goondas" frequently kidnap local businessmen for ransom.

Sounds like a blast! Fortunately, I'm only going to Bangalore and Hyderabad.

I suspect I'll be blogging a bit while I'm over there. It's hard to know exactly how it will go. I'm having to reserve 8AM-11AM Pacific for calls with people at work here. Most of you can appreciate just how coherent I will be by 11:30 at night there, if you've ever seen me up that late. Keep up the blogging!

Not Your Grandmother's Bike

Maybe it's overkill, but I love it. Aluminum frame, at least 100 gears I'll never use, just the perfect size and it's all sooooo easy. I'm busy putting miles on it. Look out, Naples, here I come!

Ready to Ride 

Strange Gift Ideas

Kyla used to love those special bandaids. We had Care Bear bandaids and every other style. I don't know how we missed these. As long as I'm in the mood for wacky gift ideas, I'm hoping I can pick up a bottle of this aftershave while I'm in India next week.

Yale Architects Meet Real Builders

It was always a standard test Dara used for her architecture projects: "Steve, what do you think of this?" If I answered with a "What the heck is this deelybobber for?" or "I'm not sure you can actually build this," then she was assured that it would stand a decent chance during the design review process. Sounds like things are still a lot like that for Yalies over twenty years later.

The tension was palpable on Friday as Jennifer Newsom pinned her drawings to the wall and set out her architectural models under the formidable gaze of a row of accomplished architects. Gesturing toward the curvilinear complex that she had designed for a school and fashion museum in Milan, she likened its podlike classrooms and studios to "bubble gum pulling apart."

Jay S. Wyper Jr. of the Hines real estate development company, had more practical concerns. "I would love to see one square room," he said.

Gad, what memories from our old school days at Cal!

Job Retraining for Programmers

As they say, the future is so bright you'll need sunglasses. Here's an out-of-work programmer who turned his life around by starting a pooper scooper business.

Relles, one of a rising number of Americans seeking new opportunities as their work shifts to countries with cheaper labor, has spent the past year making his living scooping up dog droppings as the "Delmar Dog Butler."

"It sure beats computer programming because it’s flexible, and I get to be outside," he said.

Not to mention he doesn't have to take any shit from anyone anymore.