Poisoned by my home?
I feel terrible. Nauseated. Off. Unwell. Not quite right. I suspect I've been poisoned, slightly. I awoke in the middle of the night feeling like I was going to throw up and actually got out of bed to head towards the bathroom when I nearly stepped in a pile of cat puke. Then I realized that my cat was still throwing up in the living room. Very odd. I went into the kitchen to make sure the stove wasn't leaking gas and poked around a little looking for the source of our illness. Turned up nothing. Went back to bed. Rose this morning feeling only slightly better. The cat seems fine. I left him sleeping on the sofa and went to the office, determined to be free of the poisonous airs of the house.
Congrats to rcb and jjg
Congratulations to Jesse and Rebecca who were married yesterday. May you enjoy a lifetime of happiness together.
Access Metafilter by IP
If you're like me and affected by the DSL outage that killed Matt's nameserver and is making it impossible for you to access MetaFilter, you can also be like me and access MetaFilter by its IP address until the DNS issue is resolved: http://209.10.108.201/.
The importance of fact checking
Articles like this one, arguing about the importance of the Levy-Condit affair, lose their credibility when they refer to Nantucket, MA as "Nantucket, Conn." Perhaps they should buy their fact checker a map?
More on the rebate debate
Well there's a nice little discussion going on over at MetaFilter inspired by my tax rebate post below. I invite you to add your thoughts. Also I'd like to clarify a bit about what I wrote yesterday. I don't have a problem really with the way the tax relief works. It makes sense to me. Contrary to the belief of some of my readers, I do understand the way income tax works in the United States, and economics for that matter.
What bothers me is how this whole story has been twisted around. Dawn followed up yesterday with another great link to the IRS's 2001 Advance Payments Information page which states,
The Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001 approved by Congress and signed by President Bush directs the Treasury to send checks to most income taxpayers this year, giving them an advance payment of a 2001 tax credit.
So why isn't it referred to like this in the media? Why is everyone pushing this as a rebate and making it sound like some sort of refund? Fucking politics. Fucking media. You know what's funny though? www.irs.gov lead the rankings of fastest growing domain ending July 22, 2001 according to Neilsen/NetRatings and 58% of the site's audience visited the page on tax relief, according to this ZDNet article.
Planet of the Apes
Planet of the Apes? Well it was better than The Score, but it was no, um, no (grasping to recall some movie viewed recently at the theatre that was actually good, but none come to mind, none! What is it with movies this year? Huh? They all majorly nearly-suck. There's nothing just plain incredible. And to think, in '99 in the span of a few weeks I saw "Fight Club," "American Beauty," and "Being John Malkovich." Jesus, if I could see one move of that calibre this summer I'd be psyched.) So PotA was kinda cool with its effects and makeup but the dialogue was just terrible. And character development and film junk like that was entirely absent. And I'd hoped to be a little scared of apes during it, but I wasn't. Jesus I hope Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back is good. The preview looked damn funny, and I love Kevin Smith, and Jason Lee is reprising his role as Brody Bruce, so it's got to be good, right? Right? Please? Please let there be one good movie this summer.
Beware the non-rebate tax rebate
Astute megnut reader Dawn V. sends in this article explaining the tax "rebate" is, in actuality, an advance on one's 2001 tax obligation. Curious, I pulled out the notice I'd received from the IRS and realized something: Nowhere does the term "rebate" appear on the page. It refers to the check I'll receive as, "tax relief," and says it is based on information I submitted on my 2000 return. But it does not say it's a rebate on taxes I paid in 2000, which was my understanding. So where did this "rebate" idea come from?
It looks like articles about the plan use the word "rebate" to explain the "tax relief," such as this one in the Washington Post (from Google's cache since the original URL's dead on the Post's site). The Street also calls it a "rebate" and says "The last time the government cut rebate checks was 1975," referring to the Tax Reduction Act of 1975:
The Tax Reduction Act of 1975 was signed into law on March 29, 1975, in the midst of the deepest recession in postwar history. Taxpayers received a 10 percent 'refund' on their 1974 taxes, with a minimum of $100 and a maximum of $200. Checks were mailed out in the second quarter of 1975. ¹
But if you look at the way the 1975 plan worked, it actually was a refund on taxes paid, not an advance on monies to be paid. Perhaps this is a source of the confusion: Dictionary.com defines rebate as,
A deduction from an amount to be paid or a return of part of an amount given in payment.
So while you or I assume rebate means "return of a part of an amount given in payment," i.e. a refund on taxes paid in 2000, the media and the government means, "[a] deduction from an amount to be paid," i.e. an advance on your refund for 2001. That's some tricky cash-flow shit, yo.
Imagine one day at work your boss says, "You've been working so hard, I'm going to give you a bonus. Here's $300."
"Thanks!" you say, pocketing the cash.
"No problem," s/he replies, "Oh, and your next paycheck will be $300 less."
This money isn't money being refunded to from taxes you've already paid. It is simply money you were going to get nine months from now when you filed your 2001 tax return.
Do something with your tax rebate
If you're one of the folks receiving the tax rebate from the government this month, and you've been wondering what to do with the cash, consider this: Give For Change, a website which allows you to make "online donations to causes you care about," will match your $300 or $600 donation (up to a million dollars) to any non-profit. If you'd been considering donating your refund, this looks like a great way to increase the impact of your gesture.
A longer review of The Score
Several folks have written asking why they shouldn't see The Score so I shall direct you to this New York Times review which explains it all much better than I could.
Considering that movie ticket prices are up to $10 at some theatres now, one is forced to be a bit choosier about the films one sees. At least, if one is me and attempting to be fiscally responsible.
Do not waste your time
Dear readers,
A tidbit of advice: under no circumstance should you see The Score.
Yours always,
Megnut
I need to see V
Cruel DVD masters, why must you mess with me so? V is out on DVD and I watched it on Saturday. It was just as good as I'd remembered it being: frozen arms and annoying teenage girls and aliens who aren't what they seem. And as the end neared, I was hooked. What will happen to these earthlings? Will their Resistance succeed? Why of course the answers are available in the sequel, V the Final Battle, but that's not out on DVD! Argh...how long will I have to wait to see the birth of the twins? And see our great victory over those nefarious slimy aliens?
Sigur Rós is pretty good
You know what? This Sigur Rós CD is pretty good. I'd heard good things from folks in the know, but now I'm actually listening to it, and I must concur. It's nice to listen to music with headphones again, it's such a different experience than listening through speakers. It's much more enveloping and the music becomes the focal point when no other sounds distract. This current song (Starálfur) sounds like it could be the soundtrack in some post-apocalyptic futuristic movie, something taking place when we no longer speak English and the world is decimated by wars, yet somehow there's a green field that's survived it all, with a young sapling reaching upwards, and that's where the camera zooms in on our heroes and this song plays in the background. Or something. I don't know. Work with me here.
The lunar landing anniversary
Today is the 32nd anniversary of the first lunar landing. I know I've been yammering on and on about the moon this week, but it's just so fascinating to me. And today I'm going to imagine what it must have been like to be inside the LM the moment after it landed, after the descent engine has shut down, knowing that whatever happened next, we'd landed on the moon. I'm going to imagine looking out that small window into the Sea of Tranquility, seeing the pockmarked crust and the dusty surface and the view of Earth off in the distance and I'm going to imagine that I've landed on the moon.
In all my messing around on NASA's servers this is my favorite find so far: Press Kit for Apollo 11 Lunar Landing Mission. It's in PDF and it's 3.23 MB so it will take a while to load, but it's filled with great details about the mission and includes terms like "Translunar Injection." Now if that's not a band name waiting to be snagged, I don't know what is.
On a less lunar note, it's back to nearly winter-like weather here in San Francisco. Foggy, cold, and I've got the heat on full-blast. Crikey, I need a trip back east where it's warm.
2002 budget for the United State, some thoughts
While poking around the other day, I came across the 2002 Budget for the United States. There are all sorts of goodies contained within its 241 pages (which doesn't seem very long for something you'd imagine to be as big as the US budget). One of the most enlightening tidbits for me was the, "$14.2 billion increase in Department of Defense spending in 2002 to begin to arrest the decline in national security[.]" Decline in national security!? I had no idea we were experiencing a security decline, no wonder I've felt so out of sorts lately.
Here's another laugher, tucked into page 37 beneath the "Solar and Renewable Resources" heading in the Energy section,
Solar and renewable energy will benefit from the Administration's legislative proposal to open a small part of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to oil and gas leasing and production. This process will generate bidding bonuses for the Federal government estimated at $1.2 billion, to become available in 2004, which will be made available over a series of years to increase the funding for solar and renewable energy technologies.
Available in 2004, eh? So during the Bush-Cheney term no money derived from the infiltration and disruption of this pristine wilderness will be invested in renewable energy sources. Interesting. As long as we're "direct[ing] research toward the most critical barriers to expansion of coal use for power generation in the United States"¹ I guess we won't really need those alternative energy sources much anyway.
And of course, my dream of high-speed rail development didn't make it into the budget [ed note: not sure it was ever proposed]. It looks like the rail budget is only $521 million (see p. 69, Transportation, Passenger Rail) "to support Amtrak capital improvements and equipment maintenance." Wouldn't a high-speed rail system (like Thalys) reduce aircraft and car pollution by reducing the number of trips made by such vehicles? And improve people's travel experience? And reduce all that "air rage" we keep hearing about? Imagine a high-speed train along the west coast, all the way from Seattle to San Diego. And trains from LA and San Francisco to Vegas. How fun would that be? And fast!
It occurs to me that perhaps I should just move to Europe, where they appear to care more about the environment and the trains already exist.
I love the moon
A proposed new banner for the site, compliments of Jason:
More on the Moon today (which prompted a certain someone to remark, "you should rename your site MoonNut.") Apollo 17 was the final mission to the moon, and on December 14, 1972 Gene Cernan and Harrison "Jack" Schmitt blasted off from Taurus-Littrow to rendezvous with Ron Evans in the command module and return to earth. Sadly, we've never returned. Apollo 17 is the only mission that occurred after I was born, and for some reason that makes it feel special for me, as if I too experienced our time on the moon eventhough I was too young to be aware of it.
Check out this film of their lift-off (3.6 mb) shot from their Lunar Rover, which remained on the Moon. There is just a slew of cool images to check out from the mission. Here's Jack Schmitt with the American flag and Earth over his shoulder. Looking at them it's hard to fathom that all this really happened, it's hard to believe that men actually walked on the Moon.
You can view the results if you'd like without voting.
Not quite there
So the end of the week is here and the site I'm supposed to have up by today is, well, about 75% there but not ready for debut. The backend is taking longer than I thought, doing a tableless, all CSS layout is proving trickier than I'd anticipated, and well, let's face it: I haven't spent enough time on it. So look for it sometime next week instead.
Indochine
Need a movie recommendation? Indochine is mmmm mmmmm good. The cinematography is outstanding, Catherine Deneuve is beautiful, and Vietnam prior to Dien Bien Phu is something to behold. It left me with some curious questions about colonization. Deneuve's character has lived her whole life in French Indochina, yet is forced "home" when France finally loses possession. I kept thinking, "How sad to love and lose someplace that was never 'yours' to begin with." And I wonder, what makes a place anybody's anyway? Do you have to be the same race as everyone else? Do you have to be born there? Grown up there? Part of the power? Fighting the power? From the locals throwing beer bottles at the college kids where I grew up to the continued global hotspots Northern Ireland and the Middle East, this insistence on owning place sure causes a lot of pain, bloodshed, and death.
I'm not scared. Really.
I'm not scared today is Friday the 13th. Are you?
Allergies or illness?
Some days I can't tell if I'm getting sick or if it's just allergies. Today is one of those days.
The Wind Done Gone
I finished reading The Wind Done Gone yesterday, "The Unauthorized Parody" of Gone With The Wind. First grievance: this was hardly a parody ("A literary or artistic work that imitates the characteristic style of an author or a work for comic effect or ridicule.") I'm not sure if that label was some sort of concession to Mitchell's estate which enabled the book's publication or what, but I would not call it parody. It wasn't even a retelling of the same story as much as picking up where the original left off and provided an alternative view of some previous events.
Gone With The Wind is one of my favorite books ever, I even wrote my senior paper (a requirement to graduate from my high school, everyone had to write a 10 page paper on a topic of his/her choosing) on, "Scarlett O'Hara, A Study of Independence," analyzing the character of Scarlett as the anti Southern belle she appeared to be. (A working title for the paper I'm all the sudden recalling was "Rebelle." Ugh.) I was always impressed with Scarlett because she followed her gut, did not conform to the role that was dictated for Southern women, chose to run her own business, and "unsexed herself" by being "good with figures" (she could add!).
Needless to say, I knew I'd be difficult reader to impress simply because, well because. Because I'm difficult and not a huge fan of modern fiction. I loved the concept of revisiting Mitchell's antebellum depiction of the South and making it more realistic, I loved the idea of Scarlett having a half-sister, it was one of those books that in theory should have been great. But it wasn't. Somehow it fell flat for me. Partially it was just the style (it was a journal), partially it was the voice. The writer was just too aware of the story she was telling, as if she knew as much as we do about the failures of Reconstruction and about the events leading up to the Civil Rights movement. It was fun to spot the references to events in the original, but that was about the most pleasure I got out of reading The Wind Done Gone.
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