The little critters:)

Here are some of the small critters that lurked in our garden this year. There was this one Praying Mantis that flew it's way into the house! Sean was very patient in trying to lead it outside, but the little fellow was stubborn. With a little coaxing the Mantis returned to the garden and feasted on the aphids and mosquitoes. The caterpillars just kept chowing down in the garden till they got to be too big to be supported by the plants branches. I believe that maybe a few of them became a tasty treat for the hungry birds. In the end I hope that a few of the caterpillars had the chance to complete their life cycle:)

Strange Bedfellows

That's how Schneier puts it while describing how the NSA and China are teaming up to create a standard for traceback of IP addresses. He also rightly points out that traceback would do nothing to prevent malicious users, but would make it easier to monitor users en masse. Good times, good times.

Get them savings!

"I've already filled up four gas cans. I figure while the savings is there get the savings!" How true, my friend, how true.

"Sexual relationships with prohibited sources cannot, by definition, be arms-length." Thank you, master of the obvious.

"I need to know if she thinks dinosaurs were here 4000 years ago...that's an important...I wanna know that, I really do, because she's gonna have the nuclear codes."







Amen, amen.

Large Hadron Collider

Just in case you're feeling nervous about LHC, now you can monitor it via webcams. If you prefer textual status updates, there's always hasthelargehadroncolliderdestroyedtheworldyet.com.

Toetools of Infamy

[Dementia, I blame you for this newfound addiction.]

This being the diary of Dodók Kuletber, pickmistress of Ninlòr Sedish, "Toetools of Infamy"


25th Felsite, 202, Late Spring

I suppose I should begin keeping a diary of this place now that it seems we're here to stay for a while. The twenty-four new useless migrants who just moved in during our second spring here at Toetools seem to ensure that much. It's a good thing we seven original prospectors cleared the nearby forest for wood when we moved in, before that damn kobold made off with our only steel axe, else there wouldn't be enough material to create beds for all these louts. Still, I suppose we should keep our just-arrived soap and cheese makers, millers and tanners, rangers and animal vivisectionists happy while we force them to do real work. I mean, we have no milk, so what the fuck do we need with a cheese maker? Stone detail for you, my lass.

At least there was one miner amongst the rabble, Vabôk ónlevud, and he brought his own pick. Of course, soon after settling in he scurried away from the hard work, claimed himself a mason's shop, and busied himself building a limestone armor rack. A limestone armor rack. We have not a lick of armor in the entire damn fortress, but no one had the heart to tell him that. I've recently got him back digging with me and Libash as we build a new underground farm plot to feed our hungry mouths. Libash has been a bit full of himself since I named him sheriff to watch over the newbies, but he's been solid enough since we set out for this godforsaken pit. I need to keep a close watch on him, though. Recently he asked for, all but demanded in fact, his own office and dining room. I'm the fucking leader of this comedy of manners and even I don't have an office. Then again, perhaps it's not such a bad idea.

Our mechanic Zefon Allaskol has been abed since autumn following his harrowing encounter with an angry goat. I mean, it's a fucking goat, right? Still, there's no rousing him. If he's still asleep come next autumn I'm going to be forced to deny him water so his bedroom goes to more productive use. I've conscripted the new woodworker as a mechanic for the time being, but at the pace he's going we'll be lucky to have a single stone-fall trap in place this year.

We're running dangerously low on meat, and the alcohol supply isn't looking great either. I'll have to lash the brewer to the still and round up those dogs that've been breeding like rabbits in this place. Give the animal dissector something to do at any rate. Gods help us come winter.