Surreptitious Opinionation

posted an article about nuclear power, and asked what it was missing. I started this as a reply to ‘s response, but it rapidly mushroomed into a fully formed post. And so here you have it.

My take on nukular power, and the current energy status

I was searching for maps for the 1980 census in the government documents department of the library, and my librarian guide couldn’t locate what I wanted, so she suggested that I head down to the map department (1 floor down, on the other side of the building) to see if they could help me. Turns out the map department has that $1000+ cd with the entire 1980 census on it. You know, the same thing that’s taking up more floor space than my building holds, all on cd. With convenient mapping utilities. =) Yay!

Still, paper draft due next monday (or is it wed, I have the syllabus, I can find out). I hope to have it done by friday.

The relationship between a graduate student and their faculty mentor
represents a very personal and dynamic partnership. The imparting of
knowledge and experience combined with support for and encouragement of
creativity and individuality are fundamental contributions of the
successful mentor. For their part, successful graduate students
ultimately provide new insights, challenge conventional thinking, and
extend a mentor’s perspective and experience. Because of the
interdependence between mentor and student, their relationship is of
necessity very personal and highly individualized. Success of such close
personal interactions is predicated on accessibility, open-mindedness,
mutual respect, honesty, and trust between these two individuals. In my
experience no two students have been alike. Hence, my relationship with
each of my students has been unique to them. Insertion of
intermediaries, surrogates, or union representatives is incompatible
with the essential one-to-one nature of mentor – graduate student
relationships.

Yeah, a personal and dynamic partnership with set wage rates and benefit schedules brought to us courtesy the university administration. They’re already inserting themselves as intermediaries in that “essential one-to-one” relationship. They just want to maintain their monopoly. Good gods, that explanation takes me from mildly to ambivalently in favor of unionization to strongly in favor. Doublespeaking weasels.

After pointed me to a response to a recent article in city pages, I started reading it. Then I kept on reading it. It’s good stuff.

St. Paul Democratic state senator needs head examined
My TA in local politics (I already knew about it, but it’s good to get a third party evaluation)
Gambling for state funds and senator fuckup strikes again.
Gore Vidal on modern America
Military propoganda documentary, also contains reference to a perhaps less propaganda-ish representation. I’d like to see the latter. And maybe the former as well, under the principle that ignorance is bad.
Lamers protest smoking ban (t-minus 1 week, yay!)
Childrearing, (s)mothering, and independence

I may have to start reading it regularly. =)

So, yesterday evening marked the first of my real troubles with the mac. Wireless wasn’t working. I couldn’t figure out why. When I ran into the same problem here at school, I switched to the desktop and did a little investigatory work. It’s not dhcp’ing. It’s decided to supply its own ip address and screw the servers. Turns out others have had this problem before. The solution? Reboot. Fortunately, firefox allows me to set a homepage of several tabs. =) What’s so great about this? It’s been two months, and this is the first significant problem I’ve had with wireless. =)

Reading through the old entries of a recent subscription, I noted alot of stuff about relationships, fidelity, and marriage, and I decided to devote an entry to the cause. But, then I realized that I have absolutely nothing to say that I haven’t said a hundred times before. Every relationship is unique and deserves unique treatment. Monogamy is a cultural fixation, and neither inherently healthy, nor the only possibly healthy arrangement. Polyamory is another strategy for managing jealousy, among other things, and it doesn’t always work, and it does increase the risk of exposure to various std’s. People are more important than principles, though principles may help us see effects on people we might otherwise overlook. As my distinguished colleague pointed out, there’s more than one way to be a jerk in a relationship, and a failure to do wrong in a relationship is a damnation by faint praise. Relationships are organisms unto themselves. Some are just born non-viable. All require care and feeding.

Marriage shouldn’t really be the business of the state. Co-parenting should be a legally recognized state that I could enter into with my best friend, sister or grandmother, if we so chose, with no expectation of sexual anything attached, regardless of the relation or lack thereof between the parties. Coresidence likewise, to encourage the efficiency and conservation benefits of cohabitation. A joint application for those wishing legal recognition of their traditional relationship would be fine. People should not be held responsible without power to make a decision. Ie, a father should not be held accountable for a child’s care and financial well-being if he is divested, or if he divests himself, of any and all say in the child’s life, likewise for a mother. On that theme, if people can’t vote then they shouldn’t count for purposes of representation (if you don’t let felons vote, they shouldn’t count towards your allotment of congresspeople and electors), but really, felons should have the right to vote.

I kinda suck at relationships. The list of reasons behind this is long and something I’d prefer not to get into at the moment. I’ll save that for another post. This was nothing like what I intended to write when I first made this post. Heh.

Well, my transportation & land use paper plan relies on data from the 1980 census for pittsburgh. Apparently, this can be had at the info desk of the Hillman library at Pitt on CD or on microfiche here. Given that it fits on one CD at hillman, I have to suspect it’s in some sort of spreadsheet or database format already. I’d kill to get my hands on that. I’m betting I won’t get the chance. So, I’ll get to spend hours with a microfiche reader this weekend gathering data for my research paper. Let me tell you how thrilled I am about that.

And just in case you’ve forgotten, Terri Schiavo, drilling in ANWR? Distractions. I say ANWR is a distraction because nobody really wants to drill up there anyway. I doubt it’s profitable, given the opportunity cost, and the total oil capacity of the place wouldn’t begin to cover US consumption for a year. It’s a distraction from social security; it’s a distraction from congressional embarrassment. Keeping us focused on the unimportant things. Call me a media conspiracy lunatic if you want. Just don’t come bitching to me when our parents are begging on the street.

All hail the new feudalism.

I will be going to spring carnival this year, courtesy the Foundation’s generous Booty Shaker Scholarship. Alas, my philanthropic benefactor has said he will not be joining in the festivities.

Flight: Northwest Airlines 1056

Depart: Minneapolis/St. Paul International Airport, April 14 6:58 PM CDT

Arrive: Pittsburgh – Greater Pittsburgh International, April 14 9:59 PM EDT

Flight: Northwest Airlines 3489 (Operated by: MESABA AVIATION JET SERV/NW AIRLINK)

Depart: Pittsburgh – Greater Pittsburgh International, April 18 12:16 PM EDT

Arrive: Minneapolis/St. Paul International Airport, April 18 1:38 PM CDT

Since opining on this case seems to be in vogue. Allow me to share my comments from a post in ‘s journal on the Terri Schiavo events.

here there be opinions