"Every why hath a wherefore." - Comedy of Errors, Act 2, Scene 2

Thursday, December 15, 2005

My day in credit card receipts

(Partially saved from the Diary-X debacle.)


(Actually they're debit card receipts, which is better because at least I'm actually paying for the stuff I'm buying, but anyway - for this purpose, same difference.)

Sephora - $32.48 - the bad part about this is that it's not even a gift. I bought Frederick Fekkai shampoo, the kind that has a little bit of haircolor in it, and a mascara, because the one I keep at work had gotten all nasty and clumpy.

lunch (Chili's) - 11.72, including tip. A little high for a hamburger and an iced tea, really.

Metropolitan Museum of Art Store - $61.28 - for three boxes of note cards and a shoe ornament. And that was 10% off.

L'Occitane (or L'Occitane en Provence, the receipt informs me) - 38.97 - three soaps and a candle. I love their verbena soap. Also the cinnamon-orange stuff. I bought some of both, mostly intended for stocking-stuffer type gifts.

Pottery Barn - $62.79. I went in intending to buy a tree topper that I'd seen in the catalog, and I did, but I also bought a rather expensive clock, which I'm going to give my dad and his new wife, because I didn't know what to get her anyway, and this can be for both of them.

Best Buy - $35 gift card - for my nephew, who's at that age (almost 15) where it's useless to try to actually pick out gifts for him. Oh, and they had the gift cards packaged in CD cases, which was sort of cute.

gas - $19.75 (okay, this one doesn't really count as shopping, but still... $19.75 to fill up a freaking Honda Civic? And I know, I know, that's cheaper than gas was a couple of months ago, but I still can't get used to it.)

Wednesday, December 14, 2005

More on New Orleans

Death of an American City, from the New York Times. Read it.

Monday, December 05, 2005

Being the #3 guy at al-Qaida is hell

I know that war is Hell and all that, but I have to think that the guy who fired the rocket by remote control loves his job. I have an image of him sitting in an air conditioned headquarters someplace, feet up on the desk, a bag of Cheetohs on one side, a Budweiser on the other, staring at his computer screen. It’s about 1 am and everyone else is asleep. The order comes through on e-mail saying something like “Blow up mud hut #4,7855.” So he takes a break from playing Doom and plugs that number into the GPS system and soon his drone is hovering over said mud hut, missiles ready to go.

Maybe it’s just a “guy thing” but the idea of blowing up a mud hut by remote controlled drone sounds like the most fun thing I can think of. And if the number 3 al-Qaida leader happens to be inside, that’s a bonus. It certainly makes your story sound less nerdy afterwards.
--Scott Adams, from The Dilbert Blog