Calendars

Today is apparently the Jewish New Year.

Ramadan begins tomorrow?

jaxdahl on fark.com says:

please: Doesn't Ramadan start soon too? And who says those cultures are completely unrelated...

They actually coincide on the same day this year - both start sundown on September 12, 2007. I did some calculations and I believe this is the first time this has occurred since September 12, 1942 -- correct me if I'm wrong.

The first day of Ramadan is not the first day of the year in the Islamic calendar, it is the first day of the 9th month (holiest month for them). Rosh Hashanah is the first day of Tishri, the first month of the year in the Jewish calendar.

The Jewish calendar is lunar based but self-correcting, there are extra months every now and then to keep it in sync with a solar based calendar. Rosh Hashanah is almost always in September on the Gregorian calendar, but sometimes happens in October. The Islamic calendar is lunar based with no self correction so the first of Ramadan shifts back by 11-12 days every year.

Nah, not foreboding or anything....

Unintentional Arguments

I'm reading a lot of financial blogs recently. Many learned commentators appear to be confused (moreso than normal) about the state of the world...

Sometimes these people are saying things they don't even realize: case in point. Note the picture at the bottom. Was The Onion publishing in 1929?

What Mr Sutton is saying there is that no matter how studied and academically accomplished he might be, he has yet to learn not to believe everything you read on Teh Intarwebz. I wonder how many other pundits and professors suffer the same perceptual gaps...

Pipeweed

I used to smoke cigarettes. Now, I smoke a pipe. When I switched (this time), my local drugstore still had the same stock of "Half & Half" pipe tobacco that they'd had the last time i quit smoking cigarettes, back in 1996. I finished the two cans they had in June. The new stuff deserves the bad reviews.

Hunting for more on the intarweb led me to the shocking news that the company that used to make Half&Half doesn't anymore, and I might've been enjoying the last couple cans of "the real stuff" around (should've sold them...)

Shopping for alternatives led me to this gem of marketing speak:

"The premium version of Captain Black regular."

Oh. Really. Premium.

I think I'd rather go out and strip the husks from last year's unharvested rotted cornstalks, feed those to my dog, and then dry, shred and smoke the result; than experiance something billed as a premium Cpt Black. May the perpetrators of that sentence be forgiven...

The Splenda Infiltration of Everyday Products

We were at the supermarket today and saw two of our regular favorite products had been 'enhanced' with Splenda, the sugar substitute. I had to stare at the two bottles of pickles, side by side, for a long time until I could see what the one difference between them was. And I am surely glad I did see it before that item made it's way into my cart!

It's not that I'm against things with less sugar. [Dragon, however, is against less sugar. He likes his sugar!] I am against chemical substitutes. Need we mention the problems with aspartame and saccharin? Make up your mind, have real sugar in it or not. If you can't have regular sugar, then learn to cook differently. My mom is a diabetic, and when I was a kid we changed our entire way of eating to accomodate her new dietary limitations. Instead of sugar she would add spices or a sweet fruit or vegetable to the menu. Rarely she would use a small amount of honey. When I became older and learned to cook for myself I still didn't see much value in adding sugar to most dishes to enhance the flavor.

I've tried Splenda in iced tea and in baking - and it is definitely 'fake.' Not only that, but the sweet flavor it gives is decidedly wrong, too sweet in one way, slightly powdery in another. So, to see it as an option in our usual brand of pickles or applesauce made me wince in pain.

I hope this isn't a trend that will supersede the regular products. It would be a hard choice between buying the item with the Splenda in it or just changing brands. A generic brand might be less likely to have been 'infiltrated' by this substance. If it came down to it, I would much rather have something that wasn't sweet at all, or add sugar to it at home. I am definitely not impressed to buy something off the shelf because it says 'Now with Splenda.'

Making loans to people who can't pay them may be bad fiscal policy. Amazing thought, eh? Found on naked capitalism.

OK, why another blog?

I bitch a lot. It amuses me, which is reason enough. I hope to amuse bystanders as well, and I think I do -- people often laugh at me...

I've been venting my whinging on IRC for years, but it's finally time to supplement it. IRC is a wonderful medium for bitching about the things that annoy you (and thereby pretending they're dealt with), but it's a limited audience, it's impermanent, and you can't search what archives you keep very easily. So It's about time I got me a blog.

Marie (the light and love of my life) and I have some major annoyances, and some joys too. We're looking forward to the birth of our daughter sometime after Halloween: a blog will be a good place to post baby pictures. Surely all of the massive ad revenue people talk about will be helpful for the nappies and such.

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed...

I love this picture...

Boo!

eek a blog.

bah. an edit.