Our farmers` market is closed during the winter and only open one day a week during the harvest seasons. But I can get local organic free range eggs at the kitchen store and they are NOM so much better. You can tell a huge difference in the darkness and richness of color in the yolk. And in taste too, obvs, but you can see it too. My farmer neighbor also sells eggs, and I check on the chickens all the time driving by (they look happy) but since he doesn`t put out his veggie sign in winter, I`m afraid to stop by just for eggs.

My mother's middle name is also Elizabeth.

When she was born, my grandparents had only discussed what her name would be if she was a boy, so when she turned out to be a girl, Grandma was at a complete loss as to what to call her. Grandpa immediately proclaimed her Shirleymae Elizabeth. No idea where it came from.

I miss my farmers' market which doesn't come back until May, but at least one of the fruit stands nearby is year-round, so I'm not completely lacking in fresh local produce and eggs. Need to go get eggs and whatever, in fact, maybe tomorrow.

Sarameg, speaking of farmers markets and las cruces, just a reminder to ping your mom about that jewelry holder. I still want it! :)

Oh, I mentioned it to her last weekend, but I suspect it got lost in the swirl of other Stuff going on with her. I'll email her, that'll stick.

I share a name with my paternal Great-Grandmother who was Elizabeth Kathryn Vehre.

I love Farmers' Market. We went this week. All we got were sprouts and daffodils, but still very happymaking.

We had wings for dinner at a sports bar. I was almost ballistic with the manager who wanted to change one of the 8 bajillion TVs off of Women's Curling.

Curmudgeonly essay on "Why the Internet Will Fail" from 1995

In 1995, astronomer, amateur hacker tracker and Klein-bottle maker Clifford Stoll wrote an essay (and a book, too, but I haven't read that) explaining why this Internet thing will never work. His main argument seems to be, "Hardware and software will all top out in the mid-90s and, thus, the Internet will never ever get any more user friendly or portable. Also, it is different and scary." Hilarity ensues.

The truth is no online database will replace your daily newspaper, no CD-ROM can take the place of a competent teacher and no computer network will change the way government works ...

What the Internet hucksters won't tell you is that the Internet is one big ocean of unedited data, without any pretense of completeness. Lacking editors, reviewers or critics, the Internet has become a wasteland of unfiltered data. You don't know what to ignore and what's worth reading. Logged onto the World Wide Web, I hunt for the date of the Battle of Trafalgar. Hundreds of files show up, and it takes 15 minutes to unravel them—one's a biography written by an eighth grader, the second is a computer game that doesn't work and the third is an image of a London monument. None answers my question, and my search is periodically interrupted by messages like, "Too many connections, try again later." ....

Even if there were a trustworthy way to send money over the Internet-which there isn't-the network is missing a most essential ingredient of capitalism: salespeople.

I wonder what that guy is doing now?

Downloading porn and thanking God every day for it.

Would it be crazy to buy a saltlick and plant it next to my downspout during the winter? (icing up, but not enough to fuck with my walls, but still.)

Stoll was a pretty accomplished hacker at that point, not a neophyte. Read charitably, it's not completely off base. He's not claiming the internet will fail, but that rosy-eyed futurists are expecting miracles from a system that does not totally replicate the human touch. It's not like it's something people don't say today.

I still love rereading Stoll's book The Cuckoo's Egg.