I think when you visit a country with a language you don’t speak, it activates something in your mind whose purpose is to try to understand it. I felt it working when I was in Italy as I was comprehending far more than I expected. After we left Italy, I felt that same part of the mind at work as I heard different languages at the airport.

That dang ol’ mind is amazing, innit?

Just in case anyone tells you something is the greatest thing since sliced bread, read about sliced bread.

I poked around a bit to find a link to the real estate listing for my grandmother’s house. I hear its under contract now, so a new owner may be calling it home soon. The link to the site will probably not last, either.

One of the reasons I was anxious last month to pick up the furniture from it was so that I could walk through it one last time. Of course Grandma isn’t there anymore, but there are plenty of memories inside those walls.

Its still weird to see it empty.

I was glad to see that ‘Merica did some housecleaning while we were out of the country. A federal appeals court threw out the FCCs plans to implement the broadcast flag. This would severely limit innovation in the personal-video-recorder (PVR) and PC-TV convergence field by prohibiting hobbyists and open-source developers from playing. Thus, the MythTV box I am building – for use in my own home – would have become illegal to sell. Using existing boxes would still be legal.

The rule will not take effect on its scheduled June 1st implementation, but don’t think for a minute the greedy, evil bastards in the entertainment industry who are pushing this will accept defeat. Take a moment to visit EFFs action page and let your representative know that the broadcast flag is a bad idea.

I composed this while waiting for my flight last night.

I’ve spent the day in New Jersey, on the road for business. The travel has been less than smooth, with weather delays causing headaches for my connecting flights. I should have been on the way home now, but Independence Air is still waiting for my chariot to arrive to take me to Dulles.

On the way to the office this morning, I had a very interesting conversation with the limo driver, a Russian immigrant. Having spent four years of my life facing down what Reagan dubbed the “Evil Empire,” I have a lingering curiosity about our former enemy. Rather than exhort me to visit the country of her birth, though, she instead advised me to steer clear of it. To her, Russia was far too dangerous, both from the crime and the unpredictability of the government. She thought Putin was returning the country to its dictatorship past. I listened with interest, but really became intrigued when I saw a website headline which also suggested Russia’s turn towards dictatorship. She may be right that it may take 100 years before Russia is safe.

The Boingo account I activated for our trip to Italy continues to provide dividends. Boingo makes it a breeze to find Internet access when you’re on the road. It has already paid for itself many times over. Unfortunately for my stay in the Newark airport, service is only available at a handful of gates.

I’m looking forward to the weekend. It’s the first post-Italy weekend we’ve had, which means we can concentrate on home stuff for a while. Half the lawn still needs mowing. The garage needs to be cleaned out. New blinds need to be installed. And my office needs to be tamed, mess that it is.he

We can also do some gardening now: hanging plants for the front porch and a garden to be planted out back. Also, we’ve collected a few bids on fixing our landscaping in the back yard, which will allow us to finally fence the backyard.

Early this morning, we were awakened by an unfamiliar sound. A steady, low rumbling becan to shake the house. As the first train we’ve heard in weeks, it would have been unusual enough. This train, however, was the latest one since we’ve been here, rumbling by at 1 AM. I didn’t have to see it to know it had a huge load. I heard a hundred cars, twice the usual amount, pass by; its huge diesels howling like banshees into the night. It was a haunting sound.

Well, it looks like my plane will arrive after all. Look for some more posts this weekend, when I hope to catch up with an Italy report.

A footnote. My plane didn’t take off from Newark until 9 PM, almost two hours late. Weather-related air traffic control delays were to blame. I didn’t arrive home until 11:30 PM Friday night.

Short attention spans aren’t just a side-effect of television. Television is designed to shorten attention spans.

I got this idea after finishing John Taylor Gatto‘s excellent book Dumbing Us Down. Gatto writes mostly about the poor state of schooling, but also puts a good deal of blame on TV.

I was also happy to see that Doc quoted Gatto’s book in a recent Suitwatch column in Linux Journal.

If you haven’t read the book yet, do it.

The jet lag is catching up to me. I think a good, early bedtime is in order.

Blog at you later.

We’re back from Italy/France. We completely missed both of our flights back from DC, so we rented a car and drove back. Thanks a bunch, Air France. I must collect the many ways Air France screwed up, but the list is too long to post tonight.

I’m insane for considering going to work tomorrow, but that’s the plan. Missed connections mean the buffer day we planned was used for travel instead. Here’s hoping I’m productive tomorrow.

I think the French got their reputation for being dirty and smelly because they all have Air France connections.

Thank you! Thank you very much!