The costs of jury service

I found out yesterday that the jury duty I almost had to perform was for the Kathy Taft murder case. While I was willing to serve, I am feeling very fortunate today not to have been tapped for this case. I work as a contractor and get paid by the hour and the contracting firm that employs me would’ve only paid for the first 40 hours of jury service. The Taft case will likely drag out for months, putting us in a significant financial bind. The $50 a day with which the court would’ve compensated me would not have come remotely close to bridging the gap. This all aside from the emotionally traumatic impact the case will have on all its jurors.

If these factors often weed out good juror candidates, what does that leave for our justice system? What can be done to allow people like me to serve without the risk of putting us in the poor house? Should trials be shortened solely to minimize the disruption on jurors, or would that be denying the defendant his or her due process rights?
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US Navy deploys 2nd aircraft carrier to Gulf

Two of the U.S. Navy’s aircraft carriers are now in the Persian Gulf. These carriers certainly raise visibility, though in a bathtub-sized body of water like the Persian Gulf they’ll be spending most of their time just getting out of each other’s way.

One comment to this story was from a former sailor who talked about how boring it is to be on a ship. That is especially true in the Gulf, where one can enjoy “hours upon hours of boredom punctuated with sheer moments of terror.”

The U.S. Navy said Monday it has deployed a second aircraft carrier to the Persian Gulf region amid rising tensions with Iran over its disputed nuclear program.

The deployment of the nuclear-powered USS Enterprise along with the Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group marks one of the few times the Navy has had two aircraft carriers operating in waters near the Persian Gulf, said Cmdr. Amy Derrick-Frost of the Bahrain-based 5th Fleet.

The two carriers will support the American military operations in Afghanistan and anti-piracy efforts off Somalia’s coast and in the Gulf of Aden, she said.

via US Navy deploys 2nd aircraft carrier to Gulf :: WRAL.com.

Kings Dominion

At Kings Dominion


Yesterday the stars aligned where it became possible for the family to spend the day at Kings Dominion along with Kelly’s brother, David and his son, Wesley. It had been two years since we took the kids to Carowinds and in that time our kids gained a lot more confidence in what they wanted to ride.

True to form, Hallie led the way, never backing down from any ride we suggested to her. She prefers the wooden coasters and enjoyed a few rides on the Rebel Yell, KD’s version of Carowinds’s Thunder Road. She didn’t even blink when I challenged her to ride the biggest, baddest coaster in the park, the Intimidator 305 (though I had to gulp when she actually accepted the challenge)! We were both laughing when we walked off that ride, and Hallie got the chance to introduce her mommy to it. I am amazed by her bravery.
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Lorum ipsum spam?

When one receives a spam email, one expects some sort of offer such as “MAKE MONEY FAST,” or “MALE ENHANCEMENT” or the like. This morning I got a particular spam email which included only the boilerplate lorem ipsum text:

From: “Deal Amazon” info@gocdidong.info
Subject: Deal of the Day – Offers – Deals & Promotions
To: “markt” markt at rules the universe dot qrz
Date: Sun, 8 Apr 2012 00:06:43 -0700

Please enter your message here

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.

Are spammers really so lazy now that they can’t even be bothered to add their own text to their spam?

New Belgium lands in Asheville

Yesterday the rumors that craft brewer New Belgium was considering building a brewery in Asheville came true when the company and politicians announced the decision. I don’t live in Asheville but I do consider myself a beer connoisseur. I’m thrilled that New Belgium joins Sierra Nevada in making North Carolina a beer destination.

I remember finding out in the mid-90s about the Pop The Cap effort to change the state law, allowing higher-alcohol-content beers in North Carolina. Many of the Bible-thumping representatives didn’t want the change to happen. Then-Governor Hunt, a teetotaler, was also reluctant to make the change. The bill went nowhere.

Then out of nowhere (and after another questionable start), the Pop The Cap bill passed in 2005, bringing better beer to the state. Before long I was enjoying high quality, high-alcohol beer here at home.

Since 2005 the sky hasn’t fallen. Instead we have a whole new industry moving into western North Carolina, providing not only much-needed jobs but also a promising future. It’s wonderful to see how far we’ve come!

Call to duty

I’ve been tapped for jury duty and will thus report Monday morning to the Wake County courthouse. It’s not my first jury duty at Wake County: the last time I was summoned was perhaps 1995. Of course, I showed up for jury duty in federal court recently but wasn’t selected to serve. Prior to that I was asked to serve on the day my son Travis was born. I was excused for that one, needless to say!

Serving on a jury is disruptive, inconvenient, and sometimes costly. I could make a good case for dismissal, being that I’ll be lone parent around for the kids for most of this week. Still, I feel that would be weaseling out. If I expect our police officers to keep us safe, then I owe it to them, the defendants, and society as a whole to accept the call to weigh guilt or innocence. I take my duties as a citizen very seriously.

I don’t expect I’ll be blogging from the building but I will take mental notes of the experience and share them here afterward.


Update: I found out later that my jury number’s high enough that I won’t be needed after all.

Tony Shin taken to task

It seems that Earle Holland, Ohio State University’s assistant vice president for research communications, also got one of the mysterious Tony Shin Infographics, only Holland didn’t simply post it to his blog unquestioned. Instead, Holland took the time to thoroughly review the infographic, pointing out its numerous errors. [PDF]

Holland writes on his blog:

“Infographics,” first popularized by the coming of the USAToday newspaper, are a quick and easy way of conveying information. Sadly, however, they’re equally useful in simplifying data to the point of misrepresentation. Science as a subject is all too often seen by the public as too complicated to understand. It’s a normal tendency for people to reach out for, and maintain, simpler notions that require less work.
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Apple plans nation’s biggest private fuel cell energy project at N.C. data center

I’ve been meaning to blog about this all weekend. The N&O’s John Murawski has uncovered a very interesting aspect to the datacenter Apple is building in North Carolina: the country’s largest private fuel cell project.

North Carolina will be home to the nation’s largest private fuel cell energy project, a nonpolluting, silent power plant that will generate electricity from hydrogen.

Apple (yes, that Apple) filed its plans with the N.C. Utilities Commission on Thursday to build the 4.8-megawatt project in Maiden, about 40 miles northwest of Charlotte. That’s where Cupertino, Calif.-based Apple has built a data center to support the company’s iCloud online data storage system and its SIRI voice-recognition software.

The fuel cell project, the nation’s largest such project not built by an electric utility company, will be developed this year. It will be located on the same data complex that will host a planned 20-megawatt solar farm – the biggest ever proposed in this state.

But it’s the fuel cell project that’s generating buzz, eclipsing anything ever dreamed of in California, the nation’s epicenter for fuel cell projects.

“That’s a huge vote of confidence in fuel cells,” said James Warner, policy director of the Fuel Cell and Hydrogen Energy Association in Washington.

I’ve written before about how large companies build their datacenters in North Carolina to take advantage of the cheap electricity: electricity generated from dirty coal. Yet, fuel cells are (still) incredibly expensive and are among the cleanest energy sources around.

Why would Apple build a fuel cell plant in our state? It’s ironic, really, since all of Apple’s products are manufactured in China – powered by coal-smoke-belching power plants.

Does this mean that my dream of one day having a dishwasher-sized fuel cell power my home is moving closer to reality? What’s really going on here?

via Apple plans nation’s biggest private fuel cell energy project at N.C. data center – Business – NewsObserver.com.

Festival au Desert

If the ancient Mali city of Tumbuktu wasn’t already remote and exotic enough, now it’s in the hands of Tuareg rebels after a coup took place in Mali March 21st.

For over a decade, Mali has been the home of an annual African music concert known as Festival in the Desert. I’ve long wanted to travel to this concert and see the Sahara Desert and the city of Timbuktu but the security situation in the country brings this into question.

It’s not that I was ready to jet off to West Africa any time soon but I still hope one day to ride a camel to hear some of the most beautiful music on earth.

Making FreeNX always suspend

I’m running my Rivendell radio automation software on a virtual host, connecting to it using FreeNX. It works very well for the most part, but there’s been one little piece which could cause disaster: the FreeNX server’s habit of asking me if I want to suspend or terminate my session. Because my music will stop if the session terminates, I don’t ever want that option. I want it to always suspend.

I spent a few minutes tonight tracking down the best way to do this. It turns out the /usr/bin/nxdialog script is being called. By patching this script, I can force the suspend option every time. Problem solved!

Below is the code that does the magic:

— nxdialog.orig 2011-10-24 11:45:14.000000000 -0400
+++ nxdialog-mine 2012-03-30 21:41:33.000000000 -0400
@@ -415,6 +415,11 @@
exit 0
}

+always_suspend()
+{
+ return 3
+}
+
#
# main case statement
#
@@ -427,7 +432,7 @@
${dialog_interface}_yesno
;;
yesnosuspend)
– ${dialog_interface}_yesnosuspend
+ always_suspend
;;
panic)
${dialog_interface}_panic

You can also download the raw patch here.