Andrew Sullivan (a big Obama supporter) often posts readers' accounts of views of Obama from other countries... here are some good ones:
I was in Europe the past two weeks and it was absolutely stunning. Everywhere I went, people wanted to speak to me about Obama. An old woman sweeping the street in Lisbon stopped me when she heard me speaking English and said: "American? Obama?" I could only shake my head and smile since I don't speak Portuguese. The doorman in Frankfurt, the waiter in Munich and the hotel receptionist in The Netherlands all bent my ear for about 10-15 minutes about how they are so looking forward to having Obama as President. Notice that they didn't say "your President" or "the American President" - it was simply "President". Everyone feels like they have a stake in this election. I hope the American public understands just how important it is that we get this one right.
Finally, at a medical conference a doctor from Angola came up to me with tears in his eyes and implored for me to vote for Obama. I told him that I was an Obama supporter and he thank me over and over. As he left, he said to me "Only in America. Only in America."
...
I live in the north of Paris and each weekend I go to the local flea market, the biggest in Europe. This time my girlfriend was with me and we were amused to see that Obama T-Shirts were on sale. I remarked to her that he must be really doing well in the States if the marketing had made it here already.... Then we saw a young black kid wearing an Obama T... then another. Then a woman who was fifty if she was a day. Then, passing the thudding bass of the local hip-hop stand a group of rough-looking guys, Arabs and blacks speaking about... Obama!
[link]
I look forward to the day when my nephews and honorary nieces and nephews look at me incredulously when I say that I was in my 30s when same sex marriage was legalized (because I'm OLD and that's just stupid it took that long!) And I really hope this one is the final hurrah and it becomes standard from now on.
I sincerely hope for this as well.
Today is my anniversary at this job and I'm being taken out to lunch of my choice. I have no idea where to go though!
More stuff for coffee drinkers to worry about: Denial-of-coffee attacks affect networked coffee-maker
Almost sounds like an
Onion
headline....
If you own a Jura F90 Coffee Maker, you can also buy a Jura Internet Connection Kit, which lets you program and set your coffee prefs via the network: however, its got a bunch of vulnerabilities that allow for remote denial-of-coffee attacks:
Guess what - it can not be patched as far as I can tell ;) It also has a few software vulnerabilities.
Fun things you can do with a Jura coffee maker:
1. Change the preset coffee settings (make weak or strong coffee)
2. Change the amount of water per cup (say 300ml for a short black) and make a puddle
3. Break it by engineering settings that are not compatible (and making it require a service)
I'm completely boggled that they embedded Windows XP in a coffee maker.
Could be worse; it could be Vista.
I'm completely boggled that they embedded Windows XP in a coffee maker.
So if it fails, you get the blue liquid of death?
Wonder if you can program it in Java?
C. Thomas Howell just looks so unpleasant.
Damn. One of my bosses was just in a motorcycle accident. He's OK, but he has some injury to a disk in his neck.
Just last week he was all excited upon trading his Triumph for a more powerful BMW cycle.
I think motorcycles are cool, but I've known too many people who've been badly injured on one... so I don't think I'll ever own one (as long as I live in a big city, anyway).
One of the boingboing commenters nails it:
How long until the RIAA issues files a lawsuit against a coffeemaker for music downloads?
