Thanks, Strega. I'm looking through that info now.

We ended up going for a TiVo last year when we couldn't find a DVD recorder for a reasonable price.

It is looking like what I want was on the market 2 years ago and has since disappeared.

If you're going to get a recordable dvd player, stay clear of Toshiba--they don't let you use DVD+R discs, so you can only record up to two hours per DVD-R disc, which really sucks. I only discovered that after going to their website, because even the instruction book doesn't mention that little fact.

Does anyone want a 50-pack of DVD+R discs?

How a Basic Income Program Saved a Namibian Village:

It sounds like a communist utopia, but a basic income program pioneered by German aid workers has helped alleviate poverty in a Nambian village. Crime is down and children can finally attend school. Only the local white farmers are unhappy.

It's a pretty fascinating and fantastic story.

Parents are now able to pay tuition, and the proportion of children attending school rose to 92 percent last year. The school has used the additional revenue to buy paper, pens and ink for its printers. The rate of malnourishment among the children has plunged from 42 to 10 percent. The local police crime statistics show a decline in theft and poaching. People with AIDS are responding more effectively to treatment, now that their nutritional needs are being met more consistently. "Suddenly the children were wearing shoes," says the teacher. A man went to see Dirk and Claudia Haarmann. Beaming from ear to ear, he asked: "Don't you see?" They asked him what he meant. "Don't you see? I now have trousers and a t-shirt. I am now a person."

Even dignity, it seems, can be purchased for 100 Namibian dollars a month.

Even when gmail was down, they were saying, "Users can access their email via IMAP or POP."

My notifier checks the web interface. The moment I gave up on the web interface and set up IMAP, boom, the web interface came back.

That's fascinating, Polter-Cow. I really like the underlying principle and that it seems to be working is just wonderful.

100 Namibian dollars is $12.66.

It's so interesting that it's working so well. I don't know how you could try the same thing here since the cost of living is so much higher. I wonder what the comparable basic income would be here.

Yeah, I don't know how you'd figure that out, but the idea that everyone is entitled to enough of an income to subsist, just for being a live person, is very attractive to me. I hope it keeps working.

That's a cool program.

I have Y membership now. Whee? It's a nice facility, only a few years old. Pool!

One of the neighborhood cats was sitting outside the french doors (I have them open, screens shut) and wow! the sounds coming out of Loki! He was all inflated and WAILING! He's got such a high pitched voice, it's funny. Other cat just sat there, watching, nose to nose, unperturbed. This is one of the cats I've found on my porch roof (and scared the shit out of me sunday at 5:45, clawing at the bedroom window), my entry roof and specifically who has tried to follow me in. Ballsy little bugger.

Yay, pool! I just got myself a swim cap that allegedly will handle long hair, so I'm going to attempt to swim tomorrow. Also got goggles on the theory that maybe I can wear my contacts under them and see while I'm swimming, which is a totally foreign idea to me but I might try it.

Pushy cats crack me up.