Mostly Travel

 J ust some quick thoughts, but has anyone tried to examine cats for psychic phenomena? I realize that actually getting the cat to cooperate might be a bigger challanege then proving anything, but there should be enough evidence to prove something anyway. First item, the bed space issue. If a cat decides to sleep on your bed, no matter how small the cat, how large the person, or how large the bed, somehow the cat will take up the majority of the space. Whether this is use of telekinesis to push out the space around them or telepathy to figure out were they can be to prevent the person from spreading out. Second item, opposition. If you provide a cat with two identical choices (say a scratching post and a sofa upholstered in the same material) the cat will always choose to sharpen its claws on the one you don't want. They will continue to do this even if you put catnip on the scratching post and repellent on the sofa. Somehow the cat must be able to tell which is which and is simply...

  Just an update to the very angsty post you didn't see last night, but today I talked to the real estate agent who helped me buy my house. Houses in the neighborhood with advantages and disadvantages that would make them roughly equal to mine have been selling in the range of 125-129. Doing a very rough sort of math, this would indicate that I can probably sell my house for nothing out of pocket, cover comission and maybe even make back a little of the closing costs I paid. I doubt I'll come out ahead, overall, but if this comes to pass its still this is a lot better than I had thought I'd do. Thus I am in a reasoable position to find a job elsewhere (somewhere in the NE hopefully) and move without going majorly into debt. Update to the Update to the post you didn't see. I'm depressed again. My agent snuck me into the house that sold for 129 and I don't have a chance in h*** of matching it. It has a full remodel with nice pergo floor, central air, a real masonr...

  I'm from Gryffindor! Hogwart's Sorting Hat Quiz made by  The Genki Gang I never post these, but LJ ate my long and angsty post about how unjustified my firing was and how much my life sucks right now and I was just amused at how off I think this thing is. It places my in Gryffindor, but from the descriptions I should be in Ravenclaw. Cold, distant, knowledge seeking is definitely more my type.

            Today our wonderful president announced his plan for moving the US space program into high gear, with a whopping 1 billion dollars in additional funds allocated to NASA for the next five years and an overall budget of 12 billion including diverted funds from other NASA projects. Admittedly this is not supposed to be the full cost of putting a permanent base on the moon, but it is a significant (5 of 11 years, including most of the R&D) fraction of it. In contrast the original Apollo program cost 25.4 billion in 1960's-70's dollars. If anyone believes that Bush's numbers will give a practical result I'd really like to see an explanation.           Almost all practical plans I have seen for a permanent presences on the moon involve three separate segments with specialized craft. An earth to low earth orbit launch vehicle, an orbit to orbit transfer vehicle, and a lunar orbit to lunar surface landing vehicle. The simple...

  I had what had to be the best interview of my life today. I was coherent, concise, and really sold myself well. I covered all my good points, glossed over my bad points, demonstrated how I was working to fix my past problems and was extremely personable (not my strong suit). There was only one tiny problem. They didn't have a job for me. You would think if a company has your resume they would read it and think about it before calling you in. What they are looking for is someone who can move into a low level managerial level position, so what I will be about another 3-5 years down the road(minimum). Definitely not something I'm capable of right now. Once the interviewer clarified that (toward then end) even I had to admit it. I find this very frustrating simply because such a good interview on my part was completely wasted. (Unless I still don't have a job when something at my level opens up, but hopefully that won't be an issue). We'll see but: AAAAAARRRRGGGGHHHH!...

  Okay, for those of you who don't know, I was laid off last week. I'm in okay shape financially, with enough money (with unemployment, anyway) to last 6 months or so. I've also already got an interview lined up for Tuesday. I've been coping with it reasonably well emotionally until today. What gave me trouble today is the simple fact that I had a large bill come in, and the logical response was to put it on one of my credit cards. Now this doesn't sound like to big a deal, and I guess it really isn't, but it bothers me. This is the first time in roughly 6 years I have put something on my credit card without the intention (and capability) to fully pay it off at the end of the month. I don't know why this bothers me as much as it does. Secured debt such as my mortgage or car loan don't give me to much anxiety (though right now both are a little troublesome). However the thought of having unsecured debt in any amount terrifies me. I can point to examples s...