USB Ports

What is the "top" of a USB socket?
I think the top of a USB socket has the plastic bar in it.
And so the top of a USB plug has an opening (the plug is the end on the flash drive with a smooth metal exterior.

Do you agree?

Best Lunar Eclipse Photo

My new Fuji Finepix F50fd digital camera was not getting the job done (not enough zoom):

So I borrowed my wife's Nikon Coolpix S10 digital camera with 10X optical zoom. Late in the eclipse, I got the bright idea of setting the camera on a bench and tilting the lens upward (this is a cool camera). After cropping, I got my best photo:

Credit Card Arithmetic

Ever thought about the money involved in the credit card industry?
For rough numbers, let's assume that:

--100 million American families with credit cards

--Each American family has $1,000 of credit card short term loan (the typical total family credit card charges per month)

--Each American family has $10,000 of credit card debt
--The average interest rate paid on this debt is 12% per year
--The credit card companies pay 4% for the money they borrow to cover the consumer debt

Therefore, the credit card companies always have about $100 billion in outstanding credit card debt that they carry at no charge to the customer. To borrow that money for the consumers, the credit card companies are paying about $4 billion per year out of their pockets.

Therefore, too, the American credit card debt is about $1 trillion. Compare THAT to the national debt of $5 trillion or so. It is significant!

To borrow that money for the consumers, the credit card companies must be paying around $40 billion per year. But, consumers are paying $120 billion per year to the credit card companies.

Therefore, the consumers who borrow from the credit card companies and make their loan payments are allowing the credit card companies to net about $80 billion per year, which more than covers the $4 billion they pay for the money loaned to cunsumers who pay off their card every month. And gives them money left over to pay all their operating costs and to cover the charges on stolen credit cards (which is money lost to the credit card thieves).

It is no wonder there are so many credit card companies sending new cards in the mail.

Walk and Lock

My office overlooks a parking lot. People lock their cars three ways. Which are you?
1) The "walk-and-lock" confidently walks away from their car and waves the magic button in the air behind them to lock the car.
2) The "lock-and-walk" stands beside the car to lock it before walking away.
3) The obsessive-compulsive (me) " lock-check-and-walk" locks the car, checks a door handle or two anyway, and finally walks away.

There is a fourth category -- the few that apparently do not bother to lock their car.

Washington Caucus Results

Washington state had huge Democrat caucuses yesterday (possibly double the number of people showed up compared to 2004), and gave it to Obama by a 2 to 1 margin. The Republican caucuses had much lower turnout, and gave it to McCain, with only 25% of the vote (which is not very strong support for the presumptive nominee in a narrow field). Huckabee got about 24%, Ron Paul got about 21%, Romney about 17% (even though his campaign is on hold), which leaves 13% for "uncommitted".

I have heard what seven people did yesterday.
Four did not go.

One voted at a Republican caucus.
One went to a Democrat caucus and was "thoroughly bummed out by the experience."
Another one went to a Democart caucus and walked out before voting.

It is all over for Democrats, but Republicans are holding a primary on Feb. 19 to select the other half of their delegates. Strange, eh?

Washington Caucuses

I decided not to caucus today. I am very unhappy with my choices:
1) An aging Vietnam vet known for being a Republican "maverick" because he has sided so often with the Democrats on a wide variety of Senate legislation.
2) A liberal Baptist minister who happened to get elected governor of Arkansas as a Republican.
3) A nice young man with no fresh ideas ("change" is rather vague), minimal experience, and zero accomplishments other than voting against invading Iraq in 2003. On the bright side, Michelle is an angel compared to Bill.
4) A ex-First Lady with a long record of tolerating an adulterous husband for the express purpose of becoming president. (And how did she ever escape conviction in the Whitewater case as her business partners were?)

IMHO, when elected, none of them will:
1) Withdraw our troops from Iraq, Afghanistan, or any of the other gazillion countries where we have troops.
2) Close our borders to terrorists or illegal alien workers.
3) Save Social Security by privatizing it.
4) Cut taxes and fees.
5) Decrease the size and scope of the federal government.
6) Appoint conservative constructionist judges to the Supreme Court.
7) Save our health care system by pushing it towards the same free-market system that brings us inexpensive and plentiful food and cars.
8) Protect our First Amendment rights to free political speech and contributions.

Only the Second Amendment folks and the Pro-Choice/Pro-Life folks have a clear choice.

Happy Anniversary!

Forty (40) years ago today, my wife and I became engaged to get married. We did, and we have been. Here is a sneak peak of how we looked on our wedding day.

Vote Chooser

Pretty interesting! Try it out to find out which candidate's positions best match yours on 10 major topics.

http://www.votechooser.com/

Mine results almost perfectly matched my list of preferences below.

Super Tuesday

Okay, I admit it, I am bummed out by the election results yesterday. It looks like our next president will be #5, #7, and #10 on my list of preferences below.

Maybe McCain will figure out that he needs to ask Thompson to be his running mate to get elected?