Jack M

tex, what kind of parent sends their kid alone into that situation? i say blackmail. we don't know anything.

I don't dispute any of that, but my attitude towards cops was tempered when I had to enlist their services once. The officer was extremely professional, intelligent, competent, and got fast results. I was very impressed and grateful. They do protect and serve.

both! lighten up.

It's completely relevant to the si/std debate.

McCain-Feingold was bipartisan. Anyway, I'm 100% sure this will not stand up to the constitutionality test. 4th and 5th amendments cover this explicitly.

Someone either on here or a BMW forum I read said to avoid the STi like the plague due to poor reliability. I'd stick with the regular WRX unless you can afford regular shop visits or DIY. bschurman had an Audi S4 that he said was in the shop twice a year, minimum $1200 each time - don't know if that translates to the S3. If you're in the range of an S3, you might consider a BMW 330xi wagon. It's AWD with a 3 liter inline-6. Historically more reliable than Audi. "Only" about 225hp (a bit more on the new generation), but it's quick and one sweet ride. I love my '03 sedan. Gets decent mileage too, like 22/29. I just did a 100 mile trip yesterday (15 miles city, 85 highway) and averaged 28.3mpg with the cruise on 75 on the highway.

Har har. Some riders can handle the extra response. ;) I don't mind the bending over, it's the stopping and sitting down that sucks. Makes me feel like a gd softbooter. I really love being able to get off the lift, skate, glide, step-in and go.

For video if you are going to try to follow the riders at all, obviously skis. Other than that, you can do whatever you need to do on a board. Just take your back foot out. This is easier with step-ins. At the ECES where I was camped out in one spot shooting a lot of riders streaming down the trail I just took the board off completely.

By next season I meant 2010. Would a donation in March be too late? If so, perhaps we could make ongoing donations in advance as people sign up for the ECES.

Thanks Phil. Next season's East Coast Expression Session (ECES) will serve as a fundraiser for these athletes, and we will channel it through Chris Klug. Come one, come all!

Yeah, mine neither! But you can put a very enjoyable home theater together in a non-dedicated room for pretty cheap. Correct. Fin is having his hosting service look into it. If you need to post pictures from your computer, upload them to www.tinypic.com and you can use the url they give you to include in your posts. +2. We've had good luck with our Velux skylights, but it is impossible to seal out light. My son can't deal with his, so I staple-gunned a navy blue towel over it for the summer.

Yes. But now they are also doing checkpoints for seatbelts. So I've heard, I haven't seen one myself.

Bamboo floors. Cheap, very attractive, very renewable. Don't do concrete. Some friends of ours did this and they regret it. The look is trendy and it's uncomfortable. Home Theater: even if you don't do the speakers or anything now, run the wiring now. Wish I had done this when we built our garage with play-room above. Doh. +1 on Bordy's laundry. Put it on the same floor as the bedrooms. At the very least keep it out of the basement.

Nice! Those sound like some decent and versatile lenses. Being able to use those saves you a ton of coin. As for a p&s with HD movies, the Panasonic TS1 is a great solution if you need a submersible camera. It was great on our vacation. 12mp, 28-128mm lens, optical image stabilization, nice package.

It can work if you market yourself enough, and it helps big time if you are the exclusive source for professional photos of the event. I just finished shooting my town's little league baseball and softball. 50 teams. I've netted about $5000 so far. $2000 of that was through smugmug - people going to my galleries and buying prints after the fact. The other $3000 was from pre-paid and satisfaction guaranteed photo packages, e.g. an 8x10, a 5x7, 4 wallets and a refrigerator magnet for $24 which is a discount compared to buying those things a la carte. Smugmug does not provide packages yet, but they tell me they are aggressively working on them. I had to do all the order taking, money handling, and fulfillment for the packages. That was a nightmare, I won't do that again. When smugmug provides packages, it will be a relative breeze. I agree on-site selling will generate more sales due to impulse buyers, but that is a more complex model with more overhead, especially if printing on-site. That would require personnel and equipment. The smugmug model allows a solo shooter to cover and sell an event, but it depends on customers taking the initiative to go online and buy something. And then a lot of people, once they see the proof online (limited size, obtrusive watermark and all) their curiosity is satisfied, they email a link to the proof around, and then they don't need to buy prints. Smugmug also says they are aggressively working on coupons/credits. You will be able to pre-sell the coupons so people will have an incentive to go buy prints. For example, sell a $30 coupon for $20, and only sell those AT the event. That will be a great way for a solo shooter to easily make on-site sales and capitalize on impulse buying without the overhead of a staff, printers, and viewing kiosks. It's not exactly easy money, but if you love photography it's a fun way to support the hobby and earn some petty cash. This job nearly covered our recent family trip to Jamaica, and now I can take a tax write-off on new camera gear. But I agree with Sean, it would take a lot of hustle to make this a career.

It is mandatory in most states (these types of laws are at the state level), but what has changed here in Maine (and I assume in other states) is that it is now a primary offense like speeding. They can pull you over and ticket you for it, whereas before they could not unless you were also committing some other primary offense. It could only be tacked on as an additional offense if you got pulled over for something else. The problem with this is not the intent of the law, it's the power grab. It is part of the notion that the government should be responsible for your well being and making decisions for you. America was founded on the principals of personal responsibility, among other things, and this is yet another step away from that. Slippery slope. Of course there is no argument against wearing a seatbelt, but your line of thinking is a humongous slippery slope right there, Phil. Similarly, as a purchaser of health insurance (and never making a significant claim), I could say it makes me sick that people choose to be fat, smoke, and be generally unhealthy while I am a relative picture of health myself. Should I encourage fines against such behavior, or outlawing it altogether? And then someone else who is more timid and cautious with their life might look at the absurd activity of sliding down a snowy hill on a plank and say that it's reckless to do so at speeds greater than X and that we should be fined for speeding. Or that we should pay more into the system for even snowboarding or skiing at all. But of course! We danger-seekers are at greater risk of requiring expensive health care than someone who is more sensible in the winter. Right?? It's called freedom. The freedom to snowboard is the same as the freedom to think for yourself and be responsible for yourself and decide what is acceptable risk. If I need to make a quick trip to the store a half mile from my house down a quiet road and I forget or just don't feel like putting on my seat belt, in a free country I shouldn't have to worry that The Man might come around the corner and "get" me. Besides, I don't know how logically you can simultaneously outlaw not using a seatbelt while permitting the use of motorcycles and scooters.

secret revolving book case entrance to the man-cave. radiant heat. but isn't gas better for a tankless hot water system? like a rinnai?

Ha! I remember seeing a news story on TV about that! Cool. I would think ADM etc. would jump on that.

You work for Al Gore?? ;) ;)

He was the perfect target. We'll never know if he was an actual pedophile. The guy was beaten as a child, seriously disturbed, never had a childhood and always asserted he was still a child inside. His playdates and sleepovers could simply have been a futile attempt to recover the childhood he never had. It's extremely sad. What kind of parent sends their kid off alone with any adult for such activity? We know that he paid millions to make at least 2 such cases go away. And they did. What does that tell you? As I parent I can tell you if my child were actually molested, I wouldn't go away until the m-f'er was behind bars, euthanized, or dead in my hands. Mike Gordon of Phish paid to make a case like this go away too. Is he a pedophile?

We'll never know if he was an actual pedophile. The guy was beaten as a child, seriously disturbed, never had a childhood and always asserted he was still a child inside. His playdates and sleepovers could simply have been a futile attempt to recover the childhood he never had. It's extremely sad. What kind of parent sends their kid off alone with any adult for such activity? We know that he paid millions to make at least 2 such cases go away. And they did. What does that tell you? As I parent I can tell you if my child were actually molested, I wouldn't go away until the m-f'er was behind bars, euthanized, or dead in my hands. Mike Gordon of Phish paid to make a case like this go away too.

Here in Maine the man can now pull you over and ticket you <i>just</i> for not wearing your seatbelt. In 20 or even 10 years, the next driving generation won't consider this an outrage, and the nanny state will move on to the next way to protect us from ourselves. Then we can be sure to see it on the slopes.

While Fin checks this out, in the mean time use www.tinypic.com to upload, grab the URL, and then use the button to put it in your post.