Nobody Knows Anything

Welcome to Diane Patterson's eclectic blog about what strikes her fancy

Karaoke for bedsheets

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Via the comments section at Firedoglake, I found a link to No More Mr. Nice Blog, who found this delightful story:

WOODBRIDGE, Va., April 9, 2006 — The Landstuhl Hospital Care Project added $4,400 to its coffers April 7 to buy items needed by wounded, injured and sick servicemembers at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center, Germany, and hospitals in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to Karen Grimord, the project’s coordinator.

The money was raised during the “Hook & C’s Karaoke” 2nd annual benefit, held here this year at American Legion Post 364….

This marked the fourth benefit held by the Landstuhl Hospital Care Project since Grimord and her husband Brian founded it in November 2004. “We try to provide mostly clothing items, but we’ve also extended to hospitals in Iraq and Afghanistan that need supplies, including bed sheets,” Grimord said. “The project started supporting three hospitals In Iraq in 2005 and one in Afghanistan this year.”

… the hospital in Afghanistan asked for bed sheets and pillows to use on litters….

Some muckraker didn’t dig this up. It’s a story from the Department of Defense.

Military hospitals are holding benefits to raise money for items needed by wounded, injured and sick servicemembers. They have had four such benefits since November, 2004.

How much have we wasted on this war? 200 billion dollars? Probably more. At this point, who can keep track?

None of the money, apparently, is going to the people actually doing the fucking job of operating this damned war. Where’s it all going?

And what makes you think you’re entitled to find out?

Wicked Cupcake

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One day Rob mentioned to me, “Hey, did you know that MacBooks are available for Employee First Discount?”

I ran to Darin with this news. “Okay, then, let’s get you a MacBook,” he said. He got onto the Employee Purchasing website, filled out the information, hit Send.

Seconds later he realized he’d put 3 Infinite Loop as both the mailing and delivery addresses. So he called the support number listed and changed the addresses.

He called back the next day, just to double check. And indeed, they had made one teensy, weensy, mistake: instead of actually changing the address, they’d merely changed the city name. So instead of sending the computer to 3 Infinite Loop, Cupertino, CA, they were sending it to 3 Infinite Loop, Small Town Silicon Valley, CA.

Sigh.

The computer ships from China. They try to deliver it to an address that doesn’t exist. They ship to a gigantic Apple warehouse in Elk Grove, where it sits and sits and sits until they can figure out what the frack is going on.

Meanwhile, each and every day I asked, “Didja hear anything? Is it on its way?” Darin patiently explained the situation to me a few more times, and every time when he finished I asked, “Is there anyone we can call? Seriously, they’ve got to have packing numbers!”

Who cares. The Sturm und Drang is over. The doorbell rang this morning and I glanced out the window. “FED EX!” I yelled. Darin beat me to the door and he took in the smallest, thinnest box I’d ever seen. I felt a wave of disappointment. “That can’t be it.”

“Oh yes it is,” he told me, and he opened the outer box to reveal the Apple packing box, which is a marvel of modern industrial packaging. Seriously, if you want to see excellent design in box-making, hie thee to an Apple store and ask to see the box the MacBook comes in. It’s fabulous: thin, compact, yet complete.

And now, after double-checking that all the files have been ported over and all my major apps are working, I have a brand new machine. As I lay here on the couch, my MacBook rests on my abdomen, kind of scarily warm (gotta look into lapdesks). I am happy. All is right with the world, and not just because I made a killer lemon Bundt cake this evening.

For a while I couldn’t decide what to name my new toy. I thought about “Wicked Fast” (given that it’s at least five times faster than my iBook and has four times the RAM) — remember when the Macintosh IIfx was wicked fast? Hahahaha. And then I thought, No! I should name it after a current interest of mine.

Hence the title of this entry, which is also the name of my computer.