Uproar....

Amy brought my attention to this article about Carroll College, which we both attended. It does not bode well. While I don't think Carroll is in any trouble of suddenly going away, it certainly faces some hard financial times. This latest debacle, a potential attempt to turn it into Carroll Technical College, coupled with the on-going fracas over fraternities on campus, will certainly cause alumni to think twice about making donations to the school. Just as I am reaching the point in my life where I can begin to consider such a thing, actions like this from the administration are causing me to consider otherwise.

Furniture....

Our new furniture was delivered yesterday. I had the day off because of my 5/4 schedule at work, and Maryanne got her AWP day switched. The delivery men arrived around 12:10, just as Maryanne was leaving to go to a meeting. The kitchen and living room both look so much better with new furniture in them.

The old dinette set went to Goodwill, along with some other items we no longer needed or wanted. The rest of the quite pleasant afternoon was spent running some other errands, though we forgot to get coasters to help protect our new end tables.

Furnishings....

A number of furniture stores in Madison had sales over the weekend. They did what they intended: packed the customers into the stores. Parking at the west-side American was horrendous. We didn't find anything we were looking for there, so we moved on to Steinhafel's. Parking was better, but we found the same situation. On our way back home we stopped at Oak Express, on the east side, and found what we were looking for, and much better parking. We ended up with a dining room table with four side chairs and a pair of end tables. We probably could have stood to buy two more chairs, but frankly, we don't have the room for them right now. It turned into a productive but tiring weekend.

Bad driver alert....

American Family Insurance employees drive like assholes. Not all of them, of course, but enough to want me want to leave nasty messages on their cars and bludgeon the drivers.

Today it was an asshole in a dark, smoky gray Pontiac Grand Prix. He was obviously in a hurry, not only to get to work, but apparently in a hurry to break four traffic laws to do so! He pulled into the wrong lane making a left turn, passed two cars at once (myself included), passed on the right, and, of course, was speeding. I hope he gets a blowout!

Moving forward....

Steve Jackson, gaming-industry guru, reflected upon the loss of the Columbia:

There's no such thing as "routine" in space. The Columbia was only a few minutes from landing when... what? Maybe we'll never be sure. Frontiers are dangerous.

The heroes on Columbia knew the dangers and were proud to accept them. The team that built and launched the shuttle, no less heroes, did their best -- more than their best. We could build a better shuttle if we started from scratch today, and perhaps we should. But what we must not do is get bogged down in hand-wringing, finger-pointing, and blame-shifting.

We must continue toward space. Not because heroes died. Merely in spite of it. No frontier was ever explored without risk, and to insist that all possible risk be avoided is the same as saying "Give up and stay home." And we absolutely must not give in to those who will seize upon this tragedy as an excuse to further gut our space program. The future is out there. Resources, knowledge, a home for humanity other than this one fragile planet... we must reach space, while we still can.

We lost seven heroes yesterday. Mourn them, but honor their dream. Close ranks and go on.