eric.openflows

It's been a long and lonely 4 months since Partners-the-cat died. In some ways it might still be too soon to get a new cat, in others it is the perfect time.

A friend took in a pregnant cat recently and we're in line to get one of the kittens. A cute grey tabby female kitten, as soon as it is old enough to leave its mother, will be joining our family.

The thought of getting the kitten left us really excited to have feline energy around the place again; we figured that the kitten should have a friend.

This past Thursday, Rep John Conyers introduced HR 5994, which is almost exactly the same as HR 5417, the Internet Freedom and Nondiscrimination Act of 2006.

The idea of the bill is to ensure a level playing field on the internet and to tie that to existing anti-trust laws, providing a way to enforce net neutrality.

A brief rundown of my recent trip to Barcelona. I've also uploaded a set of photos taken during the trip by Rick Jungers.

day one:
after 8 hours on a plane we land in Barcelona; I run in and get a transit map while Rick smokes a post-flight cigarette; we're talking about which bus to take and trying to figure out where at the airport the bus stops and the bus pulls up and stops right next to where we are standing. We rush, putting out half smoked cigarettes, and run to the bus which takes 15 min to depart.

Customer service that's so bad it really is comical. Here's the most recent insanity from the "customer care" staff at hotels.com in regards to censorship of negative reviews:

I apologize for your continued frustration in regards to this issue.

Unfortunately, we do not have any control over which reviews get posted on the website. I can advise that since the process was redesigned there are several kinks still being worked out. I thank you for your patience during this process.

I have not posted in a while, but a lot has happened that I should have mentioned here if I had the time.

Here's a quick rundown:
most important is the news that all charges against Steve Kurtz have been dropped. If you don't know about his case, check out the the Critical Art Ensemble Defense Fund site.

I saw this today and it made me so happy. Even though I'm not all that into the roasted pig, I'm so glad that John is still up to his old crazy stunts...

from http://www.nypost.com/seven/04092008/gossip/pagesix/pork_protest_105711....

Bruce Willis is not being warmly welcomed by the anarchists, Marxists and counter-culture riffraff of the Lower East Side now that he's opened the Bowery Wine Company on East First Street. "We want to show our opposition to right-wing Republicans opening yuppie wine bars in our neighborhood," activist John Penley told Page Six. Penley, who is organizing the August celebration of the 20th anniversary of the riots in Tompkins Square Park, said, "We're getting a pig and we're naming it Bruce." The whole, roasted pig from Chinatown will be served while folk singer David Peel serenades with his anthem, "Die Yuppie Scum!"

I read about this in my spouse, Jenna's blog and it is so offensive I have to rant here... Abortion is now a stopword in the POPLINE database...

There is a federally funded database, POPLINE, that is run by the folks at Johns Hopkins. POPLINE bills itself as "the world's largest bibliographic database on population, family planning, and related health issues."

However, you'll have a hard time finding abortion information there anymore.

Jenna suggests the following:

Location(s)

City Mine(d) is organizing the KRAX Conference, a meeting between creative ideas in Barcelona and other cities, from April 23 to 26, 2008, focusing on urban autonomous cultural spaces - public spaces that support the creativity of a city’s residents, and generate debates about the way the city is managed. These are autonomous cultural production initiatives based on new models of (self)management and a coherent discourse in response to urban changes. There’s a need for political institutions to get to know and recognize these spaces and the value and richness they add to the city.

A few years back, I wrote the following april fools joke and sent it to various ABC No Rio mailing lists. Some of the reactions were really great.

Being that it is april 1, I thought I'd use this as an excuse to remind all of you that ABC No Rio really needs your money.

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April 1 2003:
ABC No Rio Announces New And Important Policy Changes

Due to the rapidly changing neighborhood and new political climate the following changes will be instituted immediately:

Location(s)

It's time for NYC Drupal Camp again!

This time, I'm involved in organizing the event and also doing a workshop on how to evaluate contributed modules. The workshop is geared towards a broad range of folks, anyone from novice to experienced users of Drupal (drupal is a free/open source Content Management System)

workshop outline: