The whole thing about going into Iraq was first to get rid of the WMDs… and of course none were found. Then it’s because Iraq harboured terrorists, which also turned out to be a farce.

So then it’s to go in and liberate Iraq from a repressive regime and help make the country a self-sustaining entity.

Of course, what a better way to do that than mandate that the country be dependent on foreign seed.

Order 81 is a new patent law that includes a chapter on plant variety protection. The gist of this chapter is that Iraqi farmers are now only allowed to plant “protected” crop varieties defined as new, distinct, uniform and stable. The heritage seeds Iraqi farmers have been saving since the time of Babylon do not meet these criteria; those that do are products of multi-national seed companies and include transgenic seeds. In addition, this order gives plant breeders that claim to have discovered the new varieties the exclusive rights to all production and sales of the “protected” varieties in seed and harvested plant form.

Cute. Especially when one considers Monsanto’s past legal actions…

I now come to this building several times a week. Everytime, as I am about to enter the door, I reflexively grab for my old badge.

Downloading AIM. Hard to believe that the Install_AIM.exe archive is 4.4 megs, while the archive for the Win32 Firefox 1.0 installer is 4.7m.

Tired of hearing from staffing companies. Contracting would theoretically pay the bills, but it wouldn’t pay the benefits. Also tired of sending resumes to job listings that turn out to be staffing companies. They’re getting better at masking such things these days.

…26 October 1998 – 07 December 2004…
Good luck straightening out that big ship, surviviors.

CNN: High court to review interstate wine shipping laws

Well, good on the SCOTUS. It’s about time that these stupid wine laws are scrutinised. For one, they’re just ridiculous in the first place — booze laws with regards to interstate commerce are antiquated and useless — and more specifically, they make getting my wine dividend nearly close to an exercise in futility — although I have done it.

But anyway — the old woman CNN shows in that article… Swedenburg Vineyards is not far from my house, probably a good half hour drive… we tried to stop there one time when we had a hard time finding Chrysalis.

There were the two of us, but there were also about two other cars of people, not with us, who had a winery guide, and wanted to go tour some facilities. Swedenburg was listed in this guide as a place that could be visited — and according to the Virginia Wines site, they should’ve been open. However on this particular day, a Saturday, the place looked pretty quiet, we were all looking around…. a few of us finally went and knocked on the door of the place.

Knock knock
Nothing…
knock knock
We see this shadowy figure shuffling across the floor in the house.
(door opens)
Old Woman: “Hello…? Did you want to buy some wine?”
Us: (in various states of confusion) Uh, no, we just wanted to see–
Old Woman: Well, okay then… goodbye….
(door closes)

It was a bit strange, to say the least. But for sure, it’s the same woman.

I think there is more funkiness afoot than meets the eye, however — looks like their domain has expired, as well.

I had a dream last night, the main topic about which isn’t currently appropriate discussion, albeit due to current circumstances, it’s come along several times now.

Regardless, in the dream, I was playing poker with JAS and a few other people whose names/faces escape me. We weren’t playing for cash, however. There was a random stash of good, quality CDs and CD singles over on a shelf, and everyone was allowed to grab a handful or two… and instead of betting bucks, you bet your album tracks, which each had an appropriate intrinsic, and often equivalent value.

Now, of course such a system would only work if people shared the same intrinsic value of these songs, and there was indeed a bit of differing of opinions. Dialogue went something like this.

Well, I’ll see your “Uncle John’s Band”, matching it with my “Corrina, Corrina”, and I’ll raise you “A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall”.

“Corrina, Corrina”? What kind of match is that?

Well, I mean, I know it’s no “Like a Rolling Stone”, but it’s still good…

This of course was probably brought on by seeing the 60 Minutes interview with Dylan last night, and reading RS‘s Top 500 Songs article last night. Regardless, it was a pretty interesting concept. There were other bits to the dream in the game which escape me now.