Saddam Hussein is going to die. I don’t think I’m going to feel safer. America should not feel safer. The planet should recognize this as yet again another act of irrelevant barbarism by a species that seems addicted to such acts.

It’s not that he doesn’t deserve to die. It’s that his execution is like swatting a fly in the midst of a plague of locusts. In the long and troubled, occasionally graceful, history of humanity, no good has ever come from executing anyone.

No, I'm not referring to Condoleza Rice. My family and I got home tonight to find our coastline in the clutches of one mighty kinghell windstorm. My Mom called to say that electricity is out at their house, a few miles away. I still have power – need it for the net, you know – but I won't be surprised if I lose it before I can finish writing this post. The weather channel says we're getting 40mph gusts, but it feels worse than that to me. The building is shaking. Lights are dipping. So we'll see. God is with us.

Christmas was really nice. It was at my brother's house in the foothills of the Sierras, between Sacramento and Reno. It was cold and quiet, except when it was warm and cozy and full of the sound of family having fun, enjoying the holiday. We had a wonderful time together, especially with my little nephew. He's 5, and such an incredible kid.

I hope your Christmas was good too.

Time for holiday with the family. I might not be blogging much the next several days. Maybe a little. You won’t miss me; I am not the droid you’re looking for.

Be nice and remember, he sees you when you’re sleeping.

Hunting is not a sport. In a sport, both sides should know they're in the game.
-Paul Rodriguez

A mass of Latin words falls upon the facts like soft snow, blurring the outline and covering up all the details. The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one's real and one's declared aims, one turns as it were instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish spurting out ink. In our age there is no such thing as "keeping out of politics". All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred, and schizophrenia. When the general atmosphere is bad, language must suffer.
-George Orwell

No, really. It’s at dailyclaus.com, right here on the internets.

I found it at dooce.com.

Metaphor’s hooking you up again.

WASHINGTON — The 109th session of Congress, frustrated by partisanship and criticized for its meager record of accomplishment, ended with flurry of bill-passing and promises of change when Democrats take over the House and Senate in January. [Link]

I am reminded that when the last spike of the transcontinental railroad was driven at Promontory Summit in northern Utah, the striking of it was broadcast by telegraph. I wish they had done something like that today, as Dennis Hastert gaveled the 109th Congress to its ignoble end. We have CNN, C-Span and the Net now. I would’ve liked to see it – that inauspicious moment – sigh into history.

Simply a moral vacuum.

The ol’ blog has a new look today. Gone are the mat – textured header and the grid background in the right column. And a few other things went with it, most of which made the site look clunky. I like the new colors, and there are lots of new toys and easier formatting behind the scenes, for the geeksome blogger.

This is all due to an upgrade by Blogger, and consolidation with their megalocorporate parent, Google. Unnerving in an Orwellian sense? Sure, but it’s still free so it’s all good. I’ve been tempted several times, some recently, to switch to WordPress. These changes forestall that irksome possibility.

Are you watching me write? Good. Discreet applause please, for using geeksome and irksome in the same post.

… that’s better. I turned off the TV. It’ll turn itself back on at 10:00, so I can watch Numbers. I think it’s a rerun tonight though.

Looks like the neighbors across the alley are stringing lights tonight. Which is nice. I’ve had mine up for several days now, just a simple string around the balcony and down the stairs. Maybe the neighbor has aspirations of winning the association’s decoration contest next week. He doesn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell, and neither do I. Some of the condos have really dressed it up this year. There’s a unit a couple of streets over with bushes that look like a magical train. The wheels turn and stuff. The kind of thing that can make a six year old go completely fruitcake with Christmas glee.

If it seems like I’m kind of vamping here, faking it because I wanted to blog about something and had no ideas at all, that’s about accurate. Last night, as I was kicking back in the tub reading the New Yorker, I was struck stupid with a brilliant idea for a story. But it washed away, as ideas tend to do. So it goes. And tonight I’m mostly looking forward to bedtime. I usually like to stay up, but I’ve got the old Sealy all decked out in wintry flannel sheets, and that’s really going to feel good. I love these little transitions in life, the kind that don’t require medical or funereal ministrations. Just the flannel sheets in winter, the fan blowing on the bed in summer. I am a man easily satisfied by change.

Change is like cologne, a little drop will do it.

and probably don’t even realize it.

Yahoo TV listings have recently been updated to the latest fancy level of complete uselessness. No fault of mine. So for TV listings, I’m going over to zap2it.com. Don’t say I didn’t hook you up.

click toon for better view