I put up a quick summary of our cruise yesterday. I dated the entry for March 20, which is when we officially returned home. I can't add any pictures yet due to our still-broken internet connection. When that gets resolved, I will stick some photos into the post.

I started looking for a new ISP today. It's a painful process. Our old one used to be pretty good, but I just called there and had a fairly painful conversation with a no-nothing dweeb who had to put me on hold for every question and ask someone else for the answer. Why do places do this? I understand having front line people to allow the technical staff some time to actually do technical stuff, but when Front Line Guy is clearly in over his head, take the phone and talk directly to the customer. Hearing every question you ask repeated by Front Line Guy to someone else, then hearing a muffled response, then hearing that response repeated by Front Line Guy back to you, is just plain annoying. Besides, I already knew the answer to my question as I had previously talked to the owner. The answer I got this time was different. This is called a test. You failed.

I tried a couple other places: one has a disconnected phone line (never a good sign), and the other is closed for Good Friday. I guess I will start over on Monday.

Other than being pissed that my $65/month internet connection has been down for a week, there really hasn't been much happening. We are just marking time until the snow melts. We did have a friendly letter from the code office that all the permits on our house have been canceled and all work must cease on the house. To which I respond: screw you, asshat. You want to stop me from working on my house, Bob, you come and try. I have a .44 Magnum and a swamp. And no one I've met that lives or works construction in Antrim County would bother to look for you.

Speaking of killing people, the Terri Schaivo case has become positively surreal. Here are my thoughts on the case in no particular order.

1. Terri is not in a persistent vegetative state. She responds. Regardless of how you view her "quality of life," at least get the basic facts of the case right.

2. No one is really sure what her long-term prospects are (although they certainly don't look all that great) largely because anyone who could evaluate her condition has been prevented from doing so by a judge. I know judges like to think of themselves as God's Anointed, but this is completely ridiculous.

3. The Florida judge has ruled that the legislature is not allowed to pass any laws that he personally doesn't approve of. Not that the law is unconstitutional, just that he personally doesn't like it, so therefore, he is ordering hospice personnel to starve Terri to death in direct defiance of the Florida legislature.

4. If Jeb Bush had any balls (and it doesn't appear he does), he would send in National Guard medical personnel to reinsert Terri's feeding tube under the guard of armed, National Guard soldiers.

5. If George Bush had any balls (and it doesn't appear he does), he would send in Army medical personnel to reinsert Terri's feeding tube under the guard of armed, Army soldiers.

6. Neither Bush has balls. There is a joke in there somewhere, but I'm too tired to find it. I leave it as an exercise for the reader.

7. It is unlawful in every place I know of to kill or even, through neglect or ignorance, allow harm to come to any animal by starvation and dehydration. Yet this is what we do to a human being that has become inconvenient.

8. Expect more of this as Medicare/caid comes to eat an ever-increasing share of the economy. We kill the unborn in the name of economic efficiency and convenience. We are now killing Terri in the name of economic efficiency and convenience. If you are over 70, be afraid: you are next. Don't think so? Do some research on medical rationing practices in Holland.

9. If the husband had any balls or sense of decency, he would walk into Terri's hospital room and shoot her in the head. It can't possibly be considered murder as she is already being executed by thirst, one of the most painful ways to die. Shooting her would be the equivalent of hanging a charge of black powder around the neck of someone being burned at the stake.

I could go on, but why bother? No one cares and we all get to watch Terri slowly die on cable TV. The ultimate reality show. What this case has shown is just how far from a republic we have drifted. We are now ruled by an aristocracy of judges who only permit the state and federal legislatures to rule inside carefully proscribed boundaries that the judiciary can change on a whim. The last time this happened, a little dust-up typically referred to in history books as the Revolutionary War took place. I doubt that would happen today. I mean, what would happen to my 401k?

Enough. It's time to head for home.