Danger!

You’re probably thinking that it’s faceless hackers, Muslim extremists, Karl Rove, or James Carville. Nope — statistically those people are very unlikely to be the source of anything that hurts your computers. Well, then who is the most likely?

Your friends.

That’s right, your friends — the ones who email you those funny video clips, or the tear-jerker animal presentations. They are helping the real bad guys (who need red-hot pokers in their rectums) spread their evil. Of course your friends don’t know they’re helping the bad guys, but they are.

And so, most likely, are you. Because, like the vast majority of innocent email users, you (like me) forward those cute movies, those funny foreign advertisements, etc. to your friends.

And some of those attachments are bad.

How can you tell? Don’t anti-virus programs catch all those things?

No, they don’t. They catch some, to be sure. I use anti-virus software on my system, because I know it will catch a lot of the bad stuff. But I also know that it misses things — it misses the newest variations of viri, worms, and spyware. It will also miss the more sophisicated variations, especially the “polymorphic” ones that change constantly, specifically to evade anti-virus software.

But, you say “I would never forward an attachment to someone after it infected my system!” Well, I would hope not. But here’s the rub: you won’t know your system is infected! You see, the evil hackers (may they be plagued by incurable whole-body acne) who write these things understand quite a bit about human behavior.

There are many ways for them to fool you. One of the most common is the “time bomb": they tell their evil software not to do anything bad until some specific date, or until after it’s been installed on your system for some time — plenty of time for you to have forwarded it to all your friends. Another category of evil software simply hides itself, trying hard to never do anything that would bring itself to your attention. That’s because it’s quietly watching all your keystrokes — including when you enter your credit card number for online shopping, or your username and password to your bank account. Then it sends the interesting stuff back home to the scum who wrote the software.

How can you protect yourself against this? Especially if you’re not technically saavy?

The truth is there’s not much you can do. Even being technically saavy isn’t enough — to detect the best of the evil software (fortunately this is the small minority of it), you need to be a specialist with the right knowledge and tools. And you’d have to spend a lot of time, constantly, checking and rechecking your system. It’s a little bit like taking a walk. Someone evil could be lurking behind almost anything. You can improve your chances by being careful where you walk (a walk in San Diego’s Balboa Park is very safe when compared with a walk in San Francisco’s notorious “Tenderloin” district). Likewise, you can try to be careful with the attachments you open. Some of them (for instance, any that end with .EXE, .COM, or any of a few dozen other “extensions") are inherently dangerous, and should be avoided unless you know absolutely for sure that they are safe.

But with such advice, we’re already assuming some degree of tech saavy. Most non-technical people I know have already just given up on this — they either never open email attachments, or they always open them. In the latter case, they’re just hoping that nothing evil comes their way. And aside from running anti-virus software, and keeping it up to date, there’s little I can do to help them out. Chances are that one of these days they’re going to discover that some pimply ex-Soviet bloc teenager has their credit card number, or a Mulim fanatic in Iran has their street address and phone number, or … substitute your own nightmare.

The reality is this: if we want to enjoy the use of this modern technical marvel (the personal computer), we have to accept some level of risk — much as we accept the risk of an accident as the price we pay for enjoying the use of our car. There are things we can do to help mitigate the risk — we can spend money on anti-virus software, firewalls, etc., and we can educate ourselves. This is much like having seat belts and airbags in our cars, and learning defensive driving skills. And we can even try to “drive” our personal computers in better neighborhoods (e.g., be a little selective about exactly what email attachments you open). But we can’t make it completely safe to use a PC…

Puppy Journal

This is the latest installment of Sheila Miller’s “Puppy Journal", covering the progress of a new litter of field spaniels — one of which will be ours, and the next agility champion! You can read the previous installments here and here. We’ve named our new puppy: Miki (pronounced MEE-kee) — Hawai’ian for fast, agile, and alert. Pretty good for an agility champion, eh?

And now without further delay — the puppy journal:

My how time flies. Has it been 10 days now? Everyone is doing well. The puppies have more than doubled their weight. They weigh between 1 pound, 10 ounces (the two black males) and 2 pounds (the two girls). The other two boys fall in between but are closer to the girls' weight. Picabo is also doing well and is keeping her weight and attitude up.

10 years ago when I first started breeding dogs, a CBR friend of mine told me, “The first three weeks are easy. The dam does all of the work. Just keep her clean and fed.” True, the work right now isn’t physical but it is stressful. There is that little worry always in the back of your head about puppies not gaining weight, getting cold or squished and not getting handled enough. They receive mild stress every day in the form of a series of 5, 5-second exercises. The pads of each foot are tickled with a cosmetic brush. They are held vertically (and I look at their sealed eyes), on their back in my hands (and I look at their umbilicus and the pads of their feet), held head down and finally placed on a cool surface. The mild stress boosts their developing immune system, oxygenates their tissues, and helps their neurons make connections as they attempt to right themselves. The things I look for are the first signs of an eye infection, umbilical hernia, and pigment to cover those white toes! The pigment is there!! :-) I am also looking for Cosmo’s perfect feet. His first puppies with Picabo have nice feet but they aren’t his (and he got his from his daddy Spicer and I think he got his from his daddy Roger). Right now it looks like one of the black boys might have the “squishy” pads I’m looking for. On my “to do” list with the puppies is to put them in rick rack. Because of the gender and color split I have, it is very easy to tell the puppies apart. Well, if you pick them up. I need to color code them so I can ID them from a distance. That comes in handy when they become more interactive and I keep track of what they do. They can do a lot right now. They can root, they can crawl, they can snuffle your ears and sleep their twitchy sleep in the crook of your arm. They have a wide range of vocalizations. They “purr", cry on occasion and even bark (though they don’t open their mouths so it is muffled and very endearing). I love these puppies. :-)

As for Picabo, she is much like a puppy herself. I take her outside, not just put outside, to relieve herself. I swear I have a permanent poop bag on my right hand. As long as I am outside (in my pj’s, parka, and flashlight) walking her up and down the yard, I might as well pick up whatever poop is out there. The longer I am outside, the longer she is out getting some exercise and fresh air. I pick up her poop for two reasons: two of my dogs have developed a “taste” for hers and for quality control. I have become quite an expert on her poop as each bowel movement determines her next meal. Her base food is Iams Puppy with either meat, eggs, cheese, yogurt, bran, or whole wheat bread added to it. Two of her meals are soaked in one half cup of Goat’s Milk Esbilac. The result so far is a bitch who is keeping up her weight and pooping well (I can pick it up). After every trip outside, she gets (in this order) her face washed, boobs washed, discharges wiped away and butt wiped. Once a day I comb her out. She is getting kind of itchy (she is starting to shed) so tomorrow night I am going to give her a bath with oatmeal shampoo.

I have to tell you about Monday (President’s Day) and the ongoing saga of my Dura-Whelp. I went to Winnemucca for my weekly shopping. I couldn’t get my film developed because one place had their machine torn down for maintenance and the other place was closed because of the holiday (but I was able to get the van’s tires rotated!). I went to Wal-Mart and was irritated that part of the parking was fenced off and torn out (Super Wal-Mart is coming). I pulled my van up to the newly set up outside garden area and there they were with a little new snow drifted around them - plastic wading pools! My puppies were born one week too late. Oh well, I went inside for paper and plastic products, dog food, and Velcro. They had 3” wide industrial strength Velcro in your choice of adhesive or nonadhesive. I grabbed the adhesive because I needed the one side to stick to the Dura-Whelp. I also bought 2 1/2 yards of fleece so I could make two extra beds for the Dura-Whelp. I thought I was so smart. I would cut the Velcro in squares, stick the loop end to the Dura-Whelp and sew the fuzzy end to the fleece. Oh, the adhesive! The adhesive! It gummed up my sewing machine needle. I had to keep wiping the goo off the needle with rubbing alcohol. My poor Pfaff. It was never meant for crafts. :-( I finished the job and put a note inside my machine that said, “Gummed up”. I will deal with it the next time I use the machine. The sad part is that I already resolved the shifting bedding problem I had with the command, “Don’t dig”. When Picabo has the urge to dig, she leaves the box and scratches up a blanket I left on the floor. Oh that hindsight! I should have bought one package of adhesive Velcro for the box and one package of nonadhesive Velcro for the fleece. And forget “industrial strength”. It is so hard to peel off that the fleece will tear long before these puppies are weaned. LOL

I promise I am trying to get pictures! :-)

Sheila Miller

Wolftree Acres

Nevada, USA

Security Hole

Update: Welcome, visitors from Pajamas Media! The number of people visiting my corner of cyberspace jumped this afternoon because of a link those nice folks posted this afternoon. I hope that while you’re here, you’ll look around a little. There are lots of things to explore here, from political scribblings, science and technology thoughts, to photos of our travels and our collection of animals. And much more!

Update II: Will wonders never cease? Now there’s a link (broken at the moment <sob>) to this post from Instapundit! Assuming Glenn fixes that link, I suspect I’ll have even more visitors. Welcome, one and all — please take a look around while you’re here!

Bruce Schneier has a wonderful little story on his blog (original article here) about a test of an attack method that combines technical means and a little social engineering. It’s a clever exploit that (unfortunately) is just one example of bazillions of possible clever exploits. In this one, the testers went onto the streets of London and handed out CDs that supposedly contained a Valentine’s Day promotional. Many of the people who were given the CDs carried them straight into their (allegedly “secure") offices and ran the programs right of the CD. Any IT guy could tell you that by doing so, they bypassed nearly all of the security measures the companies had in place; had the software been hostile, it could have done a lot of damage — either by stealing confidential information, modifying critical information, or even by taking down internal systems.

Not good. And oops.

The original article basically blames the employees' bad security attitude, or lack of security education. Bruce draws a better lesson: that the real problem is insecure infrastructure. While I agree with every one of Bruce’s points, in a practical sense it doesn’t seem likely that they’re going to be addressed anytime soon. To use Bruce’s example, this particular attack could have been prevented by not giving every employee a worksation or laptop that could just run any old software from a CD. True enough. But … I don’t know any company that is actually going to run out and put that restriction in place…

I’ll draw another (fairly obvious) lesson from this story: that many IT organizations are throwing their security money at the wrong problems. In particular, except in the most sophisticated IT security environments, the emphasis is almost 100% on “border security": firewalls, multi-element identification, etc. And almost nothing is done about security inside the firewall — even though it’s demonstrable that the biggest threats for most companies are of internal origin. The CD attack is a great example, though theoretical. Already happening are worm and virus attacks — and many (I suspect most) companies are woefully unprepared for these. I’ve worked at two companies — and I know of many more — where all the company’s servers are fully exposed to the LANs that host the company’s workstations. That means that any worm or virus that infected a workstation has free access to those servers — and in these days of laptops and employees VPNing in from home, if you’ve got more than about three employees, the chances are pretty good that some of them are infected. The fact that more damage isn’t done this way is testament to the bad design of worms and viri, not that the risk doesn’t exist.

Yet changing the way company’s secure their IT infrastructure isn’t easy, as my personal experience attests. I’ve had one boss (the CEO) who, after my presentation of things we needed to do to secure ourselves internally, said “Let’s just get SecureID!”. When I told him that would be like putting a padlock on a wet paper bag, he countered with “I don’t care if it really does anything — what I care about is how secure we’ll appear to our customers.” Customers who are, more than likely, equally uninformed about security. This company ended up doing precisely nothing about internal security, despite my tiresome railing on the subject. And to this day they have not been hit with any big problems, which reinforces that illogical behavior. Sometimes I’ve thought that a small “demonstration” was in order, just for the educational value…

I don’t have any good answers for this challenge. My suspicion is that it’s similar to corporate behavior with respect to backups: the issue will be ignored until the company gets burned, then it will be addressed. Companies sometimes seem to be incapable of learning from the pain of others…

Iraqi in the Raw

Ordinarily I would excerpt a “teaser” from an article like this (titled “Iraq and a Hard Place"), but it would be unfair in the case of this one. It is just too complex and varied to be encapsulated; you really just need to read the whole thing. The Iraqi blogs under the name “Truth Teller", and is generally more sympathetic to the insurgents than most Iraqi bloggers that I read. But his perspective is very interesting, and eye-opening in its own way…

Blondes with Hammers

Becky and Sally Ann, were doing some carpentry work on a Habitat for Humanity house.

Becky, who was nailing down house siding, would reach into her nail pouch, pull out a nail and either toss it over her shoulder or nail it in.

Sally Ann, figuring this was worth looking into, asked, “Why are you throwing those nails away?"

Becky explained, “When I pull a nail out of my pouch, about half of them have the head on the wrong end and I throw them away."

Sally Ann got completely upset and yelled, “You moron! Those nails aren’t defective! They’re for the other side of the house!"

Frost!

Being southern California types, we generally experience the solid phase of water (i.e., ice) only in the form of ice cubes or that funny white stuff on the outside of our frozen pizza cartons. To see it outside, without any nearby man-made apparatus to create it, is a bit jarring for us. Some of the later-rising folks out here think that naturally-occuring ice is a kind of urban legend — you see, if you don’t get up until 9 or 10 in the morning, you’ll never see frost or ice around here!

Well, here’s the photographic proof that ice really does occur in this neck of the woods. You easterners and northerners can laugh at us all you want — for us, a “cold snap” is when the temperature dips below 60F. And that’s plus 60F, not those horrifying minus temperatures you’re dealing with. I like our version of a cold snap much better…

The three pictures above are plants covered with frost, of course. But the two at right probably aren’t so identifiable. It’s a sort of upside-down icicle (the closest we’ll ever get to a real icicle), formed on a rock just below our bird water’s dripper. One drop of water falls about every 5 seconds onto this rock. With the sub-freezing temperature, the ice seems to have slowly accumulated until it formed this marble-sized protuberance. I was mostly interested in the strange striations that appear in it — I’ve no idea what caused them to form…

Steyn-a-mite!

Put down your coffee for a moment (so you don’t end up blowing it out your nose) and read this new sure-to-be-a-classic Mark Steyn column. A sample:

Mark Steyn: Cheering tidbits lighten otherwise grim week

Fortunately, the Washington Post had that wise old bird David Ignatius to put it in the proper historical context: “This incident,” he mused, “reminds me a bit of Sen. Edward Kennedy’s delay in informing Massachusetts authorities about his role in the fatal automobile accident at Chappaquiddick in 1969."

Hmm. Let’s see. On the one hand, the guy leaves the gal at the bottom of the river struggling for breath pressed up against the window in some small air pocket while he pulls himself out of the briny, staggers home, sleeps it off and saunters in to inform the cops the following day that, oh yeah, there was some broad down there. And, on the other hand, the guy calls 911, has the other fellow taken to the hospital, lets the sheriff know promptly but neglects to fax David Gregory’s make-up girl!

One can only hope others agree with Ignatius' insightful analogy, and that the reprehensible Cheney will be hounded from public life the way Kennedy was all those years ago. One would hate to think folks would just let it slide and three decades from now this Cheney guy will be sitting on some committee picking Supreme Court justices and whatnot.

Come on, Mark…tell us how you really feel!

Ribbons!

Debbie was at a local NADAC agility meet yesterday, in Ramona, California. She ran both Mo’i and Lea, three trials each. And they placed in every single trial, plus Mo’i qualified ("Q’d") in two of them. So between the two dogs, they took home eight ribbons in a single day — the biggest “ribbon haul” they’ve ever made!

And they’re back at it today…

In the photo (click for a larger view), the ribbons from left-to-right are:

Fourth place: Lea

Third place: Lea

Second place: Lea

First place: Mo’i

First place: Mo’i

First place: Mo’i

Qualified: Mo’i

Qualified: Mo’i

Woohoo!

One Year!

One year ago today I made the first post to this blog. In that year, this little blog has had just over 10,000 unique visitors (the counter in the green area at far right was started a couple of months after the blog actually started, so it reads a bit low).

For me, the most enjoyable part of blogging is the interactions I’ve had with my readers, in comments and in private emails, and even in some phone calls. Of all the many things I’ve done with the web, this blog has been the most fun by far — largely because of that interactivity, which all of my previous web adventures lacked. Blogging is also an outlet for two of my favorite creative activities: writing and photography. I get to inflict both on the world, and the world can’t do anything about it (except ignore me, of course)! And there have been all sorts of other benefits, like bragging about Debbie and her dog agility adventures (with our two field spaniels, Mo’i and Lea), doing some actual reporting (such as the Jamul Casino groundbreaking ceremony), and getting my political voice heard. It’s been lots and lots of fun, and I have no plans to stop anytime soon…

Of course, that last statement will disappoint some <smile>.

The graph above right shows the number of page views ("hits") on JamulBlog, per month since its inception (February is linearly projected). The general trend is obvious enough, though I think this month will be anomalously high because Michelle Malkin (who has the most popular blog on the web) linked to my blog early in the month, causing a surge in visits. But no matter how I squint at the numbers, the trend is up. When I look more closely at the logs, I see that there are a steadily increasing number of people who visit my blog regularly (thank you!). That number is hard to measure with any precision, as some folks visit several times a day; others visit only once or twice a month.

No author likes anything more than to have his scribblings read. I cherish every one of those visitors, and I’m just tickled pink to see the numbers increasing. Can’t account for it by any rational means, but I sure do like it…

Thanks!

Rain

Just a half-inch or so of rain, but it sure is nice to see it. And the forecast says we might even get a little more!

At far right is the weather radar view from earlier this morning, and immediately at right is our rain gauge readings for the past few days.

As usual, click on the small pictures for a larger view.

Kitten and String

Peaches and cream, bread and butter, kittens and string — all things that just really need to be together.

Maka Lea, the latest feline to join us (we have eight others!), is still in that cute kitten stage. He’s got some problems with his locomotion (more about that here and here, along with more pictures!), but he doesn’t let that bother him in the slightest.

Way on the right, little Maka Lea spots me carrying the camera into the livingroom. He can be hard to find — he’s so small that he fits into the tiniest hidey-holes, and under just about anything. But his curiousity got the better of him this morning — he saw that strange thing in my hands and just had to come see what it was.

Then I took him into the bedroom for one of his favorite games: playing with a short piece of twine. You can see how much he’s enjoying himself; he completely forgot about the camera. Eventually he did the universal kitten-and-string thing, getting himself all wrapped up in it.

It’s interesting to watch Maka Lea deal with his disabilities. Basically his strategy is to ignore them, along with their consequences. He’s bouncy and energetic, even compared with other kittens, and this results in all sorts of incidents that just look awful to us. For example, he might run headlong, at full throttle, into a piece of hard wooden furniture — making a resounding “thunk!” that we can hear on the other side of the house. Maka Lea acts like this is just a normal part of life; shakes his head a couple times, and resumes his headlong, full-throttle galivanting. We’ve seen him up on high places, not knowing how to safely descend. You can see him reach a point where he figures he’s got nothing to lose — can’t stay stuck here all day! — and he just launches himself into space. He might be over a hard rock or ceramic floor, or over a dog, or over some pointy object — it doesn’t matter, he just goes for it and ignores the consequences.

With this positive attitude, little Maka Lea does just about everything the “big kitties” do — even a little earlier, I think, than a normal kitten would do. His utter fearlessness lets him march right up to our dogs (who scatter whenever he comes too close, as they’re leery of getting nailed with Maka Lea’s awesomely sharp little claws). He just seems to have no idea that any action might have consequences; the very opposite of the stereotypical scaredy-cat. It’s good compensation for his disabilities, so long as we keep him strictly indoors (which we do)…

As usual, click on the small pictures for a larger view…

Troubling

Troubling. It seems I keep reading about politicians calling this or that “troubling”. I first wondered if I was imagining things, so I did a little research:

Google the web for “troubling” and you’ll get 27 million hits; google “trouble” and you get 340 million. So troubling isn’t exactly an unusual word, but it’s far from the most common.

Google News, on the other hand, has 8,820 hits for “troubling” at the moment I tried it. I perused the first 100 hits, and the majority of them are in stories related to politics. Not all of them, to be sure, but the clear majority. Ah, ha!

My final experiment was to do four searches on Google News: “troubling hillary-clinton", “troubling harry-reid", “troubling president-bush", and “troubling bill-frist”. The hits, respectively, were 38, 22, 976, and 16. But there’s another pattern, slightly subtler, that’s more interesting: the hits on the two Republicans were almost all about the Republicans, and the hits on the two Democrats were almost all said by the Democrats.

This is very one-sided. Apparently Republicans are very troubling to Democrats.

Then I wondered if I really understood what the word “troubling” meant, so I looked it up:

troubling

adj : causing distress or worry or anxiety

Well, that’s about what I thought it meant.

So why are the Democrats so one-sidedly “troubled” by the Republicans? Not that I’m really troubled by this, I’m just kind of curious about why that word seems to keep popping up.

I googled all sorts of things, trying to find someone who knew the reason; didn’t find a darned thing. So I took the more difficult approach: I sat down and pondered. And here’s what I came up with:

I think this is a conscious effort on the part of the Democrats — a word wouldn’t be so lop-sidedly used, otherwise. The Republicans are, I’m sure, just as troubled by the Democrats as vice versa. Yet they aren’t saying so. That difference can really only be accounted for by a deliberate effort.

If the Democrats are doing it on purpose, why are they? I’ll bet they got some advice from someone they trust, a political strategist most likely. I’ll further bet that they got advice that the word “troubling” is a splendid way to make your political enemy look bad — it’s completely non-specific and can’t really be countered. Think about it: Harry Reid calls the NSA wiretaps “troubling”. What’s President Bush going to say? “No, Harry, they’re not troubling"? Doesn’t work. But anybody listening to Harry Reid hears a respected [did I really say that?] Senator calling President Bush’s actions “troubling”. Sounds bad, doesn’t it?

I think that’s the explanation. When faced with a situation where they have no reasoned, defensible counter-position (something that seems to happen to them with great regularity), the Democrats have deliberately decided to invoke the generic, all-purpose adjective “troubling” to register their non-specific objection, and to convey their concern with the proper gravitas.

I’d like to see the Republicans counter this troubling trend. Everytime a Democrat uses “troubling” to characterize a Republican policy or action, I’d like to see the Republicans challenge the Democrats to articulate and defend their alternative. I don’t hear that enough; instead, the Democrat’s non-specific whining is usually allowed to stand unchallenged, like the mom who ignores her screaming child.

Sometimes the child really does need a good spanking.

Education Matters

My readers (all 11 of them) know how concerned I am by the anti-results, anti-science, touchy-feely culture that pervades our educational system. A report delivered to the National Academies on Thursday provides some concrete evidence that competition in the intellectual arena is heating up. Financed by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, which “…strive[s] to foster an environment nationwide in which entrepreneurs have the information and tools they need to succeed” (from their web site), it reports on a survey of over 200 multinational companies. The survey aimed at uncovering the factors that drove outsourcing. Key graf from the press reports:

The study contended that lower labor costs in emerging markets are not the major reason for hiring researchers overseas, though they are a consideration. Tax incentives do not matter much, either, it said.

Instead, the report found that multinational corporations were global shoppers for talent. The companies want to nurture close links with leading universities in emerging markets to work with professors and to hire promising graduates.

In other words, America is no longer the premier source of talent — many other countries now have talent pools that look very attractive to these companies, and the trend is for that to be even more true down the road. When our children get a shoddy, short-changing education, we are as a nation crippled in our ability to compete in this arena. This is the core of what worries me on this issue.

The report’s author also had this to say:

"The United States would seem to have a comparative advantage in maintaining its innovative leadership through the high caliber of its scientists and its strong protection of IP,” said Lesa Mitchell, vice president of Advancing Innovation at the Kauffman Foundation. “Industry and universities must be alert to removing obstacles to joint research, or emerging countries will overtake us in innovation breakthroughs, and the burst of discovery that has been driving our economy for the past half-century will be over."

Another public policy implication of the findings, say the researches, is that the United States must focus on highly skilled worker immigration.

"We are educating the best and the brightest, but make it impossible for them to stay in America and immigrate. We need major immigration reform that welcomes, instead of pushes out, highly skilled workers,” said Dr. Marie Thursby.

That first point, about the collaboration between universities and companies, is new to me … but it certainly makes sense, and it jibes with my own experiences in Estonia. The point about our immigration policies stupidly preventing us from importing talent is one I whole-heartedly agree with. If we can’t educate our own children (through our own mismanagement of the education process), well, the next best thing would be to allow (and encourage!) the world’s best and brightest to become American citizens. Why any current American citizen would object to that is beyond me…

A presentation about this report is available here. The report itself is currently undergoing peer review; when it is actually published I’ll let you know.

Puppy Journal

From Sheila Miller:

So the puppies were born late afternoon/early evening on Sunday. A very civilized time to be born. Let me go on record right now by saying that Picabo is one hell of a brood bitch. I can’t believe how much she has emotionally matured since her first litter almost two years ago. She was a great mom then but so serious. Age and experience have left her very skilled but easy going with the newborns.

It was an easy delivery and easy clean-up. We settled into bed by 11:00 p.m. If you haven’t been around neonate puppies, they mew like kittens. I laid in bed and listened to the sounds they made. They have sounds for “too cold", “too hungry", and “too squished” and one for “just practicing my mew”. They weren’t cold, they weren’t hungry, and they weren’t being squished. They nursed and slept. So then I laid in bed and listened to all the sounds this end of the house makes. There was the ticking of the clock, the rumble of the space heater and further from the bedroom I could hear the whole house ventilation fan and every once in awhile, the fridge. IOW, I didn’t sleep much. One of the things that kept me awake is my new Dura-Whelp whelping box. Since it is winter, I couldn’t buy my reliable $6.00 wading pool and had to buy the $280.00 plastic box. I’m happy enough with the Dura-Whelp though I’m still a bit in shock over the price. The box is held together by Velcro. Every time Picabo would stretch out, I would hear that distinctive tearing sound of Velcro separating. I was positive the whole thing would collapse in the night. It didn’t but the bedding kept shifting.

I am always “sick” for a day or two after a litter is born. This time I really was (still am) sick. Some respiratory virus that has overtaken our school has traveled the whole of my body and settled in my chest (and has turned me into a mouth-breather). I was hoping Monday would be a day of checking on dogs, puppies and sleeping. Monday was spent ironing out the wrinkles of the Dura-Whelp. My main concern was the bedding. The bedding is just a square of synthetic fleece with Velcro sewn in the corners to match the Velcro in the corners of the box. Picabo doesn’t dig much in her box but she does shift her body position. Every shift from her, shifted the bedding. Every shift of the bedding put the puppies at risk of getting caught underneath the bedding or on the cold, slippery surface of the plastic box. I had some Velcro in my sewing box and tried adding more to the edges but its adhesive wouldn’t permanently stick to the plastic. I wasn’t about to use a stronger

adhesive and let those babies inhale the fumes. I had to fix this problem because in just another day, Picabo and her puppies would be on their own all day long. What I came up with was carpet tape. I clean and dry the Dura-Whelp and then place additional squares of carpet tape around the fleeces bedding. It sticks fairly well to the plastic an OK to the fleece. Enough to last the day. When I change the bedding, I just pull off the tape and repeat the process.

Monday night was another short night because Picabo had her post-whelping diarrhea. I would like to know how the other breeders on this list feed their bitches during the first 36 hours after whelping. Mine all get yucky diarrhea as they work out all those consumed placentas from their bodies.

We headed over to Elk Tuesday afternoon for tail docking and dew claw removal. I used to be so conservative about this. I always waited until they were 3 or 4 days old and had definitely put on weight. No more. Picabo’s first litter was docked at 48 hours old and they immediately bounced back. This litter was a few hours shy of 48 hours and each one’s whimpering stopped before the next puppy was docked. It is the most disgusting ordeal to witness but I like the look of a docked tail and they really do recover quickly.

Wednesday I was back in school and Picabo was on her own. I came home to a stinky house as she had a poopy accident (but hit the papers!) in the bedroom. Picabo’s GI tract consumed a lot of my time with her first litter. I am going to stay on top of her digestion this time. I’ve added bran cereal to her diet to help hold her together as she adjusts to the physical stress she is under. It seems to be working so far.

Now it is Friday and these puppies and their mom are just great. OK, I said 2 boys and 1 girl were liver and 2 boys and 1 girl were black. But you really didn’t think they were all black and all liver coming from Cosmo and Picabo did you? LOL

Little Black Boy: White muzzle, white toes on front feet, white chest, and a thin white line between the eyes.

Bigger Black Boy: Dusting of white on nose. White cross on chest.

Liver Boy (AKA the Border Collie): White muzzle, four white feet, white chest, and white spot on the BACK of his neck.

Other Liver Boy: Dusting of white on nose, white chest, white toes on two front feet. This boy is a darker shade of liver than the other two liver puppies. He is also the only puppy in the litter NOT to show bright tan under the tail. Most believe that is a sign the puppy is a carrier for tan markings.

Black Girl (AKA the springer): White muzzle, full white blaze between the eyes, white chest, and four white feet.

Liver Girl: White chin, white chest, and white toes on the two front feet.

The good news is that everyone now has “dirty feet” meaning they are ticking up. I am confident that all of the facial and toe white will fill in. I know that the chest white will decrease in size to just a flash of white. But they sure are cute now. :-)

Debbie is going to stop by my house on Saturday. We will take pictures and I hope to have some up for you to view by Monday.

Sheila Miller

Wolftree Acres

Nevada, USA

Puppy Journal

You’ve read my scribblings about our two field spaniels (Mo’i and Lea). In fact, you’re probably really tired of them <smile>! Well, I’ve got bad news for you: things about about to get worse.

We’re going to have a new field spaniel puppy in a few weeks! That means completely out-of-control field spaniel blogging (with photos!) is just around the corner…

Meanwhile, Sheila Miller will pick up the slack. Sheila is the field spaniel breeder whose inspired matchings produced Mo’i, Lea, and a whole bunch of other beautiful brown dogs. This time, though, they’re not all brown — you see, field spaniels come in variations and mixes of browns, plus black and white.

Picabo just gave birth a few days ago to the litter from which our puppy will come — and that litter, as you can see below, has a variety of colors. A little later Sheila will have the puppies “temperment tested", so we can choose one with a better likelihood of being a good agility dog. I’m hoping that the winner of that contest will be at least partially black — I really like the black, black-and-liver, and black-and-white field spaniels that I’ve seen at shows…

Sheila is writing a “Puppy Journal” on her experiences with this litter, and here’s the first installment:

Sheila Miller’s Puppy Journal:

First, let me thank all of you who have sent private and public congratulations. Its not like me to not reply to an e-mail but I’ve been busy. :-) I appreciate your warm thoughts.

I also want to thank Picabo’s co-owners Debbie Miller and Sandy Burt-Jones for allowing me to lease Picabo. Like Scarlett O’Hara’s line, “I depend on the kindness of others”. LOL

Let’s go back to May 23, 2004 when Picabo whelped her first litter. Her puppies were huge, the time between water breaking and first puppy being born was long, and every puppy was delivered with screams from her. I told myself that I would not lease Picabo again (I’m a wimp when it comes to the pain of others). After the dust settled with that whelping, I told myself that IF I lease her again, then 2006 would be a good year to have puppies.

Picabo’s first litter was sired by Cosmo, son of Spicer and Juno. They are turning out very nicely and I figured I would breed her to a relative of Cosmo’s (half-brother, nephew or cousin). Well, the best laid plans… After the fourth stud dog choice wasn’t going to work out, I found myself with an in-season bitch and nowhere for her to go. So I brought Picabo and Cosmo to the vet for blood tests (brucellosis and thyroid) and made the appointment in Reno for eye checks.

I’ve never repeated a breeding before. I don’t have anything against it. It is just that since I’ve never bred a bitch more than twice in her life, I’ve always chosen different studs just for the genetic variety. The breedings went very well. I would crate all of my dogs for dinner, put Picabo out in the front yard and Cosmo out in the backyard. I would close all the doors to rooms where I didn’t want a breeding to take place and then let the two of them in. They would run around the house while I flipped channels on the TV. When they stopped running, I would go look for them and wait out the tie. What could be easier than that? :-)

Flash forward to a couple of weeks ago. I’m getting ready for the whelping by making sure I not only have everything the dam and puppies will need but also everything I will need such as food, paper products, beer, wine, etc. Once the puppies come, I will be a weekend-only shopper.

Wednesday, February 8th. Picabo and I run to Elko after school for her x-ray. Since I live so far from my vet (75 miles) and there aren’t any emergency vet clinics closer than 250 miles, I x-ray my bitches to get an idea of how many and how big to expect. Picabo is water buffalo big but the x-ray only shows 4 puppies. One puppy shows a complete spine, full ribs and head. I ask Dr. Rob if that couldn’t be two puppies overlapped. He said, “Where’s the second head"? OK, good point. So four for sure, maybe, just maybe a fifth. Rob thinks they look good-sized (i.e. big like the first litter). He then tells me that he is leaving the next day (Picabo’s first due date) for a four-day rock climbing trip near Las Vegas. He asked me if I wanted some oxytocin to go. Of course I do. I always have a shot on hand in case I need it. If I don’t need it, then I give it an hour or so after what I think is the last puppy as a clean out shot. He gave me four shots. OH MY GOD. Does he think they will be so big that I will need one per puppy??? Oh, this will be a long weekend by myself.

Even though Thursday is her first due date, I absolutely don’t expect puppies until the weekend at the earliest. Picabo’s first litter taught me that she breeds well before she ovulates. Thursday and Friday go by as normal days for little black water buffaloes.

Saturday is pretty normal too. The only thing I noticed about Picabo is that she crated herself after dinner (not her crate, but Cosmo’s crate). No nesting, just sleeping. She didn’t show any other signs of labor. Her appetite and attitude were both good. She was crated in my bedroom that night and I awoke at 12:00 a.m. to sounds of her digging in her crate. I listened as she flipped her crate pad around and settled back down. I fell asleep. I awoke at 1:00 a.m. to the same sounds. She settled down and I fell asleep. I had a dream…

I dreamt that Picabo easily whelped her puppies. Puppy #1 was a bitch! Unfortunately she was a rather large Bernese Mountain Dog. :-( Puppy #2 was a dog. A big, fat, deadgrass MALE Chesapeake Bay Retriever. A handsome boy but I need another male CBR like I need… Puppy #3 was a bitch! A small bitch! A black bitch! A black bitch with two white stripes down her back??? Puppy #3 was a skunk! LOL Not a puppy marked like a skunk but an actual skunk. It doesn’t take a dream analysts to know that I was worried about the size, sex, and color of these puppies. I awoke again at 2:00 a.m. to sounds of Picabo digging in her crate. Enough was enough. I put all of my dogs outside for a potty break and went into the spare room/office/whelping room and made up the bed in there. By 2:30 a.m., Picabo and I were in bed. She scratched around the whelping box a couple of times then jumped in bed with me. We slept the rest of the night away…

Sunday morning dawned and Picabo’s appetite and attitude were good although once again she crated herself. She had to be in the early stages of labor. She asked to go out with the rest of the dogs around noon. I watched her dig a nest under a bush. By the time I walked to the back door, Picabo was at the front door asking to come in. She came in and went back to bed. Later that afternoon came out all peppy and joined us on a walk (well, more like a waddle). When we came back to the house, I told the dogs we would feed the birds and put out the trash. Picabo said, “groan”. I said, “Picabo was that you"? Again she said, “groan”. The two of went in the house. I admit all I could think about was that I was hungry and wasn’t going to get to eat for awhile. :-) Her water broke and she delivered the first puppy ten minutes later. This was an easy, stress free delivery. Boom, boom, boom. 3 puppies followed and Picabo took it all in stride. I on the other hand, became more depressed with each birth. We were expecting four puppies and the first four were all boys. I crossed my fingers that there would be a fifth but I had to wait about an hour to find out. Boom, boom, two more puppies this time girls!

Here they are in birth order:

black male - 9 ounces

liver male - 13 ounces

liver male - 12 ounces

black male - 10 ounces

black female - 15 ounces

liver female - 14 ounces

These sizes are all normal for FS and very good for little Picabo. They are now four days old and the only puppy who hasn’t yet crossed the one pound threshold is the first black male and he is only an ounce away.

To be continued…

Sheila Miller

Wolftree Acres

Nevada, USA

Promoting Ignorance

Sometimes I have to read something several times to be sure the author was serious. This was one of those, and sadly, the author was serious. From the Washington Post (why do I even go there?):

What Is the Value of Algebra?

I am haunted by Gabriela Ocampo.

Last year, she dropped out of the 12th grade at Birmingham High School in Los Angeles after failing algebra six times in six semesters, trying it a seventh time and finally just despairing over ever getting it. So, according to the Los Angeles Times, she “gathered her textbooks, dropped them at the campus book room and, without telling a soul, vanished from Birmingham High School."

Gabriela, this is Richard: There’s life after algebra.

In truth, I don’t know what to tell Gabriela. The L.A. school district now requires all students to pass a year of algebra and a year of geometry in order to graduate. This is something new for Los Angeles (although 17 states require it) and it is the sort of vaunted education reform that is supposed to close the science and math gap and make the U.S. more competitive. All it seems to do, though, is ruin the lives of countless kids. In L.A., more kids drop out of school on account of algebra than any other subject. I can hardly blame them.

This piece was written by Richard Cohen, a well-known liberal columnist.

It turns out, as you read further, that what’s got Mr. Cohen upset is the idea of required subjects (such as algebra) for high school graduation. He objects to the idea of having to pass a test to graduate, as well. The column is specific to Los Angeles, which has such requirements for the first time this year.

I can understand (though I don’t agree with) other arguments I’ve heard against stringent graduation requirements. But Mr. Cohen is definitely thinking out-of-the-box here — his argument is that things like algebra shouldn’t be requirements because they’re not needed!

Oh, my. I posit that Mr. Cohen just doesn’t grasp what his world would be like without algebra. Virtually all the things he takes for granted — technology, cars, medicine, as obvious examples — would all be back in the Stone Age without algebra (amongst other things). As I hope most people understand better than Mr. Cohen apparently does, mathematics underlie an awful lot of things that separate us from the gerbils.

Mr. Cohen goes on to relate how algebra has never once been a requirement for him, once he left school. Well, that may well be, Mr. Cohen — it’s certainly possible to choose a career where no mathematics is required, just as it’s possible to choose a career where no ability to write prose is required. But neither of those statements says a darned thing about the importance of either area of study.

But here’s Mr. Cohen at his most condescending:

Look, Gabriela, I am not anti-algebra. It has its uses, I suppose, and I think it should be available for people who want to take it. Maybe students should even be compelled to take it, but it should not be a requirement for graduation. There are those of you, and Gabriela you are one, who know what it is like to stare at an algebra problem until you have eyeballed a hole in the page and not understand a thing you’re seeing . There are those of us who know the sweat, the panic, the trembling, cold fear that comes from the teacher casting an eye in your direction and calling you to the blackboard. It is like being summoned to your own execution.

"I suppose…” How arrogantly certain he is! And so certain about such a really dumb piece of advice, all projected from his own inability or lack of initiative to learn mathematics. And how typically liberal the notion that the kid’s feelings matter more than actually learning something. I’ve been battling that meme for a long time, which makes it all the more disheartening to see something like this from a prominent columnist…

And if you extrapolate this mindset (which I will remind you is very much like the National Education Association’s mindset), you can confidently predict America as a second-tier country in science and technology, with our leadership lost to those with a more … serious … educational system.

Different Cartoons

For your viewing pleasure, and as a counter to all the negative press on political cartoons — here’s a collection nobody should object to. And if they do, well … I guess that’s just too flippin' bad!

As usual, click on the little pictures for a larger view…

Laws of the Universe

I can personally confirm most of these laws:

LAWS OF THE NATURAL UNIVERSE

Law of Mechanical Repair: After your hands become coated with grease, your nose will begin to itch or you’ll have to pee.

Law of the Workshop: Any tool, when dropped, will roll to the least accessible corner.

Law of Probability: The probability of being watched is directly proportional to the stupidity of your act.

Law of the Telephone: When you dial a wrong number, you never get a busy signal.

Law of the Alibi: If you tell the boss you were late for work because you had a flat tire, the very next morning you will have a flat tire.

Variation Law: If you change lines (or traffic lanes), the one you were in will start to move faster than the one you are in now (works every time!).

Bath Theorem: When the body is fully immersed in water, the telephone rings.

Law of Close Encounters: The probability of meeting someone you know increases when you are with someone you don’t want to be seen with.

Law of the Result: When you try to prove to someone that a machine won’t work, it will.

Law of Biomechanics: The severity of the itch is inversely proportional to the reach.

Theatre Rule: At any event, the people whose seats are furthest from the aisle arrive last.

Law of Coffee: As soon as you sit down to a cup of hot coffee, your boss will ask you to do something which will last until the coffee is cold.

Murphy’s Law of Lockers: If there are only two people in a locker room, they will have adjacent lockers.

Law of Dirty Rugs/Carpets: The chances of an open-faced jelly sandwich of landing face down on a floor covering are directly correlated to the newness and cost of the carpet/rug.

Law of Logical Argument: Anything is possible if you don’t know what you are talking about.

Brown’s Law: If the shoe fits, it’s really ugly.

Oliver’s Law: A closed mouth gathers no feet.

Wilson’s Law: As soon as you find a product that you really like, they will stop making it.

Terror Alerts Raised

Maybe our color-coded terror alert levels aren’t so bad after all…

The British are feeling the pinch in relation to recent bombings and have raised their security level from “Miffed” to “Peeved.” Soon, though, security levels may be raised yet again to “Irritated” or even “A Bit Cross.” Londoners have not been “A Bit Cross” since the blitz in 1940 when tea supplies all but ran out. Terrorists have been re-categorized from “Tiresome” to a “Bloody Nuisance.” The last time the British issued a “Bloody Nuisance” warning level was during the great fire of 1666.

Also, the French government announced yesterday that it has raised its terror alert level from “Run” to “Hide.” The only two higher levels in France are “Surrender” and “Collaborate.” The rise was precipitated by a recent fire that destroyed France’s white flag factory, effectively paralyzing the country’s military capability.

It’s not only the English and French that are on a heightened level of alert. Italy has increased the alert level from “Shout Loudly and Excitedly” to “Elaborate Military Posturing.” Two more levels remain: “Ineffective Combat Operations” and “Change Sides."

The Germans also increased their alert state from “Disdainful Arrogance” to “Dress in Uniform and Sing Marching Songs.” They also have two higher levels: “Invade a Neighbour” and “Lose."

Belgians, on the other hand, are all on holiday as usual, and the only threat they are worried about is NATO pulling out of Brussels.

Not to be left out of the fun, some of the newer European countries have also raised their alert levels. For example, little Estonia is currently at the “Pretend You Can’t See Them” level, increased from the “Speak In Estonian to Confuse Them” level. They have two higher levels: “Hide In The Forest” and “Beg Putin To Be Readmitted To Russia”.

On the other side, the terrorists have only two levels: “Yell, Bomb, and Shoot” and “Flee or Die When the Americans Arrive”.

Seems like Al Qaeda spends a lot of time at heightened alert these day…

Hansen Harangues -- Again

NASA’s Jim Hansen is flogging his theories again, this time with an article in the Independent (what’s the matter Jim — can’t get a respectable scientific journal to print your rants? The Independent? That’s really bottom-scraping…). The lead:

Greenland ice cap breaking up at twice the rate it was five years ago, says scientist Bush tried to gag

A satellite study of the Greenland ice cap shows that it is melting far faster than scientists had feared - twice as much ice is going into the sea as it was five years ago. The implications for rising sea levels - and climate change - could be dramatic.

Yet, a few weeks ago, when I - a Nasa climate scientist - tried to talk to the media about these issues following a lecture I had given calling for prompt reductions in the emission of greenhouse gases, the Nasa public affairs team - staffed by political appointees from the Bush administration - tried to stop me doing so. I was not happy with that, and I ignored the restrictions. The first line of Nasa’s mission is to understand and protect the planet.

Let me translate that for you: NASA told him to shut up about the connection between greenhouse gas emission and global warming for two reasons: (1) that connection has not been proven, and there is no consensus in the scientific community on the question, and (2) the entire notion global warming itself has not been proven. While it is certainly true that in the past century the earth’s average temperature has increased, it’s done the same thing many times in the past (long before humans were around). We just don’t know yet whether our recent warming is another transient effect, as in the past, or if it really is something mankind is doing. The most recent findings I’ve read cast a lot of doubt on the “we’re killing ourselves” theory — especially the unexpected finding that forests are emitting the majority of the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

Oops. And thank you, NASA, for attempting to muzzle this dangerous nutcase.

But Jim Hansen is a “true believer”. He’s got religion, and he’s had it for a long time. Like Jimmy Swaggart’s fundamentalist Christian schtick, Jimmy Hansen’s “global warming religion” and schtick has brought him fame and fortune. For a flavor of his publications, check out this list. And just in case you think I might be the only one questioning Jim Hansen’s objectivity on the issue, look here, here, and here.

I don’t usually get all fired up over a dispute in science — they’re generally more interesting than they are alarming. But this man wants to change our lives in ways that I certainly am not interested in. He wants us to drastically change our lifestyles (especially in reducing our commuting and travel, to reduce oil consumption) and to increases our taxes (to pay for greenhouse gas reduction). If — and that’s a very, very big if — I believed that the case had actually been made for global warming’s existence, for mankind’s activities causing global warming, and for the proposed remediation efforts “fixing” global warming, then I would actively support this program. But not one of those three requirements has been met — and to undertake civilization-changing efforts like the ones Jim Hansen promotes on the basis of speculation is sheer folly. Ol' Jim-boy though, would make out just fine in such a scenario — he’d be the de facto “religious” and intellectual leader. Kind of like that Jim Jones fellow a few years ago, except Jim Hansen’s “flock” would be the whole world, and he’d likely to be able to fool them for all his natural years. Scary prospect…