U.S. Constitution

With the Pentagon's blessings and assistance, apocalyptic evangelists are proselytizing US troops in Iraq. (AlterNet)

What the hell is my country coming to? I suppose I should say "Hell." The Feds are sending copies of the "Left Behind" video game to the troops (that's the one where you have to kill or convert the 'non-believers' - gosh, sounds like Muslim extremism, as well) - along with an apocalyptic group of live entertainers to make sure their End of Days scenario is hammered into the soldiers' little heads. One Two Three Four, what are we fighting for? Not our Constitution, that's for sure. Just to be on the safe side, they are sending a 'highly rated' (by the evangelistas) text -printed in English/Arabic, to explain the whole 'come to Jesus and live, or don't and die' thing so allegorically presented in Revelations. That will give the local ME's (Muslim extremists) a whole 'nother reason to kill Americans.

STS118

Watching NASA TV covering the shuttle to ISS mission. Thought it was in real time, for a minute there, but now is hard to tell. Well! Bloody amazing, I say. "Crossing eastern pacific ocean approaching the equator" Space walk to rearrange fittings for new module, attach said module, etc. They have electric wrenches that calibrate torque and how many turns it took to get there. The sort of feature you need to work on a Subaru, heh heh heh. Frequently, I could see the earth past the equipment the camera was focused on. How - tragic, that that is as far as we've gotten in 30+ years. Never been back to the moon, barely planning for Mars.

Another night of 'shoulda gone to work' but didn't. I cleaned up - mostly, the growing shuffled pile of "to do" items, some of which are a month past due. There has to be a drug to cure this. Pulled a few weeds, cut flowers, made a bunch of bouquets; made some butterscotch brownies, ate a lot of them smile

NASA does seem to be showing Houston Control live, with no sound, or nobody is talking. They scoot back and forth between monitors, or stare fixedly at one. Some one sporadically stands up and moves a few steps.
(now my very own Satellite aka Dish Network, is doing its daily 'checking for important system upgrades' ' don't touch me' thing)
Means it's time for me to go to sleep. 04:00