Boy oh boy where to begin?
I will start with some geek stuff. At work we have been getting pounded by these worms, Netsky and MyDoom. We don’t have to worry about getting infected because we have an almost all Mac network but our inboxes fill up with the messages anyway. 20 every time your email client checks your mailbox is pretty annoying.
So I try installing this filter based on a perl script that scans incoming messages for attachments. However, in order to do that I needed to install MIME-tools that run with perl. But that required an update to Perl 5.8.1. That required downloading, compiling and installing. I had never done that before and was always put off by things that required me to get down and dirty in the shell/Terminal. I usually look for a Mac OS X specific package somewhere and install that.
This time I couldn’t find a package that worked. So I got my faithful Unix PowerTools and figured out some stuff, did some research and figured it out. So it was a very good experience. I’m very proud of myself.
So enough of that.
I’ve been tutoring this 11 year old in English. He had been getting 4s (kinda like Ds) and last week he had a test and got a low 2(B+). Tomorrow his parents are having me and M over for dinner to thank us. I get paid in beer, cigarettes, and the occasional meal. I’m not really comfortable with making money with it yet because I don’t really know what I’m doing. What if he got an F and his parents shelled out cash? Then I would feel like I ripped ’em off.
All I do is go over the homework with him and explain why something is right or wrong, correct his spelling and work on the pronunciation. I think it is the extra one on one attention that makes the difference. I have no training in teaching so I don’t really know what I could do better.
I did give him a copy of Sgt. Pepper’s and told him to listen to it a few times and we will go through a song together. I’m thinking “When I’m Sixty-four” or “Fixing a Hole” or maybe even “Getting Better”. The lyrics for those songs are pretty much straight forward. The other songs are a little too far out there to try to translate and explain to someone. We’ll see.
I went to Hamburg last night see Damien Rice play. I heard a few songs beforehand and to be honest was not too excited but I was invited and M accepted the invitation on my behalf. It was a good show. Kinda of like David Grey but a little rougher around the edges and without the wacky drummer. For the encore, Vyvienne the cellist, played Seven Nation Army by the The White Stripes alone on stage. It was very cool. The opening act was Josh Ritter. Also good. Very entertaining. The show was at a club called Knust, which I am told means the heel of a bread-loaf in Low German.
So it looks like Kerry is going be the democratic candidate. I hope he’s tough enough to deal with the super neocon republican media smear tactics that are sure to come his way. And seeing as he is a politician after all, I hope he will be able to dish it back out.
If I was voting with my conscience I would be voting for Kucinich. I voiced my support for him already a few times here. This time, however, it’s all about beating Bush. Kucinich brought up some good issues and was a strong critic of Bush. Unfortunately nobody cared. I hope he never shuts up. He is the kind of strong critic that needs to be there telling it how it is. As far beating Bush was concerned, he never had a chance. So if Kerry is the one, so be it. Somebody has to beat Bush. I hope he does.