You can't touch this.

Getting a clearance is sort of part of the routine when you live in the Metro DC area. If you can't get a clearance (for whatever reason), it's sort of like trying to get a line of credit with a low FICO score. It's just impossible. Today, I'm finishing up paperwork for a defense contractor, but on contract to a civilian organization, and the contractor (who I work for, as opposed to the primary, which is the government) has noticed that my name is misspelled on my passport. Now, I've been using that passport for some time now. I've gotten numerous clearances with it. All I was trying to do today is fill out my I-9, my withholdings, and so on. But no dice.

I'm not sure there's anyone here to be sore at. I mean, in theory the people that said "no" today were just being vigilant, which is what they're supposed to be doing. On the other, it's obviously a federal identification document, the person in the picture is obviously me, and the risk associated here with my coming onboard with a misspelled name is, well, I don't think it even merits a "marginal" threat to anyone, let alone the company I work for or the Fed/Civ organization I'd be working for.

These are the people that want to x-ray my helmet when I get in to the office. Oh well. The good news is, it is so damn nice to get out on the bike. I was sitting there on 395S at about 9,000rpm, and it had been raining all day when it strikes me: wow, this is a total blast. Now, the road was wet, I didn't have my winter or water gear on. In fact, it had been so muggy this morning I didn't even bring my jacket in. It was just YT with flannel and poly lined rip-stop khakis and a polo shirt. The whole ride took mammoth concentration as cagers were more or less always trying to kill me, but even they didn't seem to be hell bent on it today. So for the occasional few seconds on my roughly 37 minute ride home (5.7 miles!) it would be me, the bike, sunlight splashed liberally all over the sparkling road, and the wail of pistons flying up and down in the engine, just inches from my head. I'm having a hard time being angry at anyone with all the time I've had on the bike of late. Even in the rain. I suppose that says something. I should get somebody to make an eeg or something that I could fit on the bike so they would know what sort of state I'm in on the bike, so they could make a pill out of it. Boy, I've never thought I've ever had a problem with a prescription drug, but if I had sixty Motorcycle Zen pills... Yeah. I'd be a junkie. Sigh.

Owch!

Got beat to hell by the bike today. Must ride more, more often, harder and smarter. Looking for intermediate level skills dvd's... I've heard the MSF advanced course is lame, so don't really want to do that.

For anyone keeping track, it looks like between $wife and I we're doing maybe 7500 miles across both bikes in a year, with about 5000 of that basically me being a stubborn ass. I will ride you in the snow!

One of the reasons I'm so sore today is the hammer is just so, so, so heavy. My obliques and abdomen, and my lumbar spine are just completely out of whack, and my knee started showing signs of failing again. Riding wasn't like this when I rode every day, religiously. Granted, you can't ride your bike when you're in the hospital, or if you're having neurological issues.... but I really don't like feeling like an amateur when I get back on the bike.

Loads of fun, though. Even though I drove to and from work in absolutely hideous traffic, there were a few moments where it was just me and the bike and the scream of that motor as it wound up to 13k. I can't stay mad at it long. Besides which, it was my fault all along, wasn't it?


(...getting back on the ankle lifts on three axes, doing tiny little crunch-type exercises for the obliques and abdomen...)

promed to save the day..

First, how was directionality of infection established?  Was the worker sick when he came in contact with pigs?  If so, what lapse in biosecurity allowed a sick human worker to even be on a swine farm as standard biosecurity practices on progressive or up to date swine farms would screen such an individual out and prevent him or her from coming into contact with pigs?  Has the worker tested positive for the novel influenza A H1N1 virus?  What is the prevalence of the new virus in the swine herd and finally, but most importantly, what quarantine and traceback procedures are in place to make sure that the swine herd does not infect other swine farms?  Finally, although we know animal diagnostic laboratories have never seen this virus before in pigs, what surveillance efforts are being made to look at previous swine serum banks or test apparently healthy swine herds on a population basis to actively ensure swine populations are free of this novel influenza A H1N1 virus.

(emphasis mine) I've been saying that what I've read makes it looks like H3N1, although details are so sketchy and the signal to noise ratio is ... boy, I don't know what the data-appropriate term is for a "whiteout" condition (that is, when there is so much data flowing it's impossible to watch anything meaningfully within a length of time that allows you to react in a time appropriate for the data you observe). At any rate, a bit-out it is. And none of the people talking, except a very few, are making any sense about this ... pandemic. I really don't think it's that big a deal, unless we start seeing this thing with a mutation that works (extra point if you can name the enzymes it needs to do this). If we do wind up with an H3N1 or H1N1 that is bidirectional from pigs to people, we'll be in Pretty Deep Shit... speaking of, where's PETA?).

I wish people would just shut their respective yaps and listen. There are a few things you need to concentrate on:

• don't go to work if you're sick.
• if you are sick, don't go to work. if it gets worse, go to the hospital. you'll be fine.
• wash your hands, idiot.

 please consider the internet to be read-only for a while.

Need to get back out on the bike

Grunt. It's been too long. I can't keep doing this five-days-between-rides thing, or I'm not fit enough to get back on the bike and ride like I want to. I'm either brilliant (aw, shucks), or seriously deluded, clearly. I've managed to convince myself that the bike is good physical therapy. And, for that matter, my orthopede. That's, well, kind of shocking. But you know what they about putting proofs... (I wonder if anyone's made an interface for the Nike+Run thingie that works on automobiles or bikes...)

Whilst atop my pile of bit detritus, watching the interwebs roll by, I come across this:

"It's not a simple matter. All these pigs won't be killed like you're pushing a remote-control button," he was quoted as saying by the state-owned Al-Ahram daily [see also item 2 below]. Mr Amin said that a farmer at an undisclosed location had been nabbed with 300 pigs as he tried to smuggle them to freedom on Wednesday. Armed police are stationed outside some of Cairo's pig sties to prevent such attempts.

"nabbed with 300 pigs"? I mean, ???!!. And now the "armed" police are guarding pig farms? I don't suppose there will be a "save the swine" mujahedeen corrective action" to counter this new anti-mulsim froth. Let's also not pretend for a moment this has anything to do with H1N1 (although, if you ask me, this is starting to look more like A/H3N1 all the time. I'd love it if someone could clear that up for me...) because it is positively clear that this is spreading via human-human contacts. Only a fool (or someone entirely without understanding of how the influenza, or indeed all kinds of virus) would behave this way.

I don't suppose any of this has anything to do with a particular religions and their feelings on pork?