erica's joys :)

This hits pretty close to home since two of my grandparents died from illnesses directly related to smoking.
Infect Truth.

• Apartment hunting in New York is a pain in the ass.
• I always end up waiting until the last minute to get a Halloween costume. Now the costume I want is sold out everywhere. Ugh.
• Christmas in New York is going to be fabulous! I can't wait to go ice skating again.
• I played Second Life on the recommendation of a friend. I'd tried it once before last year but it was way to slow on my crappy laptop so I gave up on it. Now that I have a decent laptop, it's um...interesting.
• Every so often I really notice my height. For example, after I get something out of the fridge, I stand up and look down at the top of the fridge and realize, damn I am pretty tall.
• Firefox 2.0 looks very tasty, for lack of a better word.
• I love my digital camera. No seriously, I've been taking more pictures than ever. I now have 5.45 GB of pictures I've taken since I got it. I'm not sure if thats a good thing or a bad thing.
• I'm really in love with tea right now. Particularly POM Tea because it comes in the cute reusable drinking glass container and Assam Black Honest Tea because it is just plain GOOD. If Assam Black Honest Tea came in the cute containers, I'm afraid I'd have to buy a pallet.
• Daft Punk never fails to put me in a better mood. Like when I spill the aforementioned POM Tea all over my bed.

Sorry I keep posting videos but who else am I going to share them with? Anyhow, this one is friggin funny. Enjoy!

In case you haven't heard, Google opened a new office in New York. The place has a great view (see the pic on the left) and the space is very Googley. Yes yes, I really use that word. I went up there for the opening and managed to end up in one of the articles done about it. It was fun to send my mom the article as she is still giggly about where I work. When she saw the picture the first thing she says is "Wow it looks like you guys have toys at work....do you have toys?!" Cute.

Speaking of New York, I may move there pretty soon. I've been looking for apartments online and I'm already exhausted. Searching for apartments in New York is like searching for apartments on Mars. It's truly unlike anything I've ever done before and I don't recommend it to anybody. Thankfully, I've been using the updated Google Reader to kind of help with this a little. Currently I'm subscribed to feeds from Craigslist and Google Base (how come more apartment search sites don't have feeds?!) that are customized to the exact kind of apartment I'm looking for. See, I'm not one for going out somewhere to do my laundry. Call me spoiled but something about being able to toss a load in whenever I so desire works for me.

anyhow, I never used Google Reader before because I didn't like the interface. The most I did with it was had it power the RSS feeds on my blogs sidebar (Dugg and I Wish...). However with the new interface, it's actually usable! For the apartment hunt, I have a tag called apartment hunt (shock!). I've applied that tag to both the Craigslist and Base feeds and now I can keep an eye on apartments that fit into my criteria. By the way, if you know of more apartment hunting sites that have feeds, I'd appreciate if you left a comment with the link.

Back to Reader, while its got a nice new look and some cool features, there are still things that are missing. For example, it's not possible to search feeds. For example, if I wanted to find all the items with the word "Brooklyn" in the apartment hunt tag, I'd have to go back to the feed source and modify my search there. Not helpful at all. Also, unless I'm totally missing something, (someone correct me if I am) its not possible to create new tags without first applying them to individual items. The lack of auto-refreshing is annoying. I hate having to click refresh to see new items. However, aside from those 3 things, the new Reader is fab. Congrats to the folks who worked on it. :)

Okay so this post has gotten much longer than I planned for it to be so I'll save the rest of what I wanted to say for another day. Have a good weekend folks!

Can someone tell me why people want to put this in their bodies?

SEC. 106. HABEAS CORPUS MATTERS.

(a) In General- Section 2241 of title 28, United States Code, is amended--

(1) by striking subsection (e) (as added by section 1005(e)(1) of Public Law 109-148 (119 Stat. 2742)) and by striking subsection (e) (as added by added by section 1405(e)(1) of Public Law 109-163 (119 Stat. 3477)); and

(2) by adding at the end the following new subsection:

`(e)(1) No court , justice , or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider an application for a writ of habeas corpus filed by or on behalf of an alien detained by the United States who --

`(A) is currently in United States custody; and

`(B) has been determined by the United States to have been properly detained as an enemy combatant or is awaiting such determination.

`(2) Except as provided in paragraphs (2) and (3) of section 1005(e) of the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 (10 U.S.C. 801 note), no court , justice , or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider any other action against the United States or its agents relating to any aspect of the detention , transfer , treatment , trial , or conditions of confinement of an alien detained by the United States who --

`(A) is currently in United States custody; and

`(B) has been determined by the United States to have been properly detained as an enemy combatant or is awaiting such determination.'.

(b) Effective Date- The amendments made by subsection (a) shall take effect on the date of the enactment of this Act, and shall apply to all cases, without exception, pending on or after the date of the enactment of this Act which relate to any aspect of the detention , transfer , treatment , trial , or conditions of detention of an alien detained by the United States since September 11, 2001.

From this bill. Translation: Bush (and his administration) cannot be tried for anything they did to detainees after September 11, 2001. Wave bye bye to the Geneva Conventions, right out the window. Please, can we throw him out of office now? Do I need to send in a secret operative to seduce him so we can impeach him on moral grounds? That's the only thing that seems to work in this country.