Kowabunga

I just received the following via the Clan MacDude mailing list:

Kelly Turner, November 6, 1961-September 18, 2005

Kelly Turner passed away today after a brief and completely unexpected illness. He was rushed to Irvine Medical Center on September 5th with an extremely high temperature, extremely low blood pressure, and possible organ damage. He remained in Intensive Care for several days while doctors attempted to stabilize him and figure out what had happened. Despite their best efforts, including dialysis to take the load off his organs, he fell into a persistent vegetative state on September 13th, with no brain activity. He had a Living Will and left explicit instructions that extraordinary measures should not be taken to preserve his life, so life support was withdrawn yesterday afternoon, in the presence of his family, in accordance with his wishes. He passed peacefully in his sleep this morning in the arms of his life partner.

Kelly is survived by his mother, Rosetta Turner, three older siblings, and by his life partner, Tom Grossinger.

Plans for a memorial service are forthcoming, and will be announced here when they are known.

Kelly was an active fan and costumer in the 70's, 80's, and early 90's. He was part of the crew that built the "V'Ger Flyby" sets for STAR TREK: THE MOTION PICTURE in 1979. He worked on the committees of Costume-Con 1 and 2, and chaired Costume-Con 6. He was Masquerade Director for the 1986 Westercon in San Diego. He was the managing editor of the first nine editions of The Whole Costumer's Catalogue. He also was the editor of Costumer's Quarterly for the ICG for several years. He competed in the Master division, and his costume credits include THE EGYPTIAN GODS, PYROGENESIS, TURN OF A FRIENDLY CARD, and NIGHT ON BALD MOUNTAIN. In real life, Kelly worked in the video game industry. He started as a programmer at the coin-op division of Atari in 1984 (his games included Super Sprint, Vindicators, and Tetris). Over the last 20 years, he worked in virtually every aspect of development and production at such companies as Atari, P.F. Magic, Virgin Interactive, Rhythm & Hues, The 3DO Company, and Eidos. Most recently, he was Executive Producer of external development at Eidos, Inc, and sat on the Board of Governors of the Producer's Guild of America's New Media Council.

Kelly was a good freind of mine back in our days in S.T.A.R. San Diego, and will be greatly missed.

Posted by Sqotty at 9:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
View blog reactions

I would like to take a moment to announce the birth of my daughter, Anna Marie.

She was born on September 20th, 2005, wighed in at 8 pounds and 5.8 ounces, measured 21 inches in length.

And Lord, is she beautiful...

Posted by Sqotty at 5:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
View blog reactions

This story begins on Thursday afternoon when I received a communication that the United Way Caring Connections was looking for volunteers to man various Hurricane Katrina relief efforts. I took a look at my schedule and decided that the food drop and truck loading being organized by Edina Reality in Eagan, with Hope for the City on Friday afternoon was the right fit, so I sent an email asking to be scheduled for that time and place.

I received confirmation back Friday morning, and after lunch, I wrapped up my work day and headed down to Edina Realty in Eagan to help load that truck.

When I arrived at the site, just before two in the afternoon (schedule was 2-6), they were in the midst of offloading bottled water from a pickup truck onto the trailer. The pickup was fully loaded with water. The guy driving it said there would be more coming.

Water is probably the number one physical need (cash is king in an emergency like this), and there had been quite a bit of bottled water dropped at this site. Along with food, new clothing, and critically needed baby supplies.

People came bringing a variety of goods to fulfil a variety a needs, and they came with a bag or two of items, and occasionally with a truck load of goods. All of the donations were given with the biggest of hearts.

There is one story I want to tell, though: one of the volunteers from the early shift, owns a restaurant. When she finished the first shift, she called her supplier and worked out a deal to by goods at his cost. She then contacted some friends and pooled together some funds to purchase a pickup truck load of canned goods and water. When she and her husband pulled in at the drop site, we were just closing for the day. We reopened the trailer and offloaded the pickup as quickly as we could, getting the goods stacked neatly on pallets in the trailer. The point of this particular story is the ingenuity that one person came up with to help accomplish the goal of acquiring goods to help those in dire need. This was a very creative way of getting the best bang for the buck, so to speak, and my hat is off to her.

There was a second, personal, benefit to having fun out and volunteered for the afternoon. I had the opportunity to meet and chat with some very nice people, so smiles put on the faces of some very young children who were being introduced to giving at an early age (they even got their pictures taken by the folks from Edina Reality) and it was just plain fun.

I'd like to thank Edina Reality and their staff for hosting this drop zone, and they took darned good care of the volunteers with a cooler full of water, and arranging with Panera Bread to provide lunch and snacks, Cold Stone Creamery providing an ice cream treat in the afternoon and Domino's Pizza providing an end of day pizza, all of which was donated.

These drop off zones will be active through Sunday, Sept 11th, from 10 A.M. to 6 P.M.

Posted by Sqotty at 9:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
View blog reactions

Hugh Hewitt, Instapundit and the blogosphere as a whole is organizing a Blog-O-Thon for relief in order to help people find ways that they can donate money to help the people impacted by Hurricane Katrina.

I don't have to go in to the details of how serious a disaster this is, the media has full coverage of the magnitude of the damage, and the many tens or hundreds of thousands made homeless overnight.

Hugh Hewitt has a list of organizations that you can contribute to, as does Instapundent.

Also, the United Way has made it possible to contribute to Hurricane Katrina relief through its E-Way online donation system.

Lutheran Church Missouri Synod is running a campaign for Hurricane Katrina Relief.

Lest we forget, many service members serving in Iraq and Afghanistan have families in the region devestated by Hurricane Katrina. Soldiers Angels. contributions can be sent to:

Soldier's Angels Foundation Operation Katrina Relief 1792 East Washington Blvd. Pasadena, California 91104

Or made online at Soldiers Angels.

Americans pulled together to generate millions of dollars for Tsunami Relief earlier this year. I hope that we can do the same, or better, for Hurricane Katrina Relief which has hit our own backyard.

Posted by Sqotty at 8:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
View blog reactions

Hurricane Katrina continues to be at the forefront of the news, and well it should be, as it is the worst natural catastrophe to hit the United States probably since the Great 1906 'Quake of 1906.

The downside is that there seems to be a great deal of finger pointing by the power mongers (on both sides of the aisle) and by the leftist controlled media at a time when many Americans are trying to pull this country together and help the hundreds of thousands of displaced Americans during their time of need. Our leaders need to focus on the ball, and stop playing the blame-game.

The Wall Street Journal has a excellent piece on this matter. Give it a read.

Then there is all the bellyaching from the hard-left Celiberals, like Pierce Brosnan, Oprah Winfrey and others, bemoaning that the administration did not act fast enough, and has been irresponsible in its efforts to deliver needed aid, ignoring the fact that federal assistance was initially turned down by the governor of Louisiana, and that the hard assets (205 school buses left unused) were in place to evacuate most, if not all of the residents of New Orleans prior to the hurricane striking the region, yet it was not done.

There were mistakes made up and down the chain of command, failures throughout, yet the leftist elites focus only on the shortcomings of FEMA and the Bush administration, while the right-wing focuses more on the failings government leaders at the local and state level.

There are calls for a bipartisan investigation into the breakdown in rescue efforts, and so long as this is performed in a bipartisan fashion, where the objective is to improve our system, rather than to politicize the failures, point fingers, or otherwise seek out political gains, I am all for it. I fear it will turn into a three-ring circus where the best interests of the American people are not kept in mind.

America suffers some form of natural disaster nearly every year, from hurricanes along the Gulf Coast and Eastern Seaboard, to tornadoes in the mid-West, forest fires ravaging out of the control, and earthquakes in California. I do not recall ever hearing such vile rhetoric being slung about so freely as it is with Hurricane Katrina.

Now I learn that Hillary Clinton is now using Katrina as an excuse to raise our taxes, never mind the fact that billions of dollars has been raised to help with relief efforts by hundreds of non-profit organizations.

So much for my rant on the politicizing of the Katrina disaster. Note to Congress: Keep you r eyes on the ball, and not politicize this catastrophic disaster.

Posted by Sqotty at 2:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
View blog reactions

I got up this morning to check the news and found the following on Yahoo!:

U.S. Chief Justice William Rehnquist, a conservative force on the Supreme Court for over 30 years, died on Saturday after battling thyroid cancer since October, a court spokeswoman said.

The loss of Rehnquist is a great loss to out country, and he will be greatly missed.

The article continues to with:

Rehnquist's death came just days before the Senate was to begin confirmation hearings for John Roberts, a conservative appeals court judge picked by Bush in July to replace the more moderate Justice Sandra Day O'Connor and whose choice ignited a partisan clash. The court's new term opens on October 3.

With to positions on the Supreme Court to fill, and the Democrats playing partisan games over the Roberts nomination, it may be a long time before we see both of these seats on our highest court filled.

Posted by Sqotty at 6:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
View blog reactions

Last night was the monthly get-together of the Townhall meetup group. There was a somewhat smaller turnout, possibly due to the exorbitant price of gas. Also, we lacked an agenda, so we made one up on the fly: Hurricane Katrina and disaster relief.

As per usual, the conversation drifted about, as we really didn't expect to stay on topic. The question came up as to what the international community was doing in OUR time of need and it was pointed out that Germany and several other countries had made calls and offered aid. We'll see what materializes.

The impact that Katrina has had on the Gulf Coast region, and New Orleans in specific is astronomical. I still can't get over the devastation.

Tracy, the fearless leader and Anti-Strib blogger, has a list of evil corporations that are contributing substantial aid. Check it out when you get a chance.

The group was smaller, about twelve, and mainly the usual gang of suspects. Hopefully some of the other familiar faces that missed this time around will be back next time. It has been floated that, since we are having to come up with our own agendas, next month we discuss the Fair Tax Plan versus the Flat Tax Rate Plan and the current "progressive' (or graduated) tax system. If you haven't been to one of these, and you are in the Twin Cities, mark you calendar for the first Thursday of the month. If not, hit townhall.com and get on their list for local group meetings.

Posted by Sqotty at 2:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
View blog reactions

I have often been asked why I like living in the country so much, and there are many reasons I can give, but none make it so clear than coming home on a crystal clear night like tonight.

It's already dark when I arrived home, my dogs anxious for their evening walk The night sky is, as I mentioned above, crystal clear. I am forty miles from major metro lights, and being out in the country, there is just a little bit of light leakage across the sky from the smaller rural ciities. There are no street lights, and it is late enough that the few houses around me have their lights out.

Putting the leashes on my dogs, we went out into the night for their final P and P patrol for the day, and I marveled at the beauty and serenity of the night sky above me.

The Big Dipper is the most recognizable constellation, and one of the few I can identify without any aid. This is something I should work on changing; I need to learn the consteallations.

I have never gotten over how beautiful a night sky is out here. Nothing like what I have lived with during all my previous adult years, living in San Diego, LA, or the SF Bay area, where the night sky is overwhelmed by the city lights, washing out many of the stars that are clearly visible to me here.

Soon, I think, I shall have to get my camera out and try my hand at some time lapse photography, and post it on my site. It is the most remarkable sight to behold, and unlike my travels to remote places where there is virtually no light polution, I get this on every clear night.

And then I thank the Lord that I am able to live like this, out in the country, surrounded by farms, woods and wild life, and able to enjoy the tranquility of a marvelous starry sky.

Posted by Sqotty at 10:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
View blog reactions

I was visiting Wombat Ramblings, a buddy of mine, and he has a good piece about how Katrina is going to have an impact on the ag business, especially since the Port of New Orleans is out of the picture for the duration.

One other thing to bear in mind is that there is now a shortage of transportation for this year's harvest, which also have an impact on the economy.

We're in for a rough one this year.

Again, my thoughts and prayers to those affected by this disaster.

Posted by Sqotty at 6:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
View blog reactions

As mentioned in my message at the top of my blog, there are ongoing efforts within the blogosphere to help direct readers to organizations that have set up Hurricane Katrina Relief funds, and several bloggers, most notably Hugh Hewitt and Glenn Reynolds, the Instapundant, are at the forefront of these efforts.

The magnitude of the damage caused by Hurricane Katrina is astronomical, and the mainstream media has been doing a tremendous job reporting on it. The scope of this natural disaster is still not known. 80% of New Orleans is reported to be underwater, with some places as deep as 20 feet.

How many people have been made homeless by this disaster has yet to be determined, with some 25,000 refugees heading to Houston, and thousands more displaced in other places in the region, it will be some time before the total number of people living in refugee camps will be known.

The mayor of New Orleans has estimated (guessed) that the death toll there will be in the thousands. If so, this will be the highest death toll due to a natural disaster to hit the United States since the 1906 San Francisco quake. In other places hit by Katrina, the death toll was at 123 as of August 31.

My thoughts and prayers are with all the people hit by Hurricane Katrina.

Posted by Sqotty at 2:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
View blog reactions