I spent the day with Buzz in Westfield today. We were especially productive during the morning: we compiled msql, apache, and php for macsox and then installed duck, dap, phpmyadmin, and tikiwiki. We got that all done in the morning and went for lunch at the South Street Bistro. After lunch, we solved a problem with the printer on his imac cart (the "PC guys" there couldn't get it set up) and got a good start on getting radmind set up. It was good to feel like we accomplished stuff.

It was a beautiful day for the forty-minute drive back from Westfield on the expressway, listening to NPR. I've always rather enjoyed driving, but I can't believe how many people commute that far (or farther) to work. At various times in my life, I've had to commute to work and I remember how it contributes to stress and eats away at one's free time. I'm so glad I've been able to arrange my circumstances so that I can walk to work and my boys can walk to school. Of course, when gasoline hits $5/gallon, I think a lot more people will begin to organize their lives along similar lines -- if they can.

Hearing about Bernie Ebbers being convicted reminded me of Alisa's previous work at a company that did what I considered to be shady manipulations of their sales figures in order to maintain artificially stable business characteristics to increase their stock prices. I realized during the witchhunt of all of Clinton's associates how economic forces pressure business people to skate too close to gray boundaries of ethical behavior. If you're not close the line, you're not competetive (because someone else will be willing to skate closer) and, in many cases, it isn't possible to tell which side of the line you're actually on without having the issue decided by a court. It's a real problem with capitalism.


StevenBrewer