Dogs

• Maya:
  



Maya is an American Pit Bull Terrier mix, and she's 7 or so months old in this picture. We are fostering her from Help Orphan Puppies.org. She enjoys long walks through the park, chasing squirrels, and howling at sirens from passing fire engines.

• Jackson:
  



Jackson is half American Pit Bull Terrier and half Labrador Retriever, and in this picture he is around 3 months old. We have adopted him from the same organization as above. His entire litter of 6, from Toronto, Ontario, was going to be gassed because they contain some Pit Bull. As you can see, he is very dangerous.

On the tech side...

• Slashdot - Perhaps the only truly necessary site in the geek's repetoire.  You'll be amazed... you'll be astonished... you'll be chagrined... you might even decide to post something.
• The F.S.F. - Home of the Free Software Foundation.  Learn all about why I feel guilty typing this on a computer running Windows XP (I do have Fedora Core 3 installed on my other partition, though, so that helps some...).
• Fedora Homepage - Speaking of, why not check out this community-centric GNU/Linux distribution.  Getting better all the time.  Someday I'll suck it up and shift completely over to GNU/Linux again.
• Mozilla - Home of open-source goodies such as the Firefox web browser, Mozilla Suite, and Thunderbird email client, among others.  Some of the best, most reliable, and friendly non-proprietary applications to be found.
• Wikipedia - An extensive, public-editable, constantly-growing encyclopedia.
• E.F.F. - The Electronic Frontier Foundation.  They are concerned with the economics of technology.  Some thought-provoking articles and action, as well as a lot of information relating to all things tech, privacy, copyright law, and much more is to be found here.

• The ACLU - When you worry about things political in the U.S., your first action should be to head here.  If the ACLU is talking about it, then it's worth worrying about.  Become a member!
• C-SPAN - The channel that most people love to avoid watching also has a web presence you can avoid as well!  Nearly everything (official) that happens in the government of this country is documented here, with often interesting analysis accompanying.
• CounterPunch - Edited by Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair, this is an explosive, updated-daily, political magazine.  The primary interest here is in the sphere of Israel/Palestine, but this often leads into pointed and interesting commentary on myraid other subjects.  One of my favorite sites.
• SourceWatch - Formerly known as the "Disinfopedia", this site tracks the statements of government officals, thinktanks, corporations, and media outlets, in an attempt to maintain some level of accountability among these groups.  Because this accountability is difficult to find, however, they work to clear the "spin" and expose whatever truth may lurk beneath.
• TruthOut - It's hard to summarize what this site is all about.  They are a progressive organization focused on government and human rights, the environment, the state of the world, and advocacy in the pursuit of liberal ideals.  They keep a close eye on the action of governments, especially as those actions have consequences among the voiceless.
• Sadly, No! - Though it's been around for some time, I just recently discovered this really funny, poignant blog.  The maintainers have some kind of razor wit... and the results are great.  But the best part is that they don't get drowned in the humor.  It's the vehicle for some very interesting observations and comments.

• This Modern World - Homepage of Tom Tomorrow.  See his cartoons (new one posted once per week), read his insightful blog, buy cool stuff, follow his links to other spiffy net locations.
• Home of the Underdogs - If you like older, less well-known games for MSDOS and Windows (3.0 to XP), you should check this site out.  They are a purveyor of "abandonware", providing copies of games that are no longer sold or supported by their original manufacturers.  Some great games can be found here, including more than a few that were major hits during their first-run.
• Ted Rall Online - My favorite cartoonist's homepage.  Ted Rall is not known for holding back his opinions on any subject, and he is always worth listening to.  Even if you are not left-leaning, many of his observations and comments may still strike a chord in you.
• Mail2Web - If you, like me, enjoy traveling and find yourself at times without your handy laptop (or behind a restrictive firewall, like I am at work), plug your email address and password into Mail2Web and have your POP or IMAP (or AOL, or GMail, etc.) mail displayed as webmail.  Be sure to check the "Secure  Login" option, though, to prevent your password being sent as plain text.
  
• Lonely Planet - Probably the best mainstream general travel site on the net.  They also publish, bar-none, the best travel guides you can find.  Lonely Planet is an individual-oriented company, specializing more in people that enjoy getting down to the dirt in their traveling than in those that would rather book a 5-star hotel or a Caribbean cruise.  And if you are one of the latter, I ask you: Why bother leaving home?
• Pitchfork Media - This is a fantastic site for music lovers.  Pitchfork is basically a bunch of guys who spend all of their time listening to new music.  They conduct interviews with musicians, review albums, see shows, recommend their favorites, and put it all up on the web for you to see.  This site has influenced much of the current direction of my listening tastes.  Their album reviews, especially, are some of the most insightful I've read anywhere.