On November 7th, Oregon voters face a potential twin-towers of ballot measures. My opinion: NO votes on both Measure 41 and Measure 48 are crucial to the future of the state, as the effects could be more devastating to our education systems (and other state services) than was Ballot Measure 5 in 1990. Click on the links above to read what The Oregonian had to say when they weighed in on these matters. And then head on over the Defend Oregon Coalition website.

This is important! Really.

I know, I know...I said last time that “I’m baaaacck” ...and then I went away again. You just can’t trust anybody anymore, can you? 

The truth is I thought I was back, but it proved to be not true; I continue[d] to be locked out again (after that last entry). This most recent experience with Blogger is pretty much the last straw for me. As you may recall, when I migrated TechnoMonk’s Musings away from its Comcast-server location (to the present URL) during the summer, I spent weeks and weeks devoted to the task. When things went kafloowie, I just had to figure the problems out by: sorting through the only-modestly-helpful Blogger help files, asking questions of the Blogger Help Group (discussion board), using Google to search the internet for solutions that other users had come up with, writing emails to people I thought might be able to assist, figuring it all out by myself, or leaving a task undone. (Not that you, the reader, noticed very much of this at all…I’m mainly talking about behind-the-scenes web-maintenance stuff.) Anyway, it was very time consuming and frustrating. 

I received word a couple of days ago that one of my high school classmates does not have long to live. Several years ago she was diagnosed with breast cancer but was able to survive the experience back then. The most recent memory I have of her is from a class reunion where I observed her smoking a cigarette. I must admit, I had a judgment about this. I thought: A cancer survivor. Yet she’s smoking. Incredible. She must have a death wish.

Linda was someone I shared rides with to school in the morning some days (via a carpool). I can’t say that we were really friends, though. We were acquaintances, mostly; we lived in the same neighborhood of our small, rural northern-Wisconsin town and our parents knew each other. She was at least one notch, probably more, above me on the social scale. She was a good looking teenager (rather hot, actually) and dated the jocks. I was extremely average looking, small, non-athletic, academic — and nerdy with a rather rebellious wild side. I didn’t fit. She did.

Now she’s in hospice care. So, again I’m left thinking: what’s this life all about, anyway?

Just so you know, I’ve become totally enamored with the services and user interface at squarespace.com and have committed to locating my blog here on a permanent basis. I’ve laid down my money and made the move. The new domain name will be technomonksmusings.com. (Yep, I’ve finally got my own dot com location!)

The really frustrating part now is that I still am unable to log into the Blogger system to let my readers at technomonk.us know about this transition. Sooner or later, I suppose, I’ll be able to get back into the system long enough to notify everyone of my new address. In the meantime, folks’ll probably start to get worried: my last post there indicated that I was “back” – and then I disappeared again. Hey everybody: are you out there?

Welcome!! My old Blogger-produced blog was good for my first year of online journaling, but I ultimately discovered I was desirous of a cleaner, more-professional, and up-to-date look. So, here I am with a new address and a new blog. Thanks for traveling this journey with me!