Summer Vacation 2013 No. 2

The second vacation of this summer is nearing its close.

heat

Given how cool the weather has been so far this year, the week had a heat wave with temperatures around 95°F (35°C). For that reason, I spent most of my time indoors with my two air conditioners, one to cool down my bedroom and the other to reduce the humidity in my living room. The only times I was outside for any length of time were to mow Madre’s grass (Wednesday), to mow my own (Friday), to dump my old Haier air-conditioner at the recyclers and to visit Sam's Club (Thursday).

Speaking of mowing, the replacement parts for my Fiskars push-reel arrived Wednesday, and I installed them on my mower the following evening.

vet visit

The only thing of importance this week was taking my cat Thyme to the vet. I had to ask my sister the editor over to help catch Thyme, who never likes to be picked up and never likes being toted around. My sister came with a beach towel. We trapped the cat in the bathroom (the only room in the house with real doors). I wrapped the cat in the beach towel and put the mass into the carrier. It took no more than ten minutes, which was amazing considering it took the better part of an hour last year. Thyme behaved herself at the vet, and she checked out fine.

the humiliation of mit

MIT is making an ass of itself by interfering with the release of documents under FOIA relating to the prosecution of the late Internet activist Aaron Swartz. MIT claims that it is protecting those employees who helped the Secret Service; in fact, such employees' identities are routinely edited out of government documents. It is evident MIT suits are trying to save face, as if they are officials in some East Asian country. Instead, they are tarnishing MIT's rep in the eyes of the tech community.

MIT was one of the first universities to support open online courses. It has a long history of encouraging the open exchange and sharing of knowledge and information. It seems like quite a departure from its history and mission to suddenly focus on trying to increase the government's secrecy and blocking access to information.