xmascard 04: credits
- Last year we started with "And we thought last year was bad..." We clearly
jumped the gun. This year was even worse, but not even good humored dr bob can
plunge into this morass without offending too many recipients that would
defeat the upbeat intent of the holiday greetings that should override any
downbeat political or social message. Besides with four more years, there will
be plenty of time to rethink issues in later editions.
- Ani got bob to remove the following barb from the card:
If the moral values espoused by
the annual dr bob christmas message are inconsistent with your moral
values, send a message like
"yo bob, I've had enough of your liberal crap,
UNSUBSCRIBE me yesterday" with the subject message UNSUBSCRIBE to
hatemail@drbobenterprises.com.
Friendly messages are welcome at
lovemail@drbobenterprises.com.
Maybe it was a bit in-your-face. Sorry folks.
- References to the "starving Armenians" (connecting to the world hunger
theme) and the estimated 100K dead Iraqi civilians (but who's counting?
certainly not the US military) in the ending remembrance got edited away too
in the softening up process, appropriate to focus attention only on the
horrific tsunami event in Southeast Asia that itself in a few brief moments
probably surpassed the 100K dead statistic, with more inevitably to follow in
the aftermath health crisis. The American
Friends Service Committee is one of the relief organizations providing
help to the survivors, which bob turned to first. While individuals should
give what they can, it would be appropriate for the rich nations to open up
their wallets a bit more than the initially paltry sums that were offered.
Time will tell how much follow through there will be.
- Recent world hunger news:
http://www.fao.org/newsroom/en/news/2004/51809/index.html. You can find
more on world poverty with google. Life is bleak for many even without
surprise tsunamis. A sad status quo.
- You might remember Clancy the stuffed bear from last year's
card credits as one of the ideas that
did not make the cut. He finally made it into
this year's edition.
- Googling "hummer" turns up some interesting sites, among which is one
dedicated to a unique salute to the vehicle. Ironically the same
administration that was running attack ads in the swing states like PA
accusing Kerry of not wanting our soldiers to have bullets body armor etc by
making a symbolic appropriations vote against the war, was not making a real
effort to armor the military humvees even though they were regularly being
blown up, which blew up in Rummy's face when he was caught in his callous
remarks by the response of the industry itself that said they were not asked
to do better. But who said campaigns were about truth?
- The whole carb awareness thing really hit this past year, with bob even
buying ani the South Beach Diet book, which apart from the diet itself, was
really an honest attempt to get people to start eating more nutritiously,
aiming for more complex carbohydrates. Our pasta intake has been severely
restricted with no net result weightwise. bob is still barely able to maintain
his average weight. At Villanova, bob made an effort to get some more whole
grains in a lunchroom and in the student center, and whole wheat pizza crust
actually arrived on campus! Meanwhile, trying to influence the pizza at the
local Genuardi's supermarket only got a polite response from corporate and no
action. Oh well.
- We missed the Christmas deadline this year due to bad timing of dr bob's
day job final examinations. Better late than never, eh?
- Printing instructions (for web card)
This year we created PDF output to sidestep
frustrating problems in page setup for the web
version that conflicts between Microsoft Internet Explorer and FrontPage
generate. Of course US 8.5x11 in versus A4 paper size in your printer is a different issue...