This one's a quickie... Er, at least it was originally intended to be.

I just read Eric S. Raymond's Open Letter to Darl McBride. Mr. McBride is the CEO of SCO, a public company that has been attacking Open Source as being tainted by intellectual property belonging to SCO.

But SCO is being nasty. Rather than behaving in a civilized manner and explaining to the open source community exactly which parts of the publically available source code infringe their copyright and explaining how those parts infringe, SCO instead is keeping quiet. How is this bad? Let me give...

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My new 2003 Hyundai Sonata GLX in Zion National Park, UtahIt's Monday again. This evening, I joined my parents, youngest brother, and two of my sisters for a Family Home Evening activity--going to see a movie, Disney's Freaky Friday, the new 2003 remake of the classic Jody Foster movie. Wow! Disney managed to do it right, just like they did with the remake of The Parent Trap. This newest remake was well written, and the parts were marvelously portrayed by Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan. I had a blast! I wish all Disney remakes were this good. They really have a mixed track record. This one's going on my "must buy" list of DVDs once it is released.

Did I mention I have a new set of wheels? A week ago Saturday, before I went to Texas, I bought a new car, a 2003 white, four-door, automatic transmission Hyundai Sonata GLS. There's a bit of a story behind the acquisition...

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Here it is 9:17 PM (actually 10:17 here in Texas) on Tuesday, and I sit in a chair by the window on the 12th floor of the Dallas Texas DoubleTree Hotel as outside a huge thunderstorm winds down after pelting the area with water, hail, and lightning. At the nearby freeway exchange northwest of the hotel, emergency vehicles' flashing lights grab the eye, and sirens blare as others come to join. I have no idea what happened, but assume that the bad weather resulted in a severe multi-car accident with perhaps many injured. I hope this is not the case, but I can't imagine why so many sirens and flashing lights keep approaching, one after another. From the elevators, we (my coworker, Randy, who is here too -- we're attending a two-day training work-related seminar) can look west and see the flashing lights, and other cars off the side of the road with their emergency flashers on. My curiosity is driving me crazy.

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Smoke rises from the remnant
of the Timber Top Mountain fireRewind to Thursday, the 31st of July. Early that evening, while at my folks' home in Hurricane, I was going stir-crazy, having been indoors all day in front of a computer. So I badgered my little brother until he admitted a desire to get outside, and we hopped in his car and took off. When he asked where I thought we should go, I told him, "Wherever the car takes us." It took us to Zion National Park, in particular, the Kolob Fingers area of the park, just off of Interstate 15, near New Harmony, Utah.

Not long ago, on a trip to Minersville, Utah, my brother and I had noticed a pillar of smoke climbing into the sky from atop one of the towering sandstone mountains of the Kolob Fingers area, Timber Top Mountain, that just peeks over the hills and is briefly visible from the freeway. We both surmised it was from a recent lightning-started blaze. Well sure enough, as the scenic drive rounded the hills to climb southward toward the view point, we had a clear view of smoke rising from a nook, a saddle of sandstone well below the 8,055 ft. elevation summit of Timber Top Mountain.

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I was going to go to bed without writing anything tonight (now early A.M. tomorrow morning). That was until I stumbled across an old MIDI file from 1996, one of my very first attempts at musical composition, a very short 12-measure piece.

Back when I first got a computer of my own, in 1996, I shortly thereafter experiemented with some MIDI editing software that allowed me to enter notes into the computer by hand, and then would play them back to me. I had a blast! I think I went a little crazy.

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Ok, since I'm one of those single guys, those bachelors, that Brigham Young is purported to have said are a menace to society, holding a Family Home Evening, as counseled and as President James E. Faust recently reiterated in the First Presidency Message in the June 2003 Ensign can prove rather interesting. Sometimes I visit my parents in nearby Hurricane and participate in their Family Home Evening. Since I'm no longer in a singles ward, I don't belong to a Family Home Evening group. Thankfully, I've got an LDS roommate who wants to be obedient, and who gently reminds should I forget or think to shirk. So we hold Family Home Evening after all, my roommate and I, joined by our mutual friend.

That's what we did tonight, the three of us, after a dinner of Subway sandwiches.

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My sister's kitten plays on the bookshelvesWell she did it! I don't know how, but she did it. My youngest sibling finally triumphed. For a very long time now, my father has been adament that cats were outdoor pets only. My teenage sister wore his resistance down, and now she has a cat, a kitten. And it's fun to play with, sociable and friendly, soft fur, sharp claws and all.

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It's my brother's birthday today, so here goes: Happy Birthday, Andy! Andy's been not only a brother, but a friend since we grew up together. Now he lives in Georgia with his wife and five kids. Though I do miss spending time together and visiting, he's the kind of brother and friend that when we do meet or chat on the telephone, we just pick right back up where we left of. Andy has also been a great example to me, of patience, diligence in doing what's right, and listening and obeying answers to prayers. Thank you, Andy!

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This evening (Saturday evening), I read some of my earlier web page entries out loud to some family members. Eeek! I made a painful discovery! You see, I'm one who appreciates excellent grammar, correct spelling, and good writing. I discovered that this this web page was a perfect example of what I dislike, gross grammar, sad spelling, and wretched writing.

So please forgive me should ever I chide someone else for poor writing skills, or point my hypocritical finger at another web site. And please, feel free to laugh at my mistakes, or if you are generous, point them out to me (see below).

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I am definitely my father's son. Or so my dad told me this afternoon, when I told him how I cut my finger.

While I was visiting at my parents home in Hurricane, Utah this afternoon, my sister pulled her Pontiac Sunbird into the driveway, home from work in Zion National Park. The other day she'd noticed that her car had a small coolant leak. After parking in the driveway, she opened the hood of her car, looking for the source of the leak. Soon she came inside the house and announced she'd discovered the source of the coolant leak. It was a radiator hose -- it had a hole in it, spraying a hot mixture of antifreeze and water into the engine compartment.

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