After a few days of downtime due to my injured back (which is improving, albeit slowly, thanks for asking) I went back to work this weekend. The network was running pretty smoothly; there were very few problems I had to deal with.

I spent my free time furiously hitting "refresh" on Twitter's #IranElection search page.

Fascinating, and heart-rending.

Note to the Bush haters: that is what a stolen election really looks like.

Hot Air headlines points to a handy guide on how to track the Iranian uprising on Twitter and other social media.

'Round about midnight last night, as those of you who follow me on Twitter or Facebook might have noticed, I blew out a disk in my lower back.

Yes, "blew out" is an overstatement; it's maybe herniated, but certainly bulging and putting pressure on the nerves to my right hip and leg. I'm OK when I'm sitting, but standing and walking is unbelievably — almost unbearably — painful.

Going down the stairs, feeding the cats, and coming back up last night was perhaps the single most physically challenging thing I have done in my entire life. I was tempted to cry like a little girl, but I suspect that if I had, my inner child would have showed up, slapped me around and told me to cowboy up.

[I have yet to attempt the same feat today... but there are three very annoyed-looking cats staring at me. I think they sense my vulnerability; I know if they were anywhere close to my size, I'd be lunch.]

As luck would have it, I had a repair done on a root canal last week; I was given Vicodin, which I didn't need at all at the time. It's coming in handy now, as is the brand new bottle of Advil, for its anti-inflammatory effect. At least, I hope they'll be effective today; they didn't seem to do much good last night.

Good thing this all happened on my days off from work. It's not like I have chores to do and errands to run or anything.

Homemade breakfast burritos for dinner.

What can possibly explain the music videos of the '80s?

Drugs. Had to have been lots of drugs.

Wait, no... that was the "literal version" of Bonnie Tyler's Total Eclipse of the Heart — I've been LOLing over it since I saw it last week.

It's a good song, maybe even a great song, but forever mockable for its hyper-clichéd video. Which also, coincidentally, can be explained by drugs.

And for my brother, here's the literal version of Tears For Fears' Head Over Heels. Awesome.

Hurricane season begins today.

(Why yes, I have been stocking up on emergency supplies. Probably should have started a long time ago, but better late than never.)

I'm Pro-Life. Always have been, always will be. The casual murder of the unborn is an evil beyond compare, and needs to be fought. This, though, is not the way..

Looks like they caught the shooter, by the way. I've seen people wishing that the killer was a disgruntled husband, or a relative of one of Tiller's patients; I don't think so. Gateway Pundit quotes one of his commenters:

Despite peoples' wishes, I think we're going to find out that Tiller's murderer was indeed associated, albeit on the fringes, with some sort of pro-life organization.

That association will indeed be used to tar the entirety of the pro-life movement, in precisely the same way that the entirety of Islam wasn't after 9/11, or the Left in general wasn't after a Weather Underground bombing.

Don't kid yourselves. The odds of Tiller having been murdered for any reason other than his "medical" practice are vanishingly small.

Actually, yeah, that's me he's quoting.

There will be a backlash against the Pro-Life movement. It's coming. Never mind that the murder has been universally condemned — the forces of the Left, with the willing assistance of the most abortion-friendly (and gun-hating) administration in our history, will use this crime as a pretext to do their utmost to silence their opponents and, as a bonus, will likely try to leverage this incident to disarm Americans.

Now, I have a very hard time shedding a tear over the fate of a man who committed what I consider to be infanticide for a living, and I know I'm not alone. But let me be perfectly clear: murder, every murder, is wrong.

I am always dismayed when someone takes into his own hands the powers that are reserved to the State and to God: administration of justice, and judging a man's soul. The latter is particularly to be regretted; there is always a chance for anyone to reform their ways, to repent of their evil past. Though the odds may have been slim, the murderer robbed Tiller of that opportunity to change.

The irony, of course, is that the murderer will get the justice he deserves... but in the right way, through the legal system. Meanwhile, he has done incalculable damage to the cause he purports to support.

Aside: Tiller was killed at church. I'm guessing that particular church isn't really strong on the whole "repentance" thing. I mean, seriously, what kind of allegedly Christian church welcomes an abortionist, particularly one who unapologetically performs late-term abortions, without insisting on repentance and reform?

Would your church welcome, say, an unrepentant serial rapist into the fold?

Ed calls it domestic terrorism. Yeah, I think that's about right.

I am part of a management team, 50+ people, which oversees 30,000+ routers and switches. These are not little routers like that Linksys or D-link you might have on your desk at home. The smallest router I deal with has ten times the capability of those... and the most powerful ones are nearly the size of a refrigerator.

We have quite a few customers; some can be repeatedly and stupidly problematic. Like, for instance, not keeping their virus definitions up to date.

John(14:45:10): it's amazing how often what they do to themselves suddenly becomes our problem
Russ(14:46:15): yes, if only we could do without those pesky customers
Russ(14:46:27): the network would run a lot smoother
Russ(14:46:34): and be waaaaay smaller

Customer-caused problems = job security. I hope.

^{[Once again I note for the record that I haven't and won't say who I work for.]}

I certainly enjoyed former VP Dick Cheney's speech yesterday. I didn't bother listening to Obama's.

It continues to irk me that Obama would release details about interrogation methods used against captured terrorists, but won't, per Cheney's request, release any information about what results were yielded, what specific terrorist plots were thwarted. Heaven forfend that anyone begin to suspect that our intelligence methods might be effective.

This turns the entire notion of "classification" on its head. One of the very first things they teach everyone in the intelligence business is that things are classified based on sources and methods, not on the results achieved.

The way he's operating, I suspect that if Obama had been president in 1942, he'd have released the details about Magic, but not told the American people about the US victory at Midway.

I'm not entirely convinced that Obama has our best interests in mind.

Since my birthday is Sunday, I thought I would mention that if anyone is thinking about getting me anything but doesn't know what, well, I'd like one of these.

I have two nieces and a nephew, and reason to be proud of all three of them. They are exceptional kids, and will soon be fine, upstanding adults.

Here's one reason I'm proud of my nephew: he composed the piece performed here.

[That is the Santa Barbara High School Madrigal Choir at their annual Spring concert.]

He's a talented young man, and I could not be prouder.