Winding down...

I'm one page short of finishing another section of translation, but I don't feel like finishing the job tonight. It's better to do it tomorrow... at least I know it won't take me long. :^)

Despite earlier declarations, I did sit down for about 10 minutes to see what I could see with regard to the infected file on zion. First, it turns out that I misread the data in the antivirus report: IE5 was not infected. Rather, it was a file called explorer.exe stored in a subdirectory whose path has 'IE5' in it as the extension to a directory.

I checked the path variable of the environment and did not see anything unusual.

The note from Kaspersky suggested I try deleting the file. That didn't work. It then suggested I search the Registry, which I did (to a broader extent than suggested by the e-mail). Next, I searched the autoexec.bat, win.ini, and system.ini files. No joy. Although 'explorer.exe. appears often in the Registry, to the best of my knowledge, none of the references were to the infected application sitting in its own subdirectory.

Nothing seemed to help solve the problem of why I couldn't just delete the file (the system wouldn't let me, claiming the file was "in use").

However, when I restarted the system in MS-DOS mode, I had no difficulty deleting the file. Nothing heinous has occurred since restarting the machine, but we'll let that simmer overnight to make sure.

Time to hit the hay.

Cheers...

P.S. Drew did call earlier in the day. They made it to California okay, but I suspect they arrived at oh-dark-thirty. But they got there safely... that's what counts!

Out of the frying pan...

A couple of nights ago, while surfing the channels on the kids' satellite TV, Galina ran across a pitch to sign up for a pay-per-view showing of Bridget Jones's Diary. We eventually passed on that, but last night, I made a special trip to the rental place down the road and brought back a copy of the film, at Galina's request.

Personally, I've been mildly interested in the Jones phenomenon ever since the ATA conference at the beginning of November. There, I recall hearing a speaker cite Bridget Jones's Diary as an example of authentic British speech, in a presentation on the differences between British and American English.

Most folks know that some things have different names in the U.S. and England. For example, an apartment here is a "flat" there, a truck is a "lorry," an elevator is a "lift," and there are many others. There are even companies out there that offer a "translation" service between BE and AE, as they are called.

Idioms are different, too. In college, I recall a ping-pong partner newly arrived from England asking me "Shall I knock you up?" which was the source of great amusement for all concerned for half the night (he was asking if I wanted to do what we Yanks call "warm up"). It's the kind of thing that lends credence to what Winston Churchill once observed, that Britons and Americans are "kindred peoples separated by a common language." But I seriously digress...

In her presentation at the ATA conference, the speaker - among other remarks - stated that it was the Puritan ethic that kept Americans from using certain words in their workaday lives, and mentioned the dialog in Bridget Jones's Diary as an example of how real English-speakers expressed themselves. Not having read the book, I could only imagine what she meant.

Now, I can't speak to the crack about the Puritan ethic, though I suspect it's a crock. That one does not go through life with the lower lip fixed to the edge of one's upper central incisors, in perpetual readiness to say the "F" word (or one of it's cousins) seems poor evidence of religious influence. I'd put it in the same class as not forgoing the use of soap, deodorant, comb, and clean clothes in social situations. In short, most people don't use certain words, or try not to use certain words, more as a means of maintaining a level of civility and civilization than anything else. But again, I wander... and carrying a soapbox, no less...

Don't mind me.

After watching the film - and it's an eminently watchable film, by the way - I suspect that I'll have to read the book for the full "linguistic" effect, as the film's language was likely bowdlerized to mollify the flacks rating the film for release. If that is the case, I cannot imagine how the film suffered for the bowdlerization, or how the film might have been better without it.

Cheers...

To: Any service member

On this Christmas Eve, you might consider sending a message of support to the kids who are out defending our country as members of the Armed Forces. If you go to this site, it won't even cost you a stamp!

My note, addressed to a member of my old "outfit":

Greetings from an old jarhead, who went through boot camp before many of you gyrenes were born.

This year, Christmastime finds you on the other side of the world, away from your homes and your families. There's a bunch of us that know that feeling, and we know there's little we can say or do to take the edge off of that ache, except possibly to note that the job you've got needs doing, and that there are no better men around to do it.

A pair of lines from an old poem written by a guy watching an artillery barrage a long time ago helped me during my time in the Corps. They go like this:

"Oh! thus be it ever, when free men shall stand
Between their loved homes and the war's desolation!"

The author of the poem was a guy named Key, and we sing the first stanza of his poem before every ball game. :^) The lines above are from the last stanza, which speaks of the worth of placing your young body in harm's way to protect that home and family you're missing.

One could argue that,* given the circumstances, there are few better ways to spend Christmas, but you won't hear a very convincing argument from me.

Take care of yourselves, stay on the bounce, kick butt, and then come home! Meanwhile, all you guys will be in my thoughts and prayers.

The limit on the size of the message is 1000 characters; unfortunately, the site doesn't warn you if your message is over the limit (mine is, apparently; the asterisk marks the cutoff).

Cheers...