Don's Patch Issue #2006-06-01 from http://www.don-guitar.com First word, from Don: It's heating up in Texas. With temperatures in the lower nineties and humidity hovering around seventy percent this is a great time to be doing something indoors. *grin* Of course Lisa's entirely unfazed by any such notion and continues to spend as much time as possible in the yard communing with her plants. Don't get me wrong, I'm not immune to the appeal of puttering with plants. Just this morning, in fact, I spent a few minutes planting garlic bulbs in the flower garden and a couple of days ago I put out some sweet banana pepper seedlings. Sometime in the next few days I plan to put out some bell pepper seedlings. She has no objections to vegetables but she's a little more interested in flowering plants. Me, I just look at the plant and ask "Can you eat that?". My thanks to those few who sent us feedback on the last issue but let's have some more please. Where do you live? What do you enjoy? What's good, bad, or interesting about your world? Let us know. Don's feedback form: http://www.don-guitar.com/contactme.html Lisa's feedback form: http://www.don-guitar.com/lfefo.html Our personal news page. http://www.don-guitar.com/babbleon.html Don at myspace.com. http://www.myspace.com/donguitar Don's blog. http://blog.myspace.com/donguitar Lisa at myspace.com. http://www.myspace.com/81825549 Lisa's blog. http://blog.myspace.com/81825549 ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Wild, wild west. http://wildwildwest.warnerbros.com/cmp/frameset.html http://www.pjfarmer.com/woldnewton/WWWest.htm http://www.uvm.edu/~glambert/twww1.html http://www.wildwildwest.org/ American west. http://members.aol.com/gibson0817/homepage.htm http://www.americanwest.com/ http://members.aol.com/TeacherNet/West.html (portal) Would you like to report a crime? http://www.911.com/ AACircuit is an interesting app for electronics hobbyists. It creates electronic circuit diagrams using plain text characters. The website is in German but the download link is clearly visible. http://www.tech-chat.de/ What do you do if an atomic bomb goes off while you're on the golf course? http://joekohl.com/toons/abomb.htm Some very nice online learning explorations from the (U.S.) National Health Museum. http://www.accessexcellence.org/RC/ Play a battleship-like game online against another online human opponent. http://www.sinkmyship.com/ The Kingdom of An Tir from the Society for Creative Anachronism, Inc. http://www.antir.sca.org/ Creating social change. http://www.ashoka.org/ The American Sign Language browser. http://commtechlab.msu.edu/sites/aslweb/ Take in some science courtesy of the BBC. http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/ Business and entrepreneurial resources. http://www.bizjournals.com/ http://www.advancingwomen.com/ http://www.loc.gov/rr/business/guide/guide2/ http://www.gsea.org/ http://www.entrepreneurfund.org/ http://www.entrepreneur-web.com/ http://www.eonetwork.org/ http://www.businesstown.com/ http://snipurl.com/r36b http://www.gleq.org/ http://www.entrepreneur.com/ http://www.mbemag.com/ http://www.benlore.com/ http://www.tenonline.org/ http://www.youngentrepreneur.com/ http://www.tannedfeet.com/ http://www.nwen.org/ http://www.khake.com/page31.html http://snipurl.com/r36k ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª This publication is only mailed to verified double opt-in subscribers, and is brought to you by me, Don Crowder, my wife, Lisa Miller, and http://www.freelists.org ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Story of two rescued rabbits and lots of info about bunnies. http://homepage.mac.com/mattocks/morfz/home.html Communists suppressed all art but their own, but the result was a style that was distinctive. http://info-poland.buffalo.edu/socrealism/tot/ http://www.iisg.nl/~landsberger/ http://www.iisg.nl/exhibitions/chairman/ How many did Communist regimes murder? http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/COM.ART.HTM Just what it says. http://www.damninteresting.com/ One of the most valued plants in the world, and a good site. http://medplant.nmsu.edu/taraxcum.html A kitten a day. http://dailykitten.com/ Stop "Digital Rights Management" software, designed to impose restrictions on computer users. http://defectivebydesign.org/ Diabetes information and advice. http://www.diabetes.remedyonline.com/ Take this test to see which Linux distro is right for you. http://desktoplinuxathome.com/distro.html Interesting DOS programs. http://www.opus.co.tt/dave/index.htm Dr. Bob's interesting science stuff. http://www.frontiernet.net/~docbob/ See live images from around the world. http://www.earthcam.com/ Encyclopedia of Escherichia coli. http://ecocyc.org/ Gods of Japan. http://www.onmarkproductions.com/html/buddhism.shtml Costless online games. http://www.freeonlinegames.com/ Elementary Theme pages. http://www.cdli.ca/CITE/ ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª At the time this issue was posted, the current subscriber count for this publication was 295. ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª This issue's collection of news/magazine/informational sites (these are chosen for maximum diversity regardless of "spin" ). http://www.getunderground.com/index.cfm (embedded sound) http://www.hollywood.com/ http://glossynews.com/ http://www.luckymag.com/ http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/ http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/ http://www.nlr.net/ http://www.networkworld.com/ http://www.new-agri.co.uk/ http://www.ddj.com/ (embedded sound) http://www.freenewmexican.com/ http://www.tnr.com/ ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Boardgame geek. http://www.boardgamegeek.com/ Don't quote me on this. http://www.brainyquote.com/ Chandler is a PIM (Personal Information Manager). http://www.osafoundation.org/Chandler_Compelling_Vision.htm Children's Literature. http://www.ucalgary.ca/~dkbrown/index.html Did you eat breakfast? http://www.choosebreakfast.com/ The FOSS movement http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FOSS has it's fringes. http://civicactions.com/ Some computer geek-like resources. http://foldoc.org/ http://foldoc.org/ http://www.webopedia.com/ A few sites you may have mythed. http://mythicjourneys.org/bigmyth/2_eng_myths.htm http://www.pibburns.com/myth.htm http://web.uvic.ca/grs/bowman/myth/ http://www.mythinglinks.org/ http://snipurl.com/r3u8 http://www.st.rim.or.jp/~cycle/myrefE.HTML http://www.mythman.com/ http://www.mythweb.com/ http://www.powhatan.org/pocc.html (this is cool) Home entertainment media on steroids. http://www.mythtv.org/ What in blazes is it? Start here. http://www.mythtv.org/docs/mythtv-HOWTO-1.html#ss1.1 ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª If you'd like to help promote this non-commercial publication, please forward this ezine to anyone you know who might appreciate it. To spare them the forwarding carets (>>>>these things) I suggest you copy/paste the ezine to a new email window, or save the ezine as a text file to be inserted, or copy/pasted to a new email. If you've received this publication as a forward and wish to subscribe you may easily do so from online forms in these two locations: http://www.don-guitar.com/subsmanager.html http://www.freelists.org/list/donspatch ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Genetic science and health. http://snipurl.com/r4xo http://www.ygyh.org/ http://gslc.genetics.utah.edu/ http://www.genome.jp/kegg/ http://wheat.pw.usda.gov/GG2/index.shtml What's your sign? http://www.luckyfortune.com/ The children of northern Uganda. A Google video that is tough to watch but informative and stunning. http://snipurl.com/r4yj For anyone interested in Open Source software. http://ithacafreesoftware.org/ Interesting thing of the day. http://itotd.com/ Fun site for kids, parents and teachers. http://www.millsberry.com/index.phtml Some cool videos here. http://www.mojoflix.com/ Sacred sites and ancient civilizations. http://www.mysteriousplaces.com/index2.html For once in recent history, it's hip to be a nerd. How nerdy are you? http://www.nerdtests.com/index.php The Nobel Prize. http://nobelprize.org/index.html NPR's online music show. http://www.npr.org/programs/asc/ The ends of the Earth. http://www.photolib.noaa.gov/corps/ Kenny Muir, a wonderful photographer in Scotland. http://www.flickr.com/photos/krmuir/ What's your pirate name? http://www.fidius.org/quiz/pirate/ ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Our feedback form: http://www.don-guitar.com/contactme.html We welcome all comments, suggestions, or criticism. The form doesn't access your email client (it's a CGI form), so your privacy is assured. If you know of a website that would be a good candidate for this ezine, please pass it on via our online feedback form (link above). ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª What are your 43 things? http://www.43things.com/ A few resources for electronics hobbyists. http://electronic-circuits-diagrams.com/ File extensions are the three characters after the 'dot' in a Windows file name. Almost every Windows user will, sooner or later, find a 'mystery' file, with a file extension he or she doesn't recognize. There's help online. http://www.ace.net.nz/tech/TechFileFormat.html http://www.cybertechhelp.com/fileextensions/A http://www.fileinfo.net/ http://filext.com/ http://www.computeruser.com/resources/dictionary/filetypes.html http://www.sharpened.net/helpcenter/extensions.php http://www.stack.com/file/extension/ http://www.file-ext.com/ Social commentary from a civil affairs soldier at war. http://www.fortunateson.org/ I didn't care for the music but you might. http://www.fortunate-accident.org/music.html#null Student activism. http://www.freeculture.org/ Gaming. http://www.gaminginside.com/ Recipes and more from General Mills. http://snipurl.com/r51a ASL dictionary. http://www.handspeak.com/ Recipes and more from Heinz. http://www.57.com/ Here's an interesting fact. This site's 'daily' fact hasn't been updated in over two weeks. http://www.hookedonfacts.com/ Some online resources for young students. http://illuminations.nctm.org/ Do optical illusions hurt your eyes? http://www.ritsumei.ac.jp/%7Eakitaoka/saishin-e.html This one looks interesting. http://www.interesting.com/ ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Archives for this ezine are available online here: http://www.freelists.org/archives/donspatch/ The current issue is also available on our website. http://www.don-guitar.com/currentissue.html RSS feed is available via this link. http://www.freelists.org/archives/donspatch/feed.rss ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Getting there with renewable energy. http://www.planetsolar.org/planetsolar.en.shtml Population growth and balance. http://arcytech.org/java/population/ About visas and embassies worldwide. http://www.projectvisa.com/ Painted beehive panels from Slovenia. http://snipurl.com/r4zv Historic Route 66. http://www.national66.com/ Let the Prez say whatever you like! http://george.says-it.com/ The National Academy of Sciences of Belarus. http://www.ac.by/index.html Some interesting sounds. http://asa.aip.org/sound.html Online computer checkup and diagnostics. http://www.pcpitstop.com/default.asp An interesting blog. http://www.stepintomythimble.com/wordpress/ ABC Science Online. http://www.abc.net.au/science/ Ever hear of Goa Tse? http://www.uncyclopedia.org/wiki/Goa_Tse United Nations Crime and Justice Information Network. http://www.uncjin.org/ Very cool illusion. http://www.patmedia.net/marklevinson/cool/cool_illusion.html Look up words or build your own dictionary. http://www.wordcentral.com/ You can be an author of this travel guide! http://www.world66.com/ The World Almanac for Kids Online. http://www.worldalmanacforkids.com/explore/index.html As usual, a picture is worth... well, you know. http://snipurl.com/r511 ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Websites everyone should know about. These aren't sponsors, they're the best of Internet publications and I highly recommend them all. http://askTCL.com http://www.langa.com http://www.tourbus.com http://www.lockergnome.com http://www.neatnettricks.com http://www.scotsnewsletter.com http://www.tricksandtrinkets.com http://marylaine.com/neatnew.html ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Here in central Texas we see a lot of mosquitoes whenever it rains but the 'skeeters' don't last long thanks to the Mexican Freetailed bats. http://www.thewildones.org/Animals/mexFree.html http://www.rozylowicz.com/retirement/carlsbad/carlsbad-bats.html http://www.ctdxcc.org/bats/ http://www.utexas.edu/features/archive/2004/bats.html http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/environment/bats_tx.htm http://www.earthsky.com/earthcare/shows.php?&date=20010608 A walk through Durham Township, Pennsylvania. Kathleen Connally 's awesome photoblog. http://www.durhamtownship.com/ Letterbox word game. http://letterbox.lexigame.com/ An interview with Linus Torvalds. http://snipurl.com/r523 Videos of extremely close calls (may not be worth the wait on a dial-up connection) http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2053215653895871142 http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4683502345579146769 Marilee's word puzzles. http://marilee.us/wdpuzzles.html Monterey Bay Educators Against War. http://www.mbeaw.org/ Men versus women (funny). http://sneesh.fireflyinternet.co.uk/malefemale.htm Learn about meta-search engines. http://snipurl.com/r52f http://searchenginewatch.com/links/article.php/2156241 http://www.indiana.edu/~librcsd/search/ Try out a meta-search engine. http://www.highway61.com/ http://www.mamma.com/ http://www.surfwax.com/ http://metasearch.com/ http://www.webmetasearch.com/ http://www.dogpile.com/ http://snaket.di.unipi.it/ http://www.kartoo.com/ http://www.ixquick.com/ http://vivisimo.com/ http://www.searchallinone.com/ http://www.metagopher.com/ http://www.zworks.com/ http://www.jux2.com/ http://www.widow.com/ http://www.monstercrawler.com/ http://www.windseek.com/ http://turbo10.com/ In my lifetime, agriculture has become the concern of big business consortiums but small-scale farming and ranching are still alive and looking for ways to get by. http://www.albc-usa.org/ http://www.nal.usda.gov/afsic/AFSIC_pubs/altlist.htm http://www.lpes.org/Small_Farms.html http://www.naturalfamilyhome.com/livestock.html http://msucares.com/livestock/small_animal/index.html http://www.farminfo.org/ ============== Humor ============= Things said by kids. Part IV It was an age of great inventions and discoveries. Gutenberg invented removable type and the Bible. Another important invention was the circulation of blood. Sir Walter Raleigh is a historical figure because he invented cigarettes and started smoking. Sir Francis Drake circumsized the world with a 100-foot clipper. The greatest writer of the Renaissance was William Shakespeare. He was born in the year 1564, supposedly on his birthday. He never made much money and is famous only because of his plays. He wrote tragedies, comedies, and hysterectomies, all in Islamic pentameter. Romeo and Juliet are an example of a heroic couple. Romeo's last wish was to be laid by Juliet. ============== Tips =============== Computer tip of the week from KAMU. http://cis.tamu.edu/training/tips/index.php Computer help powered by volunteers. http://www.help2go.com/ Photography tips. http://snipurl.com/8pro ======== Reader Contributions ========= Links from readers are always welcome and you can even write your own link descriptions if you like. Guidelines are available here: http://www.don-guitar.com/descriptivetext.html ================================= From reader, and web sibling Jo-Ann Burton. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sharinglinks2/ ================================= The Guinness World Record for longest gum wrapper chain. http://www.gumwrapper.com/gary.htm Thanatology: The history of death, dying and mourning. Sociology of death and dying. http://www.trinity.edu/~mkearl/death.html Museums of funeral history and customs. http://www.nmfh.org/ http://www.funeralmuseum.org/ http://www.fieldtrip.com/pa/02595800.htm Aging and death in folklore. http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/aging.html Backcountry death ways. http://xroads.virginia.edu/~UG97/albion/adeath.html Gravestone symbolism and inconography. http://members.aol.com/TombView/symbol.html Military funeral customs. http://www.arlingtoncemetery.net/customs.htm Mourning rituals, clothing and customs in general. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mourning http://snipurl.com/qtr0 (pop-under) Jewish. http://www.jdcc.org/sepoct97/doc1.htm Victorian. http://www.quilthistory.com/VMC.htm http://historiccamdencounty.com/ccnews43.shtml http://ky.essortment.com/victorianmourni_rlse.htm Aboriginal. http://snipurl.com/qtr3 (pop-under) Aztec. http://snipurl.com/qtr9 Hawaiian. http://coffeetimes.com/feb98.htm Mexican. http://snipurl.com/qtrc Mongolian. http://snipurl.com/qtre Quaker. http://snipurl.com/qtrh Chinese. http://snipurl.com/qtri http://www.zip.com.au/%7Elyallg/chinfun.htm Memento Mori. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memento_mori Warlords of Afghanistan (ancient to present). http://www.warlordsofafghanistan.com/ Take a peek at all of the new and nifty cooking gadgets. http://cooking-gadgets.com/ Cooking and food. http://www.cooking-and-food.com/ Weather Chaos. http://www.weatherwars.info/ A site that packs a punch. Loaded with all sorts of trivia. http://home.nycap.rr.com/useless/site_index/ ================================= From reader and friend, Irving Stein. http://www.irvings-info-page.cityslide.com ================================= DNS (geeky) stuff. http://www.dnsstuff.com/ I could have done without the sound but this quiz is cute. http://snipurl.com/ewgr A simple but challenging game. http://members.iinet.net.au/~pontipak/redsquare.html Remote backup. https://mozy.com/ USDA Forest Service. http://www.fs.fed.us/ A video archive. http://www.videobomb.com/ ================================= From reader and friend Patrick Barden ================================= Common place. http://www.common-place.org/ Everyday Mysteries. http://www.loc.gov/rr/scitech/mysteries/ Download a camera. http://snipurl.com/r55i *sigh* As usual, I didn't care for the embedded music, but Lisa loved the website. http://www.treherneminis.com/Doves%20page.htm Thank you Irv, Jo, and Patrick. ================================= Links I snagged from the Highland Lakes Computer Club http://pages.tstar.net/~hlcc/ ================================= The infinite cat project. http://www.infinitecat.com/ Dell Inspiron/Latitude/Precision fan control utility. http://www.diefer.de/i8kfan/ An unusual Windows repair tool. http://www.e-fense.com/helix/ A cross-platform podcast receiver. http://juicereceiver.sourceforge.net/index.php A Linux utility that I'm not geek enough to fully understand (but it looks interesting) http://klik.atekon.de/ A catalog of full commercial games that have been liberated and made (costless) in playable form to the public. http://www.liberatedgames.com/gamelisting.php A Linux distro selection test. http://www.zegeniestudios.net/ldc/ Linux is Not Windows (an interesting article). http://linux.oneandoneis2.org/LNW.htm Linux help from Scot Finnie. http://www.linuxclues.com/ If you travel a lot while your computer stays at home, here's a site you might be able to use. http://www.mail2web.com/ Hummie's digital scrapbooking obsession. http://www.hummiesworld.com/index.html You know how Internet Explorer and Outlook Express have always been bundled? If you've always liked that but aren't entirely happy about using Microsoft's browser and email client, SeaMonkey is for you. http://www.mozilla.org/projects/seamonkey/ SystemRescueCD is a useful tool for Windows or Linux computer systems. http://www.sysresccd.org/Main_Page ================================= Last words, from Lisa: Recently, I was talking to my mother, who does not own a computer. I suggested she might like one, if for no other reason than to send and receive email. Our family is notorious for promising to write and never doing it. Most people will take the time to sit down and write a quick email to a friend long after that friend despaired of ever receiving a 'real letter'. Coincidentally, Don has strongly suggested I start a blog, so the idea came to combine the two. So far it has been easier to write a journal if I know it's a 'letter to Mom', trying to write some most everyday, printing and mailing it about once a week. That way, I have a diary, a blog, and a 'real letter' to my mom. Think I'll get a blog and call it "Letters to Mom". Y'all come back, now. Lisa Lisa's feedback form: http://www.don-guitar.com/lfefo.html Don's feedback form: http://www.don-guitar.com/contactme.html Our personal news page. http://www.don-guitar.com/babbleon.html Don Crowder and Lisa Miller Wednesday, June 1, 2006 12:15 AM CST - Buchanan Lake Village, Texas, USA Served by the U.S. Post Office in Tow (rhymes-with-cow), Texas ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª Privacy: We will never share, sell, or otherwise compromise your email address. Privacy Policy on our website. http://www.don-guitar.com/privacy.html Freelists.org Privacy Policy. http://www.freelists.org/privacy.html ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª The most important people on the Internet, for you and I as computer users, are software developers. The world's coolest computer, without software, is like a car without fuel. It might look great, but what can it do? It doesn't matter who produces the software you love and use regularly, the developers of that software need your support. A bit of advice from Internet veteran Bayard J. Fox: New computer users are often in awe of the things you can get without cost on the Internet. There can be hidden costs for the unwary. Use a "throw away" email address to register, and be constantly on guard against giving away personal information. Use a firewall, and provide only the barest minimum of information on questionnaires. ªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªªª This is a reader-supported publication. You can show your support by making a contribution in any amount you choose. No contribution is too small. http://www.don-guitar.com/donations.html ___________________________________________________________ Subscription management for this publication is available online here: http://www.don-guitar.com/subsmanager.html or here: http://www.freelists.org/list/donspatch