A million tweets = One big roar

Thanks to those who mentioned beer traps for garden slugs. I have two just like this. The slugs smell the beer in the wells, crawl up that little slope, and fall into the beer and drown. (At least they die happy!) They work amazingly well, and after a couple of days, the trap will be crammed with slugs. It's disgusting. What was even more disgusting was one year when I dumped the trap by where the marsh starts, and when I went out the next day...something had eaten them all. Ewwww! Anyhoo, yes, beer traps really work! I didn't need to use them this year, because I didn't plant lettuce, and that seems to be what they really go after here.

It rained most of the day here, although Ken was able to get the lawn mowed. I'm actually happy to see a good, soaking rain, because it's giving the garden a drink! We'll be leaving for Detroit tomorrow afternoon, and returning on Saturday. I think I'll take my laptop, so I should get an update or two in there somewhere. We'll be meeting up with our pal Mark of Stars Like Grains of Sand in My Pocket and attending the Star Trek exhibit at the Detroit Science Center, plus seeing the new "Star Trek" movie. Mark hasn't seen it yet, so I know he'll enjoy it! I anticipate a dinner somewhere that will include lots of talk about his plans, our lives here at Nutwood, and we should be able to solve a world problem or two while we're at it. [grin] On Friday, we'll travel to Monroe to meet our friends Bill and Mary Sue. Ken used to work with Bill when Ken lived in Michigan. They're such nice people, and even came down for our wedding in 2001. That meant a lot to both of us, and we're looking forward to seeing them again. We'll have plenty to catch up on, believe me! I think they will be quite stunned to hear about some of the things that have happened since we last met up.

Wish we could see some of our other peeps in the Detroit area--Alaina, Tawnya, Linda...did I miss anyone? This is a short trip, though, so we might have to save that for the next one! I'm looking forward to visiting Detroit. I've never been there before, only to Dearborn many years ago.

Like many of you, I've been following the protests that are taking place in Iran following the election. It's pretty obvious that Ahmadinejad stole the election, but I think it's unlikely that anything will be overturned. What is remarkable is to see the thousands of people that have mobilized to showed their support for the opposition, and displeasure with the current regime. It's also frightening to see the violence and rioting, and the pictures of state police beating protesters. I ask again: does anyone really want to see that in our own country? We need to strive for peaceful change, not violent revolution. Take a look at some of these pictures. If you're like me, you will get a feeling of gratitude that we live where we do, as well as a profound respect for those Iranians who are protesting the regime that they find oppressive and backward. I salute them and hope that there will be no more deaths at the hands of the state police.

The other amazing element in this story is what a huge part the Net has played. As explained in this piece, the Iran government clamped down on media and Net access...but they forgot about Twitter. Although they've tried to shut that down, too, the unique nature of Twitter (from what I understand, it's highly configurable, and user-generated content is a large part of it) means that people found "work-arounds" in order to tweet about the conditions on the ground in Iran. I was stunned to pull up #iranelection and see the thousands of tweets. Just in the time it took me to read a few--perhaps all of a minute--there were over one thousand additional tweets. It was awesome to me, in the truest sense of the word. I've never seen anything like it.

At the 1968 Democratic convention in Chicago, protesters shouted "The whole world is watching!" as the protests became violent, and TV cameras beamed the images around the world. The 2009 protests in Iran will go down in history as an almost participatory worldwide protest. I couldn't do much, but I changed my time setting on Twitter to show that of Tehran, in order to make it harder for the Iranian government to try to track down those who are tweeting "illegally" in the country. Something that the oppressive government there--and in other countries around the world--has yet to learn is that the world has moved on. Cell phones, digital cameras, and pocket video recorders mean an almost instantaneous update, a real-time, front row seat of the event. Does anyone else find this amazing, or is it just me?

How about a little music from The Only Band That Matters (I think there are plenty of others, but in their heyday...yeah, they pretty much were THE band), The Clash? Here is "Clampdown." Still relevant, isn't it?

Kick over the wall, cause governments to fall
How can you refuse it?
Let fury have the hour, anger can be power
D'you know how you can use it?