Finally got the Wizards pics up. Yes, those are the Wizards dancers. If I remember correctly, they were wearing blue and white earlier in the game, but came back later wearing black and gold. I think they even changed a second time, into a third outfit that was again black and gold. Go figure.

Not much else to report lately. El Niño is making everything cold. At least El Niño is partially responsible. There’s also the dip of the Arctic air. It comes down every winter, just usually not this far south and this cold.

Soft Batch chocolate chip cookies. Remember when Chewy Chips Ahoy were new? I thought they would be so great — then I tried them. They sucked. I stayed away from soft style store bought chocolate chip cookies from then on. Then during college (note that for me, college is in the past tense), Dan Brown had a bag of Keebler Soft Batch. I assumed, naturally, that they would be no better than Chewy Chips Ahoy. To my delight, I was mistaken. I nearly finished the bag, but Brown pried it away from me. So that brings us up to about three weeks ago. I’m walking through the grocery store, and I didn’t feel like Oreos or standard blue bag Chips Ahoy. So I figured, how about Chewy Chips Ahoy? I’ll bet they’re pretty much the same as Soft Batch. Maybe my tastes weren’t as defined the last time I tried them. Maybe there were drastic improvements in soft stlye cookies over the last decade.

I was wrong. Chewy Chips Ahoy are as bad as ever. I want to say that they contain gelatin. It’s really quite revolting. I couldn’t finish the bag. So the next time I was at the store I cautiously purchased a bag of Soft Batch. Although they didn’t seem as good as the time I first tried them courtesy Dan Brown, they were pretty damn good. I definitely sense a similarity between Chewy Chips Ahoy and Soft Batch, but … Soft Batch is better. Chewy Chips Ahoy are not tolerable. Soft Batch are more than acceptable.

Alright. Drastic change in topic. Social Security Cards. I carry mine. I hate to do it, but sometimes – like when you least expect it – you need it. Like at the DMV. I mean, do you really want to wait in line for eighty minutes just to be told that you’ve got to come back when you’ve got your Social Security Card? And at a recent temp job orientation I had to hand it over with my driver’s license so that both could be photocopied. Granted, it was a government contractor, but … The way the Social Security number is used in this country is ludicrous. All you hear is, “Don’t give it to anybody. For any reason. Ever.”

Bullshit. When I got my cellphone at Radio Shack I had to speack to a Sprint representative on the in-store phone. I had to tell the person on the other end of the line my Social Security number. Meanwhile, any of the seven other people within arm’s reach could just jot it down. Make a credit card purchase over the phone? Better hope the friendly voice makes enough at his or her part time, minimum wage job. Next thing you know, some fifty year old bald guy puts his $10,000 trip to Aruba on your bill. This system stinks! For one thing, the original purpose of the number – retirement benefits for everyone – now amounts to chicken feed, and will likely be dried up by the time people our age retire. So now it’s more of a personal security number. Only problem is, it’s not very secure, and it’s certainly not private.

The solution? Probably bio-identification. Thumbprint scanners and retinal scanners. Maybe even voice recognition. We can send a credit card number over a phone line. Why not a high resolution image of a retina over the Internet? They ran out of phone numbers because of credit card scanners, but IPv6 should mean that we’ll have enough IP addresses to last forever, right? Right?

I think next time I’ll talk about how the record industry is F’ed. Have I talked about that lately? How about I discuss the different industries that have changed drastically or will change drastically because of advances in technology. I’ll start with photography. I’ll include telephony and music. Movies will get thrown in there. Stay tuned.