It's January 2004! Welcome to the future! Hmmm ... looks a lot like 2003! There's a lot to follow in the news:

-- The Democratic Primary: Looks like Dean will win in Iowa. But the Dems seem hell-bent on self destruction. Lieberman and Kerry need to get their heads screwed on straight. Neither one had a chance of winning the primary season, or of beating Bush. They are just the "democratic wing of the Republican Party." Why vote for these losers when we already have GWB? And all the character assassination they have done against Dean will come back to bite the party in the general elections.

-- The Mars rovers. Hooray for Spirit! Let's hope Opportunity successfully lands in a couple of weeks. It was disappointing to see the Beagle 2 not make it, since that was the only probe specifically designed to search for life. American scientists pursue their determined rock-hunting, which is cool from a scientific point of view, but lacks much zip for the general public. -- I'm still doing writing. The rejections tick me off, but that's part of the biz. I'll keep at it until I succeed or starve.

-- Today I cancelled my ATT long-distance service. I can use my cell phone or one of those 10-10 numbers if necessary (I hardly make any LD calls anyway). But the process was ridiculous. First, I called ATT and had to speak to some idiotic VR system. "Just speak naturally," it intones. And oh, it's just SO friendly! Makes me want to remain a customer, NOT. Then after I speak "Cancel" three times into the receiver, I get transfered to an operator. Then I wait 15 minutes to speak to a human. The human I finally get to talk to turns out to be an Indian (and I don't mean an Apache). Finally, after much mumbling on her part and sarcastic invective on mine, I get it through to her that I want to cancel my long distance. Then she tells me I have to call SBC to tell them I have cancelled my ATT. What the??? So then I call SBC, who at least has a native-English speaker as an operator. She tells me that ATT just handles billing, and that SBC has to physically disconnect me from ATT's network. And that carries a $5.00 charge! So no matter what you do, the corporate vampires suck your blood try.