I've seen some rough cold fronts, but in the last 24 hours the folks in northeast Wyoming have had a doozy. Here's the latest U.S. temperature-change map from Unisys:

As requested, here is a full-face beauty shot, from late September:

"Many of you may ask why this strategy will work when previous strategies have not."

"The majority of Iraqi Sunni and Shia want to live together in peace."

"We will work with the governments of Turkey and Iraq to solve problems along their border." (Like, for example, the million or so Kurds who are fed up with both.)

"Even if our new strategy works exactly as planned..."

"There will be no surrender ceremony on the deck of a battleship." (Well, sure; I mean, how would Terrorism sign a treaty?)

"Acting on the good advice of Sen. Joe Lieberman and other key legislators..."

Not so much a laugh-line, but: what's all this about Al-Queda "still" being in Iraq? They didn't move in until after we invaded.

Did anyone else notice all the books behind him?

Did anyone else notice that he's not taking questions?

I don't know if this qualifies as a "full-face beauty shot," but it's the best I could do on short notice:

I mean, come on, is he not the cutest dog?

Anne forwarded a Times article (reg.req.) about how gift cards are bad for everyone except the retailers:

The financial-services research firm TowerGroup estimates that of the $80 billion spent on gift cards in 2006, roughly $8 billion will never be redeemed—a bigger impact on consumers," [financial-services research firm TowerGroup] notes, "than the combined total of both debit- and credit-card fraud." A survey by Marketing Workshop Inc. found that only 30 percent of recipients use a gift card within a month of receiving it, while Consumer Reports estimates that 19 percent of the people who received a gift card in 2005 never used it.

So I should start selling gift cards: $20 redeemable in puppy-petting time. I'd make a mint, and Parker would get lots of belly-rubs.

I'm still scanning all my old photos, now up to slide #964 of 3,828 (not including the 176 rolls of negatives). In addition to the embarrassing photos of me as a gangly teenager, and embarrassing photos of my family (complete with 1980s hair and clothes), I've also found some of general interest, like these two of New York in July 1984:

We got back from Miami late Friday. Parker, happy to have us home, wanted to keep us as close as possible Saturday and Sunday. Yesterday, for example, he kept close to Anne even while Anne was off doing other things:

The New York Times picked up the ongoing story of botnets, networks of computers that spammers and other miscreants have taken over:

According to the annual intelligence report of MessageLabs, a New York-based computer security firm, more than 80 percent of all spam now originates from botnets. Last month, for the first time ever, a single Internet service provider generated more than one billion spam e-mail messages in a 24-hour period, according to a ranking system maintained by Trend Micro, the computer security firm. That indicated that machines of the service providers' customers had been woven into a giant network, with a single control point using them to pump out spam.

Users, ISPs, users, software vendors, and users contribute to the problem:

Serry Winkler, a sales representative in Denver, said that she had turned off the network-security software provided by her Internet service provider because it slowed performance to a crawl on her PC, which was running Windows 98. A few months ago four sheriff’s deputies pounded on her apartment door to confiscate the PC, which they said was being used to order goods from Sears with a stolen credit card. The computer, it turned out, had been commandeered by an intruder who was using it remotely.

Note that Winkler's computer probably ran slowly because it had already gotten infected, and the ISP's security software had a lot of work to do because of this.

At least with the Times picking up the story, perhaps more people will notice.

Wal-Mart will soon start scheduling employees based on predicted customer loads, requiring the employees to be more "flexible:"

The move promises more productivity and consumer satisfaction, but could demand more flexibility and availability from workers in place of reliable shifts and predictable pay checks, the Journal reported.

Wal-Mart started using the system for some workers, including cashiers and accounting-office personnel, last year, the paper also reported.

This is an example of software developers forgetting their work sometimes has human consequences.

Today's Chicago Tribune asks, "Who needs Florida?":

Balmier days are forecast to continue in Illinois over the next few days, a result of warmer air masses flowing in from the west and southwest and the effects of an El Nino year.

While no records are being broken—back in 1876 it was 65°F (18°C) on Jan. 2—temperatures in coming days are expected to remain mercifully above the historic average high of about 30°F (-1°C).

I find this funny because I'm sitting in shorts and a polo shirt by a pool surrounded by palm trees, a light 24°C (75°F) breeze cooling my sandal-clad feet, looking at Chicago's weather report, which tells me it's 1°C (33°F) back home—with a wind chill of -4°C (25°F).

I really can't answer the question "who needs Florida," but I can say the weather's a lot better here than in Chicago.