Your Numbers Up

From azcentral.com

25 arrested in dollar-store ID theft ring

…

A three-month investigation of the Governor’s Fraudulent ID Task Force, “Operation Dollar Store” targeted 14 dollar-stores across the Valley suspected of selling cell phones activated with false identities to people who claimed they had no legal identification.

Authorities believe some of the phones,… were used to facilitate organized crime operations. Similar phones are widely used by … fake id manufacturers,…

…

It could be months before authorities determine which identities belonged to actual people.

“It’s impossible to tell, and that’s the frightening part,” Morrison said. “Some of these were real victims in the sense of identity theft and some were fraudulent names. It’s going to take a while to see who are the real victims.”

From The Star.com

SEGAMAT: Malaysians will soon get to have personalised registration number plates for their vehicles, by paying an extra fee.

“However, there are still some finer details which we need to look into before Malaysians can apply to have their own personalised registration number plates,” Transport Minister Datuk Seri Chan Kong Choy said here.

“We are also looking into the formats for the plate, whether to allow names, numbers or both,” he said after opening the Segamat Road Transport Department branch office here yesterday.

The Road Transport Department (JPJ) has submitted the proposal to the ministry for evaluation.

Voices in my head: go to the airport and travel

Reasons not to go to work today:

1. It is rainy outside.
2. My apartment is dry and warm.
3. I have an old friend staying with me.
4. She is not planning on getting up until 10:00.
5. The manager of our office took everyone out for dinner last night.
6. Then I stayed up late talking with my friend.
7. I slept on the couch.
8. It’s tough to get a good night’s sleep on the couch.
9. I am tired.
10. Very tired.

It’s no secret that identity theft has become a major problem in this country. Last year alone, more than 9.9 million Americans fell victim to this devastating crime. And it can be devastating.

Identity theft occurs when someone acquires key pieces of your personal information with the intent to commit fraud. Most commonly, they use this information to open new credit accounts and run up huge debts. However, this is not the only use of stolen personal information. It can also be used by someone looking to immigrate illegally, carry out terrorist activities, assume a new identity, or even to blackmail you or someone in your sphere of relationships.

How does a thief gain access to your identity?

I had breakfast this morning with my friend Paolo from Milan Italy. Paolo teaches screen writing and the business of television in Milan and we had a wonderful conversation about the state of television both here in America and over in Europe.

What was perhaps even more interesting, however, was to discuss the state of politics in Europe. One of my biggest concerns in this country is how divided we’ve become. It scares me that my republican friends hate the democrats so much and my democratic friends hate the republicans so much.

There’s a chill in the air and almost all the leaves have dropped off of the tree outside the door to my apartment building. Winter is arriving.

And with the change in season, it’s time for a change in cocktail. Last winter was all about bourbon, but while bourbon should retain a place in your holiday season’s imbibing (mix a couple fingers of Maker’s Mark in with your ‘nog as you sit by the tree this Christmas Eve), it is the martini that will get you through the office holiday party this year.

I really like Allen-Edmonds dress shoes. They are amazingly comfortable, cut in a sort-of timeless style and they are built to last. They are traditional leather dress shoes with leather soles and yet I frequently walk home from work in them (about 4 1/2 miles) and they’re totally comfortable. So, ok, they’re incredibly expensive. But unlike some shoes, they really will last a long, long time and do I’d argue that over the long run they’re not much more expensive (maybe even cheaper) than buying several pairs of cheaper dress shoes.

Maybe it was the walking 4 miles a day on concrete in them, but after a couple years I finally wore through the soles. I was crushed, but I had heard that you could have them “recrafted” by Allen-Edmonds, so I dropped them off at the store to try out this service.

I just got server activity logs for the last couple of weeks for this website and, I’ve got to say, you are an impressive bunch. Because I am a statistics geek, I thought I’d share some:

Tuesday is the most popular day. What’s up with that?

8AM is the busiest hour of the day – almost twice as busy as any other time.

People from at least 11 different countries read this blog.

Almost 20% of people spend over 30 minutes on the site at a time.

A surprisingly high percentage of people who found this site via a search engine searched for “pepsi holiday spice”.

Including that last statement in this entry will probably increase that percentage.

Mozilla has released Firefox 1.0, the first formal release of their next-generation web browser. I downloaded it Friday to use on my PC at work and downloaded the Mac version at home over the weekend.

I really like it. It combines some of the best features of Safari with the stability and rendering accuracy of the Mozilla engine. Plus, like Safari, it’s fast and incorporates tabbed browsing. It has some nice features of it’s own, which I’m still learning. Right now I’m loving the really cool real-time “find” feature. Oh, and Firefox is free free.

I’ll probably still use Safari for most things at home, if for no other reason than I’m comfortable with it and it’s so nicely incorporated into OS X, but at work I’m switching to Firefox. In fact, I’m using Firefox to post this right now.

So I’m sitting on my couch and it’s a beautiful morning. The sun is shining and Yahoo weather tells me it’s 32 degrees out, which gives the morning a crisp feeling.

I’ve got a fire going in the fireplace, the first one of the year. I made myself a latte this morning, complete with homemade vanilla syrup. I’m eating a bowl of Fruity Pebbles cereal because I am five and because it is my favorite no-redeeming-value cereal. There’s some jazz playing softly on the stereo.

And in this pleasant environment, I’m getting a lot of quality writing done. Life is good.

Hope your morning is going just as well.

Popularity: 45%