Diary of a Network Geek

Our nation’s finest tracking holiday spirit.

As I usually do at this time of year, I’m reminding you of where to find Santa and, more specifically, how to track his progress.
During the Cold War, the North American Aerospace Defense Command, more popularly known as “NORAD”, stood between us and what we were sure was complete destruction at the hands of the Soviets. What with the recent tensions vis-a-vis Russia, China, and North Korea, NORAD may find itself busier than ever in the coming year, but, until then, thankfully, they can fall back on my favorite tradition; tracking Santa. It started with a wrong number and an accidental connection, but a gentle soul in a high-pressure job spread a little Christmas cheer once a long, long time ago. The story got around and before you can say “Who’s violating my air space?”, everyone was misappropriating government resources to make kids happy. Before long, it was fully sanctioned and, if I say so myself, an entirely proper use of my tax dollars. In any case, now, whether you’re young or old, or whether you have children or not, you can have fun tracking Santa with the Official NORAD Santa Tracker!  Besides, it’s about time for the Federal Government to bring us a little holiday cheer, don’t you think?
I’ll post again on Friday, but, until then, have a very merry Christmas!

This post originally appeared on Use Your Words.

According to the official NORAD Santa Tracker, the jolly fatman that’s keeping our economy running is on his way!

He’s been spotting in the Pacific Rim and is headed East toward India, Europe and Africa as I post this.  He’ll be here in United States and Central and South America before you know it!

Also?  On a slightly more serious note?
No matter what  your religious bent, please, join with me in celebrating the return of light to the world.  Friday was the Winter Solstice, which is the longest night, or shortest day, of the year in our current lap around the Sun.  So, every day since then has been getting a little longer, letting a bit more light back into the world.  And, I don’t know about you, but I think we could use all the light we can get in the coming year.

Be kind to each other, okay?
And, Merry Christmas, everybody!

Could you rebuild civilization?

No, seriously, could you?
Maybe I spend too much time on the fringes of political and economic thought and news, but I hear stories about how experts think we may be heading for disaster on a very large scale.  Food riots and oil shortages and barbarism just around the corner to listen to some of these more extreme pundits.  The collapse of civilization itself!
Well, what if that happened?  What would you do?  Could you organize people enough to rebuild civilization?  What would you need to make a small village prosperous enough to become the kernel that would grow into something we would recognize as civilization again?

Well, thankfully, I’m not the only one obsessed with answers to questions like this.  There are a bunch of engineers and other like-minded, clever folks who are putting together a DIY Civilization “Kit”, with open source plans for all the basic technologies that one might need to get a self-sufficient town working again.  It’s quite an ambitious project, but, I think one that is worthwhile.   Even if we never need it to rebuild society, it may prove a useful thought-experiment to help make independent towns in developing countries.
In any case, it’s an interesting project, I think, and worth a look.