October 27 - The Volunteers

I may have mentioned at some point that I work in basically a museum.  We try to make as much of our collection searchable as possible.  Unfortunately, our pool of labor is pretty limited.  There is a group of 80 year old volunteers that come in and attempt to help out, but they usually end up giving us more work in the end.  Here:



Ok.  5 unkown caddy strippers.  Seriously this went into one of the volunteer's databases.  Luckily we don't give them access to the real ones.  For the curious, they are supposed to be Candy Stripers which are old timey hospital volunteers.  Anyway, I'm not entirely sure who came up with the idea that these people should have access to a computer, but I'm thankful for the new business model for golf.

October 23, 2011 - Some Pictures!

Time for some new pictures!

Snow!  Good thing it's only on the mountain... not a huge fan.  Hopefully it waits a while before the real snow begins.

Also, what the heck is this?  I couldn't get close enough for a better picture, but this spider was silver.  Ok fine, I refused to get closer.  It looked singularly evil.

The Law of Water Part 2

When we last met, we had barely scratched the surface of the study of water law.  The first method of water allocation that we will discuss is called Riparian rights.  Landowners bordering a waterway are considered riparians.  It is by virtue of having land abutting water that gives them certain rights under the laws of most states in the United States.  Historically, landowners next to water had great advantages over those landowners who had no ready access to water.  It is easy to see why, aside from providing basic necessities such as food and water, access to the water allowed mills, later industrial uses and recreation.

Historically, American jurisdictions subscribed to a "natural flow" rule that gave every riparian owner to have the water in such a state that other users would not diminish the quality or quantity of the flow.  Such theories proved to be impractical however, because any use would diminish the water in some perceptible way.

These days, most jurisdictions espouse a "reasonable use" principle.  This does not mean that the use itself must be reasonable, but the use must be reason in relation to all other uses.  The result of which is a confusing tangle of rights based on land ownership, land size, and proportions.

None the less, riparian rules apply in 29 states and are therefore important.  These states however are generally ones where water is plentiful.  Our next segment will examine prior appropriation, a method used when water is scarce.

The Law of Water - Part 1

After a short break from blogging, I have decided to make a comeback writing about a subject near and dear to my heart, that being water law.  There are few areas of law that are defined by access to a particular resource and especially a resource of such catastrophic importance and variety of needs it fills.  Aside from the obvious quenching of our thirst, it grows our crops, provides a habitat for fish, and satisfies recreational and aesthetic needs.  The list goes on and on.

Water is one of the most plentiful substances on the planet, but it is precious because there never enough water of the right quality, in the right place, at the right time.  Water might be little thought of on the coasts, but in the central United States, the competition for access to water resources is fierce. 

Because of the inequalities in access to water found throughout the United States, American jurisdictions have developed radically different methods of allocating the resources: riparian, prior appropriation and hybrid.

Next time, we will start to go over these different types of law showing just how differently we have dealt with the allocation of water.

September 26 - Need a better camera...

So I went down to the river again a couple days ago and attempted to take some pictures at night:

Yeah.  I have come to the conclusion that my camera kind of sucks at low light shots.  Any camera people out there have any advice?


September 21

Time for a work rant.  I basically work at a museum.  We keep track of everything using Microsoft Access.  Lately, someone donated a new collection and the decision was made to create a new Access database to manage it all.  No one in the office knows anything about Access.  IT is completely overloaded and we are basically bottom rung.

I had the most experience with computers, so I was basically told to figure it out.  Fine.  Tinkering around, I think I figured most of it out.  Here is where the problems come.  Each one of our computers uses a different version of Access.  The person who will actually deal with the database has 2000.  Serious.  2000.  I have 2007, all the research computers have 2003 and we have one random laptop with 2010.  These do not play nice together when you are attempting to create or change anything.  Searching, fine.  But you dare change the name of a column and everything is shot straight to hell.

But Scott, you say, surely there is a way to standardize everything.  Yes, random blog person, there is.  If IT could get a few (dozen) more people.  So, basically, no dice.

Anyway, what kind of work annoyances do you deal with?

September 17

I was filling out a request for a forebearance from my student loans yesterday.  I was thinking about how this is getting a little demeaning sitting here begging the government (mine are consolidated) not give me a little more time to get my finances together before I start paying them.  I read about a petition online concerning student loan forgiveness.  Groups are pushing the government to forgive all student loans.  Ahh, I thought, that would be nice, wouldn't it?  To be free of student loans?

Sadly, student loan forgiveness can't, and frankly shouldn't, happen. The money you are loaned does not magically appear, it is the result of investments. You cancel the loan and someone along the way loses that money, and who should be left holding the bag?

And this isn't completely heartless either. What do you think will happen to future student loans if they are forgiven? Who will invest in student loans? No company would touch them.

I don't have the numbers in front of me, but that pretty much leaves the government to take care of everything. If the recent debt problems are any indication, I'm not terribly confident they can or have any inclination to take over the student loan business.

I would benefit greatly from student loan forgiveness. Law school isn't cheap, and I haven't been very successful finding a job in my field. They do need to work on how they issue student loans however. Giving people realistic expectations of their earnings potential should be mandatory. If you are studying art history, you should know that the chances that you actually use the degree you are paying for are slim.

I heard somewhere that the student loan bubble is a lot like the housing bubble and when it pops, its going to be bad. Let's hope they figure out something to do about this, because I wouldn't want to see that happen.

What about you?  Do you have student loans?  How's it looking in paying them back?  Think we should forgive them?