War Update, Plus Work Productivity Note

After the last three public executions, the mice decided to lie low for a while.  We didn't hear a peep from them until last night, when a scout foolishly ventured into the garage while we were paper mâché-ing jack-o-lanterns for Webelos.  He was quickly apprehended and incarcerated, then met a swift end at dawn at the hands of our chickens.

On a different note, my productivity at work has soared since I blocked a few websites in my /etc/hosts file.  I realized I had gotten in the habit of working, then every time I hit a complicated spot, I'd almost instinctively switch to a browser to read a quick Slashdot article or CNN report.  The waste of time was adding up quickly, so I decided to block a handful of sites for myself at work.

127.0.0.1 ksl.com
127.0.0.1 cnn.com
127.0.0.1 slashdot.org
127.0.0.1 failblog.org
127.0.0.1 espn.com

It's worked surprisingly well over the past couple weeks.  Even though I could unblock them in a few seconds, the very fact that I'd have to jump through a hoop reminds me that I'm supposed to be focusing on work.

Nice neighbors

Our downstairs neighbors are really nice. We found out that our ISP wouldn't be able to get us Internet service before February 4 (?!) so our neighbors were nice enough to let us borrow their wireless password.

Working online is much easier when you're not doing it on an iPhone over the cellphone network.