Joe's Random Ramblings

In their latest FAQ, EBay states that checks and money orders are no longer allowed for payment.
Instead, they want people to use Paypal, which has a really bad reputation. Paypal's fees are outrageous, and their handling of disputes is way below par.
So, it seems EBay management is trying hard to run the company into the ground. Yet another Internet company that doesn't understand the Internet...
In a lot of markets, Craigslist already is eating EBay's lunch.

I came across this hilarious description of the $700B bank bailout proposed by the US government.
The best description of the "bailout" yet.

I went to the Reno Air Races the last weekend.
It is a lot of fun seeing these stunning airplanes flying around the course, very fast and really low to the ground. As a pilot myself, I really admire the skill of the race pilots. They are in a class of their own.
I took a lot of pictures over the two days I was there, which I'll put up later in the week.
I'll certainly be back next year!

The Inquirer, a British IT news site, reports that former Broadcom boss Henry Samueli may face jail in Broadcom's option backdating scandal.
The other Broadcom founder, Henry Nicholas, also has been indicted on a number of charges, including securities fraud and drug-related charges.
In the Henry Samueli case, I am wondering what the universities are going to do who named whole schools after him. Both UCLA and UCI have a "Henry Samueli School of Engineering" (here and here.)

Last weekend (Labor Day weekend in the US) I went hiking the Narrows, all 16 miles of it, in Zion National Park in Utah.
I had a campground reservation for Saturday, August 30 (they are pretty hard to come by, you have to make the reservations a couple of months in advance.)
The forecast for the weekend was rather bad, with a 50% chance of thunderstorms on Saturday and a 70% chance of rain on Sunday. Consequently, the ranger at the backcountry office in the Zion visitor center tried his best to discourage me from the hike. I decided to go ahead with the hike, anyway (my backcountry permit has the remark "advised of dangerous conditions"...)
As it turned out, the weather held for the duration of the hike. No rain at all on Saturday, and only some rain on Sunday morning, which didn't result in any significant change of the water level in the river. It was over 100 degrees F on Saturday, but it was cloudy on Sunday, which makes for much nicer hiking weather.
The rain started on Sunday morning right after I tore down my tent and cleaned up my camp site. Just like the other hikers on the trail, I decided to advance to the last campsite, campsite #12, near Big Springs, which is the last place that has safe high ground, and to see how the water flow looks at that point. It turned out that by the time I arrived at campsite 12, the rain had stopped. The water flow was normal, and the water was clear, so I, like everybody else, decided to go on through the long section of the Narrows between Big Springs and Orderville Canyon which doesn't have safe high ground.
I hurried a bit through that section, and I was at the north end of the Riverside Walk an hour before I had expected to be there, but that was just fine with me. It was a nice hike, and I enjoyed it a lot.
My photos are up in my photo gallery on this site.