Worked like crazy this week. Just plain exhausted, and need to rest. There are three sad laptops sitting on the table behind me and two laptops and three desktops waiting back at the office. Have hardware on order for several other clients, and all I want to do is sleep. Probably will kick around a little, get my second wind and re-enter the arena of Malware and Trojans. Did ancient Troy have gladiators? Guess not. But I can still pretend when I am working to defeat the "bad guys."

Later all.

Chose to select my Five Favorite Films for facebook. It was hard to choose and I left out some I really love like "Gone in Sixty Seconds" Actually almost any Jerry Bruckheimer film works for me. I feel like he is someone I could like in person. One can only hope.

Twitter has turned out to be much more interesting than I had thought. I am only following 19 people, but their tweets make great reading. Most are people I know IRL, but a few public figures (famous people, celebrities, or ?) There is a reason that some of them have several hundred thousand followers, they are *interesting.* Writing is not easy or natural for most people, we react to images and sounds, very concrete things. Words are abstract. To take these funny little symbols and string them together coherently is an art. You could have natural talent, but like all skills, this one must be practiced and polished. I enjoy movies, but I love books. I love the time spent touching the pages, handling the weight, and studying the typeface. I love settling in to meet mind to mind with another person. To listen closely to what they are saying. To think and to be mentally challenged. I enjoy reading from the computer too. Blogs are cool, and now twitter is proving to be a modern literary salon. Rather than overwhelmed, I feel refreshed and excited there.

When I read Hayek, or Lewis, I often wish I could sit and visit with them, to hear their ideas in their own tone of voice. One of my most treasured possessions is a CD set of most known recordings of J. R. R. Tolkien reading selections of his written work. Sometimes I read along with him, sometimes I just sit and listen. When I read tweets I hear the voices of my friends speaking.

(Speaking of speaking, I am watching GiSS while I write this, is anyone as cool as Sphinx ?)

While reading The Road to Serfdom, in places I think I see hints of humor, and I wonder how it would sound if Hayek were sitting on the couch here, just telling me his ideas and thoughts. Then I wonder, if the translators caught his tone correctly. German is very expressive, and Hayek was clearly bi-lingual but was his English in 1944 this correct and smooth? Trnaslations make a huge difference as SoS Clinton discovered in Russia recently. But tonight I will not worry about it, and simply enjoy my meeting of minds.

"It is necessary in the first instance that the parties in the market should be free to sell and buy at any price at which they can find a partner to the transaction and that anybody should be free to produce, sell, and buy anything that may be produced or sold at all." Hayek. So straight forward and so simple, and yet utopia. In other words, unattainable. But the closer any society can come to realizing this ideal, the happier the people in it. I cannot understand why some people cannot keep their noses out of other people's business, literally. If two parties can engage in a transaction that pleases both of them, why do some others get so offended that they *must* interfere? Are there people who are so little inside that they cannot live their own lives and must destroy those who can? If someone is busy producing something that can be sold they should not have time to worry about what the next person down the road is doing. Many people misread the phrase "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." The pursuit of happiness does not refer to chasing pleasure, but instead to being free to choose a life occupation that is what one wants to do. It means the government is not empowered to micro-manage its citizens.

Imagine, I raise chickens, and you weave baskets. You need some food and like fresh eggs and fried chicken. I need baskets to hold eggs and feed. If we can decide on an happy trade of eggs and chickens for baskets, and we are both completely satisfied, whose business is it except ours? I do understand the need for joint cooperation for the betterment of society, i.e. taxes. I know that each citizen cannot afford to build a strip of road that they need, and that some services, such as recording of legal records require someone to be supported by the whole community for the good of all. But there are reasonable limits to taxes and governance. Hayek uses the term "method of coordinating individual efforts" and this is a wonderful way to describe what we all need. He also points out that competion is a superior method to that of coercion to obtain this end. That is something the Founding Fathers clearly understood. And that our current government does not. Carrots *do* work better than sticks alone.

Tired, more later.

Thunderous rain storm today. High winds and lightning added to the excitement. Later I walked down to the pond and listened to the frogs peeping, chirping and croaking. A red-tailed hawk glided by, so silent and smooth. I love being here after the rain.