Hacking AMSAT's Website

AMSAT has a nice web site, full of information on amateur radio satellites, tools for tracking them, news, etc.
My gripe with the site has to do with the page style. The background image is something called "flannel", which is a bunch of fine black stripes on a white background. For me, it is too much white. To make matters worse, on some monitors, the stripes do some sort of flickering. Not Moire lines, but flickering, probably due to some video card setting I have wrong.
Rather than impose my tastes on others, I wrote a goofy little Greasemonkey script to change the background:

// ==UserScript==
// @name BlueAmsat
// @namespace http://userscripts.org/users/57521
// @description Change the AMSAT default background to blue
// @include http://www.amsat.org/*
// ==/UserScript==
document.body.style.backgroundImage = "none";
document.body.style.background = "darkblue";

You can install it directly here

Gas Prices and Hamfests

According to Gasbuddy, prices in my area today are averaging to $3.92 per gallon. My 300C gets about 24 mpg on the highway if I can believe the computer, so that makes my 320-mile round trip to Dayton cost $52.

Last year, a gallon cost $3.27, for a cost of $44. The 300C manual says to use mid-grade, but prices tend to track.

At any rate, I am not going to miss Hamvention for $8.

Another perspective is on Eham.net.

Thing's I can live without on AFV

I like America's Funniest Home Videos. I am a little annoyed that the Disney-controlled network's (ABC) show does some off color stuff, like play Big and Rich's "Save a Horse (Ride a Cowboy)" during rodeo/western/horse -themed clips, but in general it's family-watchable. However, there are a few things that I'd rather not see anymore

• Fake lottery tickets. One time was funny, more was annoying.
• Food coming out of noses.
• Dental work coming out of mouths.
• Pulling baby teeth in unique ways.
• Dogs and cats whining and yowling words.

People keep sending them and they keep playing them for some reason, but I fast-forward Tivo through them now.

Happy 20th Birthday, PERL

Larry Wall announced it in 1987 in a posting to comp.sources.misc newsgroup. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perl

The Republic

What if the democracy we thought we were serving no longer exists, and the Republic has become the very evil we have been fighting to destroy?

- Senator Amidala,
Star Wars, Revenge of the Sith