Ludo lent me a laptop that was rented for him at work. I am using the laptop now.

After Ludo gave me the laptop, I reinstalled the OS, putting the Windows XP that came on the recovery disks on a small partition, Ubuntu 7.04 on a larger partition, leaving space for Solaris. Anyway, after installing Windows, I went to get all the security updates. I saw the following dialog box during the update process.

Which is the harder problem? Getting everyone at Microsoft working on Windows to collaborate to the extent that the update mechanism does not recommend not using itself? Doing things in a way that is both secure and comprehensible to end lusers like me?

When my mom, dad, or stepfather come over to France, they do not watch too much television. Maybe they figure it would be too hard to understand. Maybe a lot of what is on French television depends on understanding the audio track. (That’s not true in general, but might be true for French films.)

My mother-in-law and father-in-law are here now, in Austin, sitting on the couch watching television. They have been watching television in the evenings since we returned from our trip to the Grand Canyon.

Maybe US television is not too hard to understand. Maybe little US television depends on understanding the audio track. Or at least there is a lot more of it that does not depend on much understanding at all.

PS They are stunned by the number of advertisements, though.