Anyone that knows me fairly well knows I like driving out to the country. If gas was cheaper, I’d cruise around aimlessly every day. There’s such a sense of freedom that comes with traversing the open road late at night, away from the light pollution of the suburbs.

One of my favorite places to go is Beaumont On The James, a roadside pulloff slash park and boat landing, off Route 522 in Powhatan County, on the James River. It’s beautiful out there, and a wonderful place for stargazing. It’s pitch black at night and completely quiet and peaceful, save for a few other souls who venture out therefor the same reasons on occasion. With the price of gas and my 17 MPG Xterra, however, this fifty-mile (there and back total) trek is no longer a frequent option.

That being said, I decided to only venture out a little ways last night. Rochelle and I were driving around, talking about this and that and working on some script ideas for upcoming RCC dramas. We were headed through the West Creek office park complex in eastern Goochland at the time. Deciding my tank of gas would dry up long before our conversation did, I figured I should put it in park eventually or I’d just drive around all night. So, we pulled into one of the parking lots for just a few minutes.

Not even five minutes into our stay, an SUV pulls up to my car. It was very obvious that it wasn’t a police car. Nope, it was a rent-a-cop, I’m guessing from the office park. I just laughed when he pulled up, because apparently I’m a rent-a-cop magnet (most of you will recall my VCU Police incident slash misunderstanding a few months back, plus other incidents).

So after I had a good chuckle, I put my window down and very politely said hello and that we weren’t doing anything wrong and would head on our way. In the SUV was a grumpy old man who spoke with a strain in his voice that was a result of his failed efforts to sound stern and threatening. He swiftly barked at me, “You are tresspassing! Leave immediately or I’ll report your license to the police!” All cops, real ones or fake (as was in this case) seem to have a coherent attitude towards people of my age group. No matter how cooperative or respectful you are of them, they still all seem to go on the defense right off the bat. I guess it’s understandable considering how some people my age would probably get into some sort of mischief out there, but come on, I wasn’t doing anything wrong and wouldn’t have even gone in there if I saw any sort of “no trespassing” signs. I didn’t see any posted.

So as I was backing out, the guy annoyingly used the only “weapon” he had on him: his flashlight. He waved it around in a circular motion and tried to blind me as I went in reverse. What the crap. He seemed like he was way more afraid of me for some reason, despite how nice I was to him, than I was of him (which was not at all).

So there you have it, another day, another “rent-a-force” (or farce) story. It’s funny how the people who actually do wrong in these places get away with it and people like me who do nothing get all the heat. Oh well, at least it gives me a good laugh every time.

Oh, and in other news, this morning as I was pulling out of my neighborhood, a Henrico County policeman (yeah, a real police officer story for once) had pulled over a golf course maintenance truck on the cart path! How great is that? Granted, he may have done something on the road and just caught up to the guy once he hit the golf course, but still, that’s priceless.

If your mailing address is Richmond, Virginia, but you live most anywhere in Henrico County, your address will soon change to Henrico, Virginia. Why? Henrico County loses millions of dollars every year to the City of Richmond. Big corporate chains that are based outside of the area think that because the mailing address is Richmond, the taxes should be paid there. This adds up quickly. Well that’s interesting enough alone. But it gets better.

Henrico County sent out a mail survey asking residents if they wanted to change the name to Henrico or leave it Richmond. They also did a TV ad campaign. Fair enough. What I don’t get is that Richmond did an ad, too! Richmond Mayor Doug Wilder (leave it to him) decided it would be a competition and fought to keep the undeserved money in the city! Then again this is Doug Wilder we are talking about here. Should we be surprised in the least? He needs to go.

I’ve always been fascinated with local history, but nothing has intrigued me more than Three Chopt Road. Hundreds of years ago, it was an Indian trail, and was then improved in 1730 as a more substantial roadway between Richmond and Charlottesville. Route 250 (Broad Street) replaced the road in the 1930s, but it’s still one of the oldest roads still in service today in Virginia. Thomas Jefferson frequented the road, going between his home in Monticello and the Capitol in Richmond quite often. Many, many other notable individuals have also traversed this roadway.

I’m about to undertake a huge project. I’m going to single-handedly document the entire road from its origin near Powhatan Hill east of Richmond, all the way to Augusta County in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Why? It’s one of the most historic roadways in America, and yet little has ever been done to completely document everything on this rapidly-deteriorating (because of replacement roadways) trail.

I’m going to set out to document interesting buildings and houses, landmarks, and other features of the road, beginning near the city, sometime in the next two or three weeks. Armed with just my GPS, camera, and camcorder, I’ll document anything interesting I see. I hope to somehow export geodata about where videos and pictures were taken onto a custom Google map as the project progresses. Check back on the website I bought for the project, www.threechopt.org, soon. I’m ready to do this!

Am I crazy? Maybe. But this is my passion! Plus, a lot of people I’ve talked to out at the local history exhibition I put on every Fall always ask about the road and its history. Heck, it even runs right through Short Pump, although most of the original portions in this area have been realigned to make way for developments, such as West Broad Village.

Stay tuned, there are many more updates to come! If you or someone you know would like to get involved, I’d love to hear from you.

So I went to the library tonight. I don’t hardly ever read unless forced for school or something. But I renewed my library card from five years ago and checked out two great books. All I do is read stuff online if anything, but it’s about time I did some actual reading about stuff that interests me. Plus, the Twin Hickory library is amazing. It’s brand new, huge, and even has a cafe! This place trumps Barnes & Noble tenfold, plus it’s free. How could you beat that? Check it out sometime if you haven’t yet.

How’s this for ironic? The CEO of Lifelock, Todd Davis, has finally been hacked himself! He’s the guy that advertises his real social security number on billbords, trucks, television, and radio.

And while this may be to prove the point that he has total faith in his company, which protects you from any identity theft attempts and backs up the protection with a $1 million liability guarantee should anyone succeed in using your good name.

In my opinion, it’s just stupid to openly advertise your social security number, even if you do have this service. It serves him right. Here’s an online article about the whole thing. His picture should go on the FAIL Blog!

Why did Todd Davis, CEO of Lifelock, need to contract with an outside firm when his own identity was stolen last summer? Because true resolution does not come easy…. and is not a marketing gimick. Who did Mr. Davis choose to handle his personal financial recovery when his fraud alert system failed? An Identity Theft America partner, National ID Recovery.

According to an article that appeared in the Dallas Morning News on July 23, 2007, Mr. Davis became a victim when a man obtained a $500 payday loan in his name. This, despite the fact Mr. Davis was using the well-advertised Lifelock services.

According to the article, Teletrack, a subprime credit bureau that was used by the payday loan lender, doesn’t receive fraud alerts from the three national credit bureaus - Experian, TransUnion and Equifax. In the article, Mr. Davis admitted that “Fraud alerts aren’t always going to be bulletproof. There are areas where someone can still compromise your information.” This despite the fact that Mr. Davis advertises his social security number in the media to convince consumers that his system can prevent identity theft.

You can’t afford to be left with no where to turn and empty promises with fine print. Make the same choice that identity theft industry executives use when the chips are down. Identity Theft America assures quality, professional services to help with identity theft. Regardless of the advertising, there is no prevention for identity theft, so be prepared if it happens to you.

Pastor Rick gave a profoundly impacting message at church this morning. It was all about forgiving those who have wronged you in the past and appologizing to those you’ve wronged yourself. I think everyone has both of these situations in their lives with at least one person, and I’m no exception. I generally don’t hold grudges against anyone, but there are one or two people who I need to apologize to for certain things. They’re actually mutual situations so I hope that by being the bigger person and reaching out to them to apologize, they might, too. But even if not, it will still make me feel better to right the wrong.

God forgives us for our sins by coming into a relationship with His son, Jesus Christ, and He commands us to do the same to others. He proclaims that there is nothing more essential in life than loving other people, and that’s essentially the basis of Christianity. That being said, I have a bit of work to do to make things right again in my life with a few people.

As bad as gas prices are now, they could be far worse. In fact, they already are in other countries. This article explores how things would change if gas cost $10 a gallon. There would be no more pizza or newspaper delivery, plastic water bottles or other daily things we take for granted. FedEx, UPS, and taxis would be a luxury for the rich. But, after a short recession and period of adaptation to fuel costs, this article suggests we just might be better off because of the push that would ensue for alternative fuel, telecommuting, home rooftop gardens, etc. Check out the “what if” article by clicking here.

I’m a ridiculously-versed music junkie. It’s been established. But not in a cultural or intellectual way. No, I’ve always been a fan of pop, pop-rock, and other processed and acoustically-appealing, unoriginal music. There’s nothing wrong with any of it (with the exception of a few of the new unlistenable bubblegum pop and urban songs). I could easily be a great radio DJ for a any station that plays popular stuff from the past twenty years with all the mainstream stuff I like. But that’s not all there is to the music scene, and I’ve turned a blind eye to the rest of it for way too long.

First off, I’ve just gotten sick of this type of music and hearing the same songs over and over again. I have 200-some channels on my XM Radio in the car, and only listened, until recently, to three or four. How sad is that? So last week I started exploring other stations, and my new favorite is channel 45. It’s called Starbucks XM Cafe. There are many names for the music they play. Some call it coffeehouse music, some call it Triple-A (adult album alternative), and there are others.

Anyway, this station has just gotten me started. There’s so much good stuff out there that’s more down to earth, genuine, original, and appealing. I’ve listened to similar stuff as that station and gotten hooked on the refreshing stream of unprocessed or doctored music. I guess the main thing is I just wanna discover some new artists. If you have a particular favorite alternative artist, comment this post and pass them along! I’m done with this pop crap. There’s so much more to life, musically speaking.

This looks like some fake news story you’d expect to find on The Onion. But it’s actually real. A woman in the United Kingdom claims to suffer from electrosensitivity, a severe reaction to being around wireless electronic devices, especially wi-fi and cell phones. It’s very rare, but apparently also very real. Check out this article to find out more.

“The Woman Who Needs Protection From Modern Life” - via The Daily Mail

No, she’s NOT a beekeeper. This woman believes that her bizarre headgear can save her from the dangerous electrosmog all around us. Can she possibly be right? Before knocking on Sarah Dacre’s door, I take the precaution of checking my mobile phone. It’s switched off, as she has requested.

“Last time someone came to visit,” she warns, “I started feeling awfully nauseous. It turned out he had a picture phone with him and had left it switched on. A picture phone!” She pauses, looking genuinely horrified. Apparently, this type of mobile automatically sends signals to a local base station every nine minutes - “No wonder I felt so sick.”

Sarah, 51, is one of a growing band of people who claim to be experiencing extreme - and incapacitating - sensitivity to electrical appliances, as well as to certain frequencies of electromagnetic waves. “Wi-Fi, or wireless broadband networks, seem to be the worst thing,” she says. “Closely followed by mobile phones - particularly if they’re being used in an enclosed space - the base stations of cordless telephones and mobile phone masts. “I have to restrict the amount of time I spend on the computer or watching television, and make sure I don’t have too many household appliances on at once, because that sets me off as well.”

This may sound bizarre, but there is no doubt that Sarah’s symptoms are real. To date, they include hair loss, sickness, high blood-pressure, digestive and memory problems, severe headaches and dizziness. They strike with such ferocity that, since diagnosing herself as “electrically sensitive” in May 2005, she has been marooned at home. She can’t work. When she wants to phone friends, she has to use a land-line - a significant advancement, it turns out, because she was so ill at one stage, she says, that she couldn’t even touch an ordinary receiver without feeling a violent shock pass up her arm.

Food shopping is done as rapidly as possible, once a week, at a time carefully chosen to avoid younger people and their permanently switched-on mobile phones. And she can venture into built-up areas only if she is swathed in a net-and-hat ensemble made from a special “shielding fabric” that makes her look like a bee-keeper.

Read the rest of the story here.

You’ve got to be kidding me. I like Dollar Tree for some things, but this is ridiculous. This is an actual newspaper ad I scanned in from the Richmond Times-Dispatch. Dollar Tree is now offering hot dogs and even, get this, steaks! How much? A dollar, of course. Just like everything else. Does this not scare and worry anyone else? I was already weary of buying meat at Food Lion, but this makes them look pretty good. Also, notice the top right hand corner. Dollar Tree is apparently “graduation party headquarters?” Well of course! Wow, this is like one of those headlines people send in to Jay Leno.