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Great book that runs the gamut of synthetic biology

The term "natural" used to be substantially easier to apply to basic items like fruit and animals. It is both exhilarating and frightening to consider "improving" genetic material, but humans have a knack for putting their marks on everything imaginable.

During high school and college, I worked at Kentucky Kingdom amusement park in Louisville, Ky. Besides battling racuous crowds and the blazing heat, one thing that was interesting to me was trying to keep track of the different people I was seeing throughout the day. As a games attendant (a.k.a. carnival barker), I would attempt to personally say things to people that I saw multiple times, whether at different games or at different parts of the park. This was mostly just a sales tactic, and I think the customers likely thought I was training to have my own magic show.

Raymond and Damon are back to their shenanigans in "The Surprise Visit," the second book in the Caimans at Work series.

Raymond and Damon are busy with many orders these days. Their friend Clara stops by the shop with an urgent request. Will the caimans be able to help her before time runs out?

In the web world, an upgrade is usually a thing of joy and agony. On one hand, you want to have the latest and greatest, but on the other, there are usually so many hoops to jump through that it can oftentimes be better to wait until the last minute.

I guess in this case, I'm a little late to the game with Drupal 9, but I've finally upgraded this site - all the way to 9.1 with the Gutenberg editor. Now it is time to dance.

I may have been the last person on earth to pick up any of the "Harry Potter" books, but I'm pretty certain I wasn't the last one finished. It's amazing to me the number of people who have at least read book one, let alone the number who have actually finished the series.

There are a plenty of new careers and opportunities these days, yet you rarely see anyone entering the piracy field. Some people have invented their own versions of a shipwrecked pirate - stealing stereos, hacking into computer files, playing baseball in Pittsburgh - but few take their chances on the high seas.

On the other hand, the Assocated Press said pirates killed more people in 1998 than the year before. The International Maritime Bureau reported Malaysian pirates, who killed 67 crewmen last year, are "getting increasingly violent."

Pirates? Violent?

I have had Verizon service for almost two years. I guess I would classify myself as being a little less than satisfied with the product. I had to switch phones four times, and I've spoken with the company's reps more than 10 times regarding my service. While nothing was ever completely solved, the reps always attempted to help me, which gave me a little satisfaction in knowing they were at least trying.

But after the recent Verizon debacle regarding an erroneous rate charge, I have to consider questioning what is occurring at the phone super giant.

You receive a lot of spam, right? Apparently, so does everyone else.

In a recent report compiled by SoftScan, close to 90 percent of emails sent in July were spam. It should be noted that SoftScan is a company that offers anti-spam software, and that it also acknowledges that fewer actual emails were sent in July because of the holiday, according to vnunet.com.

Fed up with the Internet? Tired of spam email messages? Sick of your slow connection? Ready to implode the World Wide Web just like it is the Kingdome?

If you are in favor of any of the above assessments, I may have good news for you. According to Yahoo News, researches are exploring destroying the current Internet and replacing it with a new one.