Dan Bricklin has a thoughtful post on software patents as a follow up to a bunch of stuff that’s gone around the web the past few weeks since the NY Times article on Microsoft’s quest for patents. Buried in Dan’s post is the ultimate wisdom: “I’m not against patents in general (they are good for some industries, I guess), but I do have real problems with how they are affecting the software industry which has other means of protection and incentive that have proven successful to society. Of course, as I’ve written, they are the current law of the land and I still apply for them at times.”

Chris asked Ross this morning if he could switch us all to Linux so we could be supervillians. Even Amy laughed when she saw it.

Earlier this week I did a brief post on the “no shop agreement” that is a common feature in a term sheet. I compared signing a no shop to the construct of serial monogamy in a relationship. I had a couple of comments (one that was intellectual, one that was a little harsher and painted VCs as “duplicitous.”) I was mulling over my obviously (in hindsight to me) asymmetric view when Tom Evslin very clearly and coherently articulated why my analogy was really unilateral monogamy (e.g. the VC isn’t signing up for serial monogamy – only the entrepreneur is.)

I just noticed that the price of crude oil topped $67 a barrel. When the fuck did that happen? In the early 1980’s, my first programming job (when I was in high school and a freshman/sophomore in college) was for a software company in Dallas called Petcom Systems. I was the first non-founder programmer (it was started by a husband and wife team) and I wrote “Oil and Gas Economic Analysis Software” (called PCEconomics) and a Well Log Analysis Program (called PCLog). I also worked on their Oil and Gas Accounting Product (PCAccounting) which was my first intimate exposure to the thrills of accounting software I got paid $10 / hour plus 5% of revenue for the software I wrote, which turned out to be a suitably large number for an 18 year old in 1983 and 1984. I watched Petcom grow from the four of us (husband, wife, me, secretary) to 20 people as they rode the early 1980’s oil boom.

My long time friend Andy Sack’s company Judy’s Book has just released “Judy’s Books Maps” (they claim to have had countless focus groups and thousands of hours of brainstorming to come up with the name for this new feature.) It’s yet another great example of combining Google Maps with a “Web 2.0 service” (or whatever the hip phrase is this week). Take a look at some of the reviews that I’ve done on Judy’s Book in Homer or in Boulder. Andy and team are hard at work and ramping the features, functionality, and community around Judy’s Book quickly – join the party, do some reviews, and win some coffee or a free iPod Shuffle.

On my run today, I listened to a hilarious podcast from Chris Pirillo and and his wife Ponzi. The first fifteen minutes topped Jon Stewart on the hysterical meter as Chris makes every “husband mistake” in the book around cleaning dishes, cooking, and laundry. Chris – two words passed down to me from my grandfather: “Yes Dear.” And – do NOT criticize her cooking. Finally, when she starts talking about her hair, don’t forget to say “Darling, it’s amazing – you’ve had two perfect haircuts in a row.” Chris and Ponzi are clearly having fun – the subtext of it all is that she’s got him completely handled.

Fred has another great post up this week in his VC Cliche of the Week column on the cliche “he’s got the weight of the company on his shoulders.” If you are a CEO or a senior exec who feels the weight of the business on your shoulders, read it.

I have a long set of rants about how most PowerPoint presentations suck. Every now and then, I see a great one, but most of the time I’m just tortured by them. Today, I got an email from Ted Dolotta (one of the first Softbank-related people I ever met) that was priceless. It linked to the The Gettysburg Powerpoint Presentation. In addition to being a classically miserable presentation, Lincoln’s intro was perfect.

I have my wife back. Amy has been lost in a tome (1079 pages) called Infinite Jest (by David Foster Wallace) for the past 10 days (about nine days longer than it takes her to read a typical book.) Our friend Matt Blumberg referred to it recently as “Infinite Book” – that says it all. By Saturday evening, Amy was reduced to continuously muttering words I didn’t know the definitions of while repeating “David Foster Wallace is a genius” over and over again. Tonight she wrote up an Infinite Post on the book – if you want to expand your vocabulary, are a reader, philosopher, wordsmith, linguist, grammarian, high school spelling bee champion, or just generally nuts, wander over to her post on the subject: “Infinite Jest: Victory.” Of course, in the spirit of this book, she has several other posts up already about it including “Infinite Jest: Prolix” (what the hell is a “prolix”?) and “Infinite Jest: Biting Off a Big One.” Damn – it’s still almost Tuesday.