I'm really surprised that there has only been the ONE mention of GLONASS. GPS/GLONASS receivers have been available for years, but with collapse of the USSR, GLONASS almost became totally useless.

Now however, they've been launching 6 satellites a year and have a nearly full, and quite usable constellation. The accuracy is not quite as good as GPS and it's a much harder system to work with, but, quite useful shoudl anything happen to GPS.

CF bulbs are not designed for short on cycles. They're a poor choice for a hallway where the light is only turned on for a minute or two, or in a laundry room.

I think you're mistaken. I know, because I watch TV! Mythbusters looked at lightbulb myths recently. Actually, I'm not sure what you have in mind when you say CFs are not "designed" for short cycles. If you mean that they will burn out faster, that's certainly possible, but I doubt it. If you're referring to power-up energy costs, CFLs' energy-savings start at 15 milliseconds, so it's generally OK to turn off the bulb.

I think he was referring to the fact that bulbs take a minute or two to get up to full output. I have one CFL in my house that my wife complains about incessantly because it takes "sooooo long" to get to ful brightness. I've heard other people state that they like that side-effect -- it gives the eyes a few minutes to adjust.

Personally, I can see the commenter's point that if you just need to flip the light on to get through the hallway, then it gets turned off again, it would be nice if it came on at full brightness.