Posted 7/31/2007 05:59:00 PM by Douglas

Fascinating article about where your mind takes you when you're not paying attention.

New studies have found that people tidy up more thoroughly when there’s a faint tang of cleaning liquid in the air; they become more competitive if there’s a briefcase in sight, or more cooperative if they glimpse words like “dependable” and “support” — all without being aware of the change, or what prompted it.

Psychologists say that “priming” people in this way is not some form of hypnotism, or even subliminal seduction; rather, it’s a demonstration of how everyday sights, smells and sounds can selectively activate goals or motives that people already have.

I have no doubt that these "jedi mind tricks" are for real and can be quite effective. I just wonder why their full manipulation hasn't been realized by the truly evil. You know, like car salesmen and the media.

Posted 7/31/2007 05:50:00 PM by Douglas

Time for this year's Bulwer-Lytton award. Meh.

Gerald began - but was interrupted by a piercing whistle which cost him ten percent of his hearing permanently, as it did everyone else in a ten-mile radius of the eruption, not that it mattered much because for them ’permanently’ meant the next ten minutes or so until buried by searing lava or suffocated by choking ash - to pee.

I think this is going to be a really short novel.

Labels: Bulwer-Lytton

Posted 7/31/2007 05:39:00 PM by Douglas

Sometimes the headline says it all:
Study finds the 237 reasons to have sex

Six decades after Alfred Kinsey's findings on sexuality shocked America, two University of Texas at Austin psychologists have found some surprising answers to a question most people don't bother to ask: why people have sex.

"I was driven to do this study because of all the different reasons I hear women give for having sex, but I never expected this richness of answers," said Cindy Meston, an associate professor of psychology and study co-author. "Motivation for sex is not as straightforward as people think."

What the hell is wrong with these people?? They're 236 reasons over their limit, and if you need a reason, trust me, you're not doing it right.

Posted 7/30/2007 05:49:00 PM by Douglas

People are Sheep.

Crime-fighting beats privacy in public places: Americans, by nearly a 3-to-1 margin, support the increased use of surveillance cameras — a measure decried by some civil libertarians, but credited in London with helping to catch a variety of perpetrators since the early 1990s.

Given the chief arguments, pro and con — a way to help solve crimes vs. too much of a government intrusion on privacy — it isn't close: 71 percent of Americans favor the increased use of surveillance cameras, while 25 percent oppose it.

Sometimes I get tired of pointing out how stupid people are.

Posted 7/30/2007 05:38:00 PM by Douglas

Incredible site for digital photography. Check out the dead airplanes.

Posted 7/30/2007 05:16:00 PM by Douglas

Stanford Law, Class of 1952. William Rehnquist graduated #1 and Sandra Day O'Connor was #3. Who was #2? This guy.

Here he is: David Salisbury, a business lawyer from Salt Lake City. He never had the fame obtained by his classmates, but he did pretty well for himself.

Yeah, I think he did do pretty well for himself.

Posted 7/30/2007 05:01:00 PM by Douglas

So you go to the dentist. While you're under, your dentist implant boar tusks in your mouth and takes pictures. You sue, yet he gets a half million bucks.

Dr. Robert Woo of Auburn had put the phony tusks in while the woman was under anesthesia for a different procedure. He took them out before she awoke, but first he shot photos that eventually made it around the office.

The employee, Tina Alberts, felt so humiliated when she saw the pictures that she quit and sued her boss.

Woo's insurance company, Fireman's Fund, refused to cover the claim, saying the practical joke was intentional and not a normal business activity his insurance policy covered, so Woo settled out of court. He agreed to pay Alberts $250,000, then sued his insurers.

A King County Superior Court jury sided with Woo, ordering Fireman's Fund to pay him $750,000, plus the out-of-court settlement. The insurance company won the next round, with the state Court of Appeals saying the prank had nothing to do with Woo's practice of dentistry. On Thursday, the state Supreme Court restored Woo's award.

In a sprightly 5-4 decision, Supreme Court Justice Mary Fairhurst wrote that Woo's practical joke was an integral, if odd, part of the assistant's dental surgery and "conceivably" should trigger the professional liability coverage of his policy.

What?!?

The backstory, the court wrote, is that Alberts' family raises potbellied pigs and that she frequently talked about them at the office where she worked for five years.

The oral surgery on Alberts was intended to replace two of her teeth with implants, which Woo did. First, though, he installed temporary bridges that he had shaped to look like boar tusks, and while Alberts was still under anesthesia, he took photos, some with her eyes propped open. Before she woke up, he removed the "tusks" and put in the proper replacement teeth.

Woo says he didn't personally show her the pictures but staffers gave her copies at a birthday party.

What a douchebag. And he walked with $500,000.

Labels: crazy dentist

Posted 7/29/2007 09:08:00 PM by Douglas

Good golf, good tennis, or whatever makes you happy:

Houston loses an icon today:

Marvin Zindler, a Houston institution for more than three decades and a pioneer of consumer reporting, died Sunday at M.D. Anderson Hospital after a fight with cancer.

The irascible, flamboyant 85-year-old television personality had been diagnosed in July with inoperable pancreatic cancer that had spread to his liver.

Even in his last days, Zindler continued to work, filing reports from his hospital bed. In his last report, broadcast Saturday, in which he helped a 45-year-old U.S. citizen secure a social security card necessary for employment, Zindler appeared thin and his voice was weak.

Still, he signed off with a hearty "MAARVIN ZINDLER, EYEWITNESS NEWS" — his trademark for 34 years with KTRK Channel 13.

Marvin was as inherent to Houston as humidity and bad Mexican food. In the day of antiseptic newspeople with no accent and no discernable heritage, Marvin was unapologetically Texan. It's hard to imagine Houston without him. Sure, you didn't watch the Restaurant Report every Friday, but you knew it was on, and you knew Marvin was on the job, finding "slime in the ice machine."

I can't think of a bigger Houston icon.

Posted 7/29/2007 05:35:00 PM by Douglas

I'm not a big fan of managed pension funds, but something about this one that stinks. State workers paid with confiscatory tax money investing on something that's illegal in Texas? How does that fly?

The Teacher Retirement System board voted Friday to target nearly a third of its $112.5 billion in holdings to alternative assets like private equity, hedge funds and real estate — and to make a casino project the first direct investment under its new real-estate strategy.

The plan to diversify the pension fund has drawn national attention, with alternative investments viewed by some as potentially riskier, albeit with potentially higher returns.

Well, duh. Higher risk better have higher returns, or you are stoo-pid. But still, you'd think TRS would shy away from historical Mob-related investments, especially after losing $35 Million to Enron.

Posted 7/28/2007 05:43:00 PM by Douglas

"I never smelled anything and I still don't smell anything." Wondering where your wife went? Check the storage room:

A man whose wife's decomposing body was found in a storage room of their home said he thought she had left him.

Eugene Pilouw, who said that diabetes has damaged the nerves in his nose, said he noticed his wife was missing on July 12. Three days later, his daughter found his wife's body in a storage room in the back area of the home.

And then it gets weird:

After he decided to give his cats away because he couldn't take care of them by himself, his daughter went to his home July 15 to pick one up.

You give her cats away before you find out where she is? Kooky, dude, but the rest of the blogosphere is waiting for the autopsy report.

Posted 7/28/2007 05:37:00 PM by Douglas

As a blogger, I can't decide what I dislike about this more: The fact that I hate FoxNews, or that I hate liberals

Posted 7/28/2007 05:23:00 PM by Douglas

No idea how my "real age" is less than my "chronological age." And yes, I figured in the drinking.

Labels: dumb internet quiz

Posted 7/26/2007 05:38:00 PM by Douglas

I AM UR DEATHCAT

IM HERE FER UR SOUL!

When Oscar the Cat visits residents of the Steere House Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Providence, Rhode Island, the staff jumps into action -- Oscar can sense within hours when someone is about to die.

In his two years living in Steere's end-stage dementia unit, Oscar has been at the bedside of more than 25 residents shortly before they died, according to Dr. David Dosa of Brown University in Providence.

He wrote about Oscar in the New England Journal of Medicine.

"It's not that the cat is consistently there first," Dr. Joan Teno, a professor of community health at Brown University, who sees patients in the unit. "But the cat always does manage to make an appearance, and it always seems to be in the last two hours."

Raised at the nursing home since he was a kitten, Oscar often checks in on residents, but when he curls up for a visit, physicians and nursing home staff know it's time to call the family.

"I don't think this is a psychic cat," said Teno. "I think there's probably a biochemical explanation," she said in a telephone interview.

Is it? OR is Oscar killing old people? I'll bet most people at the home kick Oscar out of the room when he comes in.

Posted 7/26/2007 05:30:00 PM by Douglas

The NASA Astronaut Corps is obviously suffering from an identity crisis. So they do what most folks do when they have a crisis. They have a few drinks.

At least twice, astronauts were allowed to fly after flight surgeons and other astronauts warned they were so drunk they posed a flight-safety risk, an aviation weekly reported Thursday, citing a special panel studying astronaut health.

The independent panel also found "heavy use of alcohol" before launch that was within the standard 12-hour "bottle-to-throttle" rule, according to Aviation Week & Space Technology, which reported the finding on its Web site.

A NASA official confirmed that the health report contains claims of alcohol use by astronauts before launch, but said the information is based on anonymous interviews and is unsubstantiated. The official didn't want to be named because NASA plans a news conference Friday to discuss the panel's findings.

Wow. They really can do whatever the hell they want to. All pilots know the 12 hours "bottle to throttle" rule is only superceded by "12 feet from the plane" rule. I guess it's no different in orbit.

Posted 7/26/2007 05:29:00 PM by Douglas

More trouble for NASA. Don't they have enough trouble with computers and other shit messing up without people doing it intentionally.

A space program worker deliberately damaged a computer that is supposed to fly aboard shuttle Endeavour in less than two weeks, an act of sabotage that was caught before the equipment was loaded onto the spaceship, NASA said Thursday.

The unidentified employee, who works for a NASA subcontractor, cut wires inside the computer that is supposed to be delivered to the international space station by Endeavour, officials said.

"I don't want to speculate on motivation," Gerstenmaier said.

Yikes! What is going on with those knuckleheads?

Posted 7/26/2007 05:27:00 PM by Douglas

I don't know how, but I landed on this article, from 2002, from venerable presidential lap-dog Brent Scowcroft, NSA Advisor for Ford and Bush 41, yet somehow he manages to have his own opinion on our current quagmire.

But there is scant evidence to tie Saddam to terrorist organizations, and even less to the Sept. 11 attacks. Indeed Saddam's goals have little in common with the terrorists who threaten us, and there is little incentive for him to make common cause with them.

He is unlikely to risk his investment in weapons of mass destruction, much less his country, by handing such weapons to terrorists who would use them for their own purposes and leave Baghdad as the return address. Threatening to use these weapons for blackmail--much less their actual use--would open him and his entire regime to a devastating response by the U.S. While Saddam is thoroughly evil, he is above all a power-hungry survivor.

This isn't Cindy Sheehan. This is a life long Republican. Don't you hate it when it takes five years to prove just how right you are?

Posted 7/26/2007 05:24:00 PM by Douglas

Truly Bizarre: An internet feud that got a little heated.

A Navy man who got mad when someone mocked him as a "nerd" over the Internet climbed into his car and drove 1,300 miles from Virginia to Texas to teach the other guy a lesson.

As he made his way toward Texas, Fire Controlman 2nd Class Petty Officer Russell Tavares posted photos online showing the welcome signs at several states' borders, as if to prove to his Internet friends that he meant business.

When he finally arrived, Tavares burned the guy's trailer down.

The feud started when Anderson, who runs a haunted house near Waco, joined a picture-sharing Web site and posted his artwork and political views. After he blocked some people from his page because of insults and foul language, they retaliated by making obscene digitally altered pictures of him, he said.

Investigators say Tavares boiled over when Anderson called him a nerd and posted a digitally altered photo making Tavares look like a skinny boy in high-water pants, holding a gun and a laptop under a "Revenge of the Nerds" sign.

Be careful who you insult online. You never know who is going to show up in your town and burn your house down.

Posted 7/26/2007 05:23:00 PM by Douglas

Thanks for giving me fat buddy:

Obesity can spread from person to person, much like a virus, researchers are reporting today. When a person gains weight, close friends tend to gain weight, too.

The answer, the researchers report, was that people were most likely to become obese when a friend became obese. That increased a person’s chances of becoming obese by 57 percent.

There was no effect when a neighbor gained or lost weight, however, and family members had less influence than friends.

First off, duh. When friends have like activities (or lack thereof) and hang out at the same Chinese buffets, it's easy to see how their weight would fluctuate similarly.

More importantly, this is the kind of thing that the NEJoM is publishing? How's that cancer thing coming along?

Posted 7/26/2007 05:05:00 PM by Douglas

Lady Bird Lake.

The scenic lake that bisects Austin will now be named after the woman who was partly responsible for its beauty.

The Austin City Council voted unanimously today to change the name of Town Lake to Lady Bird Lake, two weeks and a day after the former first lady died at age 94.

Mayor Will Wynn was latest in a line of several mayors, starting with Roy Butler in 1971, who have wanted to stamp her name on the lake whose trails and greenery she spearheaded.

Yet 36 years after Johnson began her drive to beautify the city's signature lake, her original plans for a hike and bike trail to completely encircle it never have been fulfilled, City Council member Mike Martinez noted during today's meeting.

How fitting.

Posted 7/25/2007 05:58:00 PM by Douglas

Emergency officials tell you to get the hell out. You don't. They have to come get you. The county sends you a bill.

A man who shot himself in the leg while stranded at home during flooding is being asked to reimburse the county for his swift-water rescue because he ignored evacuation orders.

Parker County commissioners voted Monday to bill Edward Musick for $1,573.68, the estimated rescue cost.

"We understand that in emergencies, we all share the burden, but this one could have been avoided," said County Judge Mark Riley, adding that a lien should be filed against Musick's property if he fails to pay.

Well, couldn't all of these flooding rescues be avoided? Just because he did something even dumber than staying in a flooded house doesn't mean he's declined all emergency services, does it? What if he had a heart attack? Does that mean the county is just going to write him off?

On June 27 Riley ordered 2,000 people to evacuate homes along the Brazos River, where heavy rain had caused severe flooding.

Authorities said Musick refused to leave his home, which is on stilts but was surrounded by 4 or 5 feet of water. About 1:30 a.m. on July 1, Musick — who had a gun to protect his property against looters — accidentally shot himself in the leg and called 911, authorities said.

Rescuers reached Musick's house in an inflatable boat, but a fence post cut a hole in it, so they had to swim. The rescue took about four hours because they had to put him in a basket and pull it across the water to a National Guard truck, Riley said.

County officials asked the fire marshal to tabulate the rescue's cost, using the $9-per-hour reimbursement rates set by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Riley said.

The problem I see with this is that the individual is asking other people to accept risk that he was encouraged to avoid, and that gets in the way of the state's power, but the state can't have it both ways.

If they issue an evacuation and you chose to stay, your own private medical health insurance can deny your claims on grounds of your dumbassedness. Ok, fine. No one is going to weep long for the 2X4 stuck in your kidney because you didn't want to leave behind your Hummel figurines.

But what about the other side of that coin? Those that died because they did what the government told them to do. If they get to wield their power to pick and chose whom they save, they'd better gall durned well prepare to make remediation for when there's a body count during an evacuation for a storm that didn't come.

Posted 7/25/2007 05:31:00 PM by Douglas

Don't let this year's lack of hurricanes fool you. We're still all gonna die.

Nearly eight weeks have passed since the last tropical storm in the Atlantic-Caribbean region faded away, but banish any notion the 2007 hurricane season has been unusually slow and beware the coming months, experts say.

The peak of the six-month season is just around the corner and forecasters are still predicting a busy one.

Of course! What else are they gonna say? Hurricane forecasters don't get paid to not forecast hurricanes.

"There's absolutely nothing out of the ordinary," Gerry Bell, a hurricane forecaster for the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, said of the Atlantic season's first two months. "It's not slow. It's not fast."

Wait, why is this news? Oh yeah, because it scares old people.

Labels: hurricanes

Posted 7/25/2007 05:20:00 PM by Douglas

Pretty cool game. Too bad they don't teach geography anymore.

Posted 7/24/2007 05:47:00 PM by Douglas

When you're drinking, be sure you make it home to the right house.

An intoxicated, visually impaired man entered the wrong northeast Harris County home early today and suffered minor wounds after the frightened homeowner fired a shotgun, officials said.

"It was not his residence," said Lt. Michael Young of the Harris County Precinct 4 constable's office. "The homeowner requested that this person leave and the interloper refused, insisting it was his house."

When the confused man advanced on the homeowner, the homeowner fired a round of bird shot that grazed the man on his face and head, Young said.

The man, whose family told deputies he has been involved in similar incidents before, was taken by ambulance to a hospital, where he remained this morning, Young said. The man lives nearby, he said.

Before he was wounded, the confused man had been jiggling the front door of the home on Devlin, shouting and pacing back and forth when he could not enter, Young said.

Although he had no key, the man managed to enter the front door, Young said. It was unclear whether the deadbolt lock was set, he said.

Also, lock your doors at 2:45 in the morning.

Posted 7/24/2007 05:34:00 PM by Douglas

What will those pesky terrorists think of next?

Airport security officers around the nation have been alerted by federal officials to look out for terrorists practicing to carry explosive components onto aircraft, based on four curious seizures at airports since last September.

The unclassified alert was distributed on July 20 by the Transportation Security Administration to federal air marshals, its own transportation security officers and other law enforcement agencies.

The seizures at airports in San Diego, Milwaukee, Houston and Baltimore included "wires, switches, pipes or tubes, cell phone components and dense clay-like substances," including block cheese, the bulletin said. "The unusual nature and increase in number of these improvised items raise concern."

Security officers were urged to keep an eye out for "ordinary items that look like improvised explosive device components."

Milwaukee? A block of cheese? Is there any limit to this fear-mongering?

Posted 7/24/2007 05:08:00 PM by Douglas

Not the finger I'd have picked for myself, but oh well

You Are a Ring Finger

You are romantic, expressive, and hopeful. You see the best in everything. You are very artistic, and you see the world as your canvas. You are also drawn to the written word. Inventive and unique, you are often away in your own inner world. You get along well with: The Pinky Stay away from: The Index Finger

Labels: dumb internet quiz

Posted 7/23/2007 05:19:00 PM by Douglas

Pretty strong words from the world's 4th largest computer maker. Windows Vista sucks! Imagine that?!?

The head of Taiwan-based personal computer maker Acer, Gianfranco Lanci, hit out at Microsoft's Windows Vista operating system, saying that the "entire industry" was disappointed by it.

"The entire industry is disappointed by Windows Vista," the head of the world's fourth-biggest PC maker told the Financial Times Deutschland in its online edition on Monday.

Never before had a new version of Windows done so little to boost PC sales.

"I really don't think that someone has bought a new PC specifically for Vista," he added.

Well that's not entirely true. I bought this laptop so I could avoid Vista, so in a way, it did spurn a sale, but I've long been a proponent of the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" school. Sure, I know that same attitude would have left me back with Win 3.1 living in a cave, or at the very least peeing in my sink. But I was a devoted Mac user during the ugly Windows years, back before Steve Jobs convinced everyone to drink the Kool-Aide and Mac-ies turned into an iCult full of people with weird haircuts and grey tunics.

But seriously, what is Vista gonna do for me that XP isn't? This lappy has 2 gigs of ram and 120 gig hard drive, all for about the same price as my 15" monitor 10 years ago. I'll admit I'm a total idiot (on this), but I just don't see what Vista can do for me, considering the biggest memory whore on my machine is the OS itself, and the intertubes has turned just about every RAM filled box into a dumb terminal, anyway.

I'll be hanging on to XP for quite some time. At least until MicroSoft figures out what "backwards compatibility" means.

Labels: vista

Posted 7/22/2007 04:48:00 PM by Douglas

Rap is officially lame. Remember the good old days when they were shooting each other and doin' each other's bitches? I guess that stuff is still going on, but it's lame shit like this that's making the headlines:

Platinum record-selling Houston rapper Lil' Flip was charged Saturday with credit card abuse in connection with the purchase of an airline ticket.

The 26-year-old rapper, whose real name is Wesley Eric Weston Jr., turned himself in on the felony charge around 2:30 p.m. Saturday and was released shortly thereafter on a $2,000 bond.

Weston, known as the "freestyle king" for his ability to improvise, is accused of buying a $671 Southwest Airlines ticket to Baltimore from Houston on June 8 with an American Express card held by a man identified as Jordan Salinger, according to a court document. Salinger, whose relationship, if any, with Weston is unknown, told authorities he did not authorize the purchase, according to the document.

It's hard out there on a hard bangin' playa and his criz-edit cards, yo! And then there's this incredible lameness:

Rapper 50 Cent sued an Internet advertising company for $1 million Friday, claiming it illegally used his image in a game where the player pretends to shoot him.

The game, called "Shoot the Rapper," shows 50 Cent walking back and forth in an ad across the top of a Web page while the viewer is encouraged to shoot him by aiming and clicking with the mouse, court papers say.

A successful shot results in a misty cloud of red, and the viewer is then directed to another Web page where the ad firm's client sells goods and services, according to the lawsuit.

The rapper's lawyer, Peter Raymond, says the game doesn't use 50 Cent's name, but "it looks like him, and there's no doubt the character is intended to be him."

Yo yo yo, my attorney is gonna have to go mad gansta on yo ass!

Dorks.

Posted 7/22/2007 04:29:00 PM by Douglas

Ron Paul in The New York Times. I'm kinda curious to those that can't see past the two main party candidates to this clarity:

This side of Paul has made him the candidate of many people, on both the right and the left, who hope that something more consequential than a mere change of party will come out of the 2008 elections. He is particularly popular among the young and the wired. Except for Barack Obama, he is the most-viewed candidate on YouTube. He is the most “friended” Republican on MySpace.com. Paul understands that his chances of winning the presidency are infinitesimally slim. He is simultaneously planning his next Congressional race. But in Paul’s idea of politics, spreading a message has always been just as important as seizing office. “Politicians don’t amount to much,” he says, “but ideas do.” Although he is still in the low single digits in polls, he says he has raised $2.4 million in the second quarter, enough to broaden the four-state campaign he originally planned into a national one.

Paul represents a different Republican Party from the one that Iraq, deficits and corruption have soured the country on. In late June, despite a life of antitax agitation and churchgoing, he was excluded from a Republican forum sponsored by Iowa antitax and Christian groups. His school of Republicanism, which had its last serious national airing in the Goldwater campaign of 1964, stands for a certain idea of the Constitution — the idea that much of the power asserted by modern presidents has been usurped from Congress, and that much of the power asserted by Congress has been usurped from the states. Though Paul acknowledges flaws in both the Constitution (it included slavery) and the Bill of Rights (it doesn’t go far enough), he still thinks a comprehensive array of positions can be drawn from them: Against gun control. For the sovereignty of states. And against foreign-policy adventures. Paul was the Libertarian Party’s presidential candidate in 1988. But his is a less exuberant libertarianism than you find, say, in the pages of Reason magazine.

Read the whole thing, and vote for someone that's not a complete idiot.

Labels: Ron Paul

Posted 7/22/2007 02:46:00 PM by Douglas

Apparently there's not a littering law in low earth orbit.

The station's three-man Expedition 15 crew will toss more than 1,600 pounds (731 kilograms) of unneeded equipment toward Earth, perform some repairs and other clean up work during a Monday spacewalk to help make way for future expansion of the orbital laboratory.

"We know the crew's ready," said Daryl Schuck, NASA's lead extravehicular activity (EVA) officer for Expedition 15, during a recent press conference at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. "We've got confidence in our approach to this and confidence in our crew."

Clayton Anderson, a NASA astronaut and ISS flight engineer, will lead the scrap-tossing spacewalk with the help of cosmonaut Expedition 15 commander Fyodor Yurchikhin. Flight engineer Oleg Kotov will provide support from inside the station by controlling the robotic arm, Canadarm2, to shuttle the astronauts around during their planned 6.5-hour EVA.

I thought NASA's new policy about limiting the amount of space junk they have to dodge with every launch. I guess not.

Posted 7/21/2007 05:17:00 PM by Douglas

Ok, fine. Librarians are the coolest people in the world.

Let the healing begin.

Grrrraw! Show me to your stacks, Marian!

Posted 7/21/2007 05:06:00 PM by Douglas

Is your election campaign running out of speed? Tired of running to the tired old polarizing topics of flag-burning and gay marriage? This product is clearly for you:

May cause drymouth.

Posted 7/20/2007 05:49:00 PM by Douglas

Leave it to the Texas Legislature to look out for the little guy and protect the rights of the downtrodden. Up this time? Those that need to take a crap in public places

Everyone has had the experience: out in public, in the middle of a store, when nature calls. Some calls are more urgent than others, but for those getting over a stomach bug or some food poisoning, it's not one to be ignored.

For Susan Manks, fear of that call dogs her daily life. She never knows when or where. Such is the nature of Crohn's disease, a chronic and serious inflammation of the gastrointestinal tract that struck her when she was 18 and periodically makes her life miserable.

"When my disease is active, I'm a prisoner in my home," said Manks, a 46-year-old Houston mother of two. "You are fearful of stepping out of your safe zone."

Which explains why she was eager to drive to Austin on Thursday for the ceremonial signing of a bill that does a small thing that could have a big impact on the quality of her life. The new law, formally known as the Restroom Access Act, guarantees customers with certain medical conditions the use of a retail store's bathroom.

"When I first read about this, I literally cried because I could imagine something closer to a normal life," Manks said. "People don't understand how traumatic it can be when you are denied use of the bathroom. It's just like a panic attack."

Not to belittle their strife, because we've all been in the HEB when nature calls, but honestly. Do we need to get the government involved? If Leftys can use "keep your laws off my body" can private businesses use the "keep your laws off my bathrooms?" Of course not. That would be unfair.

But come on. Just because I'm about to crap my pants doesn't suddenly make it Home Depot's fault: It makes it their problem if they don't let me use their facilities. The market could solve this one with a mop instead of legislation.

Posted 7/20/2007 05:36:00 PM by Douglas

Today's roundup of Houston shootings. What makes these remarkable? They're children. Exhibit A:

A 4-year old was shot in the stomach late today in his family home in north Harris County, law enforcement officials said.

Escobar said an initial investigation discovered that the boy accidently fired one shot from a revolver in a bedroom, striking himself in the abdomen about 5:15 p.m. at a home in the 19900 block of Chaste Tree.

Ok, that's pretty sad that he shot himself, but here's Exhibit B:

A 3-year-old boy shot his grandmother through both arms with a .22-caliber rifle, the Orange County Sheriff's office said.

The 66-year-old grandmother said she was babysitting her grandson when he got the rifle and accidentally fired it. The bullet went through the woman's right forearm and pierced and exited her left forearm, Sheriff's Capt. David Reeves said.

The shooting happened Monday at the woman's home near Orange, about 30 miles east of Beaumont near the Louisiana border.

Can we extrapolate anything about this one in that it was a 3 year old, yet it was real close to Louisiana? If it were only that simple.

Posted 7/20/2007 05:27:00 PM by Douglas

I suppose Europe should expect more of this until the Sharia is implemented. Probably about 50 years in England.

Three men were jailed Friday in Britain over a "barbaric" honour killing ordered by the family of a 20-year-old Kurdish woman after she had an affair with a man they deemed unsuitable.

"This was a barbaric and callous crime," said judge Brian Barker. "You are hard and unswerving men to whom apparently the respect from the community is more important that your own flesh and blood."

The young woman's agonising death was ordered by her Iraqi Kurd father and uncle after they discovered her affair with another Kurd, Rahmat Sulemani, 29.

Mahmod vanished in January 2006 and her body was found buried in a suitcase in a garden 100 miles (160 kilometres) away three months later.

According to prosecutors, Hama confessed that Banaz's ordeal lasted two hours and said she was subjected to rape and other degrading sexual acts before being garrotted.

Hama also said she took 30 minutes to die, adding that he had stamped on her neck to "let her soul out."

As horrible as it is, this is an excellent example of those that say the "equivalency of culture" is transparent. This kind of thing just doesn't happen in the West. I mean, sure, there are isolated examples, but this doesn't happen as a matter of law to a culture that embraces such activities.

But England has a bigger immigration problem than we do. . . they just don't know it yet.

Posted 7/20/2007 05:14:00 PM by Douglas

Be a darlin' and bring me my shades and a glass of somthin' cool, would you hon?

Posted 7/18/2007 05:58:00 PM by Douglas

I think we're all sick of seeing politicians on TV apologizing with their wives because they can't keep their dong in their pants, but I think there's something about Wendy Vitter that makes me like this Southern Belle:

"I'm a lot more like Lorena Bobbit than Hillary. If he does something like that, I'm walking away with one thing, and it's not alimony, trust me."

While I'm not one to advocate assault or mutilation, I gotta give it up for the woman that's not going to be a victim in her relationship or the media.

Posted 7/18/2007 05:50:00 PM by Douglas

Imagine that?!? A country that was never even a country, ethnically, would break up into ethnic lines if the Department of Defense would stop bombing them.

If U.S. combat forces withdraw from Iraq in the near future, three developments would be likely to unfold. Majority Shiites would drive Sunnis out of ethnically mixed areas west to Anbar province. Southern Iraq would erupt in civil war between Shiite groups. And the Kurdish north would solidify its borders and invite a U.S. troop presence there. In short, Iraq would effectively become three separate nations.

That was the conclusion reached in recent "war games" exercises conducted for the U.S. military by retired Marine Col. Gary Anderson. "I honestly don't think it will be apocalyptic," said Anderson, who has served in Iraq and now works for a major defense contractor. But "it will be ugly."

I am shocked, SHOCKED to learn that three different groups of people that have only been subjugated into a nation-state by Europeans would want to form smaller groups of their own. But for the real shocker in this one, you gotta go to the Commander in Chief:

For Bush, however, that is the primary risk of withdrawal. "It would mean surrendering the future of Iraq to al-Qaeda," he said in a news conference last week. "It would mean that we'd be risking mass killings on a horrific scale. It would mean we'd allow the terrorists to establish a safe haven in Iraq to replace the one they lost in Afghanistan." If U.S. troops leave too soon, Bush said, they would probably "have to return at some later date to confront an enemy that is even more dangerous."

Forgive me for paying attention for the past five years, but how is that different from what has already happened? Over 3,600 dead Americans and at least 70,000 dead Iraqis and Al Qaeda wasn't in Iraq before the 2003 invasion. But why bother? Forty percent of Americans still think that Saddam Hussein had a connection with 9/11.

Posted 7/18/2007 05:48:00 PM by Douglas

Ron Paul makes the Chronicle today, with the typical ignorant bias you've come to know and love from a Hearst publication.

Most of the country may know Ron Paul as the candidate who created an uproar during a debate when he said America's involvement in the Middle East invited the 9/11 attacks, or as the man who very publicly sent Republican front-runner Rudy Giuliani a list of history books to study.

How on earth can the Chronicle make fun of Rudy about the exact same thing that they're wrong about? Ron Paul never even insinuated that we "invited" the attacks, but why would a newspaper writer bother to check the facts of the story?

Labels: Ron Paul

Posted 7/18/2007 05:28:00 PM by Douglas

Poisoning our world, one farm at a time

A team of scientists from NOAA, the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium, and Louisiana State University is forecasting that the “dead zone” off the coast of Louisiana and Texas this summer — an area of low or no oxygen which can threaten or kill all marine life in it — has the potential to be the largest since shelf wide measurements began in 1985, and significantly larger than the average size since 1990.

Hey dolphins, maybe you should head south. [Thanks, long-time reader!]

Posted 7/17/2007 05:19:00 PM by Douglas

I had no idea there were Snow Monkeys in Laredo.

The frightened survivors began, understandably, to hang more closely around the roofs, fences, and compounds of both their own home and the neighboring ranches. Someone called authorities to complain. Surely it wasn't acceptable to set loose a bunch of foreign primates on a quiet rural county? Not that they were as bad as fire ants or salt cedar, but still, there had to be rules about these things, right?

Well, there had been. Until 1994, the monkeys had been protected officially as a "threatened species" under the Endangered Species Act, and unofficially by observatory neighbors who felt protective of them, and would call the observatory if one escaped. But as the troop grew, so did the nuisance, and with the observatory short of maintenance funds, nearby ranchers increasingly complained of escaped monkeys stealing food, damaging trees, or just being where they didn't belong.

Well they're safe and sound now, on their very own sanctuary. But really? What's the weirdest part of that story? Japanese monkeys in South Texas? Hunters shooting Japanese monkeys in South Texas, or South Texas monkeys being saved from hunters by Wayne Newton?

The martyred monkeys didn't die entirely in vain. The shooting led entertainer Wayne Newton to San Antonio for a fundraiser. Other people gave cash and their time. From its small beginnings in Texas, the primate refuge movement has grown nationwide.

Throw the dice on that one. . .

Posted 7/17/2007 05:14:00 PM by Douglas

Do overly-sensationalized headlines mean less if you end them with a question? Probably not, but it doesn't stop people from trying to scare the crap out of old people about GLOBAL WARMING!!!

A lot of scientists are diving into this field, a lot of different specialties, a lot of climate scientists who didn't study hurricanes before. That's a good thing because people are going to be picking apart the theory and the data from a variety of different angles and they're going to be doing new kinds of studies. For instance, what happens to storm size, has that changed over time? What happens to rapid intensification? Is that occurring more frequently? I think we're really going to have clearer answers in about five years. I'm not saying we're going to have all the answers. But that doesn't mean we have to wait, policy-wise.

We should basically acknowledge there's a scientific debate. That's a fact. And we need to acknowledge that we're so incredibly vulnerable to hurricanes, and so underprepared, that the scientific debate can pretty much follow its course while we do practical things. Global warming is a problem, and global warming needs to be addressed with climate solutions such as emission caps and better fuel efficiency.

Catch that? It's a problem, it's a debate in the scientific community, but you need to reduce you carbon emissions, you evil, evil, industrialists. What are you thinking?

Posted 7/17/2007 05:07:00 PM by Douglas

I've never seen a flashlight that looks like a taser.

Officer Charles Jeffers told investigators he'd stopped to use the restroom at his home Sunday night while on his way to investigate a burglary. He let a woman he knew into the house, leading to her accidentally shooting the Taser, according to a police report.

Jeffers, a four-year veteran of the Dallas department, was placed on restricted duty while police review the incident.

"We don't know what happened," said Lt. Vernon Hale, a police spokesman. "We're trying to figure out what occurred out there."

The woman said she picked up the Taser, believing it was a flashlight, while Jeffers was in the bathroom, according to the police report.

When Jeffers told her to put the Taser down, she was "startled and accidentally pulled the trigger," the report said.

I bet we see this event on an episode of "COPS: When Quickies Attack!"

Posted 7/15/2007 05:22:00 PM by Douglas

It's not just every day I get to see my 10th grade Spanish teacher in the news.

By the late '70s, the theater closed its doors and sunlight streamed through the Ritz's roof. But several years ago, the National Trust for Historic Preservation, concerned about the plight of deteriorating movie theaters, dispatched a structural engineer to examine it. The engineer's report said the building could be restored, but recommended that preservationists act quickly to save it.

A community-wide effort to save the Ritz began several years ago. Soon, a new generation of movie-goers will be able to take in first-run movies, musical productions and other shows at the theater, now in the final stages of a multi-million-dollar renovation.

I think I remember seeing Star Wars there, a LONG time ago in a County far, far away. Still, I bet it's an even longer before they show the quintessential small-town Texas town flick, The Last Picture Show.

Posted 7/15/2007 05:01:00 PM by Douglas

Librarians make The Times again. This time for abandoning the classification system that helped me find books since I was in the second grade. Dewey? We don't.

Trying to build popularity, many public libraries across the country have been looking more like big chain bookstores, offering comfortable easy chairs, coffee bars and displays of the latest best sellers.

But the new library in this growing Phoenix suburb has gone a step further. It is one of the first in the nation to have abandoned the Dewey Decimal System of classifying books, in favor of an approach similar to that at Barnes & Noble, say, where books are shelved in “neighborhoods” based on subject matter.

It was Harry Courtright, director of the 15-branch Maricopa County Library District, who came up with the idea of a Dewey-less library. The plan took root two years ago after annual surveys of the district’s constituency found that most people came to browse, without a specific title in mind.

Interesting that the private sector once again showing the man how to get it done. I just had no idea there was so much exciting news going on in the world of lie-berrys.

Posted 7/12/2007 05:45:00 PM by Douglas

No F1 at Indy next year?

Motorsports experts are divided over who is the biggest loser after the announcement that Formula One will not return in 2008 to Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

“The Speedway loses one of the world’s marquee global motorsports events and F1 loses out on one of the world’s largest markets for its teams and corporate partners,” said Tim Frost, president of Frost Motorsports, a Chicago-based consulting firm that advises motorsports properties on business practices.

No racing. . . at INDY?

“If this race goes away, they have a big fixed asset in that track just sitting there,” Frost said. “They’ll have to rethink their strategy.”

Exactly. I don't know how much the track (and city) was making off of F1, but I know how much it's making with no race. Squat.

It's great that America gets shut out of the most popular racing series in the world.

Posted 7/12/2007 05:21:00 PM by Douglas

When I first heard of The Simpson's movie, I thought, wow, not a decade too soon. This guy pretty much nails the suck-age on the head. That show hasn't been funny in a decade.

The Simpsons of today revels in big, stupid antics, one-note gags and obvious plot twists. The Simpsons of yesteryear, however, was a different beast, one that would have found no room for over-sized pastries pursuing characters along sidewalks. That's why it's hard to greet the arrival of the movie with whoops of excitement. If it's anything like the current TV show, this will be one of the greatest misfires in spin-off history.

Once, it was the greatest show on TV. Every episode was brimming with imagination, excitement and some of the sharpest one-liners to come out of America for decades. But above all it was smart: The Simpsons knew how to parry crudity with intelligence blow for blow. Bart's big-haired nemesis Sideshow Bob stepping on a rake nine times would be followed up with a surreal two-minute performance of HMS Pinafore. Homer lobbing a lookalike of himself over a waterfall would be followed by a reference to Walt Whitman's collection of poems, Leaves and Grass. This was dizzyingly intelligent, daring, exhilarating stuff. For every burp gag came an arch pop-culture reference. For every time Homer fell down the stairs or Bart got strangled, we had a nifty TV parody or sly political dig.

And it kept on coming, week after week. An entire generation didn't understand it. George Bush senior, then US president, even wished aloud that American families could be more like the Waltons than the Simpsons. A massive rift opened up between those who "got" The Simpsons and those who hated it. You chose your side carefully. To be a Simpsons fan was truly one of the most privileged things in the world.

Then it all changed. A new guard took over and ripped up the rules. Veterans of the show with pedigrees on venerated US comedy institutions like Saturday Night Live and The Tonight Show - Jon Vitti, George Meyer, John Schwartzwelder - either departed or went part-time. In came writers who had cut their teeth on sappy teen comedies like Blossom and unsophisticated knockabouts like Beavis and Butt-Head. A looser, lazier sensibility took hold, given free rein by new executive producer Mike Scully. And the show became stupid.

I'll stop before I quote the whole article, because it's excellent. It pretty much sums up why I won't be seeing this huge stinker of a movie.

Posted 7/11/2007 05:54:00 PM by Douglas

Texas lost a real class act today. Rest in Peace, Claudia.

Lady Bird Johnson, the former first lady who championed conservation and worked tenaciously for the political career of her husband, former President Lyndon B. Johnson, died Wednesday, a family spokeswoman said. She was 94.

As first lady, she was perhaps best known as the determined environmentalist who wanted roadside billboards and junkyards replaced with trees and wildflowers. She raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to beautify Washington. The $320 million Highway Beautification Bill, passed in 1965, was known as "The Lady Bird Bill," and she made speeches and lobbied Congress to win its passage.

"Every American owes her a debt of gratitude because it was her devotion to the environment that brought us the Beautification Act of 1965 and the scenic roadside development and environmental clean-up efforts that followed ... ," former President Bill Clinton and Sen. Hillary Clinton said in a statement. The Clintons also praised her for supporting her husband's "fights for civil rights and against poverty."

I guess the first time I every heard the name "Lady Bird" was when mom would drive by a junk yard anywhere in Texas that was lined with a row of trees and she'd say, in her best Lady-Bird drawl, "plant a tree, a shruub, or a buush: Help keep Ah-murika beautiful!" I also think my brother waited on her table when he worked in a fancy West-Austin restaurant.

As a victim of my recent arborcide, I can appreciate her legacy, and know that she will be missed.

Sad to think that most people will remember "Lady Bird" as a cartoon dog.

Posted 7/11/2007 05:48:00 PM by Douglas

Wow, don't see this every day. Government yahoo ousted by his peers for being a jackhole.

National Hurricane Center director Bill Proenza left his position Monday, just days after nearly half of the NHC staff signed a petition calling for his ouster.

I wonder if this would work in the executive branch?

Proenza is still employed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration -- a parent organization of the NHC -- but he is currently on leave, said NOAA spokesman Anson Franklin.

Deputy Director Ed Rappaport has been temporarily placed in charge.

Proenza, 62, became the director in January after the retirement of Max Mayfield.

Proenza caused an uproar last month with comments about a key hurricane satellite called QuikSCAT. The satellite is five years beyond its life expectancy and operating on a backup transmitter. Proenza said if it were to fail, forecast tracks could be thrown off by as much as 16 percent.

Ok, so what's 16% of a total guess? You can see the danger we're in.

But one of the center's longtime forecasters said Proenza's comments were misguided.

"QuikSCAT is another tool that we use to forecast," Lixion Avila said. "The forecast will not be degraded if we don't have the QuikSCAT."

You did a heckuva job, Proenza-y.

Posted 7/11/2007 05:14:00 PM by Douglas

Department of Homeland scaring the shit out of us has now changed their threat system on Michael Chertoff's gastrointestinal inclinations. Don't laugh, this is the best idea they've come up with so far. Other than x-raying my shoes.

U.S. counterterror officials are warning of an increased risk of an attack this summer, given al-Qaida's apparent interest in summertime strikes and increased al-Qaida training in the Afghan-Pakistani border region.

On Tuesday, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff told the editorial board of The Chicago Tribune that he had a "gut feeling" about a new period of increased risk.

I can't say anything more (or better) than Radley already did, so I'll just quote:

Despite the absence of any specific information, and despite the fact that his saying as much would do little if anything to actually thwart a pending attack, Chertoff still feels he has to go public with his "gut feeling" that something awful might happen this summer. And so the newspapers and Drudge and the blogs run with it. And now we get to go about our summer business with the foreboding cloud of a possible terror attack looming on the horizon.

This is pretty consistent with how the government has behaved since 9/11. We now go through an expensive, invasive, tedious, basically useless ritual every time we get on an airplane because the government feels like if we're hassled and frightened, we'll at least feel safer. When Britain broke up a half-assed attempt at an attack using liquid explosives, the government decided to add a complicated sorta'-ban on carrying gels and liquids onto flights, too. Never mind that the broken-up attack wouldn't have worked, or that it would be nearly impossible to bring down a plane with liquid explosives stored in a carry-on bag. And now, Chertoff casts a shadow over the summer based on rumbles in his gut.

And let's not forget about the threat dog method of "gut feeling" security.

Posted 7/07/2007 06:38:00 PM by Douglas

How much rain have we received this week? So much, frogs are doin' it in my back yard:

Labels: animals doin' it

Posted 7/07/2007 06:27:00 PM by Douglas

I don't care how young the profession is getting, when I think "librarian" and "hip", I think "replacement surgery."

Librarians? Aren’t they supposed to be bespectacled women with a love of classic books and a perpetual annoyance with talkative patrons — the ultimate humorless shushers?

Not any more. With so much of the job involving technology and with a focus now on finding and sharing information beyond just what is available in books, a new type of librarian is emerging — the kind that, according to the Web site Librarian Avengers, is “looking to put the ‘hep cat’ in cataloguing.”

Well, just because you're needed doesn't make you cool. Case in point: Lawyers, accountants, and engineers. Some of the most boring people on earth, yet they sometimes create a lot of knowledge that needs to be cataloged. Time to call someone even more boring.

How did such a nerdy profession become cool — aside from the fact that a certain amount of nerdiness is now cool? Many young librarians and library professors said that the work is no longer just about books but also about organizing and connecting people with information, including music and movies.

Wow. Let's combine the expertise of a technical librarian with the ineffectiveness of the flunky at Blockbuster. How could we lose!

Seriously, anyone that has ever needed a librarian (other than to find the latest copy of whatever Harry Potter drek has hit the shelves) knows they're worth their weight in flattened wood pulp. But cool? That's a stretch. Everyone that files their taxes needs an accountant, just like everyone that drives over a bridge needs an engineer, and need doesn't equate to cool.

Posted 7/06/2007 05:46:00 PM by Douglas

Today's posts make me realize one thing: I'm in a piss poor mood, so in a vain effort to assuage my crankiness from both of my readers, here's a beautiful bloom of my yellow hibiscus that is benefiting from the foot of rain we got this week. My grandmother gave me this plant in a pot almost five years ago. Who knows, with my new treeless yard, it might find a permanent home soon.

Posted 7/06/2007 05:09:00 PM by Douglas

Impeach? No, I don't think so. I don't want to see this country turn into a nation that has to impeach its president every term because we get fed up with their shit. How 'bout the 50% of the nation that voted for him wise up and pull their head out of their ass for the next election?

Nearly half of the US public wants President George W. Bush to face impeachment, and even more favor that fate for Vice President Dick Cheney, according to a poll out Friday.

The survey by the American Research Group found that 45 percent support the US House of Representatives beginning impeachment proceedings against Bush, with 46 percent opposed, and a 54-40 split in favor when it comes to Cheney.

We don't need a coup every term. We need the parties, the media, and the people to pay attention to what the lying assholes are saying now instead of being surprised later.

Posted 7/06/2007 05:02:00 PM by Douglas

I'm not one to promote, or even defend, video games, but this guy just takes it way too far.

But Second Life is more consequential than its moral failures. It is, in fact, a large-scale experiment in libertarianism. Its residents can do and be anything they wish. There are no binding forms of community, no responsibilities that aren't freely chosen and no lasting consequences of human actions. In Second Life, there is no human nature at all, just human choices.

And what do people choose? Well, there is some good live music, philanthropic fundraising, even a few virtual churches and synagogues. But the main result is the breakdown of inhibition. Second Life, as you'd expect, is highly sexualized in ways that have little to do with respect or romance. There are frequent outbreaks of terrorism, committed by online anarchists who interrupt events, assassinate speakers (who quickly reboot from the dead) and vandalize buildings. There are strip malls everywhere, pushing a relentless consumerism. And there seems to be an inordinate number of vampires, generally not a sign of community health.

Someone send this guy a dictionary with the pages with libertarianism and anarchism dog-eared. He clearly doesn't understand the difference.

Posted 7/06/2007 04:46:00 PM by Douglas

Was On the Road written on one long consecutive roll of paper? Ironically, the story of writing that book isn't any more exciting than the book is.

Legend has it that Kerouac wrote On the Road in three weeks, typing it almost nonstop on a 120-foot roll of paper. The truth is that the book actually had a much longer, bumpier journey from inspiration to publication, complete with multiple rewrites, repeated rejections and a dog who — well, On the Road wasn't homework, but we all know what dogs do.

But the scroll: That part's true. Jim Canary, the Indiana University conservator who's responsible for its care, says Kerouac typed about 100 words a minute, and replacing regular sheets of paper in his typewriter just interrupted his flow — thus the scroll.

Yeah, your flow really gets interrupted when you roll of your fifth whore of the day and just swallowed your morning's handful of benneys.

Posted 7/06/2007 04:19:00 PM by Douglas

The ArmyTimes doesn't think the AFI's top 100 movies of all time consists of enough state worshiping, pro-American "war movies." Not really a surprise, considering the source, but with the exception of Full Metal Jacket, which really was an anti-war movie, these movies are PR vehicles for the Department of Defense.

Where's the movie that shows the futility of America's post-1815 wars?

Posted 7/06/2007 05:27:00 AM by Douglas

As a victim of credit card cloning, I'm always very aware when my card leaves my sight. However, I've used these new table card readers at a brew pub in Albuquerque, and they're a huge pain in the ass.

It's become routine for customers to swipe their credit or debit cards at consoles in fast-food joints, gas stations and grocery stores. So why do we still hand over the plastic at sit-down restaurants?

Pay-at-the-table systems are popular in Europe and other parts of the world, but they haven't yet caught on in the U.S., largely because equipment makers haven't been able to point to a reason why restaurateurs should invest in the gear.

Manufacturers now see an opportunity. A rise in the number of "skimming" scams in which waiters use hand-held computers to quietly record customers' credit card information and sell it is creating a sense of urgency. So is an increased push by managers to speed the flow of diners during peak hours.

Here's what I find annoying about it: When you're ready to pay, instead of the waitress taking your card, returning with your check, and then leaving, she now has to go get the machine, bring it to your table, and wait for you to decide what kind of tip you're going to leave for her, all while she's standing right there! If I want to discuss with my other diners the possibility of her thumb slipping into my mashed potatoes when she brought my food or the possibility of my thumb slipping between her big fake boobs as a determination of her gratuity, I can't do so without the conversation becoming really, really awkward.

So who knows. Are people less likely to totally stiff their server if they're standing right there, tapping their toe? Probably. I'm sure they'll be everywhere in about six months.

Posted 7/04/2007 04:43:00 PM by Douglas

Technology is great isn't it? The easier it is for the government to take your money, the happier they are.

Which raises an interesting question: If you don’t know how much you’re paying for something, will you notice when the price goes up? Or has E-ZPass, for all its benefits, also made it easier for toll collectors to take your money?

A young economist named Amy Finkelstein started thinking about these issues a few years ago when she and her fiancé were driving back and forth between Boston, where they were living, and New York, where they were going to be married. So she collected decades of toll records from around the country and found a clear pattern.

After an electronic system is put in place, tolls start rising sharply. Take two tollbooths that charge the same fee and are in a similar setting — both on highways leading into a big city, for instance. A decade after one of them gets electronic tolls, it will be about 30 percent more expensive on average than a similar tollbooth without it. There are no shortage of examples: the Golden Gate Bridge, the George Washington Bridge and the Tappan Zee Bridge, among them.

Confiscatory taxes are the easiest to collect, as sheeple don't even know they miss "their" money the government is taking.

Posted 7/04/2007 04:28:00 PM by Douglas

Haven't we settled the whole "gas v. charcoal" debate?

At home, however, McMurrey is a purist who uses only charcoal and wood grills to cook for friends and family.

"I'm a businessman, so I sell mostly gas-grill accessories," said McMurrey, the owner of Sugar Land-based thebarbecuestore.com. "You can get close to an authentic flavor, but nothing compares to charcoal or wood."

As backyard cooks gather around barbecue pits and grills this Independence Day, many will no doubt debate the merits of charcoal versus gas. For barbecue aficionados, there is little room for compromise.

Well, duh. There's NO point in using gas. Stay inside and spare yourself the mosquito bites!

"If you have a gas grill, just throw it in the garbage and go buy yourself a smoker," said Billy Evans, the head butcher at Perry's Meat Market in Friendswood.

Exactly. I'm sick of those that say "gas grilling is so quick." Guess what's even quicker? The Outback has call-ahead seating, and you don't have to do the dishes. If you're gonna do it, do it right. And don't dump naptha on pressed sawdust.

Get some real charcoal. And you're gonna need one of these, too.

Labels: charcoal

Posted 7/04/2007 04:07:00 PM by Douglas

Maybe if I didn't drop so many "F" bombs, I wouldn't get the R rating:

Posted 7/02/2007 07:49:00 PM by Douglas

The Space Shuttle Atlantis makes a surprise stop at Rick Husband Amarillo International Airport. Of course, it was a big deal. NASA Spokes-Homo Sapien, brign it home for us:

"The runway was within our limits. There aren't very many. There's actually 19 designated landing places across the U.S. for us," she said. "We wouldn't typically come to a commercial airport. ... We needed a place to land, so we ended up here."

If that doesn't sum up your visit to Amarillo, I don't know what does. "We were out of gas, so we ended up here."

I wonder if the Amarillo Chamber of Commerce has thought about that one?

Labels: STS-117

Posted 7/02/2007 07:40:00 PM by Douglas

What a tragic end to a tragic story.

A Spring teen who survived a brutal beating with a pipe last year apparently jumped to his death from a Cozumel-bound cruise ship on Sunday.

An 18-year-old was observed by "a bunch of people" jumping over the railing of the upper deck of Carnival Cruise Lines' Ecstasy around 7:35 a.m. Sunday, said Coast Guard spokesman Adam Eggers.

A written statement from the cruise line also said an 18-year-old appeared to jump from the ship.

I don't think many could understand his physical or emotional pain he's been through. What a senseless tragedy.

Still, I don't think this is an example for more Draconian Hate-crime laws.

Ritcheson called on Congress to strengthen U.S. hate crime laws.

"I appear before you as a survivor," Ritcheson told members of a House Judiciary subcommittee April 17. "I am here before you today asking that our government take the lead in deterring individuals like those who attacked me from committing unthinkable and violent crimes against others because of where they are from, the color of their skin, the God they worship, the person they love, or the way they look, talk or act."

The two cretins that did this got 90 years and a life sentence behind bars. I'd say that the Criminal Justice system is working quite well in this case.

Labels: Ritcheson

Posted 7/01/2007 05:55:00 PM by Douglas

HOU Orleans isn't going to go away anytime soon.

They're scattered across Houston's neighborhoods like pebbles flung from someone's hand. Now, almost two years into their Houston experience, this displaced population roughly the size of Beaumont longs for an identity free of Hurricane Katrina.

Among their number are students and professors, hamburger flippers and restaurant owners, entrepreneurs and frustrated job-seekers, criminals and victims of crime.

To bureaucrats and journalists, they are "Katrina evacuees." To their advocates and often to one another, they are "Katrina survivors." Someday, perhaps, they'll simply be Houstonians, but for now many still see themselves in transition.

"I regard myself as a Houstorleanian," said Mtangulizi Sanyika, a college professor and community activist forced to Houston from New Orleans by Katrina. He now splits his time between the cities. "Houston has to adapt to the reality that there are residents who still may be citizens of a different city in its midst."

As the second anniversary of Katrina approaches, leaders of agencies helping evacuees expect most of the estimated 100,000 living in Houston to remain here for the foreseeable future, if not permanently.

Well, again, who wants to live below sea level?

Posted 7/01/2007 05:33:00 PM by Douglas

How does one become such an unmitigated liar? Is there a special class you need to take? There are liars, and then there's the Vice President.

Mr. Addington did not reply in writing to Mr. Leonard’s letters, according to officials familiar with their exchanges. But Mr. Addington stated in conversations that the vice president’s office was not an “entity within the executive branch” because, under the Constitution, the vice president also plays a role in the legislative branch, as president of the Senate, able to cast a vote in the event of a tie.

Who ever heard of Article II anyway?

Posted 7/01/2007 05:32:00 PM by Douglas

I'm so sick of the iHype I could spit up. Apple hasn't created anything cool other than hype since 1994, and the PowerMac still couldn't punch a dent in MS Windows. Hey Jobs, try making a computer for a third the cost. Maybe if you got rid of those annoying commercials you could build a machine for under a grand. Hell, try two grand first. But this is spot on:

Labels: Mac

Posted 7/01/2007 05:26:00 PM by Douglas

On the road:

Labels: STS-117