I know I need to fix some stuff with my blog (apparently the comments link is broken, and I need to spiff up my theme and do a bunch of other things, like, you know, post and stuff), but sometimes stories jump out at me so much that I have to post them immediately.
Linked from BoingBoing:
Mayor shuts down home produce stand operated by kids
Money quote from the asshat mayor:
“They may start out with a little card-table and selling a couple of things, but then who is to say what else they have. Is all the produce made there, do they make it themselves? Are they going to have eggs and chickens for sale next,” said Manning.”
Putz.
I don’t know whether to be proud or ashamed
“courtesy” of Reuters Oddly Enough, emphasis added:
Wolf whistle works, woman strips
WELLINGTON (Reuters) - Road workers in a small New Zealand town got their wish granted when a woman stripped saying she was fed up with their wolf-whistles.
The Israeli tourist was about to use an ATM in the main street of Kerikeri, in the far north of the country, when the men whistled, the New Zealand Press Association reported.
She calmly stripped off, used the cash machine, before getting dressed and walking away.
The woman told police she didn’t take too kindly to the whistling from the men repairing the road.
“She said she had thought ‘bugger them, I’ll show them what I’ve got’,” Police Sergeant Peter Masters told NZPA.
“She gave the explanation that she had been … pestered by New Zealand men. She’s not an unattractive looking lady,” Masters said.
“She was taken back to the police station and spoken to and told that was inappropriate in New Zealand.”
Really? Stripping in response to wolf whistles and catcalls is inappropriate? How about being a lout? Is that appropriate? Morons.
I’ve only caught snippets of the story, since I don’t always hear the entire news broadcasts at the top of the hour from Israel while listening to Reshet Gimmel, but I got the gist of it from this brief review, courtesy of The Onion:
(click for full size version)
1. A terrific profile of Melinda Gates from CNNMoney.com/Fortune. My favorite snarky moment:
She made valedictorian and got into Notre Dame. But Notre Dame did not get her. When she and her dad visited, she recalls, officials at the university told them that “computers are a fad” and that they were shrinking the computer science department. “I was crushed,” Melinda says. Duke, which was expanding in computer science, got her instead.
2. Guns don’t kill people. People don’t kill people. Dogs with guns kill people.
Best news about Ann Coulter so far today (hey, the day is young, she could still get run over by a truck, which would eclipse this story):
direct lift from the Subversive Cross Stitch blog:
Seems that some truly subversive and possibly off-balance soul hand-delivered a card to Ms. Coulter’s mailbox in Florida and, according to police reports obtained by The Smoking Gun, the card they chose to express themselves with was our very own “Go Fuck Yourself” card from the set by Chronicle!
I love the NY Magazine piece’s title: But Ann Coulter Always Seemed So Nice! Bwahahahahaha!
edited to add: I looked at the police report at TSG, and was delighted to see the evidence photo showing the “two words unclear” on the inside of the card mentioned by the cop. “They” are easily (to me) discernible as the single word “solipsistic” (adj., one who holds that the self can know nothing but its own modifications and that the self is the only existent thing; also : extremely egocentric). It gives me hope and cheer to know that someone with the kind of vocabulary it takes to use “solipsistic” correctly in a sentence took the time to compose this card to Ms. Coulter and hand-deliver it. Thank you, my friend, and Merry Christmas to you!
My first concert was Billy Joel on (I think) The Bridge tour, so I’ve been a fan for a long time. I went to that concert with my mom, who’s also a big fan. She was kind enough to point me to Billy’s latest social commentary tune (following up on, just off the top of my head, Goodnight Saigon, Allentown, We Didn’t Start the Fire, The Downeaster Alexa, and others; videos of all these and more available here), Christmas in Fallujah (buy from iTunes). Here’s Billy introducing the song and the singer (Cass Dillon does the vocals), and here’s the performance itself.
The first comment on the Youtube page for the introduction references another song by the same name, released over two years ago by a different, independent artist named Jefferson Pepper. THAT youtube now comments on the Billy Joel track, and, while it’s easy to understand why it didn’t attract mainstream attention, it’s worth listening to/viewing. You can also download the song here (a couple more of his songs may be heard here).
Thanks to Joel for passing this along:
Arkansas Menorah in the Baghdad Palace
Celebrating Chanukah 2007 in Saddam Hussein’s Republican Palace, who would think? Yet tonight inside a marble encrusted hall in Baghdad, we lit the eighth light of a hand-made, 6-foot tall menorah. We prayed in Hebrew, joyfully sang a medley of Chanukah songs, ate latkes, and best of all, we were Jews together in the land of our earliest forefathers.
Read the rest…
No, not the animated short that spawned South Park. I’m bringing you this silly marketing gimmick from Travelodge in the UK:
Hotel chain offers a room at the inn for Marys and Josephs
…”The ‘gift’ of a free night’s stay is to make up for the hotel industry not having any rooms left on Christmas Eve over 2000 years ago when the original ‘Mary and Joseph’ had to settle for the night in a stable,” the company says on its Web site….
