Head scratcher of the day

To summarize: Bruce Kluger writing at USA Today, says that bloggers helped Lamont defeat Lieberman in the Democratic primary, but they should be sad because Snakes on a Plane isn't make much money, which seems to somhow relate to a revival of Joe-mentum? (Joes on a Plane, perhaps)?

Newspapers want to refer to bloggers as this monolithic entity, so I guess the next dumb thing I read in People I can take to mean USA Today has lost it's edge, too.
Link via Atrios.

Lawyers who don't get the Internet thing

An attorney for Apple Computers sent a cease and desist letter to Michael Arrington's blog, Crunchnotes, regarding a video link about some new Apple software features. Mistakes the lawyer made? First, thinking someone posting a link to a youtube.com video was responsible for posting the video. Second, sending it to a blogger, who of course, will post about it, thus exposing the material to the public even more, this time with a dose of knowledge that Apple likes to pick on it's own customer. Finally, they are asking the blogger to delink to a video that shows features also displayed on Apple.com.
(link via BoingBoing)

Vacationing in Nova Scotia this week

* = Explanations to follow when we return!

Away from computers

We're visitng relatives in Nova Scotia this week - back on next Monday or Tuesday.

Only comment so far is that Bar Habour, Maine, is fracking impossible to reach with all the people crowing the road to the island.

Blogger Portraits

Adam Harvey had his portait painted recently, a good likeness. Photographs can sometimes be accurate but clinical, by comparison.

Joementum

I have no comment on the Liberman thing, except two note that a two party state is only one party better than a one party state. Also, as Declan McCullagh points out:

As a politechnical aside, Lieberman's defeat means that one of the Senate's most strident morality crusaders may be forced to retire. Lieberman has campaigned against violent video games, embraced a Web porn tax, and called for a .xxx domain.

All of these ideas share the property of being really, really, stupid.

Wasting time

Worried that nearly 5 years after the 9/11 attacks that the government is wasting it's time, pestering law abiding citizens for worthless information? That's a good thing to worry about:

Where, I was asked, did the money in the trust come from?

As the bank knows, I said, the trust was established by my wife's mother, Mrs G.

Where did Mrs G get that money? I explained that she inherited it from her mother, Mrs B.

Where did Mrs B get money? From her husband, who pre-deceased her.

Where did Mr B get the money? I said I thought he was a stock broker but wasn't sure.

via
Boing Boing.

Private saviours?

Cleveland area journalist and writer Roldo Bartimole moved to the area long ago, and looks back while thinking about the various private organizations that I see written about to try and fix the local economy...

Corporate control - particularly through what I would call 'front groups' as the Greater Cleveland Partnership - dominated then... and now.

These institutions seem to keep themselves in business with their healthy executive salaries by not solving the problems.

When I read the PD pieces, my thoughts were...

'Did J. D. Rockefeller need a Cleveland non-profit to tell him how to make his billions and create an industry here?'

'Did Bill Gates need Computer Jumpstart to create and nourish Microsoft?'

Worth reading in full, as usual with Roldo.

When idiots attack animal shelters

Some numbskulls smashed the window at the Cleveland Animal Protective League, a non-profit that helps shelter animals and check on animal cruelty. The APL page has a page where you can donate money or items they need for the critters.

Heat waves

Overhead at a coffee shop that I use to keep awake during the day...

"Do you guys sell instant coffee?"

The look on the faces of the barista could be described as similar to the looks on the faces of the remaining citizens of Rome as the Visigoths approach.

Despite the sullen heat wandering around the Cleveland area, looking into windows and spreading it's misery like tacky curtains, I still refuse to drink ice coffee. I wonder if there is a law of thermodynamics concerning how drinking a few ounces of a hot or cold beverage does not allay the enveloping swelter.

As I drove down to work in the US the first time, back in '95, I made my was to Boston thinking it was probably similar to Halifax, with stranger accents. As that first summer wore on, I realized my air-conditioning free car, though useful back in my old Nova Scotia haunts, was a hell in the sun driving up I-95. Even more so here in the Midwest, where each of us must go to and fro in our cars cocooned and observing the world through glass, like gently cooled aliens looking for habitable environments. Some even suggest the modern convenience is causing more obesity. I can definitely say if forced to run around outside in the heat, my corpse would end up losing weight, so this makes sense to me.

Without air conditioning, I would be forced to rely on fans, or perhaps my lawmower, to keep cool. If you've ever help your face in front of a running lawnmower, you can understand it might give you a bit of trepidation. Now living in Lakewood, you might consider going to the lake. Except, of course, there is no way to actually reach the lake in Lakewood, save by boat which I have neglected to purchase up to now. One could visit a beach - assuming the bacteria count is not too high, which it often is. It removes the veil of natural joy of water to be swimming in what might charitably be described as city gravy.

Perhaps the only solution is to try and stay outside as much as possible and regain the magic ability I had as a kid to run in the heat and not die, or at least start down a road of heat conditioning, as I think this may be a chronic condition of our age.

Yourish on the Washington shooting

When you go to church on Sunday, do you ever wonder if a gunman will break into your church and start indiscriminately shooting?

When you’re going to the gym at the YMCA, do you have armed policemen standing outside the door? Do you have to go through security checks to get to a lecture at the Y?

When you drop your children off at religious school, does that school have armed guards and bullet-proof glass?

When you go to services on Christmas and Easter, do you have to increase security, not because of the added number of worshippers, but because of possible terrorist attacks?

Jews do.

More at Meryl's site, here.