Ataxia is the thing with feathers.

Rejoice and Be Gay

Massachusetts finally got its act together about something and repealed that law from 1913 that prohibited couples from marrying in the Commonwealth if their union would not be legal in their home state. (Though I gotta tell ya, I’m curious who those 36 assholes are who voted against.) This law was originally intended to prevent interracial couples from marrying here, which tells you a lot about the statue’s value. And mostly, it was pretty much forgotten about, just like all those other goofy laws like “no lady may walk her leashed moose on a street on tuesday mornings” or “it shall be illegal to dance without shoes in any yard not enclosed by a fence”, until The Gays were allowed to marry and Governor Crazypants decided this particular goofy law applied to them.

Technically, the law’s repeal is not official until Governor Patrick signs off on it, but he already said he wanted to so that seems like a no-brainer.

Let the Massachusetts economy flourish with the massive influx of wedded unigendered couples! Or something.

Tuesday Linkdome

• Bennigan’s Restaurants Shut Down Nationwide
  Corporate-owned locations closed as of today, franchise-owned locations still open. Which seems odd.
• “Close for Remodelation”
  Homey D. Clown, general contractor.

NASA

President Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space Act into law on July 29, 1958, thereby creating NASA.

Happy 50th, NASA!

Monday Linkdome

• Cop Assaulting Cyclist at Critical Mass NYC
  yet another tale of a police officer taking the “law” into his own hands. truly disgusting. I no longer see any reason to trust authorities in the United States, really.
• Eight reasons even the innocent shouldn’t talk to the police
  … and a set of two videos to tell you why you should not ever, under any circumstances, talk to the police about anything.

Friday Linkdome

Today in the Linkdome:

• Rush take on themselves
  Behold as Rush attempt to play their own song “Tom Sawyer” in Rock Band… on expert!
• Man Stole Miami-Dade Buses, Drove Them On Routes
  “Harris would take the buses from several Miami-Dade Transit bus depots in the county and drive the buses on their routes, picking up and dropping off passengers along the way. He would then return the buses at the end of the day. Police said he also didn’t steal any bus fare.” Someone should do this in Boston; at least then the buses would be running.
• Yankees ban sunblock to fight terrorism
  I told you last year about my trip to Yankee Stadium and how the team’s management actually believes that they, a baseball team, are a legitimate terrorist target. Now they also think they’re an airport. Oh, they’ll also sell you one ounce of sunblock inside the stadium for $5 to replace the sunblock they just stole from you… just like the airport! Fuckers.
• The Process: What if there were no stop signs and a major corporation was charged with inventing one?
  “The fire department kind of owns red so we’re going to have to lighten it up on the Pantone scale.”

Fannie Mae Bailout

Let it be known that the government bailing out Fannie Mae is utter bullshit. The employees and executives at Fannie Mae doctor their books and even then can’t run a business properly (someone gave out a lot more money in mortgages than they should have been). Other companies in their situation are left to crash and burn, but Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are deemed “too important” so the government gives them money pulled out of the Federal Reserve’s thin air, which will in turn increase inflation and reduce the value of the dollar even more, decimating our economy even more than it already has been. All this to benefit a bunch of rich assholes.

Philip Greenspun has a very nice post about this topic. Read it here.

In Roman times the employees of Fannie Mae would be decimated, i.e., they would draw lots and 90 percent of them would beat the unlucky 10 percent to death with clubs. What would be a modern equivalent? At the very least taxpayers should have the satisfaction of seeing the highest paid 100 Fannie Mae employees fired with two weeks of severance pay (it can’t be that hard to find replacements given that the current staff’s primary achievements have been accounting fraud and then insolvency).

In Wiener Veritas

The Wieners Circle, the hot dog stand around the corner from the hotel we stayed at in Chicago a few weeks ago, was apparently featured on the TV version of This American Life last year. Check it: clicky link

Font Conference

I know just about everyone has linked to this already, but I couldn’t let this go. I just love a good font joke!

Font Conference

Ketchup

It’s been a little while, I know. I spent a weekend in Maine recording with my band, and I went on vacation in the Midwest to visit my family and knock four more Major League Baseball parks off my list, including Wrigley Field which it has been my dream to visit since I was about 6. There are a lot of pictures of these things on my flickr page.

Now that I’m back in Boston, it’s time to hunker down and study for my upcoming exam, and do other regular things. But I should be updating again. So I will soon.

Things I Am Not Fooled By

From: “Canadian National Lottery”
Subject: HOLLA!!!!!!

Seriously, spammers. You’re not even trying.