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United States, Massachusetts, Boston, Brighton, English, Ron, Male, Photography, Nudity.
January 22, 2002 - February 9, 2002
You can't offend all the people all the time... |
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| February 9, 2002 |
Today I went to the Museum of Science for a demonstration of the Segway. I got there just after the last of the stickers were handed out to people who would get to test ride one. All I could do was join the crowd to watch others test them. I did do that for about ten minutes. Took a couple of photos. But watching people test ride Segways in person is not a lot more exciting than watching it on TV, so I didn't stay around long. Went off to wander the rest of the museum.
Upon leaving the museum I went around the corner to the mall to look at little digital cameras, because my little shoddy one had decided to auto-select malfunction mode. There's a Best Buy and a mini-Circuit City. Now, I know one or the other of those advertises that their store is the fun place to come and do the guy thing, pushing buttons and trying stuff out and seeing if it will break. But at Best Buy the cameras are restrained with cords attached to something that feels like a 5 pound sack of potatoes. You have to keep one hand tightly gripped on the cord so that you can hold the camera. I was tempted to just release so we could all enjoy the moment as the camera SMASHED back into its little platform, but I didn't have the nerve. But worse, the camera had no battery and no memory, so it was impossible to do any damn thing with it at all. Basically I could look at the outside and I could read a little yellow card typed up by a possible high school graduate.Over at Circuit City the cameras are bolted to posts 6 and 7 feet off the floor. There's no restraining cord at all. And who knows if they have batteries in them, because no fuckin' way are you going to do anything with them except admire them from a distance. Since I'm 6 feet tall I could at least comfortably read the little white card typed up by a possible high school graduate. The possible high school graduate who was the only sales person on the floor was too involved in a personal conversation on his cell phone to do much else.
So I'm sure now, this recession we're in has not gone on long enough. No, I'm still seeing lots of fat and misallocated resources…especially in the retail electronics sector of our economy.
The Boston Archdiocese of the RC church considers pedophile priests to be so routine that this week they neglected to notify the press when they turned over a list of 49 more priests accused of pedophilia to various district attorneys on Thursday. (Possible current total: 87). I'm sure someone's put up a little Post-It note at the legal offices of the Archdiocese saying "Ped Priests - Call Globe 617-929-3000"
119 tonight. Come on down. Anybody who comes up and says they read Ron's Log gets free drinks for as long as they can find me. They may be required to answer certain knowledge-testing questions.
| February 8, 2002 |
Yeah, baby!
I'll just say it now, and maybe I'll be able to get through the Olympics without feeling pressed to mention this again: NBC hasn't changed a bit. Their announcers are morons, as are 99% of sports announcers. While they have learned that "Kazakhstan" has 3 (not 4) syllables, they still don't know that "athlete" has exactly 2 syllables. But what really pushed my button was when the female announcer ditz described John Glenn as representing the United States when he was carrying the Olympic flag, when it had just been made quite clear that he represented "The Americas." What do these idiots do when not on TV? Obviously they don't study the language, current events or sports. Do they just smoke dope?
Hey, next week I'm participating in a focus group about Acela or, as the woman who called me pronounced it, "Axela." Do you think my point would be clear if I brought along my copy of Atlas Shrugged? How about if every time the conversation came around to me I said something like "Two words: Taggart Comet!" or "Four words: Who is John Galt?" Or would it be more constructive if I said "You want to reach 150 mph in Connecticut? Two words: Rearden Metal!" Unfortunately, the session won't be long enough to allow me to quote all of Galt's speech.
Well, it might look good on the tape, but I'd never get invited back. I hope there's a cute little Eddie Willers in the group.
It's a slow week in the Boston Archdiocese of the R.C. church: only 6 priests ousted for sexually molesting children. Law assures us that they're finished now, all the bad ones are gone, and the church is abrim with good, honest, trustworthy, reliable priests. Well. I'm glad that's settled.
Poll says…by the way, I don't think much of polls, but…poll says 38% of local Roman Catholics want Law to stay in his position as Archbishop. I'm sure that's a higher approval rating than Nixon had at the end. One loyal Catholic had this to say: "He's done the best he can with a can of worms that was given to him. Even Jesus Christ couldn't keep Judas Iscariot from betraying him."
I know there are some small differences between the Bibles used by Protestants and Catholics, but I hadn't heard about the part where Jesus covered up for Judas for 17 years. I'm starting my research on that bit of news even as you are reading this. (I wonder if that could account for the reason the Catholic and the Orthodox churches have different dates for Easter).
The poll goes on to say that 22% of local Catholics do not "believe church leaders have tried to cover up cases of sexual abuse by priests." That's probably roughly comparable to the percentages of people who believe in UFOs and black helicopters.
But polls don't count. The Globe explains that "The church teaches that bishops such as Law are the divinely instituted successors to Jesus's apostles." I think the LDS church uses almost exactly the same wording. Wonder if the Mormons have to cover for pedophile clergy, too. Probably not. I think Mormon clergy are required to carry firearms. Uh, OTOH, maybe pedophile clergy are not a problem in the LDS church because so many of the children carry firearms. Yes. I like that picture.
"52 percent say they have not lost confidence in the church as an institution." DWFP, indeed!
15% of the visitors to Ron's Log are using some version of Netscape. 18% of visitors are Mac users! There have been visitors to Ron's Log whose domains suggest they may be in these countries: United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, France, Mexico, Sweden, Netherlands, Australia, Belgium, Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Switzerland, Portugal, New Zealand, Singapore, Finland, Poland, and Israel, in addition to the U.S., of course. Where, I ask, are the Russians?!
The 100 worst films of the 20th century. You gotta check this list. I guarantee you some film you love is on it. Even Titanic makes it! Somehow, though, Gummo escaped.
A scientist at Brown University discovers a new class of cells in the retina which are for setting your biological clock. Research involved "Three kinds of blind mice." (You just know the reporter was dying to write that sentence!)
Another Mormon temple open house. This one is in Snowflake, Arizona. Doesn't the building look similar to the one in Belmont, Massachusetts (which, by the way, has a steeple now)?
| February 7, 2002 |
There must have been some notable tremors in southern California today, because something knocked loose a couple of messages from some previously anonymous readers. One writes "I love your wit…If you're not an author, you should be." Ah yes, wishing me a life of hard work and poverty. The same back atcha, fella!
The other L.A. boy writes: "I've been reading your blog for the past couple of months and find it funny, creative and intelligent. I enjoy your links and photos and find it all extremely entertaining." See! Something fell off a shelf and used this guy's head for a soft landing spot. Nonetheless, I didn't miss my chance to flirt right back at him. I'll let you know how it turns out.
 Probably not today's color guard, but genuine U.S.S. Constitution crew who I'd salute anyway. |
By way of explanation to those of you who don't know me in real life, I work for a federal government agency. [There, my utter hypocrisy is laid bare for all to see.] Today a highly placed political appointee came to visit from headquarters, so we had a big meeting where she spoke to a couple hundred of us. We've had these sorts of visits before from her predecessors. They get appointed and confirmed and then go on a trip to explain to the little people "in the field" what their vision is. We can tell they're excited about it, and sometimes we get excited about it, but it's all stuff we've heard before. These highly placed political appointees come and go on something like a quadrennial basis (oddly enough), and four years is never enough time to change the direction of a massive (massive) bureaucracy. Eight years might be a good start, but none of 'em get eight years. None of that has changed.
What has changed is at the beginning of the meeting we had the honor guard from the U.S.S. Constitution carry the flag up the center aisle and then we all said the Pledge of Allegiance. That was a change.
Recently viewed: Gummo which was the most disgusting movie I've ever seen. Far worse than Texas Chain Saw Massacre because Gummo seemed almost real. Sometimes I could watch only 5 minutes or so before having to shut it off. I thought it might eventually begin to make some sense or come to a point, but no. This was like the finale to Pink Flamingos but it went on for 90 minutes.
| February 6, 2002 |
What would you think of this? Posted by one of my cow-orkers outside his cubicle:
SO MANY WOMEN, SO FEW WHO CAN AFFORD ME.If you were his co-worker or supervisor, do you think any response or action would be required on your part?
GOD MADE US BROTHERS, PROZAC MADE US FRIENDS.
COFFEE, CHOCOLATE, WOMEN ... SOME THINGS ARE JUST BETTER RICH.
DON'T TREAT ME ANY DIFFERENTLY THAN YOU WOULD THE KING.
I'M OUT OF TESTOSTERONE AND I HAVE A GUN.
WARNING: I HAVE AN ATTITUDE AND I KNOW HOW TO USE IT.
OF COURSE I DON'T LOOK BUSY...I DID IT RIGHT THE FIRST TIME.
DO NOT START WITH ME. YOU WILL NOT WIN.
ALL STRESSED OUT AND NO ONE TO CHOKE.
I CAN BE ONE OF THOSE BAD THINGS THAT HAPPENS TO BAD PEOPLE.
HOW CAN I MISS YOU IF YOU WON'T GO AWAY?
DON'T UPSET ME! I'M RUNNING OUT OF PLACES TO HIDE THE BODIES.
And my personal favorite!
IF YOU WANT BREAKFAST IN BED, SLEEP IN THE KITCHEN.
Send this to 10 Bright Men to make their day!!!!!
A little essay on the distinction between blogs and journals. And another one. Or consider the Weblog Resources FAQ.
Praise for MetaFilter.
John Dvorak writes about blogs and says nice things.
Henry Kloss, founder of KLH, Advent, Acoustic Research and Cambridge Soundworks, died last week in Cambridge.
Until I saw this article I hadn't noticed that Bread & Circus does no advertising. Even so, their parking lots and store aisles are jammed, and they continue to open new stores as "mainstream" supermarkets die.
What would you think of this? I altered that bit of office "humor" above. Here's the original. It was posted by a woman outside her cubicle. Does that change your opinion?
| February 5, 2002 |
 Click for full size |
Don't overlook the "MAGIC ELECTRONIC SKIP PROTECTION" feature. Amazing, isn't it, that even though this is a Philips product — the very same Philips who invented the cassette tape and collaborated with Sony on the Compact Disc — they have to rely on magic for their 100 seconds of skip protection. That must be why it had to be manufactured in China, land of magicians. Actually the very nature of MP3 compression confers some inherent skip protection. I turned off MAGIC ELECTRONIC SKIP PROTECTION while it was playing, picked it up, turned it over, shook it around. Not even the tiniest bleep of hesitation or glitch.
Drawbacks are (1) limited display (no titles, only numbers), and (2) no window so I can show friends how most of the time the disc doesn't even spin. But neither of those features will be needed on the bike. Takes one AA battery.
Practice your Czech here - I can't find it on an English Philips page. (Did you know Liechtenstein's royal family claims restitution for 1,600 sq km of land in the Czech Republic confiscated in 1918? Did you know Liechtenstein had a royal family?)
Meanwhile on the recording front, I used Exact Audio Copy last night to record Satyagraha by Philip Glass. In Act 1, Scene 1 it picked up a lot of errors and was grinding away for the longest time (more than an hour). Speed dropped to 0.2X when I decided to turn off the monitor and go to bed. Ten minutes later, before I had even begun to doze, I heard the beeping that indicated the recording was done. I leapt up to see that it had ripped (is that where the term came from?) through the balance of the disc so quickly, the average speed had been pulled up to 3.something X. Scenes 2 and 3 were noise free, according to the report, but a couple of troublesome spots were reported in Scene 1. Exact Audio Copy lets you go right to the segments it thinks are noisy. I listened to a 10-second suspect patch repeatedly and damn if I could hear any noise at all (those dance club nights have really paid off!), except some faint artifact that I suspect was some noise in the studio, a singer brushing a microphone, perhaps, or maybe an instrumentalist scuffing a shoe (do they wear shoes in a recording studio? they always do in the movies so they can have violent fights and go storming out to maintain their artistic integrity and/or do yet more drugs). It's wonderful to be able to listen to the whole opera right through without having to change media. Couldn't do that before, except on Hi-fi VHS, and nobody ever made an audio VHS walkman. No idea why not!
By the way, I don't think my burnt out ears can hear any actual difference between 128 Kbps and 256 Kbps. If any reader has experienced a distinction, please let me know what sort of music or headphones might help me detect the distinction too.
Chip speed: once again a pronouncement was made that we had come up against some absolutely impenetrable technological barrier, that the very laws of physics would prevent us from doing something faster or bigger or smaller or colder or hotter. And once again, the pronouncement was wrong. It's Intel again, with 10 GHz speeds at room temperature. What I want is an Intel chip that sits in your computer and does nothing but evalutate the rest of the computer and fix problems. Why not? Why not a Pentium that spots conflicting drivers, say, and tells my main Pentium to hold up just half a nano-second while a repair is performed. Why should I spend a weekend figuring it out? And to pre-empt the usual remarks, it should also be more efficient than the millions Apple spends working to guarantee they never have a driver conflict. I mean, hey, why do the work when we have computers? Let's put some of that excess chip speed to work counteracting Microsoft's efforts to slow us all down.
Are you an XP user? Have you encountered Windows Product Activation yet? How'd it go? Here is some info on workarounds for when you get locked out. The official Microsoft poop is here.
TIME IS THE ENEMY, journal of yet another young gay man in Brooklyn. Not updated for over a month, which usually suggests to me that the owner has forgotten it, but his last entry indicated trouble with DSL! Ha! That shit again. So I think we should assume it's the machinations of electronic communications cartels that are keeping him quiet.
And then there's brooklynkid.com, the journal of a young gay man in, uh, Brooklyn. Good photos!
Went to the Globe today and searched for "priest," which is like searching for "sex" or "Britney Spears" at Google. Much to my surprise I got back the reply you see below. Apparently either the entire staff of the Globe or everyone at the Archdiocese (or maybe both) took a Super Bowl break.
The author of Alaska's constitution dies in Wellfleet.
A little follow up on the rollout of the Segway. Be forewarned; downtown Tampa has not yet been completely transformed.
February 4, 2002
Sunday's article in the Washington Post all about George Bush working on his September 20th speech. And here's today's "Epilogue."
I seem to have finally achieved success in repeatedly creating good MP3s. First, MusicMatch Jukebox is just a toy. PC Magazine did give it an Editor's Choice, but I think that's because they were impressed that it would do a lookup for ID3 tags. It never worked at all on my Win 2000 machine, and produced noisy recordings on my old Win 98 machine. The help files and FAQs (both the installed version and on the web) were superficial and unhelpful. I couldn't find any forums or discussion groups for MusicMatch users. I had a paid-up registration ($20) so I could send e-mail to MusicMatch asking questions. It took them 3 days to answer them, and then they gave me obviously canned answers that indicated they hadn't even read my question. I asked a question about ripping and they gave me an answer about burning. I asked why it wouldn't start on the Win 2000 machine and they sent me advice on how to minimize jitter on my Win 98 machine.
Tried Exact Audio Copy which has something MusicMatch lacks entirely: error detection! When an error is detected EAC can re-read the track until it gets it cleanly. And it would actually start and rip and on the Win 2000 machine, but it was godawful slow. Recording speed registered at 0.0X, but if I let it go for 5 or 10 minutes I might get anywhere from 5 to 20 seconds of .WAV. And good sounding .WAV it was too!
My Plextor CD-RW is supposed to support C2 error detection, but when I turned off that feature, the speed of ripping picked up to a respectable and barely tolerable 1.1X! I saw occasional peaks above 3X. But then it ground to a halt on one noisy track.
The breakthrough came when I changed the properties of the CD-RW device. Long ago when I had created a new user on that machine, the user had no access to the CD-RW or the DVD! In an effort to try to give the user access I turned on network sharing on the CD-RW, even though I have no network at all. When I turned off network sharing, ripping speed soared to higher than 7X (yahoo!). C2 still doesn't work, but EAC reports 98 to 100% accuracy on every track, and I can't hear any noise at all. I'm using LAME to encode to 256 kbps (with RazorLame as a front end).
The Froggies blog awards.
Naked Blog, Scotland.
this is F***ing political by Hugh, newly in Park Slope.
UltraSparky, also Brooklyn.
Common pattern: gay or bi man marries a woman, years pass, urges build, man decides to get a few men on the side (which might be where I come in to the story). But now here, right on your very own computer screen, one of those men has started a journal to describe his, uh, life. What despair looks like, from somewhere in Texas.
EastWest.nu 2 guys. East coast. West coast.
Moby's blog.
BRYAN'S PLACES AMONG THE POPULACE, journal of a young gay Kansas Citian, a student at UMKC.
Absolutely, definitely, the very youngest blogger on the web: RobbieCripps. Born on Friday, February 1, 2002, and already blogging it. Calls himself a "dot tot."
Zen Slut, a libertarian lesbian in Seattle, but originally from Kansas City, Missouri. She does not list Atlas Shurgged as one of the books that have influenced her.
Diary of a Mad Monk is, actually, the journal of an "ex-Priest," Roman Catholic he eventually tells us, a Marist specifically. Every ex Roman Catholic priest I've met (I think the total count is: 1) were quick to emphasize that you can never be an EX-priest. Okay. Fine. Whatever.
This one is heterosexual. He wrote this back on November 6, 2001.
Are priests perverts? There are perverts everywhere and I am sure that the clergy has some among its ranks. Anyone who commits an act of violence against another creature has a problem and needs help. A priest who would do such a thing not only needs help, discipline and punishment, but also needs to be reminded of his vows. Just as the vow of celibacy makes sexual orientation a moot point, the vows of chastity and celibacy should also counter perversion. But, this isn't a perfect world and the vows do not stave off or cure illnesses such as pedophilia. Yes, there must be perverts among the clergy, but I doubt that there are any more of them in the Church than there are in your local schools or police departments.Like all those other ex-priests I know, he is naive.
Local Roman Catholics react to all the recent news about pedophile priests. Even good ol' Ray Flynn confessed this little kernel of free-thinking Protestantism in his soul: Flynn, like other Catholics interviewed in recent days, said he is increasingly making a distinction between his faith in God, which he said remains intact, and his attitude toward the church hierarchy.
The Globe interviews Eric Schmidt, Chairman and CEO of Google, Inc. (All Hail Google!) check this guy's history: chief executive of Novell, CTO Sun Microsystems where he led Java development, started at Bell Labs and Xerox PARC! (All Double Hail PARC!). Not an iota of Microsoft in his blood.
February 3, 2002
Check out this site for getting low airfares. Let me know if it works for you.
I've been having an incredibly difficult time getting my Win 2000 PC to rip a CD, but I think I may have finally got it going. And wouldn't you know I'd find the solution only after posting my question to the EAC Yahoogroup, revealing my woeful ignorant newbie status.
A few fresh scans:
- A self portrait; the source for the new photo at the top of this page.
- Courtyard of the Boston Public Library.
- Wisconsin dawn.
I got this link a few days ago from Alexandra Koltun who has provided me with useful information a number of times. This is the best summary I've seen on the Pallotta/AIDS Rides debacle.
A father and son, both molested by priests in childhood.
The Boston Archdiocese removed 2 priests yesterday who had parishes in Quincy and Randolph. The church insists they've gotten them all now.
February 2, 2002
 Click for full size |
Did I mention that David Z's long term plans to move to Palm Springs got quickened to this year? Now, today I got a call from him at Logan Airport, and I guess the schedule's picked up even more. So next New Year's Eve you know where you'll find me. Friends in hot places! Oh boy.
Walked over to Richard's this afternoon. He lives at Forest Hill. This is a few miles from me, and even though we have real winter temperatures again, it was all dry and calm and the cold air felt almost good, almost.I walked through Olmstead Park and I was surprised to discover I had never done that! I guess I've biked and walked only on the edges. The place is full of little trails. Surprisingly woodsy for such an urban spot.
At Richard's we watched Don's Party which was some sort of ultimate suburban/stepford wives/domestic hell kind of movie that was graced (amazingly!) with a good 10 or 15 minutes of naked man butt. But if any friend ever invites you to a showing of Don's Party, insist that the sound be turned off.
We also watched Fortune And Men's Eyes. Wow. Haven't seen that in at least 25 years, and it's a lot better to watch now…and 90% of it has been cleaned up for the DVD.
After reading through a lot of gay men's blogs and journals I see I need to drink more or take up anti-depressants or get a lot younger. I find Friday nights are a good laundry night, don't you?
RC Church says no parents would come forward to complain about Reardon who was eventually convicted of molesting 24 boys.
February 1, 2002
Yesterday's installment in the Washington Post series "10 DAYS IN SEPTEMBER: Inside the War Cabinet." The subject: Saturday, September 15, Camp David. And here is today's; Monday, September 17, "Combating Terrorism: 'It Starts Today'"
Does anyone trust their kids alone with a Roman Catholic priest anymore?
- Archdiocese of Boston in the last 10 years has settled child molestation claims against at least 70 priests. Seven Zero…and that's the number settled. How many ignored? How many never came to light?
- Boston Archdiocese turns over lists of priests who have been accused of molesting children in the last 40 years. Suffolk County (Boston, Chelsea, Revere, Winthrop) got a list with only (ONLY!) ten names. An average of 1 priest every 4 years. No worse than a presidential election! Numbers of victims were not reported.
- One priest says he was falsely accused. The church settled for $60,000. A bargain!
- A loyal Catholic who had himself been molested by the priest tried to work with the Archdiocese in the early 1990s. "The crime of sexual abuse of a minor is one of such heinous proportion that to withhold information about a known perpetrator is in and of itself criminal," [he] wrote in a letter to Law. Law ignored that advice.
- Paul Shanley, a priest who created a "ministry to alienated youth" on the streets of Boston used this ministry to molest children and organize sex with young men in the 1960s and 70s.
- Protestant voices are heard. Unitarian Universalists and the United Church of Christ say proposed legislation is too lenient and would not protect children.
- The church's active role in suppressing information about Christopher Reardon in Middleton allowing him to molest 24 youths as recently as 1999 and 2000.
- Jon Martin, who covered for Reardon, has turned up right in our little Brighton neighborhood, at Cardinal Law's residence. My, my! Isn't that interesting?
- [Acting Suffolk District Attorney Elizabeth] Keeley said she would not rule out prosecuting church officials as accessories to sexual abuse committed by priests. Nor would she rule out lodging obstruction of justice charges against church officials, including Law. "I'm not aware that he stands in any priviledged position," she said.
DVD easter eggs.
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"Best GLBT Weblog" went to Little.Yellow.Different.
Just A Little Queer - more GLBT blogs and journals. Some of 'em are dead.
YeahTotally.net weblog.
Diarist.net "JOURNALS & DIARIES ONLINE"
Online diarist TomatoNation witnessed the collapse of of the WTC buildings and writes an excellent description here:
At last, I get onto the [George Washington] bridge. Automatically, without thinking, I turn to see the skyline stretching away on the left. The skyline is gone. The Empire State Building is dark. The World Trade towers have disappeared. The lights below 14th Street have gone out. Nothing moves or sparkles; the occupied city is dark except for a necklace of EMS lights, and the slow, steady, sorrowing plume of ash wending its way down into the harbor. And my mind wakes up. I imagine the screams of the dead, from which the scream of the building protected me before. I hear the evenness my father willed into his voice, hear Don telling me hesitantly, "Well. Take good care, Sarah." I feel the hole in the city as a hole ripped out of my chest and head, thousands burned and crushed and orphaned and ruined and dead.
Journal of a gay man on welfare who is recovering from crack and alcohol addictions, dealing with depression. Name o' Bruce W. Very well written.
Oversight by Marcus, a journal by a gay man in DC. Good reading, but he surrounds his text with a table with a height attribute of "100%." IE knows he couldn't really mean that and compensates, but Opera takes him at his word and won't let me scroll down to read the text that obviously exceeds one screen's height.
The Boston Diaries by a man who lives in Coconut Creek, Florida!
A view on Groundhog's Day (tomorrow).
January 31, 2002
The paper edition of the Globe included a list of priests who they have been able to identify as convicted or accused of child molestation. I couldn't find it in the on-line version of the Globe, so I include it here for your handy reference:
From page A20 of the 1/31/2002 Boston GlobeMore links tomorrow. Too late tonight.
The convicted and the accused
Clergy identified through pending lawsuits, publicly settled lawsuits, confirmed private settlements, criminal charges, and church officials.
THE REV. ROBERT BARRETT was sued in 1997 for molesting a boy repeatedly in 1967 and 1968 in Framingham The case was settled in 2000 He is retired and is at McLean Hospital in Belmont.
THE REV. GEORGE C. BERTHOLD has a pending 2000 lawsuit for sexual assault and battery His current church assignment and address are unknown.
THE REV. ROBERT M. BURNS served a prison term after pleading guilty to molesting a boy in his New Hampshire apartment. The archdiocese settled lawsuits charging him with abusing boys in two Boston parishes He has been defrocked.
THE REV. RICHARD T. COUGHLIN was suspended in 1993 by the Orange County Archdiocese in California after being accused of molesting boys in a chorus. The Boston Archdiocese has paid for therapy for a man who filed a 1985 complaint that Coughlin molested him in in Stoneham and Lynn between 1958 and 1962 Coughlin left the Boston Archdiocese in 1965.
THE REV. JOHN M. COTTER was accused by several men of sexually molesting them when they were boys in St Theresa's Church in West Roxbury The cases were settled by the archdiocese He died in 1989.
THE REV. JOHN J. GEOGHAN has been accused of sexual abuse by at least 130 individuals He was convicted on one count of indecent sexual assault earlier this month and has two additional criminal trials pending He is a defendant in about 90 remaining civil suits.
JOSEPH GILPIN, a former seminarian, was sued in 2001 for repeatedly abusing a Wareham boy from 1965 to 1968. The case is pending Gilpin, who lives in Florida, denied the abuse occurred.
THE REV. FREDERICK L GUTHRIE of St Ann's Church in Gloucester was arrested on Nov 6,2001, at a Nashua ice cream stand after allegedly attempting to set up a sexual encounter with a teenage boy over the Internet. The case is pending.
THE REV. JOHN R. HANLON, a former pastor of St Paul's Church in Hingham, is serving a life sentence for his 1994 conviction for the rape of a Hingham altar boy in 1980 The archdiocese settled a civil lawsuit filed by the rape victim and his brother for an undisclosed sum in 1994.
THE REV. KELVIN IGUABITA of All Saints Church in Haverhill was arrested on Jan 15,2002, and charged with two counts of rape of a child and attempted rape and assault of a 15-year-old girl. The case is pending.
THE REV. BERNARD J. LANE has had at least six sexual abuse cases settled after he was accused of raping teenage boys when he was director of a home for troubled youth in Littleton. In addition, there is one pending lawsuit He is retired and living in Barnstead, NH.
THE REV. PAUL J. MAHAN has 12 sexual molestation lawsuits pending from accusers who say they were molested while Mahan was at parishes in Dorchester and Needham from the late 1960s to the early 1980s. He was defrocked and is living in Arlington, Va.
THE REV. RICHARD 0. MATTE had a sexual abuse lawsuit settled by the archdiocese. The suit was impounded. He lives in South Dennis.
PAUL E. MCDONALD was accused of sexually abusing a boy in the 1960s before he left the priesthood The case was settled last year.
THE REV, JAY M. MULLIN was accused of sexually molesting a boy in the early 1970s while assigned to St Anthony's Church in Allston. The archdiocese settled the claim several years ago, and then assigned him to St Ann's Church in Wayland. Late last year, he was removed as chaplain at St Joseph's Manor, a Brockton nursing home. Mullin remains "unassigned" and lives in Harwich.
THE REV. EUGENE O'SULLIVAN pleaded guilty in 1984 to having sex with an altar boy. After probation, he was assigned to four New Jersey parishes. Pastors in three of the four said they were never told about his conviction. He was recalled to Boston in 1992 and banned from priestly activity.
THE REV. RONALD H. PAQUIN is an admitted child molester. The archdiocese has settled at least four sexual molestation cases against him and he is in the process of being defrocked He is living in Malden.
THE REV. GEORGE ROSENKRANZ was sued in 2000 for sexual abuse that allegedly occurred at Blessed Sacrament in Saugus in the 1970s. He has been on sick leave since 1990. His case is pending.
THE REV. PAUL R. SHANLEY has had at least three cases charging him with sexually molesting teenage boys settled by the archdiocese. He is retired and living in San Diego.
THE REV. ANDRZEJ SUJKA was removed from Our Lady of Czestochowa, South Boston, on Oct. 1 after an allegation that he molested a minor.
THE REV. C. MELVIN SURETTE was accused of sexually abusing children at the same Littleton treatment facility where Bernard J Lane was accused of raping teenage boys. The archdiocese settled the case against Surette. He is living with a family in Peabody
THE REV. ERNEST E. TOURIGNEY was accused of molesting two children at Immaculate Conception Church in Weymouth. Both cases were settled by the archdiocese, for $35,000 each. He is on sick leave and living in Pocasset.
THE REV. ROBERT TURNBULL was sued in 2000 for sexually abusing a boy at Austin Preparatory School in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Turnbull is dead. The case against the school and the archdiocese is pending
THE REV. PAUL D. WHITE, a former priest, was sued in 1998 for molesting an altar boy in the 1960s in Haverhill. The archdiocese settled the case.
January 30, 2002
Today's intallment in the Washington Post in the series about the 9/11 attacks.
I got one suggestion from a reader to use Apple software to solve my ripping and encoding problems. Fine, but when I came home tonight the free, slightly used Mac that I'm sure he meant to send to me was nowhere to be found. For constructive suggestions I had to do my own research. The Usenet newsgroups in the alt.music.mp3 heirarchy were quite productive. The ideas that I think are most likely to succeed are (1)to break ripping and encoding into separate steps and (2)to check if my ASPI drivers are up to date on the Win 2000 machine. Okay. Will try.
Here is Xory's MP3 FAQ with a lot of info. And there's a bounty of information at r3mix.net (P.S. For you Mac guys, I did run across this site.)
One of the lions at the BPL.
By the way, check out that BPL site. On the home page the logo for the library is so small and obscure, I thought I'd gotten a commercial site by mistake. The logo for AT&T is much larger. oh wait…it looks better in IE, but is broken in Opera. And in Netscape? Hmm. It works in Netscape, too. In Opera the words "Boston Public Library" are simply not there.
January 29, 2002
Part 3 of the Washington Post series on what happened in Washington from 9/11/2001 to 9/20/2001. Today, the subject is: September 13.
Noelle Bush (age 24), daughter of Governor Jeb Bush busted at a Walgreen's in Tallahassee for trying to pass a fake prescription for Xanax
Surface City, a Boston blog, among other things. Jeff Thacker is obviously great at good, clear web design; and his site his chockablock with tons of good reading. As for the residence in South Boston…well, even I made the same mistake after being in Boston about as long as he has. He'll know it's time to move on when he realizes the dog shit IS the main theme of street life there. Hey, he's almost zackly the same size as me, but not a libertarian. Go figure.
Littleton school district in Arizona is a quick study for the Roman Catholic way of dealing with child molesters.
bricolage \bree-koh-LAHZH; brih-\, noun: Construction or something constructed by using whatever materials happen to be available.The Internet is a global bricolage, lashing together unthinkable complexities of miscellaneous computers with temporary lengths of phone line and fiber optic, bits of Ethernet cable and strings of code.
--Bernard Sharratt, "Only Connected," New York Times, December 17, 1995
Cooking with leftovers was bricolage--a dialogue between the cook and the available materials.
--Susan Strasser, Waste and Want: A Social History of Trash
I point out to my students that no one ever really reads Hamlet for the first time now; we've heard it all before in bits and pieces, cultural bricolage.
--Marjorie Garber, "Back to Whose Basics?" New York Times, October 29, 1995
Bricolage comes from the French, from bricole, "trifle; small job."
from www.dictionary.com
Just to let you know I'm not part of the roaring crowd.
January 28, 2002
The Florida boys proving that real estate investment requires strong backs and a pick up truck. Left to right that's Darrell, Frigidaire, Ralph.
Click for full size
The boys have selected this classic lawn ornament to highlight the garden alongisde their pool.
Click for full size
It's George, but not in Florida. No, this is Gloucester, in front of the famous fisherman's memorial.
Click for full size
And, if you're interested, here is the matching photo of me taken by George.
Photo of an aerial cactus growing up a tree in St. Petersburg. Some of these cactuses no longer even touch the ground, but root themselves in the dead palms at the top.
Guns saved lives at school shooting, but most of the press ignored the fact.
Very interesting read in the Washington Post. A summary of what was happening on September 11 in the White House, on Air Force One, and at the Capitol. Here is Sunday's installment; and here is Monday's. The series runs all week and will cover events up to September 20.
Oh no! Another Fox program that I really like is being cancelled: The Family Guy. It makes me want to love Rhode Island! More info here.
stopsatan.org where they provide Some ways to protect yourself from satan:
- Keep a package of epsom salt handy (satan hates epsom salt)
- Do not eat chicken picante
- Do not go near chicken picante
- Do not go to Palm Springs with strangers
- Avoid looking at spinning or flashing strobe lights
- Do not go into the "disco" section of electronics stores where strobe & other flashing lights are typically on display
- Completely avoid all black clothing & accessories
- Avoid the following materials : pvc, latex, liquid latex, nylon, fishnet, and spandex
January 27, 2002
Oh, those lazy, crazy, hazy days of January! At least it was in Boston this weekend. I walked to my gym at North Station this afternoon. I wore a light jacket over a t-shirt and went hatless, but even so I arrived a sweaty pig (which is not necessarily bad). Along the way I saw hundreds of men in shorts and t-shirts, including even a few who were utterly shirtless. The last time I walked that distance was September 11 and I was heading home. Nobody knew what was coming next and I thought that if I were going to be exploded or gassed, it would be better to suffer that out on the surface of the earth, rather than in an MBTA tunnel.By the time I got back home tonight the nearly full moon was rising and I thought of those terrorists, assistant terrorists, terrorist cadets, terrorist trainees, and wannabe terrorists who were enjoying the very same moon in the lovely, soft climate of Cuba and decided things were much improved now…especially when I consider that Bin Laden is somewhere dead or dying of chronic renal failure. How many dialysis clinics are there in the world that would host him?
I installed musicmatch Jukebox today. But maybe we should back up to last August when I bought my Riovolt CD/MP3 player. That thing just plain, simply died less than 10 days after I got it. I sent a message off to customer service and got back a LONG message. It looked like comprehending all they had to say would take me a good hour of study, so I put it aside. And then I rushed off to Pennsylvania, and then it was Labor Day, and then it was 9/11, and then there was a long time when I was distracted and concerned and then the next thing you know, it's November!I started the process again. Mailed the dead player back to them in early December. They mailed me a refurbished player last week.
So now I download musicmatch Jukebox and install it. I don't have any young MP3 crazed buddies hanging around the place (nor am I likely to), so I'm pretty much on my own. Recorded some albums…excuse me, I ripped them. The software has this "Supertagging" thing where it will go on the internet to get identifying information for my music, which is quite lovely when it works. I can only get it to really work by shutting down the Jukebox and restarting it. Since this is not a Microsoft product I don't think that's the way it's supposed to work.
Burned a CD with 5 albums of music on it and listened to it while walking to the gym. Most of it sounds good, but one particular album sounded like shit. It sounded like the CD was skipping like mad, but the original CD is in good shape and plays without skipping. I recorded at 128 k (is that 128 kHz?). Now I'm re-recording at at 160 k to see if that makes a difference. Ideas? Suggestions?
Florida! The requests are pouring in from both coasts demanding a tell-all story about what I did in Florida. Might as well do it, since the guys I visited in Florida are VERY unlikely to actually read here…this oughtta teach 'em!I went down there to see Ralph, who I hadn't seen since my mother's memorial service nearly two years ago. He lives in both Kansas City and St. Petersburg. Ralph and Butch picked me up at the Tampa airport and we zipped back to his place where we picked up Darrell, his business partner. Went off for dinner at a place that LOOKED pretty tacky, but actually served really good food…deep fried. They're famous for their deep fried chicken, but it takes second place to Stroud's in Kansas City. I had a broiled white fish, starts with "A" and I had never of it before, so I quickly forgot it, although it tasted really good. Also had deep fried okra, which Ralph refused to try. After that I don't think we did much more than splash around in their backyard pool (that is, Ralph and Darrell's, not the restaurant's).
Friday morning Ralph and I drove to the "mobile home plaza" that they are developing. Called Lakeview. It's right by a lake! This place was an evil, overgrown, broken down place until they took it over recently. Now they are in the process of rapidly throwing out the trash with plans galore for bringing in tons of new, reasonably priced housing so that the poverty-stricken of St. Petersburg can live in a place with a nice lake view. Then we went for coffee and Ralph sent me home in his pick up truck while he continued to work. I spent much of the day trying to get their PC to work better, splashing around in the pool, and napping. Tough stuff. Also took a walk to the nearby waterfront.
Ralph returned in time to take me to happy hour at a place called something-something Alibi. In a strip mall, it's really popular and not quite like anything in Boston. Spacious with at least 4 bars, a full kitchen, a dance floor, couple pool tables, and genuine cutrate prices on alcohol. Drinks were 2 for 1 when we were there. The mix of the crowd was impressive. It looked like somebody had run through a gay pride parade and pulled out a random sample of people to stock the bar. Lesbians, coke twinks, average guys, leather guys, old guys, drunks, you name it. Spotted one yellow hanky on the butt of a nice man named David who was an assistant manager at a Wal-Mart, I believe. We discussed the party scheduled for the next night and he said he would try to be there. Then he hurried home to bed, even though it was only 9 o'clock. He had to be at his store by 5:30 in the morning.
Ralph had had 3 margueritas, so rather than driving to fetch Darrell, we thought it best to have Darrell fetch us. He did, and we drove up to a deep-fried seafood place. Looked like a cheap, fast food joint, but the food was great! I think I had deep-fried scallops. This was the most expensive meal we had the whole time I was there, and managed to grab the check. The total for the 3 of us was $34.
We went back to their house, planning to splash in the pool to wake ourselves up and head back to Alibi. We turned out the lights so we could skinny dip, and after a bit of that decided nappy time sounded better than more bar time, so we just let Ralph's car sit at the bar until morning.
Saturday morning we drove downtown (a 5 minute process) to a very divey looking cafe that seemed to serve mostly street people and the down and out. We sat at a table out on the sidewalk. It was apparent that Ralph and Darrell were quite buddy-buddy with the waitress who was quite fun. She acknowledged that her husband had come from "Weymouth or Braintree or some place like that." After breakfast I bought a couple of tickets in the huge Florida Lotto game. I only lost $2. Mike, who I have never seen outside of Pennsylvania before, drove over from Clearwater. He and Ralph and I headed downtown to The Garden for lunch al fresco. The Garden did not look sleazy or divey. After lunch we drove to a bakery called Mozart's where everything is very high fat and lovely. They sold marzipan pigs. I was tempted, but resisted. Ralph, however, walked out with an entire fruit torte which cost (get this!) $12. I don't think I found anything in St. Petersburg that was expensive.
Saturday night was a party in south St. Petersburg. Ralph and Darrell elected to stay home for a quiet evening, but they let me have their manly pick up truck to get to the party. Mike was planning to meet me there later, but never made it. He had taken his mother to see an appearance of Debbie Reynolds and Don Rickles (no, really!), which performance ran until about 11, so he never made it. But the party was quite nice anyway. I knew one of the guys there (smoke and mirrors), and got to know everybody else. There was a big spread of food and tons of space with large rooms, cathedral ceilings, a big lanai, huge back yard. On and on I could go. The highlight (well, one of the highlights) was the host's absolutely cunning use of some bright red chili pepper fabric. Not only did he use it to make some smart curtains for the kitchen, but he used it to cover the top of an old 50s style, oval kitchen table, then covered that with glass. It was brilliant! We were stunned!
I hung on until midnight hoping Mike might show, but as I left several guys invited me to come with them to the Suncoast. I was tired and didn't want to drink, so I declined. When I got back to Ralph and Darrell's I did some more skinny dipping while I gave Ralph the dish on the party.
Sunday morning the three of us drove downtown to another divey restaurant around the corner from Saturday's divey restaurant. Maybe the clientele at Sunday's place was a bit better. The bike club was breakfasting and tons of expensive bikes were arrayed out front. Biking seems to year-round. Don't know how I'd adopt to that. Someday I'll try.
Sunday afternoon Ralph and I headed over to tea dance at Suncoast. Everyone raved about it, but I hadn't expected to be so impressed. It's on old Holiday Inn or similar that has been converted to a gay resort. Besides being a big motel, there are 2 or 3 bars in the place, a leather toy shop, a store for disco clothes (stuff that would embarrass International Male to sell), and a couple of video stores, one of which is a porn store. There's also a restaurant. On Sunday afternoons they open up a bar in the middle of the courtyard between the pool and the volleyball courts and sell drinks cheap. 16 ounce drafts of Miller Lite were a buck, as were shots of selected liquors (nothing I would ever drink). Huge crowd which was, again, quite mixed as at Alibi. Lots of fun to be able to carry your drink into all of these shops. Like being in Las Vegas or New Orleans that way. The boys in skimpy things playing volleyball were a nice distraction. The balconies of the motel are rich with cruise potential.
Ralph and I finally ended up at dinner in the Flamingo restaurant there, which is pretty good. Had a smartass waiter who irritated Ralph, which is almost always a good thing, so I tipped well. We had been hoping to see Mike here, too, but we left there about 7 o'clock he didn't show up until 10! It's definitely not tea at 10!
I've left out some bits about touring their other properties and how lovely the weather was and watching them load refrigerators on their truck. It was a full weekend. But I want to segue into this next bit which occurred at the Tampa airport.
 |
January 26, 2002
Have you seen one of these?
Click for a bigger version
I got it from one of my other hosts in St. Petersburg. Black ribbon wrapped around the World Trade Center. It came from his employer, Smith-Nephew, but I don't know if it is something they created. The actual pin is slightly smaller than this picture.
A 180° panorama taken from the downstream side of the Longfellow Bridge.
Current DVD: Texas Chain Saw Massacre. "Chain" and "Saw" are two words.
Recently read: All The Pretty Horses. Really enjoyable as a novel. I suppose I ought to see the movie now.
Pandiculation (Noun)Pronunciation: [pæn-di-kyê-'ley-shun]
Definition: Stretching the body and extremities when drowsy or tired, usually accompanied by yawning, especially when going to bed or waking; also, around the office, a pastime for those who work at a computer (I should know).
Usage: The verb is "pandiculate" and the agent noun is "pandiculator." The term is used by those who not only do not eschew obfuscation but wallow in it with great relish.
Suggested Usage: This is a great, albeit rare word, but the slightest bit of context explains it to your (underprivileged) friends who do not subscribe to YDC's Word of the Day: "Archibald could have lounged around all day in a state of constant pandiculation, but the grass wanted mowing." Mentally immobilize your kids (or their teacher) with gems like this: "Thirty minutes into Mr. Furman's driver's ed refresher course, the class was rippling with pandiculation."
Etymology: Latin pandiculari "to stretch one's self" from pandere "to spread out" + icul (diminutive element "a little"). The underlying PIE root * [s]pen- with variable [s] "pull, stretch, spin" not only gave German spannen "stretch, span" and English "span" and "spin," but the Latin verb pendere "to weigh" behind "pendant," "pendulum," "pensive," and "depend." (For a larger slice of PIE, have a look at "How is a Hippo like a Feather?" in YDC's library.)
from www.yourdictionary.com
January 25, 2002
Robert Nozick, philospher, died yesterday. Author of Anarchy, State and Utopia. The Globe obituary. The NY Times obituary. The Harvard Gazette obituary.
If you use Agent (by Forte, Inc.) to read Usenet newsgroups, version 1.9 has just been released. Not much of an upgrade. Adds a trashcan feature, but still can't display HTML.
Buncha luddites in Mendocino, California, are working to make the town safe for those who are "electrically sensitive." The best description of the troubles that beset the ringleader are as follows:
If he visits wireless-saturated San Francisco, three hours south of Mendocino, his devices go berserk and he experiences multiple symptoms, including an unquenchable thirst, a pressure in his chest and behind his eyeballs, and "buzzing sensations" in his lips.I know what he means. I get those very same sensations when I'm in San Francisco…but I'm real sure it has nothing to do with radio frequencies, microwaves, cell phones or the ubiquitous 60 Hz hum. A good, long night south of Market can bring relief.
I'm amazed to see the Boston Globe printing so much about the RC priests who molest children. The Globe has always been the Catholic church's best little buddy. If Hitler had been ordained a Catholic priest, the Globe would have defended him. But today there is a good column by Brian McGrory: The apologies aren't enough. In case that disappears, I've got a copy of it here. Other Globe articles:
- Geoghan in denial. He's never had sex in his life! What, never? Well, hardly ever!
- Light very, very slowly dawns on Marblehead as Law agrees to report ex-priests who are pedophiles.
- Police and DSS involved in Geoghan case as far back as 1986.
- Law had the story on Geoghan and other priests in 1985.
- Monsignor Paul B. McInerny said: "Cardinal Law is the best thing that's ever happened to the church of Boston in terms of leadership" - Derrick Jackson's column.
- Derrick Jackson calls for Law to resign.
- Today's Globe editorial in which they say they are very, very disappointed, but [throwing hands in the air] they don't know what to suggest. (It is, after all, still the Globe).
- Long summary of the whole story (part 1). And here is part 2 where we find out why he preferred boys from poor families.
- Interview with the woman who was raising seven boys - all of whom were molested by Geoghan.
- Geoghan timeline going back to his seminary days in 1954. First report of child abuse was in 1962. 1962! Geoghan's been a pedophile priest since before Kennedy was shot!
- The doctors who okayed Geoghan in 1984 and 1989.
- The view points of the Attorney General and Senate.
- James Carroll expresses his opinion that the church heirarchy may be stonewalling. Oooh! Don't go out on a limb there!
- The Vatican says "Stay the course. Secrecy now. Secrecy forever!"
- The Globe editorial where they express their disappointment in the Vatican's position.
- One of Law's apologies.
- Law lashes out at the press and the attorney for the 70 victims in July 2001.
- Geoghan pleads not guilty in December 1999.
- Law defrocks Geoghan in 1998.
- Church settles 12 lawsuits against itself and Geoghan for up to $10 million.
- The church stonewalled the victims and their families as far back as 1972.
- Geoghan sued in 1997.
- Geoghan sued in 1996.
For the broader issue, I refer you once again to SNAP
January 24, 2002
Very latest great-nephew. Like, delivered today. Collin Charles Gilbert.
Click for full size
For your classic full frontal, go here. Gallery here.
Bloggie nominations are in. The finalists are listed and voting commences. Winners guaranteed not to get limo rides.
The 5 nominated for the best GLBT weblog are:
Here's an interesting time waster: PIC2HTML. Give it a picture and it converts it to HTML! Here's a sample I created.
billet-doux \bil-ay-DOO\, noun; plural billets-doux \bil-ay-DOO(Z)\: A love letter or note.Perhaps she just looked first into the bouquet, to see whether there was a billet-doux hidden among the flowers; but there was no letter.
--William Makepeace Thackeray, Vanity Fair
Young lovers in Victorian England, forbidden to express their affection in public and fearful that strict parents would intercept their billets-doux, sent coded messages through the personal columns in newspapers.
--Susan Adams, "I've got a secret,"Forbes, September 20, 1999
In French, billet-doux means "sweet note" or "short note" (billet, "note" + doux, "sweet," from Latin dulcis).
from www.dictionary.com
Find out what kind of driver you are!
January 23, 2002
Design changes. Feedback desired.
The war blogs.
January 22, 2002
My host in St. Petersburg, Florida: Butch.
The Sun Coast Resort at Sunday Tea Dance:
Click for full size
Joys of traveling update: here's how things went on the weekend when we (supposedly) went to 100% baggage security (or whatever they say it is). Got to Logan airport very early and sailed through the line to check one bag. But that's because it was Delta, and they provide express service if you're on a non-stop to Florida. The security lines were moving pretty fast, so I got through there in about half an hour. Argenbright is gone from Logan now (hallelujah!) and the replacement service looks and acts like they all want to join the Israeli army: wearing camo, boots and berets. Most of them shout instructions, which I like. However, I did get subject to a personal search because I set off the metal detector. They had me remove my shoes first, but then they did nothing with them. Perhaps they have profiles based on socks. Maybe terrorists have holes in their socks. After being wanded by a woman, a man came over to pat me down. Unlike the other security staff, he spoke very quietly and with a west African accent. When he came up to me he said "Hello, Sir." And when he was done he said "Okay, Sir." In between he said lots of things and I never understood one single word. He may have been giving me instructions. I don't know. I just stood there.
On the return flight when I boarded in Tampa I did NOT set off the metal detector, even though I was wearing the same clothes. But this time they wanted to inspect my carry-on bag. It was the lead film bag that triggered that. I wonder why the x-ray tech in Boston didn't want to look at it. In Tampa, after inspecting my film and camera, the security employee (older, white-haired, apparent native speaker of English) said to me "Sniff your shoes?" I was sure I had missed part of what he had said, so I asked him to repeat it. He just said "Sniff your shoes?" again. I looked at him, a bit incredulously, and asked "Do you want me take off my shoes?" He said yes he did. I wonder what keeps him from simply stating this directly. Rather than looking at or feeling the shoes, they were wiping them with discs of something like paper and then inserting the disc into a machine which I think is supposed to read it for traces of explosive materials. In effect it is "sniffing" my shoes.
I noticed that the Tampa airport (as nice as it is) uses almost no graphic images on their signs. No languages besides English, either. So if you don't read English, you're just screwed. I should think any airport that calls itself "international" should use at least one language in addition to English (preferably Spanish or French), and it should use graphic images where possible. Most airports, though, use only English and graphics. At Tampa one of the few graphics they use is that of two figures, one male, one female, standing together. It's supposed to indicate the "companion" restroom. But they put this sign outside every restroom and then provide directions IN ENGLISH to the "companion" restroom, which is on a different level. There is no other graphic outside restrooms. The result is that if you don't read English, every restroom looks like it's supposed to be co-ed.
Whining: why do people assigned to low-numbered rows feel the need to stand around idling in the line of high-numbered row people who are trying to actually board? Why do people feel they need to be up close to the baggage carousel just to WATCH for their bag? Why not stand back until you see the bag, and then step forward?
This is not a complaint, but when curbside checking is available and the line there is only about 2 people long, why do people go inside and join a line of 100 people? Surely there aren't that many people buying tickets or seeking to make last minute changes in their flight plans. I'm actually happy with this situation, because I've been able to check my bag in about 60 seconds, rather than standing for an hour.
Another resource from the Library of Congress paid for with your tax dollars: Portals To The World. Although it's not quite as up to date as one might wish. Drilling into the information on Afghanistan we find a link to www.taleban.com which is described as the "official" site of the Talibans, but it seems to be down right now. [Why would the Talibans use a .com domain?]
When you check out the CIA Fact Book information on Norfolk Island you could almost confuse the place with Afghanistan if you only noticed that the island has no railroads, no industry, 1 TV station, 3 FM stations and only a little more than a thousand phones. But Norfolk Island's total population is only 1,879 in an area about one-fifth the size of the District of Columbia. The inhabitants are primarily descendants of the Bounty mutineers. Tourism is the primary engine of the local economy, but they also export postage stamps and seeds for those ubiquitous Norfok Island "pines." The island is a territory of Australia and has proposed to ban entry to the island of anyone with AIDS, HIV, or Hepatitis B or C. No word is given on their policy on tuberculosis, influenza or herpes. It's not clear if the law would apply only to tourists, or to everyone. The U.S. bans entry to tourists who are HIV positive.
My Libertarian Purity score: 94.
At South Station today I was able to get a better photo of that "other" Acela locomotive:
Click for full size
It's two-headed, and the ends are blunter. The big difference is it hauls the older passenger coaches, not Acela coaches.
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