My Shower With Profgrrrrl

After she struck this pose, the Muslim in me was pretty much obliged to try to wash the decadence off her. Allah Akbar.

[redacto! poor you.]

The Gall

"Mohammed," shouted the police. "Take your clothes off! Come out with your hands on your head and you will be all right!"

"I have rights!" came the reply. "I have rights."

So said one of the suspects in the 2nd wave of attempted bombings in London. If that's really what he said, and he was involved, I hope someone kicked him the nuts when he finally came out. But we should think for a bit about how strange this is: asserting your rights is an appeal to the very best of western society: the law's protection for everyone; a protection so powerful that even a presumably guilty man cornered by dozens of armed men can invoke it and expect it to be respected. That's an astounding force, and truly rare in human history. So how can a man who feels--or at least recognizes--that he has such rights also wake up one day and try to kill dozens of his neighbors? There's a startling lack of alienation here that confounds our usual explanations of the motivations of suicide bombers.

Environment

This probably isn't in the spirit of the event, but the BlogHer conference: good place to pick up women or terrible place to pick up women? Kevin Drum is going. Should I have gone?

Behind

Hey, all three people left in the reading group: I cannot tell a lie, there's no way I'll finish the precis tonight. It will have to be the weekend. I'm posting this here since people actually read this blog.

Erect

Most amusing to me about this story is that the guy pictured, even nude and from the back, is completely Austrian.

Harry Potter Thread

SPOILER ALERT. The links and comments in this thread will contain spoilers. If, somehow, you haven't read the book yet, don't click.

I recommend the discussions here and here.

More good links.

Interview with Rowling.

I knew I should have left five minutes ago

But I had to read this at Pandagon. Letter to an advice columnist:

To make it short, my new guy was a date rapist for seven years before we met. His victims were mostly older, unattractive women whom he met in clubs and bars. They were weaker and liked the attention of a younger man. He would manipulate them by telling them lies and by staying sober while buying them drinks. He also had a one-year "relationship" with one woman who was six years older and going through a divorce. She was never interested in sex, but he would pressure her and cause her to feel guilty in order to get what he wanted. At times when he was not able to convince her, he would tell her that she could just lie still while he had his way. According to him, she had obvious mental problems.

Question: should I stay in this relationship? And Cary Tennis' reply.

Dear Salon: I can do better! Pick me!

I Got Nuthin

Sorry for the dearth of posts. I think I'm totally bored with myself.

Uh, discuss?

However: I can pass along that it's nice to work in an office where you can say "hit me," go out for a pass, and then do the Icky Shuffle and have someone say "Are you doing the Icky Shuffle?"

Individual retirement accounts-- a great way to save!

Wow-- another big victory in the GWOT! Apparently the IRA has renounced violence. It would be interesting to know what influence, if any, developments in the Islamist use of bombs had on this decision, what other considerations went into it, and so on. (It will also be interesting to see if anything comes of this.)

More at Back Seat Drivers, my blog of choice for Irish goings-on. Also (via comments) Slugger O'Toole.

Back In The Saddle

Are you using an RSS reader that you love? I like Newsgator, but I need one that doesn't rely on Outlook. I'm on Windows, don't want a web-based reader (like bloglines or kinja) and have already tried and rejected: Sage, Habari Xenu, BlogBridge, and BottomFeeder. RSS Bandit does everything I need, but crashes my system. RSSOwl is very nice, but has a bug that won't let me open links in my browser. Surely there's something that everyone loves?

Convicted

I love that the victim/perp in this story is a schoolteacher ("How would you like it...?), and double love the names of the main players. But seriously, so many women are bothered by the pat-downs that the TSA needs some new guidelines, like maybe explaining to people what's going on, and what's involved. Take a few seconds to build some trust and rapport before you grab people's breasts. Good advice for everyone, actually.

Unsucky

Two great songs (w/ iTunes links; should I link some other how?).

I Second That Emotion, by Claudia Russell. I don't like any of her other songs, but this cover is really good. Dig the steel guitar.

Diamond Joe, by Charlie Butler. This is just beautifully sung.

Nah Is Right

Sue was ambushed.

When we first started dating, back in the Mesozoic era, Kriston asked me a question which I've since come to understand is a litmus-test question, and which I failed miserably.

The question was this: "If some aliens came and offered to take you away with them and show you their galaxy and you could see the wonders of this universe that no human has ever seen, but you have to leave all your friends and family behind and never return to Earth, would you do it? For our purposes, we assume the aliens are benign."

I said, "Nah."

According to Kriston, if you're not willing to go, you "lack the gusto for adventure and discovery." I think we can all agree that young men are insane. What the question is really asking is this: would you leave your friends and family forever? I don't even like my friends and family¹, and I still think only a nutso would say yes to this. Because you can't come back, you're not expanding the store of human knowledge, or making possible a better future from humanity, you're going on an (admittedly fantastic) joyride. And you can't even tell anyone about it. What's the point?

¹ Kidding friends, kidding.

Eureka

Sometimes I look at the freestyle times of elite swimmers and think "how the hell can they go so much faster than I do?" My technique isn't that bad. A reminder:

They're bald. Of course!

Sniper

It's immensely sad, but a very human and well-written account of the shooting of an innocent Iraqi, by a reporter who knew him.

Indeed

Here.

In Perfect Harmony

I know I'm just a simple country boy, and props to Osama for thinking outside the box, but how could this possibly kill thousands of people?

Usama bin Laden tried to buy a massive amount of cocaine, spike it with poison and sell it in the United States, hoping to kill thousands of Americans one year after the Sept. 11 attacks, The Post has learned.

...

"They wanted to kill thousands of people — more than the World Trade Center," said a source.

Ok, so the original story was in the NY Post, so the "source" is probably just trying to make this sound Really Scary, but wouldn't plain old word of mouth and a few news stories considerably limit the number of deaths this could cause?

Unfacon

Inspired by Atrios, who, if his press release is to be believed, hosts "one of the most impassioned and thought-provoking blogs on the left," I suggest that the Unfogged Community meet "in order to create, in real time and space, the lively (and sometimes unruly) comments section" here at Unfogged. Given the size of readership and the tone of the comments section, I suggest some conveniently located public bathroom.

UPDATE: please welcome Brad to our fine community. His political views and typographical excellence are sure to fit right in.

Myan

It turns out that Mel Gibson is an idiot.

A year after breaking box-office records with "The Passion of the Christ," which was shot in Aramaic, Latin and Hebrew, Gibson has struck a deal with the Walt Disney Co. to release his next picture in a Mayan dialect.

...

A note on the first page of the script says: "The dialogue you are about to read will not be spoken in English." Gibson presumably will have the script translated into Mayan by a scholar of the language and release the film with English subtitles, as he did for "Passion."

Mel, one thing that makes a language "foreign" is that it sounds different; another, more important thing is that it conceptualizes the world differently. A story written in English and translated into Mayan is a different-sounding English story. Why bother?

Consumation

Wonkette links to Fontana Labs. Now they can like, get married, and buy strap-ons. The American dream.

What Did You Call Me?

Well if y'all are barely going to comment, I'm just going to post willy-nilly. This reporter's name is Vikas Bajaj. That's great.

Your Other Lance

They're not joking; they're just Mormons.

Um...: I think the site is being hammered because everyone noticed it at once. Here's a screenshot, if you can't connect.

In other news...: I'm a sucker.

The Beach

It's only fair. Here's Rachel Wacholder's boyfriend, Sean Scott (pic from here).

I don't know, he's all taped up, probably injury prone.

See Me Type

Hey, Crooked Timber's new comment preview is really cool.

Wrong Answer

John Roberts said he would recuse himself if he had to apply a law that conflicted with his religious beliefs? Oy vey. This is sure to get ugly.

The Phat Phone

I ordered a new cell phone. It's not very photogenic, but looks better in person, and has a great personality. It even has hips. Meet my 6620. If you had one, and hated it, I don't want to know. I'll tell you all about it when it arrives.

Unsubscribe

This should make the apostropher happy.

Vardan Kushnir, notorious for sending spam to each and every citizen of Russia who appeared to have an e-mail, was found dead in his Moscow apartment on Sunday, Interfax reported Monday. He died after suffering repeated blows to the head.

I have to admit, with various filters in place (spamassassin at my ISP, thunderbird here, postini for work), I almost never actually see spam anymore. But a year ago, he totally would have deserved it.

Lance

I guess Lance Armstrong is pretty good. It's great to see him go out on top, and this year had its own drama, in the two stages where his teammates couldn't keep up, and Armstrong held off his rivals alone. Good stuff. But I wonder if even ten people in America will watch the next Tour.