April, 2016 archive
Model Legislation 0
In the Sacramento Bee, Meredith Hattam discusses proposed California legislation to extent to fashion models (who are, after all, performers) the sane workplace protections that actors have enjoyed for decades. She starts by describing her short career as a fashion model:
I was 5-foot-9, and 135 pounds, an awkward teenager bullied in high school. My mother was in a hospital with a terminal illness, and my father was there with her. Losing weight was probably the only thing I could control. If I had the potential to be a model, why shouldn’t I at least try?
And so I only ate protein and vegetables and ran 3, 6, 10 miles a day. In eight weeks, I had lost 20 pounds, and I returned to the agent’s office. I modeled in California and New York from 2006 until 2010, when I quit to graduate from college. Most of that time, I was starving, though I denied that fact to my father, my friends, my co-workers. My period stopped. I was cold all the time. I stayed up late nights obsessively chronicling how many calories I’d eaten.
Read the rest.
The Rich Are Different from You and Me 1
They have money.
Make TWUUG Your LUG 0
Learn about the wonderful world of free and open source. Use computers to do what you want, not what someone else wants you to do.
It’s not hard; it’s just different.
What: Monthly TWUUG Meeting.
Who: Everyone in TideWater/Hampton Roads with interest in any/all flavors of Unix/Linux. There are no dues or signup requirements. All are welcome.
Where: Lake Taylor Transitional Care Hospital in Norfolk Training Room. See directions below. (Wireless and wired internet connection available.) Turn right upon entering, then left at the last corridor and look for the open meeting room.
When: 7:30 PM till whenever (usually 9:30ish) on Thursday, April 7.
Directions:
Lake Taylor Hospital
1309 Kempsville Road
Norfolk, Va. 23502 (Map)
Pre-Meeting Dinner at 6:00 PM (separate checks)
Uno Chicago Grill
Virginia Beach Blvd. & Military Highway (JANAF Shopping Center). (Map)
Join the forums.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
Politeness is cleaning up.
Two men suffered wounds Tuesday morning when a gun accidentally went off while being cleaned.
One man reportedly had a bullet wound through the hand and the other was shot in the hand and stomach, . . . .
And Now, a Musical Interlude 0
I’ve always wondered, who the heck was Elmer?
Misdirection Play, Decreased Postage Dept. 0
My bank sent me an email urging me to switch to on-line statements for, I kid you not, “increased security.”
Increased security.
Right.
The Voter Fraud Fraud 0
Amy Fried explains that the Republican gut-out-the-vote effort is working as intended. Here’s a bit:
Stuff like this happens in all innocence.
All his life, my Granddaddy, who was born in the 1880s, was known as “Bailey A.” He went through life thinking that his middle names was “Ames”; indeed, we were related to an Ames family. Only when he died did we find that the middle name on his birth certificate was “Alford.”
The “Panama Papers” . . . 1
. . . contain no revelation, only confirmation.
If you didn’t already know that the system is crooked, you haven’t been paying attention.
Food for the Ears 0
Harry Shearer interviews David Cay Johnston about Donald Trump and related topics.
Johnston has followed Trump’s careen career for almost four decades. The discussion ranges over Trump’s business dealings, apparent ties with the mob, history of–er–prevarication, and much, much more, with a side trip into business tax law in theory and in practice.
Listen up, y’hear.
Society Is Social 1
In the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Bruce Peterson, taking issue with a previous column (linked in his article), explains that a civilized society is, indeed, social.
No summary or excerpt can do his article justice. Just read it.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
Friends treat friends politely.
(snip)
“It’s a tragedy, a freak accident,” Berry said. “It was a misfire of a gun that ricocheted, hit the floor and unfortunately hit Chad. It’s crushing for everybody who was there and even more crushing for the one who was holding the weapon.”
Where I come from, a “misfire” means the damn gun doesn’t go off.
The Barnum and Bailey Election 2
At The Guardian, Frankie Boyle takes a blistering look at the U. S. Presidential campaign. A nugget:
Just read it.
Fifty Shades of Stupid 0
My school trips were so very tame.
Buried deep in the story is a qualifier that the students in question picked out the film, no one was forced to watch it, and everyone who did watch it was old enough to see it in a movie theatre.
But, really, now, there is no way that this could have turned out well.
One Person, One Person 0
A conservative reactionary attempt to create a class of non-persons* for apportionment purposes fails unanimously in the Supreme Court.
Even Clarence Thomas couldn’t stomach this one.
________________
*One suspects that “3/5s of a person” didn’t play well with the focus groups.
Clarence Page Is an Optimist 2
Clarence Page potters about:
Some Twitter users compared Trump to Voldemort in December after the billionaire developer and TV reality show star proposed a ban on Muslims entering the United States.
“How horrible,” Rowling responded in a tweet of her own. “Voldemort was nowhere near as bad.”
Follow the link to observe Page grasping at a straw: the desperate hope that Paul Ryan just might be the sane one in his insane party.