Author: Aaron Weber

I should have mentioned this before, but I am deeply gratified that the constitutional convention has kept gay marriage legal.

Kenmore Square T Station and Charles/MGH station renovations actually making progress. You kind of expect the T never to get anything right, and sure, they’re behind schedule on the projects, but they’re really looking good.

From back in 2000, here’s an article about anti-abortion activists who get abortions, and how they justify it. A lot of people will take this as an example of how the right in the US is full of hypocrites, but that’s not quite the full picture: humanity is full of hypocrites.

Recently I got a parking ticket for parking my motorcycle in a residents-only spot in Cambridge. I’d assumed (foolishly) that because Somerville doesn’t require resident permits for motorcycles, Cambridge must have a similar policy. Now, Cambridge doesn’t enforce this law very carefully, but nonetheless it’s a law, designed to decrease traffic in Cambridge by encouraging people to take the damn train. I agree that traffic in Cambridge sucks, that global warming is horrible, and that fewer people should drive in Cambridge. Yet I sometimes drive, because I much prefer riding a motorcycle to sitting in a train. I was incredibly annoyed when I got that ticket, even though I agree with all of the laws and planning decisions that put it there.

Maybe I’m not as hypocritical as someone who wants to outlaw abortion who goes and gets an abortion, or a tort-reform advocate who sues for millions in punitive damages for a slip-and-fall accident, but I sympathize with them anyway. We all share that human tendency to expect special treatment for ourselves.

CNN Money talks about the seven dirty words: “Since the 10 A.M. argument was being televised live by the cable station C-SPAN, the judges soon began wondering about the decency of airing a legal argument on indecency. At the argument, after all, the Fox lawyer and the judges were repeatedly saying “fuck” and “shit.” (The FCC lawyer primly referred only to “the F-word” and “the S-word.”)”

Sectarian terrorism is tying up traffic near my office, and interrupting my meetings and phone-calls with stupid sirens and police tape. Someone has found a suspicious package at the abortion counseling center upstairs from the furniture store, so the road is closed off and surrounded by the bomb squad, several fire trucks, a half-dozen motorcycle cops…

What a pain in the ass.

I think my new personal motto is going to become a txt-spk abbreviation: STFU&GTFO.

Paris Hilton’s next song should be a cover of Kryptonite (I’m On It) by the Purple Ribbon All-Stars, just for this verse, which so perfectly mirrors her life:
If it’s jail I get for stompin’ haters to sleep, fuck it I go.
Freak I’ll be out in a week
Straight geeked swervin’ down your street
In a stolen Bonneville with 23s on the feet…

HousingPANIC has some nice charts here, although they are missing a key detail– the label on the Y axis. I think that it’s percentage change in median price of sales. Click through for the big versions.

The city of Chattanooga is using goats to combat kudzu.

The Isle of Man TT motorcycle races are having their 100th anniversary this week. They’re not really shown on any US TV networks, but it’s a big deal in a lot of places. Here’s a scene:

The narrator says the rider “survived with only a bruised lung.” Actually it was a lot more than a bruised lung: several ribs broken, kidney damage, spleen destroyed… apparently there were more than a couple days they didn’t know if he was going to survive, but he did. He no longer races, but in this Times (UK) article he rides the 37-mile course with a journalist in his passenger seat.