I found this on the internet somewhere and thought it wonderful. I may write more about it later, but just in case I didn't get around to it, I wanted to share it with y'all: The Buddha was walking on a river bank, when he was approached by a man with a question...   more »

So I fired up my BlogLines news aggregator today and took a peek at the Yahoo News -- Presidential Elections RSS feed. I saw these two articles listed one right after the other... kind of says it all:

• Ten Economic Nobel Prize Winners Endorse Kerry (AFP)
   
• Republicans Endorse Ban on Gay Marriage (AP)

Apparently, the party of "tax and spend" is being endorsed by nobel laureate economists, while the party of "small government" is endorsing more government regulation of something as personal and private as marriage (of all things)...   more »

James, on Aces Full of Links, has made available his results in a 'Religion Survey'. The survey is not very well designed (it assumes some sort of theism on the part of the respondant), but perhaps you will find it interesting anyway. Here's what my filled in survey looks like...   more »

Those are two words I hear applied to Liberalism a lot, usually by people who mean to cast it in an unfavorable light, and as such people are prone to do, calling liberals "moral relativists" is a wild exaggeration at best. If you can find a liberal who thinks armed robbery is okay, then you've found a moral relativist. (Stupid comments about taxation as stealing will be deleted, so don't waste your breath.) So what is moral relativism? Read on...   more »

Here we go again. Despite the fact that conservatives everywhere are decrying the Swift Boat Liars for Bush ads as utterly baseless fabrications, Bush refuses to do so. This should come as no surprise, as Aces Full of Links recently noted, Bush is a coward. William Rood, an editor at the Chicago Tribune, who has long refused to speak of his time in Vietnam, came to Kerry's defense yesterday calling the allegations of the Swift Boat Liars untrue. Rood has a perspective that most of the Liars do not, he was there the day that Kerry earned his silver star...   more »

Actually there is, if you live in Lincoln, Nebraska. Residents of Lincon may own up to 5 cats legally, but to keep any more in their homes requires a special permit... and even then you are limited to a maximum of 15. Somebody should have told Rickey Meyer of this, because when the alarms in the Cat Detector Van started going off, he had accumulated 146 cats in the basement where he lived...   more »

Apparently widespread deforestation has led to organized monkey attacks in Kassala, a city in Sudan. Apparently the day-long attacks are driven by a need for food. The monkeys are purportedly snatching food from children, shelves of bakeries and grocery stores, and invading homes to raid refrigerators...   more »

...and liposuction, and facelifts, and so forth. Apparently the military surgeons think it is great because it gives them practical experience that comes in handy when they are attempting to do reconstructive surgery on an injured soldier. Is this an appropriate use of tax dollars? Our soldiers risk their lives for all of us every day, should we consider this a fair benefit? What do you think about this and about breast augmentation in general? Read on to hear more about this story and also (of course) more about what I think on the subject...   more »

If you're going to be in New York perhaps you should check out the Meow Mix Cafe. Bring your cat...   more »

Back in 2002 my friend and coworker Matt went on an adventurous trip to Morocco which involved planes, trains, busses, taxis, and even camels during a trek through the Saraha Desert. He has written an extended travelogue of his journey which makes great reading...   more »

Brief post today folks... here's an interesting article about a woman from Britain who claims to have been struck (grazed really) by a falling meteorite.  Yeowch!  Be careful when you hang out your laundry!  I, of course, probably have better chances of being struck by a Perseid than I do of ever witnessing the Perseid shower.

Today marks my wedding anniversary and the thirteenth year I have spent with my beloved wife.  Today we celebrated with a small dinner at one of our favorite restaurants (Dandelion Green in Burlington, MA).  There was an exchange of modest gifts (she got me Lindt chocolates, I got her some jigsaw puzzles... I think I got the best of that deal) and an evening working over a jigsaw puzzle and singing music we used to sing together when younger (Talking Heads -- Little Creatures).  After all these years there's still nobody I'd rather be with, eat with, sing Little Creatures with, than her...   more »

A couple kids spot some beehives sticking out of a space in a wall in an apartment complex. In my experience, kids are typically drawn to things they should stay the hell away from, and these kids are no exception. So they pick up some rocks and throw them at the beehives... then all hell breaks loose. Thousands of bees come pouring out of the hives and terrorize the local neighborhood stinging bystanders and sending some to the hospital. Part of the city is cordoned off. Sounds like a silly horror movie, right? It's not. It's real, and the Associated Press has the story...   more »