Follow Directions

I installed a new stereo in my girl's car this evening. It was my first Crutchfield experience, and they lived up to every expectation. The final fit was a little tough, but overall accecptable. If it was a newer car, I would probably not be happy with the fit - because it isn't perfect, but it is not a newer car.

The diagrams for the wiring harness were great, and I enjoyed soldering the wires and all that. Last summer I took apart the dash, so that part was also easy. The hard part was putting it bacl together without following the instructions because I thought I knew what I was doing. OOps. I wasted about 45 mins cussing at the thing because it wouldn't fit before I finally looked at the instructions and realized I was doing it wrong. SO!! One of the main reasons Crutchfield is good is that they give you such good instructions, which don't do any good it you don't follow them.

The unit I put in is an Aiwa CDC-X304. It's more than enough to push the Kenwood speakers I put in last summer - 4s in the front and 5.5s in the back. I'm glad I took the time last summer to run speaker wire, so I could get off the stock wire that could fit up my pee hole. The bass response from those speakers leaves a little to be desired - esp. since I'm used to the 6x9s in my back dash - but the clarity is great and the volume will finally beat out the noise when we're blasting the 4-80 air conditioning (4 windows down at 80 miles per hour).

I enjoy doing stuff like that, but it's most satisfing to know that she will get to listen to music that moves her.

Don't Move, Don't Whisper, Don't Even Breathe.

Look who's back on the program
Hookin' up another fly joint
When I flow on the slow jam.

Judgment Night has got to be one of the all time great bad movies. Remember when Emilio Estevez was cool? When Denis Leary was new and nobody had an idea who Cuba Gooding Jr. was?

Maybe just as much, the movie carries a sense of nostalgia for the highschool days when all the Boys would stay up playing Baseball Simulator 1000 on old school Nintendo, and know that if it were us in that movie, we would kick ass.

Or maybe it is the infectious soundtrack, which far surpasses the movie. It's like someone wanted to do a compilation album and put punk bands with rap groups - but no one would bite, so he went out and made a movie and called the album a soundtrack. There are a few movies that support the soundtrack, and this is the best.

Go get it, dust it off, and play it loud.

adultery

People who drive 240s are a special breed. I can only compare the obsession to that of someone who loves old mustangs, or VW Busses - but I don't really know because I don't drive those. The thing about the 240 is that it is the perfect car. It is slow and boxy, yet wonderfully sexy and smooth. It runs forever, and you can work on it yourself.

I drive a 1981 Volvo 242 manual transmission with push-button overdrive affectionately named The Houride. I got the The Houride almost ten years ago, and it is my first and only car. It has driven me everywhere I ever drove and has only left me stuck a couple times - both of which a mechanic failed to diagnose the problem and put me on the road when he shouldn't have. That car has serviced a lot of crap that I put it through - including countless jaunts from Atlanta to Charlotte with the spedo pegged out at 85 the entire way. Needless to say, the car, and interior, should be completely ragged out. But she's still in decent shape. I've made it this long, that hopefully I will be able to keep her going until I get out of lawschool and buy a house with a garage, where I will begin proper restoration.

Whenever I see a 240, I admire. I look at the bumper, headlights, taillights, wheels, windshield trim, badges, antenna, paint color, etc - all in an attempt to identify the year and trim package. While I admire, and sometimes lust, I have still never met a 240 that I would trade for my own. Until this weekend. I was walking near school and from about 100 yards I saw it. It looked like my car, but from the distance without my glasses I couldn't even be sure that it was a 2 door. As I got closer I noticed that it was.

I started debating whether I should cross the street to get a closer look, and just then a woman came out of the store and went to the car. I walked over and I think I scared her - and asked the brainest question ever "Is this your car" as she was getting in. I'm talkin, this was the most gorgeous 1981 242 that I have ever seen in my entire life. Everything from the paint to the taillights was original and looked as though it had just been driven out of the showroom. It was the exact same model as my car - same color, same everything - only brand new. The woman was the original owner and the car had been garage kept in Arizona for most of its life. Houride, I hate to say it, but I would trade you for that baby.

If you love your car, or love to drive, or both - check out the Sunday Washington Post Car Pages. Warren Brown (left side of the page) writes wonderful reviews that make you want to hit the road in whatever you drive and roll the windows down and turn the stereo up.

Guilty Pleasures

I think we all let ourselvs dive into a 2 hour marathon of Pimp My Ride everyonce in a while. But last night I setteled in for the season premier of MTv's "Sunday Stew," which begins with Pimp My Ride, then Viva La Bam, Punk'd, and new to the rotation is the Andy Milonakis Show. Many of you may recognize Andy from the "Smokin Beenie's Freestyle" video clip that has been floating sround on the web for at least 2 or 3 years. I laughed outloud and generally felt comfortable with the knowledge that there will always be a 20 year old stoned college student somewhere inside me. It also reminded me of goodtimes maxxed out in the Vortex, watching early episodes of JackAss.

summer camp

sorry for the slack posting this week. The judge I intern for hosts / sponsors / founded what is referred to in the community as "Law Camp." Every summer 30 rising highschool Sr.s from all over Loudoun & Faulkier counties spend a week with volunteer attorneys etc where they are given a hypothetical accident and investigate & litigate whatever side they are assigned to. It's pretty cool, in that semi-dorky way. Hey, I went to debate camp when I was their age.

At the end of the week, they argue their cases in real courtrooms with real judges - which can pretty intimidating for law school students, much less highschool kids.

Are they "kids"? That was the weirdest thing for me. As a chaperone or whatever, I realized how old I have gotten. I've never worked with kids before, and it was much more difficult to relate to them - or not relate - than I expected. I was never that young. Where is the 10th grader in me yelling that when I'm a parent I'll never forget what it was like to be my children's age?

The real moral of the story is that working with kids is amazingly exhausting. Everyone out there who works with kids is like "duh" and everyone who has never worked with kids probably thinks they know, but you don't know. And as a buddie of mine who taught middle school Spanish pointed out, I had it easy. Try chasing 30 7th graders around Madrid.

Too lazy? too busy.

Blog Wars

By Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, June 21, 2005; 7:36 AM

Every day, it seems, there are more blogs, more compilations of blogs and more chatter about blogs, as online debate comes in more flavors.

You have congressmen, presidential candidates and corporate leaders all doing the blog thing, as well as legions of ordinary folks armed mainly with opinions. This, in my view, is a great thing, even though no human being, including me, can keep up with the millions of words being posted each day. (Now you have to keep up not just with Josh Marshall's Talking Points Memo but with his TPM Cafe, not to mention the 1,239 people posting at Huffington).

But the debate on the most popular political blogs often seems to reflect the old right-left warfare -- just search on "Downing Street Memo" if you doubt me -- in ways that too often seem utterly predictable. (This was sort of captured in my chat yesterday. A D.C. reader: "Once again we are left with the media using manufactured documents in a naked effort to drive President Bush from office." A Michigan reader: "I find the mainstream media's response to the memos' explosive content very amusing. It's as if British papers had discovered Watergate, covered the hell out of it, then the American papers sniffing months later that everybody knew about all that already.")

Now comes an exchange over whether the top conservative and liberal blogs are different in more than just ideology. To wit: Are liberals more likely than their counterparts on the right to gather in cyber-communities? If so, is that a real strength that helps galvanize folks? And are blogs on the left becoming a more powerful force, if not quite to the point that conservatives dominate talk radio?

Chris Bowers of the (liberal) MyDD kicks off the debate:

"Last September, I wrote an article entitled "Top Down Right-Wing Blogosphere Growing Powerful," that argued the anti-community nature of right-wing blogs was allowing them relatively greater message discipline than left wing blogs and a superior ability to influence the content of the national media.

"In January, I wrote a follow-up piece entitled "Partisan Democratic Blogs Growing Far More Influential Than 'Independent' Right-Wing Blogs," where I argued that progressive blogs, due to their affiliation with the Democratic Party, were growing influential in ways that the largely media focused right-wing blogosphere was not. In my latest irregular installment that compares the national liberal blogosphere to the national conservative blogosphere, I would like to discuss a new phenomenon I see emerging. The left-wing blogosphere is beginning to decidedly pull away from the right wing blogosphere in terms of traffic. This is largely a result of the open embrace of community blogging on the left and the stagnant, anti-meritorious nature of the right-wing blogosphere that pushes new, emerging voices to the margins . . .

"Of the twenty-four liberal blogs in the top quintile, Dailykos, TPM Café, Smirking Chimp, Metafilter, BooMan Tribune, MyDD, and Dembloggers are full-fledged community sites where members cannot only comment, but they can also post diaries / articles / polls. By comparison, there are no community sites among the top twenty-four conservative blogs. None, zip, zero, nada. This is particularly stunning when one considers the importance of the Free Republic community to the conservative netroots. While it would appear that there are hordes of Glenn Reynolds wannabe's among conservatives in the netroots, Redstate.org sticks out as the only success story for a community oriented blog within the conservative blogosphere. In fact, of the five most trafficked conservative blogs (over 200,000 page views per week), only one, Little Green Footballs, even allows comments, much less the ability to actually write a diary or a new article."

Patrick Ruffini a former Bush-Cheney campaign aide, sees a different dynamic:

"Conservative blogs may be smaller, but they are more densely interconnected. Conversation on conservative blogs is just as likely to happen between blogs as within them. In fact, I've noticed a unique phenomenon emerging right here: quite often, my number of trackbacks rivals, and sometimes exceeds, the number of comments. In terms of solid, valuable interaction, trackbacks are pure gold: they tell you that someone thought enough of your post not just to respond to it on a seldom-read comments page or diary, but to give it prime real estate in their personal space, all the while sending visitors your way.

"Bowers disparages the proliferation of large numbers of mid-tier conservative blogs, but in what way is this unhealthy? In fact, most of the cooperative, traffic-sharing arrangements in the blogosphere have emerged on the right. These days, it's hard to keep track of all the various carnivals and link-fests, from the Cotillion to Carnival of the Capitalists to Classiness All Around Us to Conservative Grapevine . . .

"We have quite a paradox here: liberal blogging is thoroughly centralized and highly stratified, with Kos at the very top of the pyramid. The conservative blogosphere is more cooperative and egalitarian, with plenty of Kumbaya-singing, beer-swilling, and link-swapping around the campfire. In the conservative blogopshere, it's leave no blog behind."

Kumbaya ?

A poster named Jason responds to Ruffini: "I think traffic is stagnating or dropping in the right blogosphere simply because the job of re-electing Bush has been accomplished. There was a bit of a circus on all sides about Social Security, but that has since dropped off the radar. Other than Terry Schiavo, there have been few issues that are important to the right-wing grassroots right now."

Still no Bolton, as the Los Angeles Times reports:

"Senate Democrats again blocked a confirmation vote on John R. Bolton on Monday, opening the possibility that President Bush would bypass lawmakers and use a recess appointment to install the nominee as U.N. ambassador.

"Despite last-minute lobbying by the White House and public pressure from Bush, Republicans fell short of the 60 votes [the vote was 54-38] needed to break a Democratic filibuster and cut off debate on the nomination. . . . And White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan refused to rule out the possibility that the president might appoint Bolton while Congress is on its weeklong July 4 break.."

That would drive the Democrats bonkers.

The Washington Times uses the F-word:

"The Senate yesterday failed to break a Democrat-led filibuster against President Bush's nominee for ambassador to the United Nations, leaving John R. Bolton at an impasse and setting up the possibility of a recess appointment."

A USA Today survey finds the country in a "funk":

"Fewer Americans fear a terrorist attack on the USA in the next several weeks than at any time since 9/11, a new USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll shows.

"Overall, 35% say another attack is likely soon, down from 39% in January and a high of 85% in October 2001, a month after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

"The public has lost confidence in the Bush administration's ability to protect the nation from terrorist attacks, the poll shows, but 61% are still confident it can." Only 39 percent say they support the Iraq war.

Everyone seems to enjoy this story: Saddam loves Doritos.

Ed Klein's book about Hillary hits today, and National Review chats up the author:

"National Review Online: In a sentence, what is 'the truth about Hillary'?

"Edward Klein: Hillary is not a victim (not of sexism, not of her husband, and certainly not of this book); she's not a moderate (despite her effort to re-brand herself in the Senate). Even my sources on the left admit she's positioning herself as a victim and moderate in order to win the White House.

"NRO: Matt Drudge has highlighted the 'rape' claim in your book [Bill Clinton supposedly and allegedly assaulting his wife]. Which, to be upfront here, I thought was a terrible story to be highlighting, about a child and her parents. Why on earth would you put such a terrible story in your book? -- that looks to be flimsily sourced at that. But even if it wasn't -- why tell it?"

"Klein: Let's set the record straight here. Actually, I don't make that claim in the book. I included the story about their 1979 trip to Bermuda because Hillary herself brings it up and spins it in her own book as an example of their supposedly romantic marriage. The point of the story is that my source, who was with the Clintons in Bermuda and quoted Bill's boastful remarks to me, was stunned when Bill phoned him a few months later and told him he just learned of Hillary's pregnancy by reading about it in the newspaper! Those who read the book will see this is hardly a 'rape story' -- rather it's yet another example of a bizarre political union where a pregnancy is leaked to the largest newspaper in the state and treated as political gain rather than shared privately as a couple."

Salon's Rebecca Traister wonders how a former New York Times Magazine editor got to this point:

"What is a guy with Klein's background and reputation doing writing a book like this? 'The Truth About Hillary' boasts a passel of petty, sexist and plain old 'no duh' claims against Hillary: 'She shows no wifely instincts,' 'She isn't maternal,' 'She's a feminist, but she rode to power on her husband's coattails,' 'She has abetted decades of chronic infidelity,' 'Many of her closest friends and aides were lesbians.' It claims to shed light on the way that 'the culture of lesbianism at Wellesley College shaped Hillary's politics' and that 'she set up an elaborate system to monitor her husband's girlfriends.' The book opens with a scene in which former White House intern Monica Lewinsky fondles Bill Clinton's penis at Radio City Music Hall.

" 'Life of Samuel Johnson' it ain't. But the fear of many Democrats is that 'The Truth About Hillary' could prove to be a powerful weapon against Clinton as she moves closer to becoming the Democratic candidate for president in 2008. Even if most of the claims in 'The Truth about Hillary' turn out to be baseless, there's a palpable fear that it could be a lethal cousin to 2004's campaign killer 'Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry.' In New York media circles, the discomfort is doubled by the knowledge that this time, the cudgel is being wielded not by some easily dismissed nut-job from a state they fly over, but by a man they know, they've worked with, and whom they may have even created."

Weekly Standard Editor Bill Kristol floats an idea on Dick Durbin:

"Conservatives (and, one trusts, many liberals) have been appalled by Sen. Durbin's comparison last Tuesday, on the Senate floor, between 'what Americans had done to prisoners in their control' at Guantanamo and what was done by Nazis, Soviets, and Pol Pot. Conservatives (and, one trusts, many liberals) have also been appalled by Sen. Durbin's non-apology last Friday: 'I have learned from my statement that historical parallels can be misused and misunderstood.' In other words, Sen. Durbin apparently still believes there could be a proper use and understanding of an 'historical parallel' between American soldiers and Nazis . . .

"Why not put the burden on the Democrats? When Sen. Trent Lott made a far less damaging, but still deplorable, statement two and a half years ago his fellow Republicans insisted he step down as their leader. Shouldn't Democrats insist that Sen. Durbin step down as their whip, the number two man in their leadership? Shouldn't conservatives (and liberals) legitimately ask Democrats to hold their leader to account, especially given the precedent of Lott?"

Andrew Sullivan flatly disagrees: "I've now read and re-read Senator Dick Durbin's comments on interrogation techniques at Guantanamo Bay. They are completely, perfectly respectable. The rank hysteria being perpetrated by some on the right is what is shameful."

The Downing Street debate is still hot and heavy, and NYU's Jay Rosen deconstructs what happened:

"What journalists call news judgment used to be king. If the press ruled against you, you just weren't news. But if you weren't news how would anyone know enough about you (or care) to contest the ruling? That's what having singular influence was all about. The way it works today, the World Wide Web is the sovereign force, and journalists live and work according to its rules.

"Now if there's something newsworthy coming out of the U.K. but neglected in America the political blogs in America and other activists online keep talking about it. Quickly the story's unjust obscurity will reach a political player who can change that by acting in a newsworthy way, lending fresh facts and additional reason to cover the story.

"By such means the appeal of news judgment starts to take shape. This happened within a week when John Conyers began circulating a letter to President Bush -- signed by 88 Democrats -- that demanded from Bush an explanation. The Knight-Ridder Washington bureau, increasingly a dissident voice on these matters, treated that letter as news in a May 6 report. (The signers were up to 122 by the time Conyers sent his letter.)

"Players in politics, reading the blogs (or in the case of Conyers, writing for them), pick up the chatter and amplify it. Radio talk show hosts, also reading the blogs, and getting the e-mails from activists, amplify the chatter some more. Columnists who weren't a part of the consensus pay attention, seeking vindication for their own judgment. And all these players together mount the appeal. They go into Supreme News Court and say: 'the press denied us, but we have a case.'"

Washington Monthly's Kevin Drum responds to a post (excerpted here yesterday) about the Sunday Times of London using copies of the memo:

"The wingnuts are getting desperate. Captain's Quarters, in a nostalgic attempt to recreate the glories of Rathergate, suggests that the Downing Street Memos aren't real. Why? Because Michael Smith, the reporter who got hold of them, had them retyped to protect his source and then returned the originals. Jonah Goldberg feverishly calls CQ's revelations a 'must read.'

"Now, unlike the Killian memos that were at the center of Rathergate, there are quite a few principals in this case who either wrote or received these memos and therefore have absolute knowledge of whether or not they're genuine. The first memo, for example, was written by Matthew Rycroft and distributed at the time to David Manning, Geoff Hoon, Jack Straw, Peter Goldsmith, Richard Wilson, John Scarlett, Francis Richards, Richard Dearlove, Jonathan Powell, Sally Morgan, and Alastair Campbell. So far, not a single one of these people has claimed they're fake."

John Hinderaker of Power Line, a blog that helped lead the charge on the National Guard memos, is skeptical:

"I very much doubt that the documents are fakes, for two reasons. First, to my knowledge no one in the British government has denied their authenticity. The 'Downing Street memos' are much different from the CBS National Guard documents in this important respect: the CBS documents were ostensibly authored by Jerry Killian, who had been dead for twenty years. The Downing Street documents, on the other hand, were allegedly authored by, and relate to meetings recently conducted by, a group of men who are very much alive and well. I can't conceive of a reason why they would fail to attack the documents' genuineness if there were a basis for doing so . . .

"The Downing Street memos, while interesting, are innocuous. If someone went to the trouble of faking them, I would expect him to fake something better."

Finally, I thought I knew of all the accomplishments in Ted Koppel's long and storied career, but the New York Post has unearthed a new one:

"Busty actress Sally Kirkland tattles that curiously-coiffed 'Nightline' anchor Ted Koppel was the first man to lay a hand on her ample bosom.

"Kirkland, 60, says Koppel made his move when he was a 17-year-old senior at Manhattan's McBurney HS and she was 14-year-old freshman at Nightingale, when they were riding in the back of a horse-drawn carriage after his prom."

One in a long line of Koppel firsts.

boy oh boy...

... was I drunk when I made that last post. I had been sipping on Evan Williams Single Barrel (1995 Vintage), and I must say that it was excellent. It is on the sweeter side - although probably not as sweet as Knob Creek - with strong notes of vanilla. For 21 bucks, I don't think there is another bourbon that can even get close. Elijah Craig 12 was my previous "Best Buy" but I might have to put the Evan Single in that category. I usually find Elijah for around $17 a bottle, so the Evan is a bit more expensive - but it is just that good.

(both Evan Williams & Elijah Craig are produced by Heaven Hill Distillery. I highly recomend poking around their website, as well as the Evan Williams site, to learn more about the bourbon making tradition.)

So anyway - to clarify my late night rant - it is amazing that a substance people use all the time without ever getting into trouble is the same substance that some people get sent away to federal prison for a very long time.

A good friend of mine once pointed out that if pot is illegal, there is no way Bourbon should be legal.

Drugs are bad

So, this summer I am interning with a judge on the Loudoun County Circuit Court of Virginia. Yesterday I visited the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia - and man was it different. The building and courtrooms were much more imposing - and I saw several sentencing.

The thing that really hit home was seeing people sent off for 87 and 124 months on drug charges, with their families sitting in court crying, watching them get hauled off. What hit me were the stringent drug laws, which are totally backwards for the most part. Why should people arrested for simple possession - no intent to distribute - be sent to jail for ten years? That is not the way I want my tax money spent. But seeing these people - they were in deep. They earned being arrested, and they earned incarceration.

It's crazy to think that the same thing they are spending ten years in jail for, tons of people do all the time on a "recreational" basis. It's playing with fire. Everyone that does drugs is doing the same thing that these guys do - but they are going to jail for 124 months.

I don't want to go to jail.

But if you do drugs, be informed.

Get out of the way

I live in a big city with a lot of people, so there are bound to be a lot of morans. And where there are a lot of morans, there are a lot of morans on the road. I'm sure that is not an uncommon problem, but since I have an hour long commute to my internship this summer I run into way too many of them. That's ok.

What I don't understand is how many of them are cab drivers. It's amazing. And I don't mean aggressive lane-changing crazy tail-gating taxi cab drivers. I mean slow cruising just under the speed limit in the left lane of a 5 lane 55 mph highway where the flow of traffic rarely dips below 70 and if you are going 80 in the fast lane you are in teh way.

So how then can professional drivers, espically the ones that ONLY ever drive between Dulles Airport and the city, drive like such morans? If they want to go slow and run up the tab, that is their business - but get the hell out of the way.

Conspiracy Theory

For the first time in my life, the evil forces of puberty and employment have formed a secret pact requiring me to shave every day before work. Not every other day, not twice a week, and not the in-school standard every once in a while. Every day.

My face is pissed, and each time I lose 5 or ten minutes of my life staring at myself through a steamy mirror.

This makes me happy

Bad stories come out of the NFL all the time, and Mike Minter has been a good story long overlooked. Similarly, the Panthers office doesn't get enough credit for the decisions they make.

Jarrod Cooper was cut mid season because of off the field problems, and Todd Sauerbraun was shown the door as well. Both players were arguably the best at their respective positions (ST Gunner & Punter) and while it may not have been the same as letting a probowl WR or QB go, our team was worse off (on paper) for making those calls.

But before you can be a good team, you have to be a respectable team. Winning at any cost is not as valuable as winning the right way.

Mike Minter knows how to win the right way, and while many other teams may have simply cut him to save cap room and make room for a younger player - and many players would have tried the free agent market in order to squeze every last cent out of their contract, Minter & the Pathers did the right thing. This is the kind of deal in football that you use to teach your kids about the right things in competition and life:

Minter agrees to contract extension
By Darin Gantt The Herald

CHARLOTTE -- Mike Minter laughed Friday afternoon, the laugh of a man secure in his place. After all, this time, he didn't have to threaten to go to Cleveland.

The Carolina Panthers ensured their veteran safety and leader of their defense would retire a member of the organization that drafted him, signing Minter to a four-year contract extension which will carry him through the 2009 season.

FULL STORY

MWI

I used to live in Decatur GA - essentially the same thing as ATL. Decatur itself is the size of a very small town, and its police are known as some of the most aggressive DUI enforcers. I have several friends who we given citations in Decatur. One of those friends already had a suspended license from a previous arrest...which is why he was riding his bike home from the bar at 4:30am (last call is 3:45). The officer stoped him because he was weaving back and forth across the lane - understandable since he had a girl doubling on the seat, and another riding on the handle bars. It's true.

As odd as that may seem, there has been a recent outbreak of Mowing While Intoxicated. While this guy in Delhi, Ohio gets major points for his efforts, the guy in Culpepper, Virginia blows him out of the water - with a higher BAC, and vastly superior time and location of arrest.

One of the dumbest things I ever did, in terms of getting caught, was walk 3 blocks to the gas station and fill up an empty crown handle of absolute with Exxon Super Octane 93. I was not sober, and I was not of-age. Strangely, I was lucky because the cops busted the party while I was gone.

I considered providing a link to the City of Decatur web page, but you may have more fun reading the City Code that regulates "Adult Entertainment." To my knowledge, there are no strip clubs in incorporated Decatur.

Sec. 10-51. Findings of fact.

Based on the experiences of other urban counties and municipalities including, but not limited to, Atlanta, Georgia; Fulton County, Georgia; and DeKalb County, Georgia; which experiences we believe are relevant to the problems faced by the city, we take note of the notorious and self-evident conditions attendant to the commercial exploitation of human sexuality, which do not vary greatly among generally comparable communities within our country. Moreover, it is the finding of the city commission that public nudity, either partial or total, under certain circumstances, particularly circumstances related to the sale and consumption of alcoholic beverages in so-called nude bars or establishments offering so-called nude entertainment or adult entertainment, begets criminal behavior and tends to create undesirable community conditions. Among the acts of criminal behavior identified with nudity and alcohol are disorderly conduct, prostitution, drug trafficking and drug use. Among the undesirable community conditions identified with nudity and alcohol are depression of property values in the surrounding neighborhoods, increased expenditure for and allocation of law enforcement personnel to preserve law and order, increased burden on the judicial system as a consequence of the criminal behavior described in this section, and acceleration of community blight by the concentration of such establishments in particular areas. Furthermore, the public health, safety and welfare require that adult entertainment establishments and their locations, operations and employees be regulated and licensed in order to reduce the potential for harm and in order to preserve the quality of urban life in residential and business areas of the community. Therefore, the limitation of adult uses and adult entertainment to certain prescribed areas of the city is in the public welfare, and it is a matter of governmental interest and concern to minimize the occurrence of criminal behavior and undesirable community conditions normally associated withestablishments which provide or establish adult entertainment or adult uses. To that end, this article is hereby adopted.

...
Sec. 10-53. Definitions.
...

Seminude means the exposure of one or more, but not all of the following: human genitals or pubic region, buttocks, or female breasts below a point immediately above the top of the areola.

Specified anatomical areas means and includes any of the following:

(1) Less than completely and opaquely covered genitals or pubic region, buttocks, or female breasts below a point immediately above the top of the areola; or

(2) Human male genitalia in a discernibly turgid state, even if completely or opaquely covered.

Specified sexual activities means and includes any of the following:

(1) Actual or simulated intercourse, oral copulation, anal intercourse, oral anal copulation, bestiality, direct physical stimulation of unclothed genitals, flagellation or torture in the context of a sexual relationship, or the use of excretory functions in the context of a sexual relationship, and any of the following sexually-oriented acts or conduct: anilingus, buggery, coprophagy, coprophilia, cunnilingus, fellatio, necrophilia, pederasty, pedophilia, sapphism, or zooerasty.

(2) Clearly depicted human genitals in a state of sexual stimulation, arousal or tumescence.

(3) Use of human or animal ejaculation, sodomy, oral copulation, coitus, or masturbation.

(4) Fondling or touching of nude human genitals, pubic regions, buttocks or female breasts.

(5) Masochism, erotic or sexually oriented torture, beating or the infliction of pain.

(6) Erotic or lewd touching, fondling or other sexually-oriented contact with an animal by a human being.

(7) Human excretion, urination, menstruation, vaginal or anal irrigation.

Eat on the slow

It amazes me how much time it takes to eat breakfast in the morning. If I skip food, I can be out the door in 1/2 an hour easy. If I eat, it invariably takes me an hour and fifteen minutes to get out the door. Why? I have no idea. I don't cook & eat for 45 mins. Well - I have some idea. There are too many distractions. Checking e-mail, emptying the dishwasher, watching 5 extra minutes of ESPN because Linda Cohn is looking particularly good in her pink argyle cardigan. (Coming out early is the best sports center commercial ever) At any rate, I am perpetually 10 mins late to my internship - which isn't the end of the world, but it does annoy me.

One day when I am old, I will just wake up earlier - but 6:30 is about all I can do for now. I will also make sure my commute is not a 37 mile hour long drive, and my car will have a CD player, AC, and get at least 40 MPG.

Don't be a Moran

John Kerry is a moran:

C why Kerry sat on grades?

BY CORKY SIEMASZKO DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

So much for the notion that President Bush is a dunce compared with Sen. John Kerry. Newly released records reveal that the tangle-tongued Texan and the loquacious liberal senator from Massachusetts were both C students at Yale. Also, Kerry earned four Ds in his freshman year - in geology, in political science and in two history courses. "I always told my dad that 'D' stood for distinction," Kerry yesterday told The Boston Globe, which obtained the senator's grade transcripts.

READ THE WHOLE STORY HERE

tough stuff

This is way harder than I thought. A friend of mine has an imensely entertaining blog (nolege), and I was feeling like I had somethig to say, so I started this one. But then I realized that no one wants to read a blog made up of someone's daily cry-baby bitch session. Until I find a purpose or theme for this, you will have to deal with my inconsistent posts and probably an extensive amount of news postings - with a tilt towards the Panthers. Of course, no there could be as venerable as visiting 1000 bars in a year.

The 2005 season is showing a lot of promise as we've added a top-flight OL and CB. But there is always going to be a question mark somewhere - and this season it is looking like WR. We are really only 2 deep at WR, but Drew Carter could be the answer we're looking for.

Carter makes speedy recovery
Returns from knee injury as fastest wide receiver

By Darin Gantt The Herald
(Published June 7‚ 2005)

CHARLOTTE -- Drew Carter said he always believed he'd make it back.

He convinced himself last week, proving himself the fastest wide receiver on the Carolina Panthers' roster.

Despite missing last season with his third major knee injury, Carter was able to out-run teammate Steve Smith for bragging rights when the team tested players in the 40-yard dash.

A grinning Carter said he was clocked in 4.34 seconds, slightly faster than Smith.

"Number one," Carter said, nodding. "I was giving Steve a little stuff, because he's had the crown for the last three or four years."

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