Events

Despite recently complaining about public transit in Chicago, I have to say I like ctabustracker.com, the Chicago Transit Authority's online bus tracker. It's a public-private venture with Google, and I think everyone benefits. In fact, I'm writing this blog entry because I have 11 minutes before my bus comes, and it only takes me 4 minutes to shut down my laptop and get to the bus stop. This, I think, is the epitome of efficient labor markets. All right, maybe not the epitome, but certainly a good...

Via TPM Muckraker, the Boston Globe reports today that the Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation moved from bonds into stocks just before the market fell last fall: The agency refused to say how much of the new investment strategy has been implemented or how the fund has fared during the downturn. The agency would only say that its fund was down 6.5 percent - and all of its stock-related investments were down 23 percent - as of last Sept. 30, the end of its fiscal year. But that was before most of the...

Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo wrote this evening about his own thoughts about physical books vs. Kindle: I've always been an inveterate collector of books. Not in the sense of collectibles, but in the sense that once I buy a book, I never let it go. As I made my way through adulthood it was while dragging a tail of several hundred books along with me. ... Don't get me wrong. Book books still have some clear advantages. Kindle is a disaster with pictures and maps. But I didn't realize the book...

This morning, consistent with other early spring mornings I remember from years past, Chicago is having a blizzard. We're on the backside (in so many ways) of a low-pressure center, getting some fresh spring breezes (41 km/h gusts out of the north), delightful spring warmth (0°C with a windchill of -6°C), and a gentle sodden wet heavy snowfall. In other happy news, the New York Times health blog yesterday reported 86,000 emergency room visits each year by people who tripped over their pets: That...

The Economist reports that traffic to Internet dating sites is up: [A]long with discount retailers and pawnbrokers, online-dating sites such as eHarmony.com and OkCupid.com have seen business look up. There are several theories to explain why. It may be that people have more time to devote to their private lives as the economy slows; that uncertain times increase the desire for companionship; or that living alone is expensive, whereas couples can split many of their costs. At OkCupid, which is aimed at...

Last night, while studying for an economics exam, I took a moment to execute the following SQL against a client's production database: UPDATE table_name SET column_a = 'Equipment', column_b = 'Equipment' WHERE column_a = 'Boojums' GO UPDATE table_name SET column_a = 'Borfins', column_b = 'Equipment' WHERE column_a = 'Nerfherders' GO The client called this morning to ask why the application suddenly had two different types of equipment, one which looked suspiciously like a collection of borfins. You can...

The city of Chicago, apparently responding to citizen complaints, has started fixing broken parking meters on its own and billing the company: Indications of a more urgent approach to fixing the problems became apparent Monday morning when the Tribune observed meter inspectors and repair personnel working downtown. It followed a Tribune story on Friday that exposed the broad scope of the problems and how drivers and business owners are angry at the city, which watched rates quadruple this year as part...

Via the New York Times Freakonomics blog, Germany's Der Spiegel reports an unusual acquittal: German police say at least one of the identical twin brothers Hassan and Abbas O. may have perpetrated a recent multimillion euro jewelry heist in Berlin. But because of their indistinguishable DNA, neither can be individually linked to the crime. Both were set free on Wednesday. ... DNA [found at the crime scene] led to not one but two suspects -- 27-year-old identical, or monozygotic, twins with...

Though, as Mark Morford explains, you need to choose one first: Communists had their turn. Feminists. Hippies. Then came the evil homosexual people, with their famous, much-lauded agenda to destroy the holy sanctimony of Christian marriage via encouraging girls to smoke and listen to punk rock, teaching interior decorating to straight boys and convincing innocent church pastors and Republican senators to fellate them in cheap motel rooms. The horror! But no longer. Proposition 8 and The Ugly Mormon...

Sorry. Alaska's disasters, natural and man-made, are front and center today. First, today is the 20th anniversary of the Exxon Valdez disaster. Who can forget? An estimated 11 million gallons of oil eventually spilled into the water. Attempts to contain the massive spill were unsuccessful, and wind and currents spread the oil more than 100 miles from its source, eventually polluting more than 700 miles of coastline. Hundreds of thousands of birds and animals were adversely affected by the environmental...