Events

Odd as it seems[1], the parking meter fiasco may turn out to be the turning point of the Daley administration. The city of Chicago today had to declare a moratorium on parking tickets because too many meters and kiosks are broken: The private company that earlier this year assumed operations of the city's 36,000 paid street parking spots recently promised to speed up installation of pay-and-display boxes after suffering widespread problems with coin parking meters. The new boxes, roughly one per block...

The Cubs finally pulled one out last night, winning 6-1 in 5½ innings before the game got called for rain. This afternoon, of course, they can resume losing, but at least they stopped their losing streak for a night.

That's how many the Cubs have lost as of last night. Somehow, even with Mr. T (yes, that Mr. T) revving up the crowd in the 7th inning, even with 8 runs, even with a sell-out Wrigley, they lost. Again. The game's highlight, from where I sat (on the third-base side where I couldn't see the Cubs' dugout), was Freddy Sanchez going 6-for-6. Unfortunately, Sanchez got those six hits for the Pirates. Not much more to say, but for those of you who haven't been to Wrigley and wondered what Waveland Avenue looks...

Probably nothing like this: *MANN, JOE E. Rank and organization: Private First Class, U.S. Army.... On 18 September 1944...Pfc. Mann boldly crept to within rocket-launcher range of an enemy artillery position and, in the face of heavy enemy fire, destroyed an 88mm gun and an ammunition dump. Completely disregarding the great danger involved, he remained in his exposed position, and, with his M-1 rifle, killed the enemy one by one until he was wounded 4 times. Taken to a covered position, he insisted on...

As we wake up today to news that North Korea has reportedly detonated a 20-kiloton atom bomb (first reported, actually, by the United States Geological Survey), it's worth remembering two other major news events from previous May 25ths. In 1977, Star Wars came out. (I saw it about a week later, in Torrance, Calif. My dad had to read the opening crawl to me.) In 1979, American 191 crashed on takeoff from O'Hare, at the time the worst air disaster in U.S. history. And now we add to that a truly scary...

Via the Economist, a Japan Air Lines 747 sucked a misplaced baggage container into its #1 engine at LAX: To the shock of onlookers – and no doubt the dismay of airline officials and crew on board – the empty baggage cart was sucked into one of the Boeing 747’s four engines, forcing the plane to become grounded and passengers returned back to the terminal. The Times of London has video.

From the New York Observer, some very evil humor: 4. You’re Americans! Who do you think you are? Us? ... 9. Please! For the love of God, I can't take any more of this harsh treatment which does not rise to the level of torture! I couldn't stop laughing and cringing at the same time.

Via Talking Poinst Memo, Mancow lasts six seconds before deciding waterboarding is torture: "If I'd known it was going to be this bad, I never would have done it." As TPM noted, "remember: this was in a controlled setting where the victim knew he wasn't going to be harmed."

Via Cele|bitchy, one more instance of a person confusing fame and infamy: Mary Kay LeTourneau, who was imprisoned as a 34-year-old teacher for raping a sixth-grade student, will host a "Hot for Teacher" night this weekend at a Seattle bar, KOMO-TV and the Associated Press report. "It's turned into sort of a love story," says [Mike Morris, owner of the Fuel Sports Eats & Beats bar]. "I realize it had a sick twist at the beginning, but they're both adults now. They're both married by the state of...

Cold fronts always seem to arrive with more fanfare than warm fronts, even when they don't bring precipitation or even clouds with them. Here's the U.S. situation as of 7pm this evening: Since then, the cold front shown draped over Chicago has moved east, passing over the city at almost exactly 8:35 pm. I know this because I had the windows open so their paint could dry. Some explanation: Because it's critical that the Inner Drive Technology International Data Center not melt, I keep careful watch on...