Events

Chicago's Francis Cardinal George, the highest-ranking member of the Roman Catholic Church in Chicago, apparently thinks gays are like murderous racists: George’s initial comments came in connection with a controversy over whether next summer’s gay pride parade would interrupt morning services at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church in the Lakeview neighborhood. “Organizers (of the pride parade) invited an obvious comparison to other groups who have historically attempted to stifle the religious freedom of...

The City of Chicago replaced a bridge on a principal north-south street and opened it up to traffic a week ago...but then it closed the next bridge south for five months: The Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT) on Friday is opening the new Halsted Street Bridge over the Chicago River North Branch Canal, which has been closed since November 30, 2010 for reconstruction. The new tied-arch bridge will feature two full traffic lanes in each direction—up from the current one lane in each direction—as...

After almost exactly 5 days (actually 5 days and 20 minutes), I'm unpacking, laundering, rehydrating, and figuring out where I put the gifts I didn't get a chance to hand out before leaving. Regular updates resume presently. Oh, and:

I'm at the Peet's Coffee in Half Moon Bay, Calif., while the rest of the family slowly starts their days. In the past hour I've heard the following: "All meditation techniques are awesome."—60-something woman "What I really need is someone who's good at syndicating real-estate investments."—the same woman three minutes later "If you eat something that only eats vegetarians, that's still vegetarian."—man of unknown vintage wearing dark sunglasses and a pony tail, trying to work out why the Jewish clerk...

The Air Force has released a report about a F-22 crash that killed the pilot: Capt. Jeffey Haney had his mobility and vision restricted while flying an F-22 at 11,580 m feet and 1,925 km/h [true airspeed], at night, and then the jet cut off his oxygen supply. According to the accident report released last week, Captain Jeffrey Haney became distracted when his oxygen system stopped delivering oxygen. After initiating a descent, he allowed his F-22 to roll past inverted, unchecked. The fighter's attitude...

Codey might want to play tug, but Roger couldn't care less:

Codey waits for me to put down the black flashy thing and start playing tug again: Canon 7D at ISO-6400, 50mm, f/1.8 at 1/250, just a few minutes ago.

Every time I visit San Francisco, I stop here: Today I only left with 400 g, which unfortunately I'll have to leave with my family. Well, unfortunately for me; knowing them, it won't last two weeks in the house. That's an acceptable outcome.

Via Sullivan, a constitutional analysis of the Stop Online Piracy Act: To begin with, the bills represent an unprecedented, legally sanctioned assault on the Internet’s critical technical infrastructure. Based upon nothing more than an application by a federal prosecutor alleging that a foreign website is “dedicated to infringing activities,” Protect IP authorizes courts to order all U.S. Internet service providers, domain name registries, domain name registrars, and operators of domain name servers—a...

Given my activities yesterday (i.e., going through airport security), I found the latest interview with Bruce Schneier timely and once again correct: As we came by the checkpoint line, Schneier described one of these aspects: the ease with which people can pass through airport security with fake boarding passes. First, scan an old boarding pass, he said—more loudly than necessary, it seemed to me. Alter it with Photoshop, then print the result with a laser printer. In his hand was an example, complete...