Space Shuttle Down Nothing to add to the story from here [and here, and here, and here] — except that this hurts just as much as the last time we had to go through this. May God speed the souls of all on board.
Tim and Esta's father worked for years at the NASA facility in Langley, Va. I have to wonder what he's thinking . . .
Oh what? You say that I can't drive all high on marijuana, shooting off my gun, running down children (on their way to voucher schools of their mother's choosing) in the crosswalk? Drat. I was beginning to like libertarianism.
Capitol Chronicles: Day Nine At the Gold Dome this morning, the halls were alive with the sound of Harleys — lots of Harleys. Bike riders swamped the Capitol grounds today to rally for repeal of the state's helmet law. [My quip: "[t]hey should have coordinated this with organ donation awareness day."]
It made for a strange menagerie — everywhere you looked, it was as though someone had taken the old-boy legislators and crisp-collared lobbyists and plunked a ZZ Top impersonators' convention right in the middle of them. Some of the guests had a hard time learning the culture of the place, though — more than one rider left a line of people behind him fidgeting under their umbrellas while he learned the mysteries of the modern metal detector.
Later in the day another lobbyist told me about the cyclists' pilgrimage two years ago — which just happened, as it turned out, to coincide with the legislature's fateful vote on changing the state flag. One senator — I won't name him, but his initials are J-O-E-Y B-R-U-S-H — capitalized on the moment by hustling off the Senate floor right after the vote to give a hellfire-and-brimstone speech to the denim-clad throng at the bottom of the staircase. By the time he finished, he'd whipped the crowd into such a lather that you could hear the noise from one end of the Capitol to the other.
I'm just playing a hunch here — but something tells me that if Roy Barnes had listened that day, he might not have had to make that sudden relocation this month to Atlanta Legal Aid.
Hit and Run Sometimes, you're in the mood for War and Peace — and sometimes, you just want Maxim. I have the attention span of a gnat tonight, so rather than write a magnum opus . . .
Meet the Governor? Why? I've been a naughty lobbyist tonight. I blew off a ticket for a reception with the new governor because, having just gotten home from the Capitol, I didn't feel like rousting myself from the house and schlepping back into town. Bad me. What with pitching for sound water management and higher cigarette taxes all day — and keeping an eye on matters for tech companies when I could find the spare time — I just felt all tuckered out.
'Course, my boss does all that, manages the local office of an environmental PAC, and runs the Atlanta city council, so I really ought not complain.
Maybe I should have given the ticket to Jessica — she seems to have taken an interest in Georgia's new chief executive . . .
Jobs for America? Those rascals at Slashdot tossed around an inspired thought last week: how about running Steve Jobs for president? I say go for it — he gives a better speech than the president, and has the reality distortion bit down cold . . .
My Kind of Sound One could say plenty about Chicago — but at this time of year, anyone living there would have to say it past a pair of chapped lips. Weather like today's could make even a Daley consider fleeing for Sarasota.
Three million people can't be wrong, though — and one thing they're emphatically not wrong about is the music scene, one of the most fertile one could hope to find anywhere. Tomorrow's release date looks like a red letter day for the town; two of the biggest names on the scene have new projects coming out.
Zwan, the band pieced together by former Smashing Pumpkins bandmates Billy Corgan and Jimmy Chamberlain, rolls out a debut disc tomorrow called Mary Star of the Sea; and
On Blogorrhea— Hope you enjoyed last week's geyser o' blog as much as I did. I had more fun writing those posts than I have since my first week at the Green[e]house. Expect more of the spontanaiety you saw last week going forward — although I might throw in some dry, exhaustive posts on curling, just for good measure.
Posts should appear on a lighter schedule this week, thanks to work and some personal business — but I plan to keep the site updated every day.
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