Dr. Memnus Lagbane Soultooth the Mad

Depressing symptom of Utah #whoknows: Ever tried buying condoms in a Utah grocery store? Any other state, they're generally stuck innocuously between the tampons and the baby food, giving shoppers all their reproductive options in one place. But around here - at least at Smith's, the one store I'm familiar with - they're brought out to the pharmacy section of the store. Ok, makes sense I guess. But it's worse than that. They're kept in a glass case, generally right under the prescription counter, the kind you generally need to flag down an employee to get into. Once, I saw a sign on the case declaring it to be unlocked, but that doesn't change the fact that you have to single yourself out to get to them - and that scared kids are going to be that much less likely to use them. Worse, if you go in after pharmacy hours, the gate that blocks off the prescription counter (which DOES get locked) blocks off the condom case as well! That emergency midnight condom run might as well be foiled. Ok, yes, you can go across the street to Walgreen's, but there's no self-checkout there. A teenager buying condoms still has to look someone in the eye and, if not verbally so, say "I'm headed off to have sex soon." Combine that with an unhealthy dose of cultural shame about that fact, and you have plenty for LDS Family Services to do.

In today's news, Big Brother is watching Second Life (BBC News). Do they really think that ter'rists are going to set up a Bomb-Making Island? What, exactly, constitutes "suspicious behavior and actions in the virtual world"? What virtual world or MMO actually has the backend available to do that kind of data mining?

I only wish this were in the Onion: U.S. Military makes purchasing decision on value of product instead of lobbyists; Congress vows to find out what went wrong. I sincerly hope that someone in the DoD has the balls to stand up for this decision. Ok, first I hope there was an honest decision process behind it. Since I can't be pissed that it had to be a decision in the first place, I have to start somewhere... right?

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Man convicted for sex with bicycle (BBC News)

The headline would grab anyone's attention. The charge, "sexually aggravated breach of the peace by conducting himself in a disorderly manner and simulating sex," makes it sound like he was in the middle of the street at the time, which would be a different matter entirely. This turns out to be far from the case.

The act itself doesn't faze me. I've learned well that people do some bizarre stuff with their genitals. No, what weirds me out and makes this entirely fucked up is that this "breach of the peace" was performed in the man's own bedroom, behind a locked door. And for it, this gentleman has been placed on a sex offenders registry for three years.

Three years. For fucking his own bicycle, in his own locked bedroom. The hell???

(In the interest of fairness, this was a bedroom at a hostel. There may be rules in place at hostels regarding what is and isn't private space, but somehow I suspect that if the cleaners had walked in on him with another consenting adult, there would have been nothing more than a few blushes and a quickly closed door. Feel free to correct my assumptions here.)

Sex offenders registries help no one, when the innocent bicycle fetishist and the high school senior that happened to turn 18 before his high-school-senior girlfriend are lumped in with the serial stalkers and baby-rapists. That's a big gap, here, but two years from now nobody's going to look at this guy and see a guy caught in an embarrassing, but harmless situation. No, they'll see a sex offender, and treat him accordingly.

Sense of perspective, anyone?

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OMG I want one. (Link via BBC News.) A thirty-story greenhouse in the middle of a city. And they want to make this commercially viable - they claim that by becoming New York City's premium local lettuce supplier, a single farm could turn a $10 million annual profit. And they look cool. Now, if only I could find that $80 million I'd set aside for risky investments...

Also via BBC News, the Vatican has now declared road rage a sin.

Meanwhile, as I was in the apartment office today turning in my NOTICE OF INTENT TO VACATE, there were two old ladies also there complaining to the manager about the repainting project the complex has embarked upon. However, these two were not residents of my humble little Equal Housing Opportunity complex. No, they seemed to live in the high-rise condo building just down the hill, and apparently had some very strong opinions about the "impact" of such a drastic change. Now, feel as I may about the new paint - it's a rather ugly yellow/marigold/orange - I'm firmly of the opinion that, especially in cities, you have no right to complain when your view changes. Cities are living, growing organisms, and if you want them to be static you're defeating the purpose. I noticed it first in Colorado, when some people on the east side of Denver managed to block some construction (downtown, of course, where there are already buildings of similar height) because it would have changed their view of the mountains. Not blocked, as I recall... changed.

And now, back to looking for ways to stay entertained for a few hours. Do they really need to keep the hallway colder than the server room?

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I think Arbuckle is perhaps one of the most strangely beautiful things I've seen in the webcomic world lately. From the mind of the same guy that wrote 1/0, the idea is to redraw Garfield with the same scripts, but without seeing what Garfield is thinking. (The original idea was to draw it in a realistic style, but many of the artists have thrown that part out.) Not only is it a wonderful example of Fair Use, it also makes for a wonderful statement about stagnation in syndicated comics. I mean, seriously, Garfield is going on thirty years old now, to the best of my knowledge without a damn thing happening. In my regular reading I've got at least two entire universes in serious danger of destruction, countless planets have gone through the same risk (some faring better than others), and plenty of jokes that are actually funny.

(I suppose I should get an updated count of my reading. Accounting for erratic schedules, it seems to be somewhere around 150 updates per week.)

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Actual photo gallery headline: Itronix laptop takes a licking. Sadly, there is no actual licking going on in those pictures.

Oh, SoultoothII, I miss you sometimes.

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