On this day....

• 1149 - Raymond of Antioch is defeated and killed at the Battle of Inab by Nur ad-Din.
• 1194 - Sverre is crowned King of Norway.
• 1534 - Jacques Cartier makes the European discovery of Prince Edward Island.
• 1613 - The Globe Theatre in London, England burns to the ground.
• 1888 - First (known) recording of classical music made, Handel's Israel in Egypt on wax cylinder.
• 1895 - Doukhobors burn their weapons as a protest against conscription by the Tsarist Russian government.
• 1927 - First test of Wallace Turnbull's Controllable pitch propeller.
• 1956 - The Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956 is signed, officially creating the United States Interstate Highway System.
• 1964 - Rama Bhalla was born
  
• 1972 - The U.S. Supreme Court rules the death penalty could constitute "cruel and unusual punishment".
• 1974 - Isabel Perón is sworn in as the first female President of Argentina. Her husband President Juan Peron had delegated responsibility due to weak health and died two days later.
• 1997 - Mike Tyson bites off a piece of his opponent Evander Holyfield's ear during a boxing match
• 2003 - Thirteen are killed in a porch collapse in Chicago.
• 2006 - Hamdan v. Rumsfeld: The U.S. Supreme Court rules that President George W. Bush's plan to try Guantanamo Bay detainees in military tribunals violates U.S. and international law.
• 2007 - iPhone was released.

Happy Birthday Mrs. Bim!

I have a dream that I will look upon this fair land one day and see conservatives who actually conserve

It depresses me that this country's political dialogue and power has been high-jacked by conservatives who don't conserve.

If they did, then maybe they would champion for clean water and clean air ("Air as clean as the Founding Fathers breathed!"), or stop an escalating utterly corrupt and illegal war that has consumed over $400 billion of our tax dollars ("War is fiscally irresponsible!"), or prevent the sprawl that is chewing up our forests, open space and agricultural lands ("Cornfields: Tax relief you can eat for breakfast!").


Sigh... one can only dream. And wait for conservatives to look at rising body counts and rising tides from melting ice caps washing over Orange County beaches and realize that Love is all you need.

We've become part of the 74 percent

I have to admit that I suffer from some professional guilt over this.

But we moved into the new house last weekend.

So, here we are with our own garage, driveway, back yard, 4 floors on which to live, play and store our flesh bags and our stuff. This does not appear to be an efficient way to use scarce land, energy, and material resources.

But I couldn't be happier. The kids can trot through a backyard avenue (complete with pygmy picket fence gates) to friends on both sides and the new neighbors are feeding us and watching the young'uns.

I think we found a keeper.

It's an 'Merican 4-square, looking sorta kinda like this:

Uh-oh. Storm clouds on the horizon. Now they tell us. Oh lordy, lordy. Can we take it back to the store for a refund?

Mac Rebennack and transit

Doctor John, in asserting his bona fides in his song "Qualified", sings:

"Your Cadillac ain't no hipper than my busstop."

Amen, brother.

Surely, this makes me surly

This alternative energy vehicle craze has gone just a little too far.

Enough, I say!

No more sticker envy

It's about that time.

I've not been one to mark up my skin for eternity with tatoos or settle on a certain attitude, style of dress, or brand of car, shoes, sports team, etc. to uniquely and permanently identify myself.

Bumper stickers are like that for me. It's a commitment thing. The last time I had a sticker that I wanted to tag my car with, it said "Earth girls are easy" and it was circa 1990. But I didn't have a car that I thought would outlast the life of the sticker, so I didn't do it.

Last summer a "Rhodes for Sheriff" sticker decorated my bumper. But that was a joke and the car mostly sat idle in a Maryland townhouse complex parking lot until I yanked it off. (Ya see, Mr. Rhodes was a friend and I wanted to help out an Ole Blue Dog. But he lost.)

But, as I was saying, I do think it's time for a sticker. I bought it on the Mall in DC awhile back and thought I would give it to my father who attended the '72 Inaugral and who may or may not have misgivings about the existing President:

"I never thought I would miss Nixon."

That about says it all about the state of our current Administration.

I'll know it when I hear it

As vile as he was, and still called on periodically to insert his villiany when the occasion calls for it, Ed Meese got it partially right when he called "music the new pornography."

By partially right I mean that reading about music is the new pornography. While nu laddies love Maxim and Blender, I'm content with my kleenex favorites Mojo and The Big Takeover.

UPDATE: OK, I know. It was Jimmy Swaggert who actually bespoke the pornography quote. But it's so much more fun to kick around a rogue from Reagan's posse.

From time to time, the Emporium likes to bring its readers the best in today's art and culture.

As John Gorka once said, Ohio is like New Jersey, only more so.

As evidenced here.

Maxim of the Day:

Commuting, like golf, is a game of inches.