historic firsts

i write my representatives on a fairly regular basis to weigh in on the issues that matter to me. i've never gotten a response until this week, when i got back two responses from Sen. Dianne Feinstein. i'd written to her regarding the stupid fucking useless piece of crap smokescreen flag-burning amendment and the bill to extend the fascist totalitarian -- uh, i mean "patriot" act. only i was more polite than that because, you know, she is a senator and all.

naturally, she is in favor of both[1], and has a lot of political blowhard crap to say about it. but hey, at least i know someone read the emails. that's reassuring. of course, it also means They know i'm a dissident now. so if i suddenly disappear you can just write me c/o Gitmo.



[1] when did she start drinking the kool-aid?

gedankenexperiment

two people with no shared language are alone together.

Person A, for cultural reasons irrelevant to this discussion, owes Person B a great debt, which A feels compelled to repay.

B, being unaware of A's culture, doesn't even know that his casual, reflexive action was significant to A.

how does A convey his indebtedness to B? not just gratitude, mind you, but the idea that A feels the need to repay B in some way.

note: blow jobs are off the table.

another huge step for stem-cell research

Scientists send skin cell back to embryo stage

holy crap. i mean, fuck. that is so cool.