Links

Stuff I find around the web that interests or amuses me.

Seattle Solstice

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Odd things about being a (fairly) recent Alaska transplant — this last weekend was summer solstice, and I didn’t even really notice. While I don’t think I’ll ever be moving back to Alaska, the summertimes really are some of what I miss. Seattle’s solstice (sunrise at 5:11am, sunset at 9:11pm) really pales in comparison to Anchorage’s (sunrise at 4:20am, sunset at 11:42pm)!

(Thanks to Lee LeFever for the link to the sunrise and sunset page!)

1-800-ooooops

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Another reason cars and cell phones are a bad mix:

An adulterous Finn pressed all the wrong buttons as he made love in a car — unknowingly prompting his mobile phone to call home just in time for his wife to hear his mistress moan “I love you.”

The wife, doubly enraged after recognizing her own friend’s voice, has been convicted of assault after going to her rival’s flat and striking her in the face and later attacking her husband at home with an axe, though he fended off the blow.

(via Dad)

Supreme Court Tries Sodomy…and likes it!

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Sorry, I couldn’t help the title — especially after Slate magazine’s unfortunate choice of headline (‘Supreme Court tries sodomy’) from the beginning of this trial.

The Supreme Court struck down a ban on gay sex Thursday, ruling that the law was an unconstitutional violation of privacy.

The 6-3 ruling reverses course from a ruling 17 years ago that states could punish homosexuals for what such laws historically called deviant sex.

Laws forbidding homosexual sex, once universal, now are rare. Those on the books are rarely enforced but underpin other kinds of discrimination, lawyers for two Texas men had argued to the court.

The men “are entitled to respect for their private lives,” Justice Anthony M. Kennedy wrote.

“The state cannot demean their existence or control their destiny by making their private sexual conduct a crime,” he said.

[…]

Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas dissented.

What a wonderful ruling heading into this year’s pride weekend!

(via ‘Michael Savage Weiner’, Daily Kos, and Mathew Gross)

IntyOS

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Just something very geek-cool: someone is working on coding — in assembly language, no less — an OS for the old Intellivision gaming platform!

IntyOS is not a port of Contiki and does not have the same desktop environment, nor the same built-in tools. It was written from scratch in CP-1600 assembly language in order to fit exactly to the hardware specificities of the Intellivision. Its main goal is now to see how far it’s possible to go with today’s technologies on such a limited system from the early 80’s…

(via /.)

'Hands-free' isn't accident free

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I’ve got a habit of hanging up on people if I know that they’re calling me from a cell phone in their car. I’ve been grumbled at this on more than a few occasions, especially lately when they can use the excuse that they’re using a ‘hands free’ headset, so they don’t have to have one hand on the phone. I’ll still get off the phone — I’ve never believed that jabbering on a cell phone while driving, with or without a headset, is safe.

Looks like researchers agree with me.

Talking on a mobile phone while driving your car is just as dangerous when using hands-free equipment as when holding the phone in your hand, according to a Swedish study published on Monday.

The National Road Administration (SNRA) tested 48 people in driving simulators, dividing them into two groups — one with and the one without hands-free mobile phone devices.

The drivers in both groups received about 10 phone calls each during 1.5 hours of simulated driving in different conditions. The test revealed almost no difference in reaction time between the two groups.

“It is the distraction of the phone conversation that is the problem,” Ingemar Skogo, the SNRA director general, told Reuters.

So, please — if you’re going to call me — get out of the damn car first.

Jesus with a riding crop and a rainbow flag

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Just on the off chance you hadn’t heard yet, Canada earlier this week decided to recognize gay marriages.

SFGate columnist Mark Morford has a wonderful commentary that is well worth reading all of.

“I don’t really know what this means, what it represents, what it entails, what gay people stand for, where they come from or what they do or why they do it or how they become that way in the first place or even if they’re allowed to vote or fly in airplanes,” announced a very trembly George W. Bush at a hastily arranged press conference in the Super Mega Hetero Gun Room of the White House.

“But I do know we won’t stand for it, and if these gul-dang furriner evildoers think they can get away with these kinds of tender unions and hand holdings and loving smiles and beautiful intimate commitments, well, they haven’t seen America’s righteous firepower!” he shouted, pounding his cute little fist on the podium. “We shall prevail!” Then he fainted.

[…]

Already, America’s perspective has been affected. In a shocking new poll, fully 41 percent of Americans now believe the terrorists responsible for the 9/11 tragedy were, in fact, gay married Canadians.

Similarly, 23 percent are now convinced Saddam Hussein was either “somewhat” or “almost totally” Canadian. Or gay. Or a member of Loverboy.

[…]

Meanwhile, the rest of the largely benevolent and open-hearted and divinely attuned polyamorous universe just laughed and nodded very, very approvingly at Canada and said, well Jesus with a riding crop and a rainbow flag, it’s about goddamn time, you know?

(via Len)

Russian to English?

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Can anyone out there give me a better translation of this page (a Russian-language LiveJournal that links to a post of mine) than Babelfish’s translation?

I’d kind of like to know what the discussion is about, but Babelfish’s translation leaves a bit to be desired.

The wind brings down snow and howls after the window.The transformation of America into the scoop is accompanied by sharp climate variation.So it must be.