The Pagan Science Monitor

I love my bike but fear my government

...which is what Denis (duh-KNEE) likes to say. That's the QDJ.
This is the last Friday of the month, and you know what that means.
A month ago, when Chicago police arrested 7 Critical Mass riders, the Sun-Times wrote wistfully about a "partnership" between cyclists and the police -- a partnership that "fizzled."
At least 2 of the 7 arrestees have already been to court and gotten good outcomes.
(The municipal codes they were accused of violating are here and here.)
Tonight's ride will celebrate CM's 10th anniversary in Chicago, and National Lawyer's Guild Legal Observers will ride along.
Provided nothing "fizzles" tonight, check back for an update.

Monday update: Nothing fizzled. YouTube video here.

Tags: Chicago word, Critical Mass, legal+observers, Legal Observers.

Happy Johannestanz day

June 24, 1374, Aachen: An outbreak of dancing mania grips the town.
The citizens hallucinate and experience convulsions until dropping from exhaustion.
The phenomenon was widespread in Medieval Europe and known before the twentieth century as "St. John's Dance."
(Aside: "St. Vitus's dance" is a neurological disorder related to Huntington's Disease and unrelated to manic dancing.)
(Further aside: The pic is a lithograph of the Danse Macabre, also totally unrelated; it's just that I'm listening to The Faint.)
The Skeptical Inquirer has a good breakdown on dancing mania here. (Three fallacies.)

I Disappear
I disappear / I lost control / My body's moving / All on its own / I watch myself / Walk away / A foreign spirit / Took my place....
--The Faint, Wet From Birth, 2004

(Housekeeping: Starry D. & Severn don't blog here anymore. T.P.S.M. is a one-man show.)

Tags: St. John's Dance, dancing mania, Danse Macabre, Skeptical Inquirer, Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, skepticism, The Faint, Zombies.

Quotation du jour, Mon. 6-11-07

Them that's got shall get
Them that's not shall lose
So the Bible said and it still is news
Mama may have, Papa may have
But God bless the child that's got his own
That's got his own

Quotation du jour, Tue. 6-5-07

"You know, if you really think about it,
whoever invented music was really
kind of a genius."
-- Gene, my father, baritone saxophonist, and master of the unintentional howler.

Quotation du jour

The QDJ is wordless. Today, it is a sound.
It is the refrain from "Isn't She Lovely" (Stevie Wonder, Songs in the Key of Life, 1976), played (with heart) on a little harmonica, by someone I glimpsed in the bustle of pedestrians on the south side of the Federal Plaza here, about 4:45 this afternoon.
The sound pulled me out of the silent world you go to in loud public places and in intense private moments. It pulled me back into the other sounds of the street, back into contact.
(Aside: Listen to Patti Smith, Twelve, 2007.)
There's a lot of grousing on these pages. It's been a grim week in this world. The sound reminded me: Thank you. The I.D. social worker who tells me, "I'm too tired to laugh." The public defender who will be drunk again tonight. The prisoner advocate who will not be (again, tonight, and for fourteen years, three weeks, and two days, right?). The accountant ("don't call me that!") at the AIDS-service non-profit who is supposed to call in a few minutes (perhaps with a proposal to get drunk). Thank you. It's been a hell of a week, all the way around, for a lot of people. But there was a sound that pulled me back into the sunlight. May you all find something, too.

Tags: politics, Stevie Wonder, Patti Smith, Quotation du Jour, QDJ, social work, social workers, public defenders, indigent defense, non-profits, Iraq, Cindy Sheehan, gratitude.

Anti-death penalty lesbian prosecutor for president in 2008

So you work in public-interest law, and you'd rather be thought of as a reader than a TV-watcher, but your secret, guilty pleasure is a crappy police procedural on NBC. So how thrilled are you to learn that Serena Southerlyn is going to be the next president of the United States? Will it make you start taking electoral politics seriously? Get off your bicycle and put your clothes back on? Stop wringing your hands about the war and the war and the war and the war and the torture and the torture and the other torture and the wiretapping and the wiretapping and the wiretapping and the wiretapping and, oh yeah, the war?!
Oh, you answered, "Yes"?
Well, screw you, it's actually this guy who's running for president.

He sure looks presidential, too, huh?


Oh, yeah, don't forget to call the corporate media the COMA.


Tags: politics, election, 2008, presidential race, media, corporate media, COMA, "Law & Order", Elisabeth Rohm, Fred Dalton Thompson, Fred Thompson, LGBT, lesbians, Iraq, Iraq war, torture, eavesdropping, wiretapping, FISA, skepticism, Critical Mass, World Naked Bike Ride, Zombies.

Quotation du jour

pray for a new age
pray for information
i can hope, see
even if i don't believe

Eleanor to Franz Ferdinand: "Do not tell me what to do with my boots"

Attention, CTA Blue Line riders. If you regularly ride the Blue Line between Grand and Damen, between midnight and 5 a.m., you have noticed the switch. During normal daylight and evening hours, the switch is set to "very irritating, but still tolerable." During vampire hours, the switch is flipped to "kill me now."
Here is a tip. Regardless of the position of the switch, you can flip your experience of the ride into a different mode altogether. Here's how: Close your eyes and imagine the El is a theme-park ride. The workers have traded their hard hats for pirate outfits. You don't have to pretend they're shouting, "Arrrrr!" because they do that anyway. So, enjoy.

Tags: Chicago, Chicago word, Franz Ferdinand, CTA, punk, pirates, Johnny Depp.

WWJD?!??!

Q: When was Julio's dialysis?
A: Yesterday, from 6 to 8:30 p.m.
Q: Why was Jacquetta drunk?
A: Public defenders are all drunks.
Q: Was Willie just drooling?
A: Yeah, but you can kinda see why. That dude was extremely good looking.
Q: Would Jesus discriminate?
A: Go here and you decide.

Would Walrus jilt Dumbo? Wait! We'll jump down! Waffles with jam?! Du-u-u-u-de! Walk with Jay-Z, DMX. Where will Jorge defecate? Wilmette, Winnetka junipers desiccated! What we justifiably dread. Wasp wings jitter delicately. Wiretap whoever joins dissent. Wicked Wisdom jams dangerously. Whistle while julianne'ing datils. Waste water just drips. Wolf wobbly Jell-O down. Wendy's whispering, Justin's dozing. Write windy, jealous diaries. Winter weather jems dazzle. Wild women jazzed Detroit! We were joyful, dolorous. White webs jettisoning dew. Wax, wane, journeying disk. Watch while Junior dives. Wanted: wacky jingle downloads. Whirling wheels' jig's done. Wet whiskers' jasmine delicacy. With whiskey, just drink! Wombat, wolf, jaguar, doe. Wear wigs jauntily, dearie! Without watchers, justice dies.

What T.P.S.M. will not be doing tomorrow night

Because we are utterly lame, and never get organized in time to have fun, and also because 1-third of "we" doesn't even really live around here anymore, and the other third is nesting. I feel abandoned.
The Arcade Fire show at the (gorgeous) Chicago Theatre has been sold out for however long, but I kept thinking somebody would come up with a couple extra tickets.
Hiho.