Evil Horrors only Charles Stross Would Appreciate!

I might be a mad scientist, I might even be a megalomaniac, but this, this, is so evil even I wouldn't do it.

Remember, it's not Roe v. Wade that upsets them. It's Griswold v. Connecticut

Rep. Ryan 'booted' from "Democrats For Life Of America" For Supporting Contraception.

Ryan, it seems, signed on to the "Preventing Unintended Pregnancies, Reducing the Need for Abortion and Supporting Parents Act," an Obama-backed bill that would do what it says it does by providing better access to contraception for low-income Americans, as well as comprehensive teen pregnancy prevention sex education. Those will reduce the number of abortions. But "Democrats for Life" apparently don't see it that way. Contraception is still a problem for them. And they have told their members not to vote for this bill.

I have to point again to Red Sex, Blue Sex: these people know that their actions will result in more, not fewer, teenage mothers. They Don't Care.

Friends sometimes just bring you a gift...

Box fans!

Real friends bring you two perfectly good box fans the day before the first major heatwave of summer is forecast to break.

The lovely kaelisinger and her equally lovely husband were cleaning out her mother's old garage, found a few box fans gathering dust, and immediately turned around and offered them to us. They have been lifesavers. Our one ancient fan has fallen over one too many times; pieces are missing from the protective grill, it wobbles when it's running, it doesn't stand quite square, and pieces of rag are shoved into strategic spots on the grill to keep it from rattling. We only leave it on the floor now, propped up by the sliding glass door to the back yard, and try not to turn it all the way up.

It took me only an hour, a screwdriver, a dustrag, a can of air, and a bottle of Mrs. Meyer's cleaning spray, to get all of the dust bunnies out of the mechanism and to get the blades clean, and the two fans have been running perfectly at full speed for several days now. Given that the weather topped 90F yesterday (I know, some of you live in Texas, and Australia, and the open mouths of live volcanoes; for Seattle, that's hot, okay?), those fans, and their givers, have saved lives.

Oh, dear, Meg Ryan, yes, Yes, YES!!!!

The schedule of command, the schedule of creation:

Most powerful people are on the manager's schedule. It's the schedule of command. … [Makers] generally prefer to use time in units of half a day at least. You can't write or program well in units of an hour. That's barely enough time to get started.

When you're operating on the maker's schedule, meetings are a disaster. A single meeting can blow a whole afternoon, by breaking it into two pieces each too small to do anything hard in.