OLD FLOG™

Because you've bothered to come sniffing in this direction, not only have you discovered that it no longer looks so old, but you also get to see this:

ENJOY.

You'll adjust.

As of 5 PM Saturday, February 28, 2004, the Mouse Poll and the FLOG Poll! are closed to voting, I just decided. Let's take a look at the results.

First, from both polls I learned the extent of my readership. It turns out my 30-40 hits per day, which I was sadly proud of, all come from the same 7 readers. Hi, guys. Is there anyone I haven't met?

Okay:

Mouse Poll
With 57% of the vote, Danger Mouse won this one going away. Which I'm fairly happy about. It's good to know there are others out there who remember that Steve Irwin did not introduce "crikey" into the lexicon. I believe I will go have a glass of Penfold's in celebration.

The nearest competition was a three-way tie that, interestingly, featured the strongest and the meekest mice around, as well as one mouse who may not exist. Like those subatomic particles that we only know about from watching other particles respond to them, the only evidence for the mouse behind my sofa is that my cat goes back there every day, without fail. It's the sole reason she gets out of bed.

Danger Mouse: 57%
Modest Mouse: 14%
Mighty Mouse (with cape): 14%
The mouse behind my sofa: 14%

No one else (DJ Dangermouse, Mighty Mouse (with bong), Mickey Mouse, Maus, Mickey Kaus) got a vote.


FLOG Poll!
This one was a farce of democracy. I'm jumping the Blogger ship regardless of what you think. Fortunately, The FLOG of the future triumphed, 60% to 40%, over The one you're looking at. This will be my last post at this FLOG™. Okay, that's a lie.

FLOG Poll!
Which freakin' FLOG?	The one you're looking at. The FLOG of the future . . . click here
	Current Results

Mouse Poll

Which freakin' mouse? Danger Mouse DJ Danger Mouse Modest Mouse Mighty Mouse (with cape) Mighty Mouse (with bong) Mickey Mouse Maus Mickey Kaus The mouse behind my sofa Current Results

The Portland Communique reports that lawyers for Multnomah County are researching whether the County might be allowed to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples. At issue is this Oregon Statute:

106.010 Marriage as civil contract; age of parties.
Marriage is a civil contract entered into in person by males at least 17 years of age and females at least 17 years of age, who are otherwise capable, and solemnized in accordance with ORS 106.150.

Apparently the rub is that the statute speaks of "males" and "females," and a broad reading of the statute thereby might allow "males" or "females" to marry each other, as long as one pretends to be the "husband" and the other the "wife" pursuant to ORS 106.150.

I don't buy that. The statute reads "males . . . and females." Were that an "and/or," the law would easily allow males to marry males and so on. But it's just an "and", which binds the "males" to the "females" and defies any alternative construction. This question of statutory interpretation is best settled by Frank Sinatra: when a clause has an "and," you can't have one without the other.

However, what everyone is overlooking, so far, is that the statute easily could be construed to permit any number of "males" to marry any number of "females" and have a great big house o' swingin' fun. If the bible-thumpers are scared now, just they wait!

All of which just goes to show you how hard it is to write a good law. Constitutional amendments are even harder.

UPDATE: Updated. I never say what I mean the first time around. Lousy blogging.

Here, precisely because nobody asked (or gave permission, for that matter), is a review of the film Bandits submitted to FLOG™ by correspondent Ruff:

Bandits
by Olly Ruff

Barry Levinson's Bandits is a valuable film, insofar as it violates a bond of trust that one can easily take for granted when paying to watch things. Inexplicably, surreally bad in every respect - poorly edited, stupidly plotted, woefully acted and apparently scored at random by sadists - it succeeds only on the most basic of levels. The focus, for instance, is reliably OK, and the second unit crew never accidentally films itself in a mirror. Everything else that can go wrong, does.

Wacky convicts Bruce Willis and Billy Bob Thornton escape an Oregon prison by climbing into an unguarded cement truck in the middle of the yard and driving it away, then set off down the coast, blithely robbing banks as they go, in hopes of reaching Mexico with enough money to open a nightclub. En route, they acquire Cate Blanchett's shrill, one-dimensional unhappy housewife, and flounder around in a half-hearted menage a trois for the nine-hour remainder of the movie.

At the mercy of an authentically dreadful script, Thornton and Blanchett - both usually excellent - drown here in unfunny behavioral tics, while Willis tries to keep his head down and not smirk. Many scenes play as though improvised, particularly the lip-gnawingly awful spectacle of Willis and Blanchett bonding over the lyrics to "Total Eclipse of the Heart." And the worst conceits, the ones that reduce the entire theater to helpless giggles, are drawn out to the most excruciating length. By the time a sulky Willis forces Thornton to dance with Blanchett, while Thornton, believing himself to have a brain tumor, loses the use of the right side of his body for no very good reason, it's hard not to feel a little bad on their account.

But as the film accelerates downhill, your sympathy wanes. Painful when it tries to be funny, shallow when it tries to be deep, and getting worse by increments all the way into its interminable final reel, Bandits is either a spectacular human error or a profound declaration of contempt for its audience. The DVD will be worth renting in order to hear the commentary tracks and find out which.

I think I just found some of the best entertainment the web has to offer. Thanks, Blog. This is freakin' sweet. People all over the world, painfully short on grammar and punctuation skills but hilariously long on the desire to learn How to Be a Dirty Hippy. The best part of the site is "Hippy Havens," where various "hippy hot spots" are reviewed. Let's pick back up with our German friend "HaschischFixer" and his anguished questing:

I try everything to reach that [being a real hippy] but it''''s impossible where I live. I travelled a lot in Asia and so I got contact to real comunities. It was wonderfull. But i had to leave soon to get back in the daily boring live at home. When I finished school I want to take action and leave the country to live together with people of my attitude. Can anybody give some advice? Perhaps there are some interesting people in Germany or Europe?
If not, I guess I will try to find the real luck on earth in asia forever...!
You know, smoking weed in Germany isn''t a problem at all, like I had to realize when I visited the states. The states can be so fucked up....
but only smoking weed isn''t the only thing. Although i live very close to holland I''ve never been there so far. Do you can find there native styles of living?

Heh. I'm almost speechless. Now don't go thinking I'm being unfair to HaschischFixer because he's German; truth is he's got a better command of English than many of the Americans at hippy.com. For instance, check this review of Bellingham, WA:

hey bellingham is a cool town and vary beutiful but it gets borin after a wile ...... trust me i live here ....well u can score any drugs u wont here but its a pritty cool place to visite

--"anomuness"

Hippies get bored? I did not know that.

The best part of the site for me is the section on Eugene, Oregon, the source of my semi-Cartman-esque feelings on the subject of hippies. Apparently debate rages among the hippies about whether or not Eugene is still, uhm, "chill". Here are some samples:

...Looks like Corporate America is taking over. Ugly strip malls on W. 11th going out of town what used to be nice green fields (and a drive-in theatre, which is long history). City limits are now stretched westward to Green Hill Rd., which used to be a road of farms, is now a road with ugly new housing developments. Two Wal-Marts have came to town, as well as a Target ...

... On the plus side, I was rather amazed at all the environmental, leftist, and feminist bumperstickers I seen on the backs of cars in Eugene...

--"Ben"

Well, that's a relief.

yep its now beat here just snobs tweek and schwill bums. A lot of fake people and kesey is dead. Lets not even get started on the state of the fair. Saturday market is still cool but probly not for long. Downtown is filled with sketch balls and drain bows.

--"fragles"

What is a sketch ball? What is a drain bow? There's a downtown?

...the whole area has been spoiled to a certain extent by events that have led to police walking around harrasing people in riot gear.... city officials spending money on fencing in tree sitters when they can barely keep their schools open...and undercover cops at the fair.

--"crazyquilt"

Inevitably, anytime this level of negativity piles up near hippies, somebody has to chime in with this:

...[A]fter reading the negative reviews posted here, it seems no wonder that there is a bad vibe going around. Just remember you reap what you sow. Throwing out negative vibes in response to other bad vibes, just continues the cycle. Self-fulfilling prophesies are everywhere and each of us is responsible for our own experience. Eugene is no different than anywhere else, a few enlightened citizens try to hold back the Wal-mart tide.

--"eugenius"

It's true, man, there are some pretty bad vibes going around. My brother Mike is fond of telling of the time he witnessed a fight break out in a Saturday Market drum circle, presumably over who was mellower. But can you blame them, man, when they have to put up with this?

...[A] town full of people who are pissed off that I would assume they would be open minded and caring and lots off, Bush Inc. supporting, 4x4 driving, flag waving close minded assholes.

--"disappointed in eugene"

Oh dear, I think he's talking about me. I'm sorry I offended his open mind.

All of this is stunning to me. You see, I hate Eugene. It is a back-asswards poorly-run little podunk mess, however scenic and comfortable it may be. Most everyone has always known this, even if we don't always talk about it. Most everyone, that is, except the hippies. Now even they aren't so sure.

Well, I will tell you this: the day even the hippies give up on Eugene, it will roll itself up and disappear into the ground, leaving the University of Oregon standing alone amidst open and barren wheat fields. Which I don't really find objectionable.

Rasheed Wallace bounces to the Pistons.

Yesterday, at a local Italian restaurant, I ate several ounces of a thing called "Pacific Northwest Free-Range Veal." And I am wondering still, what in blazes is free-range veal? If anyone knows, please help me out, because right now all I can imagine is a 2-feet by 4-feet cattle ranch.

Was it good? You're goddamn right it was good. Today, I ate the leftovers in front of a bunch of vegans. Even better.

I've been quiet since last week, recuperating from the spate of ferret law and constitutional law I went through for a while there. I've lately been reflecting on my excellent Christmas Break, a part of which you are of course familiar with from ¡Vegas! The rest of it is best summed up by this:





That pic was actually taken by my brother Mike, just before he fell into sweet dreams while watching football a couple days after Christmas. Now he's stuck in limbo at Fort Benning, awaiting his duty orders for the good old Army of One.

While Mike washes linens in Georgia and waits for his plane to come in, another fine, creative young man of my acquaintance is serving his time in that most infamous of duty stations, Iraq. And I urge you, if you haven't already, to peruse Bryan Roberts' "blog," e-rocky-confidential. I placed it among my links a while back without comment, other than labeling it a "blog with meaningful content," as opposed to ones like yours truly. But if you haven't been there yet, please do go. Bryan is a keen and sensitive writer (Commentator alum, naturally), and his latest posts put you right in his shoes as he joins a convoy from Kuwait into Baghdad. It's riveting and vital stuff.

And while I'm on the subject of different conceptions of marriage, I think Phooeyhoo's equation is rather instructive about the qualities that all good marriages, straight or gay, ought to share.

I have a lot of things to say right now over at the Oregon Commentator blog, if you're headed that way.

CORRECTION
Apparently I didn't read Section 2118 close enough. Probably this is because it was so close to being 2112 and I kind of had a little Rush bliss-out. ("We are the priests/of the Temples/of Syrinx!")

Okay, that's not true and anyone who construes it to mean I still love Rush is on notice of suit for defamation.

Anyway, I missed this bit in the current version of Section 2118: The "Order Carnivora (carnivores)" is illegal to possess with the obvious exceptions of "domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) and domestic cats (Felis catus). " The Carnivora order includes the Mustelidae family (that of the ferret), which the statute describes as "undesirable and a menace to native wildlife, the agricultural interests of the state, or to the public health or safety."

Take that, Ferret Lobby!

FLOG™ regrets this error. Ferrets are still banned by statute in California, and not merely by administrative regulation.


THIS IS NOT A 14TH AMENDMENT THING, MAN
I have discovered a case, Wright v. Fish and Game Comission, in which a leader of the Ferret Lobby (former president of Ferrets Anonymous, no less) sued the Fish and Game Commission, claiming that the rules against possession of ferrets violated his right to equal protection of the law under the California Constitution. Fortunately, this claim was shat on. As the California Court of Appeals said, "The Constitution simply does not guarantee owners of ferrets regulatory status precisely equal to the status of owners of other animals." Amen.

I just noticed how WRONG! that excerpt from the Ferret Lobby was. In pertinent part:

The Catholic Church ruled by decree in Gallileo's [sic] day that the earth revolved around the sun...

And there I should have included a [sic]. Dear, even nihilists generally acknowledge that the earth does revolve around the sun. The Church decreed that the opposite was true. Stick to ferrets.

If you, dear reader, have felt I've been using too much bold and italics, not to mention CAPS, here on FLOG™ it's because I frankly consider my own damned site HARD TO READ.

Do you feel the same way? Any suggestions on a redesign? What if I went for dark text on a light background like everybody else? Please suggest stuff.

Yesterday a correspondent asked me to harness my awesome research powers to look up potential criminal penalties--for trespassing, vandalism, resisting arrest, and assault and battery on a police officer--within the state of California. As I poked around in the California statutes, the 45 times I've seen The Big Lebowski led me to wonder--is possession of an amphibious rodent, you know, for domestic, uh, within the city...is that really illegal?

I would not rest until I knew.

Before proceeding, I postulated that the "nice marmot" in TBL was a ferret. If anyone disagrees, please FLOGback™. With that, I waded into the depths of the California Fish & Game Code.

First, the basics. According to Cal. Stat. s. 656,

"animals wild by nature are the subjects of ownership, while living, only when on the land of the person claiming them, or when tamed, or taken and held in possession, or disabled and immediately pursued."

No help there; all that says is that you can only claim to own a wild animal if it's on your property or in your hand. Nothing about whether you can own a ferret specifically.

Then I spotted a statute on "fur bearing mammals," Fish & Game Code s. 4000. Do ferrets bear fur? Let's see:

"The following are fur-bearing mammals: pine marten, fisher, wolverine, mink, river otter, gray fox, cross fox, silver fox, red fox, kit fox, raccoon, beaver, badger, and muskrat."

Nope, no ferrets there. But wolverines??? I'd kill for a wolverine coat! I'd kill 6 or 7 wolverines for a wolverine coat!!!

Still no luck, though. Getting frustrated, I typed in a broad search for the word "ferret." Mostly what came up were court cases referring to "ferreting out" stuff. But then I hit paydirt:Fish & Game Code s. 2118. Importation, transportation, possession and release of specified wild animals. And it mentioned ferrets! So they were illegal, right?

No, at least not by statute. From the time the California Department of Fish & Game was created in 1933, until 1961, this law forbid the importation or transport of the ferret and two of its brothers into California: "weasel, Mustela nivalis; stoat, Mustela erminea; ferret, Mustela furio." And in 1961 Section 2118 was amended to further ban possession of "all species" of the "Family Mustelidae (weasels, ferrets)." (Possession of squirrels, vampire bats, and flying foxes was also banned.)

The statutory ban on ferret possession held sway, however, only until 1974, when the mustelidae family was dropped from Section 2118. (That same year, elephants were finally added to the list.)

However, the Department of Fish and Game has continued to hold ferret possession illegal through its own, nonstatutory regulations. Specifically, California Administrative Code title 14, section 671 provides:

"(a) It shall be unlawful to import, transport, or possess alive animals restricted in subsection (c) …

(c) Restricted species include…

(K) Order Carnivora -Raccoons, Ringtailed Cats, Kinkajous, Coatis, Cacomistles, Weasels, FERRETS, Skunks, Polecats, Stoats, Mongoose, Civets, Wolves, Foxes, Coyotes, Lions, Tigers, Ocelots, Bobcats, Servals, Leopards, Jaguars, Cheetahs, Bears, etc."

Alright, so we've established it--possession of amphibious rodents, you know, for domestic, uh, within the city...that ain't legal either.





And here's where things get really funny. Introducing the Ferret Lobby. A great many Californians are really bent out of shape by the whole thing. See here and here.

Here, from the later site, is a reaction to the unfavorable result of a recent Fish and Game Commission Hearing on Ferret Legalization:

"The Catholic Church ruled by decree in Gallileo's [sic] day that the earth revolved around the sun. Just as that decree didn't make the heavens suddenly change course, [the Commission's] absurd attempt to disguise the domestication issue with the lie that "the definition of 'domesticated' should be decided by 'legislative statue,' [sic] " doesn't disguise the fact that the domesticated ferret is in a wildlife statue [sic] where it simply does not belong!"

You can see they feel pretty strongly about this.

Therefore, this should come as no surprise:

"There could be hope yet for ferrets, banned as pets in California for 70 years on fears they might weasel their way into the wild and ravage populations of ground-dwelling birds.

Scofflaw ferret owners believe that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who shared the big screen with a ferret in "Kindergarten Cop," would sign legislation legalizing the creatures.

I don't remember a ferret in Kindergarten Cop. Is that why they filmed it in Oregon?

Unfortunately for the Ferret Lobby, according to the article, "Schwarzenegger has been busy with other priorities..." Really? Like what?

Still, the Ferret Lobby, and its weasels in Sacramento, hold out hope for bringing their new governor around:

"He's worked with ferrets in 'Kindergarten Cop,"' [State Senator Dede] Alpert said of Schwarzenegger, "so he knows they're not the man-eating creatures that Fish and Game makes them out to be."

Charles Krauthammer, George Will, and now Bill O'Reilly have begun to turn on Bush.

If I'm jumping the gun here, I'm sure AP will let me know, but...who out there still does love this President?

Mr. Prophet, your thoughts? Have the Republicans become adorable yet?

I think. Don't look to me for the details. (Look here.)

Seriously, though, I'd just like to note that, even before the Sheed/Sharif scoop, the Blazers had really been going out of their way to make me look like an ass for writing their eulogy three weeks ago. Since that post, they've gone 8-2. Granted, that 8-2 also began after Cheek's sob-fest. But I'll take the credit for talking shit like a man, while Mo Cheeks was off in the locker room bawling like a little girl.

I keed, I keed. Go Blazers: you're not dead yet.

Explanation? You don't need an explanation. Just hurry over to wazeth while the eggs are still hot. (Knit eggs, that is.)

WTF?
According to my web counter, which I monitor quite jealously (Hi, Belgium!), I have a frequent visitor from some organization known as The Advisory Board Company.

Could this person please contact me and explain what an advisory board company does? Thank you.


THE TRUTH WILL SET YOU FREE
By the way, everything makes sense now.


THIS MAN WILL SET YOU FREE, WITH SCIENCE!
Also, in Who is this man? news, I now know who that man is. No, he's not the guy with the mutant cabbage patch kid from Total Recall. He's Mark Pauline, founder of Survival Research Laboratories,

an organization of creative technicians dedicated to re-directing the techniques, tools, and tenets of industry, science, and the military away from their typical manifestations in practicality, product or warfare.

They apparently pursue this mission by building incredibly cool and dangerous machines -- they don't skimp on the fire -- just for the freakin' hell of it.

So dedicated is Mr. Pauline to pushing humanity forward -- through such efforts as the Flame Hurricane -- that he "blew his hand off while working with a rocket engine and then had a toe or toes (?) grafted onto his stump so that he could regain some sembalance of a hand," according to my brother Barry.

Yes, Barry, I really SHOULD have known about this guy already. He is a hero to us all.

That settled, there's still the much larger matter of...

Something tells me this isn't actually from Yahoo!...

Date: Sat, 07 Feb 2004 13:24:25 -0500
To: "D" (d_p_atkinson@yahoo.com)
From: "_Yahoo!_" (translate@freeproblem.com)
Subject: Your` Yahoo* _account_ (d_p_atkinson@yahoo.com)

DE@R Yahoo! Users,

_This_ e-ma!l INF0RM You that your Yahoo` id (d_p_atkinson@yahoo.com)
_will_ be blocked _after_ 14 _days_ (@S after autoomateed reegisttration) if You will_
not signup _on_ Yahoo* White List (T0 s!gnup - _click_ Here: http://D.yahoo.com/)

This_is done - beecause we` update now` YAH0O! _not_ autoomateed reegistered IDs.

c67lT2I6E

I think it would be kind of wacky, some day, to go to a cemetery and stand in the road next to my truck, watching a random funeral from a distance, like bad guys do in the movies. But it might also be rude.

Among the many perks of being a law student -- free printing & test booklets ("green books"); the knowledge that somewhere in the building, at all times, there is (1) a judge of some sort, and (2) free pizza; frequent visitations from The Frohn -- probably the best is the free subscriptions to Lexis/Nexis and Westlaw. These are online legal publishing services that provide free access to students so that we get hooked and rack up thousands of dollars in usage fees out in the real world. With them, I can look up every court case worth knowing about, as well as statutes and everything else.

Anyway, this evening, when I should have been studying (yes, on Friday. Bugger off.), I harnessed the awesome research power of Westlaw to search for dirty words in court cases. When you search for a word, up pops a brief excerpt from each case it appears in, to provide some context. But not much context. Just enough to make you curious. Curious enough to write a short story. Check it out:

Boogers

1. State v. Mathis,
2004 WL 193062, Tenn.Crim.App., Jan 30, 2004

...to his death. The only thing that he did was to sit up in his chair, confront two (2) woolly boogers coming out of the night. * * * You know, there's a part of me that wishes he...

2. Cheek v. State,
119 S.W.3d 475, Tex.App.-El Paso, Oct 30, 2003

...as 8,9,4,5,7,8) when the questions did not call for a numerical answer. Britiny stated that she saw blood and red "boogers" come out of Alixandra's nose. When asked what else she saw when she saw the boogers, she responded, "Dinosaur." ...

3. Adams v. State,
172 Tex.Crim. 130, 354 S.W.2d 147, Tex.Crim.App., Nov 29, 1961

...awful nervous and I says wake up Lona, there's something sure enough around. She always called me to hunt the boogers * * *.' The witness then related: 'Somebody come up to the window. We couldn't see how many it was, or whether there...

Poop

Unfortunately, "poop" mostly turned up sex abuse cases, and trust me, you don't want to know. Happiness notwithstanding, sexual abuse really doesn't make for the ha-ha. However, there were a few "clean" cases:

1. In re Anderson,
2003 WL 22718864, 2003-Ohio-6154, Ohio App. 4 Dist., Nov 12, 2003

...One time Donald told VanMeter that "he'd rather shovel horse poop than visit with" appellant. VanMeter explained that both children interact well with their foster families and that Anna Marie's relationship...

2. Williamson v. State,
839 So.2d 921, 28 Fla. L. Weekly D786, Fla.App. 2 Dist., Mar 19, 2003

...floor. The rest of the coins became lodged in Williamson's swim trunks causing it to look as if he had "poop" in his pants...

3. Mouton v. State,
101 S.W.3d 686, Tex.App.-Texarkana, Mar 07, 2003

...also noticed Mouton had a large bulge near his right front pocket. During the stop, Mouton expressed a need to "poop," which he did in a nearby field. During Mouton's dalliance in the field, Ashby saw Mouton fiddling with something in front of him. Fearing Mouton had a weapon...

4. Consumer Justice Center v. Natural Balance, Inc.,
2002 WL 827404, Nonpublished/Noncitable, (Cal. Rules of Court, Rules 976, 977), , Cal.App. 4 Dist., May 01, 2002

...the intestines. The captured fats are theoretically eliminated from the body through the natural process, or as CJC puts it, "poop[ed] out." The defendants brought a motion to dismiss the complaint under section 425.16, [FN3] which the trial court denied....

5. New York Stock Exchange, Inc. v. Gahary,
196 F.Supp.2d 401, S.D.N.Y., Apr 08, 2002

...stan cottrell got a little close to that area recently and developed testicular cancer hence the discovery of olsen's radioactive poop chute. I know it sounds weird, but it's right up Bico's alley, wouldn't you agree? Gahary's tirades were even, on...

Turd

1. In re Lantronix, Inc.,
2003 WL 23198818, C.D.Cal., Dec 31, 2003

...e-mails written by CSFB analysts several months after the IPO which characterized Lantronix's stock as a "piece of crap," a "turd," an "embarrassment," and as a deal that "was jammed down by [CSFB's] LA bankers." Id., ¶ 34. The e-mails also...

...the pricing statement are the e-mails from CSFB employees referring to Lantronix's stock as a "piece of crap," a "turd," an "embarrassment," as a deal that "was jammed down by [CSFB's] LA bankers" and that CSFB's bankers "hyped this deal...

2. Smith ex rel. Smith v. Mount Pleasant Public Schools,
285 F.Supp.2d 987, 182 Ed. Law Rep. 520, E.D.Mich., Sep 30, 2003

...during lunch in school cafeteria did not violate First Amendment, under the circumstances; in addition to being critical of school's "turd-licking" tardiness policy that was purportedly made by Nazi and supported by "teacher gestapos," statements speculating as to school principal's...

...these teachers as "teacher gestapos [sic ]." The plaintiff devised a crude abbreviation for the tardy policy, calling it "turd. lic.," which he also designated as "turd licking." Aside from criticizing the tardy policy, the commentary discussed the belief that...

3. People v. Goldstein,
196 Misc.2d 741, 763 N.Y.S.2d 390, 2003 N.Y. Slip Op. 23692, N.Y.Sup.App.Term, Jul 17, 2003

...a slimy piece of s--t"; and "I will do everything I can to help the public know what a loathsome turd you are. I'm only beginning. You are finished as a secretary. You are finished as employable." For this reason alone,...

4. State v. Bikrev,
2003 WL 21458683, Tenn.Crim.App., Jun 24, 2003

...where he lived. He stated that she also told him, "The police were out here. They ... couldn't find a turd in an outhouse. They didn't find your sh--t. You never will either." Maislin testified that the Defendant then told his...

Celine Dion

Now this turned up something really interesting. Read:

1. Salazar v. State,
90 S.W.3d 330, Tex.Crim.App., Nov 27, 2002

...accompanies the entire seventeen-minute video and includes such selections as "Storms in Africa" and "River" by Enya, and concludes with Celine Dion singing, "My Heart Will Go On," from the movie Titanic. Almost half of the approximately 140 photographs depict the victim's...

...test. Appellant properly objected under Rules 401 and 403. [FN27] The video itself was not admissible and the Enya and Celine Dion background music greatly amplifies the prejudicial effect of the original error. FN27. Although appellant's objection was made after the video...

Want to know more?

Are you sure?

Okay:

It was a drug murder case involving a special ed student. (I had the facts up here but decided they were too long and grisly for a family blog. Don't like it, you can FLOGback™.)

At the sentencing hearing, the state was allowed to play a video of the victim's life, set to the emotive stylings of Enya and Celine Dion as detailed below.

On appeal, the court ruled that this was evidence would prejudice the jury; its prejudicial effect amplified by Celine Dion's "My Heart Will Go On."

So now you know: the use of Celine Dion evidence in a criminal trial is appealable error. If your lawyer tries it, find a new one. Here's an excerpt from the case:

Next, Jonathon's father, Jeffrey Bishop, testified. He said that he lived with Jonathon until his son was fourteen; then he and Jonathon's mother divorced. He stated that he had spent several days compiling old photographs of Jonathon to make a video to show at his son's memorial service. The State then offered that video, State's Exhibit 118, into evidence.

Appellant's attorney objected: "Judge, we have never seen this exhibit before, so we would ask just to be permitted to examine it so we can make any objections we have, I have no idea what's on this exhibit." The judge immediately responded: "Overruled, It's admitted." The State then played the seventeen-minute videotape.

State's Exhibit 118 is included in the appellate record and we have viewed it. This video is an extraordinarily moving tribute to Jonathon Bishop's life. It consists of approximately 140 still photographs, arranged in a chronological montage. Music accompanies the entire seventeen-minute video and includes such selections as "Storms in Africa" and "River" by Enya, and concludes with Celine Dion singing, "My Heart Will Go On," from the movie Titanic.

Salazar v. State, 90 S.W.3d 330, 332-33 (Tex.Crim.App., 2002).

I'm not sure how to end this post, so how about this:

I'm not sure I appreciate that.

If you, too, want your preference for President fed to you via a questionnaire that addresses nebulous and nuanced social issues with sentence fragments and radio buttons, click here.

First up is the popular and silly Bowflex™ fitness machine. It seems that the designers were so caught up with all those nifty bows, they forgot about basic structural integrity.

As a result, the Consumer Product Safety Commission has received

at least 70 reports of the backboard benches breaking, resulting in at least 59 back, neck and shoulder injuries...

[In addition,]

Nautilus Direct has received at least 18 reports of the "Lat Tower" rotating forward and falling, resulting in at least 14 back, neck, shoulder, teeth, nose and head injuries, some of which required stitches.

Okay, maybe you're not sick enough to be entertained by defective Bowflexes. But how about this:





This is a fucking brilliant product. Some wizards deep underground at Hasbro realized they could cross a Nerf™ football with an Etch-a-Sketch™. Why? So kiddies could draw up plays inside their footballs.

I can't really see the utility of being able to draw up a play inside a football. Assuming, first of all, that the other team is kind enough to let you remove it from the line of scrimmage (and who's to say they don't want to draw up their own play?), you're inevitably dealing with a team of snot-nosed brats who will forget the play as soon as you close up the football.

But let that be. The reason the Big Play Football™ is being recalled is not the severe defectiveness of the idea, but the fact that it "contains a hard plastic interior frame that can pose a risk of facial cuts if a child is hit during play." Already, nine such incidents have been reported, eight requiring stitches. According to the CPSC, "consumers should stop using this football immediately."

Who knew cramming an Etch-a-Sketch™ inside a Nerf™ football would make it hard and pointy?

FLOG™: Looking out for you.

No really, I have no idea. This isn't a game. I received this picture from correspondent Niven, with little explanation, and I'd really like to know,

Who is this man?