I'm a lasagna boy!

The most popular finger?

Thanks to memepool, I saw this classical rendition of Sir Mix-A-Lot's classic ditty. Our heroine used to boogie down the newsprint to the sounds of the mixmaster. I don't think she would approve of the official web site, though: it loads all at once, taking half a minute over a residential cable link.

Of course, without some background in dactylic hexameter and other forms of Greek metre, this wouldn't be as enjoyable.

The New York Times reports on a legal precedent in Texas:

Is it legal to give someone the middle finger? Yes, says the Texas Court of Appeals, Third District, which ruled for a man who had appealed his conviction for making the gesture to a couple in a car. The court majority, in its opinion, decided that flipping "the bird" did not rise to the level of "disorderly conduct" unless it can be shown "to incite an immediate breach of the peace."

"That the gesture may be thrust upon unsuspecting or sensitive viewers falls short of the type of conduct in a public place that would incite those present to violence," Judge Jan P. Patterson wrote for the majority."

Which do you think is the most popular finger?

Wolfgang, you cheap bastard.

The lead paragraph of a music review appearing in today's Chronicle disparages Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart:

"We think of Mozart as the prototypical musical wunderkind, but compared with Felix Mendelssohn, little Wolfgang was a piker. "

This irritates me. It's the lead in an above-the-fold front-page article of a major metropolitan newspaper, and more than 10% of the words (non-grammatically necessary) are misused. Specifically, piker, which is an American slang term meaning "a risk-taker, gambler; a stingy person". The synonyms are uniformly negative. Merriam-Webster goes so far as to suggest TIGHTWAD as the first synonym and linked definition.

I wrote a letter to the editor (and author). I'm well on my way to roaming the city with a MUNI transfer in hand, plastic bag full of books under my arm.

FOLLOW-UP:

received email from the author, to wit:

I quote from Webster's 11th Collegiate:

one who does things in a small way

"Slacker" would've served my purpose too, I suppose. But the locution I used is a common and venerable one in drawing a comparison unfavorable to a particular party (in this case Mozart): Compared to X, Y is/was a piker.

Thanks for reading my words so closely, though.

Xperimental Jet Set.

This morning's New York Times reports that the Port Authority will spend $90 million to study the feasibility of rail links between Kennedy and Newark airports, and will commit as much as $1 billion to construct the link itself.

"The Port Authority also agreed to spend $90 million to study the feasibility of rail links between Lower Manhattan and both Kennedy and Newark Liberty International Airports, and to commit up to $500 million for the construction of each project if they are deemed feasible."

Bus and subway links serve JFK; the MTA has bus service to LaGuardia; several private livery services operate to EWR.

The New York Times also ran a brief history of transit disasters in the area's public transit system.

New York City's Worst Transit Disasters

October 16, 2003
By TINA KELLEY

The worst accident on a Staten Island ferry was the
explosion of a boiler on the Westfield II, which killed 125
passengers as the boat departed South Ferry on July 30,
1871.

Yesterday's ferry accident appeared to be one of the
deadliest accidents in the city's transportation system.

In 1918, 97 people were killed in a subway accident, and in
1991, five people were killed and more than 200 injured in
a subway crash at Union Square Station caused by a drunken
motorman.

The motorman admitted that he had been drinking all day and
was sentenced to up to 15 years in prison for manslaughter.

Eight months earlier, on Dec. 28, 1990, two people were
killed and 188 were injured in an electrical fire in the
subway tunnel near Clark Street in Brooklyn Heights.

On Aug. 24, 1928, a derailment in Times Square killed 16.

The worst subway disaster in the city's history occurred on
Nov. 1, 1918, when a derailment near the Malbone Street
station in Brooklyn killed 97 people and injured more than
250. The driver was a train dispatcher filling in for
striking motormen.

Until the terrorist attack of Sept. 11, 2001, the single
worst disaster in the city's history was the wreck of the
General Slocum, an excursion vessel that caught fire in
1904, killing at least 1,021 people.

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/16/nyregion/16DISA.html

Angry about calm.

The slow traffic / slow lifestyle movement isn't winning friends in handsome hamlets on the peninsula: this story in the Chronicle talks about neighbourhood reactions to various traffic-calming devices built into residential districts in Menlo Park, Palo Alto, and the Lower Haight.

Of course:

"To head off controversy, San Francisco traffic officials have turned to democracy in testing of seven new traffic circles in the Haight two months ago,
polling neighbors who live within a block of each circle. "

Isle of Skye.

Belatedly on the heels of Am I Hot Or Not? comes this foo or not generator.

Still not as much fun as going to the Edinburgh Castle.