And that's how it is.

It's good to be the king. Say it in your best Mel Brooks Louis XIV, and then go read the article. You'll understand why.

Missing something nice to round out the coverage, this article is. 13% of female teens in an "abstinence-only" sex-ed program got pregnant. What's missing? Statistics on comparable schools where contraception is taught. Far be it from me to defend "abstinence-only" education, which I find useless, but if you're going to make the claim that changes need to be made, there should be something that says, "Only X% of female teens in schools where contraception was taught got pregnant." For all we know, that school might have the lowest pregnancy rate in the area. Always be wary of statistics - they will tell you what you want to hear.

Because it's a classic, and because Jack Chick deserves every bit of mockery ever thrown at him, we have... Dark Dungeons, the one that started most people on the path to making fun of the fundies (the ones that deserve it, of course.). There are others available at the website, too, if this one has you rolling on the floor in laughter. Or, you can take a howl at stupid quotes heard in a bookstore.

Veterans fighting the effects of depleted uranium? Again, why fight with radioactive materials? The damage is much more permanent, and the casualties on both sides are higher from the poisoning. That is, of course, if anyone admits that depleted uranium is, indeed, toxic, radioactive, and just as willing to kill friendlies as enemies.

And if you want to think of what might have been, here's a series of bloggers and columnists all trying to answer the question What if the 11 September attacks never happened? Definitely worth reading, for those of you planning on crossing dimensions. Or perhaps this is a guidebook from someone who already has...

There were some interesting replies to my views of the Kingdom Hearts universe. From those who tell me that light's not so great (the pure ones are the Princesses of Heart), to those who will embrace their darkness and their light, and find the Way to the Dawn or die trying. Someone else asked a very salient question, though - do you consider darkness to be passive or active? Turning that question over in my head, I thought that darkness has at least some passive element to it, as it flees at the onset of light, and then recovers the lost ground when the light leaves. The agents of the darkness are more active - the Heartless and the villains of the story are trying to seize control using the darkness. Even then, though, one might strictly say that the darkness, and the Heartless, its agents, are passive. The Heartless can be controlled by those who have the strength of will to do so. The darkness can be controlled by those with the will, much like the light. Both forces as passive, manipulatable, magical, directed by will alone. I guess I don't see completely where the question lies. A passive darkness and light would not necessarily make one preferable to the other, I guess. Those who could use both would be the most powerful.

Trying to consider what constitutes an active darkness. Something that would move to snuff out the light brought into its presence. In a sense, light is active, in that it tries to repel away the darkness. What comes to mind are more like the agents of the darkness moving, not the darkness itself. Any suggestions from the peanut gallery about all of this?

The oddities one finds around.

The BBC's official pronunciation blog, for example. Or that not everything you see on television is news. (Well, we already knew that.) Moreso that the FCC is finally investigating whether or not video adverts were packaged as news items. From, yes, the CBC in Canada. Anyone else see the hilarity here?

Regarding the article of the 13% who get pregnant, here is, as Paul Harvey puts it, the rest of the story. Comparisons between counties in South Carolina for the microvision, comparisions between the United States and European countries for the macrovision. Note that the United States has an extraordinarily high rate, nearly four times the Europeans. And finally, here's some insight into how Europeans look at sex, sex education, and prevention. Would that the U.S. could be so reasonable.

Our maestro of the church of Tina Chopp (remember your vegetable sacrifices) will be pleased to know that suit is being brought over an adherent of the Church of Body Modification's termination. Recognition may not be far off for the Tinites and Pastafarians.

A trinity of religious/spiritual/mythical related links - the satan got really bad PR (he was really just a functionary doing YHWH's bidding), Why won't God heal Amputees (which takes a look at the somewhat poor track record of prayers offered to requests granted ration from YHWH), and Dave's Mythical Creatures (which is by no means complete).

This has been all over the blog-waves. A judge in Detroit stepped up to the plate and ruled the warrantless wiretaps unconstitutional. The cynic in me says that the SCOTUS will overrule it and/or the president will ignore it and continue on as if nothing ever happened. The unitary executive and all that. Still, if this stands up, then there's a way that even the most spineless of representatives could hide behind in pushing through an impeachment resolution. Mind you, it would put Cheney in charge, but I don't think it would take long for him to run afoul of something that would get him thrown out, too.

I also got to see my first official sillything today. Someone filed in a comment card at one of my places of work, asking that a "Parental Advisory" sticker be placed on the picture book And Tango Makes Three, because of the subject matter that it discusses. Namely, two penguins who love each other very much, but both happen to be boys, the inventive zookeeper who gives them the egg they want, so they can raise a kid just like the other penguin couples, and the people who attend the zoo that don't notice or particularly care. (The penguins are cute. You wouldn't know they were boys without the narrative saying so.) This book obviously requires that we place something on it that shouts "Challenge me!" or "This library thinks you can't handle controversial issues with your children, so we're placing this sticker here to tell you this book is different!"

Yeah. The difficulty in crafting replies to this, whichever person is tasked with it, is to give a serious, earnest reply to what was a serious, earnest inquiry. Snarking them, while appearing eminently appropriate and reasonable, is not the correct thing to do. Instead, a well-measured, properly thought out and logical reason for why the library is denying such a request is in order. So now I've seen both ends of the spectrum of users, I think. Or at least examples of how both ends can react. Another year of schooling, and then this becomes part of my job. Hopefully I'm ready for it.