The Linkage for May 28th

Here’s a quick look at what I was reading online from May 21st to May 28th:

Study finds hurricane gaming parties can be hazardous to your health
I think the problem here isn’t necessarily that the kids were playing video games, but that their parents were dumb enough to run an electric generator inside the house. And I seriously doubt anyone considers video games a “post-disaster necessity.” More likely, these people figured they already had the sucker fired up to run the air conditioner and might as well use some of the excess power to keep their bored kids from killing each other.
Tags: texas weather hurricane_ike health parenting houston stupid

Germans reexamine history after revelation
The killing in 1967 of an unarmed demonstrator by a police officer in West Berlin set off a left-wing protest movement and put conservative West Germany on course to evolve into the progressive country it has become today. Now it’s been revealed that the officer in question was also an East German Stasi spy, igniting a new national debate over some of the uncomfortable issues surrounding Germany’s post-war history.
Tags: history germany cold_war

Brace yourself. Mankind has created scratch n’ sniff baseball caps.
Just when you thought Major League Baseball couldn’t sell their souls any further, something like this happens.
Tags: baseball mlb business

Nokia demonstrates how not to launch an app store
After years of trying to catch up with Apple’s business model, Nokia finally rolled out their Ovi Store. Unfortunately, it seems to be a flaming bag of fail at the moment. Hope they get it together. A little competition from the Finns would be good for the market.
Tags: technology mobile business nokia

Lawmakers battle over Texas Xmas crown
With heady issues like the budget, overhauling the state’s transportation agency and implementing voter ID facing the state legislature, how are two northeast Texas representatives spending their time? That’s right – they’re battling over who should or shouldn’t be called the “Christmas capital of Texas.”
Tags: texas legislature republicans democrats holidays stupid

Times staffers admit they missed the ball on Watergate
Oops. A former New York Times staffer is saying that then-acting FBI head L. Patrick Gray spilled the beans about Watergate to him on his last day of working at the paper and that his editor failed to follow up on it. Betcha Woodward and Bernstein are glad the Times couldn’t be bothered to look into the head of the FBI calling the sitting president a criminal.
Tags: media newspaper history watergate presidents

Texting threatens health, life, universe
In more proof that everything that’s even remotely enjoyable, useful or popular must be bad for you, here’s an article outlining all the various ways that unlimited text messaging will cripple children and destroy the human race.
Tags: health technology

Arizona rookie is channeling Wyatt Earp, Rollie Fingers
I think this is something everyone can get on board with – Arizona rookie Clay Zavada has brought handlebar mustaches back to the major leagues. Let’s hope this starts a renaissance. The story of his long road to the big leagues is pretty interesting, too.
Tags: baseball diamondbacks facial_hair mlb

Stanley Cup engraving rife with typos
The NHL’s iconic Stanley Cup, which is handed out each year to hockey’s champion, carries with it the marks of another, quieter history – decades of botched spellings, spacing gaffes, repeated words and the unsightly results of attempts to fix them.
Tags: hockey language funny nhl

Even the players hate interleague baseball
With an estimated 3/4s of players expressing a dislike for interleague play, it’s time for Bud Selig to admit that outside of a few honest geographic rivalries, the concept just doesn’t do anything for anyone. Is having six Mets-Yankees and White Sox-Cubs games a year really worth all of the crappy match-ups and inherent schedule imbalances that interleague play creates?
Tags: baseball mlb

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