dork-a-palooza: art and software

Nathan Sawaya, Lego Sculptor




software
Even as lifehacker struggles for relevance, (can someone explain advantage of calibre over stanza?) they offer the occasional gem.
So far, cloudapp seems quite handy, especially for quickly sharing screenshots and the like.
via

Last but not least, even though Chrome for mac still needs much improvement, its full screen mode looks great and proves very useful for viewing maps and book previews.

an uplifting article and an encouraging article

the times runs an almost identical article every few months, but I love it nonetheless:
For the Battle-Scarred, Comfort at Leash’s End
By Janie Lorber
WASHINGTON — Just weeks after Chris Goehner, 25, an Iraq war veteran, got a dog, he was able to cut in half the dose of anxiety and sleep medications he took for post-traumatic stress disorder. The night terrors and suicidal thoughts that kept him awake for days on end ceased.
Aaron Ellis, 29, another Iraq veteran with the stress disorder, scrapped his medications entirely soon after getting a dog — and set foot in a grocery store for the first time in three years.
The dogs to whom they credit their improved health are not just pets. Rather, they are psychiatric service dogs specially trained to help traumatized veterans leave the battlefield behind as they reintegrate into society....
....Under a bill written by Senator Al Franken, Democrat of Minnesota, veterans with P.T.S.D. will get service dogs as part of a pilot program run by the Department of Veterans Affairs. Training a psychiatric service dog and pairing it with a client costs more than $20,000. The government already helps provide dogs to soldiers who lost their sight or were severely wounded in combat, but had never considered placing dogs for emotional damage....
....But when Gloria Gilbert Stoga, who runs Puppies Behind Bars, received an application from Maj. James Becker, she decided, with support from his doctors, to take a chance on a veteran who had just left inpatient care.
Major Becker, 45, suffered two severe brain injuries in separate explosions, earning two Purple Hearts in his three tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. When he came home last winter, his 24-year-old daughter, also an Iraq veteran, was being treated for leukemia.
In Major Becker’s mind, home started to resemble Afghanistan’s Helmand Province. His P.T.S.D. symptoms worsened, and a suicide attempt in July landed him in San Diego Naval Medical Center for seven months. A few weeks after leaving the San Diego hospital, Major Becker flew to New York to collect his dog, Annie, and participate in a two-week training session with Puppies Behind Bars. Still, he said he spent a lot of time alone in his room “because it’s easier to deal with four walls than it is to come out and deal with crowds.”
But within days, Annie was beginning to pull him out of his shell. “She helps me meet people,” he said, describing how people are attracted to the dog.
He added, “I like to think it’s going to get better.
[I had to make sure to include the Al Franken and Puppies behind Bars details, in case your heart requires more than vets' therapy dogs to melt completely.]


(my) City Endorses New Policy for Treatment of H.I.V.
By Sabin Russell
In a major shift of H.I.V. treatment policy, San Francisco public health doctors have begun to advise patients to start taking antiviral medicines as soon as they are found to be infected, rather than waiting — sometimes years — for signs that their immune systems have started to fail.
The new, controversial city guidelines, to be announced next week by the Department of Public Health, may be the most forceful anywhere in their endorsement of early treatment against H.I.V., the virus that causes AIDS. ....
Dr. Katz said that despite cuts in health budgets, a policy to add to the number of H.I.V. patients taking expensive drugs made economic sense. “H.I.V. medications have been continually proven to be cost effective,” he said, “and in this case, it is also the right thing to do.”....

I love the annual peep show!

you know you are nutty when...

another possibility in my quest for convenient ways to send text messages from my computer

I think I am pretty hooked on google voice for computer texting. I am nonetheless pleased to see that other options have improved. Google talk in gmail has had sms capability for a while, but since it incorporates all of the messiness of google contacts, I never liked it very much. The newer version works more simply; you have the option of entering the number you want to text without having dig through hundreds of gmail contacts.

things I hope are fake include...

charging the drug buddy: this increasingly popular approach cannot possibly help

if you use drugs with someone who overdoses, you get charged with homicide or manslaughter. The 112 government bodies who failed to keep drugs out of the country, to make drug treatment a viable option, or make naloxone readily available?

Rock County teen sentenced in overdose death
A 14-year-old Edgerton girl accused in the drug overdose death of a 13-year-old boy has been sentenced to state custody for the next five years. ....

Man goes to prison in girlfriend's fatal overdose
By Christy Gutowski
....Brett M. Johnson was sentenced to four years in prison for supplying his girlfriend, Jill Przespolewski, with heroin last year in his grandmother's home on the 900 block of Columbia Court in Carol Stream.
Johnson called 911 at 7 a.m. March 25, 2009, after he awoke and found the 33-year-old Clarendon Hills woman unresponsive. Police said Johnson admitted repeatedly driving into Chicago to buy heroin and crack cocaine for them during a two- to three-day binge. He said his girlfriend only snorted heroin when with him. ....

foolish fourteen year olds...

may be the ones to convince mainstream America that laws require nuance.
Your half-naked teenager may help illuminate the drastically disparate realities underneath superficially similar acts.

Rethinking Sex Offender Laws for Youth Texting
By Tamar Lewin
....In most states, teenagers who send or receive sexually explicit photographs by cellphone or computer — known as “sexting” — have risked felony child pornography charges and being listed on a sex offender registry for decades to come.
But there is growing consensus among lawyers and legislators that the child pornography laws are too blunt an instrument to deal with an adolescent cyberculture in which all kinds of sexual pictures circulate on sites like MySpace and Facebook.
Last year, Nebraska, Utah and Vermont changed their laws to reduce penalties for teenagers who engage in such activities, and this year, according to the National Council on State Legislatures, 14 more states are considering legislation that would treat young people who engage in sexting differently from adult pornographers and sexual predators.....

Virginia, Oklahoma, Mississippi.... I give up.

Yeah, my blue state, elitist, snobby butt is staying put.

Oklahoma Senate passes amendment to opt out of federal hate crimes protections
....State Sen. Steve Russell, R-Oklahoma City, said the newly passed Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, which extends hate crimes law protections to include actual or perceived gender, sexual orientation, gender identity and disability, oversteps the bounds of the federal government and hinders free speech and religious freedom. ....
.....“The law is very vague to begin with,” Russell said. “Sexual orientation is a very vague word that could be extended to extremes like necrophilia.” read the rest of the article here

Miss. prom canceled after lesbian's date request
JACKSON, Miss. — A Mississippi county school board announced Wednesday it would cancel its upcoming prom after a gay student petitioned to bring a same-sex date to the event.
"Due to the distractions to the educational process caused by recent events, the Itawamba County School District has decided to not host a prom at Itawamba Agricultural High School this year," school board members said in a statement. ....

more reasons I still love John Kerry and will never understand what the hell goes on in Virginia...

Outdated, unnecessary ban on blood donations should be lifted
by John Kerry

Cuccinelli asks colleges to rescind policies protecting gay state employees
By Rosalind S. Helderman
 

catholic needle exchange

Their reasoning seems pretty nutty, but I will take it.
Albany, N.Y., diocese defends needle exchange; some Catholic scholars disagree
By Daniel Burke
In launching a needle-exchange program recently, the Catholic Diocese of Albany, N.Y., said the decision came down to choosing the lesser evil. Illegal drug use is bad, but the spread of deadly diseases is worse.
The medical evidence is clear, the diocese said when it began Project Safe Point in two Upstate New York locations through the local branch of Catholic Charities. Public health studies document that exchanging used syringes for new ones can reduce the spread of blood-borne diseases such as AIDS and even lead drug abusers to treatment and recovery. ....