Just came across this supremely weird story about photos that used to be taken of freshmen at Ivy League and Seven Sisters schools. As recently as forty years ago, freshmen were told to strip naked and allow themselves to be photographed with metal pins affixed along their spines to indicate their posture. This was supposedly part of some now-debunked, Nazi-tinged scientific theory. Many of the photos were destroyed, but the surviving ones (27,000 of them) are now in a restricted archive at the Smithsonian. Many now-prominent people were photographed, including George W. Bush, Hillary Rodham, Meryl Streep, Diane Sawyer, Judith Martin, Bob Woodward, and Nora Ephron.

We lost our cat Crumb today. He lived a good cat life with his brothers and sisters. He was happiest when we left him alone, but he always made our day when he decided to visit us.

We'll miss you, buddy. You'll always have a place behind the books on the highest shelf of our house.

Comcast has come through. We are solidly online.

This is depressing… here's where all the presidential candidates currently stand on the political compass. Boy, they sure are close together, aren't they?

If you remember, this is where I fall, in the opposite corner. Hell, they can't even hear me shouting from where they are.

It's too bad my only ideological compatriots are a lawn gnome and a schizophrenic homeless man. Of course, if Gravel is such a loony, what does that make me?

John McCain's campaign manager, chief strategist, and chief of staff all quit this week. I'm not a "Washington insider," but I doubt this is part of a sequence of events that ends with President McCain.

Also: New York Times coverage.

More on Rupert Murdoch from Bill Moyers since my post the other day: "He is to propriety what the Marquis de Sade was to chastity."

In case you didn't know: Bill Moyers rules.

From the New York Times:

Written and directed by Brad Bird and displaying the usual meticulousness associated with the Pixar brand, "Ratatouille" is a nearly flawless piece of popular art, as well as one of the most persuasive portraits of an artist ever committed to film. It provides the kind of deep, transporting pleasure, at once simple and sophisticated, that movies at their best have always promised.

I am so looking forward to this movie.

Just seen on Lifehacker: if you don't like the driving directions Google gives you, you can just drag the route around until you do. It updates the directions automatically.

Just managed to resist clawing out my own eyeballs long enough to read a few paragraphs of this story about Mitt Romney tying a dog carrier, with the family dog in it, to the roof of his car. I think it speaks for itself, so I'll not comment.

Wait, yes I fucking will. What the fuck is wrong with you if you are a grown man and you tie a dog to the roof of a car and fucking drive it around? What the hell is going on in your brain when you do this?

Please, do not give this man the nuclear launch codes. I apologize for needing to resort to profanity. Thank you, that is all.

Just to brighten your day a little, here's a slideshow of photos tagged "inexplicable" on Flickr. Enjoy.