I’ve been meaning to post links to these blogs for a while:

• A Gay Girl in Damascus
  What it says on the tin. Amina lived in the US for several years, and then moved back to Syria a while ago. I found her blog a few days ago thanks to a link from a coworker - around the same time the secret police started looking for her and she went underground. ( Read more... )

A good summary of the decision striking down Proposition 8 in California, and why the details of a decision that is certain to be appealed still matter an awful lot.

So plumtreeblossom and I (and docorion and many other people we know) were quoted extensively in a great story on polyamory in today’s Boston Globe magazine. The print edition has photos of me and docorion as well as the photo of Alan and Michelle that’s on the online edition. The online version (linked above) has a video that docorion and Alan (W.) and Michelle were interviewed for ( Read more... )

This Daily Kos entry about the inclusion of incentives for bicycling in the stimulus package is kind of interesting, although we are talking about pretty small numbers.

① My wonderful friend bbbsg was the subject of an article in yesterday’s Boston Globe. Here’s the article. It’s mostly about her decision to have her foot amputated (a prosthesis would give her more mobility and less pain), but it fits with the subject of this post because it also talks about her skills in “circus arts” - namely silks, although the ( Read more... )

Massachusetts is not going to have a popular vote to deprive same-sex couples of equal rights under the law! I was first alerted to this news by qwrrty, who I gather was there. The line “The narrow 45-151 vote means Massachusetts remains the only state in the nation to allow same-sex couples to marry” in that article seems odd to me - yes, 45 votes is ( Read more... )

Here’s a Q&A session with a BBC reporter who spent some time with Taleban fighters in Helmand province. One interesting quote:I was shocked to see soldiers from the newly-formed Afghan national army taking money at gunpoint from every car that passed. This was happening on the main road linking Iran to Pakistan across the south of Afghanistan, and ( Read more... )

The Boston Globe agrees with me about who should be the Democratic nominee for governor of Massachusetts. This line from their endorsement of Deval Patrick particularly resonates with me:Patrick sees the comprehensive picture.
I’ve heard him speak (once in person, several times broadcast), and among many inspiring attributes, I am struck by his ( Read more... )

Yesterday in lieu of my regular work day I went to Linux World Expo, along with my boss. It was fun and I certainly learned some interesting stuff, but certainly not something I would have travelled for. Nice to have it in Boston, though. I heard a nifty (and well-attended) talk at the O’Reilly booth by Jesse Vincent on his company’s new (free) ( Read more... )

Here’s an interesting CNN article on British data suggesting that the mass-extinction event that humans started about 50,000 years ago (which wiped out lots of large mammals, for instance) is continuing. Unsurprising, but it's neat to see actual data about current effects. Thanks to my mother for forwarding the link.