Blawg Review #7

The 7th edition of Blawg Review is up at Jeremy Richey's Blawg.

Video Game Law

I'm posting this link to the Video Game Law Blog so I will remember to email it to someone else later. Neat.

Birth of blogs for parents

The Washington Times covers blogging parents.

Check-in

Sorry there hasn't been much blogging going on lately. I'm working on a couple things, one of which is a new blog which I plan to debut in about a week. I'll keep you posted.

Thursday Library Trip - 05/19/05

• Book: Love and Logic: Magic for Early Childhood, Jim Fay & Charles Fay
• Book: Building Trust in Business, Politics, Relationships, and Life, Robert T. Solomon & Fernando Flores
• Book: How Clean is Your House?, Kim Woodburn and Aggie MacKenzie
• Book: Growing Vegetable Soup, Carmen Bredeson
• Book: Busy Penguins, John Schindel
• Book: Bob the Builder: Let's Find Opposites, Jenny Miglis
• Book: Little Penguin, Patrick Benson
• Book: How I Became a Pirate, Melinda Long, David Shannon
• Book: Do Knights Take Naps?, Kathy Tucker
• Book: The Dragon and the Mouse: The Dream, Stephen A. Timm
• Book: Grandma's Hurrying Child, Jane Yolen
• Video: Kratt's Creatures: Checkin' Out Chimps
• Video: Bob the Builder: Pets in a Pickle
• Video: There Goes a Spaceship
• Video: Star Wars I: The Phantom Menace

Star Wars II: Revenge of the Blog

I've been blogging on ebay. No, not blogging ABOUT ebay, but blogging ON ebay. At least, when I wrote the description for this "Star Wars Princess Leia Figure Vintage 1977 w/cape", it felt awfully like writing a blog post.

While you're there, you might as well check out my Obi-Wan and Darth Maul talking banks.

(shameless self promotion mode=OFF)

Blawg Review #6

Blawg Review #6 is up, hosted by the South Carolina Trial Law Blog.

The Phantom Professor

The Dallas Morning News reports SMU blogger unmasked, unemployed regarding The Phantom Professor, a/k/a Elaine Liner. SMU (that's Southern Methodist University) officials deny any connection between the firing and the blogging.

Star Wars: Revenge of the Preschoolers

Well I've done it.

I let my 4-year old watch Star Wars (part IV if you want to get technical). Then I let him watch The Empire Strikes Back, just for good measure.

This despite the fact that Revenge of the Sith is undoubtedly too violent for him to see. Add to that recent news items criticizing the marketing of the movie, rated PG-13, some of which is aimed at the preschool set (Darth Tater, anyone?).

Now, in the marketers' defense, I must say that looking at the big picture, it's not about getting 4, 5, and 6-year olds to want to go see the movie, necessarily. It's about them wanting the 20th anniversary DVD box set for their 16th birthdays. Residual income, that's where the real money's at.

Thursday Library Trip - 05/12/05

• Book: The 7 Stages of Motherhood, Ann Pleshette Murphy
• Book: Spread the Work, William Safire
• Book: Leaving the Saints, Martha Beck
• Book: Decorating Hints & Tips, Julian Cassell & Peter Parham
• Book: Seven Layers of Design, Christopher Lowell
• Book: In My Room: Designing for and With Children, Antonio F. Torice and Ro Ligrippo
• Book: Desigining Rooms for Children, Mary Gilliatt
• Book: Memorial Day, Jacqueline S. Cotton
• Video: Blue’s Clues: Blue’s Big News
• Video: Wiggly Play Time
• Video: Penguins and Otters
• DVD: The Big Space Shuttle

Childbirth Drug Risks

The FDA has issued a patient alert for Misoprostol/Cytotec, a drug sometimes used to induce labor but not approved for that purpose.

And the Honolulu Star-Bulletin reports that a young woman died four months after giving birth due to complications from her epidural, leaving her husband to raise their disabled son alone. Wrongful death suit has been filed, nautrally.

Child endangerment for drinking?

Via Blogging Baby, comes this news out of Eastern Iowa, Pregnant woman charged with child endangerment for drinking. Let's see, she was not merely drinking but falling-down drunk, and was also charged with prostitution and public intoxication. The county attorney plans to request that child endangerment charges be dropped, since "under Iowa law, a fetus is not a person until it has been separated and been born from the mother and taken a breath independent of the mother, period."

Wonder if it will show up in the Express police blotter.

Blawg Review #5

Oh, and did I mention Blawg Review #5 is up over at Conglomerate?

Mommy Lawyers

Carolyn Elefant of My Shingle has a nice piece on Lawyer Moms, Moms, Law and Change. She writes:

I know many moms who believe that by working grueling schedules at law firms, they set an example for their children, particularly daughters, that women can succeed. Maybe so. But the message that I'd rather send I hope is one better: not just that I can succeed in my legal career, but that I can do so on my own timetable and not someone else's.

When Doctors Leave Town, Where Do They Go?

Notes from the (Legal) Underground discusses "medical liability reform" in When Doctors Leave Town, Where Do They Go?.

International Midwives Day

Today is International Midwives Day! Please call (write, email) your midwife and thank her.

Link: Midwives Alliance of North America

Wayback Humor

I sometimes describe myself as "subscribed to way too many Yahoo! groups". Anyhow, while cleaning out some old files last night, I found this oldie that was originally written in 1997 or earlier (at least, that's when I printed it out). For you young'uns, that was before the days of Yahoo! Groups (in fact, it was before Yahoo), Internet bulletin boards (the ones we had then were stand-alone and not connected to the Internet), or easy-to-use discussion group software. What we had back then were newsgroups - which were named hierarchically (rec.arts.tv.soaps, for example), and accessed by typing a command such as "trn" at something called a "Unix prompt". Ok, I know I'm really dating myself here. Anyway, don't know who wrote it but here it is:

Q: How many internet mail list subscribers does it take to change a light bulb?

A: 1,331:

1 to change the light bulb and to post to the mail list that the light bulb has been changed.
14 to share similar experiences of changing light bulbs and how the light bulb could have been changed differently.
7 to caution about the dangers of changing light bulbs.
27 to point out spelling/grammar errors in posts about changing light bulbs.
53 to flame the spell checkers.
156 to write to the list administrator complaining about the light bulb discussion and its inappropriateness to this mail list.
41 to correct spellling in the spelling/grammar flames.
109 to post that this list is not about light bulbs and to please take this email exchange to alt.lite.bulb.
203 to demand that cross posting to alt.grammar, alt.spelling and alt.punctuation about changing light bulbs be stopped.
111 to defend the posting to this list saying that we all use light bulbs and therefore the posts **are** relevant to this mail list.
306 to debate which method of changing light bulbs is superior, where to buy the best light bulbs, what brand of light bulbs work best for this technique, and what brands are faulty.
27 to post URLs where one can see examples of different light bulbs.
14 to post that the URLs were posted incorrectly, and to post corrected URLs.
3 to post about links they found from the URLs that are relevant to this list which makes light bulbs relevant to this list.
33 to concatenate all posts to date, then quote them including all headers and footers, and then add "Me Too."
12 to post to the list that they are unsubscribing because they cannot handle the light bulb controversey.
19 to quote the "Me Too's" to say, "Me Three."
4 to suggest that posters request the light bulb FAQ.
1 to propose new alt.change.lite.bulb newsgroup
47 to say this is just what alt.physic.cold_fusion was meant for, leave it here.
143 votes for alt.change.lite.bulb.

Thursday Library Trip - 05/05/05

• Book: The Maker’s Diet, Jordan S. Rubin
• Book: Kids’ Rooms: Ideas and Projects for Children’s Spaces, Jennifer Levy
• Book: Kids’ Rooms: A Hands-on Decorating Guide, Anna Kasabian
• Book: House Beautiful Windows
• Book: Window Treatments [Better Homes and Gardens]
• Book: A Portfolio of Window & Window Treatment Ideas,
• Book: Kitchen Decorating Ideas and Projects [Better Homes and Gardens]
• Book: Blue & White in Your Home, Lisa Skolnik, Ed.
• Book: Mrs. Pepper’s Mother’s Day, Alice Wilder
• Video: Bob the Builder: Building Friendships
• Video: Wiggly, Wiggly World
• Video: Milk Cow, Eat Cheese
• DVD: Click, Clack, Moo, Cows That Type

Texas House OKs Ban on Sexy Cheerleading

In the "news of the weird" category, Texas House OKs Ban on Sexy Cheerleading. Ok, I am against "sexy cheerleading" as much as the next person, but is this really something we need to legislate? And where are these girls' parents and what the heck are they thinking, anyway?

Blawg Reviews & Midwifery Updates

I have decided that it would be best to wait until most state legislatures have finished their sessions before publishing the Midwifery Legislative Update, and give a final status report. If you are following the Texas Midwifery Board Sunset legislation (HB 1535), you can get updates here:
ATM Legislative Updates

Blawg Review #4 is up at Law & Entrepreneurship News. I especially liked Conglomerate Blog's Are Law Schools Family Friendly? and Jeremy's Weblog in which the Harvard 3L realizes he doesn't know any law. Join the club, Jeremy. I also liked this quote, since I am interested in the similarities and differences between doctors and lawyers, "It all makes me start to wonder about doctors. Now that I know what we know after law school, I have to ask – how much medicine do doctors know after medical school? ... Then again, they’re dealing with life and death. We’re only dealing with freedom and justice. So who cares?"

And since we were out of town last week, I neglected to blog Blawg Review #3 at Appellate Law & Practice. So there you go.

Ten Minute Bloggers

Received a flyer in the mail for the Texas Bar's new Ten Minute Mentor program. On the left side of the front of the brochure are quotes praising the program. No less than half (3 out of six) of the quotes are from blogs or bloggers (Blawg Wisdom, Law Practice Tips Blog, and South Carolina Trial Law Blog). If the statistics are true that only 26 percent of the population are "very familiar" or "somewhat familiar"with blogging, I can just imagine hundreds of puzzled lawyers reading the brochure and saying to themselves, "what the hell is a blog?". Oh wait, I forgot, I am the only person who reads sidebar quotes. I also scan long lists of names, looking for people I know, but that is a subject for another day.

Or perhaps lawyers as a whole know more about blogs than the general population. Is the proportion of blawgs:blogs greater than the population of lawyers:nonlawyers? What do you think?

Epidurals

Oooh, gotta blog this one:
Epidural During Labor Linked to Abnormal Head Position.