This date and year marks the 62nd anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. Tonight in honor of that courageous effort, I attended a service at a synagogue in New York City.

On the dais, and each lighting a candle representing the concentration camp they had once survived (Auschwitz, Belsen, Buchenwald and Treblinka among them) were four elderly women and one elderly man. A young woman lit a sixth candle for the million Jewish children who perished during the Holocaust.

The keynote speaker referred to his grandmother, who had been murdered, and his uncle, who had starved to death at age seven. He gave those present, and all Jews, a responsibility: that we, who live, give life to those who died. By acknowledging that they did exist (Hitler’s annihilation of them and their world notwithstanding), that we will remember them, and that we will leave a record of them on this earth, as we might hope to be remembered and recorded when we have died.

From the Mourner’s Kaddish:
Yisgadal, veyiskadash, shmey rabo.
Amen. Selah.

“Guestbloggers, the floor is yours!”

Thank you, Mister Speaker. I yield to Myself such Space as I may Consume. :)

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Now that the big election in the Roman Catholic Church is over with, let us turn our attention to the much-neglected voting set for 2 weeks from today in the world’s Other great Constitutional Monarchy & Former Empire, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

I’ll try to Post about the really Newsworthy stuff ~ the Horse Race :) ~ later on. But for Openers, here is my Drudgelike (FIE!!! :) set of Linkages to the incomparable BBC’s coverage (memo to US MSM: that’s, “Coverage.” Look into it) of some of the boring Issues & recent Developments. :)

BBC Election 2005 main page

“Election at a glance” summary, updated daily I think. / Excerpts from April 20 ~

The main opposition parties focus on attacking the council tax while Labour highlight their plans to help “hard working families”.

The Conservatives have announced they would scrap the requirement for new head teachers in England to have a professional qualification. [!!! ~ the guestblogger ]

Campaign Quote of the Day:

“Terrible outbreak of afternoon kipping in Henley - always in their dressing gowns, hard at it.” ~ Tory Boris Johnson canvassing in the seat he is defending.

Blair defiant over Iraq decision

Opposing candidates both threatened by “extreme fundamentalists who believe that elections are a crime against Islam.” The only thing Amusing about this one is that they are running in the “Bethnal Green and Bow constituency”. God Bless England :) ~ and Saints preserve her, and us, from the Evildoers.

Election attracts over 3,500 candidates, including those of the Jam Wrestling Party

Remote Orkney & Shetland Islanders not Amused at proposals to abolish Postal Voting, but residents of the Scilly Isles say it’s silly to fret

Deputy PM loses it, tells journalist to “Bugger off” :>

Labour pledges to conquer Crime

Tories promise the Moon // (OK, OK… :)

Finally, for election news from the all-important :) UK Celtic regions:

Alba

Cymru

Kernow (Scroll down for district info / mind you don’t disturb the new Dutchess :)

AAAAND ~ lastest & Loveliest :) ~

Norn Iron :) (Thuaisceart Éireann) ~ where the Big Question is whether its recent Troubles will prevent Sinn Fein from increasing its number of “seats” (presently 4, I believe) and thus the number of MP’s who cannot be Seated in Commons because they refuse to take the requisite Oath of Allegiance to Her Majesty the Queen.

Like I said: God Bless England. And, God Save Ireland. :>

Texas bans gay foster parents.

Sigh.

Not content with declaring war on judicial activism, Tom DeLay is now declaring war on the judicial use of the Internet:

“We’ve got Justice Kennedy writing decisions based upon international law, not the Constitution of the United States? That’s just outrageous,” DeLay told Fox News Radio. “And not only that, but he said in session that he does his own research on the Internet? That is just incredibly outrageous.”

Huh?

Starting at 5:00 PM tonight, and extending until 11:59 PM tomorrow night, no blogging or commenting by yours truly (with the usual exceptions — breaking news, etc.) I gotta get serious about studying for finals. Guestbloggers, the floor is yours!

…I molested my neighbor’s dog.

And I thought what she did in American Pie was bad.

For some background, Apple has an OS release called Tiger that is coming out next Friday. Microsoft, in an attempt to get attention (and trying not to focus on the delayed release of Longhorn), is trying to reinvigorate interest in its stagnant XP operating system with an advertising campaign.

Unfortunately for Microsoft, several people quickly downloaded the sample ad — and found out that it had been made with a Mac.

To make matters worse, it would not have been all that difficult to make the ad on a Mac and then change the creator information using a PC before posting the ad to the website. But when I checked a few minutes ago, the ad was still up, and the creator information still said “Adobe Photoshop CS Macintosh.”

(In other design related news, Adobe is in the process of buying Macromedia…)

I register for my fall-semester classes in 2 1/2 hours, at 1:15 PM. I have several different schedule scenarios, depending on which classes fill up. Here are the ones that figure into one or more of my scenarios that are already on the brink:

Federal Criminal Practice: Currently 12 spots left
Patent Law: 11 spots left
Admiralty: 7 spots left

Eek!

UPDATE, 11:05 AM: Federal Criminal Practice is filling up fast… now down to 7. Meanwhile, Antitrust is getting a bit iffy… only 20 spots left.

On the bright side, at least my registration time isn’t at 4:00 like some of my friends…

UPDATE, 12:47 PM: Argh! CrimPrac was stuck at 6 for like an hour and a half… and then it just went down from 6 to 2!!! Less than a half hour left, only two spots remaining…

UPDATE, 1:01 PM: F**k! CrimPrac just filled. The one-o’clock-ers stole my spot!! Bastards! :)

UPDATE, 1:08 PM: Now Patent Law is down to just 5 spots…

UPDATE, 1:17 PM: I’m registered!

Background information: We’re required to take at least 14 credits, and because of how busy my fall extracurricular slate promises to be (interview season, working 10-15 hours a week at my government clerkship downtown, and hopefully being on a law journal), I intend to take the bare minimum.

Currently, I’m registered for Cyberlaw (3 credits), First Amendment (3 credits), Antitrust (3 credits), Patent Law (3 credits) and Universal Protection of Human Rights (3 credits).

You may notice that adds up to 15, not 14. But I have no intention of taking both of the last two. I’ll take Patent Law if I can get into Federal Criminal Practice (2 credits; I’m on the waiting list), and I’ll take Human Rights if I can’t get into CrimPrac and thus end up taking Corporate Reorganization (2 credits; 39 spots still open) instead. Patent Law and CrimPrac are my preferred combo, but if I’m unable to take CrimPrac, I’ll have to take Human Rights instead of Patent in order to prevent a conflict between Patent and CorpReorg (which is the only viable two-credit alternative to CrimPrac, schedule-wise).

Got all that? :)

ANOTHER UPDATE: Here is a graphical representation, via iCal, of my schedule. The dark blue classes are the ones I’m definitely taking; the green and turquoise classes represent my options for filling out the schedule — it’ll be either green or turquoise, not both. The yellow class is a two-credit course in the MBA school that I might take in lieu of CrimPrac/CorpReorg… but I can’t get clearance to take that class until August, so that’s an Add/Drop thing and a moot point right now.

UPDATE, 2:18 PM: It just occurred to me that Admiralty (10-10:50 AM Tuesday and Thursday) would also fit into my schedule, and it was almost full, so I just added it. Hmm… I have to think about this some more…

Hot on the heels of the Virgin Mary sandwich, some Christians in Chicago believe that the Blessed Mother is showing herself again, this time on a freeway underpass.

What I find particularly interesting about this divine sighting is the fact that the Mother of God apparently inscribed “GO CUBS” next to her image:

Heh. :)

As I wrote on Patrick’s blog, I will take this Mary sighting seriously if, and only if, the Cubs win the World Series this year. :)

For all posterity, whenever anyone looks at the historic Chicago Tribune front page of April 20, 2005 — the one announcing the election of Pope Benedict XVI — they’ll also see this in the bottom right-hand corner:

Musuem?

Ouch.

Don’t these Big Media types have editors? Methinks they need to hire a few good bloggers. :)

Heh:

It seems a shame, really. The man hadn’t been pope for two hours when the lefty blogs went (literally) profane and disgraceful (and - of course - adolescent) and the press was hardlining their memes and caricatures of him.

Benedict XVI, it seems, is a relentless and remorseless hard-ass who takes-no-prisoners and wields a clumsy and undiplomatic sword, cutting a path of hard-hearted destruction no matter where he goes, and he will be a disaster for the church, and oppressor of women, gays, people of girth, people of mirth, … little puppies, small furry rodents and children he doesn’t like.

Or, something like that.

Heh.

I bet Notre Dame theology professor Richard P. McBrien is wishing right about now that he didn’t return the Washington Post’s phone call:

“If Cardinal Ratzinger were really campaigning for pope, he would have given a far more conciliatory homily designed to appeal to the moderates as well as to the hard-liners among the cardinals. … I think this homily shows he realizes he’s not going to be elected. He’s too much of a polarizing figure,” McBrien said.

Heh.

Got any plans for the big day? Sbarro at the LaFortune Student Center would like your business, apparently:

“Late Night Munchies,” eh? Hehe.

(Full disclosure: That sign has been up for several weeks. I took the picture on April 4, with the specific intention of posting it on 4/20. :)

I wish I’d gotten me one of these tickets. (Hat tip: Nick again.)