I just found this on the web. I am not an atheist, but I found myself moved by the words of this Virginia Tech professor.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/4/19/18451/0971

I’m a sociology graduate student. I like to figure out ways to interpret and explain human events. I don’t believe in universal sociological laws or truths. There are always, always exceptions to the rule. Sociological statements may approach universal truth, but we sociologists will never quite get there. Our subject matter is inherently too complex for laws or truths. While reading this, it hit me that there may be one universal truth that sociologists could acknowledge. Throughout our history, we humans have always searched for meaning, especially in the face of disaster. We may turn to God, to each other, or inward — but we always search for meaning.

Mariners fans, we’re a funny bunch. Mention the names “Hargrove” or “Bavasi” and you’re sure to get a blistering earful. Yes, we do blame them for three consecutive last-place finishes in the AL West. Mention Edgar Martinez, and our eyes light up with nostalgia for “The Double.” You know the exact double I’m referring to, right? Edgar’s beautiful, clean double down the left field line in the 1995 ALDS against the Yankees? The double where Ken Griffey Junior sprinted home all the way from 1st base? The Double even has its own Wikipedia page.

Sigh. Those were the good old days.

I just wanted to let those of you in the blogosphere know about a great Mariners blog, written by the Seattle Times Geoff Baker. He really captures the sarcasm, cynicism, and eye-rolling “Julio Mateo! Oh great, we’re gonna blow it again” attitude prevalent among many of today’s die-hard M’s fans. I’ll be relying on Baker’s blog this summer, while I’m in Serbia, missing Dave Niehaus’ voice on the radio something awful.

Oh yeah — forgot to mention that, didn’t I? I received a summer fellowship to study Serbian. I’ll be in Belgrade and Novi Sad for most of the summer, blogging from there. It will be an amazing experience.

And if any of you know the best way to listen to baseball (preferably M’s games, but I’ll take anything), while overseas, please let me know.

I stumbled across this on another blog just now: ccfsettlement.com, a Web site about a class-action settlement against banks charging excessive foreign currency fees. I got hit with more than $100 in fees in my time in Egypt last year, so it would be nice to get some of that back (and I’m eligible to participate in the settlement, yippee). But this site … man oh man are there red flags popping up. It’s a secure server, but entering all kinds of bank account information on that form that isn’t affiliated with any bank? How can I figure out if this is legit? Should I just call them or ask for a mail-in form instead? That’s what I’m tempted to do.

I got my credit card bill last week, a whopping $3.24, all of which was finance charges. Leave it to me to be so ignorant as to think that finance charges were calculated based on how late your payment was (and mind you, I had already paid off most of the not-very-large balance before the due date). By my simplistic calculations, the finance charge should have been 24 cents, but that was before I read the 400-word explanation of the convoluted, unintelligible formula used to compute finance charges. Bastards, I thought. I’ll get them to reverse this with my cunning, hyper-logical argument about how they are confounding the masses in the interest of their own greedy profits.

So I called up, uh, Bank of America and starting winding through the phone tree. After about the first layer, I got frustrated and hit 0, hoping for a person. Press 1, I was told, if this related to a charge. Press 2 if my call is about my balance. Two. “We’ve noticed that your entire statement balance is finance charges. If you would like us to reverse these fees, as a one-time courtesy to you, Press 1.” One. “Your charges have been reversed. Thank you for shoveling all your hard-earned money to us. Good-bye.” Click.

Amazing, I thought. They must get a lot of people calling about their ludicrous charges. So many that it’s far more efficient to program the phone tree like that, rather than have to listen to thousands of angry people who all want the same thing, and who will all get the charges reversed anyway. Time was, you had to put up an honest-to-goodness fight and persuade The Man that you were right. Looks like those days are gone. And it didn’t even take a call center in India to dispose of it.

Customer service, without any of the trappings of customer service. Awesome.

I was pretty irritated by this article for a number of reasons. I’m not a scholar of Egyptian history or of Egypt’s domestic and foreign policies in the early 21st Century, but don’t take me for a fool either, Wall Street Journal.

If you don’t have a subscription to the paper, here’s a capsule summary of the article: Young members of the banned political party the Muslim Brotherhood are using blogs to write about their personal lives and their political sentiments, something that is controversial even within the movement.

That’s all well and fine, but this article is lacking in context. Namely, while the Brotherhood has a substantial and growing number of members, there are even more Egyptians who sympathize and agree with at least some of the Brotherhood’s positions, if only because they are the sole organized opposition against Hosni Mubarak’s National Democratic Party (NDP). But that’s not really enough to get me riled up. No, what really got me were these two grafs, almost at the very end of the article:

But some critics believe that blogging is part of a coordinated strategy by the Brotherhood to project a modern image and widen its support beyond its traditional base.

“They’re trying to seize the imagination of the young and see this as an area that shouldn’t be just left for the liberal forces,” says Amr el-Choubaki, an expert on Islamic groups at Cairo’s Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies. “It’s part of the group’s strategy to infiltrate the different institutions of society.” Even if the blogs were introduced by grassroots members, “the leaders up high at least didn’t object,” Mr. el-Choubaki says.

The emphasis is mine. Huh, that’s an interesting title, I thought. Reminds me of the pro-government Al-Ahram newspaper, one of the most widely read in Egypt. It also reminds me of Al-Ahram Beverages, the government-backed monopoly (and formerly government-owned company) that produces all alcohol in Egypt, including Heinekin made under license. Then the kicker: If you google Al-Ahram newspaper, isn’t that fascinating how the organization of the “expert” quoted in the WSJ article comes up as a sublisting under the newspaper’s site?

Yes, Wall Street Journal, you got a government spokesman with a shiny title to talk to you. Of course that “expert” said what he did, because his paycheck, however small and insufficient, came from the NDP. Now, it’s fine to get the government’s view, but call it what it is. Don’t put it out there like your source is an academic or other semi-disinterested-yet-well-informed third party.

That’s just bad journalism.

Half of the ones on the blogroll were dead, so I figured it was about time I did something about that. Added some other ones, too. I know, the Bend blog contingent is a little lacking, but I’m working on it. I think the last time I updated these links was about a year ago, so don’t hold your breath.

So, rather amused by the link asking “Does my car say I’m gay?”, I clicked here , intrigued. After reading the article, I came away wondering what my car says about me.

I think there is some truth to the notion that people buy cars that convey a certain image. Volvos tend to be associated with liberal, latte-drinking and sushi-eating types. Minivans indicate suburban moms. Hummers give off the perception (to me, at least) of someone bound and determined to ruin the environment by using as much of our natural resources as possible. The commercial with the dinosaurs giving birth to a Hummer definitely didn’t do much for the image of that car.

I hadn’t really thought much about the sexuality part, though. What kind of car gives off the image of sexually wholesome girl-next-door? Or party girl? If I wanted to show off my boobs, what kind of car should I drive?

And apparently, I should give consideration to these issues when buying my next automobile. What if I find myself on the dating market again, and someone refuses a second date because I drive a Volvo?

Well, based on the fact that I am a sushi-eating, latte-drinking, Volvo-driving liberal, I doubt I’d be real compatible with that hypothetical person anyway.

As I’m sure many of you know, on Monday, two people were killed in a domestic violence dispute on the University of Washington campus. Jonathan Rowan, 41, walked into Gould Hall, climbed the stairs to the 4th floor, and shot his ex-girlfriend, Rebecca Griego, 26, just before 9:30 AM.

From the media accounts, she had done everything right. After he threw her to the floor in a drunken dispute, she moved out. Afraid he would find her and harm her, she moved a few times. She changed her phone number and stopped accepting his phone calls. She told her coworkers and friends to be on the lookout. She took out a restraining order, and had the papers on her desk, in case he showed up at her workplace.

The police would have served Rowan the restraining order themselves, but they couldn’t find him. This begs the question — were they even looking?

After the murder-suicide on Monday, UW Assistant Police Chief Ray Wittmier acknowledged that the UW police receive numerous reports of death threats on campus. He called these threats “not uncommon.”

But today, the Seattle P-I reports that Griego’s coworkers did not follow university procedures in place to handle threats to employees. The University Police and the College of Architecture should have reported these threats to a high-level safety team back when they occurred — in March. The safety team could have potentially moved her office, changed her phone number, and tasked extra police patrols to her building. It’s unclear whether these measures would have protected her, but they may have helped. Griego’s office location and phone number were on the UW directory — which by the way, can be searched by anyone outside the university.

Griego’s coworkers may not have known about this. I’m a TA at the University of Washington — I sure didn’t know that we have established procedures in place should coworkers receive serious threats to their safety. I don’t even know to whom I’m supposed to report any threats — except to dial 911.

Clearly, we need to take better steps to protect people like Rebecca Griego from domestic violence. This isn’t a problem we’re ever going to solve, but we can start — with education. We need to break the silence about domestic violence. Domestic violence education should be a part of mandatory sex ed in elementary and middle schools. Boys and girls need to learn that it is never okay to hit, manipulate, or abuse your partner.

There need to be coordinated efforts on all college campuses about domestic violence. Young men and women who are in abusive situations need someplace to go where they can get help getting out. This should ideally be part of every college student’s freshman orientation.

If you are reading this, and you or someone you know is experiencing domestic violence, please call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233. If you are a teen or a parent of a teen who is in a domestic violence situation, please call the National Teen Dating Abuse Helpline at 1-866-331-9474.