Propofol is used for general anesthesia. It has what's called a "high dose/response curve," which means the effective dose is only slightly lower than the fatal dose.

In a hospital--with proper equipment, and with an anesthesiologist monitoring the situation--Propofol can be safe. But it's intended to be used only once: to keep the patient asleep during an uncomfortable or painful procedure.

According to a story I read in the UK press, Jackson used an IV drip of Propofol to sleep: nearly every single night. It was only a matter of time before it killed him.

Usually, abusers of Propofol are medical professionals (because only they have access to it). MJ however had the resources to hire personal physicians.

Sadly it's not unusual for starstruck doctors--eager to become part of a celebrity's entourage--to become enablers of addiction. MJ's doctor ought to lose his license. Whether he's criminally negligible? The courts will have to decide.

Despite Propofol abuse being fairly rare, studies have been done on it. Among those who feel drawn to use it over and over again, most have had childhood trauma. These are people who've suffered with nightmares and flashbacks all their lives. They're desperate for sleep, and oblivion.

Carrying such a load of emotional pain, these folks are at high risk for self-destructive behavior. If they didn't turn to Propofol, it'd be something else.

Jackson bears some responsibility (we know he begged doctors for it). But a responsible doctor would not have agreed to give him the drug...certainly not repeatedly.

"If your seated and someone sits in front of you, obstructing your view, they have every right to"

I'm taller than the average person. When I sit down in a theater, I make sure I'm not seated directly in front of someone else.

I thought that was common courtesy. Little did I know, I have every "right" to block anyone else's view of the screen!

There is a way to remove the arrows which link to the iTunes store.

Go into Edit/Preferences, then under the Parental Control tab, check "Disable iTunes store".

Dumb move, Apple. By changing iTunes to have annoying links to the store all over the screen, you're encouraging us to make it so we NEVER go to the iTunes store ever again.

We might remember because of someone posting on the topic ad nauseam.

In 2000 in Florida, the kind of ballot you received and how it was counted varied widely depending on what county you lived in.

The "butterfly ballot" was one among many stories overhyped at the time, now a mere footnote. Its importance is miniscule: compared to the Supreme Court's Bush v. Gore decision, or the Choicepoint database fiasco.

Over 50,000 "felons" were barred from voting: many of whom had conviction dates in the future, or other unexplainable anomalies. What they clearly had in common was their race (which Florida actually records in its voter registrations): over half were African-American.

Jeb picked the company with the highest $$$ bid to "scrub" the database, and somehow the result is that a group of overwhelmingly Democratic-registered voters are removed from the rolls. The story is reported in the European press as it's happening, but not in U.S. media until months after Bush's inauguration.

Oh, but the ballots were paper.

BTW, did I say they used paper ballots?

Bush was a C student, doesn't read newspapers, and is proud of his ignorance.

Whether he rightfully earned even a C-average is questionable. "Legacy" status--i.e. old money, and family connections--was the reason for Yale admitting him. Some say this status also confers the inability to score less than a C at Yale, but the truth of this assertion will likely remain as murky as the Skull and Bones legends.

Asked to name his favorite book, he cited the The Very Hungry Caterpillar on the grounds it influenced him as a child (the book wasn't published until Bush was an adult).

Gore is vain and corrupt as any politician: but on the criterion of not being functionally illiterate, he soars above Commander Bunnypants.

("That woman; I never interviewed her."--Bush's response, after the publication of Gail Sheehy's article in which she suggested he might have a learning disability such as dyslexia. Was Bush aware his utterance does not have the same meaning as, "She never interviewed me"?)

sterilize imperfections...sterilize imperfections...STERILIZE!

Not quite the same: but people are constantly providing recordings of their voice calls, with implicit consent. I'm stunned (and amused) by some of the extremely sensitive info left on my answering machine or voicemail by people who thought they'd reached someone else.

not surprisingly, I do in fact listen to this sort of thing. which is probably why I've never found a single thing in iTunes supposedly-huge selection I'd want to download.

amazon's OK. but only if the CD is unavailable or very expensive. CDs are still a better buy. lossless, and you can always rip them again if you need to (not that I don't keep backups of my HD...)

digital.othermusic.com sells music without DRM, and at the highest bitrate for lossy MP3 (higher than amazon). oh yeah, there is one small hitch: you probably haven't ever heard of 95% of their (relatively small) selection, unless your favorite bands are Six Organs of Admittance and Nurse With Wound.

for UK fans of similar oddness, there's www.boomkat.com which is the only on-line retailer offering files in FLAC format, so far as I know.

The "candela" and "candeloo" electric-light candles (from vessel.com) recharge simply by placing them on a plugged-in mat -- no metal-to-metal contact. Somewhat impressive...but they use proprietary Ni-Cad batteries, and anyway don't have much of a reputation for reliability.