The SF Chronicle has been running a series of columns by a taxicab driver who works the graveyard shift. Night Cab is excellent reading, in a kind of literature noir, hardboiled way. If you like HBO's "Taxicab Confessions," you'll like this guy's point of view.

In the distance, I spot a hand in the air. By his clothes you know he's no college graduate. As he gets in my memory for faces kicks in. I don't have a good feeling.

He tells me he wants to go to Jack's Bar at the Cannery.

"My name is Joey. I'm the owner of Tommy's Joynt," he says. "I have a billfold packed with C-notes from my cash-rich restaurant."

I glance at him in the rearview. "That's right, Tommy's Joynt," I say, "where you are the dishwasher. Show me your C-notes."

He doesn't. Now he tells me to take him to the Marina...

Neologism of the Week

NPR coins Driveway Moment in a new section wherein they ask readers to submit descriptions of those times when "what's on NPR is so good that as you arrive back home you sit in your driveway listening until the end of the story."
Interesting term. Sort of describes that thing I do when a song I haven't heard on the radio in a long time comes on just as I'm pulling into the garage and I shut off the engine, bop my head to the music, and feel incredibly silly but enjoy it anyway. Last time it happened? Think it was "(Just Like) Romeo and Juliet" by the Reflections.

Darwin Award Candidate

You've probably heard about this one already, but it was news to moi. Seems that a week ago a 26-year-old man in Madison, Wisconsin, was having a problem with head lice (which tells you something right there). So he does the usual thing you're supposed to do—rents a hotel room, douses a towel with rubbing alcohol, and winds it around his head like a turban. Then he lights a cigarette. Technically, he can't be a Darwin Award nominee because he survived, but the "second- and third-degree burns over about 50 percent of his body" he received should get him at least an Honorable Mention.

They Don't Deserve to Live

The Carr brothers, Jonathan and Reginald, who committed the Wichita Horror crime a couple years back finally go on trial today. No, the Raven isn't all upset about the weird media silence over this case. It is perfectly clear why this crime, which is absolutely far worse than anything I've heard of in my life before, hasn't drawn much attention. But the fact that it hasn't says something very important about our society and is something to ponder deeply. An article by Stephen Webster at Frontpage does provide the details in full, but it's hard to read them without weeping.

Eh?

Santa Clara Valley's YWCA has come up with a way for women to protect themselves against certain kinds of date-rape incidents. They're distributing special drink coasters to female students at San Jose State University. You can touch a drop of a drink to a part of the coaster and it changes color if the booze has been spiked with Rohypnol or the like. So, the message here seems to be: "Gotcher coaster? Hit those bars!" I'd say the bars and drinks from strangers are the problem, but I'm a tad conservative.

9:22:48 AM