In response to our post about pay phones, Contrarian reader AN points out that people concerned about the vanishing phone booth can adopt one of the gorgeous British Telecom kiosks at left. Well, you can if you are a British municipal authority. The cost? Free, without a phone; £300 per year with pay phone service. Not sure who would want to adopt the booth at right....
A friend asked recently why I had not written about the MLA expenses flap, and I confessed that I have trouble summoning much outrage over the issue. While I admire Brian Flinn's dogged pursuit of the facts in AllNovaScotia.com, I fear that the public and the media are almost as much to blame for the problem as our lawmakers. The public nurses an attitude of begrudgery toward politicians, and the media fans these embers at every opportunity. This is not our most attractive quality, and it makes it almost impossible for MLAs — who by definition must set their own salaries...
The New York Times checked out a sidewalk booth outside the Fast & Fresh Supermarket Deli & Grocery on Queens Boulevard in Kew Gardens, NY. Benjamin Patir called his son because he was lonely and, perhaps more important, because he had a quarter. Robert J. Covelli called his son, too, to find out if, at some point during the more than 24 hours he spent in custody, he had become, for the first time, a grandfather. Frank Federico, fresh from a courthouse jail cell, called his mother, who spared him any lectures and asked him if he needed a ride home. The...
Still on the subject of aircraft, remember US Airways Flight 1549, the Airbus 320 that set down safely in New York's Hudson River after losing both its engines to a collision with Canada geese? Exosphere3D, a Denver company that "specializes in technical animation and scientific visualization of complex data sets," has combined the wealth of publicly available radar data, cockpit and air traffic control recordings, and flight recorder information to create a series of startling 3D animations the tell the story in a way that would have been inconceivable a decade ago. I've embedded the best of the bunch...
More on Flying 101 here. More pics after the jump.
A combination of actual paid work, managing the film series, and unusually exotic travel have kept Contrarian away from WordPress much of the last month. We will try to do better, dear readers....