Drive-Bys

Oooo! Add this to my birthday/Christmas/no-reason-whatsoever gift list, please! Moose and squirrel -- they're particular faves of mine.
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Giggle of the Day:

Dr Teddy Wu, who is currently working in the neurology department at Christchurch Hospital, said he believed it was the first time someone had been hospitalised by a "hickey".

I nearly wet myself laughing.

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Explosive Road? Sheesh! Naming it that was bad karma waiting to happen...
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Excuse my French, but where the f*ck were the parents here?

The boy and his sister, believed to be about 4 years old, were playing in the elevator when the incident occurred, according to residents at the Plaza Hotel, 26 W. Clinton St. in downtown Joliet.

The accident happened around 3:30 p.m Sunday. The toddler left his family's room on the second floor of the Hotel Plaza and got into an elevator, according to Joliet Police Lt. Jeff Allbert. The boy apparently started playing with the elevator's buttons, he said.

The elevator rose, then stopped, leaving a 10-inch gap between the elevator and shaft. The toddler slipped through the gap and fell about 30 feet to the basement, Allbert said.

This is inexcusable parenting.
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How do I feel after having a day to cogitate on the Bears' loss to the Packers?

Two words: Good. Lord.

Yep.

(Read the whole thing. Morrissey nails it.)
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Seems like the folks down in Springfield have finally gotten the message:

The new push is a crackdown on the rising cost of health care for retired state workers. The program costs the state nearly $500 million a year, and more than 90 percent of the retirees and survivors pay no premiums....
The idea is to start charging the retirees who can afford to pay for their health care. And new state research shows some of the 84,100 retirees and survivors appear to possess the ability to pay — the average annual household income for a retired state worker younger than 65 was nearly $78,000.

The sizable rocking-chair income is the result of waves of state workers taking advantage of sweet early retirement plans that allowed them to walk out of government jobs in their 50s, start collecting pension benefits and still have time to start a second career.

The retirees are responsible for co-payments, even if nine out of 10 of them don't pay premiums. The state's costs rose more than 10 percent to hit $488.2 million in the last budget year, and that doesn't even include dental and vision expenses. Some of the increase is attributed to workers who have left Illinois for warmer climates. The cost for their care can be higher because they can't always get the group rate discounts of a managed-care plan when they move to another state.

Yes! It's about time those who can afford to pay for this are held to account. I don't begrudge those who can't afford to pay, but I do begrudge those who can and don't. Especially those who retire on more than I make in any given year.
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