Should kids start wearing sledding helmets?
Yeah, probably.
Anyway, the best place to sled on the Northside is not at the Old Sanitarium (Health and Human Services Building) even though from the street it looks like a good ride.
It's a long, slow ride and takes forever to climb back up and if you do manage to get any speed, which you probably wont, there's nothing but a chain link fence at the bottom to stop you.
(Enter Helmet)
The best place to sled up here is on the man-made hill behind Warner Park's Dog Park. It's in the back and not a lot of people go there. You can go down the sledding hill which is really steep , but curves back up to stop your sled from going on forever and thus making for a long up-hill walk, but also there's a short hill going the other way for kiddies or if you're just trying out a snowboard for the first time.
It also has a clearly designated Sledding area vs. Climbing-back-up area to avoid accidents.

Good Times.

1. I'm sick of call-in shows on the radio where people say that Obama just can't win the election because "other people" are too racist to vote for a black man. Zogby says they're wrong.
(Obama wont win due to lack of experience. It's not exactly going to be Alan Keyes he's running agianst.)
2. I'm against anything that has the words "Stephen" and "Nass" and "Education" in them together.
An attorney general's opinion declaring it unconstitutional to block student transfers from one district to another on the basis of race could have far-reaching implications for the Madison school district.
I can see the point that race shouldn't be an exclusive eliminating factor in preventing students from taking advantage of the open enrollment program, but there has to be some socio-economic balance and The People tend to not do it themselves. (See Sun Prairie.)
In the long run, why would voters approve funding for schools when their kids aren't even going there (it's bad enough that senior citizens who have long since forgotten their own free education have a huge say in what is spent on our schools) and why would a district make any effort to correct racial imbalances when they can get state subsidies for taking on the elite of another district?
There should be a new financial incentive to keep schools integrated racially and economically, or maybe they should have to make a fair trade. Student for student.
3.A group of youths followed a bus rider home Thursday night and robbed him of his cell phone and a Sony Playstation at gunpoint, police said.
Why would you take a Playstation on the bus?
4. The DNR could try a little harder to get people to stop driving during a Air Quality Alert Day.

I know this isn't Madison, but it's a close suburb to the north, and Sun Prairie is the fastest growing city in Wisconsin and in an age where school closings consolidations and funding are a constant issue for all communities I think it's really important to pay attention to what's going on when any community has this kind of a debate.
SUN PRAIRIE -- Sun Prairie residents are weighing whether, as students around the district are shuffled to fill a new elementary school, the make-up of a school with a lot of poor children should get an extra shake-up.
I understand when parents don't want their children to have to go to different schools or go to a different school than the kids down the block, but when you live in the fastest growing city in Wisconsin, that's bound ot happen. Property was cheap for a while during the housing boom, so there has to be room for adjustment.

Robin and Denny Ehrler, whose children, including a special needs third-grader, would shift to Westside, said they are against moving to the school because it is dirty and poorly maintained
But that's not what the majority of opponents are complaining about. They don't want their children to go to school with poor or minority kids.
The Ehrlers also argued that the self-esteem of poor Westside children may be harmed if they are further mixed with children from wealthier neighborhoods. And the Ehrlers predicted property values will drop.

Nice. Well at least they're honest about it.

Cynthia McKinney comes to Madison

McKinney has been a frequent critic of the Iraq war and President Bush's leadership. When in Congress, she introduced measures to impeach Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. She has also been a critic of Pentagon spending and the agency's mismanagement of funds...

Her press conference Tuesday drew about 30 people, including Green Party members and those who, as part of the "9/11 truth movement," question the official explanation for the terrorist attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Center.

She said she was "excoriated" and "vilified" by the mainstream media when she asked in Congress "What did the administration know and when did it know it?"

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
Noooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
Noooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

Savers lost: East-side thrift store closes after 10 years

Reasons why this is horroble news:
1. If you live on the North Side or the Near East or even just drive downtown from the East side and don't want to go travel long distances, spend gas, or you want to support the local economy to buy clothing/furniture/dishware/toys/everything you just lost your #1 option in my opnion.
2. The timing was suspiciously close to that of the opening of Super Hellmart, people who shopped at Savers for economic reasons may go to Hellmart instead!
3. A Family Dollar store just opened next door to the Savers, it was a perfect match!
4. The East Towne Salvation Army closed only a few months ago so now your thrift store options on the East Side are even more limited to;
A. Good Will. I'm all for non profits, but Good Will is on the really expensive side of used clothing and furniture, and there is not a lot of wiggle room, like sales or lower prices for lower quality, it's all $7.99 for jeans, $3.99 for a shirt $1.99 for kids stuff. People can do just as well at Target or Shopko.
B. St Vinnies. It's great if you already live there and are just walking or it's on your bus route but parking-not so great with kids and the selection is really really really picked over and again prices just aren't as good as they were at Savers or S.A.

It's a sad sad day, and just in time for winter. I'll be Madison Freecycling for sweaters for the kids this year.

Tammy Baldwin is doing Wisconsin proud by being one of the 56 cosponsors of Dennis Kucinich's HR333.
Also co-sponsoring(of note) is Steve Kagen, another Wisconsin representative from up nort., and Bobby Jindal, the republican Congressman from Louisianna who just won his state's run for Governor on an anti-corruption platform. Which I don't totally understand.

Sun Prairie voters FINALLY approve new High School, they voted to split the students between 9th and 10th grades at the old school, and 11th and 12th at a new school.
Sun Prairie is a very tight-knit community and this method of expanding the high schools is supposed to keep students together, while giving them more space.
The other questions on the referendum referred to building pools, which did not pass.
One $100 million vote at a time, I guess.

Living in America
This kindof crazy gunman shit happens every day all over the country and only makes headlines IF soneone is killed, or more like if two or more people are shot.

For example, just yesterday in suburbia Wisconsin where I work, I had to have an armed-flaked police escort to my van because there was a crazy person with a gun hiding behind the hockey rink I was parked in front of.
Nice.
I'll put in my 4 year old's baby book under "First involvement with a Swat Team".

But the real terror threat in the US is that there are "too many mosques". Prepare to be "infiltrated".