Ten (or More) Twitter Laws

Here are my Ten (or More) Twitter Laws.

1. Thou shalt not abuse the DM.
2. Thou shalt not whore links non-stop.
3. Thou shalt not post nothing but quotes.
4. Thou shalt not @reply exclusively.
5. Thou shalt not tweet without spell check.
6. Thou shalt not engage in gratuitous txtspk.
7. Thou shalt not feed (follow) the Twitter sluts.
8. Thou shalt not tweet the cursed terms, marketing or porn, lest a plague of bot followers descend upon thee.
9. Thou shalt not complain about how hard your life is because you have to travel all over the damned world all the time.
10. Thou shalt not follow me in the hopes that I will follow you back.

And some bonus guidelines.
If your Twitter name is something like RainbowOneCarpets then you can rest assured that I have absolutely no interest in your tweets.
If your Twitter name is something girly like SweetCakes1980 and your registered name is George Jones then you will not be getting followed back.
If your Twitter stream is loaded with links to your blog posts and/or other news articles without any personal tweets then you will not be getting followed back.
If your Twitter stream is impossible to read because you thought light print on a light background looked cool then you will not be getting followed back.

Cycling outside the bike lane

When is it OK for bicyclists to leave the bike lane?

The following rule of the road for cyclists comes from California Vehicle Code section 21208 (a).

According to the code, whenever a bike lane is present, cyclists traveling slower than the normal speed of traffic should remain in the bike lane except when:

* Overtaking and passing another bicycle, vehicle, or pedestrian within the lane or about to enter the lane if the overtaking and passing cannot be done safely within the lane.
* Preparing for a left turn at an intersection or into a private road or driveway.
* It?s necessary to leave the bicycle lane to avoid debris or other hazardous conditions.
* Approaching a place where a right turn is authorized.

The law also provides that no cyclist shall leave a bicycle lane until the movement can be made with reasonable safety.

Read the full law online at www.dmv.ca.gov.

Banging Patients and Getting Away With It

Crimes Reported To State Not Forwarded For Prosecution

A psychiatrist who has admitted to having sex with female patients will never be prosecuted for his crime.When Dr. Kim Nagel surrendered his medical license in 2004, he admitted to having sex with at least two of his female patients, 7NEWS reported.

Yet since neither the medical board nor the attorney general's office reported Nagel's apparent criminal behavior to the local district attorney, it is now too late for prosecution.

Which is, of course, ridiculously insane. He's admitted to his crimes but, because someone in the AG's office and another in the medical board office was too lazy or incompetent to file the charges, he gets off (yes, pun intended) scot free.

The deeply wrong nature of this situation irks me in ways that make it hard to sit up straight (no, that might not make sense).

Whoever was negligent in filing the charges should be held accountable for their inaction. How many other criminals got a Get-Out-of-Trouble-Free card from the office? Any murderers? Rapists? Child molesters?

This is a serious breach of the process of law and an affront to justice.

Dr. Kim Nagel is free to reapply for a license to practice medicine anywhere in this country and that is grotesquely wrong. People in positions of authority who abuse that authority should most definitely be tried and punished for abusing that authority. Anything else condones thier activity and sends the wrong message to victims and potential perpetrators of similar crimes.