Information is power?

Work was interesting today. I checked the mail and there was a donation from an inmate at the Utah State Prison. Hmmmm. That was nice of him, I thought. Prisoners don't have very much money and he sent $20 in. Then the snoopy part of me wanted to know what he did to land in prison. While doing my research I happened upon this website: Utah's Right to Know. Basically you can look up all kinds of public information: criminal records, DUI charges, divorces, sex offenders in your neighborhood and salaries of all state employees. I found out our donor had a pretty long rap sheet: theft, aggravated robbery, false use of personal information, fleeing a police officer, possession of drug paraphernalia, telephone harassment and violation of a protective order. Interesting. It was thoughtful of him to send in a donation and I'll send him a nice thank you card.

I also looked up the sex offenders in my neighborhood. There are 3 within two blocks of my house. I find the sex offender registry controversial and I'm not sure how I feel about it. While I don't particularly want to live near sex offenders, why are they the only criminals who have to register? Why don't murderers have to register? I don't want to live by them either. Some would say that any criminal, whether a murderer, thief or a rapist, has paid his/her debt to society by serving time in prison. Unfortunately I have a few criminals in my family (although no sex offenders) and I know the system sucks. Sometimes even more so when one is released from prison. I don't know. Like I said, I don't really have a definitive opinion on the issue, but it makes me think. Have you seen Little Children? It kind of brings up some of the same issues and is an excellent movie. Not for the faint of heart, however.

On to a more uplifting topic. My sister Heather has a radio show coming up!


For those of you who don't know, Heather lives down in Moab and has a monthly show (Blue Plate Special) on the local community radio station KZMU. She will be filling in on the Gaelic Circle show tomorrow 4-6pm MST. This week's show will be made even more interesting and eclectic because there will be some live action in the studio from a Native American group called Blackfire. You can listen live here.

Quick note on the Michigan primary: can't wait to see who wins for the Republicans...it's such a tight race! I was not amused to hear that Hillary Clinton did not take her name off the ticket for the primary today. Way to show your solidarity Hill!


In other news, Hillary and Barack agreed to stop all the mean talk about race. Great idea! However, it will be interesting to see if this affects the South Carolina primary where all candidates will be courting the African-American vote.

I am anxiously awaiting the opening of There Will Be Blood on Friday. Daniel Day-Lewis AND Paul Thomas Anderson?? Why are people with 3 names so brilliant?




Lastly, as a fan of all things Mac: I want one of the new Macbook Air laptops!! I wish I was rich.