This was a great article, and many among Providence's art scene (RISDE and Brown students, mostly) had known about Townsend and Yoto's project.

However, to further understand a bit more about their motivation, know this: Like many "what were they thinking" architectural projects, the Providence Place Mall begs to be understood. It sits, hulking and imposing, in what should have been an area of pedestrian renaissance in downtown Providence. The mall faces (and weirdly straddles) the river, has an entrance directly off the freeway, and is utterly out of scale with the rest of the neighborhood. Its entrances and exits are almost impossible to find once you're inside.

Given the mystery of it, Yoto and Townsend were basically doing post-modern archeaology with Nordstrom's swapped out for Tut's tomb.

On a recent trip to visit relatives in Florida, I was offered a bonding opportunity with the youngest member of my marital family. My options: Lion Country Safari, Disney, or the Kiddie Spa.

The idea of Disney makes me break out in itchy scales.

Zoos make me sad.

I went with the spa.

The women of the family convened at 11AM (an appointment we were told we were "lucky to get...we have a birthday party booked at noon!") and we hauled the soon-to-be-manicured youngest out of her car seat. Yes her car seat.

They give manicures to three-year-olds. This is not a joke. Sadly, those in charge of the three-year-old seemed to think this was a fine idea.

(By the way, the booked-solid afternoon birthday party was for a seven-year-old.)

Beauty camp is, therefore, no real shocker, but no less depressing.

First off, as usual, Clark-Flory does a great job in hitting all the right points about a sensitive topic. Transgender folks have so many battles to fight when it comes to society that they deserve in-depth coverage in the media, not sensationalism.

Second, Jamie's cute.

Third--with all due respect to Paris and Milan--she lives in New York, the fashion center of the world, and she's wearing hideous purple pumps and acid washed jeans? Mother of god. I would not go through sexual reassignment surgery, hormones, broken hearts, and potential social rejection to dress like that.

(Oh, and on a final note: "Tranny" is usually short for "transvestite", not transgendered or transexual. In the latter context, it can be considered a slur. In the former, it's just slang.)

Would you shop for houseplants at Macy's? Would you buy shoes at Home Depot? No. So why use a site that is built for social networking when you're interested in keeping up with professional colleagues?

I'm utterly unable to understand why anyone, at any age, uses FaceSpace or MyBook for professional networking. LinkedIn is a much better, safer, more appropriate web-based networking interface--that's what it was built for.

And finally, if you don't want a past/present/potential future employer or colleague reading something, don't put on the web.

Thanks, King. While I'm only a member of Red Sox Nation by birth, and have to have my visa stamped involuntarily ever summer, you are spot-on. The Rays were SMOKIN' hot this year. They are a young, dynamic, and interesting team. It's such a disservice to baseball to complain about two good-to-great teams who will provide some (hopefully) fun and interesting moments in the series.

I'm not going to sit here and promote the Sox "just because". You have to earn it, and they didn't this year for a variety of reasons. So with all due respect, I'm checking out of RS Nation for the year and happily returning to my homeland of NonSportsFandom. But in the meantime, I wish the best to the ALCS and hope the Rays represent.

Thanks so much for this interview. What a wonderful way to hear about the strength of character and commitment to family, sanity, kindess and reason that seems to run in the Obama family.

In light of Ms. Saks Shopping Regular Hocky Mom, the conversation with Ms. Soetoro-Ng was refreshing. She demonstrates the kind of family value that any American would be proud to stand behind.

In the late '80s, Leary was working the Boston comedy scene, and his alma mater, Emerson College, had just been awarded a chunk of money by alum Norman Lear. The money was to establish a program in Comedy Writing. Leary was one of the first teachers, and I was one of his students.

Leary also became my advisor during my senior year at Emerson, and I can tell you this: The man is one thing; his persona, another. On a personal level, he's a decent guy (and by all accounts a pretty devoted dad), but he's cultivated--to great effect--a stage persona, no differently than Stephen Colbert or Howard Stern.

Leary was a thoughtful advisor, a good teacher, and I learned a great deal from him about both classic comedy, comic timing, why good comedic acting is such an art. A perfect example of his deceny was the class he held the morning of the shuttle Challenger explosion. Leary used it as a teachable moment about comedy: When does it become acceptable to laugh in the face of tragedy? How does comedy play a role in healing? He was moved (as was everyone in the class) by the scope of the disaster.

Don't get me wrong: The man's not a saint, by any means; he had a reputation for all sorts of bad habits and bad behavior. But he's not a monster, either.

With regard to his detractors and cries of plagiarism, most of us would be hard-pressed to come up with truly "original" comedy. It's derivative, because the circles that most comedian/nes run in are so incestuous.

Just some thoughts from someone who knew the guy on a completely different level.