This post in the Austin Chronicle details the use of US government-supplied medical marijuana.

http://www.austinchronicle.com/issues/dispatch/2003-06-20/pols_feature.html

Quarter Ounce a Day

Reading this article, I'd imagine that Europeans are puzzled at the insane politics of American law and the John Ashcroft-led assault on state laws that support medical use of marijuana. Photos and insightful reading today.

Dear friends, a blues great died just Saturday and this is such a dear person who made an impact on so many: John Lee Hooker.

Here is a clip from the NYTimes story on this:

June 22, 2003

Blues Guitarist John Lee Hooker Dies at 83

By JON PARELES

John Lee Hooker, the bluesman whose stark, one-chord boogies were some of the feistiest and most desolate songs of the 20th century, died yesterday in his sleep at his home in Los Altos, Calif., said his agent, Mike Kappus. He was 83.

Mr. Hooker's music stayed close to its Mississippi Delta roots. Usually playing an electric guitar with a menacing hint of distortion, he picked barbed, syncopated guitar riffs that went on to become cornerstones of rock. Electrified for tough urban crowds, they harked back to the rural South and to West Africa. "I don't play a lot of fancy guitar," he once told an interviewer. "The kind of guitar I want to play is mean, mean, mean licks."

Sad sad sad!

This post is entered with the permission of it's author, Tom Coates - click on the link to see his excellent blog, plasticbag.org

The Ten Commandments of Blogging

* The Ten Commandments of Weblogging

* I am the log of the web. You shall have no other blogs but me.

* You shall not make for yourself other weblogs on other content management systems and look at them and get all wistful and think about changing to them instead.

* You shall not mention dodgy weblog CMSs in the same breath as proper ones like Blogger and Moveable Type. Bloxsom is not a proper weblogging system. It's a potato.

* Remember the Bloggie nomination day. For it is truly a holy day and if you don't remember and self-nominate and vote for yourself lots of times and get your friends to do so too, then you're probably screwed. But be careful, 'cos if Choire finds out you're in serious shit.

* Honor your blog-father and your blog-mother at blogtree.com - or get blog-smacked-around-the-head by Dave Winer.

* You shall not murder the English language (or whatever language it is you speak) just because you're l33t. Particularly not if you're a teenager. Especially not if you like Linkin Park.

* Thou shalt not commit weblog-adultery with other people's hard-earned links unless you carefully mark them with a "via" credit. The same applies to their girlfriends, boyfriends and members of their immediate family.

* Thou shalt not steal your design (except from Kottke).

* Thou shalt not lie on your weblog (seriously, that's bad).

* You shall not covet your neighbour's domain; you shall not covet your neighbour's html, nor his homemade CMS, nor his hosting arrangement, nor anything that is your neighbour's. Except maybe his traffic.