Ruby Sinreich's blog

Warning: this post might constitute feeding the trolls, something to which I am adamantly opposed. However, the blog Chapel Hill Watch has continued to push the boundaries of taste with their strange personal attacks on politicians with whom they disagree. In their recent "Roll Call" post, CHW speculates about the personal relationships of Chapel Hill Town Council Member Donna Bell and Mayor Mark Kleinschmidt in light of their absences at a Council meeting that was held on Valentine's Day.

I just received this PDF of the Town of Chapel Hill's Personnel Appeals Committee from the attorney for the "Sanitation 2" Al McSurely, who writes: "Two out of five ain't bad. The decision for Ms. Rebecca Clark's nephew is due out this weekend, Sunday. We will be holding a Sanitation 2 Support Service next week, as this popular education process begins to move into its second phase. "

Three committee members voted against each of the points of Kerry Bigelow's appeal, and in most cases two voted for the appeal. A decision on Clyde Clark, the other half of the "2" is expected this weekend. The members are: Chair Anita Badrock, Delores Bailey, Asila Calhoun, Jim Curis, and Derek Hoar. The memo does not state which members voted in which ways.

Here's an excerpt from one of the findings... 

We're experimenting with a new type of content on OP, and we're calling them "blurts." The idea is to be similar to a tweet. It's limited to 129 characters plus a link. I will be doing some work on the site to theme the blurts so that they don't just look like blog posts that lost their body, although that's pretty much how they will function.

A few selected bloggers will be piloting blurts as an experiment and then I expect to open them up to everyone. You can see them on the Latest content page, and they might even show up on the front page once in a while.

I have some other changes planned for OP, but I'm starting with this as it's the easiest to get done. Let me know what you think.