Ends & Odds & The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing

aaronjv is bringing the HP Lovecraft Film Festival to Los Angeles. It'll be a one-day program (9-11-10) of some of the best films shown at the previous HPL filmfests in Portland, Oregon. Get your tickets.

Nifty news that a MA court struck down part of DOMA, saying (as far as I can tell - IANAL) that legislation about what is or isn't a valid marriage is a right retained by the states. Going further into IANAL-dom, I'm a little confused about the scope of the ruling. As I understand it, unless it is appealed higher up the court system, the ruling applies only to MA. So is (part of) DOMA 'banned in Boston' but operative elsewhere? How does a federal law live a twilight existence like this? My mental picture of a law being declared unconstitutional has it being banished to the outer darkness amidst flames of eternal woe, never more to trouble the sunlit lands. But it appears that it has only been kicked out of MA, but remains on the federal lawbooks. Fuckin' laws, how do they work?
( Further meanderings. Sure I could make a half dozen separate entries, but I'm aiming for a tag record. )

LA Natural History Museum reopens

Following restoration work on the 1913 building, the LA NHM reopens on Sunday with the debut of The Age of Mammals, featuring specimens from Rancho La Brea and from further afield.