I read a story in the Washington Post a couple days ago that mentioned Herndon's continued efforts to regulate or do away with the sites where day laborers meet for jobs . Herndon and the proposed sites are literally right down the street from me. While I can see where the opponents are coming from, I think I see a few flaws in their logic:

"At the 7-Eleven, it's an eyesore [...] Not too many people go to that 7-Eleven anymore . . . and now they want to put that in a residential part of town."

Several people said in public comments that they worried that the day workers would lower property values and would bring gang violence and diseases.

First, does anyone actually go to 7-Eleven anymore? The last time I was inside a 7-Eleven was on a family trip, pestering my dad for The Dark Crystal collectible cards and those rub-on kits where you could rub stickers of He-Man and Orko onto cardboard backdrops. The paucity of visitors probably has more to do with the footlong hot dog which has been travelling on the treadmill grill for over fifteen years like a hamster with a broken spirit. (Incidentally, every store uses the same hot dog -- they FedEx it around so they can be in the Guiness Book under "well-travelled dogs").

It's true that property values will probably go down near any official day laborer site, and it's minimally possible that the day laborers will form into a gang (aptly named MS-6d2) and steal hammers from Home Depot at gunpoint (actually Lowes, since the hammers at Home Depot would be out of stock). But, diseases? Come on.

I asked Jeeves about day laborer diseases, but all he could tell me was that they should wear gloves at the construction site, or else Aspergillus will put blood in their sputum. Google agreed with this prognosis, but added that illegal immigrants have higher rates of sexually transmitted diseases. The solution, then, for those worried Herndon residents? Don't have sex outside of 7-Eleven or any other designated day laborer site! Using protection while having sex in a port-a-John will also help to keep your sputum bloodfree.

I also think it's cute that visiting www.washintonpost.com automatically redirects you to the site with the correct spelling.

The next Harry Potter book comes out on Saturday. I'll probably pick it up in hardcover since I just finished rereading Traitor's Knot. The stories are always decently written, though hopefully Rowling's gotten a new editor to trim out the endless pages of "Harry's angry. GRR! Harry likes girls and is confused. This makes Harry angry. GRR!" that plagued the last book.

Today's funny video from my archives is a montage of cute cat moments from America's Funniest Home Videos (2MB WMV)