I spent a little time yesterday mourning the loss of my old hot dog stand, from back when I lived at the Camel Clutch — which is also going away. Sim and Sue’s (I never met Sue) nourished and sustained me for a year, and I think I can blame at least part of my post-college increase in stature on those fries. Oh, those fries. I haven’t yet found a new stand with the charm of Sim and Sue’s , and I don’t think I ever will.

And the Camel Clutch, well, I’ll miss it too. Thanks for the memories, Mr. Burdick.

I just caught myself screaming at the television. I was watching ST:TNG, and someone ripped some of the “flesh” off Data’s face, revealing his insides, which look like a (relatively friendly, compared to say, a Terminator) squishy circuit board with lots of blinking lights. Here’s what I screamed: “Why are there blinking lights under his skin?! No one can see those lights!” How can I have been watching Star Trek for all these years and never noticed this? I knew I had to post to my web log immediately.

Living in Chicago, in a predominantly Hispanic neighborhood, I fear for my straight Protestant white culture every time I go to my favorite gay taqueria and am served chilaquiles by a drag queen. When I see things on the internet like this, it just sends chills down my spine.

Eugene Volokh doesn’t like Hellboy.

HELLBOY: Just saw it yesterday, and didn’t much like it. I enjoy action movies, and I rather liked Spiderman and X-Men 2, so I’m not against movies based on comics. But this one was pretty disappointing — formulaic, without much wit or innovative detail to make it fun despite the formula.

Tim Burke liked Hellboy:

Hellboy gets it right because it tells a story honestly. As one of my students noted, when you see an opening quote about the Seven Elder Gods of Chaos, you know that youÕre deep in the heart of Pulpville. The storytellers know that too, and they satisfyingly plunk their butts down right where they belong and stay there consistently throughout the film.

Philthee didn’t like Jersey Girl:

ITEM: 04/7/2004 MOVIE REVIEW! Jersey Girl Sucks.

I watched Lawrence of Arabia the other day on DVD. It pains me to admit that I enjoyed Hellboy more.

The flag of the city of Chicago is rich in history and symbolism. In fact, the municipal code specifies, in some detail, the design and meaning of each of the flag’s elements. However, the code also leaves much to interpretation, especially the shape and placement of the stars.

There shall be four bright red stars with sharp points, six in number, set side by side, close together, next to the staff in the middle third of the surface of the flag.

So we’ve got four stars with six sharp points, close together. Here are a few interpretations of this instruction from around the web.

The first is from a patch the Chicago Fire sell. Next we have the stars from the Chicago Public Library information on the flag page. Then the stars from Wikipedia’s Chicago Flag entry. Finally, the stars from an eBay auction of an “authentic” Chicago Police flag patch.

All of the above representations are very nearly perfect hexagrams . The star polygon {6/2} is made from six points, equally spaced upon a circle, connected via straight lines. It’s also known as the “Star of David”, and you may recognize it as the preeminent symbol of Judaism. Would the points of the hexagram be characterized as “sharp?” Not compared to the pentagram, which you may recognize as the “normal” five-pointed star.

The pentagram has a “pointy” angle of 36 degrees (more about this angle later), but the hexagram is somewhat dull, with only a 60 degree point. Fortunately, most actual Chicago flags feature a, um, pointier star.

The first is from an actual photograph of an actual flag , flying in front of a downtown church. The other is from eBay auctions of real flags.

These stars are considerably sharper or “pointier” than the regular Star of David. To my eye, they look much more “Chicago” than the more regular 6-pointed stars. How much pointier should the stars be? Well, I’ve come up with a system by which we can derive the proper shape of the Chicago flag’s star, and I’ll suggest it as the future standard by which all Chicago flag stars should be constructed.

First, consider the pentagram. We can all agree that its points are “sharp” and its proportions are pleasing. Interestingly, its points are golden triangles, well known to be pleasing to the eye. Let us construct a six-pointed star according to the same pleasing principles.

First, construct a regular hexagram:

Using the hexagon produced inside, plan a golden triangle as the point.

Multiply this triangle for each face of the hexagon and fill with red.

Here we have what I think are the proper proportions for the Chicago star. It is certainly distinct from the Star of David, but is also founded upon geometrical principles and resembles in proportion (golden proportion!) the five-pointed stars we know so well.

I’ve also helpfully calculated the ratio between the inner and outer radii. The outer radius (the circumradius) is 2.4 times the length of the inner radius (which, in Adobe parlance, is the circle which intersects the points of concavity, not the incircle of the hexagon). I won’t show my work here, but let me tell you, it was a pretty good review of sophomore year trig to get this number. Now that I’ve done all the work, you can use Adobe Illustrator to create these stars effortlessly. Here’s the relevant dialog box:

Please feel free to call or write to your alderman about this issue. Let’s get this taken care of, Chicago!