Tim Murphy, Hello, Columbus. New York Times Travel Magazine, Winter 2010 (published on Nov. 18, 2010; not a blog).
http://tmagazine.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/11/12/hello-columbus/?scp=1&sq=columbus%20gay&st=cse
("They’re the fathers of 19-month-old Amoret, whom they adopted from a local agency. (Since Ohio forbids gay couples from adopting a child together, Grote is the legal father and Neal has co-custody rights.)")
Note:
(a) Henry Rollins
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Rollins
(Rollins has become an outspoken human rights activist, most vocally for gay rights, while deriding any suggestion that he himself is gay)
(b) The noun "strip" in "a funky strip of cafes, bars and galleries":
"a commercially developed area especially along a highway"
www.m-w.com
(c) tatty (adj; perhaps akin to Old English tætteca rag — more at TATTER): "rather worn, frayed, or dilapidated : SHABBY <a tatty shirt>"
(d) Bushwick
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushwick
(a neighborhood in Brooklyn)
(e) Tenderloin, San Francisco
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenderloin,_San_Francisco
(a neighborhood in downtown San Francisco; section 2 History)
The Tenderloin in Manhattan no longer exists.
(f) Thadeus is a last (originally) and first name of certain people.
(g) kit home: "A structure that contains prefabricated components and is put together by a contractor." A real estate dictionary.
(h) For "a jewel-box Victorian or Craftsman fixer-upper," see
jewel box (n): "something (as a theater) of exquisite or ornate design"
(i) Ohio University
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ohio_University
(a public university located in Athens, Ohio; established 1804)
(j) periwinkle (n): "a light purplish blue —called also periwinkle blue"
Originally periwinkle is a group of herbs with flowers of this color.
Vinca
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vinca
(k) For onesie, see infant bodysuit
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infant_bodysuit
--------------------Separately
(1)
(a) Lisa Wangsness, Robinson not seeking a quiet retirement; 1st openly gay Episcopal bishop plans to be active voice. Boston Globe, Dec. 5, 2010.
http://www.boston.com/news/local/new_hampshire/articles/2010/12/05/robinson_not_seeking_a_quiet_retirement/
Paragraph 3, which was highlighted in the print:
"'Jesus was constantly upsetting people,' he [V. Gene Robinson, the first openly gay bishop in the worldwide Anglican Communion] said in an interview at the diocesan offices in Concord last week. 'If we started proclaiming what Jesus did, which is our love for the marginalized and the outcast, and started demanding legislation and money that helped these people, there would be hell to pay. And that’s exactly the kind of Gospel trouble I think we should be in.’
My comment:
(i) hell to pay: "dire consequences <if he's late there'll be hell to pay>"
(ii) There is no need to read the rest.
(b) There was an article whose one sentence caught my eyes. There is no need to read the rest also (it's about a MBA garduate; the article is fun, though).
Business Language' When Tom Adams lost his job at Enron, his newly completed MBA gave him the confidence to make a bid for the top job at Rosetta Stone, writes Andrew Baxter. Financial Times, Dec. 6, 2010 (in an insert/booklet that came with the newspaer that day).
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/4c9f4e52-fdfd-11df-853b-00144feab49a.html?catid=74&SID=google#axzz17YPVpsyM
("If you don't ask, you won't get")
(2) California Proposition 8 (2008)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Proposition_8_(2008)
My comment: The ballot proposition, that "only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California," was passed by voters in California. Legal challenges ensued.
Firstly California Supreme Court turned back the challenges based on state constitution, in Strauss v. Horton (decided May 25, 2009).
Then legal challenges were mounted in federal court system, asserting that the ban violated equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the federal constitution. Perry v. Schwarzenegger. United States district court Judge Vaughn R. Walker overturned Proposition 8 on Aug. 4, 2010, agreeing with plaintiffs' attorneys Theodore Olson and David Boies. Both governor Schwarzenegger and attorney general Brown (who was elected in early November as governor) refused to appeal. United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit (based at SanFrancisco) heard the oral argument of the appeal Monday (Dec. 6, 2010). In my view, there is a fatal flaw in the appeal, that Proposition 8 proponents have no standing to carry on the appeal after the two California officials refused to do so--and the appeal court hammered that issue in the hearing. Thus, the case may not go to US Supreme Court after all. Rather the district court decision wil stand, in favor of gays and lesbians throughout the land of United States.