Banking on a Neglected Market

As for poor Charlie, riding forever 'neath the streets of Boston, he'll have the additional burden of enduring an endless stream of fast-food pitches and public-service announcements.

Bishops Seek Online Help

U.S. Catholic bishops are turning to the Internet to get advice from people who suffered sexual abuse at the hands of priests, the Globe also reported. "The survey, to be overseen by an Ohio lawyer who wrote a guidebook about preventing child sexual abuse, is intended to help shape the bishops' prevention efforts and their outreach to victims, many of whom remain dissatisfied with the behavior of church officials. Among the areas investigated by the survey is one that has received relatively little public attention to date: the impact of abuse on the spiritual lives of victims."

Victim Gary Bergeron of Lowell, Mass., told the paper that he thinks survivors and the church will benefit from the survey, while Barbara Blaine, president of Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, suggested that it "would be much easier and more effective if bishops would simply meet face-to-face with victims." On a more logistical note, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Bishops' Ad Hoc Committee on Sexual Abuse said the group would try to screen for false or repeat responses.

You May Experience Thumb Discomfort

"BlackBerry thumb:" it's the trendy new health condition that's sweeping the nation. According to a Knight-Ridder report that ran in today's Star-Ledger, "Repetitive stress injuries -- a common curse of desktop and laptop computer users -- are now afflicting people who type on handheld devices. As the sizes and prices of handheld typing devices continue to shrink, doctors and therapists caution that consumers need to treat their on-the-go text messaging work as a physical workout."

Here's some more: "While there's hardly an epidemic of BlackBerry-induced injuries, typing on little electronic devices can take a toll on tendons because it requires forceful micromovements from hand muscles. The miniature keypad leaves little room to use the stronger shoulder muscles, which would alleviate some strain. 'The endurance runs out in the smaller muscles faster,' says Stacey Doyon, a certified hand therapist and registered occupational therapist in Portland, Maine. And when those muscles grow exhausted, the body compensates by tightening the tendons, which connect muscles to bones."

The BlackBerry is just the latest technological device to save us time while adding to our physical misery. Knight-Ridder reporter Nicole C. Wong wrote up a handy sidebar to accompany the article, with digressions on carpal tunnel syndrome, trigger thumb (tendonitis from excessive bending of the thumb on little devices and the computer mouse), DeQuervain's tenosynovitis (from hitting the space bar with your bent thumb) and ulnar nerve impingement, resulting in the tingly feeling you get when typing in certain positions for too long. She also cites some safe-communicating practices. Read the story for items on "the drop," "the roll" and "the glide." They're not just for dodging bullets anymore.

I Was a Teenage Acronym

All those LOLs, ROTFLs, IMHOs, BTWs and STFUs horrify practitioners of traditional grammar, but FWIW, language experts say they should just TACP (that's Take A Chill Pill, which I am not sure if I just made up). The news, courtesy of Knight-Ridder, comes from a recent Washington symposium on "Netspeak," the language of the young gods of the online universe. "Critics object that Netspeak ignores or violates the usual rules of punctuation, capitalization and sentence structure. It's peppered with strange abbreviations, acronyms and visual symbols. Its spelling can be, well, different," KR reported. "Professional linguists say not to worry. They claim that Netspeak has become a third way -- in addition to traditional speech and writing -- for people to communicate with one another. It brings freshness and creativity to everyday English, they say. It's even reviving the dying art of diary keeping."

Why L[ ]ber[ ]ls S[ ]ck

Want to buy some vowels to solve that puzzle? Lift them from Wheel of Fortune host Pat Sajak's blog, which we're ashamed to report has been operating since late last year. We, however, simply didn't notice www.patsajak.com or his blog archive until the New York Post ran an item on it that USAToday.com columnist Whitney Matheson picked up in her Hipclicks blog.

What do we learn about Pat? That it's useless to argue with liberals: "The moral superiority they bring to the table allows them to alter the playing field and the rules in their favor. They can say and do things the other side can't because, after all, they have the greater good on their side. ... When Liberals want to legislate what you're allowed to drive or what you should eat or how much support you can give to a political candidate or what you can or can't say, they are doing it for altruistic reasons. The excesses of the Left are to be excused because these folks operate from the higher moral ground and the benefit of the greater wisdom and intelligence gained from that perspective."

Also be sure to check out "Slanted Journalism," "Dunces in the Whitehouse" and "Ask Mr. Politics!!"

Naked College Boat Party

Now that we have your attention, here's a quick grace note from USA Today on the hot, sexy spring break rituals out on Lake Havasu in Arizona: "If Bacchus ever were booted into the Greek god relocation program, he'd do well to wind up here. Two dozen boats have been lashed together in the service of a writhing mass of human flesh bent on shedding inhibitions and clothes as fast as a four-headed beer bong will allow."

The Web angle? "'You've got to be smart about things. I mean, I don't want my body on the Internet,' says Stacey Stokes, 19, a bronzed bikini-wrapped blonde from Colorado's Trinidad State Junior College. 'A guy slipped his digital camera up my skirt last night. I kicked him in the head.' An hour later, a grinning Stokes is booty-shaking to a Snoop Dogg rap as some guy inhales whipped cream off her chest and video cameras sprout like weeds from the leering crowd. So much for good intentions." Yes, there's a photo gallery.

Send links and comments to robertDOTmacmillanATwashingtonpost.com.