February 2012
2 posts
When an Entire Village Wins the Lottery
This is so great. A northern Spanish village of struggling farmers chipped in and bought lottery tickets through their homemakers’ association and won millions.
Initial reactions of the townspeople, each having won hundreds of thousands of dollars include, ‘“Some of the ladies talked about going to the hairdresser,” Mayor Pons said. “But the hairdresser won, too. And she said, ‘I’m...
January 2012
3 posts
Arizona Schools Banning Books
I got this e-mail from my former department, addressed to us lovers of education and culture, and while the news is infuriating, sadly there also is nothing unbelievable about it. Arizona attacks its own citizens. Now it is doing so on multiple fronts. They have begun to patrol literature and history with the same arrogance, closed-mindedness, and fear with which they guard their borders and...
December 2011
1 post
November 2011
3 posts
HookEmHorns.xxx
As “adult” websites prepare to dominate the xxx domain, The University of Texas is just one of a number of schools scrambling to buy sites in the xxx domain to protect the reputation of the mascots, nicknames, and sports cheers associated with their institutions. Hook ‘em horns, indeed. In a nice way.
This Man is Running for President
‘With Newt Gingrich emerging as serious contender, some Republicans are questioning his fitness for a general election campaign by seizing on comments the former speaker made in 2007 about Hispanics.
Making the case against bi-lingual education at a National Federation of Republican Women event, Gingrich said children should be taught “the language of prosperity, not the language...
October 2011
1 post
2 tags
September 2011
1 post
August 2011
6 posts
Following Kindlers
“While Kindle users have been able to post quotes from the ebooks they are reading to Twitter or Facebook for some time now, only recently has this feature been expanded to allow users to utilize their Kindle profiles in some potentially interesting ways. Before I get into what those ways might be, let me clarify that a Kindle profile and an Amazon profile are not one and the same...
9 tags
Contra-Contraception
“On August 2, Duquesne University, a private Catholic school in Pittsburgh, filed suit against Highmark Inc. because the insurer allegedly mishandled the school’s prescription drug plan over the course of three years. Duquesne’s contract with Highmark specified that the insurance could not cover contraceptives because they contradict the university’s Catholic faith, but...
Copyright Law and College Course Catalogs?
‘How can you sue someone for stealing something that does not belong to you? That is the question AcademyOne, a company that aggregates course data from various colleges to facilitate the transfer of credits between institutions, is asking CollegeSource, an older company that offers similar services. CollegeSource is suing AcademyOne for paying contractors in China to systematically...
July 2011
1 post
June 2011
8 posts
Dirty Laundry Songs (With Apologies to George...
What’s your definition of “dirty,” baby? /
What do you call “Dry Clean On-ly”? /
Don’t you know a blue jean gotta drip dry, baby?/
Doncha think it’s time you fold socks with me?
I washed your socks!
I washed your - ooooh - socks!
May 2011
4 posts
Texas Senate Approves Concealed Handguns On Campus...
…despite the fact that the proposal is “generally opposed by higher education officials across the state…,” and my head explodes with rage. Places of learning are not places for guns.
Full awful story here in the Dallas News.
April 2011
3 posts
Panoramas of Sevilla, Spain - Simply Beautiful →
Panoramas of Sevilla: When you click on one of the other options at the bottom, the camera takes you from your current view, seemingly flying, toward the direction of the newly selected site. The + and - buttons help adjust. Simply beautiful.
"Internet Stalker" (To the tune of "Vehicle" by...
I’m the friendly stranger on the internet /
won’t you send me a DM? /
I’m on Flickr, Tumblr, I post to my blog /
And I hope that you see them /
I’m your internet stalker! /
I’ll find you anywhere you’re gonna post /
I’m you’re internet stalker! /
And by now I’m sure you know /
That I’ll heart you! /
I’ll star you!...
February 2011
3 posts
PSA: Right of Way
If you are at a 4-way stop and the car across from you has the right of way and goes straight, YOU CAN GO STRAIGHT, TOO, even if you got there last, because that car serves as a shield. Perpendicular cars cannot(/should not) go through them. If you do not go (FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!) you are slowing down traffic flow and, moreover, are an idiot.
Thank you.
This has been a public service...
January 2011
2 posts
December 2010
3 posts
1 tag
IRL
December 2nd, 2007 - a Sunday - was cold and rainy.
I was late because the roads were a mess - that rain really wanted to be sleet - and also because of the (hysterically funny to me) fact that I went to the wrong coffee shop at first — there’s at least one on every block in these parts — but I realized my mistake and forged back out into the cold to find the one we had agreed...
November 2010
3 posts
I am an old woman who will fight for your honor...
I opened the window in front of my treadmill, got my water bottle and phone all situated, and began my run.
A moment later, a 70-something man comes over, closes that window i just opened, and gets on the treadmill next to me. Slowly.
My first thought is “What the hell?!?” my second thought is “The nerve of this guy!” and then I start seriously considering whether I am...
Daylight Savings...ladies?
An interesting thought about this national temporal shift is that this is the day that across the United States — in addition to changing clocks — most every woman on the daily birth control pill decides whether to honor Daylight Savings by adjusting her prescription time by one hour. There’s not usually much talk about this, but it’s staggering to think of so many women...
Flex Your Spelling Muscle: A Challenge
This small adjustment has already made a difference in attitude for me. It’s the small chinks in our fortress of writing abilities that invite poor vocabulary, laziness, and (God forbid) text-speak to infiltrate. So promise yourself that when a word you’ve typed shows up as misspelled, you’ll try to fix it manually rather than allowing autocorrect to deal with your mess.
...
October 2010
3 posts
September 2010
9 posts
