Chatter
tfk | February 24, 2007Via Grrl.
Your Linguistic Profile:
45% General American English
25% Yankee
20% Dixie
5% Upper Midwestern
0% Midwestern
What Kind of American English Do You Speak?
omnibrain | February 23, 2007Funny since my mother is a librarian... "March of the Librarians" is a spoof of sorts of the "March of the Penguins."
Via Improbable Research Blog
Watch out for that hipster librarian in the crowd!
I also just ran across this at Bad Astronomy Blog:
Good stuff!
tfk | February 22, 2007Threadless is a great site where people submit shirt designs, and highly rated designs are printed and sold. Brilliant, beautiful shirts are readily available there.
To their great credit, our Seed overlords have partnered with Threadless. Submit up to three designs on the theme "Science is Culture." The deadline is March 19. The winner gets a bucket full of cool toys.
Submit your ideas, and be creative.
goodmath | February 21, 2007 Today, the ACM announced the winner of the Turing award. For those who don't know, the Turing award is the greatest award in computer science - the CS equivalent of the Nobel prize, or the Fields medal.
The winner: Fran Allen. The first woman ever to win the Turing award. And the first Turing award winner that I've personally known. Fran deserves it, and I'm absolutely overjoyed to see her getting the recognition she deserves. Among her many accomplishments, Fran helped design Fortran and create the worlds first optimizing compiler.
One of my fondest memories of work is from 8 years ago…
tfk | February 21, 2007YearlyKos is one of those great and cool ideas, a gathering of the Kossack hordes. They are gearing up for the neoconvention, and to fund it, they are selling "unConventional," an anthology of photographs and essays about progressivism, activism, and online communities.
I'm setting aside some cash for a copy, and I hope you will too.
tfk | February 20, 2007Apologies for being a day late on this. It's been a busy weekend, but things are settling down again.
We start out with an open invitation from John B. of Blog Meridian. He'll be bringing some of his students up from Wichita to visit the Nelson-Atkins Art Museum on Saturday, March 3. He'll be hanging out at the Barnes & Noble on the Plaza around 3:30, and wants to meet you. Yes, you.
Speaking of KC area goings-on, Emaw gives us a review of the Dead Sea Scrolls at Union Station. Bottom line: "If you can afford the price of admission without sacrificing your Friday night weed money, go…
tfk | February 18, 2007Don't forget to send in your best Kansas blogging of the week. You can just leave a comment here, or email it to me if you like.
tfk | February 13, 2007The always excellent Greg Beck explains what happened in his dreams.........every night:
I might as well fess up and come clean with it. Some of you have probably already guessed it and the rest of you might as well hear the news from me instead of reading it in the stinkin tabloids.
Warning. Foul, foul language may be present in any and all of Greg Beck's posts. If you have a delicate sensibility DO NOT CLICK THAT LINK! You have been warned.
omnibrain | February 13, 2007Lots and lots and lots of snow (not quite upstate NY) but enough to close the university.
Here's the view from my window.
And here's what I'm doing about it ;)
tfk | February 10, 2007Don't forget to submit to the next Kansas Guild of Bloggers. It's at Blog Meridian.
tfk | February 10, 2007H/T Grrrrrrrrl.
What Famous Leader Are You?personality tests by similarminds.com
tfk | February 7, 2007A 15-year-old girl was arrested for child pornography and child sexual abuse for posting pictures of herself online. Would it be statutory rape if she touched herself? Or would that fall under Romeo and Juliet laws?
j7uy5 | February 4, 2007Part thirteen
The commentators are talking a lot about how brilliant the winning
coach is, even though the game is not quite over.
Are there any lessons to be drawn from this game? No. Super
Bowl games usually are not very good, and this one was no
exception. It was exceptionally sloppy, and there were other
unusual things about it, but in the end, it is just another game.
Except for those who made a ton of money.
Tomorrow, we get the treat of all the Monday-morning quarterbacking,
plus the annual ritual of talking about the new advertisements that
premiered during the game.
j7uy5 | February 4, 2007It is looking as though the Colts are going to win this one.
Another interception, this time with the Bears on the losing end.
You just can't win if you keep throwing things away.
Over the past hour or so, I put plastic over two windows, because I was
throwing away heat. The winter here has been uncharacteristically
warm up until now, so I didn't bother with the usual insulation
ritual. But now it is 18 below zero (C).
There has been a lot of atypical weather this year in the USA.
Global warming? Could be, but it is very difficult to ascribe any
single event to any single cause. …
j7uy5 | February 4, 2007Part ten. I don't think I can keep this up. Football is
sometimes referred to as "the thinking man's game." More like the
"sleeping man's game." Many football players end up with large
necks, because of the kinds of exercises they do. A neck size
greater than or equal to 46cm (18 inches) leads to an increased risk of
obstructive sleep apnea, a common sleep disorder.
I think the Colts are going to win this one, but I might not be able to
stay awake to see it.
Colts made another false start. I've lost count of how many times
they've done that. Probably cost them a touchdown. Oh,…
j7uy5 | February 4, 2007Part seven. Merifully, it is almost half time. We're at the
two minute warning. Colts offense is getting in gear. Can't
wait until half time. I hear Prince will be performing. He
promised to not have any wardrobe malfunctions. I hope he's
right.
Cripes, another fumble. And another. I bet that's the first
time in Superbowl history that there have been two pairs of
back-to-back fumbles. And the odds of that? Almost as
good as the odds of success in Iraq.
j7uy5 | February 4, 2007Part five comes at the start of the second quarter. I am eating
burritos made with soy, phytoestrogens be damned. Half the beer
is gone. Started the game with 0.66 liters. Now down to
about 330ml. Goes well with the capsaicin.
Finally seeing a decent bit of football. Bears' defense is really
the only part of the game that is going well.
Egad, did I ever tell y'all how much I hate commercials. Before
the game, I was watching Howard Zinn on Book TV. That was much
more interesting, and there were no commercials. He was talking
about the dearth of civil disobedience and the ill…
j7uy5 | February 4, 2007Author realizes he overwrote pt 2 with pt 3. Part 2 is lost
forever. Wow. That is more interesting than the game has
been so far. I've eaten all the guacamole. There was too
much garlic in it.
Oh, the game. Another fumble. That makes what, three
fumbles and one interception, and the first quarter is not even over
yet. After the fumble, Colts try a pass and it is almost
intercepted.
j7uy5 | February 4, 2007Author getting bored. Turn attention to menu. Eating fresh
guacamole from Arbor Farms, drinking Pilner Urquell, from Plzen
Czech. Some people claim that it is the original pilsner, and
that it is the best beer in the world. Could be.
Oh, the score is 7 to 6, and the Colts just recovered a fumble, then a
moment later, Urlacher of the Bears recovers another fumble. I
was hoping to see some good football, but so far it is a Cirque des
Erreurs .
tfk | February 3, 2007I am not convinced it is the truth that "Gin is better than whiskey." I truly cannot stand the stuff.
Whiskey, however, is often excellent.
But in the USA, the only truth is that gin and whiskey are horrible until your 21st birthday, after which they are no big deal.