personal
pharyngula | February 16, 2010I think I'm the main course. Anyway, Bride of Shrek is trying to organize the seating for the dinner in Melbourne on the 13th of March, and the plan is for the Pharyngula horde to sit together (I think it is so our uprising and assault will be more effective), and in order to do that, the she needs you to send her your conference booking confirmation number, which should be on your ticket or receipt. Then she'll get that information to the conference organizers, and they'll put you at the same table with me. I think.
Send the magic number to Bride of Shrek soon.
If you aren't going to the…
edyong | February 16, 2010According to Sitemeter, Not Exactly Rocket Science passed 2,000,000 page views today!!! Virtual hugs, high-fives and fist-bumps all round.
As near as I can make out, the hit that did it came from Israel and was directed to yesterday's autism post via Stumbleupon.
A quick retrospective calculation tells me that it took the first 35 months of NERS to get the first million hits and the last 7 to get the second million. I really am constantly delighted and humbled by the fact that people are actually reading this and that more seem to do so. Thanks to all of you for reading.
laelaps | February 16, 2010
Contingency has been on my mind quite often these days. What would life look like today if the ancestors of the first land-dwelling vertebrates had two legs instead of four? How would non-avian dinosaurs continue to have evolved if they had not been wiped out 65 million years ago? What if, like many other prehistoric apes, our own ancestors fell into extinction during the Pliocene? Any one of these events would have changed the history of life on earth, and even though there are not answers to these questions they still remind me of how historical quirks can have major effects.
Though it has…
pharyngula | February 15, 2010Next month, I'm going to be attending the Global Atheist Convention in Melbourne, and originally, I had planned to make this a grand tour and was even thinking about a side trip to New Zealand. Plans have changed — one of the consequences of my long journey to California and Ireland, lovely as it was, is that too much travel at once, with all the confinement and awkwardness, is that I've wracked up my back rather severely — I'm trying to get some mobility and quiet the shrieking agony right now so I can cope again, but I'm just afraid that another string of non-stop pinioning to airplane…
terrasig | February 15, 2010I was an angry 14- or 15-year-old in late 1978 or early 1979 - can't recall which year, but definitely angry - walking home on a Sunday night after a dishwasher shift at Grandma's Saucy Apron, a now-defunct Italian restaurant in my hometown where I was working to make money for a Spanish National Honor Society trip to Spain over the upcoming Spring Break.
I turned on 99X (New York City's WXLO-FM) at 9 pm for a new radio show I enjoyed from KXOA in Sacramento, CA, called The Great American Radio Show with Mike Harrison. It was the near-end of the disco era and this album-oriented rock (AOR)…
clock | February 15, 2010In San Diego this week. Check it out. I'll be there - see my session. If you will be there, let me know. Let's have coffee or lunch, etc. My session is on 21st in the morning, and there is a lot of social stuff I agreed to on the 19th in the afternoon and evening, and of course I want to see a lot of other sessions, but I am generally flexible. Just ping me over e-mail or Twitter or phone (if you have my number) or post a comment here.
pharyngula | February 15, 2010Hey, I think that's me in this cartoon!
It's a pretty good lesson, too.
drorzel | February 15, 2010I'm giving up reading blogs for Lent.
The proximate cause of this is Bora's latest blame-the-media post, which is just deja vu all over again, because I'm pretty sure this exact conversation has gone on ten times before (the fact that scientists find other scientists compelling speakers does not mean that scientists are good at communicating to the general public). But this is really part of a larger disillusionment with the medium as a whole that's been growing for the past several months. More and more, I'm finding that reading blogs is pissing me off to no good end.
This is a fairly…
pharyngula | February 13, 2010There's a serious problem with my post-talk sessions at local bars with attendees: I loosen up and start spilling secrets, and you never know when some sneaky blogger listening in might post them to the Intertubalwebs.
NO, people, I will not show you my butt-crack.
jstemwedel | February 12, 2010Matthew C. Nisbet put up a post today titled The Right Room for a Dialogue: New Policy on Anonymous Comments
. In it, he writes:
I've long questioned the value of anonymous blogging or commenting. Much of the incivility online can be attributed to anonymity. And with a rare few exceptions, if you can't participate in a dialogue about issues without using your full name and true identity, then what you have to say is probably not that valuable.
These long standing thoughts were called to mind again after reading a post by Andrew Revkin at Dot Earth. Quoting as the subject to his post a line…
terrasig | February 12, 2010
I started strong this morning, lots of e-mail interaction with the lab and even a few hundred words on a blog post, but then had another setback.
Hence I offer you a photographic (iPhone cam) composition entitled, "Still Life."
I am too young to feel this old.
(Special note to PalMD: No vomiting from the new clarithromycin but, damn, my pee smells funny.)
drorzel | February 11, 2010SteelyKid has had a bit of a sore throat the last few days, which has led to a bit of screaming and crying. Those have been interspersed with her usual cute-toddler behavior, and we managed to squeeze in the traditional Baby Blogging photo:
"Why is she waving around a Triscuit box?" you ask. Because she was cooking:
This is the latest manifestation of the rich inner life of a toddler. She gets really absorbed in this little game where she takes small objects (rocks, fridge magnets, small toys) and places them carefully in some kind of container (a piece of tupperware, one of her stacking…
jstemwedel | February 10, 2010Earlier today, I had this conversation with my better half.
Dr. Free-Ride's better half: (with a look of deep concern) So, I saw something in your post today.
Dr. Free-Ride: Oh? (Wondering if a heinous typo got through cursory attempts at editing)
Dr. Free-Ride's better half: Yes.
Dr. Free-Ride: What?
Dr. Free-Ride's better half: In the photo.
Dr. Free-Ride: Oh, that blogiversary cake!
Dr. Free-Ride's better half: Yes. Where is it?
Dr. Free-Ride: You may not remember, but that was actually what we used to celebrate the fourth blogiversary last year.
Dr. Free-Ride's better half: There were…
pharyngula | February 10, 2010It looks just like Minnesota, with less snow. Anyway, I made it to Cedar Falls, and I'll remind the locals that I'm babbling tonight at 7 on the UNI campus. See you there!
jstemwedel | February 10, 2010Five years ago today, I put up the first post on a blog that was mean to capture the overflow of discussions and ideas from my "Ethics in Science" class. Back then, I wasn't entirely sure that I'd manage to maintain the blog through the end of the semester.
It just goes to show you that you can't always tell which of the things you try will become sustainable practices (although maybe the ones that don't involve exercise equipment have better odds).
On the occasion of my fifth blogiversary, I'm reflecting on a question posed by BlogHer upon BlogHer's 5th anniversary:
What are five…
drorzel | February 9, 2010No substantive blogging for you today, as my alarm clock decided not to go off, causing me to oversleep by the hour that I usually spend on bloggy things. So that you're not left without blog-related entertainment, though, here's an appropriate poll topic:
How early do you have to set your alarm to get to work/class on time?(polling)
Of course, despite oversleeping by a full hour, I was still here twenty minutes before this morning's lab. And probably a good half-hour before the majority of my students. Their late arrival will do wonders for my mood.
terrasig | February 9, 2010I'm always pleasantly surprised when a topic generates enthusiastic reader feedback, particularly when comments come from long-time readers who share experiences I never knew they had or, in some cases, comment for the first time.
The topic this time was a simple reflection on my current bout of pneumonia and my being taken aback by how debilitating it has been mentally. It's taken me two days just put put together these few sentences of what will essentially be a referral post.
A very thoughtful commenter posed a question to me about what does it mean to be "really sick." What is long-term…
pharyngula | February 8, 2010I left Morris on the 19th of January, and finally, here it is the 8th of February and I finally made it back. Now leave me alone. I get a moment to rest, don't I? That bottle of Irish whiskey I was given in Galway will help.
OK, moment over. Next up: I get to go the the University of Northern Iowa on Wednesday! Don't say it, I know I'm insane. Anyway, it'll be an evo-devo talk in the Maucker Union, Hemisphere Lounge, at 7pm. There won't be much creationist bashing, but I'll probably spend a few minutes bashing Jerry Fodor and Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini and Mary Midgley, because they're…
drorzel | February 8, 2010There was some discombobulation yesterday afternoon that kept me from posting these-- I had meant them to be a Super Bowl alternative for the non-football-inclined. They'll work just as well as a Monday brightener, though. So here's a clip of SteelyKid a couple of weeks ago, laughing at the "got your food wrapper" game:
And here's one of her talking on the phone with her grandmother:
I've been on the other end of one of those conversations, and while I still have no idea what she was saying, it's awfully cute.
terrasig | February 7, 2010I have just a couple of thoughts today that I offer to the reader not for sympathy but, rather, for scientific observation and reflection.
I've been dealing with a case of bronchitis that became pneumonia. I tried to teach through it, do grant reviews, finish a book chapter, etc. but was finally ordered by my pulmonologist to recuperative bedrest at home for approximately four weeks.
When told I'd be confined to bed for a month, I thought that it would be great - that I'd get two papers and a grant renewal done and still have plenty of time for blog posts I've been wanting to get to, finish…