It makes me want to go to New Orleans...

The New York Times > Dining & Wine > A Lunchtime Institution Set to Overstuff Its Last Po' Boy

A silly story from last night

One of Hilary's friends at her party was showing off baby pictures on his phone. Suddenly, I received a text message and started replying to it. He noticed, and asked, "Do you have baby pictures on your phone too?"

"No. I don't have any babies."

"Well what have you been wasting your time doing? What have you been doing with an important part of your anatomy? Your biological duty?" he pressed on.

"Um, boys?"

He started laughing, and Martin was cracking up. It was great.

old rft article about black bear; panckes next saturday!

riverfronttimes.com | The Anarchists' Cookbook | 2001-03-07

Next saturday!

The third annual Confluence all-you-can-eat pancake breakfast will feature a large variety of delicious all-natural organic pancakes including multigrain, whole grain, and vegan pancakes. Also included are a variety of scrumptious fruit toppings, some of which are made from local handpicked fruits including strawberry jam. confluence volunteers and Black Bear bakers will serve up the yummy pancakes. Pure maple syrup and real butter!

Frank Rich, pretty good as usual

The New York Times > Opinion > Op-Ed Columnist: A High-Tech Lynching in Prime Time: "As Bill Maher summed it up for Jay Leno on the 'Tonight' show last week: ' 'Activist judges' is a code word for gay.'"

OU Kosher | (for scott)

OU Kosher | What's New for Passover 2005 (5765): "The OU position remains that extra virgin olive oil can be used without special supervision for Pesach. In addition, Bartenura, Carmel, Gefen, Mishpacha and Season olive oil will be available with an OU-P label. Della Rosa grapeseed oil will again be available this year. This last product was made in Europe with the cooperation of various other supervisions. Mother’s olive oil pan coating spray, Mishpacha olive oil spray and Manischewitz buttery safflower cooking spray, olive oil spray and olive oil garlic cooking sprays will also be available. Prepared olives with an OU-P will be available from Gefen, Osem, Kvuzat Yavne, Gilboa and Mishpacha."

carib-mex wet rub for fish

incomplete (in progress) but available

nyt on new consumer D-SLRs

Professional Cameras, Made for the Amateur. Go Ahead, Say Cheese.

NYT considers the Man Date

(from NYT) "Anyone who finds a date with a potential romantic partner to be a minefield of unspoken rules should consider the man date, a rendezvous between two straight men that is even more socially perilous." Another gem: "Other men say dinners may be all right, but never brunch, although a post-hangover meal taking place during brunch hours is O.K."

god damn that's cool

Slashdot | Google Adds Satellite Imagery to Maps (thanks to Scott for pointing it out to me first)

stitching and bitching

The New York Times > Opinion > Editorial Observer: A Pastime of Grandma and the 'Golden Girls' Evolves Into a Hip Hobby

ha, haha, hahaha

CNN.com - Boy Scout official charged in child porn case biiiiiig fuckin' surprise.

The New York Times > Technology > Circuits > Holding a Paper Ticket, Bracing for the Irritation

The New York Times > Technology > Circuits > Holding a Paper Ticket, Bracing for the Irritation

Aha! I knew it! *whew* I'm not crazy

The New York Times > Arts > Art & Design > Talk of the Town (Make That Whisper)

Don't be her.

Don't be so lazy that you can't empty the bathroom trash, and then leave your fucking tampon wrapper on the floor next to it. That's just rude.

Amusing coincidence, interesting subject

The New York Times > Health > Mental Health & Behavior > At War With Their Bodies, They Seek to Sever Limbs a couple weeks after an episode of South Park "dealt with" elective surgery (specifically sex reassignment surgery, but also "negroplasty" and "dolphinoplasty").

"The Hippocratic oath says first do your patients no harm," he said in the film "Whole." But maybe the real harm, he said, is to refuse to treat such a patient, "leaving him in a state of permanent mental torment," when all it would take for him "to live a satisfied and happy life" would be to amputate.

...or turn him into a dolphin.

Yay, done with ethan's midterm

Just sent it to him. I had some fun with it (Chicken featured Redneck 1 and Redneck 2; the Japan question featured Fukui and Shinichiro from Iron Chef) and will post here eventually

TunerTricks » Blog Archive » GTi - MacMini

yum

American Apparel

My new favorite clothing store!

so we've decided

that we actually want to get a pair of rings. We went to some jewellers on Wabash today and discovered our sizes (7.5 and 7.75) and looked at a few things. We don't have the time, knowledge, or money to select nice diamonds for a tension setting, but we agree that titanium is the metal of choice because it is both durable and exceptionally light. An inlay is a nice touch; understated without being gaudy. Platinum would be nice, but we don't need it and would rather go out to dinner a few times than spend the extra money on ice.

We've basically decided that an oblique 1–2mm band of white gold in a 6mm ring is ideal. The decision is now largely between a flat and a domed outer surface (note that yellow gold is pictured; we'd go with white). We'll head back to Wabash someday this week to see how the shape difference feels.

SCHRAFFT'S OF BOSTON CHEWY OATMEAL COOKIES Recipe at Epicurious.com

We varied (doubled, tweaked) this recipe for oatmeal cookies.

Salon.com News | Now serving no trans fat!

Salon.com News | Now serving no trans fat!: "Health advocates say the war on trans fat has become little more than a marketing opportunity for the major food companies to continue serving junk food with a healthy conscience. Meanwhile, with its new guidelines about avoiding trans fat, the USDA can appear to be doing the healthy thing without really causing the food companies to change their fatty ways."

I want a Mac Mini just to put in one of these.. and, well, to have.

SFBags - WaterField Designs - Mac mini Case

For Steve & Shane: Cacao

cocoa nibs, 7oz
cocoa beans, raw, whole dried

NPR : High Court Mulls Ten Commandments Displays

NPR : High Court Mulls Ten Commandments Displays

another from /.

Gui Avoider: "?"

Another set of 10 reasons, non-derivative.

Morphizm.com -- 10 Reasons Why Gay Marriage Will Destroy Our Civilization

New nickel

I like the new nickel design.

The New Yorker: The Critics: Musical Events

The New Yorker: The Critics: Musical Events

Saw this in print. Then it was on /. with the link.

Humorous formal theory article

One of the readings for Guillermo's class this week is by some theorists who obviously have a sense of humor. I appreciate it.. Below, they talk about the median voter result (and its origins in Hotelling and Smithies.

The firms might be hot-dog vendors with wheeled carts selling identical hot-dogs at identical prices along a beach. In the case of two vendors, the predicction of Hotelling and Mithies was that the vendors locate cheek-by-jowl at the median sunbather. No other configuration can be an equilibrium.... To compare the situation being analyzed to political interaction we need to spell out the assumptions underlying the two-vendor hot-dog game. (1) Vendors, and hot-dogs, are identical save for their positions along the boardwalk. People choose by minimizing the walk from beach blanket to wiener wagon. (2) Movement is free, and it is clear what movement means: the physical location of the cart changes along the single dimension of the beach. No frauds, such as creating mirages to make one cart seem closer, are possible..... (3) The distribution of hungry sunbathers is exogenous, and does not change in response to movements or fixed locations of hot-dog vendors.. (One might easily imagine a situation where this is not the case: 'where will we put our beach blanket? Oh, let us go bover beside that wurst-monger!' the result might well be two vendors, separated by a very considerable distance, each surrounded by a cluster of obese but sated sunbathers on an otherwise empty beach.... The frankfurter purchase is a one-shot deal. Once we have recieved the hot-dog and examined it, we pay for it, assuming the vendor will not snatch the steaming tube steak and abscond. But all these problems of reneging and ex post recontracting exist for politicians.

Oh, and footnote 10: "This is not to say that some politicans are not hot dogs."

CoffeeGeek rant

CoffeeGeek - So what the heck is wrong...

Yeah it's from almost a month ago, but CG isn't updated enough to check more frequently.

I didn't watch the oscars,

Because I knew something like this article from salon would both fill me in and reaffirm my decision to do statistics instead.

Gannongate: It's worse than you think

Salon.com News | Gannongate: It's worse than you think

more on the animated gay-marriage role models

An excellent cartoon in the 14&21 Feb New Yorker (scan tomorrow hopefully) shows SpongeBob and his boyfriend (Patrick?) checking the mail: "It's a very sweet note from Batman and Robin"

BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | NZ unveils Stonehenge replica

BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | NZ unveils Stonehenge replica

6 May:

42.

SuperMarriage

The New York Times > National > Trying to Strengthen an 'I Do' With a More Binding Legal Tie

Haha, I was going to blog this earlier, and then Jon Stewart made extra fun of it on the Daily Show too. Sooooo dumb.

Dumb dog names

The New York Times > Sports > Other Sports > Westminster Dog Show: Old Pros Rise to Top of Their Groups at Dog Show

Who names their dog "Wysiwyg's Hullabaloo" or "I'll Go On Lovin U"?! At least, according to the article, last year's winner was named a nice, normal Josh. Fame, Fortune, and Glory aren't too bad; and Coco is respectable. But who the fuck names their dog "Cin-Don Jan'l McShane"?

I love Scott & Scott loves me

just in case anyone was confused as to who was the better boyfriend... it's him.

Latest bin Laden videotape Wishes America 'A Crappy Valentine's Day'

from the Onion.

Premier mariage gay dans la guerilla philippine

Some things just don't make the Times...

Salon.com | More gay cartoon characters revealed!

Salon.com | More gay cartoon characters revealed!

His sociability proved fortuitous. Snagglepuss and Huckleberry soon became confidants of other prominent cartoon characters struggling with their homosexuality. And what started as an informal support group slowly morphed into a political action network.

"During the mid-'70s, the public became more aware of just how many celebrities were gay," explains Snagglepuss, turning serious. "Well, that included us, and people began speculating about cartoons the same way they did about human actors."

"The ironic thing is, they were wrong about one of the first gay icons," he adds. "There was always a lot of talk about Velma, but she's strictly hetero."

fits like a...

9:53:30 Jon: Yeah I should probably just get another waterfield - how snug is the just regular sleevecase in the horizontal direction on the 15 PB?
9:53:47 Me: you can feel it slide in.
9:54:06 Jon: well that is a nice quality HAHA
9:54:54 wustlmike: figured you'd like that oblique description.
9:55:01 Jon: haha uh-huh
9:55:09 Jon: But i mean on top and bottom : P
9:57:09 wustlmike: I can take some pictures if you like..
9:57:18 Jon: Hmmm if you would
9:57:22 wustlmike: it's a very good fit. I mean it's designed to fit it exactly
9:57:26 Jon: Yeah
9:57:28 Jon: Well
9:57:34 wustlmike: alright in a little bit.
9:57:36 Jon: See on my vert there is some play in the top.
9:57:45 Jon: No big rush, I just need it to ship before nl
9:58:10 wustlmike: you could stick a finger in the top flap loop.. maybe two
9:58:55 Jon: But it stays at that does not try and accommodate anything bigger?
9:59:36 Jon: See mine is a little looser definitely two if not three.
9:59:42 Jon: and that is just sitting in there.

valentine's weekend restaurant options

• Liluma Eleven eleven
• Red Moon
• Riddles Penultimate right by my house
• Bar Italia Aaron, Michael Popovic's boyfriend, works there
• Mélange ...brunch?
• Jimmy's also a brunch possibility and not too expensive.
• Trattoria Marcella I think is where we all went out one time.
• La Piazza where Ryan and I went when we decided to live together. Everyone around us thought we were on a date.
• An American Place Expensive.

Hmm!

Same-Sex Couples Must Be Allowed To Marry In New York, Court Rules

In today’s ruling, Justice Ling-Cohan said... “Similar to opposite-sex couples, same-sex couples are entitled to the same fundamental right to follow their hearts and publicly commit to a lifetime partnership with the person of their choosing. The recognition that this fundamental right applies equally to same-sex couples cannot legitimately be said to harm anyone.”

I think Lambda Legal is like Christy's arch-nemesis group.

NPR : An Argument Against Spokane's Planned Gay District

NPR : An Argument Against Spokane's Planned Gay District

lentil soup

It's winter, which means time to explore the universe of soups.

• 1-2 cups lentils (brown, green, french green, doesn't matter.. vary the texture and taste each time!)
• onion
• carrot
• celery
• sage and rosemary (fresh or dried)

Combine all ingredients (including herbs, if dried) and cover with about two inches of water. Simmer for an hour or so. Add sea salt and pepper to taste, and fresh herbs at this point. Serve with crusty bread and a drizzle of olive oil.

Optionally, throw in a rind of parmigiano reggiano while simmering.

Scott blogs our evening

Scott's MD-PhD Adventure: Three Happiness

late breaking news

Jenny just informed me that her grandmother died yesterday. I offered my condolences, of course... but this means for me that class tomorrow morning is just me & Itai.

One approach to comparative politics

Could it be that governments have always existed? The Hebrew bible comes close to providing an answer with the story of Saul. According to this story,members of the twelve tribes of Israel, each living under "his grape tree and fig tree" [read: state of nature] came to Samuel asking him to "make us a king" [read: constitute a government] so they would be as secure as "other nations." The old Hebrew prophet agreed to met his people's demand but not before he explained to them the nature of the trade-off associated with their request. With the benefit of the security they wished to obtain, so he argued, there would be a real cost to be paid in terms of their personal freedom.

Gideon Doron and Itai Sened (2001), Political Bargaining, p. 56

The next page gives the utility function for every agent i∈N from any σ∈σ to respect the law:

u_i(σ) = ∑_j≠ib_iσ_i–c_iσ_i

Amen!

on open formats

Most interesting in the comments on this blurb, a similar experience to my managing bibliographic data between Word users (Ryan and Christy) and Jim's WordPerfect.

You must be using extremely simple documents... basically plain text. My supervisor and his other grad students use different versions of Word (I'm not sure which one), but all the the figure positions, get screwed up, equations get put everywhere, and it's a general mess. I manage to maintain compatibily with both of those guys by not using Word but OpenOffice instead. It's actually this lack of compatibility between Word versions that got one of the other grad students to switch to OpenOffice, which was better at handling different versions of Word documents than Word itself.

yum! good foodblog!

EatChicago.net

When I grow up

I want to live in a pineapple at the ocean floor. With my boyfriend.

woohoo!

my ipod shuffle shipped today!

spring classes: for scott

Theories of Individual and Collective Choice Behavior I

aka Game Theory, with Ethan. My cohort, minus Steve, plus Rachel the Political Economy masters student. Lots of problem sets because that's the only way to learn game theory apparently. I'll appreciate it when it's done.

Quantitative Political Methodology I

with David Park. This is the class that somehow went from 3 hours a week to 5. Again, all of us minus Steve. Lots of problem sets. Apparently the first time David taught this one student said he stared at a midterm for no less than 5 hours not knowing where to begin. David's teaching style is taking some getting used to. It's not that we don't understand probability; everything we've done so far is review; but his roundabout presentation and random introduction of strange examples... hard to follow sometimes.

Comparative Party Politics

with Guillermo. Probably the most required work I'll have; research paper, discussant twice, and 3 response papers. And I'm interested in a lot of the stuff we'll be talking about.

Approaches to Comparative Politics

And... It's Jenny and me and Itai. I think we're actually going to just have "class" in his office. Three times just in the first class we got from him, "we are top twenty department in top ten university. because we are not placing our students well enough." This is after he poked around the room and like looked under chairs for how to get the overhead screen down. Finally I was like, "what are you looking for?"

ummm... ok.

Ipod World

my new favorite pens!

Staedtler Triplus Fineliner

99¢ each! But they're not permanent like lumocolor, or my all time favorite sakura pigma micron 01.

Are you a tool?

Would you like an opportunity to serve on the Washington University Board of Trustees as a Graduate Student Representative for academic year 2005-2006?

translation: Are you a tool?
I can see being on a committee, or in the grad student association or whatever, but really, is anyone on the BoT going to give a fuck what any grad student has to say? I think not.

and we all knew i'd buy both of these

iPod shuffle

sony headphones

I'm not getting one, but it's super cute.

I think and hope that it's the right move for apple: so many millions of people love their iPods, but are put off by the price of a Mac.

Elle a raison

French Women Don't Get Fat: The Secret to Eating For Pleasure, by Mireille Guiliano

Paging Dr Nakisher

• challah
• tiramisu
• butternut squash ravioli
• waffles

Sexy Liberal t-shirts

T-Shirts For Kind Humans

It takes a gay

and they just don't get it

Our people, the gays, throw dinner parties. That's one of those things we happen to do with unrivaled panache. With multiple themed courses, before- and after-dinner drinks, paired wines, and elaborate desserts. We move naturally from one course to the next; cold foods are cold and hot foods hot when they reach the table.

Not so in heterohio. Their people struggle to host a family-style dinner with three dishes (all at once, of course), and get it all on the table at the same time. In fact, they not only struggle, they fail. The food's not at all bad, it's all just planned and executed in a particularly un-gay idiom.

And the funniest part of it is they don't know they're all wrong, and it makes "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy" that much more amusing.

How I learned to stop worrying and love suburbia

There's an xmas tree on the second level, "so people driving by can look in the window and see the nice tree."

That's what suburban life is about. Showing off what you've got from behind closed doors and preferably a gate.

That and santitized everything, like the remote-controlled Heat-N-Glo® SL-950TV-D™ gas fireplace behind glass (as the model number suggests, it's as easy as watching tv!).

The New York Times > Science

Flour, Eggs, Sugar, Chocolate . . . Just Add Chemistry

About the author of this book I'll soon be buying for the Scott :)

canoe! canoe!

You know people who are into BDSM sex have safewords that mean, no, seriously, stop now?

Scott and I need such a word for Ed and Kathleen. We ask for one thing – a gift bag, say, or a bit of gift wrap for stuff we'd brought to give them – and it starts like five minutes of digging out every roll of wrapping paper they can find and going down in the fucking basement and getting out four boxes of nice bags and store bags and ribbons and bows and three scissors and four things of tape and tissue paper and colored tissue paper and—CANOE!

Or we say, when throwing together some food, "Could I have a prep bowl or two?" that prompted like five minutes of opening cabinets and getting out all the glass, plastic, and metal bowls,— wait! I think there are more in the basement!— to have a place to put one diced onion so I could clear off the cutting board.

Kathleen thinks we're saying "noo" like Canadians. It's not entirely untrue; we think that "canoe" is Sue's suggestion for a safeword.

So to them, our saying, OK! That's enough! Stop! We're fine! is like S&M sex where ow! stop spanking means "oh yes do it harder." Seriously, we tried. It only intensified the pain, and believe me, it was without pleasure.

Update: I was trying to show her how to make challah. Aside from her complete lack of interest in the science of bread (Scott and I believe it's essential to understand why things work the way they do, if you're going to change them, or even follow a recipe), I asked for a measuring spoon. I'd already looked through all the logical drawers, such as the one containing silverware, serving spoons, and the measuring cups – only to discover that there is no order whatever to the kitchen. It was as if every box that they opened just got its own fucking drawer / cabinet with no thought to where you'd be using its contents. Outrageous, and almost unusable. Of course I asked her about them (don't normal people who pretend to cook know where such tools are?) and this prompted another search through all the same damn drawers, and then Ed had to get involved, and look through boxes and shit in the garage—CANOE!

My dad & music

Listmania! Music featured on The Weather Channel

Seriously. We're driving in the car and this shit is on. I finally asked, "What is this? Greatest hits from The Weather Channel?!"

It's not bad really, it just happens to go very well with your "Local on the 8s™"

The particular song that provoked my reaction, by the way, was even called "The Promise of Rain" by John Boswell. I totally hear it every time I breeze past the weather channel. (Be sure to check out the audio sample)

I love shoes

Mine

Scott's

hot! literally sometimes

Temperature Monitor

Salon.com | Goin' south

by Russ Feingold:

"I can only wonder how many more generations of central Alabamians will say yes when the increasingly powerful Republican Party asks them to be concerned about homosexuality but not about the security of their own health, about abortion but not about the economic futures of their own children. As my wife and I drove through Greenville that night, I thought how fundamentally unfair this all is in order to support an increasingly radical conservative movement."

new drink friend! : Oatmeal cookie

from the wine bar we went to tonight:

• stoli vanil
• bailey's
• goldschlager
• milk

and you could probably make it an oatmeal raisin cookie with some crème de cassis.

three fantastic finds

At an Italian market on Taylor street near scott's campus.Villa Puccini and Villa Vetrice (discussed here, the highest "score" of the bunch). Also, tipo 00 flour for pizza and pasta, and savoiardi at an appropriate price. Of course, the vini santi are the most exciting, because wine stores rarely have even one, much less four good ones, to choose from; and they're rarely 500ml for $10.

oooooo aaaahhhh

Eva Solo Breadbin

And I'm actually completely done with the semester!

Just sent off the last paper for Ethan's class. Yay!

Now to make some dinner: whole wheat pasta with lentil ragù and maybe a trader joe's meatball.

My new favorite book!

Amazon.com: Books: The Slow Food Guide To Chicago: Restaurants, Markets, Bars (Slow Food Guides)

christian "victims"

Frank Rich writes

What is this about? How can those in this country's overwhelming religious majority maintain that they are victims in a fiery battle with forces of darkness? It is certainly not about actual victimization. Christmas is as pervasive as it has ever been in America, where it wasn't even declared a federal holiday until after the Civil War. What's really going on here is yet another example of a post-Election-Day winner-takes-all power grab by the "moral values" brigade. As Mr. Gibson shrewdly contrived his own crucifixion all the way to the bank, trumping up nonexistent threats to his movie to hype it, so the creation of imagined enemies and exaggerated threats to Christianity by "moral values" mongers of the right has its own secular purpose. The idea is to intimidate and marginalize anyone who objects to their efforts to impose the most conservative of Christian dogma on public policy. If you're against their views, you don't have a differing opinion — you're anti-Christian (even if you are a Christian).

Yeah, Bill O'Reilly and a few other notoriously disingenuous types are purely strategic here. But I think victimhood is actually central to a lot of people's belief.

The New York Times > Opinion > Op-Ed Contributor: Think Globally, Eat Locally

Exactly. As if anyone needed more reason to eat local!

The solution to these insecurities is to establish community-based food systems that include many small farmers and a diversity of products. Such systems make large-scale contamination impossible, even for determined bioterrorists. Far more people have contact with the Mexican lettuce at the supermarket, for example, than with the locally grown lettuce at the farmers' market.

Wired 11.09: PowerPoint Is Evil

Wired 11.09: PowerPoint Is Evil Yes old but good nonetheless.

Lamer than we are!: Fo Shizzle

Scott's MD-PhD Adventure: Fo Shizzle

gibson paper

here.

All day Saturday

Yesterday I took the final in the American Political Institutions seminar. The format is intended to mimic one day of the comprehensive exams we'll sit for at the end of our second year: eight hours to answer two out of three questions, with copious references to seminal literature in the field.

I'll go out on a limb and share my answers. On one hand, I think I advanced and adequately supported arguments that addressed the questions. However, my answers are quite short. I have a year and a half to learn what is expected on comps. If Bill's feedback is that I should've included more details, it's best that I know that now.

I'd also welcome comments from any of my colleagues who read this. :)

NPR : Joan Nathan's Recipes for Classic Hanukkah Dishes

NPR : Joan Nathan's Recipes for Classic Hanukkah Dishes

I haven't made latkes yet this year but I will soon! :)

How would Jesus solve those equations?

"What does it mean to have a Christian perspective of mathematics?"
What, indeed?

From patriotboy

Henry Waxman needs reëducation.

A whole bundle of niftiness!

I found urbanmainframe in a search to justify that the thing at the right of the browser toolbar that moves while a page is loading is in fact called a "throbber." (It seems to have come from the original very throbbing Netscape N. I couldn't find an animated one.)

But urbanmainframe also satisifed another little thing I'd wanted to find online, the cool original SGI logo! I do like the new simple 2000ish one or whenever they did it (very cool type family), but the old one just says hardcore power. Looking around at their products, though, they're still using the old one on the branding on the front of the machines! Yay!

Finally, on branding the new Mozilla flagship products, Firefox and Thunderbird. A good read.

Why yes, I'm working on my paper for Gibson

But in the event that I did something else (subjunctively, of course)...

Periodic table of wine: kinda neato

De Long's Wine Grape Varietal Table: Learn About Wine The Visual Way

it's funny and it's fascinating!

In Vino Gravitas - The Supreme Court has a sobering look at interstate wines. By Dahlia Lithwick
Previous posting at Volokh, making predictions before oral argument.

evangelicals and equality

(a few days old, but worth posting)
Andrew Sullivan:

"The Bush line, essentially is: 'We are not homophobes; we are happy to live alongside gay people, as long as they recognize that they can never have the same civil rights as we do. Accept your own inferiority, and we will accept you.' That's why this is so hard to compromise on. Because it cuts to the core of a human being's self-worth. On this, we cannot compromise. The simple truth is that there isn't a single civil right I would deny to an evangelical Christian. I've defended their freedom of religion, of association, of disassociation, and believe they should be treated with respect. I wouldn't dream of drumming them out of the military, firing them for their faith, tearing up their relationships, or taking their children away from them. The favor, alas, is not returned."

Semester-end snack

This semester's crunch-time snack, an impusle buy today at whole foods, are honey roasted chipotle peanuts. Yum.

ProCreation car emblem

hahaha

Vermilion

Scott points out that I should have done more work and less going out this week, and I could've driven up there for sex and Vermilion. He's right, of course, but oh well.

Adium X(tras) :: Sound Sets :: Tokyo Train Station

Hot.

Humm Page: Llama Sounds

Remember during the election coverage, on CNN, there were bizarre ads for IloveAlpacas.com? There are also ads of varying sizes in the New Yorker having to do with alpacas. Scott is knitting a scarf with alpaca wool. And last week there was an article in the NYT. With all this recent hype around such an unusual animal, I was curious what they sounded like. Apparently, they make the same noises as llamas, and I found an excellent collection of llama noises online.

ugh

Why yes, that is a bowl half full of the Spaghettios "ravioli" in a can that my roommate's girlfriend made for herself about twelve hours ago. And yes, I will try very hard to leave it there for her to clean up her damn self.

Update (40 minutes later): Ryan just cleaned it up. She's in the bathroom applying makeup.

menu for the week: it's cold out.

• Hungarian potato soup and ciabatta
• Ciabatta, frittata, and salad
• Arroz con pollo (Spanish-style, with saffron)
• Cuban black beans and rice (frijoles negros)
• Maybe a pork roast and sauerkraut

Now that's what I call a headline!

The New York Times > National > United Methodists Move to Defrock Lesbian

yet more geeky troublemaking

Hi Michael, Some of the things you recommended are actually in development right now...they were not added to the current release because of time constraints. In fact, this exact feature is already included on all the admin pages in the system...I just haven't added it to the coursepage yet. Other things, such as the resizable columns, are simply not worthwhile because of the amount of time it takes to get them tested across all browsers and operating systems. When I add the feature that controls the display of information on the coursepage I will look to see if I can resize the columns in a more pleasing manner. The pitfall there is that if I don't force a width on the right-most columns, its possible for the title to use up the whole page width, which doesn't look very good. Thanks for your suggestions...I will do my best to address them in upcoming versions of the software. -Marc Marc A. Bertone Programmer / Analyst

being a pest, cont'd.

Hi, I'm an end-user of the eRes system at Washington University in St Louis. I have requested that the library make a change to the summary view of documents, but the administrators (cc) claim that they "have no control" over the display. Surely any modern web application is configurable in the way I'm asking about.

Specifically, the summary view of documents shows only the arbitrary document "title." This default (if it is a default) is profoundly unhelpful for academics. Citations are most frequently given as "author-date" pairs, or maybe a book title; chapters of of books are almost never cited by title. Further, it's clear that richer data are entered about the documents. It should be possible to change the summary view so users don't have to open detail view for six or seven documents in order to find the right one.

How do administrators change display settings? Is it part of the application, or a control file somewhere? Three equal-size columns for "title", file type, and file size is profoundly unhelpful. They should also be resizable, no? A third of my display width for a file size is also a bit ridiculous.

Michael Malecki
PhD Student in Political Science
Washington University in St Louis

What, is it made by peoplesoft?

I'm sorry if I'm being a pest, but I want to pursue this a bit further. The detail view provides much richer data – source type, author, and year. So someone enters this in the database at some point.
I find it incredibly hard to believe that the software is not configurable for the summary. I couldn't find documentation at the vendor's site, but I'd be happy to look through the manuals if you have them. It's a very poor default, and one that should be changed, but it really has to be configurable.
Mike

On Wed, 1 Dec 2004 08:51:34 -0600, Scott Britton wrote:
>
> Michael,
> We do not have control over the display information, except that titles can
> be listed either alphabetically or in the order they were placed on ERes.
> We try not to be creative with the title of the article (avoiding "Reading
> 1" or "Author- Article Title") because readings are often used by other
> classes and are retrieved by the published title.
>
> An instructor can request that we group articles together into folders.
> This helps to organize long lists of articles.
>
>
> Scott Britton
> Head of Access

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Reserve Unit
> Sent: Wednesday, December 01, 2004 8:14 AM
> To: Scott Britton
> Subject: FW: sort key in document listing
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: malecki@wustl.edu [mailto:malecki@wustl.edu]
> Sent: Tue 11/30/2004 5:23 PM
> To: eres
> Subject: sort key in document listing
>
> It would be immensely helpful if you could add or change the result display
> to show the author and year of documents, rather than the arbitrary title
> you assigned it. As you must surely be aware, citations are nearly always
> given as author-date pairs.