Daniel Handler (Lemony Snicket) was on Forum (talk show on the local public radio station 'round here) this morning, and was entirely delightful. You can listen online if you're interested.
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(6)
04:05:50 PM,
Friday 22 October 2004
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Traditionally, the difference between liberals and radicals is that radicals believe in revolution while liberals believe in reforming the current system. Where does that put you if you believe that the current system needs to be changed radically, but that this can only be done through incremental improvements, not through wholesale revolution?
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(7)
01:23:56 AM,
Friday 22 October 2004
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Okay, so I don't really follow baseball (no objection to it, just doesn't really hold my interest), but I've been overhearing things lately, and I just wanted to say I'm very happy for you all. Whatever it is, it sounds delightful.
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(7)
03:24:04 AM,
Thursday 21 October 2004
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The Slashdot interview with Neal Stephenson is so brilliant that I cannot choose one suitable excerpt. Go and read the whole thing. (Though I would draw your attention in particular to question four.)
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(1)
08:40:06 PM,
Wednesday 20 October 2004
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Washington Post: Stewart, not to be outdone, called Carlson a part of the anatomy unique to men.
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04:37:10 PM,
Wednesday 20 October 2004
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When you see this, post a bit of poetry in your blog.
London
I wander thro’ each charter’d street,
Near where the charter’d Thames does flow,
And mark in every face I meet
Marks of weakness, marks of woe.
In every cry of every Man,
In every Infant’s cry of fear,
In every voice, in every ban,
The mind-forg’d manacles I hear.
How the Chimney-sweeper’s cry
Every black‘ning Church appalls;
And the hapless Soldier’s sigh
Runs in blood down Palace walls.
But most thro’ midnight streets I hear
How the youthful Harlot’s curse
Blasts the new born Infant’s tear,
And blights with plagues the Marriage hearse.
—William Blake
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02:07:43 PM, Wednesday 20 October 2004
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I mean, really, falafels? That's just not okay.
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(4)
08:37:28 PM,
Friday 15 October 2004
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Dammit, Ask MetaFilter is giving me that feeling again. That feeling where I'm horribly tempted to take the Foreign Service Exam. Ah well, best to just ignore it until it passes, as usual.
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(6)
05:30:17 PM,
Thursday 14 October 2004
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“It’s never quite as simple as the president wants you to believe.”
_respond? (7)
02:43:01 AM, Saturday 9 October 2004
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The Bush-wearing-a-wire thing? Totally unconvincing. Totally. We're talking about one photo where the back of Bush's shirt looks lumpy, or something, maybe. Look, people, he fucked the debate up completely, so why can't we focus on that instead of on lame internet conspiracy theories that will just be discredited and make people sympathize with him more?
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(15)
05:12:23 PM,
Friday 8 October 2004
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The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL
NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and
"OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in
RFC 2119.
Attention: If you are not registered to vote, and the registration deadline in your state has not yet passed, I would strongly advise registering. You SHOULD vote if you want to have any say at all in how your government is run. Note that, while in some states you MUST meet a certain deadline to register, in many states you MAY vote with a provisional ballot if you register on election day. Even if you have no hope of affecting the presidential election in your state, there will still almost certainly be local elections that you can affect. Therefore, you SHOULD register, SHOULD inform yourself about the issues on the ballot as best you can, and SHOULD vote on November 2nd. If you need more information, you MAY refer to this Voter Information Guide.
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(5)
08:51:13 PM,
Monday 4 October 2004
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This article assesses the link between country music and metropolitan suicide rates. Country music is hypothesized to nurture a suicidal mood through its concerns with problems common in the suicidal population, such as marital discord, alcohol abuse, and alienation from work. The results of a multiple regression analysis of 49 metropolitan areas show that the greater the airtime devoted to country music, the greater the white suicide rate. The effect is independent of divorce, southernness, poverty, and gun availability. The existence of a country music subculture is thought to reinforce the link between country music and suicide. Our model explains 51% of the variance in urban white suicide rates.
_respond? (3)
07:11:41 PM, Monday 4 October 2004
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I found Jeeves/Wooster slash reading Julia’s Friends of Friends page on LiveJournal. Naturally, I thought of Mirabai.
_respond? (2)
01:40:49 AM, Sunday 3 October 2004
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Our QA guy at work just made up a file of sample listings for an address book. "John Bigboote". "John Gomez". "John Whorfin". "John Smallberries". "John Yaya"... they are all names of Lectroids from Buckaroo Banzai. It is beautiful.
(Also, I am rather concerned to discover that the Democratic candidate for Vice President is a Red Lectroid.)
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(4)
07:40:13 PM,
Thursday 30 September 2004
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Presidential Debate Bingo!
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06:04:22 PM,
Thursday 30 September 2004
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Vivísimo has finally launched a search engine, with the unfortunate name of “Clusty“. I haven’t used it much, so I can’t say from experience how good it is, but it has the potential to be absolutely revolutionary. It clusters your search results together by topic, which can make it much easier to find the exact information you’re looking for, especially if your search terms are ambiguous. Easily the biggest development in web searching since Google’s PageRank system.
_respond? (5)
04:18:59 PM, Thursday 30 September 2004
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ATTENTION: If you are not registered to vote, be aware that registration deadlines in some states are as early as this Saturday, October 2nd. You must register and vote if you want to have any say at all in how your government is run. Even if you have no hope of affecting the presidential election in your state, there will still almost certainly be local elections that you can affect. It is your moral duty to register, inform yourself about the issues on the ballot as best you can, and vote on November 2nd. For more details, see this Voter Information Guide.
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(17)
08:25:51 PM,
Tuesday 28 September 2004
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when will you be angelic?
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(1)
12:39:42 AM,
Tuesday 28 September 2004
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“Should we take a train, or a steamship, or a plane?” asked Ann.
“Trains are too slow, and the trip by steamship around South America would take months,” replied Roger. “We’ll take a plane.”
If all stories were written like science fiction stories, by Mark Rosenfelder
[via MetaFilter]
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(4)
11:24:30 PM,
Sunday 26 September 2004
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Watched Sweeney Todd last night (not for the first time, nor, I imagine, for the last). Wonderful.
To seek revenge may lead to hell,
but everyone does it and seldom as well
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11:04:31 PM,
Sunday 26 September 2004
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Band name: The Excluded Middle.
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(1)
01:18:57 PM,
Friday 24 September 2004
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Picking up girls--MADE EASY!
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(4)
06:25:06 PM,
Thursday 23 September 2004
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About that phrase, "Perforating Mexicans".
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07:03:47 PM,
Tuesday 21 September 2004
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It's a Programming With Scissors And Tape kind of day. See, when you're dealing with long blocks of code--especially when you're dealing with long blocks of somebody else's bad code--sometimes the only good way to get a sense of how it works is to just print it all out, tape up all the functions into long sheets of paper, and rearrange things until you know how to do what you want.
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(2)
03:19:00 PM,
Tuesday 21 September 2004
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Okay, so I’ve been reading this MetaFilter thread, about the proposition that health care workers should have the right to refuse to perform procedures they find morally objectionable. It seems blindingly obvious to me that they should, but of course, since this issue is really all about abortion, the debate is complicated by the fact that everyone on every side is completely fucking batshit insane crazy.
Anyway, what’s bothering me is that, in this case, a lot of the people who fall on my side in the general abortion debate (I’m pro-choice) are pushing for a position that seems to me utterly despicable: namely that, if you are asked to do something for your job that you find immoral, either you should just accept it and do it anyway or you have no right to keep your job. It seems to me that this principle leads to all sorts of unacceptable conclusions, many of which are discussed in the thread itself. So I’m a bit concerned, to say the least, and I’m wondering: can anyone explain how this argument works, in a way that doesn’t make it sound completely fucking nuts? ‘Cause I don’t honestly expect to be convinced of it, but I’d at least like to hope that those who are aren’t just a bunch of fascist assholes.
(For what it’s worth, Ethereal Bligh’s posts in the MetaFilter thread are pretty close to my own take on it.)
_respond? (8)
06:02:11 AM, Sunday 19 September 2004
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It’s election season again, and the politicians are all out kissing hands and shaking babies.
_respond? (3)
06:28:53 PM, Saturday 18 September 2004
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Tiny teen takes on the giant one-eyed monster!
_respond? (1)
05:01:08 PM, Saturday 18 September 2004
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You're... you're actually going to elect him again, aren't you? You sad motherfuckers!
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(6)
12:23:22 AM,
Saturday 18 September 2004
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70 things about Leonard Cohen.
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(5)
05:05:32 PM,
Friday 17 September 2004
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An Unscientific Account of a Scientific Expedition.
By Mrs. Gill.
With a map.
[via this excellent MetaFilter post, which will tell you a bit more about it] _
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03:05:58 PM, Thursday 16 September 2004
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respond? (1)
03:00:40 PM, Thursday 16 September 2004
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If I lived in Florida, I would be pretty hard pressed to vote for Kerry over Nader, after the way the Democratic Party has behaved.
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(1)
12:21:17 AM,
Tuesday 14 September 2004
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I. Fucking. Hate. Computers.
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(7)
09:25:23 PM,
Monday 13 September 2004
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Dumbest Vehicle Ever.
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(5)
02:57:37 PM,
Monday 13 September 2004
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Also: Happy birthday, Elise!
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(2)
03:50:41 AM,
Saturday 11 September 2004
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Happy birthday, Neil!
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(2)
03:49:57 AM,
Saturday 11 September 2004
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