Some cheesy photos from an Internet Librarians convo. . . .

Best Amazon review ever (or maybe second, behind the Anne Rice Explosion of 2004):

This has to be the worst martial arts technique book on the market. There was no practical use of the fist for street self defence unless you were attacked by a very wet and naked horny Lesbian on heat.
I didn’t realise that Master bates was not a martial artist in the true sense of the word.
This book was a total dissapointment from a Self Defence point of view although i am a total hit with the ladies. Please forgive any error in grammer as my fingers are still sticky.

for this book (may not be appropriate for work or other sensitive environments)

hat-tip: KK

There’s also this article by a librarian and mystery author:

[A]s someone said, you never finish research; at some point you just give up.

And reference librarians hate to give up. We know better than most people that there’s always another book, another database, another website to try. It’s like giving a kid the key to a candy shop or taking a glutton to a free buffet and saying “stop when you’ve had enough.”

…

But the most frustrating thing about research is the knowledge that, no matter how much you do, you’ll probably still make mistakes, and someone will be there to point them out. On the first day my novel was on sale someone cheerfully told me of a geographical error on page 5. There was quite a crowd around, so I didn’t kill him.

hat-tip: LISNews

The NYT reviews the Colbert Report…

“The Colbert Report” is a worthy spinoff, an icy-cold beer chaser to the shot of whiskey that is “The Daily Show.”

Where does one go for a well-accessorized crotch?

to you football people: announcers keep referring to “gadget” plays. why the hell can’t they just call them what they are, trick plays, anymore?

So, is this what it feels like to be published? Or this?

If television’s a babysitter, the internet’s a drunk librarian who won’t shut up.

I’ll admit Mr Jeepers is fuzzy and adorable. But in my opinion, a beanie baby crawled up his ass and died.

Language Loggers have posted about Partially Clips quite a number of times. I’ve finally taken the plunge and started reading the archives. . .

In other news, I’ll be in Pittsburgh for a few days this week, attempting to get financial aid, a job, housing, and so forth so I can be back at Pitt in the fall. Those of you who read my companion livejournal can find my phone number here; others should email me for the number (which is the same as it’s been since last summer). Also, if anybody knows of well-paying jobs or cheap housing in Pittsburgh, please let me know.

Some of you may have heard me talking about this article last week in Pittsburgh. . . .

The Speech the President Should Give, by Sarah Vowell (standing in for Maureen Dowd, who’s on book leave, quite capably).

Excerpt from an e-mail message I received today (emphasis added):

We recently reviewed your account, and suspect that your Bank Of America Internet Banking account may have been accessed by an unauthorized third party. Protecting the security of your account and of the Washington Mutual network is our primary concern. . . . .

Another message advertising an impotence drug carried the subject line Reviving the sex lives or millions—which in fact sounded kinda accurate. After all, how much money does the government spend providing sex drugs to old soldiers and medicare recipients, and what could we be doing with it instead?

Kat on SpamCop, which processes junk e-mail and sends letters to the ISP for me: “Aw, it’s like nastygram-o-matic!”

Some spammers’ names just cry out to be made into band members’ alter egos, and/or to be names for the bands themselves. “Underscoring T. Willa” and “Marauding H. Indispensibles” (and their cousin, “Marauding Unmentionables”). “Canvasing V. Scarifies”. (Not surprisingly, all of them Chinese in origin.) “Multifariousness S. Tyndall”. “Disable H. Delineate”. “Subcontracted B. Hairstylists”. (The middle initials are a nice touch. . . .)

This is, as Rane says, “awesome”. . .

Christian creationists won too much of a victory for their own good in Tulsa, where the local zoo was ordered to balance its evolution science exhibit with a display extolling the Genesis account of God’s creating the universe from nothing in six days.

[. . .]

[Zoo directors said] they intended no monopoly for the Adam and Eve tale but rather wanted “six or seven” creation myths afforded equal time. There was the rub: there are hundreds of creation tales properly honored by the world’s multifarious cultures, starting with the American Indian tribes around Tulsa.

Apparently, they gave up.

(NYT)

i may need some kind of typists’ wrist-brace or something. . . . my wrists are getting sore, and i sometimes have trouble picking up large books like i should be able to. . . . :-(

i don’t even know where I’d get something like that, or what to look for in one. Anyone? Maybe I should’ve asked the nurses in my class that ended last week. . .

Gaelic Storm have posted their tour schedule for the next ten months. . . . they’re playing three times in Dayton, Ohio this month, but there’s not a single date in Michigan in the next year. ::sulk::

For Canada Day, the CBC had a “Canadian History Quiz“. The Dominion Institute did a 20-question survey of 1,000 Canadians, and only one got every question; 2/3 got fewer than half the questions right. I got 13, though some were purely on dumb luck. (via ::schwagbag::)

Meanwhile, in England, the Blair government’s “Antisocial behaviour tsar” (I swear I’m not making this up), Louise Casey, is facing an investigation following allegations that she delivered a foul-mouthed after-dinner speech to an audience of chief police officers.. . . . Take that, Alanis! (doncha think?)

I got really bored Monday—no work and no school make for a fidgety Juicy—and went for a rather long bike ride (uses Google Maps, which is not compatible with some browsers). The ride down Packard through Pittsfield Township was not so much fun—it’s posted “No Winter Maintenance”, but some spring maintenance at least’d be nice—apparently the signs not only mean “we’re not going to clear the snow in the winter” but also “we’re not going to fix how fucked up the sidewalk gets because of the snow we aren’t clearing, either”.