Laquetta Shepard stands in silent defiance amid Ku Klux Klan members praying for white supremacy in Bowling Green, Ky. Bravery defined. (news item with more info)
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Aimee Mann fans take note, reliable sources say that she will make an appearance on this week's episode of The West Wing. Staff member are making a trip to "Rock the Vote" (it being an election year in the alternate liberals-take-over-the-White-House universe) where Aimee and her band will perform.
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Faced with dwindling numbers, the Sisters of Carmel of the Resurrection in Indianapolis have hired a development director to do a little publicity to attract new members. It has been twelve years since someone joined their community. Despite the nuns' modest plans for a simple brochure, the development director brought in a set of advisors to propose new-fangled publicity such as a website. Now you can find out what books the sisters are reading, read their perspectives on current events, and apply to visit and learn more about life as a Carmelite nun ("If you are a single woman between 20-45"). Breaking a tradition of seclusion was not easy, but these women love their way of life so sincerely that they wish for it to continue. An ad agency took on the challenging job for free and found the sisters to be witty and even irrevent at times. Their interest in current events gave them the hook for an intriguing website and now some of them have a weekly deadline to write essays on current events. No sisters seem to regret their new exposure to the outside world. Whether or not their goals of recruitment will be achieved remains to be seen.
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Friday, September 27, 2002

The handwriting recognition software in Microsoft's new Table PCs matches your letters with preloaded samples in the database on the machine. Bill Gates thinks that the database should be augmented to learn from the user's handwriting. But others at the company want it to remain closed, with periodic updates that the company itself controls. They're not sure if the recognition will be better or worse if the software tried to understand individual handwriting quirks. Also, and perhaps more importantly to Microsoft, if they don't control a central store of samples, they won't learn which additions improve overall accuracy. Meanwhile, IBM is pushing for a digitized handwriting standard (InkXML) so that companies can collaborate and produce better results. I am happy having the handwritten ink stay as it is for me to peruse later, but I would definitely want searching capabilities for it so I'd need recognition. But perhaps it wouldn't have to be completely accurate if it was exhaustive enough to include the correct results in its various guesses for what my scribbles may mean.
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Follow Me Here linked to an article which I can't access anymore about how orchestras are getting louder and louder. A portion of the article discussed musicians' hearing loss, which some orchestra members combat with special earplugs. An online article I found claims that "As many as 52 percent of professional orchestral performers have been diagnosed with hearing problems. 26 percent of high school seniors who participated in band had measurable hearing loss." Orchestras have gotten louder over time in order to fill huge halls. Sitting in front of the brass section or even sometimes the winds can be an ear-ringing experience, and that ringing can stay with you permanently. You'd think that rock musicians would have worse hearing loss, but their amplifiers are typically pointed towards the audience, and they aren't playing directly into each other's ears. Orchestras can reach 120-137 decibels.
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Thursday, September 26, 2002

The NY Times reports that with the removal of the asterisk indicating extended time and other accommodations given to SAT test takers, business is up for doctors who test for learning disabled students. Legitimate requests have risen, but there are also parents and students looking for an extra edge. Some will shop around until they get the diagnoses they want. And these don't come cheap, $2,400 for tests and an evaluation. Students without that money and in lower income schools that can't afford to provide disability testing may not be able to even get legitimate evaluations. The College Board doesn't think this is any worse than inequities of schools not being able to afford new textbooks. But parents and teachers can creatively overcome things like lack of school supplies. How do they get their own edge on those who can afford to cheat on a diagnosis?
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Scan Scam?
If you live in an area where companies selling "whole-body scans" have arrived, you've probably heard the ads offering peace of mind and early detection of illnesses. They often feature testimonials from customers who credit the scans with saving their lives. San Francisco doctor Alan Eshleman has a problem with these "whole-body scanners". In fact, he thinks they are worse scammers than the telephone psychic who told his patient that he had a deadly lung disease. His supporting facts? There is little evidence that these CT scans really catch early signs of disease, nor do they necessarily offer peace of mind. The reports provided with the scan results tend to not be absolutely reassuring since they don't want to rule out any possible problems. So the patient is referred to their doctor for followup work on the "questionable" size of a cyst or "unexplained" density in the liver. A few hundreds or thousands of dollars of more tests later (perhaps, if they are lucky, paid by insurance but then also contributing to the rising costs of health care), the patient maybe has their peace of mind.

However, in my opinion, the fact which beats out any of the other negatives or benefits is this: "the radiation dose delivered during a whole-body scan is hundreds of times greater than that of a single chest X ray. [...] People who receive a whole body scan every few years as 'preventative medicine' actually increase their chances of getting a radiation-induced cancer." The FDA is looking into these scans for preventative screening purposes, and it's possible they may see them in a more positive light than Dr. Eshleman does, but, as I always advocate, be informed.
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Wednesday, September 25, 2002

It's a nice change of pace to go on vacation and read charming stories in the local paper such as this: Dog gone … found two miles out to sea. Block Island resident Boo Boo, a 3-year-old Staffordshire terrier who enjoys chasing sea gulls into the waves, was caught in a rip tide and disappeared. She was discovered two miles offshore, despite dense fog, by a surprised fisherman. She had been doggie paddling for about an hour and a half. Boo Boo has been reunited with her owner, a jewelry designer who is now making her pet a tag in the event of future escapades.
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Fresh Air's Terry Gross is profiled by the Minneapolis Star Tribune. Her interviews are typically done long-distance, and her producer says that "makes it more intimate and interesting for the listener." It also reduces self-consciousness for both the interviewer and interviewee. Gross does not warm up her subjects, preferring to let the rapport grow while they are on the air. Also noted in the article: Car Talk has the most listeners per hour of the NPR shows. (via Media News)
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Tuesday, September 24, 2002

Authors and Books for Children contains articles on some of my favorite books, including an informative biography on Helen Dore Boylston who drew on her own nursing experience to write the Sue Barton series, a bit on the Betsy-Tacy series, and a comparison of two editions of a Nancy Drew mystery. There are also links to online books (etexts) including those of Thornton W. Burgess.
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In the third book in the Sue Barton series, our heroine, fresh from nursing school, joins the Henry Street Nurses in New York City. When I originally read the book I had little interest in researching what realities the plot may have been based on. Now my curiosity regarding whether the Henry Street Settlement and founder Lillian Wald, who makes a brief but memorable appearance in the story, actually exist is quickly satisfied with a web search. Lillian Wald started the Visiting Nurses Service in 1893 after realizing there was a need for public health nursing and education within the New York tenement community. The group of nurses from the Henry Street house were well established by the time the fictional Sue Barton joined up in the 1930s. While there are happy endings to most of the cases Sue tends to, I would say that the book does not glamourize the conditions and hardships that these nurses had to contend with in providing care in impoverished households. The Visiting Nurse Service of New York still exists today and their web site, with its historical photo gallery, shows that they are well aware of their heritage.
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Monday, September 23, 2002

Marketing in the form of branding comes to your local plant nursery. There's a big market of gardeners out there and nurseries are taking advantage of the tried and true results of renaming generic products to make them more attractive to consumers. Resilient Jewels, Lasting Jewels, Hot Jewels, Cool Jewels, Superbells, Superbena, Supertunia. Thank goodness these plants come with more than marketing-speak names and pretty packaging; many also include instructions on their care and feeding, with more information available on company websites. Like everything else that gets branded, it's all about introducing consumers to convenience.
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A Massachusetts cat was in a tree for eighteen days before being rescued by an Animal Rescue League worker trained in tree climbing by an arborist. (thanks Jen!)
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The folks at The Undetectables, a company that helps mobile phone companies in the U.K. camouflage their cell antennas, used to build sets and scenery for Aardman Animations, the makers of Wallace and Gromit. (via Slashdot)
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Friday, September 20, 2002

Logitech's new IO pen captures your handwriting but doesn't include handwriting recognition software. It stores what you write with the pen in an image format that you can then attach to documents or just keep around for reference. Although I type faster than I can write and have almost mastered Palm's Graffiti (after several years of sporadic training), I still like to scribble out notes in many cases instead of using electronic text. It allows me to be expressive and use more graphical information (arrows, many underlines for emphasis), plus the doodling helps me think. I'm not sure I need it in electronic format, but if I could somehow search all those scribbles later for things I jotted down, that could be worth the switch from paper. (via evhead)
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Within CODeDOC, Whitney Museum's 'net art project that takes a look at the coding side of software art, this Java project was especially mesmerizing. From the source code comments: "This code reads in its own source and displays it in a tiny font, then moves three points in 'code space.' It essentially comments on itself. The white Insertion Point traces the code in the order it was written. The amber Fixation Point traces word by word as someone might read it. The green Execution Point shows a sample of how the computer reads it. The code lines themselves gradually get brighter as they execute more." More on the author's related projects at TextArc. (thanks Succa)
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Thursday, September 19, 2002

Despite the lamentable woes of Amtrak, there is still a romance to cruising the country by rail, the lulling clickety clack, the Doppler-affected clangs of crossings, and, most importantly for me, the absence of car or plane motion nausea. As most of us think about train trips we picture a comfy chair and perhaps a snug little sleeping compartment. But there's another option for the well-heeled. You can charter a private railroad car. The American Association of Private Railroad Car Owners has listings of cars available for you to rent for parties, unique business trips, honeymoons, whatever your fancy. These cars are attached to Amtrak trains traveling the usual scheduled routes, so you won't be going anywhere you can't get to with usual passenger rail. But imagine the luxury of having your own private section of a train! And perhaps then the family pet can come along?

Take a peek at this luxurious car that comes with an executive chef. And there are plenty more to choose from... the Scottish Thistle, Francis L. Suter, Dover Harbor, Northern Sky. The Caritas has Art Deco styling. Read about the inspector-with-an-attitude that kept the Virginia City car off the rails for over a year! The last Presidential rail car is on display in a Miami museum. If you want to buy your very own railroad car, be aware that you may have to pay property tax on it. California's Private Railroad Car Tax is the only property tax that is collected by the state itself (CA residents pay property taxes to the county).
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Wednesday, September 18, 2002

At the Weber Grill Restaurant, everything is cooked over charcoal on those familiar Weber kettles. Heat is heat, but there's something about food roasted over coals, and this is a gimmick that makes some sense.
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Late one evening I heard a scrabble scrabble on the roof (and I don't mean two copies of the word game). The cat raised her eyes upwards and her ears followed suit. I knew what this meant, I had read about it in the home inspection reports for other houses and heard the experiences from fellow new homeowners: roof rats. Well, we roof rat hosts are in good company, with the rich and famous of Beverly Hills fighting an infestation of "Rattus rattus", past carrier of the Plague, chewer of metal, wood and concrete, eater of vegetables, flowers, and fruits. The citizens of southern California are debating the balance between feral cats versus dirty rats. It seems the rats got worse when the cats were trapped. Hmmm. But the good people of 90210 are unlikely to want scrappy cats running around their neighborhoods even if it does solve the rat problem. Meanwhile back in Silicon Valley, we're blocking any holes we find into the attic ... but those little guys can fit through holes the size of a quarter.
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Tuesday, September 17, 2002

Steven Pinker has a new book out, "The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature." Edge has a lengthy interview with him. Pinker's book fights the "blank slate" view of mind, that we are all formed by parenting, nurturing, society. His ammunition is the results of studies in the field of behavioral genetics. Although the brain has a great capacity to learn, "research is showing that many properties of the brain are genetically organized, and don't depend on information coming in from the senses." So the old nature versus nurture arguments get some weight on the nature side from the dominance and persistence of our genes. (Thanks Skot)
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Connecticut makes nearly $600 million annually in gambling revenues. It's a staggering amount considering the small size of the state (about 3.2 million population). The Christian Science Monitor takes a look at New England casinos, pointing out the shift from traditional Puritanical views to a new view of entertainment and profits. Other states are considering opening casinos as well, with Native American tribes promising large revenues and thousands of jobs. Casinos do take a toll, however, with bankruptcy and crime created by "problem gamblers" which then costs the state money. Groups who are fighting the casinos are even comparing the gambling industry to the tobacco industry, predicting that lawsuits could arise if they don't acknowledge the problems. It seems unlikely that a state that allows gambling will be sued, after all they allow tobacco to be sold (with sin taxes of course), so that won't stop them from creating new revenue streams. What will be interesting to see is how much money there is to spread around. Will Connecticut's revenues decrease if neighboring states open casinos?
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Monday, September 16, 2002

In peeking at Alton Brown's Dannon deal, I noticed that Stonyfield, my favorite yogurt company, has formed a partnership with DANONE (French parent of Dannon). DANONE acquired 40% of Stonyfield in October 2001 and has the option to acquire a majority holding in 2004. Stonyfield management didn't change, but the deal may have interesting consequences in the future. American consumers continue to seek out healthier foods and become more aware of what is truly bad for them, so I hope Stonyfield's ingredients don't change over time to match what some big exec believes will attract more customers. Also, I assume they wouldn't want to cut into Dannon yogurt's profits, so the Stonyfield niche may be safe.
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I've driven by Sunset Magazine's offices in Menlo Park many times, but never considered visiting them. Little did I know that more than 100,000 visitors make the pilgrimage each year to see the buildings and gardens of "The Magazine of Western Living." I also did not know that the magazine was concieved as a promotion for Southern Pacific Railroad and named after the Sunset Limited train which went from New Orleans to Los Angeles. Its original subtitle was "Publicity for the Attractions and Advantages of the Western Empire" so you can see that the premise of its founding was far away from the current audience of people who already live here and want to know how to keep their (hopefully drought-resistant) plants healthy, correctly cook their nutritious farmer's market produce, decorate their Craftsman bungalows and ranches, and properly visit the plentiful national parks.
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Friday, September 13, 2002

Alton Brown's Slashdot interview of 10 questions is up. Also, he's got a new bit up on his site discussing his upcoming product endorsements. Soon you'll see him on 32 ounce containers of Dannon Plain Yogurt with an AB recipe under the lid. And he has a short term spokesperson deal for Hunt's new Perfect Squeeze ketchup bottle. Great to see him cashing in finally!
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The NY Times' Moscow Journal reports that regular inspections for radioactivity are made on produce and meats. Moscow is 415 miles from the Chernobyl nuclear-power plant which blew a reactor in 1986. Inspectors seized 3,050 pounds of radioactive produce last year and expect a 10% increase in 2002. The problem arises not with farm-grown produce but with the wild goods harvested by folks looking to supplement their incomes by selling berries and mushrooms. Open-air produce markets have labs busy with inspectors checking goods. It's now forest mushroom harvest time, but Cesium 137, easily absorbed by mushrooms, has a half-life of 30 years. Russians love their wild mushrooms, but they must remember that those grandmas selling produce on the street corners haven't had their mushrooms probed with a spectrometer.
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Thursday, September 12, 2002

Although you can buy sectioned watermelons at the grocery store, somehow it's not quite the same as lugging home the whole enchilada (as it were). Now there's a smaller watermelon for you to carry home, weighing in at 3-6 pounds and with a thinner skin. It's been named PureHeart and was created using cross-pollination, so there was no new-fangled genetic modification. They're much more expensive than the big guys, but sound perfect if you want to feed a couple people or perhaps just yourself. And you can store them easily in the fridge too.
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I never really knew what Mutual of Omaha did, but I figured they liked animals. Remember Marlin Perkins and "Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom"? Well it's coming back, though alas not with the distinctive narration of Mr. Perkins who passed away in 1986. New shows will be aired next week on the cable channel Animal Planet with Alec Baldwin narrating. Wild Kingdom is produced by Mutual of Omaha, which I now know is an insurance company, hence the full name. The original series started in 1963 and ran for 10 years and even longer in syndication, which is how I saw it.
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Wednesday, September 11, 2002

Headlines One Year Later
8:46am 9:02am 9:40am 10:10am
An Uneasy Remembrance
Year of painful recuperation
A Tentative Normality
Society's Anxiety
'Alert But Defiant'
Remembrance and Resolve
Resilience and Grief
Journey From Despair to New Purpose
Grieve Today and Then Grasp Tomorrow
In many ways, remembering
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Women at Ground Zero
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Tuesday, September 10, 2002

Despite having attended a women's college where most exhibitions and performances were the work of females, I am having trouble wrapping my brain around this concept: the National Museum of Women in the Arts. There are more than 3,000 works in the permanent collection with art from the 16th century to the present. Drawings, paintings, sculpture, embroidery, even silverwork. I am just amazed and delighted that this museum exists. Rooms of art all created by women... don't imagine it, go see it.
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Alas, it appears that stores still haven't caught onto the need to stock plenty of those extra-long sheets for dormitory bound freshmen. Despite the high percentage (90+%) of college-going seniors in my hometown, my mother still had to special order my sheets from a local store. My college roommate arrived with standard sized sheets, which kept her popping out of bed all night to get the corners tucked back in. Her mom finally found and sent her XL twin sheets, in a pretty peach color which I was envious of since all we were offered was plain boring ol' white. These days there's the web to turn to. Online stores that cater to college students, like AllDorm, carry a selection of XLs, even in flannel. Lands Ends' "Dorm in a Bag" comes in XL and other popular bedding retailers have XLs listed on their sites. So while local shops may not be keeping them in stock, online merchants may have them. And, worst case, it can't hurt to learn how to fold proper hospital corners on a mattress with flat sheets. (via Obscure Store)
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Monday, September 09, 2002

Even more colored soda? Well, you know how marketing works, when one jumps in the pool, everyone else does too for fear of losing market share. Now, the "uncola" is going upside-down as the makers of 7-Up release dnL (turn that over and see the naming inspiration). It's bright green, caffeinated, fruity, and due out in November. Dr Pepper/Seven-Up was acquired by Cadbury Schweppes in 1995.
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What does Mom pack you for lunch if she's Alice Waters, founder of Chez Panisse? How about a mozzarella, roasted pepper and tapenade sandwich? Or maybe a Greek salad with tomatoes, cucumbers, and romaine. Waters would take an hour to prepare her daughter's fresh lunches and always included fruit, in season of course, cut up and often placed in orange juice, freshly squeezed of course, to prevent browning. Yum.
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If you take notice of architectural details as you walk city streets, you'll enjoy Public Letter, a walk in central London. Created by a teacher of graphic design, it explores the lettering used on buildings, starting with the British Library which, appropriately enough, has a gate made out of letters. (via Follow Me Here)
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Friday, September 06, 2002

Take a look at the striking new design for the The Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston. The façade will be composed of identically sized vertical planks in transparent glass, translucent glass and opaque metal. The dramatically cantilevered "gallery box" section will be illuminated at night to become a glowing presence in Boston Harbor. A theater on the 2nd and 3rd floors will have back and side walls of glass allowing a backdrop of a clear view of the harbor or controlled filtering down to complete blackout. The planned completion date is 2006.
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"a veritable tsunami of umami stories"? Washington Post food writer Robert L. Wolke summarizes what is known about this "fifth taste." Named umami in 1907 by Kikunae Ikeda, glutamates are difficult to describe as far as their flavor, but then how does one describe any of the other four basic flavors without knowing them? Foods high in glutamates include popular seasonings such as Parmigiano-Reggiano, fermented soy sauce, and fish sauces. The discovery of a specific taste receptor on the human tongue for glutamates in 2000 legitimized its existence as a basic flavor. Findings this year that we have taste receptors for the amino acids found in proteins, of which glutamates are one, support the idea that our tastes provide our basic needs for nourishment. Saltiness is needed for sodium, sweetness for carbohydrates, bitterness to avoid toxic plants, he doesn't say what sour is for (Vitamin C? :-), and the umami gives us protein.
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Thursday, September 05, 2002

According to "The Ultimate Brownie Book," blondies came before brownies. Brownies were a variation. I always thought it was the other way around. The first known brownie recipe from Fannie Farmer's 1896 "Boston Cooking School Cookbook," doesn't include chocolate but has molasses and was "browned" giving it its name. The 1918 edition which is online has a listing for brownies which includes chocolate in the cookies section, but also has a molasses version in Cakes. I'll have to check the 1896 reprint next time I see it in a bookstore to see if both versions existed then. A search on blondies in the 1918 cookbook doesn't turn up anything, but there is likely something similar under a different name.
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Assembling your own furniture from flat-pack can be rewarding, but is often frustrating. IKEA's directions, which are graphical so as to be understood in any language, are clear, but not helpful with ambiguities and potential errors. I was toying with the idea of creating an online database of IKEA furniture assembly tips that customers could search before picking up their screwdrivers. It would have tips specific to each item, contributed by past assembers. Comments like: "There are two types of pointy screws, one has a rounded head and the other is flat but they both look flat in the directions. Don't get them mixed up." and "The wooden pegs won't look like they fit in the right holes, but, don't worry, they will." Stavros Antifakos from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology is working with a team to make the furniture pieces themselves recognize their state of assembly with sensors, microchips and LEDs. If you try to force a piece into the wrong position, an LED may flash to warn you. Would this cut down on frustration or would we just find ourselves arguing with annoying blinking lights? I'd like to be a usability subject for this one if IKEA considers it for production -- provided I get to use an electric screwdriver.
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Wednesday, September 04, 2002

In a Guardian article about the disposition of a violin collector's unexpectedly large trove of instruments, Graham Wells, founder of Sotheby's musical instruments department is quoted as saying: "The violin trade has always been corrupt. Compared with the rest of the art and collectors' market, and even with other instruments, only violins, because of their rarity, history and immense value, attract this level of corruption, with auction houses and the trade - and, of course, musicians who cannot afford these instruments - all suffering as a result." This fact becomes clear in the convoluted tale of Gerald Segelman's estate, as the lawyers for his charitable trust tussle with the dealer entrusted with selling, at fair market value, the many violins Segelman had collected. Along the way the female companion of the deceased claimed ownership of the collection and it was eventually discovered that there were even more instruments whose existence the dealer never disclosed to the trustees. Multiple lawsuits were filed. The remainder of Segelman's collection now sits deteriorating in storage at Sotheby's, awaiting its fate.

Speaking of violins, San Francisco Symphony concertmaster Alexander Barantschik has an arrangement to play Jascha Heifetz's Guarnerius violin, which he willed (for unknown reasons) to the De Young Museum in San Francisco. The violin is known as "The David" after Ferdinand David, who premiered Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto on it in 1845. Heifetz's will stated that it be used "on special occasions by worthy performers." The agreement between the museum and the SF Symphony is for three seasons.
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You know you've married a geek when you send your husband the URL to the Nerd Watch Museum and he sends you back the URL of the one he had. (via Yahoo Picks)
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Tuesday, September 03, 2002

Useful: capsule information on the U.S. Supreme Court Judges (thanks kitty!).
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Jerry Kindall was able to find more web info on the nonexistent map destinations by virtue of knowing the story of the towns "Goblu" and "Beatosu." These fake towns were listed in Michigan's official state highway maps for 1978-1979 and refer to the rivalry between University of Michigan (blue) and Ohio State University. Of course those probably weren't placed for copyright infringement as much as school spirit. These two town names also led Jerry to a Straight Dope article on this very topic. The term for this is "copyright traps" and readers of the column sent in a few. Thomas Guides, a popular California car accessory, are also perpetrators of this tactic. And a poster to an alt.folklore.urban thread claims that Etak, the digital map people, also use copyright traps, with one employee promoting their driveway to a street and naming it after him/herself. Perhaps if you want to make finding online directions to your home easier, you could get an insider to use you as a copyright trap. "Just go to maps.yahoo.com and search for my cat's name. That's my house."
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Diet Vanilla Coke is reportedly coming in October. I finally tried regular Vanilla Coke and my reaction was "they've managed to change the aftertaste of Coke to be vanilla." It's not something I'd go out of my way to drink, but then I don't usually drink colas. While I was looking for the Vanilla Coke I noticed something new which turned out to be Clearly Canadian in new bottles. I loved their old bottles which had a distinctive shape. The new sleeker shape was rolled out a couple years ago and now they've pumped up the label graphics. It's snazzy but not my style.
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