September Holidays

Lots of special holidays looming! Tomorrow on the 19th, of course, we get the first Talk Like a Pirate Day. Arrr! Wear your eye patch and cutlass to work, or just go see Pirates of the Caribbean again. Then entertain your more serious side, and celebrate the start of Banned Books Week starting on Saturday. Then close off the weekend with The International Day of Peace on Sunday.

Not Pittsburg

How did I miss this! I noticed a link to this list of Most Misspelled Cities in America (based on web search data), but nobody told me number 1 is Pittsburgh! I mean, I momentarily thought it might make the top ten, but it’s just not that hard to spell. Of course, as the article points out, in the late 1800’s the U.S. Board on Geographic Names standardized location spellings after over a century of people naming their towns whatever they wanted, willy-nilly. They ruled that all *-burghs would drop their final “h”, except for Pittsburgh, which got an exemption. … Continue reading Not Pittsburg

Blackout Story

I’m late on the bandwagon, but everybody else has been telling their blackout stories, and it’s cliche by now, but it really does reflect the type of town you are in. And in my case, it pointed out how much of a small, hippy town I’m really in. It’s a small town, so there wasn’t panic, because even at rush hour we’ve got no subways or skyscrapers, so there weren’t masses of trapped people. The university even had a heads-up that it was coming, as we got e-mail warning us to shut down our computers so as to avoid power-loss … Continue reading Blackout Story

NY State Fair

I’ve meant to go to the New York State Fair for the past several years, and yet it always falls the last week of August and I’m either out of town or just busy, but Friday I decided that I didn’t have anything that couldn’t wait to be done Saturday and I took the day off to drive up to Syracuse and check it out. It had been a long time since I’d even been to a county fair, and I had a great time. The New York fair in particular has really beautiful grounds with nice old buildings for … Continue reading NY State Fair

Stanley Cup comes to Cornell

A full teaching schedule for the past couple of weeks has kept me running, but I’ve been having a great time. It’s all content that I personally find interesting, which makes a huge difference. And despite the crazy work schedule I’ve gotten a few fun outings in. My latest adventure yielded the photo at the top of the page, from here at Cornell’s very own Lynah Rink. Very cool!

Mascot Abuse?

Speaking of hometown sports, the Pirates got an image upgrade last week when first baseman hit a woman in a large foam italian sausage costume over the head with his baseball bat at a game against Milwaukee. There is a link to video of the interrupted “Sausage Race” at that link, and it looks a lot worse than it sounds like it really was. Of course, this caused a huge amount of ongoing commentary, particularly in the Pittsburgh press. The large foam representative of the Allegheny County Health Department, Browny the Burger is fired up by mascot abuse, with one … Continue reading Mascot Abuse?

Mr. Yuk is Green

A friend reminded me today of what turns out to have been only a regional phenomenon, Mr. Yuk, a green frowny-face sticker from the 1970s that parents were supposed to mark household poisons with. Mr. Yuk had a dour, dirgeful theme song which was often played as a PSA during cartoons (you can hear the whole, long thing on his website), and he didn’t believe in sugar coating things for children: Mr. Yuk is mean. Mr. Yuk is green. Home is full of lots of things that children shouldn’t touch. Home is full of bad things that can hurt you … Continue reading Mr. Yuk is Green

Official Dodgeball?

Is dodge ball the next extreme sport? This article thinks so, as do the World Dodgeball Association and the National Amateur Dodgeball Association. As the article points out, the organized, safety-conscious, rules-based version promoted by the WDA isn’t the same game that is popping up on college campuses: The WDA and other dodgeball organizations tone down the game’s violence by using lightweight foam-based balls and outlawing head shots, while emphasizing teamwork. At the WDA website, the extensive rules (four “dodgers” on the inside; three “floaters” on the perimeter) read like a story problem from hell’s geometry class. “Everyone’s going to … Continue reading Official Dodgeball?

Free Nickles

Working too late leaves me with little substantive to weblog. My latest internet addiction has been loading up on free nickles with Amazon.com trivia. I was very frustrated when only my office computer was offering me trivia questions, and even after clearing my cookies they still won’t show up until I visit a subpage or two. But it’s a brilliant advertising scheme that has me checking back daily. Hey – those Babylon 5 DVD’s are expensive – getting a couple of dollars off doesn’t hurt!

Local Pranks Only, Please

Drunken prank call tip: restrict calls to your local area, as your inebriated state will probably prevent you from correctly converting west-coast time to east-coast, and particularly avoid the Daylight Saving switch as you’ll surely miscalculate that 11:30 your time is 3:30 at the house of your friend. Who, by the way, isn’t necessarily the person who will answer the phone. You’ll probably end up speaking to somebody who neither knows or nor cares whether your friend borrowed your vibrator.