You know those "useless Humanities" articles that come out all the time?

I'm amused by this ad for a U of C alumni event:
Dinner & Lecture: "Education and Utopia" with Hanna Gray
Tuesday, June 30
Debates over education tend to involve differing views not simply of the curriculum but of the ultimate purposes and futures for which students are to be educated. Those goals often describe a utopian model, one generally employed as a critique of the present state of education and culture. Finally, such recurrent controversies continue, as they have in the past, to center on the question of the liberal arts and the value of a liberal education. And, as always, they begin from a concern that the sustenance of this value is seriously threatened by contemporary trends and priorities. Join fellow alumni at the Hanover Inn, 2 South Main Street, for this timely and engaging discussion.

You can just hear how sick and tired the copywriter is of this same old same old debate.
I must admit a bit of pride and a lot of amusemement to think this is likely to be something U of Cers will be discussing for generations to come, kind of the way people now lament that people don't read enough, or don't read the right things enough...

Beni

Well, now that I'm about to leave Boston, I think I'm beginning to like this place. It's always like that, isn't it?

I've begun my tour of "Things I won't really be able to do when I'm in Ann Arbor" and one of them is buy day-caught, fresh lobster on my way home from work for $6.99/lb. Yes, that's right. Live lobster costs less here per pound than organic, free range chicken and less than most other seafood.

And on that note, I've made a resolution that each week, I will find a different way to cook lobster until I leave.

So far, on my list of methods is:
Grilled
Poached (in coconut cream or regular cream with butter, I can't bring myself to use so much butter to poach just in butter, a la Thomas Keller--any other ideas?)
Stir fried (I'm going to attempt something I once had in Cambodia here....we shall see. It's lobster stir fried with a coconut/pork/curry sauce.)
Any other ideas?

If any of you are in Boston, you are invited to the grand experiment. I don't promise the lobster will be good, but it will probably taste like lobster, so how bad could it be?

Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/10/us/10squatter.html?hp

I very infrequently find the New York Times interesting. It's usually a fine source of information, but anything that verges on opinion, social issues, whatever, I just skim over or ignore. To be fair, this isn't limited to The Times - as I've grown older and more bitter I find that my tolerance for the opinions or thoughts of pundits, experts, or even worse non-experts talking on subjects where there are experts available to talk that they ignore, has waned dramatically.

So anyway, I was pretty surprised when I found the linked article. It's not opinion or anything, but it actually got me to stop and realize that I don't know what I think of the issue.

For synopsis, and because the link will eventually die:

The housing crisis has made there be a lot of vacant houses. There are homeless people. Some homeless people have moved in to vacant houses. Some "advocacy groups" have begun helping homeless people move in to vacant houses. Obviously this is great for the homeless people, and makes the advocates feel great about themselves as well. However, it's also obviously illegal (and the advocates freely admit that). The majority of the houses are bank owned, though some are owned by other investors. Perhaps the most shocking thing in the article is that these groups sometimes have a locksmith show up, change the front door lock, and hand them a key, which they then hand off to the new occupants.

So yeah, I'm conflicted, I guess. It's great to put a roof over a family's head. It's not so great to steal. Not only is the advocacy group helping people steal a vacant house, it's a house that in theory the bank could be renting out for some real amount.

my wife found an interesting article from the "guardian" newspaper website...
[since the link to the "guardian" is apparently a blacklisted word for this server, please do a search on "guardian" and "the books we only say we've read" to find the article]

people tend to lie about ever reading a book because it'll make them seem smarter... right?

i love how the bible made it to the top 4 for the UK...

an interesting question came to mind... what would the US list look like?

we came up with the following list (in no particular order):
- walden
- catch-22
- hamlet

what do you think?

Link: http://www.indabamusic.com/submissions/show/4374

Hi everyone,
I am shamelessly plugging this contest my brother has entered. It's some kind of music contest where I think people write a song and the winner gets to do some kind of collaboration with Yo-Yo Ma.

So, check out the song he wrote. It's got a little Brazilian flavor to it. His name is: Barmey Vishnu Ung (it's sorted alphabetically by first name).

And if you like it, vote for it! Although voting might force you to register.

Voting ends January 10th.

Anyway, check it out. I like it better, personally, than what is currently listed in first. But, you know, he is my brother.

Link: http://www.thebigmoney.com/articles/mothers-milk/2008/11/12/selling-michelle

It's my own fault for reading the fashion section of newspapers before the news, but take a look at this from a recent article in Slate's The Big Money:

Semiotics brand analyst Scott Hamrah says we can expect to see more faces like Obama's in mainstream catalogs not because she's exotic to Americans, but because she's just the opposite. "It's about restoring normalcy to the mainstream. Michelle Obama is an avatar of our desire to be normal again," he says, pointing out that the Obamas have redefined normal to include smart, middle-class black people. He argues that her race grounds her in authenticity. "Being black is equated with being real," he says. "Black people are more authentic than white people for various reasons, but primarily because they've suffered more. So it makes sense that in a time that not only wants to return to normal but also wants to emphasize realness and expects to be suffering a lot, that this nation should have a black first lady, that only a black first lady could be the next Eleanor Roosevelt.

What surprises me most about this article is how....well, surprised I am by it! "Black people are more authentic than white people for various reasons, but primarily because they've suffered more." My jaw actually dropped.

I guess I am not so cynical as I thought I was.

We're definitely late on posting pictures of our puppy, and even later on posting pictures of our condo. I don't have any pictures of our condo, but I do have pictures of the puppy. So here some are!

Murphy, pretending to be a nice, cute dog.

The truth revealed, after the jump.

Read more »

Laura's post about puppies made me want to post pictures of our thus far undocumented puppy. Unfortunately, our gracious web hosts decided to not allow the posting of images. While they work on their end, I've "upgraded" our software, but haven't had time to fully re-customize the frontend. Results? So far no pictures, and the somewhat ugly look we've got right now. =(

Good thing I've got streaming puppies.

Link: http://www.ustream.tv/videoplayerpopup/channel/317016

A very zen puppy-viewing experience.

Well, Liz and I decided not to go down to Grant Park tonight.

But, pretty huge night for the country, the city, etc.

Finally we can get back to talking about things other than the election and the campaign. Moreover, we officially know the date on which there will no longer be a republican president. Hopefully in the next week or so we can all forget Palin exists. Maybe even McCain can go back to being the guy he was before he chose to run for president.

Good game, Obama, congrats.