“The planetarium show sped forward, and ticket holders’ seats literally shook as subwoofers installed under each chair created a rumbling lift-off effect. Tom Hanks’ voice filled the dome-shaped hall, and an image of the Orion Nebula burst into view overhead…. What are astronomers trying to do when they design planetariums?” Diana Michele Yap —Costs, F/X…
“The pre-modern in [T.S.] Eliot’s poetry is a matter of Fisher Kings and fertility cults; in his prose it is a question of classical order, Tory traditionalism and the Christian church. In both cases, however, a discredited individualism must yield to a more corporate form of being, roughly at the time when laissez-faire capitalism was…
“An amateur astronomer may have found another moon of the Earth. Experts say it may have only just arrived…. It could be a passing chunk of rock captured by the Earth’s gravity, or it could be a discarded rocket casing coming back to our region of space.” —New ‘Moon’ Found Around EarthBBC) Did you know…
“In 1855 two Portuguese translators, José da Fonseca and Pedro Carolino, produced an English phrasebook so unbelievably bad that it was reprinted for half a century as a masterpiece of hilarity, under the title English as She is Spoke…. I thought it would be interesting to compare Fonseca and Carolino’s translations with Babelfish‘s….” —English as…
“Skyscrapers in general, and the twin towers of the World Trade Center in particular, symbolize, for many writers, either prideful arrogance, or a new technological beauty. This site attempts to survey what has already been written on this topic.” —World Trade Center: Literary and Cultural ReflectionsDennis G. Jerz) Similar:Avoid static, wordy nominalization. Prefer compelling verbs.New…
In case you haven’t already been inundated by anniversary memorials, you can compare before & after images of the attack site. Meanwhile, First Lady Laura Bush says turn off the TVs on September 11. —WTC Satellite Images: Before & AfterSpaceImaging.com) Similar:Take a moment to appreciate these good COVID-19 statisticsMay 1, my state had the third-highest…
“On a random day, on a random flight, they found themselves – unwarned, unprepared, unarmed – on the front lines of a vicious new kind of war. And somehow, in the few confusing and terrifying minutes they had, they transformed themselves from people on a plane into soldiers, and they fought back. And that made…
“We hope you enjoyed watching the construction of the butter cow live. If you missed last year[‘]s construction, watch the high-speed, time-lapsed Real Player video from start to finish.” —LIVE Shot of the Butter CowIllinois State Fair) Similar:Thesis Critique Activity: Another Use of a Class-edited Google DocA few weeks ago, I had students in my…
“Wisconsin-born professional cheese sculptor Sarah Baumann (now of Cincinnati) admits her cheese-head heritage is to blame and has been fashioning cheese figures for advertising and publicity for the food industry, retail and foodservice clients for five years…” —Cheese ScupltureWOXY) Similar:On Office Hours and Student Contact at the Small Liberal Arts College I don’t expect students…
“But while the day [9-11] will surely be difficult to endure, it remains unclear which television network will rise to the occasion, with its sensitive, cathartic anniversary coverage helping us decide what to feel while bringing a sense of closure to our national period of mourning.” —Who Will Bring Closure to a Grieving Nation?Satire from…
“How did technologists, government officials and a host of other early players turn something with no obvious business model into a system that has become so intrinsic to the new century?” Dan Gilmor —10 Choices that were Critical to the Net’s SuccessMercury News) Similar:Introduction to The Skin of Our Teeth (optimistic, absurdist metatheater; Thornton Wilder,…https://youtu.be/1okt8MIVTtsAcademiaBusiness…
“The interest in poetry in the wake of the calamitous attacks of last fall surprised some observers. But the art of poetry makes the breath of any one reader its medium: a commanding appeal, heightened at a time when many of us felt overdosed or overwhelmed by mass media.” Robert Pinsky —Poetry and Sept. 11:…
What did September 11 have to do with Nostradamus? Oliver North? Snapple? All feature in assorted urban legends about the attacks. —Osama Bin Ladin is Alive and Well and Living in UtahSalon) Similar:Shakespeare’s Genius Is NonsenseJust as comedians generally don’t laugh …CultureBeatrix Potter-pinching and Žižekian swipes: the strange world of book theftsWe caught a gent…
“With the eyes of the world focused on a small number of related events, many stepped into the role of amateur journalist, seeking out sources and sometimes assembling these ideas for others. Most striking, perhaps, were the wide number of accounts from those who had seen the World Trade Center collapse, or had in some…
“From the comfort of their desktop or laptop, co-eds can add soap and fabric softener that is dispensed by the washing machine. Finally when the wash is done, kids can get an e-mail telling them to come and get it.” —IBM Hooks up Dorm Washers, Dryers to WebForbes) Similar:5 Fun Ways to Help Your Kids…
“The US State Department and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have granted TransOrbital, Inc. of La Jolla, California, permission to send its TrailBlazer probe to map the surface of the Moon and photograph Earth.” —First Commercial Moon Landing Gets Go-aheadNature) “He was a junkman with an extraordinary dream…to salvage the junk left on the…
“While IKEA’s instruction sheets lead to a safely constructed unit, Antifakos thinks that the order in which parts should be assembled often seems arbitrary to the buyer. ‘People find this annoying so they don’t follow them,’ he says. ” —Foolproof Flat-pack Warns of Assembly ErrorsNew Scientist) Do people hate reading instructions so much that furniture…
“If all you have is a hammer then everything is a nail. How else can you explain why web sites are so incredibly painful to use? If I were paranoid I’d assume there was a conspiracy to assure that the Internet is kept lame. But perhaps it is a combination of ignorance and laziness.” Bob…
“A blog works if it addresses its audience, whether that audience is five or 500 or 5,000. In fact, many blogs, by their precise nature, are never going to get that big. So, why worry about the bigger fish? Enjoy yourselves.” Andrew Sullivan —Are Weblogs Changing Our Culture?Slate) “What the relentless focus of bloggers like…
“Science is often hard to read. Most people assume that its difficulties are born out of necessity, out of the extreme complexity of scientific concepts, data and analysis. We argue here that complexity of thought need not lead to impenetrability of expression; we demonstrate a number of rhetorical principles that can produce clarity in communication…