Via my dad, via the San Francisco Chronicle's excellent Mark Moford: Whiskipedia.
And 28 other things to be happy about:
Women and minorities appear to be galvanized by Hillary Clinton's presidential run. Youth and college-educated voters appear to be galvanized by Barack Obama's. No one at all is truly, deeply galvanized by Mitt Romney or John McCain or crazy little Mike Huckabee, and everyone is generally repulsed by the fetid little tyrant that is Rudy Giuliani. All of this, remarkably, seems just about exactly as it should be.
The Oscar nominations are out. I can't wait for the press conference to announce the winners on February 24th.
Edgar Alan Poe is 199 today.
<rant>
I'm reviewing a lot of CVs right now, and I would like to vent for a moment. Just a few things, though:
- If you're applying for a Quality Assurance position, spelling and grammar count a lot.
- Unless you've gotten an invitation to apply, the people reviewing your résumé have others to read. Write concisely. Highlight the important parts. Limit yourself to two pages of paper with a link to a longer version. Don't waste the reader's time. Even if you're perfect for the job, you go into the phone screen with a mark against you if your CV has Dickensian verbosity.
- Don't put information on your CV that we can't use to hire you. If you put your age, marital status, immigration status, race, or anything else like that on your CV, a potential employer might bin the thing just to prevent any hint of bias in the hiring process.
- But do put down your bona fides. If you say "Engineering Degree" on your CV, you actually do need to include the actual degree (BA, BS, BBQ), the name of the institution and the date. Like it or not, a degree from the Ira Bialystock Engineering School and Storm Door Company is not the same as one from Northwestern, and since we're going to call your school to check that you graduated as a precondition of hiring you, don't waste our time by having us guess. We will simply guess that you went to IBESASDC and not NU, and pass.
</rant>
I almost slept through a story on Morning Edition just now, about sleep:
In our fast-paced, global society, many people consider it a big plus to need as little sleep as possible. But almost every sleep researcher will tell you that most people need at least seven hours of sleep for biological and psychological health. So there is a glaring disconnect between what the messages in our culture say about sleep and the messages we receive from scientists.
A very old friend of mine put her dog down this evening. I know how hard that was. Cali had a good life, and was loved. And she knew it.
Every dog owner has to face this eventually: dogs only live a few years. That doesn't make it easier.
In the Jewish tradition—in which I was raised, despite both my parents and me being devout atheists—we always acknowledge the sadness lurking behind joy. It's a Jewish curse to find the cloud behind every silver lining. We dip an egg in salt water at Passover to remind ourselves of this. Not to mention the not-so-far-from-truth Jewish joke about the widow at the funeral shouting "how could you do this to me?" So maybe it's inappropriately personalizing someone else's pain, but a friend going through this reminds me of how short Parker's life will be, and how important it is to cherish what he brings to me, which is absolutely no less than how much Cali's life brought to my friend.
So, Tink, I know what you're feeling. And I know Cali was a happy dog, and loved you unconditionally, and lived as long as she could. Nothing else really matters.
I noticed as I was leaving the office Monday that my cactus changed:
I guess it's a happy cactus after all. They're so hard to read, you know.
I don't usually comment on stupid celebrity tricks—that's my friend Katie's job—but this made me laugh out loud. Despite her obvious successes as a mother, apparently Lynne Spears (Britney and Jamie Lynn Spears's mom) will not publish her upcoming Christian parenting book after all:
Lynne Spears' book about parenting has been delayed indefinitely, her publisher said Wednesday. Lindsey Nobles, a spokeswoman for Christian book publisher Thomas Nelson Inc., said Wednesday that the memoir by the mother of Britney Spears was put on hold last week.
She declined to comment on whether the delay was connected to the revelation that Spears' 16-year-old daughter, Jamie Lynn, is pregnant.
Update, via Cele|bitchy: Bonnie Fuller has a good take on this at Huffington Post.
Phew. Aside from a 10-mile backup on I-65 north of Indianapolis, the return trip went fine. Parker has now logged three entire days in the car without puking. And now he's curled up in his crate on his smelly blanket just waiting for me to turn out the light. Smart dog.
The Commission on Presidential Debates announced Monday that my undergraduate alma mater, Hofstra University, will host the final debate in the 2008 general election cycle:
"We are extremely pleased and proud that the Commission has chosen Hofstra University for one of America's most important political events," said Hofstra University President Stuart Rabinowitz. "The presidential debates are pivotal events that can shape the course of the election, and our students and community will be able to witness, first-hand, the democratic process."
President Rabinowitz will soon announce plans for a series of academic programs to be held in the months leading up to the debate that will provide students and the community with insights into the process and workings of the national election. "With Hofstra's unique academic strengths, particularly with our Peter S. Kalikow Center for the Study of the American Presidency and our vibrant academic programs in political science, journalism and mass media, and law, we are uniquely poised to take advantage of the special opportunities a presidential debate offers. We plan to maximize every opportunity to involve students, faculty and the community in this historic event."
The debate will air Wednesday 15 October 2008 at 9 pm EDT.
No word yet on who will attend, but several qualified people have applied for the job.