Author: Frank

There’s a big fat front page story in the Ann Arbor News today headlined “Library considers big changes for main branch downtown.” Apparently the...

And Sunday’s “move-out today,” or so goes the scuttlebutt (heard as I walked by a couple of people sitting out in front of Ambrosia...

Helicopters circling over central campus, lots of clueless out-of-towners wandering around, lots of ties and shirts and trousers as opposed to jeans and shorts,...

I’m done. The end of the year has come for me, and I seem to have survived. (The true test will come when grades...

Today’s Duke Ellington’s birthday. A tip of the hat to the incomparable Sir Duke.

One of the north-south streets through East Pasadena is Michillinda—it starts up in Sierra Madre, near where my sister lives, and descends into San...

Meanwhile, record-breaking temperatures back on the left coast. Pasadena, my hometown, hit 99 degrees (breaking a record set in 1992 by 7 degrees). The...

srah said it was snowing this morning ….. and sure enough, when I took the dog out, there were unmistakable flakes in the air....

In the interest of full self-disclosure (to a point), people in glass houses, etc., I hereby present a brief (and by no means exhaustive)...

More candidates that I hadn’t thought of for 50 worst songs (from Stereogum): Chris De Burgh “Lady in Red” (truly horrific) Patrick Swayze “She’s...

An amazing quote from a new biography of King James I by Alan Stewart that I’m saving to read until after the end of...

I went to work around 9.00 this morning and the campus seemed blessedly deserted. I saw maybe five people cross my path as I...

There’s a seven-minute (or so) segment in the bonus features on the DVD of Jeffrey Blitz’s 2002 documentary “Spellbound” that features a semifinalist from...

Today, a first: a trio of homeless people kicking back with their cadged shopping carts in Frisinger Park. They must have been there because...

It’s Ella Fitzgerald’s birthday. Happy Birthday, Lady Ella, wherever you are.

Strange how you can have two very different experiences at two not-all-that-dissimilar chain restaurants. We had dinner at Macaroni Grill on Thursday night, and...

Pickerel Lake is hardly a unique appellation. Turns out there’s at least 22 other lakes in Michigan with exactly the same name.

We drove past campus today and saw undergrads dutifully trundling their belongings out to sidewalks and cars, along with a few half-hearted, exhausted lawn...

Maybe we didn’t give it enough of a chance, but I was kind of underwhelmed by the Ann Arbor Book Festival today. (It fills...

I’m really, really going to have to take (and see through) 502 next winter. Damn. Having said that, I know (especially now that the...

Can’t recall the last time I slept for 10 hours straight, but that’s what I did last night. It felt great.

I was on the bus this afternoon and passed through Party House Row on South State. One of the roofs had about fifteen subscriber...

Done, done, done ….. up till hours I’m ashamed to divulge finishing it, but it’s done ….. don’t know how coherent the product is,...

The beagle is once again in his customary final exam support role, next to me down here in the basement as the wind from...

Blender and VH1 have teamed up to list the 50 worst songs of all time. I would agree that Starship’s “We Built This City”...

How long will it be before all the ash trees in southeastern Michigan die out? I heard a figure on the radio just now...

A howling wind tore through the boulevards of the southeastern Michigan town, stirring up dust motes, leaves, beetles, and memories of regret, pathos, and...

This year’s Lyttle Lytton Prizes (a spinoff from the better-known Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, sponsored every year by San Jose State University) have been announced....

Tornado weather, says Hillary ….. great! The one that passed through the day we arrived last August was enough for me, but I suppose...

Let’s see. Prediction from the National Weather Service: possibility of thunderstorms 20%; temperature will rise to 76 by noon then fall to 67; and...

This weather is almost astonishing in its California-ness. Blue skies, sunlight for most of the daylight hours, temperatures in the high 70s, and lots...

The dog was back to his old tricks today, though he seemed to be somewhat more drowsy than usual (which is to say, he...

The nightmare that is the last few weeks of school is almost over ….. yet it seems right now as though it will never...

We no longer have cable, so we’re already unwittingly doing it, but if you have cable and are of a mind to do this,...

Today really felt like the first day of spring. Classes were sitting out holding their sessions in circles on the grass, there was some...

Walking down Liberty tonight after a movie at the Michigan, we saw the planet Venus rising low in the sky to the west. It...

A guy from Lansing talking about the two halves of Michigan on a radio call-in show this morning: “We don’t worry about the UP,...

A random question (inspired by a recent srah post): Does anybody know of any good places to buy tea (as in loose-leaf or bags...

It was sunny late this morning when I got up (had my first long sleep in almost a week). But the cloud cover rapidly...

I’ve talked to a few of the second-year students in the past couple of days. The adjectives I’d use to describe them and the...

It would seem that I’m going to have to start using a peak flow meter on a regular basis, at least until the pollen...

Apparently we’ve made it to another milestone: a listing in Google Directory. (We’re under Reference -> Libraries -> Library and Information Science -> Personal...

… there was a huge Good Friday concert in the Diag today complete with a big wooden cross on the steps of Hatcher and...

There’s a long column in yesterday’s Chronicle on Higher Education advising Ph.Ds on how to make the transition to librarianship, “because the library profession...

It’s always amusing to watch hypocrisy in action — as when certain conservative library blogs that normally get into conniption fits about any e-mail...

I lay in a hot tub for a half hour tonight and felt as though it were the first time I had had a...

Morrissey may not be making great music anymore, but he’s still good with a one-liner (this one’s from tomorrow’s Guardian): Q: What do you...

Census stories fascinate me. This one, from today’s Associated Press wire, shows that San Francisco County lost more residents in 2002-2003 than any other...

My presentation was serviceable; it was supposed to clock in at 5 minutes and the professor signaled when I was going over the clock...

I went to Ambrosia this morning to sit and do some last-minute prepping for my final 643 presentation. A grad seminar (apparently in Mideast...