Blog

A story on Michigan Radio a few minutes ago mentioned that this past month was the rainiest May in southeast Michigan on record—8.6 inches (the previous record was apparently 8.4 back in 1943). It’s sure...

As Steve mentioned, XM Radio had a Memorial Day special on one of its channels in which they played all 253 #1 songs from 1970-1979. It was cheesy, nostalgic fun, a nice escape. Some of the songs I hadn’t heard in...

Ann Arbor blogger Edgewise has an interesting self-debate over what is possibly the ultimate bugaboo of politics these days, abortion. He brings up some very good points. My own position has been, as usual, to straddle...

A brave statement for a librarian to be making these days: A children’s book depicting a masked burglar pointing a gun at a woman will remain in Evanston Public Library despite complaints that the image is too...

This is an awesome idea, especially in light of the recent vicious assaults on an art gallery owner in San Francisco’s North Beach. [CCA Santa Fe link courtesy LISNews.]

Americans are increasingly a clueless and brutal lot. Latest case in point: a San Francisco woman is forced to shut down her art gallery, after Brown Shirt thugs beat her up over the display of a painting depicting the...

I took the first mid-term for my Brigham Young University independent study geography course Saturday—an undertaking necessary, says the state of Michigan, before I enter grad school June 29th. (Michigan says I...

The latest issue of Airways magazine, the 100th, reports the following tidbit about a Harris Poll ranking 60 major American companies by reputation and perception: ‘United was 52nd, putting it in the bottom ten...

Weather today was really nice, not too muggy, sunny and warm later in the afternoon and evening. I walked home from campus after a brief stop at Panchero’s on South University for take-home burritos. It was a nice...

I saw a bunch of different kinds of sparrows outside on my way to work this afternoon, and, of course, the usual contingent of foraging robins and starlings. Birdsong filled the air, and I had no idea what any of it...

I recognized none of the birdsong I heard walking home tonight. The daunting Birds of Michigan (Auburn, WA: Lone Pine Publishing, 2003) makes you feel like such a nitwit when you open it up and see meticulous...

Weird how eerily quiet it was tonight ….. except for the occasional sound of what had to be firecrackers in the distance. Is today some holiday that I’m not aware of?

My first time in the Fine Arts Library in Tappan Hall today. It’s a smaller library than the behemoths next door, but it’s got its charms. There’s a nice, extensive reference room, and across a...

Crazy Wisdom Books on 114 South Main is worth a visit at least once. They’re well-stocked. They have two floors, one with a fairly decent selection of metaphysical and “alternative religion” (pagan...

Apparently everyone’s not universally thrilled with the new Seattle Public Library. A blog called Caminothoughts opines: Will it take half the electricity production of the Skagit River dams just to keep the...

It just started pouring rain. Forget what I said.

We went to Tios the other night. Very good Mexican restaurant (odd location, though, across the street from the Ann Arbor News building and nothing else around it). The atmosphere was pretty laid-back, the rows and rows...

The New York Times has an amusing article today about blogging. It’s essentially the same idea as most articles or mainstream media treatments these days. Blogging is an addiction (therefore morally suspect)...

The sun seems to be making a reappearance the past two days. It’s in and out, but it’s definitely there. I would say I guess the worst of the rainy weather is over, but I know better anymore than to hazard...

One of the State Theater’s recent offerings was “Latter Days.” It was not a great movie, but after seeing it, it’s difficult for me to suppress a chuckle watching those duos and trios of...

From an introduction to an otherwise typically dry BBC story tonight about an international NGO conference:

Host: Hello, Francis.

Reporter: Hello, Max, how are you?

Host: I’m well, thank you. Do carry on.

I know that they’re the coming evil mark of the beast destroyer of privacy hand in glove with the USAPATRIOT Act, but after spending the morning doing inventory for my favorite AA middle school library, I’m...

Flooding in St. Clair County ….. a tornado watch in 15 southeastern Michigan counties till 11.00 ….. over a dozen tornadoes swept through southern and southeastern Nebraska and nearly wiped out the town of...

Weather has been much calmer in the past 24 hours. There were a few scattered raindrops when I took the dog out a few minutes ago, but nothing beyond that other than the sight (which I love) of a sky full of gray...

… And then there’s a whole discussion thread (same site) about libraries in which someone says she never goes to libraries because the thought of touching books that someone else has handled freaks her out...

Someone wrote in to I Love Books asking what it was like to work in a bookstore. Here’s one answer: You don’t sit around and read and discuss literature all the time when you work in a bookshop. You do tell...

From Tuesday’s Ann Arbor News: A 34-year-old man admitted he punched a pedestrian in the face in Liberty Plaza Park in downtown Ann Arbor Monday because he didn’t like the look on his face, city police said...

There’s an article in today’s Ann Arbor News about cafes that you may have seen. I’m happy to say Ambrosia wasn’t mentioned in it once, not because I don’t wish Ambrosia long luck and much...

A quote from his new book, On Paradise Drive: How We Live Now (And Always Have) In the Future Tense (quote courtesy New York Times): In America, it is acceptable to cut off any driver in a vehicle that costs a third...

Where to begin? The Pixies are back together for a reunion tour, are not apparently tearing each other limb from limb, and are like a breath of fresh air. Morrissey has relased a new album (with a sadly ironic cover...

Ref Grunt has closed its doors. Long live Refgrunt.com, although its posts appear to be dismayingly intermittent.

There are many cool things about Michigan weather, I’ve discovered. One is that it’s so unpredictable (within reason). Another is the months of snow, which I have to say I’ve missed. And another is...

Ambrosia, which is staffed by a bunch of avid, amiable fishing enthusiasts who would probably be much, much happier in Berkeley if it weren’t for the lack of walleye and lake trout, was all abuzz this afternoon...

I walked through the connector between the undergraduate and graduate libraries yesterday and today on my way to work. Late yesterday afternoon, an impressive storm was brewing that turned out to be the near-tornado of...

Acording to Atlas of Michigan (East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 1977), which places this paragraph above a path map of an apparently really nasty tornado that hit southeastern Michigan on 12 April 1965:...

Before Ann Arbor became Storm Central in the past 48 hours, birds were everywhere. One reader (and someone who knows her avians), Dorothea of the fantastic Caveat Lector, wrote to tell me that the bird I was mystfied...

Okay, Yankees, when the sky turns as dark and ugly GREEN as it did at 2:30 this afternoon, that means you’ve got yourself a tornado somewhere VERY. CLOSE. BY. This means get in the cellar, fool, ‘fore you...

The title of a paper given by MIT meterology professor and chaos theorist Edward Lorenz at the American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in Washington DC on 29 December 1979: Predictability: Does the...

We had a ‘possible-tornado-producing’ storm last night with blowing sirens and one-inch hail and minor flooding in Ypsi and a house burned after a lightning strike. It was all higgledy-piggledy for awhile...

How fun to get something like this in your e-mail box at midnight: ‘On Monday, May 17, the University of Michigan Administrative Information Services determined that a small selection of personal student data...

More stuff on the Seattle Public Library from LISNews: The New Yorker calls the new central library “the most important new library to be built in a generation, and the most exhilarating.” The Seattle Post...

Today’s LISNews links to a New York Times article about Fundrace.org, an intriguing site that allows you to track campaign contributions by neighborhood. This is information you can go down to any...

According to the radio, not only are cicadas on the way (though so far the hype has exceeded the reality), but gypsy moths, European chafers, Asian longhorn beetles, Japanese beetles, mosquitoes, and of course the...

Still no cicadas to speak of. Steve says it’s not been consistently warm enough for them to want to come out. I have, however, seen lots of birds, including a number I can’t identify (I’m waiting for a...

Tony Randall passed on Monday, followed yesterday by Elvin Jones, probably the greatest drummer (never mind greatest “jazz drummer”) who ever lived. Jones was born in Pontiac and got his start in the Detroit...

No titillating “overheards” from Ambrosia today; just a bunch of employees meeting over cheesecake and listening to their benefits person yack about how awesome Blue Shield of Michigan’s health...

In a mere 25 minutes or so, the first homo marriages in the United By-God States of Amurrica will take place in Massachusetts. [sarcasm] We’ll be hiding in the basement so that the Angel of Death and Divine...

Before the dandelion adventure, we paid a brief visit to the University of Michigan Museum of Art. (We were thinking of doing part of the 16-site Wander Washtenaw event sponsored by the Washtenaw County Historical...

Haven’t seen this many dandelions in a town ever. Like with the squirrels, AA believes in plenty of something. Opus Bayley took a much-needed dandelion break in the park next to the Jewish Community Center...