A Modest Construct

What’s the Matter With Kansas?, by Thomas Frank. What is 52 Books in 52 Weeks?

Thomas Frank was on The Daily Show last year before the election, and though I’d meant to pick up his book ever since, I’d forgotten until I saw it at the library last week.

What’s the Matter With…

Firefox 1.5 has been released with very little fanfare, it seems, but the Mozilla Foundation launched a new site design.

Either check your repo for it, or grab it from the FTP servers. Come on, you know you want to.

I think we’ve already established that The Matrix is a pooch that was thoroughly screwed by the end of the trilogy. Still, if you like pondering What Ifs, check out this relatively complete compendium of data.

CodeQ brings word that the number of programs written in Java has finally knocked down the reigning champion, C++. Though I am not enough of a simpering twit to say “Well, what a shame, Java sucks,” I find it a little disconcerting, for several reasons.

• The implementation of Java is, in many…

Want a free 1200-page physics textbook in PDF format?

Yeah, I thought you might.

My 14- or 15-year-old, long-neutered male cat got an erection just now. Actually, it was more like a nub, but it was definitely an engorgement of the erectile tissue. I, uh, didn’t know that could happen, though I suppose there’s nothing about the surgical removal of testicles that prevents it.…

The “Cold Turkey” edition

1. Nine Inch Nails • Down In It (Shred)
2. Sentenced • Northern Lights
3. December • Trial
4. Set Fire to Flames • Injur: Gut Ted Two-track
5. Star of Ash • Odi et Amo
6. Liquid Tension Experiment • Hourglass
7. Oasis • Morning Glory
8. Jellyfish • The Glutton of Sympathy
9. Radiohead • Pulk/Pull Revolving Doors
10. Jon Brion • Trouble

[Feministe | Snooble]

…

The Know-It-All, by A.J. Jacobs. What is 52 Books in 52 Weeks?

I first read about this book in my brother’s copy of Mental Floss, a semiannual rag that’s, well, random stuff for intellectuals. Kind of like McSweeney’s, only less pretentiously literate.

The setup is this: the author, who is a senior…

STANFORD, California (AP) — Two government biologists heavily recruited by Stanford University have decided to work in Singapore instead, saying they will face fewer restrictions on stem cell research overseas.

Neal Copeland and Nancy Jenkins, geneticists for the National Cancer Institute in Frederick, Maryland said they were concerned about delays in…