Back when the world was younger (late 1970s to mid-1980s) we used to throw an Open House party on New Year’s Day. We’d turn on all three television sets for bowl games (there were only four held on January 1 back then – Cotton, Rose, Sugar and Orange), make five pans of Quiche Lorraine (from …
I just added a button over there on the left sidebar. Clicking it takes you to the American Red Cross’s secure donation page. If you want to contribute to tsunami relief, select the International Response Fund from the drop-down menu displayed on the screen once you get there. Please give if you can; it’s a …
The Andaman Islands were hit by the tsunami. The name sounded familiar to me, but I couldn’t remember where I’d seen it. Then late this afternoon I remembered: it was a locale mentioned in the Sherlock Holmes novel A Sign of Four. They apparently are just as remote as they were when Conan Doyle wrote …
From one of the initial news items about President Bush’s response to the tsunamis: Earlier yesterday, White House spokesman Trent Duffy said the president was confident he could monitor events effectively without returning to Washington or making public statements in Crawford, where he spent part of the day clearing brush and bicycling. This is the …
Amazon has set up a 1-click donation system to the American Red Cross for its relief activities. In addition, Command Post has been updating its relief links. Update: The Crazy Neighbor Lady at The Purple Porch has a match going for donations to Mercy Corps. All major credit cards accepted. Chip in if you can.
Get out the shoyu and wasabi! The sashimi (raw fish) catch looks good! “I would say (tuna) prices are going to be lower than usual if you took an average of the holiday prices for the past few years,” Fram said. The Garden and Valley Isle shop has sashimi-grade ‘ahi at a little over $15 …
World Changing has first person accounts and links to aid sites. Tsunami Help is a blog aimed at providing relief news and links. Command Post is aggregating stories as fast as it can. Wikipedia, moving more quickly than I thought possible, has facts and figures on the size and scope of this thing. We’re fairly …
When fashion, charity and medicine collide: the bracelets people wear to show their support for causes are or can be confused with the bracelets hospitals use to designate particular patients. For example, at one hospital the “Do Not Resuscitate” bracelet is almost exactly the same color as the one The Lance Armstrong Foundation uses to …
Dylan’s book won the coin toss, but it was a quick read. As you might expect, the man doesn’t tell his life story, nor does he even write the thing chronologically. And there’s no doubt it’s only Volume I. What he does do is talk about songwriting, about some of the people he met along …
It’s nearly a given that I get a Christmas book or two each year, and 2004 was no exception. Now I’m faced with the delightful problem of deciding which to start first: Chronicles, Vol. I by Dylan, or America, (The Book), Jon Stewart’s “A Citizen’s Guide to Democracy Inaction.” This calls for a coin flip.