I spent yesterday at Think Schools, an all-day gathering of people looking for constructive ways to solve a crisis facing the local school district: given that we need to seismically retrofit the existing school stock, can we do so intelligently, not destroying the vibrant community hubs that many of these old schools have become, but [...]
Archive for the ‘Society’ Category
Emailology
If I had more acting chops, I’d love to make a parody video of the Tom Cruise video, where I’m blathering on about fixing email. “If you see a bad From: header, you have to stop and help”. “I do what I can, and I do it the way I do everything (insert maniacal laugther…)”. [...]
Theft
Jane got robbed on her train ride back from ETech. That brings to mind my experience with a vancouver thief, which, it turns out, did not end there, but I never updated this pseudo-historical record of random events. On closer inspection of the garage, we found that in addition to stealing two bikes, they’d left [...]
Intelligent Design?
We just saw The March of the Penguins. I think it’s the best argument against Intelligent Design I’ve heard yet. What a silly way to bring up a next batch of genes…
New treat: maamoul date cakes
A treat I’ve recently uncovered at the corner store (Nadi’s, who, IIRC, hails from Lebanon) are maamoul, little cakes filled with dates. The store has stocked different brands, all from Saudi Arabia, with the latest definitely being the best: it has a surprisingly fresh pastry (especially if one acknowledges that it’s shipped from Jeddah). Unlike [...]
Back of the envelope math
Reading the email that’s going around about the evolution of math skills on Chad’s blog, I’m reminded of my neighbors on the plane from San Francisco last month. They were a middle aged Canadian couple returning from what must have been a short visit to the Bay Area. Like everyone else on the plane, they [...]
Massive Change: Optimistic and Simplistic, but Worthwhile
I took a long lunch today to squeeze in a long-delayed visit to the last day of the Massive Change exhibit at the Vancouver Art Gallery, before it goes on its multi-continent tour. I do recommend it as an interesting, thought-provoking show, if you happen to intersect its flight path. The exhibit’s tagline is “It’s [...]
