Clipmarks | cclogston's clips

Google Trends and the Ghost of T.S. Eliot

Wed, 14 May 2008 12:17:07 GMT

clipped by: cclogston
clipper's remarks: I'm just happy that people are putting a poem's first line into a Google search box. Yay!

Clip Source: latimesblogs.latimes.com

“April is the cruelest month.” Yes, even in May.

Last Friday morning, the opening line of “The Waste Land,” T.S. Eliot’s most famous poem, became one of most explosively googled phrases in America. (Eliot spelled “cruellest” with two L’s, but I’m all in favor of editing poets for brevity.)

The line appeared on Google’s aptly named Hot Trends list, a utility offered by the company that offers a glimpse of what the online nation is most furiously searching for at any given moment. Hot Trends is Google’s answer to the “most viewed” pages that have become a fixture on so many news and entertainment websites. Popularity is the web’s basic unit of currency now, a dynamic that works about as well as it did in high school. Chances are you know the names of the head-turning, eye-candy types—and have been unable to avoid the loud-mouthed troublemakers. As for the rest of us, sorry guys, if you’re not in the in crowd, you’re just...in the crowd.

Tags: web searching, google, peotry, ts eliot

Cheese Racing

Wed, 14 May 2008 03:36:27 GMT

clipped by: cclogston

Clip Source: www.neatorama.com

The sport of cheese racing began in 1997 when a group of friends put individually-wrapped cheese slices onto a barbecue grill to see what would happen. To their surprise, the plastic did not melt or burn. But the cheese expanded, turning the objects into inflated pillows! The object of cheese racing is to see whose slice reaches full inflation first. Full details are at the “official homepage of the exciting cutting edge sport known as Cheese Racing.” Link -via the Presurfer

Two New Ways to Explore the Virtual Universe, in Vivid 3-D

Tue, 13 May 2008 02:01:49 GMT

clipped by: cclogston

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

Neptune, left, on WorldWideTelescope.org. Curtis Wong, left in center photo, and Jonathan Fay of Microsoft, and the Orion Nebula on Google Sky.

The skies may be the next frontier in travel, yet not even the wealthiest space tourist can zoom out to, say, the Crab Nebula, the Trapezium Cluster or Eta Carinae, a star 100 times more massive than the Sun and 7,500 light-years away.

But those galactic destinations and thousands of others can now be toured and explored at the controls of a computer mouse, with the constellations, stars and space dust displayed in vivid detail and animated imagery across the screen. The project, the WorldWide Telescope, is the culmination of years of work by researchers at Microsoft, and the Web site and free downloadable software are available starting on Tuesday, at www.WorldWideTelescope.org.

Museum Kills Live Exhibit

Tue, 13 May 2008 01:55:52 GMT

clipped by: cclogston

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

Art is deathless, the poets say. Unless it isn’t.

One of the strangest exhibits at the opening of “Design and the Elastic Mind,” the very strange show at the Museum of Modern Art in New York that explores the territory where design meets science, was a teeny coat made out of living mouse stem cells. The “victimless leather” was kept alive in an incubator with nutrients, unsettlingly alive. Until recently, that is.

Paola Antonelli, a senior curator at the museum, had to kill the coat. “It was growing too much,” she said in an interview from a conference in Belgrade. The cells were multiplying so fast that the incubator was beginning to clog. Also, a sleeve was falling off. So after checking with the coat’s creators, a group known as SymbioticA, at the School of Anatomy & Human Biology at the University of Western Australia in Perth, she had the nutrients to the cells stopped.

Are L.A. freeways the roads less-traveled?

Mon, 12 May 2008 12:55:20 GMT

clipped by: cclogston

Clip Source: www.latimes.com

CLEAR SAILING: Light traffic on the 10 Freeway in L.A. on a Friday at 5:30 p.m. adds to the anecdotal evidence — backed by some data — that slightly fewer cars are on local freeways.

Three days each week, at the tail end of the morning rush hour, Jonathan Ball drives from Pasadena to his job in Camarillo -- a journey of 57 to 64 miles, depending on his route.

Over the last few months, he has seen his speed often increase and his time on the road lessen, convincing him that traffic may be easing its grip on parts of Southern California.

"It was one of those days I took the 210 to the 118," Ball said. "Instead of taking an hour and 15 minutes to get to work, it took an hour and 10 minutes. It was only five minutes, but I noticed it because I wasn't even pushing it that day."

If there has been anything that remains quintessentially unpredictable over the years in the Southland, it's traffic. One day it's good, the following it's let's-move-to-Portland awful, then it's back to tolerable.

Jacaranda trees are a beautiful mess

Mon, 12 May 2008 12:47:18 GMT

clipped by: cclogston
clipper's remarks: I love these trees.

Clip Source: www.latimes.com

The drive down Pasadena's Del Mar Boulevard under a canopy of ultraviolet-blue jacarandas has lost none of its effect on Roland Clements after all these years.

Clements first saw the blooming trees that gracefully line the boulevard in 1984 when he moved here from central Florida. He dreamed then of making his home on the postcard-perfect roadway.

Five years ago, the real estate agent moved into a restored Craftsman with an inviting front porch.

"Every morning when I step out of my house, it's like a Matisse painting," he said, the vibrant petals, to his eye, like the impressionistic brush strokes of the French master.

About 3,500 jacarandas dot Pasadena, with one rare, white-flowered exception flourishing near Del Mar and South Lake Avenue, said Kenneth Graham, the city's forester.

The trees bloom for two months twice a year, once around April to May and again around November to December.

Appeasing the Gods, With Insurance

Tue, 06 May 2008 13:38:15 GMT

clipped by: cclogston
clipper's remarks: Hmmmm. Magical thinking. When I read this article I couldn't help thinking of Dustin Hoffman in the film Rainman: "Qantas. Qantas never crashed."

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

Suppose you’re preparing to travel by air. Which of these precautions do you think is most likely to prevent your plane from crashing?

A) Sacrificing a gilt-horned bull on an altar.

B) Sacrificing two goats on the tarmac.

C) Buying flight insurance.

I’m guessing you didn’t go for the bull sacrifice. Although this preboarding procedure was practiced by ancient Greek travelers, as Homer reported in grisly detail, today there are serious doubts about its efficacy, if only because of the litany of tourist woes in “The Odyssey.”

The goat option was tested at Katmandu Airport in September to propitiate Akash Bhairab, the Hindu sky god. Officials of Nepal Airlines told Reuters that they had sacrificed two goats in front of a Boeing 757 whose mechanical problems had forced the airline to suspend some flights.

Man asks court to change his name to "In God We Trust"

Tue, 06 May 2008 02:29:11 GMT

clipped by: cclogston
clipper's remarks: Boy, that'll sure show those godless atheists!

Clip Source: news.yahoo.com

ZION, Ill. - Steve Kreuscher wants a judge to allow him to legally change his name. He wants to be known as "In God We Trust."

Kreuscher (CROY'-shir) says the new name would symbolize the help God gave him through tough times.

The 57-year-old man also told the (Arlington Heights) Daily Herald he's worried that atheists may succeed in removing the phrase "In God We Trust" from U.S. currency.

He recalls that the phrase "God Reigns" was removed from the Zion city seal in 1992 after courts deemed it unconstitutional. Zion was founded as a theocracy — by a sect that believed the Earth was flat.

The school bus driver and amateur artist in the northern Chicago suburb says he has filed a petition to change his name in Lake County Circuit Court.

Lightbulb in Livermore Firehouse has been burning continuously since 1901

Mon, 05 May 2008 12:29:41 GMT

clipped by: cclogston
clipper's remarks: This is the modern version of the eternal flame. If this story had been told during the Axial Age, a religion would have sprung up around it. Oh, Holy Light! Oh, Blessed Light!

(It wouldn't promote any type of nighttime literacy activities -- it's very low wattage.

Clip Source: www.latimes.com

LIVERMORE, CALIF. -- Five years after his retirement, ex-firefighter Tom Bramell still likes to visit Station No. 6 for old times' sake, whistling in amazement at all the changes -- the strange faces and slick high-tech engines.

But one thing remains exactly the same, and it's what Bramell misses the most about his firefighting days. The sturdy little object hangs from the ceiling in the firehouse's engine bay, emitting its familiar faint orange glow.

He calls it the long-lived lightbulb of Livermore.

That's actually something of an understatement.

At 107 years and counting, the low-watt wonder with the curlicue carbon filament has been named the planet's longest continuously burning bulb by both Guinness World Records and Ripley's Believe It Or Not.

Survey ranks L.A. last in housing affordability

Sun, 04 May 2008 22:08:47 GMT

clipped by: cclogston
clipper's remarks: I was surprised by this. I thought it would be the SF Bay Area.

Clip Source: www.latimes.com

A study by BizJournals .com, a group of business publications, ranked housing affordability in the nation's metropolitan areas, with terse advice for those seeking a financially manageable place to live: anywhere but California.

The study concluded that six of the seven most-expensive places for housing are in the Golden State.

The study compared median home payments, property taxes and household income in 50 metro areas. L.A. was the most expensive: The magazines estimated the monthly housing tab in L.A. amounts to about 75.5% of the median household income, with a median monthly mortgage-and-tax payment of $3,491.

Compare that to the most affordable metro, Oklahoma City. There, housing eats up just 19% of the median household income, the magazines said. The median monthly bill for mortgage and taxes is $667.

The complete rankings are at www.bizjournals.com; go to "Online Edition" and click "Special Reports."

Hoaxes hit bookstores

Sat, 03 May 2008 12:44:30 GMT

clipped by: cclogston
clipper's remarks: Take home message: there is a scam for every occasion.

Clip Source: www.latimes.com

It's not quite an epidemic, not yet a rash. But a recent outbreak of hoaxes on local bookstores has staffers a little, at least, annoyed.

"They're like con men," said Skylight Books manager Kerry Slattery. "They draw you in, and later you just feel so foolish."

"It's sort of creative," conceded John Evans of Diesel, a Bookstore, which has shops in Malibu and Oakland; to Allison Reid, his partner, "It keeps life interesting."

With the explosion of computer viruses, identity theft and Nigerian e-mail scams over the last few years, it may have been inevitable that bookstores got a part of the action. And slowly but surely, stores are being contacted by people claiming to be someone they're not and trying to persuade the bookstore staff to send them money. It's bewildering to a community that operates largely on trust and personal relationships.

Sierra Madre wildfire is fully contained

Sat, 03 May 2008 12:40:00 GMT

clipped by: cclogston

Clip Source: www.latimes.com

Firefighters have fully contained the 580-acre Sierra Fire that had been burning in the foothills north of Sierra Madre since April 26, officials said today.

About 90 firefighters remain on the scene, conducting "mop-up" operations and ensuring there are no hot spots, said Sherry Rollman, spokeswoman for the U.S. Forest Service. Some trails remain closed.

"What'll happen now is when the fire does get fully extinguished, we'll bring in some specialists to evaluate the area so we can for prepare rehabilitation efforts to prevent situations like mudslides," Rollman said.

During the height of the fire, about 1,000 residents were evacuated from 400 homes in the upper part of Sierra Madre last weekend as Southern California broiled in record-breaking heat. Many believed they were in the clear Sunday night but woke up the next morning to see that the fire had made a run toward town, prompting a new wave of evacuations.

California sees $4 gasoline up ahead

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 13:10:03 GMT

clipped by: cclogston
clipper's remarks: How about it's already here....... our gas is currently $3.97. I saw $4.35 in Malibu my birthday weekend and the Myth Gang in Santa Barbara tells me it's been over $4/gallon since early last week.

Clip Source: www.latimes.com

GAS PAINS: Gasoline prices began rising in February along with oil prices, and the U.S. gas-price average is now 64 cents higher than it was a year ago. Above, a station in Portland, Ore.

With oil and gasoline touching all-time highs again Monday, raging energy-price fever showed no sign of breaking. Before it's over, oil could cost at least $125 a barrel and gasoline more than $4 a gallon in California.

Fans Love Carpenters, not carpenters

Sat, 16 Feb 2008 13:32:10 GMT

clipped by: cclogston
clipper's remarks: The Carpenters also owned apartment complexes in Downey named for some of their hit songs, "Close to You" was located across the street from "We've Only Just Begun". I lived in Downey for a short time between 1980 and 1983 -- we would occasionally drive by these places. Karen Carpenter's funeral kept me from getting home for hours -- the streets were so jammed with cars, walking would have been much faster.

Clip Source: www.latimes.com

We've only just begun . . . to learn what is happening to the Downey family home that was made world-famous by the pop duo the Carpenters.

The five-bedroom tract house and a smaller next-door dwelling that was connected to it by an enclosed walkway was where Richard and Karen Carpenter fine-tuned their greatest hits in the 1970s.

The pair lived in the main house with their parents. The adjoining house was something of an annex, where there was an office, rehearsal studio and recreation room.

The Newville Avenue compound became a magnet for fans around the world when it was pictured on the Carpenters' tri-fold cover for their 1973 hit album "Now & Then." It is also where an anorexic Karen Carpenter collapsed in 1983 before dying.

The pair's parents remained in the residence until Harold Carpenter's death in 1988 and Agnes Carpenter's in 1996. Richard Carpenter sold the place in mid-1997.

Tags: southern california, local news

Author Comes to Natural Food's 'Defense'

Sun, 06 Jan 2008 04:11:44 GMT

clipped by: cclogston
clipper's remarks: Interesting advice: "Don't eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn't recognize as food." None of my great-grandmothers have been around since 1960. I wonder if any of them would have known what Fritos were. Hmmm.....

Clip Source: www.npr.org

Talk of the Nation, January 4, 2008 · Author Michael Pollan discusses his latest book, In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto. He boils his philosophy of nutrition down to seven words: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants."

Pollan suggests that people can improve their health by following relatively simple rules, such as: "Don't eat anything that your great-grandmother would not recognize as food."

Pollan discusses his definition of "real" food, and explains why he recommends staying away from what he calls the "foodlike substances" that line grocery store shelves.

Tags: food