random bits
Last night we went to a New Year's Eve party and ended up at a wedding. Cool! The hosts, who've been living together for years, stood up a couple minutes after midnight, announced their intentions, and had witnesses sign the legal documents, which is all you technically need in PA. I was surprised. I hope one of the iPhone-wielders will post wedding pictures.
Today ariannawyn had her customary gathering. She held it at her old house, presumably for the last time. The remodelling and refurbishing she's done to get it ready to go onto the market is impressive.
Last weekend ralphmelton ran another session of D&D 4th edition, which we're all exploring together. I hope to write more about the session separately. One of the players is something like 12 or 13 (I don't know exactly); his tactics were good enough that I thought he'd been playing these games for years, but apparently not. Fast learner or smart, apparently.
Last weekend we also visited with my family. The gifts we brought seem to have been generally well-received. My nephew is back from a semester at London School of Economics (he attends Dartmouth, but this is some sort of special program they have). After another quarter here he'll have a mandatory two quarters off and is considering working in Ghana (teaching). A few years ago my niece spent a semester in Italy, and Dani's nieces did this sort of thing a lot when they were undergrads. I sure don't remember these kinds of opportunities when I was in school; I wonder how much of that is the particular school/program, how much is changing times, and how much is potential obliviousness on my part at the time. (I am not discounting the last.)
Speaking of travel, I saw recently that the Shalom Hartman Institute has set dates for its summer program for lay leaders. Currently it looks to be roughly as expensive as last year (tuition +$200, air fare about the same), but now I have the benefit of a positive review from someone I know. But it's still a lot of money, so we'll see. And there's the whole question of what the level of violence is likely to be in Jerusalem by July, but no one can guess that now. Note to self: early-bird deadline Feb 15, final deadline June 1.
Short takes (it's clean-out-the-browser-tabs day; I think I found Elvis):
This looks useful: all the words in the world, pronounced, link from siderea.
Cats and yoga, a video forwarded by kitanzi. Now that's focus.
The deeds of Rudolph, Tundra-Wanderer, by Philip Chapman Bell (forwarded by ellipticcurve).
Peter David's review of "The Spirit" is a fun read even though I don't know (or care about) the movie. As jducoeur pointed out, there's something special going on when the list of positive things you can say about the movie includes, "Everyone's diction was really clear, and no one bumped into any furniture".
