This sojourn through Finland has been terrifyingly self-relevatory. I've had to question some of my basic assumptions and break down my very sense of self. Apparently, I'm just not as blond as I once thought. Or, at least, in the right light you can see my eyebrows, which is more than I can say for many of the people here ( Read more... )

While Googling in preparation for the possible adjudication of a dispute in a CalPundit comment thread, I came across the introduction of a coffee table book entitled Cats of Cairo. I could not imagine a cuter collection of sappy Orientalism.[E]very visitor to the Islamic world is aware of the innumerable cats in the streets of Cairo - and of ( Read more... )

Don't miss the story of the hoodwinked premillennialists, in which an LJer who had written a parodic Jack Chick-style diatribe against Harry Potter submits the essay to ExposingSatanism.org, which accepts it readily. (According to gehayi, the author also convinced a number of non-premillennialist Harry Potter fans of the sincerity of her condemnation in ( Read more... )

arethusa2 recently linked to a trifecta of fannish Lego sites, Boing Boing had a Lego Abu Ghraib a few weeks ago, and Maud Newton today brings us The Brick Testament, a reconstruction (in, yes, Legos) of the Bible. These are all measured against the Lego Escher project, which is unfortunately off line, though you can get a taste of it here and here.

Jim Holt examines the perils of psychoanalyzing our Intelligent Designer by reverse engineering His Creation.While there is much that is marvelous in nature, there is also much that is flawed, sloppy and downright bizarre. Some nonfunctional oddities, like the peacock's tail or the human male's nipples, might be attributed to a sense of whimsy on ( Read more... )

God put George W. Bush in the White House.

In Egypt he just killed all the first-born males. Why'd they get it so easy?

Speaking of divine punishment, Tom Toles reiterates a line of argument I've made my mother familiar with.

Brad DeLong points out that the Bush administration, bastion of laissez-faire that it is, has announced new tariffs on shrimp imported from China and Vietnam. Bush, of course, has a long history of using trade regulation to political advantage -- I think he's campaigning in Ohio as the workers' friend by mentioning that he imposed tariffs on ( Read more... )

As I mull over a possible autumn trip to Iran, I have been much consoled by Nicholas Kristof's recent columns (1, 2) reporting that its inhabitants are strikingly pro-American. This doesn't surprise me in particular, because when I'm travelling international I rarely run into anyone who even expresses resentment towards the US government, much less ( Read more... )

Avedon Carol links to an article explicating the spiritual messages of Buffy. Some excerpts:Not so long ago, Ken Kuykendall stood before a group of Mormon teens in an Atlanta suburb, dressed in starched white shirt and dark tie. He was there, he said, to talk about serious things ( Read more... )

Gary Farber points to a church whose reenactment of the Stations of the Cross included whipping the Easter Bunny. I don't know that there are any members of the clergy among my readership, but if there are, please tell me you don't do this. (Actually, I would be very surprised to learn that the member of the clergy among my readership even sponsors ( Read more... )