"You’ve heard of the Connecticut woman who was mauled by a 200-pound chimpanzee, right? Charla Nash, 65, was visiting a friend last February when her friend’s pet chimp attacked her, tearing off her nose, lips, eyelids and hands before being shot dead by cops. Nash later lost her eyes to infection and her facial disfigurement is such that she is a candidate for a face transplant. Nash went on the Oprah show last week to reveal her disfigurement and share heartbreaking details on her life since the attack, including the fact that she now has to eat everything through a straw. The plus side of getting mauled by a chimp? In a cringe-worthy response, Oprah told Nash that eating through a straw will help her keep her weight down."
- cecily
from Bookmarklet
We have the Nietzsche on the fridge, too, Josh. My problem with myself is #2. I find it quite hard to be gentle with myself. I know some people think I am hard with others (and I am sometimes :( ) but I catch utter hell from myself.
- Mar₭ the Engaged
I'm on chat reference tonight, so that means another "Questions I received during my chat shift" thread.
I need to compare the denominators of two numbers using the least common multiple.
- cecily
I need to know the difference between an independent and a dependent variable.
- cecily
So, when you get questions like the above, do you tell them the answer or tell them what book they can probably use?
- Anika
I would like information about boo radly (sic) from to kill a mockingbird.
- cecily
We're not teachers or tutors, so we don't give answers. All we can do is give them pointers. Really, really POINTED pointers. :D
- cecily
And because it's online, I usually point them to websites instead of books.
- cecily
Ah...I always wondered about that. The reference desk at the old law library here, they would practically give you clues as to what aisle you *may* consider walking down. But the the public library, they are a lot more helpful, though I can't help but laugh at the questions a friend gets asked when she works reference.
- Anika
What are the links between producers, consumers, detrivores, and decomposers?
- cecily
It really depends on the type of question. If it's someone wanting to know who the star of the movie "The Philadelphia Story" was, I'll tell them that answer. But I can smell a homework question a mile away, and I never give straight answers for those.
- cecily
"I'm writing a lab report on microscopes, but I can't find anything about lens inversion."
- cecily
"Can you help me find some books to read?" from a 5th grader. Dude. I wish I could. I am not a children's librarian. :-/
- cecily
5th grade? I did the Little House series in fifth grade which kickstarted the reading frenzy in full.
- Michael W. May
this is why I do not consider myself very librarianish. I would be sweating on that reference desk! Go Cecily!
- Laura Norvig
Harry Potter? Hardy Boys? What do 5th graders even read nowadays?
- Daniel J. Pritchett
They are reading Artemis Fowl, Gregor the Overlander, Percy Jackson and the Olympians and Diary of a Wimpy Kid
- Abigail
"University of Wisconsin-La Crosse student Adam Bauer has nearly 400 friends on Facebook. He got an offer for a new one about a month ago. “She was a good-looking girl. I usually don’t accept friends I don’t know, but I randomly accepted this one for some reason,” the 19-year-old said. He thinks that led to his invitation to come down to the La Crosse police station, where an officer laid out photos from Facebook of Bauer holding a beer — and then ticketed him for underage drinking."
- cecily
from Bookmarklet
I wish I knew, because it stinks to high heaven if it isn't.
- cecily
No matter how many times you tell the kiddos not to post things on Facebook that would get them in trouble with the law/fired, they still go right ahead and do so. Then when they do get in trouble for what they have openly shared, they try to blame the authorities for enforcing the rules. (Says the teacher who has had her fill of, "Don't you have something better to do than to catch me...
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- Miss Elle
What's the crime? He drank a beer and they found the pictures later on facebook. He didn't get in an accident, he didn't get in a fight that resulted in the police being called. This is a b-s thing to do, ESPECIALLY if they are using fake profiles with sexy ladies to get access to the pictures. Of course I don't believe the legal age should be 21, either.
- Andrizzle Gizzle
Holding a beer doesn't equate underage drinking. It could have been an empty can. Does sound like entrapment. Sure people should consider what they post, but that's ridiculous.
- Sarah June
I think the real crime here is a 21-year-old drinking age. It's 18 up here, but I think you could easily drop it down further. If you are going to ticket someone, ticket the people whole sell booze to minors. If the parents supplied it, there shouldn't be anything to do.
- Matt Mastracci
I won't go on a rant about Facebook allowing law enforcement to be Big Brother...but is this the best use of the local police department's time? Sounds like Andy needs to find something else for Barney to do...
- FF's Bubba of Arizona
It's a college town. I'm guessing there's not much else to do but bust students.
- cecily
@Sarah -- True, but I assume that the photo also may have come with a caption like, "Man, we got so wasted at that party. I was hung over for hours," or something to that effect. My perfectly above 21 year old friends caption their pictures as such, so I figured that youngins may, too. While not knowing the statute of limitations on underage drinking, I will hypothetically say that I...
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- Miss Elle
Good point Miss Elle. I know I did as well. And fortunately never was arrested. And college alcoholism is a huge problem in the US. But this type of approach won't solve anything.
- Sarah June
Whoa, I was just talking with a friend earlier about how another acquaintance of ours should hope the cops don't patrol his FB, since he'd just posted about the "big bag o'weed" he'd just bough, LOL.
- PENGUIN: MAJOR CAPS LOCK
Braces adjustment this morning = ramen noodles tonight.
"Today Solange Knowles, future indie songstress––she's just severed ties with her major label, Interscope, has said she aspires to have a career like Bjork's, and allegedly turned her sis and Jay-Z on to Grizzly Bear––sent her cover of the Dirty Projectors' "Stillness Is The Move" to Pitchfork, and from there it spread like wildlife."
- cecily
from Bookmarklet
There's a bunch of videos of that song on YouTube now. Saw one via Erikah Badu's Twitter account. It's an amazing cover.
- Helen Sventitsky
you know, i am not familiar with the dirty projectors, but i like this cover. (though gah! i can't bear to admit that i might like a knowles girl.)
- tiffany
I think that's why I'm speechless. Something from The House of Knowles that I actually LIKE.
- cecily
Tiffany, I'm uploading the Dirty Projectors version right now. Check my feed in a bit.
- cecily
Solange is totally different than Beyonce. Different voice, different attitude. She's the total antithesis of Beyonce, which I really like.
- Helen Sventitsky
I like Solange's spunk. from what I've seen of her live, her voice is a bit delicate. She needs to be produced just right. this is a good direction for her.
- jbrotherlove
The covers have been the best part of her live shows from what I hear (and from what I saw on directv). She's charming.
- Jason Toney
now i'm bummed i missed her when she came through here
- cherylcoward
Cause 2 1/2 Men was never funny. There is a much better cast on BBT.
- Danny Minick
BBT is a geek goldmine. It's funny on so many levels and even funnier when you're a geek. The hour before BBT is for Heroes and HIMYM. (which reminds me, hi @actuallyNPH)
- Sally Robinson
I should give BBT another chance. I watched the first few episodes and wasn't that impressed. But I just caught the Christmas episode which was... hysterical!
- Ken Morley
I'm with Ken, I've only seen a minute here or there in passing. Then again I don't think I have room for more than 2 tv shows total where I'll sit down and watch. Anyway, poking around youtube found a surprisingly good clips put to music vid if you like that kind of thing: http://www.youtube.com/watch...
- Micah Wittman
I have one to add! Here's a picture of Spike with the packaging from tallit katan on his back: http://www.flickr.com/photos... (and Stella squished in behind him).
- Rochelle
Grace has a dreidel and menorah stuffed toys but no tallit or kippah of her own. I've heard a rumor that there is going to be a bark mitzvah at shul for a dog turning 13 next year though.
- Michelle Jones
Rochelle, Modern Yoruba don't much use the name "Shango", but that doesn't stop voodoo dilettantes ;)
- Uche Ogbuji
"A vulgar comment was made by a reader of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch's website on Friday on an article about the strangest things you've ever eaten. The headline was practically asking for a juvenile response and, thanks to the anonymity of the internet, that's exactly what happened. In the comments section of the article, one user posted a single word response referring to a part of a woman's anatomy. Of course, the site's moderators quickly deleted the comment but it soon reappeared - obviously this juvenile was intent on having their say. But this time, instead of just deleting the comment in question, the site's director of social media, Kurt Greenbaum, did a little sleuthing too. He found that the commenter's IP address was coming from a local school...and that's where this story starts to get interesting. Greenbaum contacted the school and made them aware of the situation. In his defense, he probably thought he was simply tattle-telling on a naughty student who would learn a...
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- cecily
from Bookmarklet
If anyone in this situation should have been fired it's the IP-snoopypants snitch. Is that even his job? Does he have the right even be looking up thag stuff?
- Anika
from fftogo
Yeah, a lot of people seem to think that the site moderator went way too far.
- cecily
I've seen a lot of folks in charge of commenting sections do stuff like this when someone has been particularly offensive (although they often don't then contact the ISP/workplace, just lean on the user directly). Some sections that make it pretty clear that your IP is logged, but I'm not sure if that is the case with the Dispatch's website.
- Jennifer Dittrich
Anika, that was exactly my thought when I read this story this morning. Unless the commenter is posing a threat, there is no call for the moderator to look up the IP address and report the commenter, regardless of whether it may be a student or faculty member.
- vicster
I bet this will do amazing things for his social media "career"
- Andrizzle Gizzle
Mukmuk is a lot of people's favourite. Originally he was only supposed to appear on press materials and on the website, but people liked him so much that they started a write-in campaign to make him official. I ordered my little stuffed Mukmuk the day it was released.
- cecily
too bad all those olympic hype has deprived people in British Columbia of a big chunk of sports and culture funding, all proceeds from lotteries, casino taxes used to go to them, now, with an olympic deficit looming, all those funds were axed, and they are spending zillions on propaganda, liking hauling the supposed olympic flame, torch all up and down the country, trying to cause some...
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- daviza
What's that? The sound of an axe being ground? I'm no big fan of the olympics either, but I like cute toys, so I bought a cute toy. *shrug*
- cecily
Wassup Mukmuk! Wassup cecily! tick tock....the oly's are just around the corner!!!
- Morgan Haley
Don't I know it. A big outdoor city square/event area thingie is going up right around the corner from my office, and I can't imagine what the traffic is going to be like...
- cecily
i hear that some people are renting their homes out for a month. for $40,000 US....nice!
- Morgan Haley
I hadn't heard that number, but someone who works at MPOW rented her place for $15,000.
- cecily
from IM
"The series paints an ugly picture of an Olympic system that sanctions a virtual monopoly of ticket selling in the U.S., and inflates ticket and hotel prices at the expense of the public. "What we discovered," Willmsen said, "was that the last persons served and priority for tickets was the public. The IOC 'family' and sponsors came first." Not exactly a revelation to British Columbians. From our perspective, the well-documented frustration with the scarcity of tickets is also well down on the list of concerns."
- cecily
from Bookmarklet
"When Sarah Palin's 413-page autobiography, Going Rogue: An American Life, hit stands Tuesday, readers discovered the governor's most mavericky move yet: The book lacks an index. So Slate has compiled its own. Just print out this index, paste it into the back of your copy, and start skipping around! (And, yes, the page numbers are real.)"
- cecily
from Bookmarklet
Couric, Katie ________"repetitive, biased questions" of, 271 ________unfair editing of interview with, 273 ________condescension of, 276 ________things I could/should have said to, 274-5 ________things I could have done instead of talking to, 279
- cecily
Going rogue, actual instances of ________handing phone to McCain for a radio interview without permission, 252 ________expressing regret about pulling out of Michigan, 298 ________distancing self from $150,000 wardrobe purchase, 317 ________Todd going onstage on Election Night despite being told not to, 337
- cecily
this is a great idea for the LSW - alternative indexes to books
- marthalib
Tiffany talks about context in design, and lists some very important questions designers/developers need to ask when creating a tool for a specific audience, which in this case, happens to be transborder immigrants.
- cecily
"100 dancers led by one of Australia's most famous drag queens surprised bathers on Bondi Beach with a medley of hot jams. It starts with “Love Shack” and only gets better from there…"
- cecily
from Bookmarklet
It was fun. I helped the guy at the head of the table with a PHP error, and he ran over, hugged me, and said "Man, I *love* girl geeks! She smells good, too!" EE folks are the best.
- cecily
from iPhone
"Amazon today gave the green light to selling the Kindle 2 in Canada. The reader is the same international version sold elsewhere and will give Canadians the same access to the Kindle bookstore as Americans. Some Canadian publications, such as the Globe and Mail and the Ottawa Citizen, are also available in subscription form for the e-book reader. The reader costs the same $259 US ($271 Canadian) as before, though it's unclear whether Canadians will pay a premium for downloads."
- cecily
from Bookmarklet