(Via http://jonfwilkins.blogspot.com/2012/03/life-cycle-of-physicist.html)

"Stay away from Nevada, New Mexico, Hanford, Oak Ridge.  From remote areas with good water circulation away from prying eyes."

"Can it really be so bad?"

"I like how they, too, are always trying to be human"

"I love the idea of a magic potion that fixes things"

"That didn't make me feel better like I thought it would."

"the new US Embassy in London is intended to be "a 12-storey cube clad in a blastproof glass and plastic façade" surrounded by a 30-metre blast zone. In the proof image above, it looks not unlike a high-end bunker has been simply dropped from space on London, an impregnable and isolated chunk of America. And while security is an obvious and present concern, I think perhaps this building says a little more than it was intended to. In fact, let’s admit it. IT’S A FORTRESS WITH A FUCKING MOAT. It doesn’t say "welcome to a little piece of America, one of the best ideas the world ever had and a country that welcomes the tired and poor and afraid." It says "if you even look at us funny we’ll pour boiling oil on you from the roof. Raise the drawbridge! Release the Mongolian Terror Trout!""

If I'm honest, all these buildings and rooms look very appealing to me.

Annals of unreasonable effective anthropomorphism...

Exploiting the properties of the Chinese writing system to evade the "great firewall", including appropriating ancient forms of divination/wordplay based on splitting characters into radicals.

"I want to address all of the criticisms that Obama should have returned to the White House rather than staying in Hawaii after the attempted bombing. While the readers of this blog know that I am very critical of him, I can’t fault him on this one. If you were a black guy with close family in Africa and a Muslim name, would YOU get on an airplane while the TSA is on the alert for Nigerian Muslims?"

"In the list of horrible waste of tax-payer’s hard earned money exposed by Fox News, I saw this: '$50,000 to build a computer model of an ancient city in Pakistan complete with “animated and interactive ‘inhabitants’.' If history is our guide, it won’t be long before these inhabitants fall to radical ideologies and turn back on the NEH! Agent-based computing models are already rife with terrorists and terrorist-sympathizers. We know this."

Sounds like nothing so much as the worst excess of early science fiction fandom, only without the redeeming artistic and cultural value.

This is how English and string theory got so weird.

As he says, "a series of unfortunate events".

An essential chronicle of our time. "Are you or someone you love dating a banker? If so, we are here to support you through these difficult times. Dating A Banker Anonymous (DABA) is a safe place where women can come together – free from the scrutiny of feminists– and share their tearful tales of how the mortgage meltdown has affected their relationships. DABA Girls was started by two best friends whose relationships tanked with the economy. Not knowing what else to do, we did what frustrated but articulate girls have done since the beginning of time - we started a blog. So if your monthly Bergdorf’s allowance has been halved and bottle service has all but disappeared from your life, lighten your heart with laughter and email your stories to dabagirls@gmail.com. "

Those who have ears, let them hear.

To use the next time I give a "how to get a job like mine" talk

In which Andrew Leonard's lifeworld is colonized by the forces of Capital, and his immediate primate emotional reactions are ludicrously misplaced.

I don't know whether to snort or to sigh wistfully.

"Just thought I'd bring that up."

Do read the bits about tattoos.

"Iraqis have often been observed weeping and wailing in apparent anguish, but the study offers evidence indicating this may not be exclusively an outward expression of anger or a desire for revenge. It also provocatively suggests that this grief can posse

"Dear White Pennsylvanians..."

I corresponded with Chislenko for a while in the 1990s and then we dropped out of touch - I am very surprised, and saddened, to hear what happened to him.

Of course, back in the day, it was "someone is _wrong_ in the pages of a [scholarly journal]/[little magazine]!"

Abbas Raza's misadventures with the law in New York.