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Uncertain Principles

Physics, Politics, Pop Culture

Thursday, August 22, 2002

Vacation, All I Ever Wanted

Regular readers may have noticed a pronounced tilt toward the "pop culture" side of things in recent postings. There are two reasons for that: one, the BlogCritics launch (and the recent CD-buying binge) got me thinking about music, which turned up plenty of ideas for blog posts; and two, Kate and I are going on a long-delayed and well-deserved vacation this weekend (running up the road to Montreal for a few days), to try to unwind a little before the new school year. I've been making a conscious effort not to think about class prep until after we get back, which has sort of spilled over into not thinking about physics much at all.

When we get back, it'll be hard-core class-prep time, so there'll be plenty of science-type posts, as I try to work out the best way to explain Relativity and Quantum Mechanics to sophomores, and do some of my thinking out loud on the Web. If you just can't wait to read more about science and education, SciTech Daily provides a link to a Richard Dawkins piece about great science teaching, which is worth a read. It sort of veers off into an anti-religion rant for a few paragraphs in the middle, but then he wouldn't be Richard Dawkins if he didn't veer off into the occasional anti-religion rant.

(I'll also note that Salon has a book review with the absolutely wonderful title "Sometimes a Snake Orgy is Just a Snake Orgy", which is pretty entertaining.)

On the other hand, if you're in the mood for more pop-culture stuff, I'll plug 75 or Less Album Reviews. Leaving aside what may be a grammar error in the title (words being discrete, "fewer" might be preferred, but then "75 words or fewer" doesn't really sound right...), they do exactly what the title says: review albums using no more than 75 words. I haven't heard enough of the records they've reviewed recently to get a good read on their accuracy, but their reviews are sharp, to the point, and often amusing. It's worth a look.

And that's pretty much it. Having stuck Mike Steeves with the image of me singing a Go-Go's tune, I'm off. Back next Tuesday, or thereabouts.

Posted at 10:02 AM | link | follow-ups |