Wednesday, February 03, 2010

Round Up

Innovative uses for defunct big box stores. And an accompanying book.

OTRRpedia-old time radio information.

I recall making these potholders when I was a Brownie. It was so much fun. I'm glad to see they are still around. More here.

I would be thrilled if someone gifted me the treasure of a monthly book shipment. Have a bibliophile in your life-Giftlit just might be the gift you need for that special someone.

Good freakin' grief. Merriam Webster's 10th edtion has been banned in some American schools because a child read the definition for "oral sex". I guess it is better that children watch hours and hours of mindless television, which is loaded with violence and still in 2010, negative images of women, minorities, gays and the non-thin. I guess that's better. Grrrrr!!!!

A. read a review of this book the other day and was telling me about it. Now we both want to read it. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. Henrietta Lacks was an American of African descent. She was a poor tobacco farmer from Clover, Virginia whose cells were taken from without her consent. She has been dead for more than 60 years, and her cells still live on helping to create a multi-million dollar industry, but she lies in an unmarked grave. Her family can't afford health insurance. Her's were the first immortal human cells grown in culture.

Reading the review of this book I became so angry to hear a story of how once again blacks were not only used for experiments without their knowledge, but were not compensated at all. If this isn't total exploitation I don't know what is. I can't wait to read this book. Here is an excerpt from O Magazine.

If you are an archivist and you are looking for a job the library at the University of California, Santa Cruz campus is in search of an archivist to process the Grateful Dead archive.

Now this is one of the things that I like about Twitter. Laura Ingalls Wilder is posting. "Land sakes Laura. You have some sense of humor."

22 amazing maps.

The Somali pirates want to donate some of their confiscated loot to the Haitian people. I also like what the Somali spokesperson had to say about the Americans and Europeans. Yeah, yeah I'm radical.

I've been told I'm old school in my regards for thank you notes. If someone gives you something, or does something for you, I feel, and I will always feel that a thank you note is in order. A handwritten note, not an email, but even an email is better than nothing. I get on my soapbox about this all of the time-about people's lack of consideration, how they haven't the foggiest clue what courtesy is, and on and on. All of my rambling is getting to a point, or should I say a link-Leah Dieterich's mother always told her to write thank you notes (must be something with women named Leah -tee hee) so now she writes thank you notes for everything on her blog THXTHXTHX.

Two documentaries I would like to see are Paper Clips and From the Ashes: The Life and Times of Tick Hall.

Paper Clips was a project started by a middle school in Tennesee. The school created a monument to Holocaust victims made entirely of paper clips. At last count over 30 million paper clips had been received. Read the whole Wikipedia entry. Find out why they chose paper clips and where they obtained some of the paper clips.

From the Ashes: The Life and Times of Tick Hall is a documentary about Dick Cavett and his wife Carrie Nye's rebuilding of Tick Hall, a 125 year old house that was burned to the ground in 1997. The Cavetts had lived in Tick Hall for 30 years prior to the fire.

Always on the lookout for unusual bookstores check out this manure tank bookstore.


Educational and interesting oral history project: Oral History of the U.S. House of Representatives.

Nice blog entry on the Archivist of the Year Award. More from the New York History blog.

Enjoy!!


"As long as people will accept crap, it will be financially profitable to dispense it." Dick Cavett

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