Completely Off Base

My father had a letter published in the Arizona Daily Star.

Upcoming Talk

Hey, I'm giving a talk at Clemson next Friday.

Guess I'd better go write the talk.

World Heritage List

I've created a web page listing the World Heritage sites I've been to. I link to the official UNESCO page for each site, as well as to a description of my trip there, if available. I'm hoping to go back and provide descriptions of trips where not available.

While we were in England earlier this month, Christina and I visited three more sites: Bath, Stonehenge and Westminster Abbey. I've now been to 16 sites, which only leaves 714 to go! (Ha ha.)

Given how much I travel, I'd like to update and expand the travel section of my web site. I have a travel page that needs freshening.

Uh-huh, please share some more insights...

Since I had only sporadic Internet access last week, I've been catching up on my e-mail. I get e-mailed alerts of Slate's article postings. I've made it up to April 1 now, and I'm reading this analysis:

On the other hand, as the war drags on, any stifled sympathy for the American invasion will tend to evaporate. As more civilians die and more Iraqis see their "resistance" hailed across the Arab world as a watershed in the struggle against Western imperialism, the traditionally despised Saddam could gain appreciable support among his people.

--Robert Wright, The War and the Peace

Well, at least he said "could". And I'm not saying I'm a better prognosticator. But it's interesting how little value this analysis contains only eight days later. I mean, the fighting's not over, but Saddam's regime isn't exactly showing its tenacity.

Beer and Skittles

Tuesday night was spent at the Little Owl Pub for dinner. We participated in a game of skittles. No, not the candy.


When I asked what skittles were, I was told that it was like tenpin bowling, but with nine pins that were differently shaped and further apart. You get three throws to attempt to knock them down. I suppose if you knocked them all down with one of your first two balls, the pins would be reset. Between the 30-40 people we played with and the four frames bowled, this was never an issue. One time, someone did knock all nine down, but that was with ball three.

I had the most fun setting up the pins. This was certainly not automated -- the pins weren't even regular. Though they were supposed to be symmetrical, some wouldn't stand up on one side.

And yes, Christina did out-skittle me. Left handed.

Not Back to the Belgian Monk

I mentioned visits to The Belgian Monk in Cheltenham last year and in 2000. After less than superb dining experiences, I decided to skip the food and only go there for the Belgian beer. Well, they've moved, changed the name, are "under new ownership" and have a new menu. They don't open until today, so I didn't get a chance to go there, but at some point, you're not really talking about the same restaurant, are you?

Bath, Party Headquarters

Well, we made it to England and are now in Bath suffering from a severe case of jetlag. Normally, there's a 5-hour time difference between Maryland and England, but this week only, there's a 6-hour difference due to their starting daylight savings time a week early. Odd.

I reserved an automatic car at Avis, but somehow ended up with a Peugeot with some sort of clutchless shifting system. Weird, but neat.

We motored into Bath and went to the tourist centre to get them to book us a room. They found us a room at the Marlborough House, where we're staying in the Georgian Room. It's a lovely place, the owner seems nice, and it's reasonably priced.



On the owner's suggestion, we went to No 1 Royal Crescent Museum to see a restored Georgian townhome. Then we got some fish 'n' chips. Mmm.

Agonist

I've been finding that one of the best ways to keep up on the Iraq news lately is The Agonist. It's a one-man operation by a guy who gathers a bunch of reports about the war and summarizes them. Just thought I'd pass that along to people who aren't aware of it.

Pictures from the Conference

You can see "official" pictures from the conference here. I managed to stay out of most of them except for this one.

Berkeley in a Nutshell

I had an incident today that crystallized the type of thing that bugs me about Berkeley. Berkeley is the type of place where shopkeepers are concerned about theft enough to make you leave your laptop bag at the front of the store, but not so concerned about theft that they won't wander off and leave the bag where anybody could grab it.