Friends of Dorothy

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In my naive youth, I had no idea what a “friend of Dorothy” was; in-group descriptors, after all, are always known to members of the in group (and allies) long before they are known to the general public. “Friend of… Read More ›

Recent Posts

  • Mollie on her kitty couch

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    That tiny little Mollie doesn’t look quite so tiny when she’s stretched out on her kitty couch:  

  • Panic

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    Consider this. Here we have a great movie from 2000, starring William H. Macy, Donald Sutherland, Tracy Ullman, Neve Campbell, and John Ritter — so why hadn’t I ever heard of it before? Oh well, better late than never. It’s… Read More ›

  • “Libraries are a haven…”

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    For more reasons than one you need to read Angela Clarke’s story from six years ago. Shoutout to my sister-in-law Brenda for alerting me to this excerpt from Clarke’s account: My own fragility revealed that a library is not just… Read More ›

  • No Pi Day?

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    This is the first time in 26 years that I haven’t been able to observe a weekday Pi Day with any of my classes. Sigh. But there are plenty of online resources for my past, present, and future students.

  • Weston’s 17th Fractal Fair

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    I returned to Weston yesterday for its 17th annual Fractal Fair. That’s a lot of fractal fairs! As you might expect for a subject that keeps evolving every year, with an entirely new set of exhibitors every year, the fair… Read More ›

  • Ingrid Thoft

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    No, “Identity Theft” is not the title of this book — though you can readily see why Barbara thought so when she glanced quickly at the cover. Identity is Ingrid Thoft’s second novel. In some ways it’s in the tradition… Read More ›

  • Old authors never die…

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    Lawrence Block’s latest novella, A Time to Scatter Stones, and one of Ruth Rendell’s last novels, The Monster in the Box, have something in common — a couple of things, in fact. It’s no coincidence that both books were written late in… Read More ›

  • The top universities for linguistics?

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    Are these really the top universities for linguistics? That’s what the QS World University Rankings by Subject says. I’ve been skeptical of lists like this as I watched high-school ratings over two decades from publications like Boston Magazine and U.S. News, paying special attention… Read More ›

  • Bay State Model Railroad Museum Spring Model Train Show

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    Wow! Look at that title: a noun phrase consisting of nine consecutive nouns! Maybe the show should be called Buchtstaatsmodelleisenbahnmuseumsfrühlingsmodellzugshow. On second thought, maybe not. OK, enough fooling around with German. Let’s get back to the show itself, which was… Read More ›