Some of my recent contributions to Wikipedia spoken articles:
(in Ogg format; requires Audacity or Windows MP plug-in)

- Four-minute mile

- Mayflower

- Tupperware

- Velocity of money

Happy New Year, Mate

SYDNEY, Australia - A pulsing heart of red lights shone from Sydney’s Harbor Bridge early Sunday as tens of thousands watched fireworks ushering in the new year. Revelers around the world began partying, visited places of worship and gathered with family to welcome 2006. AP

To skip this entry, just dial zero

From Yahoo Picks:

The IVR ("Interactive Voice Response") Cheat Sheet: a simple list of the keypad numbers you have to press in order to reach an actual human being when you call the customer service line of different companies and government agencies. ...

America First 800-999-3961 0 or say "member services"
American Express 800-528-4800 0 repeatedly
American Funds 800-421-0180 Press 0.
AMSouth Bank 800-267-6884 When the recording starts, press 111-0000. This is seven digits, like a phone number.
more...

Academic Studies of Weblogs

From Into the Blogosphere

About the Collection...
This online, edited collection explores discursive, visual, social, and other communicative features of weblogs. Essays analyze and critique situated cases and examples drawn from weblogs and weblog communities. Such a project requires a multidisciplinary approach, and contributions represent perspectives from Rhetoric, Communication, Sociology, Cultural Studies, Linguistics, and Education, among others.

examples:

Power Surge: Writing-Rhetoric Studies, Blogs, and Embedded Whiteness
Kathleen Ethel Welch, University of Oklahoma

Weblogs, Rhetoric, Community, and Culture
Laura Gurak, Smiljana Antonijevic, Laurie Johnson, Clancy Ratliff, and Jessica Reyman, University of Minnesota

Geography of the Blogosphere: Representing the Culture, Ecology and Community of Weblogs
Nicholas Packwood, Wilfrid Laurier University

Who is Enya?

From Slate:

The arrival of Amarantine, currently No. 10 on the Billboard album chart, is a reminder that Enya is one of the savviest operators in the music business and, well, an original. Twenty years ago, no one dreamed that there would be a huge audience for an ethereal female vocalist singing pseudo-classical airs with misty mystical overtones—-and Enya remains the genre's only practitioner. No one has even tried to imitate her.

A blessed Christmas 2005 and a happy 2006


Nicholas Kroeze, Time to Worship

'Ooh, I know, Spendover, like Passover but less talk, more presents!' (from The Simpsons 5F09)

This cartoon sums up my feelings:

Some of Gideon Strauss' favorite lines from Gilead.

Freudians will not be convinced

For centuries, the tusk of the narwhal has fascinated and baffled. ... Scientists have long tried to explain why a stocky whale that lives in arctic waters, feeding on cod and other creatures that flourish amid the pack ice, should wield such a long tusk. The theories about how the narwhal uses the tusk have included breaking ice, spearing fish, piercing ships, transmitting sound, shedding excess body heat, poking the seabed for food, wooing females, defending baby narwhals and establishing dominance in social hierarchies. But a team of scientists from Harvard and the National Institute of Standards and Technology has now made a startling discovery: the tusk, it turns out, forms a sensory organ of exceptional size and sensitivity, making the living appendage one of the planet's most remarkable, and one that in some ways outdoes its own mythology. NY Times

Overheard

"Preaching to bishops is like farting at skunks. You’re going to lose that war."

Author Thomas Lynch, at Calvin Theological Seminary (qtd. by Kent H)