Jason Clarke

Here in Maine, the weather is likely to turn bad any day now (possibly today) and stay that way until at least early April. Hence, we’re nearly upon the beginning of the school snow day season.

One idea I’d love to see is a site where a parent (or anybody else) could grab news for a particular school. On the site would be imporant school news, especially closings and delays, and it would be available in a variety of formats- RSS, text message, and email notification pop to mind as starters.

In which I link to Rex Hammock twice in one day: Rex reports that colleges and universities are seeing a drop in male students. As Rex quotes, from the WaPo:

“Colleges and universities across the country are grappling with the case of the mysteriously vanishing male. Where men once dominated, they now make up no more than 43 percent of students at American institutions of higher learning, according to 2003 statistics, and this downward trend shows every sign of continuing unabated.”

So to recap: Secondary education was long dominated by men. Now it’s 60-40 in favor of women, and as the article says, the trend shows “every sign of continuing.”

The question that fascinates me is, what mix of sociological and other factors got us here? Was it an activism-based shift in trends, a simple shift of societal tides, or a mixture of both? And now that we are here, what do those who campaign(ed) against male-dominated universities say about the opposite? And how do they feel in general about this news?

Commenters, share your thoughts, or link to places where others do.

Rex Hammock says: “You’re crazy if you take what you read in Wikipedia at face value.”

OLS^TM (one-line summary): a bittorrent client that includes an integreated search box.

Here’s one way it could work: A user downloads a bittorrent client that includes an integrated torrent file search box. As the user, you can specify one, or a series, of URLs to pre-load the search with. The software’s maker could also choose to pre-load some popular tracker sites, based on quality/affiliates/etc. Then, instead of having to use the browser to perform a search and click on a link to your load your client, all could be handled from within the app. Better yet: if the app offered a Firefox search plugin whose results window spawned the app.

Why it matters: Because no bitorrent client I’ve ever used includes an integrated torrent search box. There may be one out there (after all, there’s no shortage of clients), but I have yet to come across one.

Bitorrent file search is so bad right now, it could easily be improved from many angles. This is one.

This may anger or distress some people, but I have to make a quick mention of the fact. You can call yours whatever you like, but in my home we’re going to keep calling it the Christmas Tree, not the “Holiday tree” that unfortunately appears to be sweeping the nation.

At the right is a shot of our Christmas Tree from 2003, when we lived in an apartment so tiny the tree was in our bedroom (and right next to a giant clunkly old dangerous heater, besides).

The picture conjures some fun memories: The TV was given to me by a friend and former roomate from my days in Boston; it lived a long and productive life for several people before finally dying out on my wife and I one day after the Superbowl in 2004.

The dresser it’s on is one I had from age 8, and finally gave up just a few months ago (it wasn’t built for two, to say the least). The ripped part of wood at the base of the dresser arrived there just a few months before this picture was taken- it stems from a gigantic hole in the ceiling of our bedroom. One day, ceiling bits and much water came in, unnannounced, and the room became so damp the wood literally peeled off the dresser. Come to think of it, that may be why the TV failed only two months after!

The couch, a corner of it visible, was one of the most comfortable I ever owned, despite (or perhaps in part?) to it being ragged and faded. Though it was too short to lie down and sleep on, it fit two comfortably. It sat lower to the ground than most, but not low enough to feel seemly. I inherited it from my first roomate in college, who got it himself when he and I took a trip around our college town scanning for couches and found that one on the lawn of a bed and breakfast, being offered for free. We snapped it up and immediately installed it our room, innocculating ourselves from tempting common-area couch raids.

The couch, the dresser, and the TV are all long gone, but even though they evoke fond memories, they’re all just things, so it’s okay.

The Christmas tree is just a thing, but it might be a bit more. Either way, in our home it’s sticking around for a while longer.

UPDATE: Yesterday, we went to cut down our tree from an ecologically-responsible Christmas tree farm near us. The photoset is here. We’re planning to decorate it today- pictures in a new post later on.

I’m back from the holiday inspired, turkey-induced blog hiatus with a quick question before I drop some longer-form posts…what is up with Flickr’s RSS feeds in Bloglines?

Flickr photo feeds are NOT working for me in Bloglines, to say the least…photos are just plain not showing up, while others’ feeds suddenly show 10 new items…except they’re not new, they’re 10 old items…grrr. Does anybody know what’s up with this?