Odds-n-Ends

AWB says far more eloquently what I was trying to a few weeks ago about academia:

I never say, as my friends often do, that it’s a bad choice. Grad school is an excellent choice for people who have enormous resources of confidence and poise in the face of anxiety-producing situations. Sometimes I’m that person, and sometimes I’m not. I wish the profession were all it purports to be, a safe haven for smart people who don’t fit in. (This is what my students seem to fantasize it will be, anyway.) But it’s not. As I’ve often whispered to myself while wandering around at conferences, “What a nest of vipers we are.”

Thanks to Cecilia over at PhD Comics, I just found out about this alternative to AAA. I haven't had a chance to look over the site much, or do any research about AAA (of which I've been a member, through my family, pretty much since I turned 16), but this Better World Club sounds pretty cool - environmentally friendly, and they provide roadside service to both cars and bikes!

My previous post was about It Can't Happen Here, which I originally (ages ago) said I picked up because it contained one of my favorite quotes ("When fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross"). Although I'm still glad I picked up the book, turns out that quote is nowhere to be found in its pages. People with more time on their hands than I have done the research on the evolution of this quote and its misattribution.