Friday Quick Hits and Varia

Today is supposed to be the day that we break the mythical 50 degree barrier here in North Dakotaland and we should be in the 60s tomorrow. It feels like we might be entering that strange liminal zone between winter and summer. I don’t remember what it’s called, but I know it involves cruel months, lions, lambs, and perhaps unicorns.

As we begin to once again feel blood circulate freely in our veins, I can offer some quick hits and varia to energize the arrival of “flood and mud” season. (You can check out the flood cams here.)

• Abandonment in modern Greece (although I do wonder how many of these photographs reflect the recent economic crisis, and how many of them reflect decades old building practices.) Here is an even more dramatic and unintentional example of abandonment. This is even more cool, an entire Soviet mining town somewhere north of the article circle, abandoned and documented by intrepid archaeologists. I haven’t seen this book yet, but I want it.

• Congratulations to Big Joe Rife for winning the CAMWS book award for his magisterial Isthmia IX: The Roman and Byzantine Graves and Human Remains. Princeton, N.J.: American School of Classical Studies 2012.

• Mapping the Jewish Communities of the Byzantine Empire Project.

• Someone just encountered the “undergraduate slash”. (I noted its conspicuous decline as early as December 2011).

• Chris Gayle scored a century in 30 balls on his way to 175*. He hit 17 sixes and 30 boundaries from 66 balls. All of these things are records for T20.

• More cricket. I am super excited to see Chris Rogers named to the Australian team for the Ashes. This is the same Chris Rogers who dismissed early buzz about his selection with the quote: “I’d like to play but, as people keep reminding me, I’m very old.”

• Jan Chipchase chimes in on Google Glass.

• This is mostly funny.

• I am impressed, but unconvinced by this guy’s headphone system. 

• I know that I shouldn’t laugh at other people’s misfortune, but since this guy has capitalized on it and it is a funny way to start your broadcast career.

• Joel Jonientz recommends that we check out Neil Gaiman’s keynote from the digital minds conference.

• An argument for the big class.

• This is a pretty cool map of the covers of Joy Division’s “Love will tear us apart”.

• An old computer that still works just fine, and the story of Steve Jobs’s visit to XEROX that transformed how we interact with personal computers.

• My blog post from yesterday, Ten Tips for a New Graduate Student, has been read over 650 times in the past 24 hours. This is by far my most popular post in its first day on the web. 

• What I’m reading: D. Hayden, A Field Guide to Sprawl. (New York 2004).

• What I’m listening to: Frank Turner, Tape Deck Heart. Young Galaxy, Ultramarine.