short takes

[cellio]

Some researchers at Columbia are conducting "six degrees of separation" research using email. It looks like an interesting project, and they're doing all the right things privacy-wise, so I signed up to be a guinea pig. My first target is an air-traffic controller in Melbourne. I believe I have moved the chain closer, assuming the recipient of my forward decides to participate. I'm kind of weak on Australians. :-) More info here.

At Pennsic amergina gave me a copy of the Ashkenazi Haggadah, a renaissance haggadah manuscript (complete with obligatory wine stains). It's nifty! Particularly nifty is that I've been able to study parts of the evolution of this particular text without resorting to the English translation much. Yeah, it's a fixed domain and all that; I know to look for certain phrases and so on. It's still neat. I will also go through the English for a more careful look.

The latest Consumer's Reports has an article on identity theft that includes a phone number for opting out of pre-approved credit-card offers. I called and it turns out to be a wrong number. Assuming I didn't misdial (the person on the other end didn't actually know their number!), that's going to be a pain for the hotel on the other end of that toll-free number. (I'll try again tomorrow to make sure I didn't mis-dial, but I didn't want to call right back and get the same operator.)

Someone at my synagogue is organizing match-ups between people seeking places to have holiday meals and people with extra spaces. I think this is a wonderful idea, and need to figure out which meals I can volunteer to host extra people for. In general I would like to be inviting random people for Shabbat and Yom Tov meals fairly often, particularly those who won't have people to share the days with otherwise, but I'm shy. So this is great -- I can say "up to N people for this meal" and someone else will make introductions. (For these particular holidays, there's also the extra twist of early vs. late services. If I'm going to the early service, matching me up with people going to the late one would pose a challenge.)

And on a more somber note... A good friend is in a lot of pain after a miscarriage a few days ago. I won't publicly name her, but healing thoughts sent her way would be most welcome.

Comments

Re: Nah, not so far...

[dagonell.livejournal.com]

This sounds interesting. I'd like to play. I am on a b-board that has an Aussie on it. Does that help? We had the point driven home to us when we were chatting on Sunday night and she posted "God, I hate Monday mornings!" :D