Inanity to the nth

Guess how many teams are in The Big Ten?
You can tell by looking at their logo.
*blink?*
I'm not sure where to start.
Probably best that I don't.

(Ehren would have posted this but he decided to email it to me instead, which earns some kind of demerit from the posting committee...)

Owl-faced night parrots: Not dead yet!

I'm watching David Attenborough's Life of Birds, and was moved to do some checking on the status of the incredibly endearing and extremely endangered kakapo. There are still under 100 of them, but seven chicks were hatched this year. Most touching detail: They all have names. All of them.

The denizens of YouTube

When I found that recording of Braes o' Balquhidder on YouTube I was happy.
I'm irrationally happier now to know that there are multiple YouTubers who are devoting themselves to uploading video of gramophone recordings. At least five. Possibly dozens, or scores.
(Discovered this thanks to Will's tip about Forty-Seven Ginger-Headed Sailors.)

Ecoguilt Calculator

Patagonia has made me feel a little less crazy.
They have a proto-ecoguilt-calculator on their website (thanks to Jeanne for the tip).
I've wanted an ecoguilt calculator for a while, and the Patagonia tool is a good start.
It doesn't do everything I want.
I want to know exactly what karmic burden I am accepting when I buy a product.
I don't just care about my carbon footprint, although here's a nice carbon footprint calculator.
I want to know about:

• Carbon footprint (including materials, production, and shipping)
• Virtual water
• Support of local economies
• Physical safety (in terms of working conditions, solvents, pesticides, other chemicals) of the people involved in production
• Degree of admirable-ness/ethicalness of the labor practices in the entire supply chain (good marks to living wages; big demerits for child labor, forced labor, or slavery)
  
• Whether any animals are involved in production (either as materials or power) and whether those animals are treated well
  
• Organic production methods for any agricultural products

I want to be able to compare (for example) these bamboo towels to these organic cotton towels and know which ones are more virtuous overall. Patagonia makes me feel less crazy for wanting to know this stuff. (Not that I need any high-performance outerwear. Really, right now it's about towels and patio furniture. I have finally accepted that a linen or cotton patio umbrella isn't practical, so I'm trying to at least get a used one from FreeCycle.)

Pandora!

Pandora Radio![1]

I have three stations already built and I've only known about this for 15 minutes, thanks to a tip from Shital [2]. I am agog at the fantastic potential for time-suckage and serendipity and other forms of pleasant weirdness that result from what could (I suppose) be looked at as a simple replacement for the tyranny of MediaPlayer. I'm anticipating that not only will the music be enjoyable and absorbing, but that the process of training the music stream as to my likes and dislikes will be a source of great joy and outrage. I'd like to apologize to Ehren in advance for the about-to-increase exclamations of "What the hell is this supposed to be? Don't you know anything??!!"

I'm looking forward to getting the taxonomy for the music I like. (Right now it's " folk roots | great musicianship | acoustic sonority | demanding instrumental part writing | intricate melodic phrasing | thru composed melodic style | minor key tonality | melodic songwriting | a prominent mandolin part | acoustic rhythm guitars | solo strings | an instrumental arrangement. (np: Chris Thile, "Big Sam Thompson")

So I will permaybehaps not need any CDs at work ever again. Now I just have to solve the car-music problem. I've been listening to the wireless since my 8-track died. (Just kidding. It was a cassette deck. Yes, I do know there's such a thing as an iPod. Whippersnappers. Get off my lawn.)

[1] Seems kind of an inapt name. (Is inapt a word?) Memorable, sure, but I'm not getting the metaphoric connection to, you know, Pandora who opened the box, or jar, full of either evil or gifts, depending on who you believe. Her. The Greek Eve, the opener.

[2] Shital never updates her own blog, so I don't know why I thought she might post here ; )