the madapes met for the traditional five days of togetherness this past week – Peter stayed with both Dan and I in NYC for a few days, then we rented a car and drove home.  It was too short, but good to be in the same place.

Peter is now in Cali, circumnavigating Lake Shasta or something?  Dan is in NY writing and watching football.  I’m taking off this morning for my hastily planned Southern Campaign.  I’ll be arriving in Jackson, MS this afternoon and biking straight east on US Route 80.  We’ll see how it goes.  SIPA people, I’ll see you in DC in a few weeks.

Happy new year all!
元旦节快乐!

a good idea whose time has come:

restaurant review by dish, for an ever-growing number of beijing restaurants.

so you get to actually see what the dishes are before you make the trek out to some far-flung district, and see what people (ok, expats) have to say about them.

plus, some occasional witty commentary.

chinabites.com

Today marks the official end of classes for my first semester. This was one of those blink-and-its over periods for me. Classes wrapping up in the next week: statistics, economic analysis, policy analysis, conceptual foundations of international relations, and land use controls. Yech.

To celebrate this momentous almost holiday, I am procrastinating. I ordered some Chinese food and am now listening to educational raps while trying to read Iranian President Ahmadinejad’s personal blog. Really.
The “Declaration of Independence” rap is a pleasing counterpoint to the rather wide range of viewpoints on Mssr. Ahmadinejad’s site. Good production values on these raps! I wonder how they are going to sell this stuff.

But this eggroll is terrible, sorry Wai Li Restaurant on Amsterdam.

The Technology, Environment and Design talks (google sponsored) were recently pointed out to me. The talks range from the African AIDs crisis to the present and future direction of space travel. There are webcast videos of all the talks up, and new ones every week or so.

Among my favorite talks thus far are Emily Oster’s challenge to the statistical portrayal the AIDs epidemic in Africa , Carolyn Porco’s description of NASA’s Cassini mission major findings, Bill Stone’s rally for space exploration, and Hans Rosling’s great ’07 lecture on geopolitical trends in health and statistics.

ps, along the lines of generosity: mexican food style, and certainly worth checking out is FreeRice, which quizzes you on your vocab as you donate rice through the UN’s World Food Program; aggrandize argotistically!

donateyourtaco.com

Thanks to Jacoby Ellsbury, we all get a free taco – but if you can’t make it to taco bell today, these guys are trying to get Taco Bell to donate an equivalent amount of texmex goodness to the Red Cross. Pretty smart.

Thanks to the globe for the tip.

go sox!

October Critical Mass: