The Cranky Professor

Chairs for Graduation – Friday

crankyprofessor — Sat, 18 May 2013 17:22:22 +0000

Chairs for Graduation – Friday, a photo by Michael Tinkler on Flickr.

The weather is kind of overcast today, but no rain predicted for tomorrow!

Whew! Random expenses averted!

crankyprofessor — Fri, 17 May 2013 15:38:43 +0000

Yesterday I got a haircut. The young woman who cuts my hair wanted to see my pictures from Egypt, so I took my iPad along with me. Then I stopped by Wegmans on my way home.

I got the fabric shopping bag (aren’t I responsible) out and slung the shoulder bag with my iPad under the cart. When I checked out, I grabbed the shopping bag and left – and my shoulder bag (with iPad and camera!) was still under the cart.

I figured out what had happened at about 8:30 last night and called Wegmans. The young man on the Service Desk didn’t know anything. I activated Find My iPhone (which covers iPads, too) and put in a lock screen message with my name and phone number.

I went back to Weggies in person this morning and it turned out they’d locked it up in the accounting office as soon as they spotted the iPad. Sure enough, as soon as I touched it my phone pinged at me – my iPad was online! And the lock screen message was there. Even if someone had walked off with it instead of turning it in to the service desk (which in Geneva I would have found hard to believe), Find My iPhone would have prodded him or her to have called me!

I’m almost as glad to have gotten the Crumpler bag back as the iPad and camera (I was looking for an excuse to buy a new camera!) – it’s the perfect day bag for an iPad, a sketchbook, and the point and shoot camera. Especially since Crumpler no longer makes exactly this bag.

So – if you have Apple portable electronics, download Find My iPhone from the App Store and activate it on all your stuff! It certainly can’t hurt!

I’d hate to be that dean this week

crankyprofessor — Thu, 16 May 2013 20:42:31 +0000

Western New England University School of Law has as its commencement speaker (which means they had to have invited her some time ago) the director for the IRS Exempt Organization Division.

via Professor Bainbridge.

Cultivating donors

crankyprofessor — Wed, 15 May 2013 22:05:19 +0000

A couple of us had lunch yesterday with the biggest living donor to our departmental efforts. He wants to give us more money – evidently while he’s still lively enough to enjoy watching what we do with it!

So, today I spent some time with another department member making a loosely prioritized wish for slices of the Pie Pie In the Sky.

Excerpt from the Impeachment Articles of Richard Nixon

crankyprofessor — Mon, 13 May 2013 00:31:17 +0000

Or, as George Will put it, how stupid do they think we are? It’s not just some functionary in Cincinnati. But then, President Obama has been cracking jokes about the IRS targeting his opponents for a long time.

Oh – I suppose I should say that I’m opposed to the IRS targeting ANY group on political grounds. Is that a Rightist position? Or do we all agree on that one? That is to say, all of us outside the bureaucracy?

And if not. Oh, dear.

Real Alcazar, Sevilla – Mudejar work

crankyprofessor — Sun, 12 May 2013 21:45:34 +0000

Real Alcazar, Sevilla, a photo by Michael Tinkler on Flickr.

I was especially taken with the realization than in the midst of these abstract shapes of mudejar quadrilobes were lions and castles – and that shield. Leon, Castile – and what? But still, Peter the Cruel (r 1334-1369) wanted ALL his subjects to understand his palace facade.

And people ask what you can do with a liberal arts degree?

crankyprofessor — Sun, 12 May 2013 15:18:56 +0000

Even better – with an MFA! You can become Deputy National Security Advisor - and help write the fiction about what happened in Benghazi.

Prof Althouse on the IRS and rightist organizations

crankyprofessor — Sat, 11 May 2013 15:27:48 +0000

What’s wrong about what the IRS has been doing? Here’s Professor Ann Althouse, in answer to an attempt to mitigate the scandal:

The unequal, politically skewed enforcement of a law is a far more serious problem than the level of harshness of a neutrally enforced law. We can disagree about what the tax laws should be and how strictly or harshly they should be enforced, but everyone knows it is fundamentally wrong to vary the degree of enforcement, selecting victims by their politics. If government cannot be trusted to avoid that fundamental wrong, it cannot be trusted with any power at all. It would be better to wipe the tax code clean and rebuild it without any complicated corners where government officials — great or small — have a place to do their dirty work.

The Suitcase Mood

crankyprofessor — Fri, 10 May 2013 17:20:09 +0000

Can a country die? Edward Hugh at Fistful of Euros thinks about the Ukraine, and what will spread to southern Europe. He’s talking about the combination of the net outflow of population and falling birth rate – both of which are true of Italy, too. I have to admit that I’m not entirely certain that when I next lead students to Rome, Spring 2014, the Bancomats will be spitting out Euros.

via Marginal Revolution.

Grrrr – we’re supposed to be having thunderstorms today.

crankyprofessor — Fri, 10 May 2013 17:01:50 +0000

I want a big one really badly. Something needs to wash some of this pollen away! Instead we get sprinkles that make it inconvenient to be outside but do nothing substantive – the streets are dry again within half an … Continue reading →