Monthly Archives: September 2004

Wrap it up, I’ll take it

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Today’s lesson, regarding The History of Paper and Papermaking:

Corrugated Paper Products
In 1856, Englishmen, Healey and Allen, received a patent for the first corrugated or pleated paper. The paper was used to line tall men’s hats. However, this was not the corrugated cardboard we know today. On December 20, 1871, Albert Jones of New York NY, patented a stronger corrugated paper (cardboard) used as a shipping material. This was the first cardboard and stronger than paperboard. In 1874, G. Smyth built the first single sided corrugated board machine. Also in 1874, Oliver Long improved upon the Jones patent and invented a lined corrugated material and this was modern cardboard as we know it today – which led to the invention of the:

Corrugated Cardboard Box
American, Robert Gair promptly invented the corrugated cardboard box in 1890. These were pre-cut flat pieces manufactured in bulk that opened up and folded into boxes. Gair made his first plain paper folding box in 1870.

Containerboard or Corrugated Containers
The first use of corrugated paper for packaging came in 1871, when an American, Albert Jones, introduced an idea of wrapping bottles and glass chimneys in it. However, it was the addition of a liner to one and then to the other side of corrugated paper that signaled the birth of cardboard as we know it.

Interesting, you say. But why are we bringing this up today?

We bring it up because we are in charge of props for the upcoming Butler Little Theatre production of Dracula.

Ah yes, you say. Of course.

Continue reading →

Gist Street Reading, October 1

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The skinny on this month’s reading, from Gist Street’s Sherrie:

Toi “Guggenheim” Derricotte and Cathy “Coming in from New York City” McKinley. Poetry and Non-fiction. A power-duo of literary accomplishment. 305 Gist Street. James Simon’s Sculpture Studio. Readings begin at 8:00; socializing begins at 7:30.

$3 suggested donation. Homemade bread. Cookies. Possibly the final fantastic batch of pesto. Gist Street raffle featuring a pumpkin from my very own garden and several politically motivated items encouraging you to VOTE this November. There will be books for sale! For bios, clear and coherent directions, and the now-complete 2005 schedule: see the website.

Fun stuff far away: special screening of The Incredibles

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I’m on the wrong coast for this event, but it sounds like an unbeatable night.

Special Screening of The Incredibles
to Benefit
The Emery Education Foundation

the_incredibles.jpg

Wednesday, October 13, 2004
6:00 PM

Hosted by
Pixar Animation Studios
1200 Park Avenue
Emeryville, CA

$150 per person

Wine Reception, Silent Auction, Tours

RSVP by October 6, 2004

For Tickets (fully tax deductible):

And the horse you rode in on

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More legal fun, thanks to on-the-ball defense attorneys: Pa. drunk driving law doesn’t apply to horsemen:

Keith Travis, 41, of Grove City, and Richard Noel, 49, of Sandy Lake, were charged with drunken driving, along with a man driving a pickup who allegedly rear-ended the horse Travis was riding away from a bar on a dark country road.

Noel, Travis and the pickup truck driver all failed field sobriety tests, police said, but a Mercer County judge threw out the charges against Noel and Travis after they argued that the word “vehicles” in the state’s drunken-driving law doesn’t apply to horses.

Although HUI (horseback-riding under the influence) is against the law in Pennsylvania, the justices felt the statute is confusing and vague, because provisions like requirements for headlamps can’t be applied to animals as they can to vehicles.

Best part of this case is the dissenting opinion, which — and I’m not making this up — a justice wrote in the style of the theme song to the TV show, “Mr. Ed”:

A horse is a horse, of course, of course,
but the Vehicle Code does not divorce
its application from, perforce,
a steed as my colleagues said.

‘It’s not vague,’ I’ll say until I’m hoarse,
and whether a car, a truck or horse
this law applies with equal force,
and I’d reverse instead.

Until we know whether Pennsylvania courts will be persuaded by the “High-Heeled Defense” in DUI cases, revelers might do better to choose a four-legged mode of transport for their drinking nights.

Among the remaining questions: What happened to the horse that was rear-ended? Is it in the shop for repairs? How do you rear-end a horse?

Defending democracy

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According to Reuters, “[t]he United States has begun flying up to 1,000 troops from the 82nd Airborne Division to Afghanistan to provide increased security for that country’s Oct. 9 presidential election.”

Which is great.

Do you think they’ll be back in time to protect “[m]illions of U.S. citizens, including a disproportionate number of black voters” from being wrongly blocked from voting in the U.S. election in November?

These boots are made for staggering

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There’s at least one lawyer in North Carolina who’s thinking outside the box:

Thomas contended it would be “fundamentally unfair” to use the results of field sobriety tests against one of his female clients because she was wearing stiletto heels at the time, making her unsteady on her feet.

One of the tests required the woman to walk a straight line for some distance and then pivot quickly. In another, she was supposed to stand on one foot for 30 seconds.

Considering that she was wearing stiletto heels, the woman did remarkably well by making it to 16 seconds, Thomas argued.

Judge Wade Barber squelched the results of the field sobriety tests and tossed out the DWI case. Besides the high heels, Barber concluded that a police officer administered the tests incorrectly.

How hard would it be to carry a pair of spiky heels in the car, even if you weren’t planning to wear them all night? Not hard at all. And to think I’ve been leaving my high heeled boots at home lo, these many Friday nights.

Number one reason I hate lists

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The Wall Street Journal and Harris Interactive have conducted a survey of corporate recruiters, asking which are the “top MBA programs.” The full results will be published later today, so we can save grousing about the criteria and the questionability of recruiters’ opinions until then. For now, let’s take a look at the top five schools.

Or rather, let’s look at the three lists of top five schools, because they couldn’t narrow things down to a single list:

The Top North American Schools

National picks:
1. University of Michigan (Ross)
2. Carnegie Mellon (Tepper)
3. Dartmouth (Tuck)
4. University of Pennsylvania (Wharton)
5. University of Chicago

Regional picks:
1. Purdue University (Krannert)
2. Vanderbilt University (Owen)
3. Ohio State University (Fisher)
4. University of Maryland (Smith)
5. Brigham Young University (Marriott)

The Top International Schools

1. IMD International
2. University of London (London Business School)
3. Escuela Superior de Administracion y Direccion de Empresas (ESADE)
4. HEC School of Management, Paris
5. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Sloan)

WSJ.com – Recruiters’ Top M.B.A. Picks

Do you notice anything odd about the lists? What makes an “international school”? Why is Wharton, which has long specialized in international business, a national school while Sloan, which is arguably better at finance, economics, and technology management, an international school?

Lists like these help smaller and lesser-known schools build awareness, which helps them compete with the brand-name schools. But they also carry so much weight that they can skew activities at the school, diverting attention from learning and research.

I found some of your life

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If you found the memory card from a digital camera and didn’t know who it belonged to, what would you do? Would you post the photos for all the world to see, and make up stories about the people in the pictures? If so, you’ve much in common with the creator of this blog: (NB: Link is broken. See update below.)

I Found Some Of Your Life

You are unknown to me.
Your camera’s memory card was in a taxi; I have it now.
I am going to post one of your pictures each day.
I will also narrate as if I were you.
Maybe you will come here and reclaim this piece of your life.

(Link via The Morning News.)

UPDATE: The blog seems no longer to exist. (Last check 9/21, 2:37p EST) There had been a reference in the final entry that the site had received a tidal wave of traffic after being mentioned on Slashdot; I don’t know whether the mention in The Morning News came before or after that, but I’d assume that Slashdot is responsible for most of the traffic.

I do know that My Brilliant Mistakes has received its own deluge of visits since I posted about the IFSOYL site. Perhaps the traffic to IFSOYL was more than Blogspot wanted to handle for free. Alternatively, it’s possible that the sudden burst of awareness caused the photos’ owner to finally discover that his pictures were being broadcast over the internet, and that legal action ensued, causing the site to be removed.

I’m mostly sorry I didn’t take the time to explore IFSOYL more — I thought there would be more time later. Another example of why we must never leave the things we care about until tomorrow.

UPDATE UPDATE: Here’s the cached copy of the Introduction page from Google. The cache also has some archived entries if you’re willing to search on the blog name and jordan” and the names of the other fake characters, but the pictures have been removed or just don’t link properly. But you can get at least a sense of what the site was like. (Enjoy while it lasts.)

Ready for my closeup, part 2

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Tomorrow, at the bright and chipper hour of 9am, I’m going to be in a TV studio smiling nervously, sweating, and shaking ever so slightly. This will be because I’ll be backstage at KDKA’s Pittsburgh TODAY Live with Jennifer Antkowiak, waiting to talk about the upcoming Book Boot Camp we’re running at Fat Plum.

I have been on live TV before, but not often enough to feel relaxed about it. Still, everyone I know who has been on Pittsburgh Today LIVE says great things about it, so I’m excited to have this chance.

There is the possibility that I’ll freeze. Like Patsy on Absolutely Fabulous, I’ll sit with legs crossed tightly and say, “Cheers.” If I can just get the web address out, I’ll be happy.

Most likely I’ll be fine, but tune in for the potential meltdown!