The Mongrel Dogs Who Teach

Month: August 2008

  • McCain’s VP

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    So, Senator John McCain has chosen Sarah Palin, governor of Alaska, as his running mate. Wow. It’s taken me a while to get my head around this. Sarah Palin is a political neophyte — if your main charge is that Barack Obama is inexperienced, then you have to see Sarah Palin as INEXPERIENCED. All of…

  • Senator Clinton’s Speech

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    mongreldogs
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    Senator Hilary Clinton has finished her address to the Democratic National Convention. My personal response: She didn’t hit it out of the park but she definitely got some extra bases and maybe batted some runs in. I think she delivered a full-throated, crystal clear indictment of the past eight years and of John McCain’s alignment…

  • Review: Marc Cohn at the Westhampton Beach Peforming Arts Center

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    Marc Cohn & band Westhampton Beach Performing Arts Center Sunday 2008 August 24 8:30 PM It’s my habit to see Marc Cohn every chance I get during the New York leg of his tours. This explains why, three days after my last Cohn concert, I schlepped all the way out along Long Island’s southern shore…

  • Review: Marc Cohn at the St. George Theater

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    Marc Cohn with Toby Lightman St. George Theater, Staten Island, NY Thursday 2008 August 21 This is another in my ongoing series of reviews of Marc Cohn shows. See this earlier one and this one as well for comparison. The St. George is a beautiful venue, an old vaudeville theater (I assume) which has been…

  • Throwing Out the Textbook (Part II)

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    (Part I gives the background.) Since the date to order a textbook has long since passed, I’m pretty committed to not going with one for “Space Science & Astrophysics”. I’ve taken the plunge. The problem is, I don’t know exactly what the course should look like now. Most especially, I don’t know of a good…

  • Throwing out the Textbook (Part I)

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    (You can skip to Part II.) Some of you might remember that this is nominally a blog about education. It’s time again to shunt aside all the personal and political things I like to blog about, and to instead post about my classes. I do this in part because school starts soon and I am…

  • Review: Counting Crows with Maroon 5

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    Counting Crows with Maroon 5 Also with Sara Bareilles Thursday 2008 Aug 7 PNC Bank Arts Center Holmdel, NJ My usual way to review a show would be to give the playlist and say what I did or didn’t like about each. That’s not going to work this time for a host of reasons. First…