Read Books for Free Using Google

Read Most of O'Reilly's Hacks Books for Free Using Google :: AO

Basically, you search for key terms repeatedly and walk your way through the book.

Attibassi coffee

Uncommonly great espresso coffee from Attibassi, in Castel Maggiore Italy.


I buy the whole beans flown from Bolagna to Tutta Bella Neapolitan Pizzaria on Rainier Ave South in Seattle.

How to board a plane

It doesn't make much difference whether an airline asks people to board at random or by back-to-front seat number, according to this paper just published in Nature.

A slightly better way would be to make window passengers board first.

[via GeekPress]

Innocent English

Innocent English has a hillarious collection of mistakes found in church bulletins. Some of these are absolutely butt-gusting:

The Fasting & Prayer Conference includes meals. The sermon this morning: "Jesus Walks on the Water." The sermon tonight: "Searching for Jesus."

The peacemaking meeting scheduled for today has been canceled due to a conflict.

For those of you who have children and don't know it, we have a nursery downstairs

At the evening service tonight, the sermon topic will be "What Is Hell?" Come early and listen to our
choir practice.

via Kevin Schofield

Yahoo! Open Shortcuts

Check out Yahoo! Open Shortcuts. Turns the Yahoo Search box into a command line, letting you type things like:

!my to navigate to "http://my.yahoo.com"
!wsf to search "weather san francisco" on Yahoo!

To create a common search shortcut, use the keyword: !set with your shortcut name and the query.

!set shortcut_name query

Similar to Yubnub, which also adds a community-based feature.

Looking for people? Argali White & Yellow -

Argali White & Yellow calls itself "the most complete and reliable phone directories search on the Internet" and was featured in today's WSJ.

Supposedly it's a great way to look up addresses, phone numbers, or even emails. Unfortunately to use it you need to install an ad-driven piece of software on your PC.

La maison du chocolat

La maison du chocolat is the best chocolate on earth. Only $43 per box!

Iraqis disagree with U.S. on withdrawal

It's not on this week's ballot, but finally somebody asked the Iraqis what they think about the presence of coalition troops and whether or not the U.S. should leave immediately.

Most Americans (including me) would leave immediately if we could. But what do the Iraqis want? According to this ABC/Time poll of 1700 Iraqis, only 26% want the U.S. to leave immediately. The vast majority "oppose the presence of coalition forces", but heck, what do you think they'd say?

Also note that the vast majority (almost 3/4ths) think things are going "quite well" or "very well". Since this is completely at odds with what most of us hear about Iraq, what do they know that we don't?

Think Labyrinth: Maze Algorithms

Nathan would love this site that tells you everything you ever wanted to know about Mazes.

It points to a free Windows software download that will generate paper copies of any maze. Maybe I'll try it out one of these days after I confirm it's not laden with spyware.

Enhance Del.icio.us with Delancey

Unto.net > Delancey is a way to manage your Del.Icio.us bookmarks with an AJAX-style app.

Weather using Google Maps

Weather Underground uses Google Maps to show you the weather conditions locally, with pushpins in each location that publishes weather from your area.

Unfortunately a search on Mercer Island doesn't include the weather station at St. Monica's High School (or any other Island location).

Ultrasound and babies

Slate responds to the news that Tom Cruise bought his own ultrasound machine and explains why this can be dangerous: the energy has to go someplace and it's theoretically possible it can cause damage if you use it too much. Unlike X-rays, however, the danger is not cumulative.

Meanwhile look at the burgeoning industry of high-definition sonograms, including the Geddes Keepsake company that does "keepsake" ultrasound images of very high quality:

Cool Tool: Diaper Free Baby

Most of the world's babies are diaper-trained well before the age of 2, but American babies often stay in diapers for much longer. Why?



Diaperfreebaby.org tells you how. Basically, just learn the signs your baby gives when it needs to go.

[via Cool Tool: Diaper Free Baby]

Stanford iTunes

Cool, Stanford offers faculty lectures, interviews and more at Stanford on iTunes.