Illiterate Americans

According to a new study, one American adult in 20 is illiterate.

Interestingly, they all have MySpace pages.

Hesperia Star 2005 holiday card

The most important thing to notice about the 2005 Christmas card sent out by the Hesperia Star and its sister papers: Santa’s reading the Star. Oh, yeah.

Winter’s Veil

Is it wrong that I was looking forward to the Feast of Winter’s Veil more than I was looking forward to Christmas?

Dr. I. Hyman Weiland, 1921-2005

For years, I had no idea my boy Jonah had siblings. The only family member he talked about was his father. (OK, he mentioned his mother, but not in the way he did his father.) On December 8, Jonah lost his dad. His memories and tribute to his father are worth a read.

Wired picks the best Firefox hacks

Hopefully, by now, you’ve all seen the light and are using Firefox, the faster, more secure, more fully-featured, all-around better Internet browser.

And if you are (and I certainly hope that you are), you probably know that one of the great joys of Firefox is that you can, relatively painlessly, make it into the browser you want it to be, via easily added plug-ins. (For instance, mine will look up any word in the dictionary if I highlight it and right-click. Handy for maintaining the illusion that I’m a superlative spellur.)

Wired magazine has gone another step in promoting Firefox, and have compiled The Firefox Hacks You Must Have.

Definitely worth a look.

• Yet more Firefox plug-ins.