3 - 2006 | ***Dave Does the Blog

Crafty

So Margie had a brainstorm about a venue for Katherine’s birthday party — hold it at this ceremics-painting shop we’ve seen over near the Rock Bottom restaurant by Park Meadows….

So Margie had a brainstorm about a venue for Katherine’s birthday party — hold it at this ceremics-painting shop we’ve seen over near the Rock Bottom restaurant by Park Meadows. And it turns out that Color Me Mine does indeed host parties, so, as an experiment, we headed over that way for dinner then a special “treat” for Katherine.

She took to it like a duck to water, picking out a cool kitty cat, then painting it pink, then putting large purple spots on it, then little black dots around the purple spots, then highlighting the ears and nose and eyes in red, then little black pupils, then …

She had a blast.

Many years ago, I was much into this sort of quasi-scuplture stuff as a hobby (family members are still groaning under the load of ceramic Christmas ornaments they received for a couple of years). Of course, the shop I went to started from close to step zero: you got an unfired ceramic piece that had been molded into the desired shape. You had to use tools to clean and smooth it. Then you chose and underglaze, came back next week after it had been fired, then added any further glazing. Fun stuff, but time consuming and not cheap (all materials were your own responsibility — the shop only sold the pieces, the kiln time, and table space).

CMM cuts right to the chase — you get a fired bisque piece, all cleaned. They have a rainbow of glazes/paints (the piece will get a clear overglaze on it), brushes, sponges, templates, tape, stamps, etc. All you provide is the time, creativity — and money.

Still, we had fun, and I did a goblet that will probably be hideous when done next week, but what the heck. Margie did a fish-shaped plate that will doubtless be good enough to serve on at parties.

And I think we got a good place for a birthday party.

Comments

My blogging client, ecto, is occasionally default to Comments = None mode when making posts. Thus, occasionally posts seem closed to comments. Since I think I have posted only a…

My blogging client, ecto, is occasionally default to Comments = None mode when making posts. Thus, occasionally posts seem closed to comments. Since I think I have posted only a few no-comments-allowed posts during my entire blog-lifetime, if you see one, assume it’s an accident and either drop me an e-mail or mention it in an open post.

(thanks, Fred, for noticing it)

Snacks

It’s been months since I’ve purchased or consumed any quantity of Nacho Cheese Doritos, so a couple of weeks back I was greatly amused when, after I had uncharacteristically gone…

It’s been months since I’ve purchased or consumed any quantity of Nacho Cheese Doritos, so a couple of weeks back I was greatly amused when, after I had uncharacteristically gone out and bought a bag for Doyce’s Firefly game, I found that someone else (Lee and De, I think) had done the same, resulting in my consuming my quota of Nacho Cheese Doritos for this quarter.

Which made this Dork Tower all the more amusing.

Masters of their domains

Looking for a cool new domain for your business, and want something short and pithy? You’re probably SOL because … … every one of the 676 two-byte .COM domains is…

Looking for a cool new domain for your business, and want something short and pithy? You’re probably SOL because …

… every one of the 676 two-byte .COM domains is registered (and registrars now require domains to be at least three characters long).

… every one of the 17,576 three-letter .COM domains is registered. If you throw in numbers, of the 46,656 possibilities there are only 228 open, but not available for another month (and speculators are circling like vultures).

Of the 456,976 four-letter domains, a whopping 97,786 are free, a bit over 20% of the possible combinations — if QFEV.COM is what you’re looking for. Add in numbers, and there are 1.16 million available. You, too, can make ML7G.COM a household name!

And of the five-letter domains, only about 8% are taken. Huzzah!

The average .COM domain is eleven letters long. The maximum is 63 letters — and, yes, DIDYOUKNOWTHATYOUCANONLYHAVESIXTY-THREECHARACTERSINADOMAIN-NAME.com is already taken (but for sale).

The article has many more fun stats, including how many of the most common male and female and family names are already taken (don’t hold your breath). Fun stuff.

MySpace tries to be safer

News Corp., which owns MySpace.com, has taken down some 200,000 “objectionable” profiles from its site. The objections being to “hate speech” or material that was “too risqué.” (No word on taking down sites that engage in rampant bandwidth theft, which would decimate the entire MySpace domain.)

MySpace claims to have 66 million users, and says it adds 250K new users every day. If they all possess the creativity and taste and talent and veracity of the folks whose sites I looked at this week, God help the world.

Ho-hum

That seems to be the general reaction by industry to the announcement that Microsoft Vista will be delayed (yet again) in production. Certainly it’s my reaction, since: I’d rather it…

That seems to be the general reaction by industry to the announcement that Microsoft Vista will be delayed (yet again) in production. Certainly it’s my reaction, since:

I’d rather it were stable than available.
I don’t expect we’ll be adopting it any time soon after it’s available.

Which seems to be the reasons IT groups in most companies aren’t terribly worried about the delay, either. Though it might be worrisome to Micro$oft that there are so few cries and wails and gnashing of teeth (or even some mild disappointment) over the reschedule.

Before Victoria’s Secret …

… there was Frederick’s of Hollywood. As in this 1977 catalog. (via BoingBoing)…

… there was Frederick’s of Hollywood. As in this 1977 catalog.

(via BoingBoing)

How things change

When I was younger, there was a huge perceived problem with “excessive” C-sections being performed. The concern was that they were being scheduled for the convenience of doctors, they were…

When I was younger, there was a huge perceived problem with “excessive” C-sections being performed. The concern was that they were being scheduled for the convenience of doctors, they were being pushed upon pregnant women, that the rate was far in excess of other countries, and that it was an unhealthy amount of major surgery (and was pushing up medical costs/insurance rates).

Today’s story is how elective C-sections are being increasingly being chosen by women.

Cesarean sections have jumped 50 percent over the last decade. Most of that rise can be attributed to cautious obstetricians, but Aubrey reports that 3 percent of mothers are getting C-sections by choice. Not only can a woman avoid a whole range of bowel and sexual complications, she can schedule that taxi weeks in advance.
This choice raises all sorts of uncomfortable issues. Obviously C-sections are major surgery, but some doctors say that cesarean deliveries cut the risk of fetal injury. Researchers can’t seem to agree on this one, so it’s up to you to decide.

Having witnessed a C-section, the idea that people are choosing it for its “convenience” is a bit alarming. But, then, this is a case where I’m seriously in no position — gender and age-wise — to dictate what others should do.

Spring forward

An interesting Wired article on Daylight Savings Time and the increasing number of tweaks to the system, and, in turn, their risks and impacts. Some of this was touched on…

An interesting Wired article on Daylight Savings Time and the increasing number of tweaks to the system, and, in turn, their risks and impacts. Some of this was touched on here recently.

Regarding, for example, the tweaks to Indiana’s notoriously complicated system (now being somewhat simplfied):

“This is like Y2K except this one is really happening,” said university IT spokesman Steve Tally.
Currently, most Indiana computer users set their PCs to a special “Indiana East” setting — Eastern time that doesn’t spring forward every April. Starting this April, however, they’ll change their PCs to Eastern Daylight Time. The few who observe Central time set their computers to Central, and will also make the switch. Tally predicts the changeover will create havoc with the widely used Microsoft Outlook calendar application. When the time changes, he said, appointments will still be listed according to the old Indiana East time. The calendars of Central time Outlook users, in turn, will continue to list appointments according to Central time.
With a nationwide shift in daylight-saving scheduling slated for next year, Indiana’s experience offers a preview of potential glitches in store for the rest of the country. Starting in 2007, daylight-saving time will begin on the second Sunday of March rather than the first Sunday in April, as it does today. Daylight-saving time will end the first Sunday of November, a week later than it does now.
David Prerau, author of a book on the history of daylight-saving time, said past time changes have not caused major technical glitches. However, the last major time change was in 1986. Since then, Americans have become more dependent on computerized and automated technologies.

And that’s important. Back in 1986, the assumption was that, when the time zone shifts, people would manually change their clocks, or intervene in automatic systems to change a setting. Today, people just assume that calendaring systems and computers and even clocks will be magically aware of these sorts of things and change on their own. It’s not quite to that point yet — and a lot of what those systems do today are based on rules, and that the rules are not being willy-nilly changed on an annual or semi-annual basis.

(via BoingBoing)

Duck!

A fun, if somewhat alarming, time-lapse of asteroids zipping past Earth for a couple of months in 2002. Sure, it looks more alarming than it is because of the scale…

A fun, if somewhat alarming, time-lapse of asteroids zipping past Earth for a couple of months in 2002. Sure, it looks more alarming than it is because of the scale and the flattening of the three dimensions — but, damn, multiply that for a few million years, and sooner or later …

And here we sit, lacking laser cannons, or thrusters, or even the ability to hyperspace out of the way …

(via GeekPress)

11/22 and 9/11

A summary of the current state of 9/11 conspiracy theorists, and their theories, drawing parallels to the JFK assassination (though further enabled, crack-like, by the Internet). For Tarpley and others,…

A summary of the current state of 9/11 conspiracy theorists, and their theories, drawing parallels to the JFK assassination (though further enabled, crack-like, by the Internet).

For Tarpley and others, this was a slam dunk: September 11 was a holocaust-as-ordered by the neocon cabal Project for the New American Century, which, like its Svengali, Leo Strauss, recognized the U.S. masses to be meth-addled, postliterate, post-logical lard-asses, a race of “sheeple” that would never rise to inherit the mantle of post–Cold War world-dominators without “some catastrophic and catalyzing event—like a new Pearl Harbor.” In other words, a new Pearl Harbor like the old Pearl Harbor, which Roosevelt was supposed to have known about and used as an excuse to get us into World War II.
Pearl Harbor, the Reichstag fire, take your pick. What mattered was that 3,000 human beings were dead, freeing Manchurian Candidate Bush to decree his fraudulent War on Terror, a Social Darwinian/Hobbesian/with-us-or-against-us struggle to corner the planet’s dwindling bounty—a global conflict without end in which only the strong, the white, and the Republican would survive.

Of course, there’s dissent within the “9/11 Truth” movement. Many of them don’t like talking about the Pentagon, since some theorists deny the attack there was by plane, while others, citing eye-witnesses, think such denial discredits the cause. Allowing, of course, for the possibility that the deniers are not, themselves dupes, patsies, or agents provocateurs for the conspirators themselves.

Deeper into late-night-talk-radio, Da Vinci Code territory are numerous incarnations of the New World Order MIHOP [“Made It Happen On Purpose”], defined by Nick Levis as the work of “a global ruling elite seeking greater control of the world Zeitgeist.” Ever elastic, NWO MIHOPs often date back to secret societies like the Knights Templar, founded in 1118 during the First Crusade. (Bush’s alleged slip of calling the terror war a “crusade” was a key hint to the real, if surreal, agenda.) The continuity is clear to any student of the hidden history. The Templars begat the Freemasons (look at the pyramid-meeting-the-eye on every dollar in your pocket, fool!), from whom emerged the nefarious Illuminati, and onward to current standard-bearers like Yale’s Skull and Bones society (both Bushes are Bonesmen; John Kerry, too), the Council on Foreign Relations, and the blue-helmeted armies of the United Nations.

Of course, however crazy the conspiracy theories sound, they do have one element that keeps folks, if not convinced, at least open to the suggestion

As 9/11 Truth advocates know well, the veracity they seek is unlikely to meet the ontological standards of Saint Anselm. They’ve got people on their side like the “WebFairy,” who runs a site “proving” the towers were not hit by planes but holograms, or “ghost planes.” Still, the truth movement wields one irrefutably puissant weapon in its struggle. As Nick Levis says, “Would you believe anything George W. Bush told you?”

Grups

The end of a generation gap, or Gen-Ys that just won’t grow up? Let’s start with a question. A few questions, actually: When did it become normal for your average…

The end of a generation gap, or Gen-Ys that just won’t grow up?

Let’s start with a question. A few questions, actually: When did it become normal for your average 35-year-old New Yorker to (a) walk around with an iPod plugged into his ears at all times, listening to the latest from Bloc Party; (b) regularly buy his clothes at Urban Outfitters; (c) take her toddler to a Mommy’s Happy Hour at a Brooklyn bar; (d) stay out till 4 A.M. because he just can’t miss the latest New Pornographers show, because who knows when Neko Case will decide to stop touring with them, and everyone knows she’s the heart of the band; (e) spend $250 on a pair of jeans that are artfully shredded to look like they just fell through a wheat thresher and are designed, eventually, to artfully fall totally apart; (f) decide that Sufjan Stevens is the perfect music to play for her 2-year-old, because, let’s face it, 2-year-olds have lousy taste in music, and we will not listen to the Wiggles in this house; (g) wear sneakers as a fashion statement; (h) wear the same vintage New Balance sneakers that he wore on his first day of school in the seventh grade as a fashion statement; (i) wear said sneakers to the office; (j) quit the office job because—you know what?—screw the office and screw jockeying for that promotion to VP, because isn’t promotion just another word for “slavery”?; (k) and besides, now that she’s a freelancer, working on her own projects, on her own terms, it’s that much easier to kick off in the middle of the week for a quick snowboarding trip to Sugarbush, because she’s got to have some balance, right? And she can write it off, too, because who knows? She might bump into Spike Jonze on the slopes; (l) wear a Misfits T-shirt; (m) make his 2-year-old wear a Misfits T-shirt; (n) never shave; (o) take pride in never shaving; (p) take pride in never shaving while spending $200 on a bedhead haircut and $600 on a messenger bag, because, seriously, only his grandfather or some frat-boy Wall Street flunky still carries a briefcase; or (q) all of the above?

Hmmmm. Do I know anyone like that?

Actually, while I know some folks who do, sorta-kinda-vaguely, I have to question the author’s assertion that it’s “not about a fad but about a phenomenon that looks to be permanent.” Maybe — just maybe — in New York or similar hip-trendy places (Kate? Comment?) — and maybe amongst certain demographic cohorts (reading the above, there sure seems to be a lot of emphasis on, well, availability to chunks of money), but while the Younger Generation I know here in Denver bears some relationship to the above (Doyce’s picture with Kaylee would fit right into the article’s photomontage), I think the point is way overblown and — well — at least somewhat a fad.

We won’t be going back to the Man in the Gray Flannel Suit any time soon — and thank goodness — but is it that profound of a cultural shift, of the sort described below?

It’s more interesting as evidence of the slow erosion of the long-held idea that in some fundamental way, you cross through a portal when you become an adult, a portal inscribed with the biblical imperative “When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: But when I became a man, I put away childish things.” This cohort is not interested in putting away childish things. They are a generation or two of affluent, urban adults who are now happily sailing through their thirties and forties, and even fifties, clad in beat-up sneakers and cashmere hoodies, content that they can enjoy all the good parts of being a grown-up (a real paycheck, a family, the warm touch of cashmere) with none of the bad parts (Dockers, management seminars, indentured servitude at the local Gymboree). It’s about a brave new world whose citizens are radically rethinking what it means to be a grown-up and whether being a grown-up still requires, you know, actually growing up.

Kids these days …

BIFF! KLONK! KAPOW!

A collection of (visual) sound effects from the old Batman TV show. Fun. And some great avatar fodder. (via kottke)…

A collection of (visual) sound effects from the old Batman TV show. Fun. And some great avatar fodder.

(via kottke)

“And absolutely, positively, no brown M&Ms!”

While rock stars and media celebrities are ofttimes poked fun at for their demands on hotels and green rooms and the like, analogous requests and conditions are made for prominent…

While rock stars and media celebrities are ofttimes poked fun at for their demands on hotels and green rooms and the like, analogous requests and conditions are made for prominent politicians: to wit, examples of handler documents for Dick Cheney …

Cheney does like his suite at a comfy 68 degrees. And, of course, all the televisions need to be preset to the Fox News Channel (what, you thought he was a Lifetime devotee?). Decaf coffee should be ready upon his arrival along with four cans of caffeine-free Diet Sprite. And when Cheney is traveling with his wife Lynne, the second family’s suite needs an additional two bottles of sparkling water. Mrs. Cheney’s H2O should be either Calistoga or, curiously, Perrier, a favored beverage of French terrorism appeasers.

… and John Kerry.

The documents (one is actually labeled “Confidential”) detail Kerry’s food favorites and drop the bombshell that the Massachusetts senator “hates celery.” Oddly, Kerry avoids all things tomato, the fruit behind his wife’s nine-figure ketchup fortune. His hotel rider notes that the “phone and the ability to order movies in suite should always be turned on and ready to go for JK’s arrival,” things that make him “very happy.” The more detailed rider, of course, belongs to the politician’s spouse, who likes celery and snoozing on a “Heavenly Bed” in a Starwood hotel that has “good air circulation.”

In all fairness, some of this may also be handlers/aides trying to anticipate needs, not the Antoinette commands of the pols themselves (“And none of that Nutrasweet crap, or I’ll disappear you to Gitmo!”). And, also to be fair, if I were on the road as much as these guys (especially during a presidential campaign), I might pull a few strings to have some standard, predictable creature comforts available, too.

Titan up

A few weeks back at Space Night at Katherine’s school, we saw a planetarium presentation that included a retelling of the story of Perseus, Pegasus, et al. Katherine followed the…

A few weeks back at Space Night at Katherine’s school, we saw a planetarium presentation that included a retelling of the story of Perseus, Pegasus, et al. Katherine followed the story raptly, so I immediately went out and ordered a copy of the classic flick, Clash of the Titans.

Came a few days back, and this morning, Margie and I IMed …

Margie: kittn woke up at 6A this morning
Dave: 🙁
She seemed restless when I went in to close her door.
Margie: wanted to sleep with me – that lasted 10 min
eventually she went down to watch a dvd – Clash of the Titans
Dave: ??!! Cool? And … disappointed i couldn’t watch it with her.
Margie: I’m sure that she will want to watch it again with you 🙂
Dave: Coolness.
Margie: She is enjoying it very much
Dave: Oh, excellent.
My Plan to Make Her One Big Geek progresses well …
Margie: I asked her what she was watching and she called it Andromeda
Dave: 🙂

Groovy.

Equal time

I have an internal client who’s a real pain in the ass. She (to randomly choose a gender) is pushy, and demanding. She raises the red flag about problems, escalates…

I have an internal client who’s a real pain in the ass. She (to randomly choose a gender) is pushy, and demanding. She raises the red flag about problems, escalates things way too quickly to upper management, finds fault in any number of things, and writes e-mails full of CAPITAL LETTERS and EXCLAMATION POINTS!!! Just when you think all is settled and going smoothly, she’ll come right out and say on a conference call that she feels things are going terribly, that she has no confidence in our ability to hit a deadline, and that she thinks the project is spiraling down the toilet. She’ll also make it bluntly and utterly clear when she has no confidence in someone.

But, by the same token, when things go well, she is the very first to say so, to spontaneously and wholeheartedly laud people far and wide (with CAPITAL LETTERS and EXCALAMATION POINTS!!!), and make sure that folks know their hard efforts have been deeply appreciated. And when asked to provide feedback on people, she’ll be honest but also quite complementary where complements are due.

She’s a real pain in the ass — but I respect that she’s willing to give equal time (and equally heart-felt time) for praise as well as condemnation, and that she’s sincere (if unrestrained) in both. I’d rather have that level of honesty and flexibility than not, even if sometimes I feel like taking my phone and throwing it into the wall in frustration.

Because that’s what we’re … um … paying you for?

We’re working with some consulting firms to bring on some people to support a Big Project we’re kicking off. One firm sent us a note describing their costs, terms and…

We’re working with some consulting firms to bring on some people to support a Big Project we’re kicking off. One firm sent us a note describing their costs, terms and conditions, which seemed high.

But, more importantly, the sales guy had an animated sig block.

I’m not talking about an animated GIF, which would have been goofy. This was some sort of crazy-ass Java or CSS or something animated sig block, where stuff dropped from the top and slid in from the sides to make an elegant signature area.

And my very first thought was … jeez, how many programmer hours did you burn to do that, and why, and how many of them did you bill to a client?

I make fun of my company for even the CEO traveling coach and renting mid-sized cars. But we do it because the philosophy of the company is show the client we’re not marking up their contracts in order to spend their money on frills.

The animated sig block is very clever, but not only is it distracting, it’s style over substance. It indicates that either they had people with time on their hands that could be wasted like that, or else they billed a client for their time to do it.

Neither of which makes me want to hire their people.

Paging Dr. McCoy …

A lot of recent and ongoing developments in finding ways other than needles to administer medicine. In January, drug giant Pfizer won approval to market inhalable insulin, a product that…

A lot of recent and ongoing developments in finding ways other than needles to administer medicine.

In January, drug giant Pfizer won approval to market inhalable insulin, a product that in three years is expected to produce $1 billion annually as diabetics abandon injections.
The breakthrough is one of the most high-profile advances yet among a small cadre of physicians committed to eliminating — or at least dramatically reducing — needle use in medical treatments. Despite entrenched needle use among doctors, researchers are moving ahead with a number of injection alternatives, from micro-needles too tiny to inflict pain, to new forms of pills capable of delivering drug payloads orally.
“This is a big bone of contention with me,” said John Patton, chief scientific officer of Nektar Therapeutics and co-inventor of the first FDA-approved inhalable insulin. “The medical profession does not think needles are a problem for people after they get used to them, and that it’s just something that they can deal with. They just don’t realize that people don’t like needles at all.”

I suppose it’s a lot easier when you’re on the administering end than on the receiving end.

The advantage of needles, of course, is direct delivery to the bloodstream. But not only are needles dangerous (385,000 needle-stick injuries to health-care workers in hospitals a year), but they may actually inhibit people seeking out treatment.

All of us instinctively shrink from needles, although most can overcome the flight reflex in order to undergo necessary medical treatments. But a surprisingly large minority of people suffer a form of needle phobia so extreme that they would rather let severe injuries and illnesses go untreated than get stuck with a pointy piece of metal.
Family physician Dr. James Hamilton is the author of the only large, peer-reviewed study on the phenomenon, “Needle Phobia: A Neglected Diagnosis,” published in the August 1995 issue of The Journal of Family Practice. Hamilton, who himself suffers from needle phobia, found that the malady is often overlooked or not taken seriously by doctors, although it may affect up to 10 percent of the population.
Keith Lamb, another needle-phobia sufferer who is co-writing a book on the condition with Hamilton, said he’s interviewed 1,500 people with severe needle phobias, and almost all of them have encountered doctors who don’t take their issues with needles seriously.

I hate needles with a passion such that I can’t watch even a simulated injection on TV or in a movie. It doesn’t stop me from getting needed injections (or giving blood, for that matter), but I can understand how it might for some people.

Anything that can make medication application safer, less painful, and less stressful, sounds like a fine idea to me, whether doctors think it’s “necessary” or not.

(via GeekPress)

Sinister

A summary of current science on handedness. Not much new info here for someone who’s read up on the subject, but still interesting. Whatever evolutionary jog made humans left-brain dominant…

A summary of current science on handedness. Not much new info here for someone who’s read up on the subject, but still interesting.

Whatever evolutionary jog made humans left-brain dominant for speech also made us right-side dominant, Annett argues. Since our closest relatives—chimpanzees—can’t talk, the gene must have arisen in recent evolutionary history. One study found most chimps prefer to fish for termites with their left hand. But other recent research shows most chimpanzees favor their right hand when throwing overhand.
“The prevailing genetic model seems to be pretty strong. There are only a few weak points that are yet to be addressed. Not only can they not pinpoint a gene, there’s conflicting data out there too,” said David Wolman, author of “A Left Hand Turn Around the World” (Da Capo Press, 2005).
In a twist on the genetic model, the gene for hand preference might also be the gene for hair whorl direction, the way a person’s hair turns on the top of their head. Half of people with counterclockwise whorls prefer their left hand, according to research by Amar Klar at the National Cancer Institute.
The same system that patterns hair and handedness could also play a role in the asymmetrical organization of the brain. “It is clear that the same genetics control both traits, along with the side of the brain where language is processed,” said Klar.

Okay, now I have to have Margie look at the (scanty) whorl on my head.

(via GeekPress)

You get what you test for

And if what you test for is just reading and math — at the risk of losing Federal money via “No Child Left Behind” — than what you get is…

And if what you test for is just reading and math — at the risk of losing Federal money via “No Child Left Behind” — than what you get is schools that drop everything and focus just on those subjects — at the expense of science, art, music, social studies, writing, foreign language, music, physical education, or anything else that gets in the way.

Schools from Vermont to California are increasing — in some cases tripling — the class time that low-proficiency students spend on reading and math, mainly because the federal law, signed in 2002, requires annual exams only in those subjects and punishes schools that fall short of rising benchmarks.
The changes appear to principally affect schools and students who test below grade level.
The intense focus on the two basic skills is a sea change in American instructional practice, with many schools that once offered rich curriculums now systematically trimming courses like social studies, science and art. A nationwide survey by a nonpartisan group that is to be made public on March 28 indicates that the practice, known as narrowing the curriculum, has become standard procedure in many communities.
The survey, by the Center on Education Policy, found that since the passage of the federal law, 71 percent of the nation’s 15,000 school districts had reduced the hours of instructional time spent on history, music and other subjects to open up more time for reading and math. The center is an independent group that has made a thorough study of the new act and has published a detailed yearly report on the implementation of the law in dozens of districts.

Is that a bad thing? Well, math and reading are fundamental — and if kids can’t read, they can’t pursue other academics, and if they can’t compute, that limits what they can do, too. But drilling on those subjects has its own problems.

The increasing focus on two basic subjects has divided the nation’s educational establishment. Some authorities, including Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings, say the federal law’s focus on basic skills is raising achievement in thousands of low-performing schools. Other experts warn that by reducing the academic menu to steak and potatoes, schools risk giving bored teenagers the message that school means repetition and drilling.
“Only two subjects? What a sadness,” said Thomas Sobol, an education professor at Columbia Teachers College and a former New York State education commissioner. “That’s like a violin student who’s only permitted to play scales, nothing else, day after day, scales, scales, scales. They’d lose their zest for music.”
But officials in Cuero, Tex., have adopted an intensive approach and said it was helping them meet the federal requirements. They have doubled the time that all sixth graders and some seventh and eighth graders devote to reading and math, and have reduced it for other subjects.
“When you only have so many hours per day and you’re behind in some area that’s being hammered on, you have to work on that,” said Henry Lind, the schools superintendent. “It’s like basketball. If you can’t make layups, then you’ve got to work on layups.”

If you have kids that only learn math and reading, are you going to have well-rounded students (or citizens)? On the other hand, if they don’t know either, the end product isn’t particularly swell, either.