Long ago -- and I really can't say when or where -- I remember reading about a bank that had supposedly written the following letter to a woman (I remember it was a woman; I could easily be wrong) who had been running a large and unauthorized overdraft:

Dear Madam,

Could we please return to ou...

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Blog headlines (and posts) I wish I had written:

Participation of the poor in mainstreaming gender empowerment for civil society stakeholders to promote country ownership of good governance for community-driven sustainable development¹

Seminar bingo is, of course, nothing new; we played it...

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I am deeply grateful to Darwin College Cambridge for organising a wonderful set of Darwin Lectures in this the year of Darwin excess. I’m even more grateful that they recorded them in reasonably high quality and made them available over the intertubes. And not just available, but easily availa...

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No, this is not about Tom Lehrer’s lyrics. But a couple of nights ago a friend explained his interest in (not-so) popular music by saying “It’s my hobby”. I don't really have a hobby, at least not as I understand them, although I do have lots and lots of things, too many, that interest me. So ma...

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Because he pointed me to this video.

And now I'm being sucked into a vortex of appalling “scientific” music videos. Alas, the “making” video to accompany that wonderful effort above doesn’t give any of the details I truly want. Are those all employees of the company? How many have PhDs. Is it...

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