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Recent Battles
Queen Victoria
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Juicing The Sheep
09 April 2009 11:11 AM | No CommentsThe Journal of Queen Victoria Thursday, October 21, 1868 “Juicing the Sheep“ At a quarter to twelve I drove off with Louise and Leopold in the waggonette up to near the “Bush” (the residence of William Brown, the farmer) to see them “juice the sheep.”...
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Queen Victoria’s Border Collies
26 January 2009 4:40 AM | 18 CommentsFor well over a century the “Collie” name has been co-opted by show breeders who have created a monster whose face looks like a door stop with beady eyes set in triangular slits. These same people have co-opted the notion that Queen Victoria was deeply...
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Show Me the Collie
22 January 2009 3:38 AM | 1 CommentHaving established that Queen Victoria’s direct influence on the proliferation of the show Collie is insubstantial at best, let’s explore what impact the Monarchy may have, in fact, had on the culture of dogs during her reign. Five. If the show Collie owes more to...
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The Queen and the Collie
20 January 2009 2:57 AM | 2 CommentsThe old wisdom on the rise of the show Collie is that Queen Victoria met them on a trip to Scotland in the 1860s, became infatuated, acquired them, sponsored them in shows, bred them, and her abundant trend-setting prowess lead to their bountiful rise to...
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The Victorian Collie Myth
19 January 2009 8:03 PM | 3 CommentsThe prevailing creation myth among show Collie enthusiasts is that Queen Victoria’s infatuation with the breed set the ball in motion, elevating the humble farm dog to aristocratic splendor. Queen Victoria saw her first Collies in the 1860′s, and she enthusiastically began to sponsor them,...
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Juicing The Sheep
stanford Archive
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In Search of the Great American Hero
Posted on February 3, 2009 | 1 CommentAfter a decade, I still find this one of my favorite pieces. It was written for my college application essays and worked for Stanford and Yale. Harvard and Princeton didn’t find it nearly as charming and put me on their wait lists. I declined. As... -
Redemption: First Thoughts
Posted on December 19, 2008 | No CommentsReprint from 12/16/2007 Update Today marks the one year anniversary of my enlightenment to the true state of the shelter system in this country, its sordid history, and the hope for a better future. What a profound impact the words and research of Nathan Winograd... -
We Feel Fine
Posted on February 15, 2008 | No CommentsI just got a click through from a rather strange looking address, www.wefeelfine.org, and I thought I’d investigate. It turns out that it’s a rather fascinating project (with a Stanford Connection) in human emotion using the Internet as a giant herd of guinea pigs. We... -
Memes about Me
Posted on February 15, 2008 | 4 CommentsI rarely participate in chain letters (and I do recall getting one or two physical letters before the internet was popular) or mass e-mails and the like (they still arrive in my in box on a daily basis), and I usually avoid the temptation to... -
How David Slew Goliath, or GO STANFORD!
Posted on October 6, 2007 | No CommentsSTANFORD! STANFORD! STANFORD! STANFORD! The pundits gave us a 0.0457 chance to beat the number one ranked USC, who hasn’t lost at home since the September 2001 (also STANFORD!!!!) and whose coach had only lost 12 total games at USC. Make that un-Lucky 13 now.... -
Barbie Collies Can Herd?
Posted on September 14, 2007 | No Comments** The original post has been re-published slightly anonymized. ** Dear Readers, The heroes of this story have been placed in the Witness Protection Program and wish to remain anonymous until such time as they feel comfortable in testifying about their experience. I feel that... -
In Search of the Great American Hero
Posted on September 2, 2007 | No CommentsAlmost a decade on, I still find this one of my favorite pieces. It was written for my college application essays and worked for Stanford and Yale. Harvard and Princeton didn’t find it nearly as charming and put me on their wait lists. I declined.... -
Photo of the Day: Stanford
Posted on August 29, 2007 | No Comments -
Techies vs. Fuzzies
Posted on August 29, 2007 | No CommentsThe techie vs. fuzzy border war is one that I learned quite a lot about in college. As far as I can tell, the terms techie and fuzzy were coined or popularized at Stanford, where a “techie” is an engineering or natural (hard) sciences major... -
Photo of the Day: Pulgas Water Temple
Posted on August 26, 2007 | No Comments
Queen Victoria's Border Collies