Closed!

The Cleveland Museum of Art, which is one of my favorite places on earth, has suddenly closed. At first, I was like, okay... some rennovations, some partial closure? NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It gets worse. Much worse.

The main galleries have been closed and will be reopened over time. Starting in 2007. Everything will be complete, and completely reopened, in 2010.

This is, for me, my first and dearest art museum. It's where I visited as a kid, and where I asked my wife to marry me. And its closure makes Cleveland suddenly a whole lot duller. :(

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Finally!Michael Marmura's edition and translation of the Metaphysics side of Avicenna's Healing came in the mail today. After being delayed for about a year. This is quite possibly the single most important publishing event in the field of medieval philosophy in the last ten years. And it's the first time that more than snippets of the work have been available in English. (Of course, you always could read the whole thing in Arabic or in a medieval Latin translation :) .)

Enceladus' Wrinkles

Here's a close wide-area shot of some of the more intriguing terrain on the little moon:

Finished!

I finished HP 6 just a few moments ago. It is, well, good but not as gripping as 2 or as epic as 5. It does have a plethora of memorable lines--although perhaps I only feel that way because I'm in the "cult."


Spoilers?
















At the risk of tipping the plot to those of you who haven't started or finished yet, I have to say that I am inclined to view this year's Dark Arts teacher as a tragic figure, rather than an outright villain.

I thought that JKR handled the teen romance muddles pretty well, although I couldn't help but see a bit of projection of the author herself in Harry's putative girlfriend.

The scene where Dumbledore confronts Malfoy was surprisingly effective, although I couldn't help thinking of the cemetary scene from the Sound of Music crossed with a dash of Jedi.

Enceladus: Closer

Cassini brushed within about a hundred miles of Enceladus' surface on July 14th. Here is a distant view of Enceladus against the rings:



Here is a global view of the south polar region through the mid-latitudes:



And here's the view from a hundred miles above the surface, boulders and all!

The Planetary Society website has posted a fine photoessay with some of the moon n ring photos from Cassini that you first saw on this blog!