I’ve been working on a project where the issue of readability has come up more than once, especially long lines of text in paragraphs. Searching for some hard data, I came upon the Usability News site, and also the University of Wichita’s psychology department and their studies based on usability testing. I’m impressed by the breadth and depth of the results, as well as its layout online. I’m going to be linking back to this one (and doing a lot of reading) in the next few weeks.

Todd, my cube-neighbor, asked me a few weeks ago if anybody I knew would be interested in a beautiful used dining room table for sale; he and his wife were selling it to make room for their new table. After a brief consultation with Jen, and a visit to look at the table (and a very tasty frittatta which Heather claimed was burnt—it was not), I signed on the dotted line. Tonight it will appear in my dining room, which is little more than a narrow hallway between the living room and kitchen, and hopefully not dwarf the rest of the house.

Outstanding television. The West Wing, over the course of the last couple of episodes (that I’ve seen, at least) has been some of the best television I’ve watched in a long time. This evening’s episode, the season finale, was gripping, intelligent drama—and last week’s leadup was some of the most suspenseful TV I’ve seen in years. And John Frickin’ Goodman as the Speaker of the House!