McDonald's Hamburger University is more discerning than Oxford, Cambridge, or Harvard.

This sort of story comes out every few years, and it's popped up again.

Nearly five years ago, news came out that Harvard University, with its 5.9% acceptance rate, was easier to get admitted into than McDonald's Hamburger University campus in Shanghai, which accepts fewer than 1% of applicants.

Now, news from London's The Mirror newspaper shares the same 'duh' moment shocking revelation that Hamburger University is also more discerning than Oxford University (18% acceptance rate) and the University of Cambridge (20.8%).

I think we all know the truth that students at Oxford and Cambridge are really just future Burger King employees anyway.




When are we going to come together as a human race and collectively admit that Ronald McDonald is freaky as hell? I don't want him smiling at me. The only people that smile like that want to invite you down to their basement--and my wealth of knowledge of bad Hollywood movies proves that you never come up from the basement once you go down.

'Lord of the Rings' map annotated by Tolkien found in rare book shop.

Acclaimed illustrator Pauline Baynes was working on a detailed map corresponding with a new edition of The Lord of the Rings in 1960. During her time crafting the finer points of places Hobbits like to hang out, she worked with J.R.R. Tolkien closely--and the author was a stickler for minutia.

According to The Guardian, Tolkien annotated an older version of a map included with earlier editions of his book, which included notes on where trees might exist, and telling Baynes that Hobbiton "is assumed to be approx at latitude of Oxford," where he was teaching.

Baynes folded the map up and placed it inside her copy of the book--which, over the decades since, largely remained forgotten until it ended up in a rare book store.

Now up for sale for £60,000, the map is on display at the University of Oxford until a map fiend or Lord of the Rings addict gets a second mortgage on their house and purchases it.



photo: Blackwells, via The Guardian

Two fragments of previously unknown Sappho poems discovered.

An anonymous private collector had the then-unknown historic poems in his collection, believed to be the ancient poetess Sappho's work, written on an ancient papyrus as a copy in the 3rd century AD. The collector showed the poems to Dr. Dirk Obbink, a classicist at Oxford University, who immediately noted the fragments' importance and asked to publish their text in a paper.

While Sappho was hugely popular and well known in her time, the vast majority of her work has been lost over the centuries, increasing the importance of this find.

The poems can be found via The Guardian and Slate, with differing translations.

The Guardian's translation of the larger poem fragment is offered below:


Poem 1:

[ … ]

But you always chatter that Charaxus is coming,
His ship laden with cargo. That much, I reckon, only Zeus
Knows, and all the gods; but you, you should not
Think these thoughts,

Just send me along, and command me
To offer many prayers to Queen Hera
That Charaxus should arrive here, with
His ship intact,

And find us safe. For the rest,
Let us turn it all over to higher powers;
For periods of calm quickly follow after
Great squalls.

They whose fortune the king of Olympus wishes
Now to turn from trouble
to [ … ] are blessed
and lucky beyond compare.

As for us, if Larichus should [ … ] his head
And at some point become a man,
Then from full many a despair 
Would we be swiftly freed.

Jane Austen could never have worked on Wheel of Fortune.

People mock Vanna White as just television window dressing. But Vanna White doesn't flub spelling out words, now does she? Sure, the letters light up for her--but has she ever failed to touch those letters correctly and give us a properly spelled word? No. That means tens of bajillion of words (rough estimate) have single-handedly been spelled flawlessly at the hands of Vanna White.

Is she the world's greatest speller? I don't know, but it's possible she's a super computer from which all spellchecks evolve.

The same can't be said for Jane Austen.

Oxford University professor Kathryn Sutherland researched 1,100 pages of hand-written letters by Austen and found that...ehhh...spelling is overrated when you're writing about Mr. Darcy. And don't ask Austen about semi-colons. Her grammar skills were apparently pretty bad, too.

There are various explanations. It was a different era. Rules were different. Maybe she was being casual in her letters. Or, you know, spelling and apostrophes just weren't her thing.

This just reinforces the argument that college students should be allowed to misspell and have pathetic grammar skills. First Shakespeare can't make up his mind on how to spell his own name. Now, Jane Austen doesn't know how to use a comma.

Cormac McCarthy needs to step it up. Just saying.