E.O. Wilson, an 80-year-old Harvard biologist, has just published his first novel, called "Anthill." One section of the work tells, in great detail, of the triumphs, the conflicts, and the downfalls of four separate ant colonies in Alabama. The other parts of the book are more autobiographical, and tell the story of a man who gives up a successful career in law to protect the particular plot of land where he learned, as a boy, to love nature -- the plot of land on which the four ant colonies are based.

Here's an excerpt from "Anthill," recently published in The New Yorker.

And here's the Globe and Mail review.

I'm a big believer in making your own fun. If the Daily Show has taught me anything (oh, how it has), it's that the news can play a big role in said fun-making. All you need are a few headlines. Such as: 

"Victoria dancers sparkle in the limelight"
Misread that as daylight, and you might think Stephenie Meyer attacked Victoria.

"J'ai tué ma mère fails to win César"
So not only did Xavier Dolan's film lose, it also came home to face a very disappointed parent Montreal Gazette.

Last night's The Vampire Diaries episode, "Children of the Damned," featured the show, once again, at its best: equal parts doom and gloom, romance, and madness. If the ladies were featured heavily in last week's episode, it was the boys turn to shine this time around.

Damon

Damon, as you would suspect, is thrilled to be working with Elena and Stefan toward a common goal (not unlike Veronica Mars' Logan, he's at his most honest when he's at his most sarcastic). He even gets Jenna drunk and makes the family dinner (why? Don't ask. We'll never know). He also, thanks to a series of flashbacks, figures out that Jeremy's new friend Anna is Annabel, the daughter of a vampire he knew back in his human days. He grabs Jonathan Gilbert's diary (endless, endless journalling on this show), declines her offer to work together, and heads off to dig up his dad, who took Emily's grimoire to his grave. Of course, that's where he finds Stefan and Elena, who already accomplished that task (not using vampire speed for reasons unknown) and are just about to open the grimoire (why? To check for an "if found, please return to Emily the Witch. P.S. That last part is a secret" inscription?). Damon, not doubt thankful since he didn't bring a shovel anyway but definitely feeling betrayed, (unbelievably) forced his blood down Elena's throat, so Stefan handed over the grimoire. Guess it's time to crack that puppy open!

Hot Tub Time Machine seems more premise than movie, and, though Craig Robinson, Clark Duke, Rob Corddry, and John Cusack are all awesome in their own ways, it's hard to imagine under what circumstances they would come together in a hot tub (well, not hard to imagine, per se, but hard to imagine in non-fanfic way). Still, the teaser trailer's out, and it had me laughing by the end.

[video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TyAi6JD3PCg 560x340]

As always, click on the title of the entry to open the entry and watch the video.

A model of the 20-million-year-old fossil of the flipperless seal discovered on Devon Island by Canadian Museum of Nature-based paleontologist Dr. Natalia Rybczynski has just passed through New York, and will be arriving back in Ottawa in 2010.

The fossil, originally found in 2007 but not revealed until Rybczynski and her colleagues had published their article in Nature, is a key find in the evolutionary spectrum, as it represents a crucial stage in the transition of the pinniped family (seals, sea lions and so on) from land- to sea-based animals. The animal possessed webbed feet, but did not have flippers.

The specimen is named partly after Charles Darwin, whose Origin of Species was published 150 years ago this year. (Puijila is Inuktitut for "young sea animal.")