Although that sounds like John Ashcroft's wet dream, it's actually about the quiz show. Jeopardy! is dropping the rule that requires champions to retire after five wins, so that in theory, one player could play forever as long as he or she can keep winning. That probably means five-time winners won't automatically get a free car, but since Jeopardy! doubled the cash values about two years ago, a ten-day champion could walk away with anywhere from $100,000 to $500,000.

The producers also say "other surprises" are coming throughout the season. I don't know when Jeopardy! starts its 20th season (they're rerunning the Million Dollar Masters tournament now), but it might be worth some TiVo space.

Karen Reed, my high school mathematics teacher, had this book of math-themed short stories in her resource closet. It was first published in 1958 (probably way, way before Ms. Reed was born, of course), and I borrowed it and read it all and loved it. I've been trying to think of the name of it ever since, and every time I see her, I forget to ask her.

Then, last night, on some unrelated Web page, there it was! I've added it to my Amazon wish list, and if you at all enjoy math (or books like Flatland or Flatterland), you should read it too while it's still in print.

There's a sequel, too, The Mathematical Magpie, which I've never read. Here are some Amazon links to these books (I've included The Annotated Flatland, even though it's more expensive than plain Flatland, because the annotations are by the author of Flatterland, which I liked):

Fun stuff!

The Oklahoma teenager who has been facing felony charges for over a year for writing a short story about a school assault (that I recently blogged about) has been cleared. The judge dismissed the charges last week after ruling that Oklahoma's statute for "planning" an attack can only be constitutional if there was evidence of malicious intent. The prosecutor didn't like the law in the first place, so the state is not appealing.

He'll still have a record that says he was charged with a felony thanks to another ridiculous Catch-22: you can only get it cleared from your record if you're cleared within a year of the charge being filed, even if being cleared of the charges takes longer. But to everyone who saw this story far and wide, know that Brian is not going to jail. Hopefully he'll get some of his life back, too.