One of the things I missed most when moving from Chicago was access to The Chicago Reader, a free weekly alternative newspaper which featured in every issue an information column, The Straight Dope, written by the possibly fictitious but always amusing and informative Cecil Adams. This column covered EVERYTHING -- in the past, he's answered such questions as "Why are manhole covers round?", "Who are the Illuminati?", "How can you hypnotize a chicken?", "Does subliminal advertising work?" and "Where does belly button lint come from?"
Well, Unca Cecil has stopped solving cosmic mysteries long enough to make his column accessible on the World Wide Web. Now you, too, can find out why skydivers yell "Geronimo!" when they jump out of planes, and how to get yourself excommunicated from the Roman Catholic Church (the topics of two recent columns). Sure beats driving to Chicago from Michigan on a weekly basis.
Click here to get The Straight Dope