Because that’s how I roll.

I can’t believe I’ve never posted this, it’s one of the funniest things I’ve seen in a long time: Get your mind out of the gutter. The only word being bleeped is “count.”

We saw the new Die Hard movie last Friday, “A Good Day to Die Hard.” It wasn’t terrible—the action sequences were good and the concept was there—but compared to the last movie it was disappointing, largely because (for me) the dialogue was very stilted and cliché, focusing more on the one-line

At some point back I’d picked up an older hardcover copy of The Complete Sherlock Holmes, and since I’ve found myself watching (and enjoying) the series “Elementary” on TV (no, I’ve missed BBC’s “Sherlock” thus far but I’m quite sure I would love it)—as well as tho

I hope everyone has had a good year; for my part I think 2012 was pretty darn good overall. Obviously if you’ve been following this particular blog for the past year (or more) then you’ll note that I haven’t posted much (once a month, on average); a big part of the reason for that is [...]

So today—which as I write this, is nearly over—is my birthday, and most people know it was a momentous one: 40. That’s right, one of the Big Ones. (From 30 onward they all get counted in tens, of course.) What’s funny is I’ve been mentally rounding my age up the past few months anyway, so [...]

Obviously it’s not news anymore that Disney bought the Star Wars franchise—or more specifically, Lucasfilm—but all the speculation about the announced new Star Wars movies (starting in 2015) is interesting, if amusing. I’m not particularly worried either way about this new trilogy of Episodes VII, VI

Hope it’s a good one!

I recently read the novel Robopocalypse, a science fiction-y thriller about the, er, robot apocalypse—the uprising of robots and technology and the attempt to wipe out humanity, and overall I quite enjoyed it: a good “popcorn” book that entertaining and …

So I got this spam a little while back, and I couldn’t resist sharing. Here, in its entirety: December 21, 2012: Mayan Galactic Alignment Once in 26,000 years Celebrate the end of the Mayan Calendar, the Sun aligning with the … Conti

No I’m not entirely sure how those two things go together: one is the latest novel from Neal Stephenson which had me riveted all the way through the 1000-odd pages, the other is the comedian best known for his influential … Continue reading

Saw this article on Discover.com earlier this month and thought it was really interesting: The Solar System’s Lost Planet. Nesvorny, who runs computer simulations to study how the solar system evolved over time, kept encountering the same problem: The four giant …

Actually this might be the only chicken article I’ve read now that I think about it. It’s long but really good. Did you know the Egyptians “mastered the technique of artificial incubation”? I did not. Oh, and don’t forget, chickens …

Zoom in on the Google Map of Corvallis, Oregon, near downtown and this is what you’ll see: Er, what? How on earth did “Illinois” and “Nebraska” get in there?

On a similar topic to my previous post about the scale of the universe, I’ve been enjoying Wikipedia’s Timeline of the far future for equal amounts of mind-boggling scale. Really, once you hit 1020 years from now the numbers are …

I realized I missed posting in April entirely(!), and I don’t like the look of the gap in the archive calendar, so I’m back-dating this entry. And you need to check this out, a Flash-animated Scale of the Universe that … Continue r

Does anyone remember the music in the ’80s Transformers and GI Joe cartoons that I can only best describe at “battle music”? It was only really played when the good guys were staging some sort of comeback, and the best … Continue r

This is only the third Leap Day we’ve had since I’ve started this blog, and this is the first time I’ve made a point of noting it. Aside from being the one extra day every four years (and, technically, only … Continue reading →

So, last weekend I found out that my blogs had been hacked. Actually, it wasn’t just my blogs, nothing personal involved or anything like that: the shared server space my sites were hosted on was compromised, and a good number … Continue re

I hope everyone’s having a great Christmas this year! I know I am so far, and since it was just my birthday two days ago as well, I’ll soon write up the usual post of my haul. And we saw … Continue reading →

Much of November was uneventful—it mostly consisted of the usual routine for the first few weeks minus a kid’s birthday—but for the week of Thanksgiving we visited Burbank to spend the holiday with my brother and his family. That trip …

Just in time for Halloween!

Just ran across this Smithsonian.com article: The Top 10 Books Lost to Time. Neat read, rife with possibilities; every link I’ve seen pulls a quote from the #4 selection, Inventio Fortunata, which does have a bit of a Piri Reis-sounding …

We attended Ignite Bend 7 the other night (merely watching this time, rather than as a presenter) and it continues to amaze me how good and fun an event this is; I’d venture to say this was the best one … Continue reading →

Being in Portland several times over the past several weeks for beer happenings got me thinking about the (mostly inconsequential) debate about “Cascadian Dark Ales” (versus the other names of “Black IPA”, “American Black Ale” and so on) and about …

This year, for the first time since 2007, I was able to make it up to Portland for the Oregon Brewers Festival—the biggest beer festival in Oregon, if not the Pacific Northwest. (They bill it at “North America’s largest gathering …

My wife and I just spent an anniversary weekend over on the Oregon Coast, in the southern town of Bandon. I think I’ve written before about how I really like this town; we’ve been three times previous but the last … Continue reading →

Some of these links aren’t as shiny-new as they were when I started this post, but even so: The CDC’s zombie apocalypse preparedness plan: Yes, the CDC is all over the possibility of a zombie apocalypse. For real. If zombies … Co

A few weeks ago I checked out Superman from the library (the first Christopher Reeve movie) so I could watch it with the kids; it had been far too long since I last saw it, and the kids (naturally) needed … Continue reading →

Tomorrow, April 12th, is a pretty momentous date: it is the 50th anniversary of the first human being to launch into space (which took place on April 12, 1961) by Russian Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin. Appropriately enough, the 12th is also … Continue reading