My nine-year-old daughter has had some interest in coding for the last couple of years. Now bear in mind, at that age, “coding” is pretty much using a program that lets the user drag and drop pre-set commands into a stacked order for, say, a basic (real or virtual) robot to execute:Forward 1 spaceForward 1…
(I am learning Danish.) In the spirit of striving to do more productive things with my time, I’ve decided it’s long overdue that I try to start learning Danish. I’m using the Duolingo system, in part because it was the system recommended to me by my daughter’s past French immersion teacher to brush up on…
I’ve just realized how much I enjoy finding art in unexpected places. I knew decades ago that I liked seeing artwork done with spray paint on buildings that you may pass by on a walk somewhere or when the subway zips past the walls of businesses that some daring artist sees as a canvas–I’m reminded…
Open Borders is a bold case for opening all borders to immigration, told in a graphic novel-style format. Written by economist Bryan Caplan, it builds upon fact after fact to promote the benefits of, and counters all common arguments against, letting more people from more countries live and work wherever they want to. Everything from…
My daughter has been expressing interest in playing the Pokémon TCG (Trading Card Game) off and on for years. Mostly on when I can’t play and mostly off when I’m ready to try it out, or when we’ve brought it with us on a road trip to stay somewhere, or have watched videos on how…
It was an unexpectedly bountiful month for reading. Here’s how it broke down: Read:The Trials of Apollo: The Dark Prophecy – Rick RiordanHoot – Carl HiaasenThe Trials of Apollo: The Burning Maze – Rick RiordanSandman Slim – Richard KadreyMucho Mojo – Joe R. Lansdale Started and stopped:Akata Witch – Nnedi OkoraforNoir – Christopher MooreFatemarked –…
This morning I read with some happiness that various film publications are refusing to review Disney’s ‘New Mutants’ until they can do so safely. It seems that Disney hasn’t sent out the common “screener” links for critics to watch the movie at home (a tactic sometimes used when production companies don’t anticipate great reviews), which…
I’ve been keeping you posted on the progress of entries for the NYC Midnight Microfiction contest, and the results for the final round came in today. Of the top 10 finalists and the top 10 honorable mentions, I… wasn’t listed. It wasn’t a particularly surprising outcome, given that my last entry felt like the weakest…
Hmm? What’s that you say?“Congratulations”? Oh… oh, I see… thanks, but no, this isn’t a good thing. I haven’t won the lottery, or any such happy event. No, I’ve breached (whale terminology not accidental) the limit I set for myself for weight gain. Like many of us in these Covid times, I’ve put on some…
Like everyone else, my family has been in isolation mode for (he cites off the top of his head because he just happens to be keeping track of it and just happened to see what today’s number was) 161 days. That’s a lot of time to be jammed right close together for anyone. To those…