Recently updated blogs

“It’s exciting, feeling you’re on the ground level of something that is new… To me, it suggests so many different possibilities.” Mark Hamill, Behind The Scenes of Wing Commander III Orchestral music swells as we are presented with the game’s title (accompanied by a tiger’s roar) and… actor credits!? Big names too, including Tom Wilson, Malcolm McDowell, and none other than Star Wars’s Mark Hamill as the star. Before long, …

In 2019, the website Thrillist declared the Summer of the Sandwich, with articles celebrating the sandwich in its many forms, anchored by a massive piece called Around The World In 80 Sandwiches. If this opening sounds familiar, it’s because I’ve brought it up before–the piece refers to me as an “enterprising investigative sandwich blogger,” a title that I’m still crowing about 5 years later. But I also bring it up …

Thinking needs space. Without this space, we cannot think. At least not with the depth and care required to achieve good results within a reasonable time frame. We create this space through thinking environments. One of these thinking spaces is the simple walk. A special aesthetic of erudition emanates from this form of walk. I would be surprised, for example, if someone imagined this walk in the industrial facilities of …

What makes an icon an icon? It’s a word that gives many the shivers, feeling it’s thrown around too easily, yet it exists for good reason. A movie star ascends to iconic status when they capture the essence of an era while staying relevant across generations. Think of Marilyn Monroe, Marlon Brando, Audrey Hepburn, or Meryl Streep—their charisma, influence, and body of work have left an indelible mark on popular …

We move through the world as surfaces shimmering with the visibilia of our accomplishments, the undertow of our suffering invisible to passers-by. The selective collective memory we call history contributes to this willful blindness, obscuring the tremendous personal cost behind some of humanity’s most triumphant achievements — the great discoveries, the great symphonies, the great paradigm shifts. This is not to say that suffering is a prerequisite for greatness — …

Madison Avenue between 27th and 34th Street in Manhattan, just north of Madison Square Park, is a high end furniture district, with the ground floors of most large buildings hosting the showrooms of (mostly) European furniture designers and manufacturers. Interior decorators come here to buy furniture of the latest style for their well healed clients. If you appreciate traditional furniture and traditional craft, you'll probably be struck how similar most …

It’s been a decade now that I’ve been leading the Houston Foresight Program. We’re preparing the next generation of the program’s leadership. This provides a great opportunity to reflect and really focus in on what to carry forward as we consider improving, updating, upgrading, and redesigning. There are many things about Houston Foresight that “we […] The post Mastery as a Guiding Philosophy first appeared on Hinesight....for Foresight.

When this blog was in its prime it was a reasonably common occurrence to feature artists that had yet to release any ‘official’ recorded music, instead relying on shaky live You Tube clips or dodgy Soundcloud demos. The last band that featured here in that way was The Dinner Party, who a few months on had changed their name (for the better) to The Last Dinner Party and became a …

York CAMRA were holding their 50th Anniversary Beer Festival last week, so I decided to head over to the city and check it out. Here's my reflections on what was a splendid afternoon there in a rather historic setting....The first York Beer Festival took place at the De Grey Rooms in the city centre way back in March 1974. Times were very different back then; it was was the year …

I know complaining about Siri is getting old but sometimes I’m just wondering how this is even possible. This doesn’t look like “I didn’t understand” behavior but rather “I checked the permission boolean and decided to ignore what I saw” behavior. Asking it again—of course—works perfectly fine. I’m sure AI will fix that…if we’ll ever be able to test it in the EU.

The bodies meant to protect us from floods are unaccountable, self-serving and feudal in character. No wonder they keep failing. By George Monbiot, published in the Guardian 18th September 2024 Labour’s first stage of government resembles a vast forensic excavation. As it works through the Conservatives’ midden of horrors, it discovers an ever greater legacy of underinvestment, neglect and corruption. However disappointing the new government’s compromises might be, we shouldn’t …

In 1943, the USAAF desperately needed an aircraft that could fly a vast distance, penetrate the Japanese Empire’s defence, outrun fighters, perform vital reconnaissance of the heartland and then fly back. This was a very tall order in 1943, even more so when the USAAF demanded a 400mph aeroplane capable of prolonged flight at 40,000 … … Continue reading →

I'd been intending for ages to do a map of Wiltshire. And now I have. Took ruddy ages, I must say. Lots of historic things, like Jane Seymour at Wolf Hall, and the Flying Monk of Malmesbury, and Hannah Twynnoy being done in by a tiger. And Stonehenge and Avebury, of course. I managed to get all the White Horses in; Broad Town, Hackpen, Cherhill, Devizes, Alton Barnes, Pewsey, Westbury. …

In early September, a curious weather pattern repeated itself: around that same time in 2017, we had days of such intense heat that I “escaped” the low lying regions of San Diego County on two occasions (1, 2) just to ... Read moreThanks for following Alexander S. Kunz Photography via RSS & keeping independent websites alive. Buy me a coffee? Support @ $3/month. Visit My Print Store. Browse My Photo …

The House at Sea’s End – Elly Griffiths Dr Ruth Galloway and DCI Harry Nelson investigate the remains of 6 bodies revealed by coastal erosion on the Norfolk Coast, baby Kate has her naming ceremonies and Ruth has a friend come to stay and memories surface from her time in Bosnia identifying mass graves during the 1990s war. Author page: The House at Sea’s End – Elly Griffiths