Recently updated blogs

Would it matter if the entire human race became extinct?1 I ask this question not because of any hostility towards human beings – as is fashionable in some circles, humans being seen as the poisonous curse of the Earth it would be better without, nor any generalized misanthropy – rather the opposite. The essay is built on the premise that human beings have been and are singular and remarkable creatures. …

Today, I am writing a eulogy for someone very close to me. Like most people, I’ve put things off. For example, I’ve been tempted to search the history of using ‘a’ instead of ‘an’ when forming the phrase ‘a eulogy’. I won’t bore you with the details. And, of course, writing this blog is another way for me to put off the inevitable. Anyway, a eulogy is about creating a …

Well, I’ve really confused Steam. It thinks I like adventure games, shooters and RPGs, minimalist games, casual games, puzzles, on-line co-op games, strategy games, simulation games, building games, 2D, 3D, indie, and multiplayer games. Isn’t that more or less liking just “games”? Anyway, My Time at Sandrock counts as a casual game. I thought I’d be in the mood for that, and it turns out I am. You arrive at …

Like many modern devices, some of the medical vaporizer devices from S&B (the Crafty, Venty and the Volcano Hybrid) offer Bluetooth connectivity and an app to control them. Unfortunately the official mobile apps have / had some problems. The iOS version is no longer available after Apple decided to remove "drug related" Apps. So understandably the company no longer developed either their iOS or Android apps, instead releasing a web …

I have been keeping up with Advent of Code so far this year, and thought after a week it might be nice to have a more detailed look at one of the entries, with commentary

Season's greetings from "a person of gravitas and insight, who says their prayers, and is sensitive to the potential of mission as 'parish-shaped'"Very quiet in the parish at the moment. The rotten weather isn't helping. On the way home after walking the dog over the fields, coming back along Icknield Way, I did spy a bit of commotion: some new arrivals in the village! An American family moving into Hazeldene, …

Yes. Is that a universal truth? Maybe not. If, in 1939, you found yourself in rifle range of Hitler, and there was no opportunity to steal him away, imprison him, or humiliate him in such a way as to defang his power - the only option to is to assassinate him and thus likely end or quicken the end of the suffering of millions (tens of millions if we count …

Jim Goldberg’s new book, Coming and Going, is a mess. It’s a mess of photographs, a mess of handwritten text, of notes, letters, a mess of collages of photographs often hundreds of images to a page, a mess of people I have no idea who they are, a mess of little details related to the page in ways that only Jim knows. The book is a mess from its front …

For the twentieth time, I am here on a blog called Said the Gramophone to share my favourite songs of the year. (No, you didn't read that wrong--it's 20: twice ten, one score) Is it time to quit? It isn't time to quit. Is it time to listen to some music that'll rattle the room? Yes sir or ma'am. It is. Here's a gift, a giant fuckin' rattle. The 100 …

♫ Mona, Markus Stockhausen et al

I created Soul Sides 20 years ago because I wanted an outlet to write about my favorite records. The blog era feels bygone — and I clearly stopped regularly updating the site years ago — but the impulse to talk about records has never faded. It’s why I’ve created podcasts and newsletters but to mark the...

“Here's a view of Saturn's moon Prometheus, made from images captured with the narrow-angle camera on Cassini on December 6, 2015. Cassini was about 37,400 km from Prometheus when the images were acquired. Part of the F ring is visible in the background at the top.” — Jason Major

What does a picture of a dark-skinned Cleopatra do in a fourteenth-century manuscript produced at the papal court in Avignon?

Our largest airport is relatively sheltered compared with other exposed locations in the UK. In terms of London it is far more exposed than areas such as Wanstead; the max gust here on January 2nd was just 50mph.Data from the Met Office revealed the following list. DateMax gust (mph)Event25/1/199087.5Burns’ Day Storm18/1/200777.115/10/198776The Great Storm16/3/199573.626/10/200273.6‘Strong winds’7/2/199070.218/2/202270.2Storm Eunice8/12/19936927/10/201369St Jude Storm2/1/202469Storm Henk

I subscribe to the TLS, which does pretty good coverage of German literature and history, including Goethe. (I have even written a few reviews in the TLS on Goethe, which you can check out online.) But I also read literary coverage generally. Often reviews of other literary traditions lead me to consider Goethe, which was the case with a recent review: The Penguin Book of Elegy: Poems of Memory, Mourning …