Recently updated blogs

I don’t post here much and when I do it’s kind of grumpy. I’m just not gaming a lot these days, and my time and energy and writing are focused elsewhere. If you’d like to hear from me more consistently, about happier things, and are okay with it not being all about video games, check out my new site: 😋 Dan Yums: A Blog of Simple Pleasures Every day of …

Vincennes Review of Books 2024 is here!Key:* = Excellent, highly recommend~ = Actively bad, do not recommendFirst readsNobber-Oisín Fagan Turn Life’s Milkshakes into Lemonade-Flynt Flossy How to Do Nothing-Jenny Odell A Net for Small Fishes-Lucy Jago A Guide Through Finnegans Wake-Edmund L. Epstein *Finnegans Wake-James Joyce *The Other Half-Charlotte Vassell ~Systems Ultra-Georgina Voss *Where Are Your Boys Tonight?-Chris Payne *For Thy Great Pain Have Mercy on My Little Pain-Victoria MacKenzie …

Ludwig, S01 E04

The original: Se nell’Anno cadente ottantadoi Hai goduto quel ben, che t’augurai, Men congratulo teco, e più che mai Dal Ciel tel prego, e da’ Pianeti suoi. Guidi lunge da te Saturno i Buoi, Che tranno il Carro suo carco di guai. Nè la spada malefica già mai Sfoderi Marte iracondo a danni tuoi. Giove t’arrida, e Venere con lui, Nè il Sol, Cintia, o Mercurio influssi rei Sparga mai …

It’s my 15th anniversary of doing these annual wrap-up posts (following 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2024), and yes, I still really enjoying creating them. For me, it’s not just about looking through what I consumed during the year and figuring out what was my favorite in each category, but it’s also a way of coming across everything that I missed …

The Beano Super Stars was yet another spin-off of D. C. Thomson's most enduring weekly humour comic, published monthly for a full decade between January 1992 and January 2002. It was very similar to the bite-size Comic Libraries and Fun-Size Beanos, with each issue telling a single long-form story over its 32 pages, but with the obvious added selling points of being in full A4 size, on glossy paper and …

To everyone who has been visiting Skookworks in 2024 – Thank you! I had a great time creating the daily illustrations and I feel like I’ve mastered Clip Studio Paint enough to get back to drawing comics. My first story will be a second Mighty Nizz piece. You’ll be able to read that at MightyNizz.com. I’ll provide links when it is up. Because I’ll be focusing on comics (and commission …

The act of weight training is governed by a multitude of factors. Of great importance is the biological factor: our physical response to training. Within this factor are multitudes of smaller factors, each contributing to the goal of getting bigger and stronger. Understanding these small factors and knowing how to manipulate them is how we grow. So we are told by the science-based advocates in the gym community. Jeff Nippard, …

As I see in the new year quietly for once, I’m remembering the turn of the millennium, a mere quarter-century ago, and being on BBC One as the nation’s Millennium Bug correspondent. I spent most of the day in TC1, the main studio at BBC Television Centre in London, while an array of presenters and guests were wheeled on and off, covering the New Year celebrations from around the world. …

Recently I gave my first-ever in-person conference presentation! I was invited to RustConf 2024 where I talked about why we're building KCL (KittyCAD language), a programming language for 3D design, at Zoo.dev. The talk has three parts: background about computer-aided design (CAD) software and mechanical engineering, then why we built a programming language, then what I learned from the process and the gaps in existing compilers 101 education. At some …

A year gone, another year about to happen

Kate and I visited Mexico City for the first time in 2015. We were here for the holidays and to visit family, but one of the things I remember from that trip was standing in the middle of Paseo de la Reforma on New Year’s Eve during some kind of race, photographing the runners. I had no idea what race that was and didn’t particularly care—I just thought it was …

At the moment of writing this, I process the chapter “reward” from the book “Good Habits, Bad Habits” by Wendy Wood. The steps are: Review the chapter and my highlights. I have read it already and added highlights. Decide what I can build from this chapter. I start a short-term project to build a structure note on “reward”. Create a shortcut for my structure notes on “reward” and “incentive structure …

This year I set a goal to journal every day in the hope I can write one of these 2024 year-in-review notes for my site. I didn't get to it every single day but I did it enough that I can look back and remember the year that was! There was a lot that happened this year so I've tried to pull out some threads/themes that particularly stood out or …

The electronic version of the latest issue of the Girls’ Angle Bulletin is now available on our website. For this issue, we have a very special interview with Erica Klarreich. Erica earned her doctoral degree in mathematics from the State University of New York, Stony Brook, then later shifted into math journalism where she has written on dozens of diverse mathematical topics with her characteristic combination of clarity and precision. …