The Sherwood Ring by Elizabeth Marie Pope, 1958. When Peggy Grahame’s father dies, she goes to live with her Uncle Enos in upstate New York, at their ancestral home, which goes by the whimsical name Rest-and-Be-Thankful. The family has lived there since the family arrived in America, fleeing their old home in Scotland after their support for Bonnie Prince Charlie failed. Uncle Enos loves history and tends to live in the past of their old home. Peggy’s father has sarcasticallysaid that Uncle…
I recently (26th-28th June 2026) went on a three day climbing trip to Hampi. It wasn't enough for climbing, but definitely enough for healing my soul through and through. This is my day to day log of a small set of things that happened. On our first day, we arrived sleep deprived in Hospete and took an auto to Hanumanhalli. Our abode was Mani's homestay (theres no maps link for it 🫠). It is a minimal 1980s style house with owning family living in a small part of the house, leaving four rooms…
A detailed history of how a destructive pest was neutralized through sicence and geography.
Superpowers with Fable has been interesting. It appears to consistently be delegating implementation to Sonnet and Haiku, which is exactly what you would want to see.I may work on my SoloTerm version to do similar but across model providers.
It's been a while since I updated you on our cruise happenings on #TheBoatTripNorth Yesterday we went on a coach trip titled "Life and Culture in Isfjordur" which was something of a mixed bag First we went into a small, old local Lutheran church and listened to a local singer perform three of his songs. Then we went to a fishing museum (or I did, because there was no possibility of my wife getting down the steep uneven path!) which was interesting but a bit - as they say - random. Then .....…
The first time I opened up to a medical professional about some childhood trauma, it was like surgically excising a living thing from behind my breastbone. That experience — the galloping pulse, the ventricle-deep ache, the sensation that something alive and malicious was digging in its claws to stay rooted — made it easy to see how one might disavow ownership of those emotions and assign them to supernatural entities. Demons rather than one’s own untilled memories. That, it seems, is the…
It’s great that BACKROOMS all sprang from a badly colour-balanced photograph (above right) taken at a disused furniture showroom in Wisconsin. Wisconsin is the wellspring of all things weird in America, after all. I liked the film as much as Fiona did. Jeremy Cox’s cinematography is really beautiful — nobody’s talking about how rich and […]
Screenshot I thought it would be fun to look at old book reviews of the two books I just read and reviewed. I’ll start with The Fittest, which I liked, and then go to Ruler of the World, which I didn’t. Follow the links if you want to read my reviews. The Fittest Astounding Science Fiction (December 1955) by P. Schuyler Miller Miller made the same connections I did to The Day of the Triffids and Brain Wave. However, Miller tells too much of what happens. The scenes of when Don’s brother and…
They say, “Matt, how are you so smart?” I tell them, “Hard work and skill.” I’m very skilled. I have all the best skills. No one has more skills than me. #LyingLikeTrump #YourTurn
Derek Thompson wrote one of the most interesting things I've read lately. One hundred years ago, on September 26, 1929, President Herbert Hoover gathered a group of social scientists at the White House. He asked them to begin research on the most detailed report ever produced on the state of the nation. Four years later, running more than 1,500 pages long, Recent Social Trends was published, offering an unusually granular look at life in the mid-1920s. America, 1926: What a Forgotten…
Happy Fourth, if you're feeling it this year. If not, well, try not to overheat heading to the subway to get some air conditioning in the theaters! Minions & Monsters opened Wednesday and continues to play at Fresh Pond (including 3D), the Capitol, the Lexington Venue, Jordan's Furniture (Imax 2D Friday-Sunday), West Newton, CinemaSalem, Boston Common (including Imax Laser 2D & Dolby Cinema 2D
Believe it or not, one of the defining moments in my relationship with black metal came the first time I heard Nargaroth's Jahreszeiten, and specifically the repetitive riffing on the last track, "Winter". This was my introduction to this band, before I knew of their earlier, more notorious records, as well as before many of the genre's foundational names. This kind of monotonous melodic austerity captured what I found to be essential in black metal, and shaped how I continue to appreciate it…
Set up a stack of virtualization tools on a Void Linux host for creating and managing virtual machines (VMs). 1. Start Here 2. Directories 3. Permissions 4. Services 5. Create VM 6. Resize VM guest window 7. Video Acceleration 8. Virsh and Virt-clone 9. Resources 1. Start Here KVM (Kernel-based Virtual Machine) is built into the Linux kernel and handles the CPU and memory details. QEMU (Quick EMUlator) emulates the various hardware components of a physical machine. Finally, libvirt provides the…
It’s been a hectic week. Lots of work, meetings, and things to get done. I still have things on my list. I might have to work a bit tomorrow. I continued with my regular P.T sessions. I could also play last Saturday, which was fun. BTW, welcome to the second half of 2026. Yamaha at Hive Club, Thanisandra. Looks all shiny after 3M cover. I have been using the motorcycle more and more. Especially in and around the neighborhood for day-to-day things. The above picture was taken at Hive Club,…
Looky at Rachel’s tall, lovely sunflowers
Recent Comments quicksilver — Jeff: “ First sighting of the rare nested footnote in retrograde! ”
2026/07/03 Friday And it's for lunch AND dinner! I saw this meme/edit years ago, glad it was easy to find again, but I will be back to it later. So a few months back I did my "Surf the Web" button, to open a random site from my button wall (some of my favorite sites), but there are other cool stuff that I think it would be cool for people to find at random, but that I don't feel like creating buttons for my wall, nor creating another section just for links... I don't deal well with too many…
2026/07/03: It's Dog Food Day!
Today I am reviewing Henry Slesar’s The Thing at the Door, the title my Patreon supporters voted for a couple of months ago. [I shall be setting up another poll soon, so keep your eyes peeled for that.] One of the reasons Slesar’s story was selected was due to its ambiguous and mysterious blurb: ‘If the root of all neuroses is in childhood --so is the root of Terror. When Gail Gunnerson was six years old, a Thing came to her bedroom door. It was so horrifying a sight, so dreadful in its…
Time in the Empire is measured in Annums (revolutions of the Mother around the local star), Starsigns (There are 10 per Annum) and Orbits (revolutions of the moon Spatha around the unseen Mother). The starsign that a Mere hatches under determines much of their personality and abilities. The time of hatching is extremely random and those of the upper classes have been unable to make their offspring hatch more consistently under the more auspicious signs. Each sign is named after a creature…
Re: Your Metablogging is Lame as Hell #julyreply Are you an enthusiastic newcomer to blogging? Write about it! Do you have tips and tricks that other bloggers might like? Tell us about them! Did you learn something about blogging that you feel needs to be told? Share it! Are you blogging about blogging because you think it’s a good way to get attention on Bubbles or Bear Discover? Well, that is kind of annoying. But I’ll read it anyway!
During my career in manufacturing, I spent 17 years with one corporation. I became acquainted with a fellow who was reliable in two ways. First, he was a superstar salesman who always achieved his targets. Second, he was the most talented practical joker I’ve ever met. His name was Karl. Karl was a storyteller who was the subject of the stories he told. He gave me the nickname Two-Can Dan. He correctly observed my inability to handle alcohol. I later gave it up because Karl was right. This post…
Uh-oh, found a new garden center.Currently Listening: Semisonic “Don't Give Up Yet”Reply via email
Clouds are slowly moving into southern Arizona as the monsoon engine starts to ramp up again. We’re not going to get storms for a few more days, but the heat and humidity are starting to creep up just a little bit. I was still able to get a walk in this morning, even though I slept in for a little while, or as long as Truman would allow me to sleep in. We don’t have a lot planned for the long weekend. I’m just grateful for the rest and relaxation I’m able to get. I’m thinking we’ll take the…
Every Friday, I intend to list 5 things that happened during the week. Feel free to join in if you want. I'm happy to link back to anyone who does, just pop me a message with the details. :) Two blog entries today, I'm on a roll! To be fair, I remembered the Friday Five after I'd published the first one and it kinda has to be done today so.... BBQEnjoyed an evening BBQ with the family of eldest's best friend. I learned some history of our house as friend's mum has access to tithe records…
You have to be strict with yourself when you record at home.One of the songs was 10 beats per minute too fast, and I gritted my teeth and re-recorded the guitar part. I made such a mess of it that I did three different versions to edit from- but they were all so different I had to give up and just play the whole song again.I closed the computer after that.Tomorrow, I'll listen to see if it's any good.Over the weekend I'll do repairs to other guitar parts, and some re-writing of clunky lyrics…
A story I've told a thousand times, but still useful, I suspect.
I had a phase of making little videos about the things in the Do book, and then I forgot.So here we go again:
"Brother, is that you?" A succesful real estate agent (John Cena) has his life turned upside down when his ‘little brother’—a kid he was mentoring in high school (Eric André)—comes back into his life. This falls pretty wide of the mark on all fronts. I don’t think John Cena is that great of an actor even as the straight man, and whilst we know Eric André can be funny the script just doesn’t seem to be there here. Matt Spicer the director also did Ingrid Goes West so it’s disappointing to see…
Today is the Fourth of July Eve, also known as July third. For those of us in the States, today is basically part one of the holiday. All the offices are closed and it's not like any business is going to get done. I took Thursday - yesterday - off, as well as next week, for my vacation time so I've got absolutely nothing going on at this point. Right now I'm currently waiting on my latest guix home reconfigure run to finish up, my old laptop isn't the quickest so it'll take some time to run. I…
