Forgive me dear reader, it’s been well over a week since my last post but for good reason. Not least, I got my first head cold of the season, which is typical as my Covid/Flu shots are not till the last day of October. Quebec is always late rolling out free shots for the elderly — having long since stopped offering them for anyone under 60 back in 2024. And yes, sadly, I now fall into that category: elderly. But the free part is mostly because of health issues. Anyway, all this to say I am…

Breaking up with cold emails: part 1 of 3: An in-depth look at why cold emails fail and how outdated they've become, by Nout Boctor-Smith and Erin Andress, who have graciously consented to allow the series, originally published in 2024, to be republished on Spam Resource. Why? Because I think it's very important that we offer options to those asking the question: If not cold emails and bulk outreach, then what? Their guidance is particularly valuable, and timely, given the issues companies are…

Whenever I think of films featuring ghosts and haunted houses, it is Jack Clayton’s The Innocents which always springs first into my mind. I don’t know about you, but I happen to think that spooky old houses are the best locations to set horror stories in. An old haunted house gives you creaking floorboards, flickering candles and plenty of dark corners; add in the possibilities of either spirits or mental illness messing with your mind, and you really have got yourself one very frightening…

My current publisher, which happens to share the same name and face as me, is a terrible marketer. Therefore, I’m at this time forced to remind you that I have books and guides I think you’ll enjoy and, perhaps, may even make your life better.

The use of JSON can be powerful in your PowerShell functions and processes. JSON is naturally a machine style language that is easy to use for storing settings and other useful elements throughout a scripts steps. Recently, I have a process that relies on a JSON configuration file and while the file existed, the contents were not valid and thus silently errors. I do have plenty of error handling but not in this one area. I was only checking if the file existed, but not the contents of the file.…

Hailey Nelson/ Arizona State University Artist’s illustration of a supermassive black hole at the center of a radio galaxy launching powerful jets all the way into the galaxy’s circumgalactic medium. Supermassive black holes are powerful engines. They can rip stars apart and feed upon them. They blast jets of ionized gas at near-light speeds. On the other hand, these gravitational beasts are rather small. Though they can be millions or billions of solar masses, they are localized to within the…

How do you become more likable? It’s simpler than you think. Genuinely becoming someone people like is a subject unto itself. It takes real effort. Real self-improvement. Real personal growth. And a whole lot of spine to stand firm in your values. But there is a simpler approach you can adopt: never say anything that contradicts people. Easier said than done. People seem to take offence at the smallest things these days. So you have to learn which opinions are likely to rub them the wrong way.…

A great reminder from Patrick Rhone on thanking those who create software you use and enjoy: I’m sure there is software and services you use daily that makes your life better. Remember that a human made that. If you ever get the opportunity, thank them.

Monaspace is nice. However, it still doesn’t beat Google Sans Code imho. Still the ruling champion of good code font for my sensibilities.

Tony Lo Bianco in God Told Me To (1976) Vitals Tony Lo Bianco as Peter J. Nicholas, devout NYPD detective New York City, Spring 1976 Film: God Told Me To Release Date: October 22, 1976 Director: Larry Cohen Costume Designer: Halston (credited for Deborah Raffin’s wardrobe) WARNING! Spoilers ahead! Background Today would have been the 90th birthday of Tony Lo Bianco, born in New York City on October 19, 1936. A terrific character actor who was often on the sidelines of great ’70s cinema like The…

We were fascinated to hear from AI Policy expert Clara Langevin from the Federation of American Scientists, who talked to us about federal AI policy in the US and Brazil: Apple Spotify YouTube

Jason Dungan / Johan Carøe - RoutineDid Arthur Russell and Laraaji ever jam together? I don’t think they did, but I can imagine them catching one another’s eye on a Lower East Side street, game recognizing game. Anyway, the new collab LP from Jason Dungan (you may know him from his excellent work under the Blue Lake moniker) and Danish multi-instrumentalist Johan Carøe sent me off on this train of thought. With its cascading zither, quizzical cello scrapes and eccentric percussion, Routine…

We’ve all seen the pictures of the thousands of arrests of peaceful protesters for supporting Palestine Action: an 83-year-old retired priest; a 94-year-old Jewish former human rights lawyer; a blind man who uses a wheelchair. As a result of this absurdity, terrorism arrests went up over 1500% in a year. Because the people in question were holding signs, usually saying “I oppose genocide, I support Palestine Action”, these arrests have been made under Section 13(1)(b) of the Terrorism Act 2000,…

Opening up about my screen addiction on Manual in May drew a strong response. Among the many comments and emails I received, one message from a reader, R., stood out. A software developer, she related to my story. She said what saves her is “sort of hating technology.” I’ve been thinking about it ever since I read that email, months ago. I asked R. to elaborate on that contradictory relationship, working in technology while hating it. She replied: I see my job as… a job. […] But beyond that,…

10th October 2026Oxford City FC were making one of their longest journeys of the season in the Conference North, taking on league newcomers Hebburn Town on the southern side of the River Tyne.It seemed a worthwhile challenge to make it to this one.Actually it falls short of the longest of City's 26/27 trips - South Shields' Mariners Park ground is all of 1.1 miles further away.My day started in Newcastle city centre which was enjoying glorious blue skies but wicked cold gusty winds.The stencils…

⌾ : Fujifilm XT5.⚲ : Queen Victoria Building, Sydney. Simply put, I just loved the colour and lit ambience of this stairwell. What colour would you call this? Blue? Green? Im just going to call it as: the green that you find amongst moss deep in a woodland forrest. So I would shoot it. I waited an inordinately long time for someone to come down the stairs. Not just someone, but someone interesting. A fanciful hat, or someone dressed in a Victorian gown, or a dude dressed as a capsicum, or a…

Hold for close-up: I'll accompany 'Nosferatu' (1922) on Thursday, Oct. 22 in Plymouth, N.H.Last week I got the nicest post-show comment I've received in awhile.On Thursday, Oct. 15, after accompanying a screening of 'The Cat and the Canary' (1927) at the Leavitt Theatre in Ogunquit, Maine, a woman unknown to me came down to visit me in the area below the stage.(She really did have to come down, as the Leavitt's century-old wooden floor is seriously slanted.)This woman said she enjoyed the show.…

i got removed from my main work project this week. my supervisor called me apropos of nothing in the middle of the day (always scary) and said that the client is renegotiating their contract for next year, and are happy to go ahead as long as i'm not on the project. this stung for the normal reasons - a feeling of incompetence, like i'd been trying my best and trying to keep an ear open for how people thought i was doing and not hearing anything, assuming no news was good news. also a bit of…

In this podcast, co-host Fabrizio Ferri-Benedetti and I chat with CT Smith about her new book, WTFM: A Practical Guide for Standing Up Docs at a Startup. We discuss why docs need a human owner even when anyone can generate content with AI, how CT kept her voice by writing the book herself in Neovim, the layered pipeline of Vale hooks, skills, model reviews, and sandbox fixtures that lets Claude Code handle about 40% of her tickets, the risk of gradual disempowerment, and why systems thinking…

quieren quitarme el río y también la playa. quieren al barrio mío y que abuelita se vaya. no, no suelte' la bandera ni olvide' el lelolai. que no quiero que hagan contigo lo que le pasó a Hawái thеy want to take the river from me and the beach. they want my neighbourhood and grandma to leave. no, don't let go of the flag nor forget the lelolai. 'cause i don't want to happen to you what happened to Hawaii

Yellow knight mushrooms, also known as man on horseback, are a controverial edible mushroom. Here's what you need to know before eating them. Jousting with the Yellow Knight is the latest post on Hunter Angler Gardener Cook.

Recently I had the happy task of contributing to a forthcoming issue of the American Behavioral Scientist honoring my PhD advisor, Paul DiMaggio. The papers engage with different aspects of Paul’s very varied work in organizations, culture, institutional analysis, and other topics. My paper, which you can read a draft of here, puts his most-cited paper, [DiMaggio and Powell, 1983], in the context of other highly-cited papers in sociology since the 1930s, and tries to see what that can tell us.…

as eleições brasileiras estão a todo vapor e com menos de uma semana para o segundo turno, eu acho que o coração de todos está na palma da mão. o que vai acontecer? (♫♪♬ vai dar pt, vai dar, vai dar pt vai dar ♫♪♬). eu sempre tive minha escolha muito às claras: sempre fui de esquerda. pra mim não existe outro caminho: ou a revolta é popular ou ela não é. sempre fui muito feminista. meus ídolos eram Raul e Engenheiros do Hawaii e Chico Buarque, em outras palavras, eram os cds que meus tios…

Spent most of yesterday in the mountains just east of Eugene, on a trail run along the McKenzie River Trail and around Clear Lake. I’ve been going to Clear Lake for years now and find it a beautiful place, nestled among the lava flows, a few giant sequoias and many vine maple trees. Yesterday was simply beautiful. Photos below. The trail itself is a trail along a “National Wild and Scenic River,” the McKenzie River and the trail parallels the river for most of it. It starts just north of Clear…

A haiku inspired by Warwick Goble's Hundreds of Peacocks of Gorgeous Plumes Source

Introducing my new scientifically accurate authoritative list of age brackets. 0-20: Child 21-40: Young 41-60: Middle aged 61-80: Old 81+: Elderly Thank you for you attention to this matter.

At PulpFest 2026, we got the fourth and final volume of Donald Keyhoe‘s Devildog Squadron series, The Coils of the Cobra, from Age of Aces Books. This was his second series, started in 1931, the same month as Philip Strange. It lasted for 24 stories from 1931 to ’35 in Sky Birds, published by Magazine […]

We drove our rental Noovo Plus from Noovo’s Los Angeles Boutique north out of LA, along I-5, ending up at Stanger Vineyards for the night. This post is about the drive… which ended up taking an hour longer than expected.An interactive map of our route:On our way:We stopped at a Ralphs grocery store to buy food and other supplies for the van:The van is 20’ 11” long, or a bit more with the storage box and spare tire on the back. So a little long for a regular parking space, but we could have…

Wizards of the Coast has rejected the request to voluntarily recognize United Wizards of the Coast's formation. Why? And what happens next? The post Proposed Wizards of the Coast Union Rejected, Goest to NLRB Vote appeared first on Hipsters of the Coast.

I have been writing about witches for a very long time. Anyone who has followed this blog for more than a few weeks probably knows that. Between Advanced Witches & Warlocks, NIGHT SHIFT, and my Jackson, Illinois, setting, witches occupy a considerable amount of my creative time. They have been part of my gaming life for nearly forty years, and I don't expect that to change anytime soon.But why witches?It is a fair question, and one I have asked myself (and have been asked) more than once over…