This post is part of the RPG Blog Carnival: Underworld & Wilderness Adventures. As soon as I announced the carnival, I received two submissions, one in a comment of the original post, and one via discord. The former is Roll 4 Ruin: Classic Dungeon Generator by Nocturnal Peacock. It contains 184 illustrated dungeon elements to roll (think chambers, corridors, and similar), making it a lovely complement to AD&D DMG Appendix A. The second contribution was Keep on the Marches by my friend Ian E., a…

While simple, today I used this trick to write the code I wanted. Variable assignment of a function is a valid, communicative way to alias a function in JavaScript. const clearFilters = () => setFilters({}); // Use the same behavior when starting a new search. const startNewSearch = clearFilters; // These create the same result. clearFilters(); startNewSearch(); In this case, calling clearFilters didn’t fit with a click handler on a button labeled “Start New Search.” With this technique, was…

Part of the ongoing Big Tech's War on Users series. Back in March I said the whole Full Self-Driving saga was a post that writes itself. In May I said it deserved its own deep dive and that we'd get there eventually. Unlike the robotaxi. Overnight, Elon Musk handed me the hook. Sometime in the middle of the night going into Friday, Musk posted on X that Tesla will be winding down Cybertruck production at Giga Texas around the middle of next year "to make room for increased Cybercab production."…

Mildly disappointed the Cooldige, which has the original art of the theater being destroyed by Godzilla in the recent Godzilla vs Boston comic book hanging in its lobby, will not be playing the new movie. Everywhere else, though, it's Godzilla time, with Godzilla Minus Zero picking up two years after the end of Godzilla Minus One and seeing the giant monster return. It's notable for being the

For a while, UK AISI, Redwood Research and others have been concerned specifically with the possibility that AIs would sabotage safety research, and have invested in looking for signs that this may be happening. This was also a key element in AI 2027, and in many threat models of how the future goes badly. It is easy to understand why this form of misalignment could be uniquely dangerous. Differentially sabotaging safety research could preserve and expand misalignment through model generations…

Wade Guyton, Untitled, 2025-26, Epson UltraChrome HDX inkjet on linen, cast aluminum (2 parts)44⅜ × 33⅝ × 7 in., as installed at Matthew Marks I really hope everyone with a Wade Guyton painting’s got their orders in for a cast aluminum crate frame, because now they look weird without one. This whole show looks so sick; it’s not just the painting of a photo of a sculpture in a crate that’s a frame that’s a sculpture. This is just a Matthew Marks fanblog now ig Wade Guyton Sculpture, through 23…

My thanks to Red Sweater for sponsoring the site this week. Black Ink 3 is the next version of their crossword app for both iOS and the Mac, and it’s premium features are free for all during its beta cycle!

Reuters reports: US FAA says it will phase out floppy disks from air traffic control by 2028. I … uhh … wow.

Pavel Etingof, “Use of AI in Mathematical Research: A Guide for Young Mathematicians” Anna Gilbert, “Math qua math“ Anna Gilbert, “Mathematical criticism“ Larry Guth, “What math means to me“ Atoosa Kasirzadeh, “A New Dawn For Mathematical Progress“ As in previous posts, readers are invited to post links to additional articles in the comments.

Another batch of Ironman races opened up for registration this week, and with that, my 2027 season is officially on. I’m currently signed up for: Ironman 70.3 Oceanside: Oceanside, California, April 3 Ironman 70.3 Northern California: Redding, California, May 23 Ironman 70.3 Coeur d'Alene: Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, June 27 Ironman 70.3 Boise: Boise, Idaho, July 24 Ironman Montana: Great Falls, Montana, August 15 Ironman 70.3 Washington Tri-Cities: Richland, Washington, September 19 Six races in…

Whilst not the biggest fan of Bruce’s Carolus Deene series, I decided to give this one a go when Barzun and Taylor highlighted it as a Christmas mystery in their book, A Catalogue of Crime. Having read quite a lot of classic crime mysteries set at Christmas, I am always on the look out for new ones, so I can add them to my ever-growing ranked list of such books.

Thomas Rigby has come up with a very fun Great British Book Off challenge, found via Alexandra Wolfe. On Your Marks — A Book You Can’t Wait To Read I've only just started Audrey Niffenegger's Life Out of Order, the sequel to The Time Traveler's Wife, which I have only been looking forward to since 2003. After that, two Claire North books: As We Fall Through Time, and Notes from the Burning Age. Signature Bake — A Book From Your Favourite Genre That would rely on my knowing what my favourite…

The Pocket Operator from Teenage Engineering has arrived. And I already love this little device!

[Here’s another remembrance of the Los Angeles Lakers’ record-setting 1971-72 championship season. This remembrance of things past comes from veteran L.A. reporter Mitch Chortkoff, who’d covered the Lakers for decades when he put pen to paper to mark the 20th anniversary of that milestone season and a reunion of its heroes. His account, though a little rough in places and very minimally edited here for clarity and flow, offers an eyewitness view and firsthand perspective of this magical Lakers’…

Two takes on urban life, animal and human, and an exciting disappointment. How Rome’s Urban Shepherds Adapt and Survive An aspect of Rome that most tourists never notice is how close to the city centre sheep may safely graze. I come across them on my bicycle and have often wondered what the story is. Now I know. The sheep are invaluable for the ecosystem services they provide, but their existence, and thus those of their shepherds, is threatened by modernisation. I hope they hang on. The…

This is the second tape chain that we did on the 4ad-l list in the mid 90s. I guess it really was about the last time in history you could do a tape chain. A few years earlier, Frauenhofer (that’s literally what it was named) had invented mp3s, and then the free mp3 encoder lame was released some years later and everybody started distributing mp3s instead. Which was a better idea, really. (For more blathering about what this all was, read the first part of this blog series.) But here’s the…

I claim it is interesting to work with a forest of terms as a primary object of consideration rather than a single tree term.

I'm someone who has trouble showering in the mornings. I have ADHD and I do everything slowly until my brain wakes up. So unless I want to be late for work, I'm usually stuck showering in the evenings, which is inconvenient for other reasons: my hair takes a long time to dry, I have sound sensitivity issues and the noise can amp my brain up and make it harder to fall asleep. So here's my hack for making myself shower in the morning: I have a maximum of ~30 minutes, so I made a 25m playlist of…

Another reason it’s unlikely there’ll ever be a third generation Martian native: Dust. Fine and ultrafine Martian dust presents additional risks for future crewed missions to MarsI love Bob Dylan, in part because he’s from another planet and doing his own thing. Pope Leo receives Bob Dylan at the Vatican

I was trying to take a screenshot for yesterday’s blog post webloc files trigger a Gatekeeper alert in the latest macOS security updates, but the screenshot was so ugly that I had to take one from Tahoe instead. Here’s a screenshot of the empty trash window on Golden Gate: Compare and contrast with Tahoe: When I take a screenshot of the entire screen on Golden Gate, the empty trash window looks fine (click for the full image): Here’s a close-up of the empty trash window from the screenshot of…

I try to live a somewhat slow life but I don’t have anything on these Budget readers. I’ve just received my third paper and I haven’t even finished the first one yet.

A student of a former professor of mine created a nice data visualization project (link). The raw data look like this:These are seating preferences of MIT students in a particular class. The dataset is actually larger than these 15 students; I clipped the rest.The classroom is a rectangle, and seat locations are fixed and clearly defined. I'm a bit surprised at the number of different locations for each student. I'd have expected that most students stick to a specific seat. The tint of the…

A lone fly fisherman enjoys the quiet waters of the Cache la Poudre River near Fort Collins, Colorado. The post Wading on the River appeared first on 75CentralPhotography.

I was walking through the kitchen right around sunset to go grab myself more water to drink. There was an awesome glow that was shining in the east facing window caught my attention. It was a bright orange so I had to look. I grabbed my shoes and phone and went outside to look at it. I guess the clouds which cleared out of here earlier today were high enough hand close enough the sun was illuminating them well to the east. This picture was taking right around sunset. I actually believe it was…

Hey, Bear. I was living of walnuts in the period of my apathy for few years. I just didn't have any money or strenght to change anything, so I was wondering and looking for the walnuts trees in my neighborhood. Now I'm eating them too. I feel shit, weak and... Yesterday. It was 13 years since my brother died. My nephew said she visited his grave and said hi. I still haven't seen her since the funeral. I still wear his clothes. I used to have his clothes back to the days and I still have some…

V and four dotsSeen beneath our feet on the shady side of the street, this traffic burnished utility cover is illuminated by sunlight reflected from surrounding buildings.The small size suggests that it may be a water utility. Any identifying markings are well worn off. The "V", the four raised dots, and the four lifting indents make for a stand out design.

Who's on your fridge?A recent New Yorker cartoon shows two toddlers discussing the election. One says to the other, "This is the most important election of our lifetime." It's a play on what has become a cliche about every single election I can remember, and I can remember a lot of them.Hindsight is 20/20, to quote another cliche, but if I had to pick the most important election of my lifetime, it would either be 1980 (Reagan vs. Carter) or 2016 (Trump's first election). Ten years ago, Trump…

I somehow coasted through most of my life with undiagnosed ADHD. I didn't get diagnosed until I was 23. I first discovered I might have it when I was talking to some friends and they said to me "I was actually really surprised when you said you didn't have ADHD." I asked them why, they said "just the amount of hobbies you have, you'll be looking at someone and have not heard a word they said, you daydream a lot..." so on and so forth. So I looked up the symptoms, and thought maybe there was…

Why does it feel so scary to post here sometimes? It feels way scarier than it used to, the stakes feel really high. Maybe not “high” actually, just completely unknown. At any rate, a few questions I’ve been asking myself recently. * * * Where can I find a good still-in-production cane? I love this book on walking sticks and canes from LMP, but none are widely in production (understandably, this was a speculative brief). The folding cane by Michael Graves Design comes close but I’ve only been…

It’s new music Friday couple with Bandcamp Friday! Let’s find some good new metal to support. Hails! Obbrobrius - death - ItalyPenny Coffin - death - UKOrbital Gate - death/slam - USAGrób - death/thrash - PolandExtol - death/thrash - NorwayKonvent - death/doom - DenmarkBesotten - death/doom - USAGrand Harvest - death/doom - SwedenOnly Worms Left - death/doom/black - GermanyAnnihilus Mundi - death/prog - USAMystical Death - tech death - NetherlandsArchitect of Seth - tech death - FranceHannes…