So, says Frolix_8, let's have a quiz.
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Philip K. Dick, far from being too paranoid to be prophetic, might not have been paranoid enough. After all, even my comments section makes you prove you're not a robot (Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?) and there really are cameras everywhere for our protection (Through a Scanner Darkly). Oh yes, and legislation aimed at protecting us from terror may have invaded our privacy (Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said).
Somehow, the November issue of Technology Review made it to the top of my Empire State Building pile of unread magazines and I happened upon this fascinating recollection by Freeman Dyson about working for the Operational Research Section during WWII.
One advantage to reading it online is that you can go to part two very easily. I'd still be looking in that monster pile 'o mags.
When John Atkinson and I were driving from Kansas to New Mexico after recording Rendezvous, we spotted a crop duster spraying a roadside field. I was stunned by his precision at high speed—and by the exuberant loops with which he terminated each run. It looked incredibly difficult, and also like he was having a ball.
Lest I begin every blog entry in a negative fashion let me begin by saying, I love the music of Led Zeppelin.
Now that the positive portion of the evening has concluded, let me get to the reason I write today. I ventured into a Virgin Megastore on Monday to purchase a Zoso CD for my nephew who I'm trying to convert from a fan of the lowest common denominator variety of rap music. Not all rap is lowest common denominator by any means but the stuff he likes definitely hits that mark. The more ghetto the better. There's an entire other blog, or book perhaps about white kids from small towns…
I've mentioned my problem with sleep. It's not that I can't fall asleep. I'm usually so tired that I'm completely gone before my head meets pillow. I could go to bed at 7pm and fall asleep, no problem. I'm half-asleep right now.
But I just can't seem to stay asleep. Me and sleep don't get along very well. We touch but never hold. I'm convinced that I'm simply "a light sleeper," the various sounds of Jersey City night—symphonies of smashed beer bottles, choruses of high school children, sirens of all sorts—rising up from the tireless street below and invading my…
John Atkinson sends along this link to The Vintage Knob, which shows the naughty bits of some classic '70s gear.
More proof, as if needed, that the true definition of a gentleman is someone who can play the bagpipe, but won't.
BBspot claims to have obtained the super-duper-secretest-ever legal decision flowchart used by the RIAA. Everything now makes so much sense!
"While in residence at the Baltimore Museum of Industry during the last two years, Catherine Wagner was given access to their 50,000+ collection of historic light bulbs, one of the premier collections of vintage and antique light bulbs in the United States, with lights dating from the early 19th century. The resulting series of photographs titled A Narrative History of the Light Bulb embodies both sculptural installation and photography. Wagner creates arrangements of bulbs that she then photographs with an 8 by 10 view camera in order to record the glass enclosures and the delicate filaments…
Revisiting Stanley Miller's 1953 experiment about the creation of life on Earth.
In the mid-'70s, I visited the Smithsonian's Air and Space Museum, which had a major exhibit called "Is There Life On Other Planets?" The major draw was the bridge of the Enterprise "D," but as we wandered down a corridor, we spotted a television and several stools. Being children of the television age, we sat down and waited for something to watch.
cue visuals: The set of Julia Child's The French Chef.
cue music: The jaunty theme of The French Chef.
And there was the grande dame herself,…