I do have trouble with the concept of being a sand collector, but I suppose audiophiles have no right to cock an eyebrow at how strange other hobbies are.
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I guess I never really thought about the uniqueness of sand, no matter how many times I heard that expression. Microscopy made me think about it—and the corollary notion that every beach and sandpit is unique as well.
This Hubble Space Telescope image of the face-on spiral galaxy Messier 101 (M101) is the clearest, most detailed piece of astronomy porn I've ever seen.
The signal returns to the source.
This weekend, over brunch, I read an article in the New York Times which discussed the Rod Serling museum, proposed for a Fall 2007 opening in Serling's hometown, Binghampton, NY. The article made a lovely, if obvious, connection between the creation of the museum and the ever-present theme within Serling's work that is our tendency, or our desire, to return home. In "Walking Distance," an episode of Serling's The Twilight Zone, Martin Sloan, a nostalgic and discontented middle-aged ad exec, goes off for a Sunday drive and wanders innocently into his…
But Damon Krukowski, drummer for Galaxie 500, has turned his back on the touring life to teach expository writing at Harvard. But that's just his day job—he still performs music around town with his wife as Damon & Naomi.
I almost called Christopher Moore the funniest writer you've never heard of, but his sales indicate that an awful lot of people have not only heard of him, but have bought his books. He's not perzackly a household name, but I'd put him in the company of Terry Pratchett, Douglas Adams, Neil Gaiman, and Carl Hiiassen—you know, writers whose books you save for when you need a can't-fail pick-me-up.
If you don't know his stuff, dip into this interview and then start working through his canon. Or is it cannon? I always get those mixed up—either way, it's high calibre.
Via Blog of a…
Unabashedly liberal; unrepenitently literary. Pogo will always be my candidate for best comic strip ever. An appreciation from the WaPo.
MPAA spokesflack Brad Hunt tried to sell a roomful of Hollywood tech types on "plugging the analog hole." Ought to be a slam dunk, right? Apparently not. The group groaned out loud when he said that retailers would have to educate consumers on its implications and after more probing questions, he got this one: "This is a room full of people whose living depends on this working. You're getting pushback to the point of hostility. If you can't sell this to us, how are you going to sell it to the target 16–45 demographic?"
iPod Hi-Fi? "iPod Hi-Fi accurately reproduces the lowest cello notes and the highest piccolo notes; the brittle strum of an acoustic guitar and the powerful thump of a driving bass."
Uh huh—as long as they're between 53Hz and 16kHz. For 128kbps files, that's probably good enough, but hi-fi it ain't.
I don't know anything about Ethan Winer except that he made one heck of a cool video of himself playing cello. It's all cello, baby.