I’m spending a few days visiting my parents in Northern Virginia. Similar:Colorful variations of an upholstered desk chair for my fantasy #steampunk #blender3d proj…AestheticsSummer project: learning the Unity gaming engine.One bedtime about 11 years ago, my 5yo d…PersonalAssembling wall units to bake into a texture atlas. Teacup is a freebie from polyhaven.co… AestheticsI really enjoyed…
Words, words, words. With the advent of the stream of consciousness in twentieth-century literature, it has come to seem that the self is very much a thing made of words, a verbal construction forever narrating itself and reconstituting itself in language. In line with the dominant, internalist view of consciousness, it is assumed that this…
Similar:More split-screen actinghttp://youtu.be/EGgeZWskEs8DesignMoonBot (from the family steampunk bedtime RPG 2007-2013) vs. a crate and lamps.https://youtu.be/h2P2Ve-oZ1U AestheticsIn November 1999, I was blogging about books, camomile tea and Skylon 4, the death of Star…In November 1999, I was blogging about …CybercultureBeing a deaf lipreader during a pandemic means increased social anxietyEven social events are a minefield.…
A Google self-study found that its own most successful employees had soft skills, such as mentoring ability, empathy, and critical thinking and problem-solving. “Those traits sound more like what one gains as an English or theater major than as a programmer,” according to the Washington Post. [A]mong the eight most important qualities of Google’s top…
Instead of flagging links to questionable news items, Facebook will instead hide them. Which is nice, but it still means we have to trust the algorithm Facebook uses. (Don’t trust Facebook to filter your news for you.) False news undermines the unique value that Facebook offers: the ability for you to connect with family and…
“Dammit Mom, I’m a daughter, not a theoretician!” — the girl, responding to a pointed rhetorical question. Know Your Meme Similar:I almost cried when I saw this entrance to the children's section of the Kansas City …PersonalCome see Carolyn and her talented castmates in The Fantasticks (Theatre Factory, Trafford …PersonalWhat kids do when Dad won't…
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No spoilers here. (I managed to avoid all spoilers, and hadn’t even seen the trailer. I did see still pics of porgs, though, and I knew the name of the character the StarWars Bros were hating on, so thank you to everyone who did their part to keep the secrets.) No intellectual critical distance for…
In the bird-flight simulator at the Pittsburgh Aviary, the girl twists and turns, careening around buildings, dive-bombing alleyways, and comes to a perfect landing in the middle of the street just as her timer runs out. The boy immediately heads up to clear the buildings, then flies toward the horizon to see how far he…
Pope Francis recently addressed Italian journalists: Your voice, free and responsible, is fundamental for the growth of any society that wishes to be called democratic, so that the continuous exchange of ideas and a profitable debate based on real and correctly reported data can be guaranteed. In our time, often dominated by the anxiety of…
If you were this person’s attorney, you’d probably want this social media blurb phrased a little differently. The headline attached to the story is clearer. Yes, the social media blurb is shorter, but I’d rather cut the “Twp” and make room for the unambiguous “and.” Derry man accused of assaulting female witness and attorney jailed…
Right now, I’m teaching “American Lit 1915-Present” for the last time. It’s the companion course to “American Lit 1800-1915,” which I’ll also never teach again. They are required courses for English majors who need to cover American Lit, but they were also designed to serve as electives. My colleagues and I have trouble covering the depth that we know our English majors need, without overwhelming students who are just looking to sample a bit of AmLit to fulfill a course requirement. So we’ve revamped both these courses, starting next fall. One new course will be “American Lit 1776-Present,” which will obviously cover fewer works than we can fit into 2 terms, but the benefit is we can be confident that any student who’s taken the course will have a clearer understanding of the scope of American literature. Another new course will be “Topics in American Literature,” which will allow us to go into some depth, without needing to cover a little bit of everything. I’m thinking of picking the focus “Literature and Government,” which could include “Rip Van Winkle,” All the King’s Men, To Kill a Mockingbird, Invisible Man (Ellison, not H.G. Wells) and Farhenheit 451.
“If you want to preserve democracy as we know it, you have to have a free and many times adversarial press… And without it, I am afraid that we would lose so much of our individual liberties over time. That’s how dictators get started.” — Republican Senator John McCain, in a Feb 2017 interview on…
The euphoria of getting my grades in Friday was short-lived. Similar:I've missed doing this! Another 10 sq cm of #steampunk control panel goodness. #blender3d …AestheticsHaven (TNG Rewatch, Season 1, Episode 10) When a low-stakes rom-com shows Troi's beau and …Rewatching Star Trek: The Next Generatio…MediaHappy Easter 2019 Current_EventsSon took out trash w/o being asked; daughter…
Similar:My crazy Friday night involved tweaking the graphic for an #MLAstyle instructional web pag…AcademiaNot a #carguy but I pried open the hatch of the van to change 4 bulbs. #adulting PersonalOur 2014 class banner was an iPad. I can’t believe I just noticed that today.PersonalUpdating a villain's lair in #Blender3D. Still a work in progress.AestheticsPOV:…
Similar:Visiting the KLBE Air MuseumPersonalThe chief engineer has a forward-facing station, on a platform above the technical staff c…PersonalOver the years I have leveled up my Blender3D skills.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CNLArSlF…AestheticsIf you win the very first time you play a game, that means you are skilled and brilliant, …AwesomeSome editing and cropping makes this cartoon a perennial. EthicsRandom…
Similar:Kate Upton and Ryan Gosling Explain the SequesterApparently these are two famous and phys…AestheticsOne of my students is demonstrating the perceived value of brand-name vs no-name products…. PersonalAn apology to Donald Trump, from the "fake news" mediaA good example of the power of satire. …CultureI baked about 12 million vertices of steampunk control panel geometry into…
Similar:Attending the Texture Contemporary Ballet.PersonalCarolyn as Maria in West Side StoryPersonalCaptain Gearheart inspects progress on his #neovictorian #steampunk æther cruiser. Now fea…https://youtu.be/VXz7kspFimM AestheticsOn the Virtues of a Dadsplained Literary ChildhoodThe last book I read to her was Wutherin…BooksAnother visit to downtown Pittsburgh with my history-loving son.CultureSpaghetti dinner with my son.Personal
Similar:A Brazilian couple bought a deforested ranch and spent decades planting over 2 million tre…A Brazilian couple bought a deforested r…PersonalHere's to the grim-based photojournalist who saved my bacon ~35 years ago Here’s to you, grim-faced photojournal…AcademiaA merry look at journalism in the classic "The Year without a Santa Claus"PersonalHelping students find my office (St.…
This clever freshman writing student created a project in Texture, which is designed for branching narratives (such as the Choose Your Own Adventure stories). In the next few screens, he put up nodes showing older and more recent writing samples, asked me to choose which one showed the better writing technique, and gave me feedback…