Yesterday was a very long work day for me. Lately I’ve been teaching a class that begins at 7 am, so I had to get up at the unholy hour of 5:15. After class ended at 11 am, I had a couple of meetings (one planned, one not) and then filled in for a colleague [...]
Author Archive
Gimme Some Skin
I played the Uncle Walt’s Band version of this song at the last record club. I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to find the original and this clip. Wowza.
The accidental genius of students
Apparently, in my class we have been working on “reading comprevention”.
Death may have no mercy, but it frequently offers some fascinating stories
I’m a big fan of the obituaries page in the Sunday paper. It may seem a little morbid, but I love the mini-biographies and micro-histories of the semi-famous and somewhat influential that can be found there. Reading an interesting, well-written obituary is among the most entertaining ways to learn a sliver of knowledge about a [...]
Catching up with Steve
Dave said it first, “Steve will end up either a house painter or a banker.” Well, he’s landed a job at a brokerage firm. The next phase begins Monday.
Torn and Frayed
As I walked out of our building Sunday morning, I noticed some bits of paper scattered on the sidewalk. It was a photograph that someone had torn up and thrown on the ground. Curious, I felt compelled to pick up the pieces and re-assemble the picture. It’s impossible to know what percentage of torn-up photos [...]
A wonderland of giant crystals
Check out the amazing photos in this article. Those people aren’t photoshopped in. They are dwarfed by giant underground crystals in Mexico.
Your kids can dance to it while it wins a war
Anyone interested in music, history, technology, and how all three sometimes converge will find Dave Tompkins’s recently published book How to Wreck a Nice Beach fascinating reading. It’s a history of the vocoder from its development in the 30s by Bell Labs as a voice encryptor for the US Military to its infiltration of techno [...]
