I'm eight years old or so. It's a weekday afternoon, early summer I think, and I flip on the TV and turn the dial (the dial) on the front to WETA Channel 26, expecting to see the last couple of minutes of Mister Roger's Neighborhood which even to my eight-year old… Read full post »

At this point in my life, I am forced to admit I'm unlikely to ever achieve my dream of being a Big Name (or at least Mid-List) Author.   I'm terrible at novel writing.  I've got ideas, and I can create the bare-bones of a plot, but I'm a failure at creating… Read full post »

In this collection of the first three adventures written by Harry Harrison, we meet inerstellar con-man turn super spy, James "The Stainless Steel Rat" DiGriz, as he gives his life of crime (barely) to fight crime, and watch him booze, smoke and pill pop his way across the galaxy fighting interstella… Read full post »

No, that's not a joke headline.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/10/27/china_peoples_daily_google_censorship_accusation/

 And they keep saying that irony is dead Read full post »

Land of the Lost was an odd duck on the 70's Saturday morning television landscape. Created by Star Trek writing alumni David Gerrold, and produced by "H.R. Pufnstuf" pioneers Sid and Marty Kroftt, it was a shoestring budget show with surprisingly effective stop motion dinosaur effects, awful puppetr… Read full post »

Confession: I used to eat Clive Cussler novels when I was a teenager.  I first got hooked on Raise the Titantic, encouraged by a brief comic serialization of the novel that ran in the Washington Post back when the book first came out.   That led me to A Night to Remember and… Read full post »

Dear Nobel Commitee,

 While I realize that "Not being George W. Bush" is in fact a great thing to be, and President Obama is remarkably accomplished at rhetoric, I really think he should be given a chance to actually... y'know... do something before being awarded the Nobel Prize.  Because f… Read full post »

Summary: Mau is having a bad day.  After spending a month on the Boy's Island in the Southern Pelagic Ocean (an AU version of the South Pacific), he's sailing home in his hand carved canoe, having finished the rites of manhood, leaving his boyhood behind and ready to recieve his first… Read full post »

...and tomorrow will be 9/12.  Deal.

 There was an article in the Washington Post this morning about how a new generation of schoolchildren are learning about 9/11 merely as pages in their history books.   For which I'm profoundly grateful.  I'm tired of that tragedy being pr… Read full post »

Re-read this one after having sit on my shelf for well over a decade. It was worth it. :)

Summary: Two years after having crash-landed on the icy world of Tran-Ky-Ky, travelling salesman turned adventurer Ethan Fortune is well and ready to return to warmer planets, as is his companions Skua September,… Read full post »

Just got to thinking about this while reading a post by Nick Leishi about Isaac Asimov.  He was waxing enthusiastically about the potential for turning more Asimov stories into films, but I politely disagreed with him, pointing out that Asimov was better at putting forth ideas than creating… Read full post »

I get most of my news from two sources these days, the Washington Post and NPR's Morning Edition/All Things Considered (with a side of BBC's online news for international stuff). Back when I was a kid though, I got it from watching the CBS News with my parents in the evening,… Read full post »

Did his "undisclosed location" become located?  Is he summering in the Hamptons?  Did he (gasp!) quit when he failed to sway any Salon readers via the logic of his arguments?  Enquiring minds want to know! Read full post »