- What Was Inside the Glowing Briefcase in Pulp Fiction?
Before I started making my own web pages, I spent a not-insignificant amount of my time on the Internet trawling the alt.fan.tarantino newsgroup for bits of knowledge about Quentin Tarantino, Pulp Fiction, and Reservoir Dogs.
Fascinating! (well not really, but still v.cool)
- iPad Pro (2018) Impressions
(to the tune of Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer) You know ‘Ticci and Gruber, @panzer and Ritchie… Marco and Jason, Joe and Rosemary… But do you recall, the most famous YouTuber of all? MKB(in)HD, had a very shiny Pro… Um, so, yeah.
My favourite kind of review is one written by ‘real people’. - In Defence of Hate
Hate can be valid and powerful, but far often it’s misused and misguided.
- American Women of the Far Right
In the run-up to the violence last year around the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, a woman named Erika, who is active in the white supremacist group Identity Evropa, was busy posting on Discord, an app originally used by gamers but used at that time by some on the far right.
Important to remember, that there are all genders involved in this. The men are the figureheads, but there are many other people supporting them.
- Your City Has a Gender and It’s Male
Why city designers are increasingly thinking about the female perspective. I have a secret to tell you about my city,” she says. “It has to do with what Eve Ensler calls the feminine cell.” It was the autumn of 2016.
Rings true for Glasgow.
- Thanks David Dimbleby. Now maybe Question Time can get with the times
Imagine the joy of turning to David “Brexit will be a walk in the park” Davis, live on TV, and saying: “Some people might think you ARE the joke about Brexit.” Last night David Dimbleby showed why he has been able to choose his own abdication date.
Not a show I watch because UGH.
- The best doesn’t exist. A psychologist explains why we can’t stop searching.
Given that we live in a consumer culture where you can get anything — a T-shirt, fancy whiskey, blood pressure medication — delivered to your door within hours, it is surprisingly difficult to buy things.
I feel this. Well, I used to (hang on, am I getting wiser as I get older?!)
- Data From Millions Of Smartphone Journeys Proves Cyclists Faster In Cities Than Cars And Motorbikes
Smartphone data from riders and drivers schlepping meals for restaurant-to-home courier service Deliveroo shows that bicycles are faster than cars. In towns and cities, bicyclists are also often faster than motorized two-wheelers. Deliveroo works with 30,000 riders and drivers in 13 countries.
Now we just need the cities to step up and deliver the infrastructure.
- Not Here to Dance
This is the story of the greatest night of my entire life. This is about a moment from the Ballon d’Or ceremony that I will never forget, even if I lived 200 years. It has nothing to do with dancing.
Yes to this. Sport is so very visible, and men are still such jackasses.
- AlphaZero: Shedding new light on the grand games of chess, shogi and Go
In late 2017 we introduced AlphaZero, a single system that taught itself from scratch how to master the games of chess, shogi (Japanese chess), and Go, beating a world-champion program in each case.
How a computer started to learn like a human.
- How I Quit Apple, Microsoft, Google, Facebook, and Amazon
It was just before closing time at a Verizon store in Bushwick, New York last May when I burst through the door, sweaty and exasperated. I had just sprinted—okay I walked, but briskly—from another Verizon outlet a few blocks away in the hopes I’d make it before they closed shop for the night.
tl:dr; it’s very very hard.
- This is What Happens to Kids’ Brains When They Talk To Alexa
While I bathe my 3-year-old daughter Marty each evening, we use Alexa to play music — usually a head-spinning rotation of her three favorite songs from Frozen.
Pause for thought. We really don’t know the longer reaching implications for so much of the technology we use these days.
- The technology that could end traffic jams
We’ve all been there. Stuck at traffic lights that never seem to change to green. Sitting in queues of cars that stretch on for miles or delayed by a glut of slow traffic that suddenly disappears. Traffic jams are a blight on our modern, fast moving lives.
A real bugbear, I know this technology exists, let’s use it!
- Tibet Is Going Crazy for Hoops
It was within such a village, Zorge Ritoma, that Dugya Bum, a sheep and yak herder from the Golden Stone Clan, took up the sport.
Zen basketball, see also; Chicago Bulls of the late 80s.
- A dog’s life: What would I sacrifice for the animal I love?
I lifted Scout from her dog bed the way the surgeon had instructed, one arm cradling her bottom and the other under her front legs, and gently carried her to my bed.
No, YOU’VE got something in your eye.
- The Endurance of A Christmas Carol
On January 2, 1840, Dickens wrote to his printers, Bradbury and Evans, to thank them for their annual Christmas gift of a turkey. He chose his words with care:
What’s this, what’s this! A christmas article!
- Year in Pictures 2018
It was a year of populist rebellions and political stare-downs. China’s ambitious expansions raised hackles and pollution levels. Trade patterns were upended, and long-standing bans were lifted. Women gained power, and refugees fled violence and starvation.
A picture tells… etc etc
- Penny Marshall, ‘Laverne & Shirley’ Star, Director, Dies at 75
Penny Marshall, who starred alongside Cindy Williams in the hit ABC comedy “Laverne & Shirley” and then became a successful movie director, died on Monday night, Variety has confirmed. She was 75.
I did not know she directed the movies she directed!
- The Rise of Anxiety Baking
Last winter, a recipe for salted chocolate-chunk shortbread cookies spread through my social circle like a carbohydrate epidemic. One of my friends kept seeing the cookies pop up on Instagram and, relenting to digital peer pressure, eventually made them.
Makes sense. I do enjoy baking, although mostly the eating part at the end.
- That Time Marines Dumped Millions of Dollars of Helicopters Into the Ocean to Save One Family
Few feats of engineering are as impressive as a military-grade helicopter.
Wow. In the midst of that war, at least there was a tiny glimmer of decency.
- Real Christmas trees are the greener choice
A fake Christmas tree has some obvious advantages over the real thing. There’s no sticky sap. No needles shedding everywhere.
We always had a fake tree. Time to review that choice.
- Prime and punishment
Last August, Zac Plansky woke to find that the rifle scopes he was selling on Amazon had received 16 five-star reviews overnight. Usually, that would be a good thing, but the reviews were strange.
Is Amazon too big to legislate?
- “Friends”: The television show that keeps on giving
Fans of the hit TV show “Friends” were relieved last week to see the sitcom’s 236 episodes will continue streaming on Netflix through 2019.
I am very guilty of rewatching. And yes, Ross just gets worse.
- The Best of 2018’s Bad Restaurant Reviews
The year 2018 gave us all plenty to complain about, and it was no different for restaurant criticism.
AH-MAZ-ING.
- 12 Reasons To Ditch The Diet Mentality
It’s the end of the year, which means resolution season is right around the corner.
Yes to this! Although I may have gone a little too far into the ‘not giving a shit what I eat’ zone…
- The Story of Dyngo, a War Dog Brought Home From Combat
It was late—an indistinguishable, bleary-eyed hour. The lamps in the living room glowed against the black spring night. In front of me was a large dog, snapping his jaws so hard that his teeth gave a loud clack with each bark. His eyes were locked on me, desperate for the toy I was holding.
What is it with stories about dogs… *sniff*