For the longest time I wouldn’t read non-fiction books outside of work or school. “What is this non-fiction for pleasure you speak of?” The key wasn’t to follow what’s necessarily popular, best-sellers on history, politics, or purely goal-oriented how-to books. The key was to start with my gut-level (as it were) interests: food, travel, biology. […]
Category Archives: Library
Encyclopedia of Life: Initial launch
Saturday, 5 April 2008
Last year I had eagerly anticipated the arrival of the Encyclopedia of Life (EoL). Entries on individual species became viewable on 28 February, a few months earlier than the projected mid-2008 deadline. Coolness! Currently they have twenty-four exemplar species pages, tens of thousands of authenticated (but not detailed) species pages, and about a million other […]
Zot!
Sunday, 16 March 2008
Last month Kam was clearing out a bunch of her comics, and while going through the boxes, I came upon five later issues of Scott McCloud’s Zot! Seeing them reminded me that I had only the first three graphic novels (the only three Kitchen Sink Press published before they went down the sink), and had […]
Cinequest 2008
Tuesday, 11 March 2008
This is the first year we decided to not see any of the shorts collections at Cinequest. Instead we watched five films from around the globe. So how did the 18th Annual San José Film Festival go? The Aerial (La Antena). Directed by Esteban Sapir, Argentina 2006, black and white. In the City, oppressively controlled […]
Books worth rereading
Sunday, 27 January 2008
Why bother rereading books at all? Isn’t it like, as Pink Floyd put it, merely “running over the same old ground,”(*) avoiding going forward or ignoring new stories? Nope, not at all! Reading a favorite book again is like eating one’s favorite comfort dish. Something to curl up with and savor. As exciting and satisfying […]
LibraryThing’s top unread books meme
Thursday, 4 October 2007
A couple of friends have posted responses to LibraryThing’s top unread books lists. Aha! I thought, a good way to write about books I have (or, er, haven’t) read. This is a popular blogging meme, yet none of the blogs (mostly on LiveJournal) include a link to the actual list —perhaps because it’s dynamically generated […]
Paprika
Tuesday, 11 September 2007
The feature-length animé Paprika has been my favorite movie this year. (Easily surpassing Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, fun as it was, as well as the films seen at Cinequest. Yes, I rarely go out for movies.) Directed by Satoshi Kon, who worked on Perfect Blue and Paranoia Agent, it contains his […]
Dragging my feet
Tuesday, 4 September 2007
This site is about my hobbies. I’ve posted a lot on food, a little about software, and even a teensy bit about gardening and plants. But I haven’t written up much about another big interest of mine: stories. Novels, comic books, animation, and occasionally television and movies. I just love consuming tales and histories! I’ve […]
Hello GreenCine, Goodbye Netflix
Monday, 11 June 2007
After a couple months of testing, I’ve decided to continue my DVD rentals through GreenCine, instead of Netflix. (As well as borrowing more from local libraries. :-D) The first four or so years with Netflix was both fun and useful. But the throttling killed it for me. While it’s great that I could export my […]
Experiments in online DVD rental services
Wednesday, 4 April 2007
I’ve been a Netflix customer for over six years. I had been pleased with their service, until a couple years ago when I noticed that they stopped Saturday shipments, as well as began throttling the delivery of the DVDs. Needless to say, the newer, slower service disappointed me. I heard about GreenCine last year. They’re […]