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photos by Lara Shipley

Entries from November 2007

The Cake Is a Lie!

November 6th, 2007 · 8 Comments

I am not ordinarily a big player of video games—and so, a fortiori, not a frequent watcher-of-YouTubes in which other people play video games. But the final battle sequence from the surprise-hit Portal is really worth a look. The game itself looks entertaining, and even features (what struck me as) an innovative play mechanism: You […]

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Tags: Random Cool Link

Redesign Thoughts

November 5th, 2007 · 13 Comments

I’m tempted to just let the redesign be a surprise, but it seems silly to deprive myself of the wisdom of people who actually know something about design, if there are any of you out there. So, below the fold (for those of you who prefer surprises) a very, very rough/tentative mockup of what the […]

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Tags: Administrativa

Unholy Alliance

November 5th, 2007 · 3 Comments

Well, this is just depressing. I had expressed puzzlement a few years back when Antony Flew, the British philosopher best known as an articulate defender of atheism, professed conversion to deism for what struck me as rather poor reasons. But hey, people change their minds for dubious reasons all the time, and I didn’t give […]

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Tags: Religion

Bastian, Say My Name!

November 4th, 2007 · 2 Comments

I’m getting set to do a redesign and relaunch of this website and blog, and I’m thinking it’s time to bid farewell to “Notes from the Lounge” and rechristen the enterprise with a title more fitted to its content. That’s a sufficiently personal thing that I’ll probably end up having to come up with a […]

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Tags: Administrativa

Unused but Vital?

November 4th, 2007 · Comments Off on Unused but Vital?

There have been plenty of links over the weekend to this ABC News story, which is generally interpreted as saying that waterboarding was only ever used, very briefly, on three detainees, and that its use was discontinued way back in 2003. (I’m not sure why this is being treated as a novel disclosure: NBC had […]

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Tags: War

I Can Now Die Happy

November 2nd, 2007 · 1 Comment

Warren Ellis has apparently read (or at least seen) my comics article. For a sense of how cool I find this, recall that I dressed like this a couple Halloweens ago. And I look like an ass with my head shaved.

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Tags: Self Promotion

Requisite Linguistic Kvetch of the Day

November 2nd, 2007 · Comments Off on Requisite Linguistic Kvetch of the Day

If you are not British or being deliberately pseudo-formal (and even this is kind of twee), it just looks silly when you write “whilst” instead of “while.”

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Tags: Language and Literature

Dance for Me, Peons, Dance! Moo-hoo-ha-ha-hah!

November 2nd, 2007 · 5 Comments

Amanda Marcotte exercises her uncanny, quasi-mystical power to peer into the dark, shrouded heart of the libertarian. Among her discoveries: We were all staunch supporters of the war, and think that the rich are morally superior to the poor (who, by the way, they own like chattel). Who knew?

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Tags: Libertarian Theory

You May Address Me as “Dear Sir”

November 2nd, 2007 · Comments Off on You May Address Me as “Dear Sir”

Starting next week, I’ll be contributing occasionally to The Economist‘s Democracy in America as a guest blogger. Per their policy, the posts won’t be attributed, but I figure those of you who’ve been reading for a while will probably recognize the flavour of my prose through the Britishisms.

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Tags: Self Promotion

Mahler? I Barely Know ‘Er!

November 2nd, 2007 · 4 Comments

A few weeks ago, my regular pub trivia team took over the rotating hosting duties at our weekly game at Wonderland. Teammate and Reasonoid Dave Weigel and I decided to close with an audio round, split into two parts: Dave did five questions about his beloved mash-ups, and I did five about 20th century composers, […]

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Tags: Art & Culture