Author: Nate

Upcoming books: “Without Warning”

John Birmingham’s latest, Without Warning has showed up on Amazon. Looks great, although it isn’t out in the US until February. If I make it to Asia again this fall, I may get it early … as I was able to do with Final Impact, since they get the Aussie editions at some of the Kinokuniyas there (can’t, at this point, remember if it was the Singapore one or the then-new Siam Paragon one in Bangkok.)

It does lead to the interesting question of whether to pre-order (then cancel, if I get it in Asia) or whether to wait to see if the fall vacation (A) happens, and (B) if it’s Asia or Buenos Aires… lots of steak plus the 32.5k mile Citi award (*) make for a tempting option, even with hotel and other prices once I’m on the ground so much higher.

(* vs 40k usually, and 70k for Asia… seeing as I’ve made PLT for the year, this is a good chance to burn miles rather than earn them.)

Rap Battles, translated.

Warning, NSFW.

Perhaps more amusing than the actual video is the near-Rickroll-like email the URL for this was included in:

Obama/McCain Debate Preview

The debates are only a couple weeks away, and it may be worth discussing the
strengths of the respective candidates on the floor.

One trippy film

Just watched Wild in the Streets on cable, and thought I’d leave a note here since it’s exactly the sort of film I see once and then a couple of years later think:

What was that 60s film about youth taking over the country?

So by writing about it here, hopefully I’ll find it more easily. It’s sort of like a prequel to Logan’s Run, minus the whole “overpopulation” angle.

Sadly, like two other movies I’d really like to see again(*), it’s not out on DVD.

(* The Dark Secret of Harvest Home[**] and Coming out from the Ice)
(** btw the book of this one is good.)

Obama vs. Dukakis

We really need to get over this whole “Mr. Nice Democrat” thing. We don’t need post-partisanship, or less partisanship… we need BETTER progressive partisanship, and candidates who will give the strong rhetorical and ideological boots-in-the-rear to the conservatives.

It seems like Democrats only do that in the primaries… and that’s exactly the time when we don’t need it, since it gives ammunition to the other side. But against the Republicans, there should be no mercy.

Must-see image: Frizza vending machine

The End Is Near

And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Tombstone Deep Dish Pizza, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with vending machine pizza, and with high-fructose corn syrup, and with trans-fatty acids, and with all the beasts of the earth.

Must go look. It’s horrific. Frozen pizza vending machine. Ugh.

“VPILF”

Ok, there hasn’t been much political discussion this time around, mostly because I’m getting most of my political news via the same half-dozen Democratic blogs that you probably are. This time, though, I had to comment on McCain’s VP choice… not because I either approve or disapprove but rather because a meme that popped up around her was just too amusing.

And that’s the subject line of the title: “VPILF,” which is the latest spin off of “MILF”… now, if you have been sitting under a rock since “American Pie” came out, “MILF” means “Mother I’d like to (expletive deleted)” … and well, VP for Vice President.

To an extent, Gov. Palin is on the younger side and has courted a “sexy” image in the press (see for example, her appearance in Vogue), but… what does this say about how seriously she’s going to be taken on the stump?

“It’s an honor just to be mentioned.”

I tried Cuil today, and was generally unimpressed – Google still does a much better job of finding the relevant pages, whatever the index size. Further, in the absolutely critical job of ego-googling myself, Google has a lot more of my personal web pages indexed… as opposed to LinkedIn or various index sites referencing my pair of grad school papers, or the one annoying of all, sites mirroring various USENET groups and old mailing lists I post or posted on.

The one very amusing thing that Cuil DID find was a recent LJ/blog post critiquing a graph in the first of my two grad school papers: Your Graph is Bad and You Should Feel Bad

As an aside, there is a rather lame blogmeme sitting in my lifejournal (cubicle_hermit) which will probably be erased, but for those interested, you might look now.

HCHS Represent

Heh. At least we got mentioned:

The Public Elites
Some schools didn’t make our list because their students are too good. The best of the best.

NEWSWEEK’s Challenge Index is designed to recognize schools that challenge average students, and not magnet or charter schools that draw only the best students in their areas. These top performers, listed below in alphabetical order, were excluded from the list of top high schools because, despite their exceptional quality, their sky-high SAT and ACT scores indicate they have few or no average students.

[snippage to lower on the page]

Hunter College High School, New York City: College prep school that serves grades 7-12 and is tied to the City University of New York system.

Oddly enough, Bronx Science got better sounding coverage than Stuyvesant, and Brooklyn Tech wasn’t mentioned at all.

(This was accidentally set as a Page, rather than a Post. It was originally posted on May 19th)