So how’s this for a science-fiction idea come to life: there’s a village high up in the Italian Alps that goes without sunlight for three months out of the year, so the townsfolks have erected a giant mirror to reflect some rays into the town’s piazza during the winter. It even tracks the sun under computer control to maximize the usable light yield. What a stroke of genius… so long as there are safeguards to prevent some evil genius from refining the mirror’s focus into a coherent heat-beam and zapping people into ashes, of course…

Today’s temporal coordinates, according to the whacked-out clock over the platform where I board my morning train: 12:45 PM, January 1, 2094.

So now time is running in reverse. (Remember, yesterday was January 2.) On the positive side, maybe my hair will start to grow back.

When I left the house this morning, it was about 8:15 AM on December 11, 2006. Twenty minutes later — at least according to my subjective experiences — the digital clock on the train platform informed me that it was now 10:05 AM, January 2, 2094. I can only assume that my car somehow approached the speed of light as I drove from my house to the park-n-ride lot.

I always thought the future would be much shinier than this. How disappointing.

It was on a somewhat, ahem, hazy morning in Cambridge, England that the redoubtable Cranky Robert and myself first beheld the wonder we came to call “birth con-poles.” (The morning was actually beautiful and sunny, as best as I can recall; it was Robert and me that were hazy. You can draw your own conclusions as to why.)

Continue Reading…

Here are a few things that have been amusing me as I’ve waited for this afternoon’s forecasted snow to arrive:

Continue Reading…

I should’ve known better than to publicly state that I was going to do lots of blogging over the holiday weekend, because everytime I do that, I end up getting busy with other things and not writing a word. This weekend was no different — I found time to watch Magnum Force (the best of the four sequels to Clint Eastwood’s iconic Dirty Harry), participate in a buddy’s film-related experiment (I think he’d prefer that I say no more about that subject right now), and do some cleaning and maintenance work around the house, but no blogging to speak of. Obviously. Which is probably why I could do no better than this on the Bloglebrity front:

So, let’s see, D-List… that would put me about on par with who? The Coreys? Or one of the “stars” of television’s Big Brother? Oy… which would be worse, to be has-been or a never-was?

The old brick-pile, as I like to think of my office building, is growing very, very quiet as, one by one, my co-workers sneak off for an early start on their four-day weekends. I’m about ready to call it a week myself. I hope and intend to do some major blogging this weekend — there are a number of subjects I’ve been wanting to write about and putting off — but for now I’ll just leave you with the following holiday-themed amusement:

If I don’t see you, Happy Gluttony!

Just in time for Annual Mass Consumption Day, the maniacs at the Jones Soda Company have unveiled their limited-edition holiday flavors for 2006: Turkey and Gravy (a perennial favorite), Sweet Potato, Dinner Roll, Pea, and the one that’s sure be the big hit of the set, Antacid Flavored Soda. A note on the web page notes that the 2006 Holiday Pack also includes a “medicinal cup for accurate servings.” I imagine that’s especially important for the Antacid soda.

And just in case you have any room left after downing your Thanksgiving meal in soda form, why don’t you pick up the special Dessert Pack, too? It contains a bottle each of Cherry Pie, Banana Cream Pie, Key Lime Pie, Apple Pie, and Blueberry Pie-flavored soda.

Mouth-watering, isn’t it?