Dad, Lisa Costello and I are leaving this morning for 12/30 and 12/31 medical consultations at NIH. We are flying so early so as to avoid being trapped by possible weather delays over the weekend, and thus missing the appointments ( Read more... )

Learning a language is like learning to drive a car, and studying linguistics is like learning to become a mechanic.

Interactive dialect map

5 lies you were told about grief - (Thanks to Lisa Costello.)

Let’s Talk About Death - The conservation project. (Thanks to Lisa Costello.)

How to change the world $1 at a time - Guerrilla bank marketing ( Read more... )

Getting the brain MRI this past Wednesday was a pretty tedious process.

First of all, in the continuing tradition of a daily crisis in my life, just as I was sitting down to dinner with Lisa Costello, Jersey Girl in Portland and C-, the hospital called to tell me that their MRI machine was down and my appointment that evening was cancelled ( Read more... )

Interview: Jay Lake - Ken Scholes interviews me for Lightspeed.

Hobbit's Gollum Lacked Precioussss Vitamins - An offbeat study, released on Sunday, which concludes that the evil characters in J.R.R. Tolkien's "The Hobbit" lost their battle against men, elves and dwarves because they suffered from vitamin deficiency. Uh… Rickets. Yeah. (Via David ( Read more... )

Skip the Supplements - I can tell from long experience as a cancer patient being treated with chemotherapy, all those ‘natural’ supplements can be a real problem. Many of the things people take thinking to protect their body can also protect the cancer from the effects of chemotherapy, for example. Good luck figuring that out by talking to anyone ( Read more... )

NSA forces novelist to scrap book - Hah. Charlie Stross from the other end of the telescope. (Via Dad.)

Hubble Space Telescope Sees Evidence of Water Vapor Venting Off Jupiter Moon - (Via Bruce Taylor.)

What You Get When You Pour Molten Aluminum Into An Ant Hill - Wow…

Strange gelatinous creature gives hints of the first animals on Earth - The ( Read more... )

Elevenses And Then Some: How To Prepare A Feast Fit For A Hobbit - Now that’s a lot of food… (Via Lisa Costello.)

Benedict Cumberbatch sees Smaug as sexy

Misheard for the holidays: When good song lyrics go bad - (Thanks to Dad.)

The Best of the Worst Logo Designs - Oh geeze. (I think I got this from Steve Buchheit, but I have lost the source.

( Read more... )

Dementia: Terry Pratchett 'angry' with government

Meet Your Body’s Death Eaters - From brain to blood to bone, macrophages take out our cellular trash. (Via Daily Idioms, Annotated.)

Calvin and Hobbes on ebooks - Hahahah.

Twitter’s World - Languages and Twitter.

Prosthetic Arm Found in Second-Hand Shop - Ah, headlines.

Irrefutable Proof that ( Read more... )

So, the Clayton Memorial Medical Fund has been a big presence in my life these past few years, helping me financially at times of great need. (I did not need them this year, as it happens, thanks to all your generosity with the Sequence a Science Fiction Writer fundraiser back at the beginning of the year.) Their reserve funds are running low, and ( Read more... )

The most beautiful death - Aldous Huxley's "most beautiful death" was described by his wife in a moving letter.

The “Copenhagen left” - A bicycle maneuver I have used without ever knowing it had a name. (Via Daily Idioms, Annotated.)

Heyday app is the anti-Facebook for the iPhone

Mercier 1937 Moto Chenille 350cc 1 cyl ohv - Wow is that weird. ( ( Read more... )