Microblog

Awaiting rescue. One of those times when there are so many things you realise you should on have done… for instance kept the breakdown number somewhere in the car!

Update: The RAC were brilliant. Turned out to be a flat battery caused by putting hazard lights on when I pulled over. Lots of lessons learned tonight.

Seems that there never was a drone. Great article by Samira Shackle.

The Mystery of the Gatwick Drone | The Guardian

Even grumpy old me was delighted with Ahsoka Tano’s appearance in the latest episode of The Mandalorian. Not so much Baby Yoda’s real name. But the prospect of Thrawn…

Not sure how this has happened but evening seems to be still there on my macbook. I thought it had wiped everything but it seems to have only installed updates. Phew! I must sort out how backing up better.

This was inevitable and I am cross with myself. Why did I leave the OS installer as a bootable option? Why do I keep so many files I’m using in a folder I deliberately don’t sync? Why did I decide to update OSX and not keep an eye on what it was doing? Agghhh!!! Maybe its my unconscious conspiring to encourage me to get a new macbook.

Interesting piece by Alex Hern warning of the possible dangers of ubiquitous wearing of “mirrorshade” AR glasses. It seems that Apple and other companies are very close to releasing ones that could be adopted by millions of people. Hern sees it as the continued trend of turninh humans into man-machine cyborgs:

“What will human interaction look like eight years after smartglasses become ubiquitous? Our cyborg present sneaked up on us as our phones became glued to our hands. Are we going to sleepwalk into our cyborg future in the same way? “

www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/nov/25/part-human-part-machine-is-apple-turning-us-all-into-cyborgs

“The persistent trick of modern politics – that appears to fool us repeatedly – is to disguise economic and political interests as cultural movements.”

Another SUPERB article by George Monbiot.

Made a quick read-through video for Micronauts #1.

Finished working through all my Micronauts issues (checking condition and rebagging) which has been a delight. Really interesting to look at sequencing covers and trying to identify the artists. The title suffered from shockingly erratic quality of covers which probably didn’t help sales.

Thought Soren might like to learn to play Magic. Impressively, the starter kit costs £6 and holds your hand through the first game. I’m hoping it might lure him towards more Fantasy and going to tie it in with an “upgrade” in the type of fiction he reads.

I’ve been working from home this week and been on my own during the day. Sometimes I’ve heard small footsteps running across one of the upstairs rooms. Like a child running. I’ve dismissed it as my imagination. Now, there’s a slow, non-stop muffled sound of something hitting a wall repeatedly from somewhere in the darkness of the house. Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud.

The original Marvel Micronauts run was 59 issues followed by 20. Have been rebagging ones I’ve just bought. Only missing one issue: the final #58. One issue has a mark on the cover which is obvious and spoils it so I’m going to look for a replacement.

Wow. I was hunting down an issue of BEM online (#24 if you’re interested) when I stumbled on what appears to be the entire digital run of the classic British fanzine from the late-70s/early-80s. The Classic Comics Zines site is pretty amazing. An incredible archive of an incredible pre-internet period.

‘There does not seem to be a particular benefit to practicing retrieval mapping over a standard free recall learning activity. “

Learning Scientists blog

The third season of the BBC’s The Lovecraft Investigations seems to have aired. Strange, as I was only wondering what had happened to the programme a couple of days ago. It’s an enjoyable – but definitely British – interpretation of Lovecraft’s stories.

Informative short video from Overlord Comics about Mantlo and Golden’s early issues of The Micronauts. A number of things I didn’t know and an interview in BEM to track down.

Just turned on the radio in our kitchen and there’s a programme about how far pigs roam in the New Forest.

I’m closing in on completing the entire run of Marvel’s Micronauts from the 1980s. Fabulous cover on #57 by Jackson Guice.

I’m still listening to Barbarians, the new Young Knives album. It’s been over a month now and I’m still so impressed. The title track and Sheep Tick tie as fabourites for me.