The Journeyman Project series rules, as most people should be aware. This is a 1992 preview of the first game in the series.
I kind of get giddy whenever I see the “This presentation was created using MacroMind Director” message anywhere. BLAST FROM THE PAST
Jesus’ Wife Mentioned on Fourth-Century Papyrus Fragment
Elizabeth Lopatto, Bloomberg:
A scrap of papyrus dated to the fourth century has written on it in the ancient Coptic language, “Jesus said to them, my wife,” reopening the debate about whether Jesus was married, as some early Christians believed.
Neat. I found this part pretty fascinating too:
“One of the things we do know is that very rarely in ancient literature was the marital status of men discussed,” [Professor Karen] King said in a conference call with reporters. “Silence in marital status is normal.”
Only women were identified in terms of family relationships, as someone’s sister, mother, or wife, King said. The question of whether Jesus married came up later when people wanted to use him as a model for their lives, she said.
#MuslimRage: How a Cynical Social-Media Play Became an Awesome Meme
Really good analysis of NewsWeek’s #MuslimRage debacle by Megan Garber for The Atlantic:
@Newsweek: COVER STORY: Ayaan Hirsi Ali on how she survived Muslim rage—and how we can end it
@Newsweek: Want to discuss our latest cover? Let’s hear it with the hashtag: #MuslimRage.
The tagged reactions to Newsweek’s proposal have been … mixed. Some tweets are funny. Some are satirical. Some are cruel. But they are pretty much united in their rejection of Newsweek’s premise that “Muslim rage” is something to be talked about, under the magazine’s brand, on Twitter. Which is also to say: People rejected glibness. They rejected cynicism. They rejected reductive branding. And they did so, specifically, by reappropriating the hashtag Newsweek had proposed. They treated #muslimrage not in the way Newsweek had framed it, but instead as exactly what it was: a joke.
… Newsweek underestimated both its audience and, with them, itself. While it may still be true that a good magazine — just as a good newspaper — is a nation talking to itself, the standards for that conversation have risen considerably since people have been able to talk to each other on their own. Conversation can no longer exist for conversation’s sake alone — which is also to say that people understand, almost intuitively, the difference between being inspired and being trolled.
Or, as Colin put it:
This Carol of the Bells medley was preformed at the Christmas Oranges Benefit Concert 12/8/2008. The Creative Stylings of Steven Sharp Nelson & Marshall McDonald join forces with two powerhouse musicians; Clayton McDonald, and Peter Steenblik
Invasion orders found wrapped around cigars in field led to bloodiest day in U.S. history
Christopher Sullivan, AP:
… Gen. Robert E. Lee’s secret Special Orders No. 191, detailing the Southern commander’s audacious plans for an invasion of enemy territory that would propel the Confederates to victory. Carelessly left behind as Lee’s army marched north, [a] copy was spotted in a field by the Indianans, and Lee’s name jumped out as Mitchell and Bloss read it.
When they passed their stunning find up the chain of command, Lee’s counterpart, the famously cautious Union Gen. George McClellan, exclaimed, “Now I know what to do!”
Four days later came the cataclysmic clash along the Antietam near Sharpsburg — what James McPherson, the eminent Civil War historian, has called “arguably … THE event of the war.”
The orders were found wrapped around a few cigars in a farm field. History is totally weird sometimes.
NBC News’s PhotoBlog posted images of the orders and a bunch of neato historical photos.
Q&A: Author Michael Chabon on the Vinyl Soul of ‘Telegraph Avenue’
Michael Chabon’s new book, Telegraph Avenue, came out last week. He’s a pretty cool guy and I can’t wait to get my hands on a copy.
James Sullivan of Rolling Stone conducted a short Q&A with Chabon about promotion, inspiration, and this:
I have a turntable within an arm’s reach in my office, but I find myself resorting to the ease of clicking on iTunes. It’s a pain in the neck to flip the album every 20 minutes.
Well, if you look at it that way, yes. But dude, let me tell you, you need to get up every 20 minutes. And sitting [at a computer] is bad for your hands, your wrists and your arms, and bad for your circulation. And now they’re starting to say people who spend their day sitting in a chair may live less long. At this point it has become a habit for me. The record ends and I get up, go to the bathroom, get a drink of water, stretch a little bit. Then I flip the record over or put a new one on. I incorporated it into my routine. Sometimes the writing is going really well, and I sit there a little while longer, and then at some point I notice the silence and I get up.
How to Boil Water without Bubbles
Katharine Sanderson in Nature magazine:
One trick to test whether a frying pan is hot enough is to sprinkle water on it. If the surface is sufficiently above the boiling point of water, droplets will skip across the pan. Those jittery beads of water are held up from the hot pan by a cushion of steam. The vapour cushion collapses as the surface falls below the ‘Leidenfrost temperature’, causing furious bubbling and spitting when the water droplet hits the surface and boils explosively.
The Leidenfrost effect lies behind the discovery, published today in Nature, that water can be made to boil without any bubbling if a surface is specially treated so that the vapour cushion does not break down. The key is to make the surface very water-repellent, according to Ivan Vakarelski, an engineer at the Clean Combustion Research Center at the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology in Thuwal, Saudi Arabia, and his colleagues. The effect might be used to carefully control how metals are cooled and heated, or to reduce drag on ships.
Finally! Every time I put on a pot of water, I get bugged the hell out by all those bubbles. It’d be pretty neato if the pot were perfectly serene, without any of that pesky indication of the water’s temperature.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NvFB10iIOrw
Here’s Ready 2 Rip by Mean Jeans. This is off their album “On Mars” which believe it or not came out in 2012.
Here’s Guided by Voices performing “I Am A Scientist” at Austin City Limits. Bob Pollard — drunk as fuck.
The Fairlight CMI IIx was a neato sampler from the ’80s. It was also horrifically expensive, apparently. Wikipedia says it cost about £27,000 in 1983, which works out to over $125,000 in today’s Americabucks or something like that.
What did you do with a IIx? Well, you played orchestra hits with it. All day, every day.