Monthly Archives: February 2004

the Slayer and the Snob

In two or three evenings my rentmate, the snob, has sat through four episodes of Buffy with seeming pleasure. She says season four is more endurable than the foregoing because most of the teenage angst has been more or less … Continue reading

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this kind of local color I don’t need

Ugh! This morning’s storm caused sewage to spew into the streets near the waterfront in San Francisco.

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slayage progress

I’ve now watched three whole seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I’ve also looked at various related websites. I usually don’t mind spoilers, but in retrospect the “panicking” scene would have been better somehow if I hadn’t known when to … Continue reading

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little bangs, bigger bangs

Decided today it was high time I tested my recently repaired .22 handguns; and the Glock came along for the ride. Despite not having shot since May, I still mostly hit what I aim at. But o my poor elbow!

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ahead of his time

The plot of Hal Clement‘s story “The Mechanic” (1966) is awkward and dated, but it’s still noteworthy as an early exposition of biotechnology quite similar to current concepts.

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autodidact

How Ben Franklin taught himself to write better

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the naked ape

Wisecrack of the day, from E B Rasmusen: Europe is going through a birth rate collapse, a singularly odd and disquieting thing, I should think. . . . Maybe humans are like other organisms that don’t reproduce well in captivity.

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