The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Wayang -er- Washington Irving
I was almost going to let Halloween go by without an appropriately thematic post, and then an old classmate shares something he’s narrated — and sharing is scaring!
Various and Sundry
Category: Various and Sundry
Various and Sundry
Real Secret Societies You May Not Know
What with the casting I’m working on for our show, Quorum, I’ve been thinking about actual secret societies, and how secret they actually are. Enter Jackie Mansky writing for Smithsonian magazine. Per the article, actual secret societies are often centered around good causes (certainly as far as the members are concerned). Not only that, but these days, they’re aren’t not too secret. Indeed, their existence is often in plain sight even if their purposes might…
Various and Sundry
Cleaning Up Personal Data Online
Firmly in the “getting around to it” folder is this NPR article about changes with Google’s tools to take personal information out of searches from earlier this year. More later this week. Right now, I’m in the midst of a sizeable casting for Jabberwocky Audio.
Various and Sundry
Oh Yeah: Columbus Day
I mean, if I’m going to post for the vikings yesterday, I might as well do this today:
Various and Sundry
Vikings in Myth and Movies
I fell down a YouTube rabbit hole earlier this year, going through the various “experts in [X] talk about the treatment of [X] in movies.” When I saw this one, I knew it had to be this year’s Leif Erikson Day post. (Because of course I have to have a Leif Erikson post. Have you seen my name?).
Various and Sundry Writing
Banning Books? Process Schmocess
In the video post from Monday, John Green briefly mentioned how one of the challenges to his book Looking for Alaska amounted to a person talked to a school official about a page in his book. The problem is, this kind of scenario happens a lot for challenging books. A single person is bringing this to the attention of a single official and there’s no process in place to review requests, challenges, or concerns. And…
Various and Sundry Writing
If a Worldview can be Destroyed by a Novel, the Problem is not the Novel
You may wonder what authors think about when their books are banned, so why not frequent vlogger and author John Green who found his book, Looking for Alaska, in the crosshairs of censors. I should note this particular video is from 2016, referencing the top challenged books of 2015. There’s usually a lag time compiling the data: while it’s interesting, it’s not necessarily pressing. However, the video is also under 3 and a half minutes…
Various and Sundry Writing
For Banned Books Week this year: Maus
Next week is Banned Books Week, and as longtime readers may know, I always make a point of reading a banned or challenged book at this time of year. You can check out the most challenged books of 2021 or just do a bit of web searching to find historical lists and find something that might tickle your fancy in a way that scolds and censors feel your fancy should not be tickled. The books…
Rants Raves Various and Sundry
Patton Oswalt: Galactic Cinema Scoundrel
I’m going to save some of my posts for Banned Books Week for, well, the week itself, but I mention it here in order to spur you on to make a reading selection, possibly from the website, possibly from visiting your friendly local library. Instead, we have Patton Oswalt rating his top 5 and bottom 5 films with the zeal and wit you have likely come to expect. Now, knowing that Oswalt is a total…
Various and Sundry Writing
Prep for Banned Books Week 2022
Next week, September 18-24 is Banned Books Week, an annual celebration of, depending on who you ask, the freedom to read, sticking it to The Man, both, or perhaps all of them and so much more. Odds are I read challenged or banned books throughout the year, but for the life of this blog, I’ve tried to make sure to do so during the coming week. In part, the most challenged books of a given…