Various and Sundry

2020: The Year We… What’s With the Monolith?!?

I saw this last week, but decided to hold off, because I didn’t want to dwell on it, but here it is: a metal monolith was accidentally discovered in the middle of the Utah wilderness and although it’s probably made by humans, the level of effort to get it and “install” it like it’s some weird “think-piece” in the middle of nowhere is deeply weird. In other words, it’s peak 2020. I’m not sure what’s…

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Various and Sundry

My 50 Favorite Films: Prep for the 2020 Edition

This past weekend was Thanksgiving weekend, which meant it was time to rediscover how to make Thanksgiving leftovers last for multiple meals, play more board games than usual, and set up the Christmas tree. But it was also Thanksgiving weekend on an even year, which meant time to start prepping for my biennial Favorite Films sort. I’m a lifelong movie buff and have watched literally thousands of movies. Not all of them are good. Some…

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Various and Sundry

America and Mass Transit

Hey! Since we here in the United States are not traveling so much on this traditional week of travel, how about we take that time and read this longform article by Jonathan English all about mass transit in the United States. It unearths some assumptions about what mass transit is and can be and how those assumptions developed over the past 100 years or so. Besides the fond memories evoked by seeing the picture above…

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Various and Sundry

A Viewing Guide for Star Trek: Enterprise

Back in September, I did a ranking of every episode of every Star Trek series. But what if you haven’s seen all of the Star Trek series? And what if you’re all ready to binge-watch another series this year? If you haven’t seen Enterprise, the Trek franchise’s first prequel series, you’re probably not alone. While I have found several people who consider it their favorite, anecdotally, it appears to be the least watched series outside…

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Various and Sundry

Pandemic Lockdown: CGP Grey Edition

Evidently I’ve hit a wall with binge-watching TV shows, as I find I’ve drifted into checking out various YouTube channels and their bite-size videos. That includes revisiting CGP Grey‘s obsessively researched, and always entertaining, videos. As probably comes as no surprise, he created a video about how to organize your lockdown life: And then he also did a follow up a couple months ago: Hey, I can’t be the only one who found this still…

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