Tag: Things to Read

Various and Sundry Voiceover

When Did Those American Colonists Stop Sounding Like Brits?

By Bjorn Munson | by Bjorn Munson

One of my favorite bits of acting training has been learning accents, not in the least because it dovetails nicely with some of the linguistic anthropology I studied back in the day. Really, it’s those times where deciding to study anthropology and theater really pay off. Despite such ardor, I couldn’t tell you when us treasonous colonials gave up our British accents, but Matt Soniak and the ever-intriguing site Mental Floss are here to fill…

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Various and Sundry

Google Uncomfortable with Reining in Cookie Monster

By Bjorn Munson | by Bjorn Munson

It could be the parts of the web where I roam, but I’ve been reading a lot more about privacy, whether it’s Apple’s recent efforts to make their iOS more inherently private (see pieces in Bloomberg and The Verge) or the growing rumblings of government regulation (see pieces in CNBC and in Recode/Vox). By virtue of simply being online, all of us have been inducted into one or more Big Data Mining ecosystems whereby not…

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Various and Sundry

The Best Space Dad?

By Bjorn Munson | by Bjorn Munson

So it’s a day after the fact, but, hey, I don’t usually post on Sundays anyway — even Father’s Day. But Father’s Day means it’s time for plenty of geeky dad memes, say of Jango Fett and his many clone offspring. However, with quite a bit of regularity, someone writes an article about how Benjamin Sisko of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, is one of the best ‘space dads’ around. I have to agree: even…

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Various and Sundry

If a Supersonic Airplane Doesn’t ‘Boom,’ is it really Supersonic?

By Bjorn Munson | by Bjorn Munson

So let’s say you’re thinking about traveling again, perhaps even flying. Perhaps you’re wondering what happened to the efforts to make a new supersonic passenger aircraft since I posted about it in November 2019. Well, you’re in luck! Rebecca Heilweil over on Vox/Recode has an update on Boom, the company working on building new supersonic passenger jets which United is now very keen to start flying. A big question, however, is not only if they…

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Various and Sundry

The Rise and Fall of Saturday Morning Cartoons

By Bjorn Munson | by Bjorn Munson

Tomorrow, your kids may be binge-watching some cartoon on some streaming services. They may even do so whilst consuming copious amounts of Chocolate-Frosted Sugar Bombs. But they will not be viewing a network broadcast slate of cartoons like generations of kids have. Why is that? Charles Moss in The Saturday Evening Post has your answers in a article so perfectly titled, I just used it above. He also provides a whole lot more detail about…

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Various and Sundry

Simply Told and Radiantly Illustrated: Appreciating the Work of Eric Carle

By Bjorn Munson | by Bjorn Munson

Generations of children may feel the world is a bit less colorful as children’s author and illustrator Eric Carle has died at the age of 91. There’s a great piece by Emily Langer in the Washington Post, where I got the delightfully succinct phrase “simply told and radiantly illustrated” from. There’s also a nice 2-minute piece by Neda Ulaby on NPR as well as a remembrance from the BBC. In these remembrances, you’ll get a…

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Various and Sundry

A Singular Ranking of Five Score Sherlock Holmes Portrayals. Most Singular!

By Bjorn Munson | by Bjorn Munson

I do not know Olivia Rutigliano, but upon starting to read her exhaustive article on Crime Reads ranking 100 portrayals of Sherlock Holmes, I immediately detected that same sort of insanity that drove me to rank all Star Trek episodes. It’s a delightfully thorough list. I know many of these portrayals, but by Jove, I hardly know all of them. And now, thanks to the assiduous investigation of, one may hope, soon-to-be-Doctor Rutigliano, I can…

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Various and Sundry

Turn off the Gadgets and GO OUTSIDE!

By Bjorn Munson | by Bjorn Munson

I wish I could find the faux PSA from whence this title came, but even though it’s about to be Insect Spring Break where I live, the notion that nature can have healing power is being bolstered by science. Adele Peters writes about a recent U.K. study that points to the health benefits in the usually-not-arboreally-themed Fast Company. In fact, it’s not like you need to suddenly fine time to fit many a day hike…

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Various and Sundry

Jobs, Mental Health, and the Malasch Burnout Inventory

By Bjorn Munson | by Bjorn Munson

The CDC announcement last week that vaccinated people could go all maskless all sorts of places has led to the inevitable realization for many of us that, “Oh, yeah. I guess we might be back in an office this summer.” But even before then, I’m sure many of us have been contemplating more about what we want out of a job — along with wondering what is up with Zoom today. So I found this…

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Various and Sundry

The Cicadas are Coming! The Cicadas are Coming!

By Bjorn Munson | by Bjorn Munson

I mentioned last month that Brood X, the prodigious cohort of cicadas that emerge every 17 years to mate and be quite loud about it, are coming this year — possibly near you! For those of you who want more of the science behind it all, here’s Mike Raupp, the “Bug Guy” and avowed cicada fan to give you all the details you didn’t know you needed.

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