Author Archives: Paul

Professional software engineer; enthusiast / advanced amateur photographer; (Apple) / Mac / iOS guy; partially omniscient, witty, tech geek; hooligan; user of 'adult language'; 37?!?; rock / blues / jazz fan; skeptic; and raconteur (...and ESRI).

My Family’s Doll Test

Dr. Ibram X. Kendi* writing for The Atlantic: Regardless of your race, it’s never too early to consider the messages a child is receiving from the world around them. Color blindness is not an option. Research has demonstrated that even at 1 year old, our children notice different skin colors. We can impress upon children […]

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Human-Caused Climate Change More Powerful Than the Fall of the Roman Empire

María Luisa Paúl repoting for The Washington Post: Every year, farmers in France’s central region of Auvergne repeat the same process. During summer and fall, their cows graze in pastures, eating to their hearts’ content. It’s only during this time that farmers can produce salers, a highly regulated semihard cheese with the same buttery depth […]

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Elvis +45 years

On this day, 45 years ago (that’s 1977, for those who aren’t great at math), Elvis Presley died.

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R.I.P. Anne Heche

Anne Heche, perhaps best known for her role as Robin Monroe in Six Days, Seven Nights, but also known for her roles in Donnie Brasco, Wag the Dog, I Know What You Did Last Summer, and Psycho as well as TV roles in Another World, and Hung, to name but a few of her credits, […]

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The Funniest Fucking Podcast

I like podcasts, and have liked them for a long time. I’ve listened to SModcast since episode 3. I’ve listened to WTF with Marc Maron since episode twenty-something. And, of course, I’ve listened to and/or watched This Week in Tech and MacBreak Weekly forever. My point is, I’m a big podcast fan, and I’ve been […]

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Fax Machines

The only thing fax machines should be used for nowadays is for ending the sentence, ‘Hey, remember fax machines?’ and that is it!” — John Oliver, Last Week Tonight S9E19, 7 August 2022.

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How Three Amateurs Solved the Zodiac Killer’s ‘340’ Cipher

Kathryn Miles reporting for Popular Mechanics: But then, in December 2020, the FBI announced a breakthrough: The 340 cipher had been solved. Not by its crack Cryptanalysis and Racketeering Records Unit, but instead by three computer wonks who’d found one another on an obscure online true-crime discussion board and started collaborating during the COVID-19 pandemic. […]

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Reason Roundup: Kansans Reject Anti-Abortion Ballot Measure—and It’s Not Even Close

Elizabeth Nolan Brown reporting for Reason.com: Voters overwhelmingly voted against a measure that would have allowed abortion to be banned in Kansas in the first post-Roe test of abortion’s legality put directly to the people. Yeah, that’s the kind of crazy thing about the Dobbs decision — the people of our fair nation are overwhelmingly […]

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R.I.P. Nichelle Nichols

Mike Barnes reporting for The Hollywood Reporter: Nichelle Nichols, Lieutenant Uhura on ‘Star Trek,’ Dies at 89 — The actress earned the admiration of Martin Luther King Jr. by playing a Black authority figure, rare on 1960s television.

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John Lasseter’s Second Act

Rebecca Keegan and Carolyn Giardina reporting at The Hollywood Reporter: No one could tell a story like Lasseter — until he resigned as Disney Animation/Pixar’s chief creative officer in the wake of #MeToo complaints. Now head of Skydance’s animation division, where he oversaw August’s ‘Luck,’ he’s attempting to turn his own story around. As a […]

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