Saturday, July 28, 2012

Finger Painting

I'm working on a new video about my upcoming book, The Cydonian Pyramid, the second book in the Klaatu Diskos trilogy.

Just for fun, here's a small piece of the video, a reverse-painted self portrait without the soundtrack. I made it using a finger-painting app on my iPod, and an older version of iMovie.




Saturday, July 21, 2012

The Netflix Algorithm

We are all becoming accustomed to the fact that technology sometimes outpaces our innate reasoning capacity. When was the last time you multiplied, divided, or even added two large numbers using pencil and paper? I can hardly balance my checkbook without a calculator. (How do you know you're lost? Your GPS tells you that you aren't where you think you are.)

As further evidence of this, Netflix tells me what I want to watch. I try to resist. Sometimes I watch things that escape the Netflix algorithm entirely. But mostly I yield. Out of laziness.

The problem, however, is that both Mary (Mary Logue, my S.O., life partner, love of my life, etc.) and I make use of the same Netflix account. Consequentially, we get parallel user recommendations like this:



Oddly enough, there are many things we can watch together. Firefly, Sherlock, and anything with Judy Dench or Helen Mirren come to mind.

That is all. I haven't been blogging much. This is because I have been writing. Furiously, brilliantly, badly, madly, desperately. As my brother, a carpenter, might say, "It's what I do."

Sunday, July 8, 2012

CONvergence

This weekend I attended CONvergence, my first BIG con. About 5000 people, at least half of them in costume, took OVER the Doubletree hotel in Bloomington, Minnesota.
I thought I knew how to have a good time, but these people know how to raise GOOD TIME to an art form. By that, I don't mean I personally had the best time of my life (although it was quite fun), I mean the regular attendees looked to be having more fun than a spaceship full of Devonian monkey creatures. Seriously, if I ever enjoy myself as completely and unselfconsciously as those CONvergers did, I would die complete. I mean, where else could you go to walk around irony- and hassle-free in a fringed loincloth and body paint? Okay, maybe a Gay Pride event. But only if you're gay. I should have taken pictures. I should have worn my loincloth. I should be twenty-one again. No. Wait. I take that back. Twenty-one? Never again.

Anyway, it was a fabulous event. I'm looking forward to next year.