Category Archives: Uncategorized

1. The obligatory Disney-buys-Marvel joke: “High School Musical: Xavier Institute Edition”. Let’s face it: it couldn’t suck worse than X-Men 3. 2. My son is back and better than ever. His cat Lewis, however, has developed some weird attachment issues … Continue reading →

1. Inglourious Basterds: The Dirty Dozen meets Mission Impossible in the 7th Circle of Hell. This is not a negative review, unless it sounds like one to you. 2. My son is in out of town this week for a … Continue reading →

I’m going to drop out of my usual apolitical mode to salute Barney Frank for saying what needs to be said to a certain faction in the so-called debate about health care. There are legitimate, if somewhat hard-hearted, arguments that … Continue reading →

Last Friday I fell off my bike again, but this time I swear it was not my fault. I came around a turn in the bike trail and there was a fair-sized tree down across the pavement. I tried to … Continue reading →

1. Errol Morris has Part 1 of “Seven Lies About Lying” at the NYT website (registration may be required). I’m not sure I can buy the pedantic distinction between lying and deception, but it’s an interesting stretch of text, illustrated … Continue reading →

1. My Blog Gate post for this week is a review/reader’s memoir of Stargate by Tak Hallus (a.k.a. Stephen Robinett), as a belated memorial to the late author. 2. You’ve probably heard by now, but Baen’s Universe is closing. I … Continue reading →

The Vortex Cannon: useful and beautiful.

Stephen Robinett (a.k.a. “Tak Hallus”) is dead–and has been, it seems, since 2003. He sort of fell out of the field by the 1980s, and personally I thought it was a mistake to drop his pseudonym: “Tak Hallus” is weird … Continue reading →

1. This is bad. What is M. Night Shyamalan thinking? I’m speaking as one of the three people on the face of this planet who actually liked The Village. But I’m about done with him, at this point. 2. This … Continue reading →

My Blog Gate post of the week is up at last, a review of Matthew Goodman’s The Sun and the Moon. Executive summary: I really liked it.