On This Day: Nov 28

by

Since I hit 20 years of blogging this November, this year I’m posting a daily list of anything I published on this day in the past.

There are 23 posts previously published on November 28th

  • 2025
  • 2023
  • 2021
    • Thoughts on The Hobbit Trilogy After re-watching The Hobbit trilogy (extended) for the first time in a good few years, I’m solidly of the opinion that, while good, there are some definite tonal issues throughout. ➡
  • 2020
    • The ball had progressed beautifully. As each reveler grew tired and departed, whether alone or with one or more partners for more private entertainments, they drew a mask from the bin by the door, placed it over their face, and returned to the safety of everyday life once more. ➡
    • 📚 forty-seven of 2020: Exiles by Howard Weinstein ⭐️⭐️⭐️ #startrek #tng 🖖 The best of the early TNG novels so far. The characters felt right, and there was a good mix of serious plot and humor throughout. An obvious final solution, but that’s forgivable. ➡
    • On This Day: Nov 28 Recognizing 20 years of blogging, here are my past posts from November 28 ➡
  • 2019
    • A surprise inheritance was strange enough, but that it included lakeside property had stunned her when she got the notice. Not as stunned, of course, as when she discovered it was actually a cemetery whose residents weren’t as quiet as she expected. Microblogvember: property ➡
  • 2017
    • Book forty-seven of 2017: The Dead Seekers, by Barb & J.C. Hendee. ⭐️⭐️⭐️ ➡
  • 2016
    • Wishlists For holiday considerations: my Amazon wish lists, or a few organizations that I think are worth donating to. ➡
    • Post-Thanksgiving Status A brief note on this year’s Thanksgiving break activities, and minor updates to this blog. ➡
    • The break is over, back to work we go! (333/366) ➡
  • 2015
    • This may not have been the best choice of display method for your holiday stuffies, Fred Meyer. #tw #triggerwarning #inappropriatehumor ➡
    • Getting started on putting Christmas up (after Thanksgiving, as is appropriate). ➡
  • 2014
  • 2013
    • Sounds From the Lost Abbey 02 Back in February, I took up a challenge from one of my friends to create a mix based around songs that I'd have played at the Lost Abbey, during the mid- to late-1990s. Here's the second of quite a few to come! ➡
  • 2007
    • Badass Bible Verses Cracked has a list of the top nine 'badass' bible verses. Just for fun, I'll list the verse citations here. Any guesses at what stories they're referring to (before looking at the linked article, of course)? ➡
  • 2006
    • No Snow Day for Us Grrrrr. It's not _just_ that I want my snow day -- and sure, I do -- but it's _dangerous_ out there. Demanding that students and teachers fight their way through this crud to get to school is stupid and irresponsible. ➡
  • 2004
  • 2003
  • 2001
    • Enterprise: Cold Front In original Trek, time travel was shown as a somewhat simple, if not trivial, concept. Now, however, we're being told that the Vulcans have 'studied time travel extensively' and determined that it's an impossibility. ➡
    • Privacy, shmivacy 'Magic Lantern,' a government developed 'trojan horse' style virus that appears as an e-mail attachment. Once on your machine, it can record keystrokes and transmit them back to the FBI for analasys. ➡
    • Aaaah! I wanna see it! I wanna see it now! Reviews of the first Lord of the Rings film, Fellowship of the Ring, are starting to hit the net...here's what I've found so far. ➡
by

Once the initial breakthrough was made, time-travel was actually fairly simple…as long as you were going backwards. After all, that had all already happened. But going forwards was a much larger dilemma due to the difficulty in targeting any one of the infinite possible futures.

On This Day: Nov 27

by

Since I hit 20 years of blogging this November, this year I’m posting a daily list of anything I published on this day in the past.

There are 24 posts previously published on November 27th

  • 2023
    • Year 50 Day 209 The joys of remote work: on the one hand, on the other hand, and on the gripping hand. ➡
  • 2021
    • Vinegar: YouTube5 was a Safari extension back when Flash was still a thing and hated by everyone. It replaced the YouTube player (written in Flash) with an HTML <video> tag. And now the YouTube player situation has gotten bad enough that we need another extension to fix it. That’s where Vinegar comes in. Vinegar also ... Read more ➡
    • Figured out how to create an iOS shortcut that grabs a webpage URL, title, and any selected text from Safari, formats it into a Markdown link and block quote, and then sends it to Ulysses as a new post to be published to my blog. Pretty happy with the result! ➡
    • With No Time To Die, or even wash his hands, James Bond’s travel hygiene fails: From his questionable sexual behavior to his unsafe eating habits to his risk-taking with regard to insect- and animal-borne diseases, it’s remarkable that the famous fictional secret agent has repeatedly lived another day. In a new paper, published in the ... Read more ➡
  • 2020
    • Once the initial breakthrough was made, time-travel was actually fairly simple…as long as you were going backwards. After all, that had all already happened. But going forwards was a much larger dilemma due to the difficulty in targeting any one of the infinite possible futures. ➡
    • On This Day: Nov 27 Recognizing 20 years of blogging, here are my past posts from November 27 ➡
  • 2019
    • Merely being rich wasn’t enough. Even being the richest person wasn’t enough. But finally, he had amassed all the wealth there was; all else was poverty. And as Bezos looked over the wastelands from atop the Amazon citadel, he still yearned for more. Microblogvember: rich ➡
    • Amazon’s Ring Considering Facial Recognition While the basic home security idea isn't bad, the implementation, especially when combined with the (existing or just discussed) partnerships with law enforcement, giving them unfettered access to the video captured by the cameras, is really, really disturbing. ➡
    • No Love for White Gloves, or: the Cotton Menace: “Rare books, unlike many museum objects, are still used today in the same way that they would have been when they were new centuries ago – they’re held and opened, and their pages are turned. It would make sense that these historical objects should be handled ... Read more ➡
  • 2016
    • Book fifty-two of 2016: Battlestations!, by Diane Carey. ⭐️⭐️⭐️ (332/366) ➡
  • 2007
    • Zoom Cosmic View, Cosmic Zoom, Powers of Ten, and the Simpsons. ➡
    • Schedule? What Schedule? Two more days without posting. It's official -- trying to enforce a daily posting routine just didn't work for me this year. ➡
  • 2006
    • Rainier and the Flood Looks like the scenery is going to be a little bit different next time Prairie and I are able to head down to Mt. Rainier for a weekend getaway. The heavy rains and flooding of the past weeks have hit Rainier National Park _hard_, including quite a few of the areas that we went through this summer. ➡
    • Best Bad Review of the Zune The Zune is a complete, humiliating failure...it almost becomes _important_ that you encourage people not to buy one. ➡
    • Snowy Evening A small selection of photos from an evening walk last night, after Seattle got an unusually heavy snowfall. ➡
  • 2005
  • 2003
  • 2002
  • 2001
    • Paying bills is such fun So that was about it...home by 10:30 or so, in bed about midnight. Not the most exciting stuff in the world, I suppose, but that's the way my life goes. ➡
  • 2000
    • Vacation time Vacation time! Off to Florida, Indiana, and Seattle -- back to Anchorage on Dec. 14th. ➡
by

🖖 Discovery S03E07: After last week’s action, really liked having a week of talky-thinky Trek that expanded both the season arc and the overall world building of the new era. Vulcans! Romulans! TNG throwbacks! Plus a nice tribute to NuTrek’s Chekov, the late Anton Yelchin.

by

While spell development was superficially similar to most any other sort of creative process, the fine-tuning was killer. There were just so many variables to know what to adjust — ingredients, gestures, words, tone of voice — that those final touches could be quite dangerous.

On This Day: Nov 26

by

Since I hit 20 years of blogging yesterday, this year I’m posting a daily list of anything I published on this day in the past.

There are 27 posts previously published on November 26th

  • 2023
  • 2022
  • 2021
    • The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ First re-watch in a few years. Some sequences really could have been dropped (the mountain giants add nothing except a few minutes of running time), others are just tonally weird (the goblin city sticks out as being goofy in the midst of serious sequences). But that said, it’s still ... Read more ➡
  • 2020
    • 🖖 Discovery S03E07: After last week’s action, really liked having a week of talky-thinky Trek that expanded both the season arc and the overall world building of the new era. Vulcans! Romulans! TNG throwbacks! Plus a nice tribute to NuTrek’s Chekov, the late Anton Yelchin. ➡
    • While spell development was superficially similar to most any other sort of creative process, the fine-tuning was killer. There were just so many variables to know what to adjust — ingredients, gestures, words, tone of voice — that those final touches could be quite dangerous. ➡
    • On This Day: Nov 26 Recognizing 20 years of blogging, here are my past posts from November 26 ➡
  • 2019
    • Baby Yoda Has Conquered the World: “‘I had a day with one of the weirdest moments I’ve ever had directing,’ [Director Deborah Chow] told Vanity Fair. ‘I was directing Werner with the puppet, and Werner had just fallen in love with the baby. Werner, I think, had forgotten it wasn’t actually a live creature, and ... Read more ➡
    • He watched the floor in satisfaction from the DJ booth as the crowd moved to the sounds of the music. Those recordings of readings from ancient texts he’d layered into the mix had definitely helped. Now nobody could stop dancing until he decided it was time. Microblogvember: mix ➡
    • Bruce Wayne warns wealth tax on billionaires could result in fewer crimes foiled via jet-powered cars: “When asked whether a wealth tax could help curb costumed murders by investing in public schools, job retraining, and community mental health initiatives, Wayne responded, ‘Sure, but do any of those programs involve a 7000 pound car that can ... Read more ➡
  • 2016
    • Book fifty-one of 2016: Dreadnought!, by Diane Carey. ⭐️⭐️⭐️ ➡
    • Book fifty of 2016: Ishmael, by Barbara Hambly. ⭐️⭐️⭐️ (330/366) ➡
  • 2015
    • Mmmm…that’s a good looking Thanksgiving spread! ➡
    • A little classic gaming with friends on Thanksgiving. ➡
  • 2014
    • Tear Gas: Banned in War, Used on the Streets The use of tear gas by the US police (and in other countries) is something I find seriously troubling. How can we justify using a chemical agent banned from use in warfare on our own citizens? ➡
    • Debate links regarding Ferguson and Darren Wilson Just found this excellent Tumblr post laying out the most common arguments defending Darren Wilson or condemning the Ferguson protests, and linking to a wealth of stories and resources addressing those points. ➡
    • Mike Brown’s shooting and Jim Crow lynchings have too much in common About twice a week, or every three or four days, an African American has been killed by a white police officer in the seven years ending in 2012, according to studies of the latest data compiled by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. That number is incomplete and likely an undercount, as only a fraction of local police jurisdictions even report such deaths – and those reported are the ones deemed somehow 'justifiable'. ➡
  • 2006
    • So Long, Space Needle The Space Needle will once again become this city's tallest building in April 2009, when NASA launches the tower into Earth orbit. The rotating restaurant will provide simulated Earth gravity, not to mention fresh salmon and Dungeness crab from Washington and Alaska waters. ➡
  • 2003
    • The trickiest zen on the menu I wanted to take a moment to point out Pops' domain, 2 Hour Lunch. I discovered his site at some point during the TypePad beta testing process, and he's become one of my favorite reads. ➡
    • Bad Santa I first heard about Bad Santa thanks to Pops about a week ago, and it immediately sounded like something that would be right up my alley. Roger Ebert's review has just solidified that. ➡
    • Digital elocution So what do you do if you're trying to put together campaign commercials for a President who can't seem to string together more two multi-syllabic words without stumbling? Simple! ➡
    • Capt. Yee charged with…being a shmuck Two counts of failing to obey a lawful general order, adultery, conduct unbecoming an officer, making a false official statement and failure to obey an order or regulation (the latter two charges stem from allegations that Yee viewed and stored pornography on a government computer). ➡
    • Troy Another film I'm really looking forward to seeing — Troy. ➡
    • Just what I always wanted! Amuse your conservative friends and annoy your liberal neighbors with the brand new Ann Coulter Talking Action Figure. ➡
  • 2000
    • Colophon djwudi.com gets a Colophon, with details on the construction and maintenance of the site. All sorts of nifty geek goodies in there. ➡
by

Space, as we all know, is silent. Sound can’t travel through a vacuum, it’s simple science.

But then the great bird of the galaxy appeared at the outer rim of the system, opened its vast beak, and uttered a call that used the very fabric of spacetime as a medium for its cry.

by

Email a dumpster fire. Literally

  1. Email dumpsterfire@hey.com whatever you want to torch. Use plain text or an image attachment. PG-13 rules apply.

  2. Watch on the live feed as your message is created, conveyed, and then dropped into the rolling flames.

  3. Experience catharsis.

Twenty Years of Blogging

by

Twenty years ago today, I became a blogger.

Admittedly, the date could be argued a bit, as I’d had my own website since 1996, and even back then had been in the habit of making short, dated updates that were usually site-related, but sometimes just personal ramblings. And I didn’t come across the term ‘blog’ until a few months later in February of 2001.

But on November 25, 2000, I moved from hand-coding updates into a static HTML page to using a script called NewsPro to manage and automate posting updates. So that’s what I’ve been using as my “official” blogging start date.

In the past 20 years, my posting frequency has waxed and waned (waning more often than waxing, admittedly) but has never disappeared altogether. I’ve moved platforms from self-hosted (first NewsPro, then MovableType) to hosted (TypePad) back to self-hosted (WordPress). Sometimes self-hosted meant on a server in my apartment; these days I use DreamHost as my hosting provider, but I still use a manual installation of WordPress rather than using the WordPress.com hosted service. I don’t tinker as much as I used to, but it’s still nice to get into the nuts and bolts from time to time.

Most of the time I’ve been doing this, I’ve just been another one of the many random voices on the ‘net, never one of the Big Names. The closest I ever came to breaking out of that…well, you can look back if you want, but I’m just glad that it’s in my past. Maybe I’ll have more to say in another three years on that twentieth anniversary, maybe not. Generally, I’m fine with just tossing my occasional thoughts on Apple, Star Trek, politics, and whatever else pops into my mind into the electronic void to see if anyone picks up on it.

If you’ve been stopping by and checking out my ramblings from time to time over the years — thanks! If you’re a new visitor, thanks to you too, especially if you’ve made it this far through this post. You might want to check out this somewhat random collection of notable posts, or just see what was posted on this day in the past (which will work for whatever day you read this).

And, of course, there’s my alter-ego DJ Wüdi side project to be promoted: A weekly (except when it isn’t) Twitch broadcast where I play an eclectic mix of music (mostly focused on alternative dance genres like goth, industrial, EBM, and various flavors of electronica, but with a fair amount of other stuff tossed in as I feel like it). Tune in to Difficult Listening Hour on Saturdays at 1 p.m. Pacific time, or cue up my past archives (plus more mix sessions) on my MixCloud page.

Twenty years down — and hopefully, twenty (and more) yet to come!

On This Day: Nov 25

by

Since I hit 20 years of blogging today, this year I’m posting a daily list of anything I published on this day in the past.

There are 25 posts previously published on November 25th

  • 2024
  • 2023
  • 2022
  • 2021
    • 📚 48/2021: The Forever War by Joe Haldeman ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 1976 Hugo Best Novel ➡
  • 2020
    • Space, as we all know, is silent. Sound can’t travel through a vacuum, it’s simple science. But then the great bird of the galaxy appeared at the outer rim of the system, opened its vast beak, and uttered a call that used the very fabric of spacetime as a medium for its cry. ➡
    • Email a dumpster fire. Literally Email dumpsterfire@hey.com whatever you want to torch. Use plain text or an image attachment. PG-13 rules apply. Watch on the live feed as your message is created, conveyed, and then dropped into the rolling flames. Experience catharsis. ➡
    • Twenty Years of Blogging If you've been stopping by and checking out my ramblings from time to time over the years — thanks! ➡
    • On This Day: Nov 25 Recognizing 20 years of blogging, here are my past posts from November 25 ➡
  • 2019
    • It’s one thing to know the regulation that everything has to be in secure storage before the jump to light speed. But the point is really driven home when you see the size of the hole that inertia and a loose pencil can punch through the hull. Microblogvember: secure ➡
    • That Uplifting Tweet You Just Shared? A Russian Troll Sent It: “Professional trolls…are the tip of the spear in the new digital, ideological battleground. To combat the threat they pose, we must first understand them — and take them seriously.” ➡
  • 2016
    • Second day off, with two yet to go. Why aren’t four day weekends more common? (330/366) ➡
  • 2014
    • Post-Ferguson Decision Links All originally posted to my Facebook account, but I need to post here more regularly (jeez, it's been over a _year_ now), and I feel strongly enough about the discussions I'm seeing in the aftermath of the Ferguson decision that this seemed a good way to get some movement here. ➡
  • 2010
  • 2009
    • Facebook ‘Dislike’ Button Suspicion I just got an invite to a Facebook group titled 'DISLIKE BUTTON is here - ADD it now!'. After looking this group over, I have _very_ strong suspicious about it, and my first impulse is to recommend that everyone ignore it. ➡
  • 2008
  • 2006
    • Black Friday Recap Ick. There were people lined up outside the store, waiting for us to open the gate at 6am. ➡
  • 2002
    • Now there’s an image for ya. You think you were surprised — I'm envisioning the world's most alarmed spider as you pull thread out of its ass as fast as it can produce it. Now there's an image for ya. ➡
    • Dreams are odd I had a dream last night that I was DJ'ing at a dance somewhere, with a lot of high-school age kids asking me for lots of bad rap. Unfortunately, all I had with me was bad techno, because I'd accidentally packed one of my music cases with boxes of cereal, instead of CD's. ➡
  • 2001
    • What a weekend Oh, and just to confirm any suspicions that may have arisen -- yes, it does appear that I'm no longer single. Candice and I talked about it Friday night, and after roughly three years of being (technically) single, I've re-entered the dating scene. ➡
  • 2000
    • Parallax1 Parallax1, then a 3-week vacation. ➡
    • NewsPro up and running NewsPro's first post. From here on out, all posts will be saved and archived for future reference. Uh-huh. Yup. ➡