Saturday, December 20, 2008

So long, Lwaxana

Majel Barrett Roddenberry has died. She was 76.

What a dame! She was so protective of Gene Roddenberry's vision for Star Trek and for the future, and she was a witty actress into the bargain. Once several years ago, when she was visiting St. Louis for a fan convention, I was in the autograph line waiting to meet her. As I approached the table where she was signing and graciously chatting with star-struck fan after fan, I overheard her say to an assistant that she'd like to have sushi for dinner and to find out a place they could go.

When it was my turn at the table, she inscribed my photo and we traded a few pleasantries. As I was leaving, almost as an afterthought, I recommended the name of a good local restaurant that I knew to have fine sushi. Her face lit up and she called the assistant back over. "Take this down," she said, and encouraged me to repeat the recommendation. "No, wait," she said. "Get this man's telephone number. You're coming to dinner with us!"

And so I did. I dined with Nurse Chapel, Number One, Lwaxana Troi (sans Mr. Homm). For almost three glorious hours, she held forth with stories and laughter, sake and sushi, and we closed down the Kirkwood eatery I'd recommended. When we parted company, I got a warm hug and a peck on the cheek which, combined with the evening's company, I'll treasure more and longer than any autographed photo.

So long, Mrs. Barrett-Roddenberry, and say hello to your beloved Great Bird of the Galaxy.

Friday, December 12, 2008

Monday, September 8, 2008

Monday, July 7, 2008

Saturday, May 31, 2008

Thursday, May 8, 2008

Wednesday, December 26, 2007

I am delicious, Master

Just in time for Boxing Day, a gingerbread K-9. (John Leeson sold separately.)

Monday, July 23, 2007

I’ll be one soon enough

Noted without comment: The Gays and Their iPhones, a Flickr group.

Thursday, July 12, 2007

iPhone: Meet the grandparents

I love this photoset of an iPhone alongside a Newton.

Sunday, July 8, 2007

Reverse the polarity of the…oh, nevermind

Oh dear. A brilliant and dead-on lexicon for those of us without lives. The Doctor Who Fan's Phrasebook.

“That bit was completely ripped-off from Star Wars.”
I believe that the world began in 1977.

“That bit was completely ripped-off from Buffy.”
It's a little known fact that Joss Whedon actually invented not only television, but also the Internet.

“I think James Marsters would be a brilliant choice for the next Doctor.”
I am twelve and have only ever seen one other television show in my life.

Tuesday, June 26, 2007

I will iPhone

We're just a couple of days away from what the media are frequently reminding us is one of the most anticipated personal electronics launches in history, the release of the Apple iPhone. From the very product announcement, I was certain that I would own one, someday. But I've relaxed my tendency to live on the bleeding edge. I will wait, I thought, until my current cell phone contract runs out, about a year hence. By then, there will probably be a new version with more features and even more whiz-bang.

Then I watched this video and decided I needed one sooner. Much sooner. With any luck, I'll own an iPhone by summer's end and will tithe the penalty to be released from my current contract with pleasure.

Here's the thing: I'm not unhappy with my current phone. In fact, the Treo 650 I've been toting is probably the best I've ever owned. It permitted me to give away my Palm organizer, stop fretting about toting a camera everywhere I went, gives me a great sounding phone experience on a broad Sprint network and serves as a perfectly acceptable—considering its limitations—web and e-mail device.

And it looks antique next to the iPhone. Which will, oh yes, be mine.

That's because it's that last bit of feature I've come to rely on the most: access to e-mail and, especially, the web. And that's what all of the reviews to date (1, 2, 3) say the iPhone does best.

I can't get away from the phone; I'm in the professional communications business after all. But even sitting at my desk, even spending a few hours a day on the phone, I spend much more time in the web browser and pushing e-mail around. It has changed the way my business works and drastically reduced the number of people I actually have to speak with daily. If you took the phone off my desk tomorrow, I'd adjust and hardly miss a beat. I can't do my job these days without Eudora or Firefox.

So what I need most when I'm out and about (and not schlepping a lightweight laptop) is a great e-mail machine, a web browser, my calendar and contacts and a phone—in that order. That's what the iPhone appears to be. If I can use it to update the websites I administer, dash off e-mail replies to media queries, do modest research while I'm stuck at an airport gate (and, more than occasionally, consult the IMDb to settle a bar bet), manage my schedule and even from time to time call my mom, then it's exactly what I need.

The web is my backup brain (with apologies to Tom and Dori) and I can't wait for the iPhone to help me make a synaptic connection.

Can't. Wait.

Friday, June 15, 2007

Butterfly tramplin’

A site analyzing Temporal Anomalies in Time Travel Movies:

Time travel has been a staple in Science Fiction since H.G. Wells. Unfortunately, much of what passes for intelligence in this area is poorly considered.

For example, it is not possible to return to the past without changing the past in some way; nor is it possible to change the future based on information from the future. Doctor Who realized early on that changes to history were hazardous, and avoided them assiduously. Movies built on a time travel theme frequently become dissatisfying when the thread of time is closely examined.

[via Jason "McFly" Kottke]

Wednesday, June 13, 2007

Pimp my Firefox

Three new (to me) Firefox extensions I'm enjoying:

• Add to Search Bar: Makes it easy to add new site search engines to the Firefox search box. I just added the search on the theatre's website and it works a treat.
• Fission: Puts a progress bar in the address bar, ala Safari.
• Smart Link: Makes it easy to open plain-text URLs with a contextual click.

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

You need to know Moore

If you don't mind knowing a little more than you probably should (in other words, thar be some spoilers here), you might enjoy reading this interview with Battlestar Galactica executive producer Ron Moore about where the series has been, is going and how it became the "ripped from today's headlines" science-fiction must-see it is.

Remember how the Great Bird of the Galaxy used classic Star Trek to talk about contemporary issues and politics at a remove? That's what BSG is today, times a billion. If you're not watching it, you're frakked in the head.

Saturday, April 15, 2006

Pleased am I

I've been in the market for a new cell phone to replace my nearly three-year-old handset, so last week I followed the herd of my friends who'd recommended it and bought my very own Treo 650. I can't believe I waited this long.

There are a lot of pluses. Foremost, I get to replace both my phone and my PDA with one device, in a form factor that's not too much larger than my old headset. It's also got a decent-for-snapshots camera (that plays nice with Flickr), so there's another device I don't have to pack everywhere. Secondly, Sprint offers a very reasonable service plan that gives me the voice minutes I need along with all-you-can-eat internet access, meaning I can use the Treo for e-mail and light web work when I'm away from the office but don't want to lug a laptop. (The inexpensive combination of voice and data service surprised me. It's only $3 more per month than my old plan.)

On those trips where I do haul along the iBook, though, the phone is really going to come in handy, since its Bluetooth capability allows me to use it as a high-speed wireless modem. That means no more shelling out outrageous fees for hotel or airport wireless and no more struggling to check my e-mail or update websites on a fluky, long-distance dial-up connection when I come home to visit my mom. Which is where I am now, posting this at blazing speed.

Have I mentioned lately how much I love living in the future?

Friday, February 10, 2006

Things I Am Loving: Mac Edition

A few utilities new and old I can't don't want to live without:

• SafariStand adds all sorts of nifty useful features to Safari.
• PDFlab joins or separates PDF files without the need to open Acrobat.
• Renamer4Mac makes it easy to batch rename files. Just drag and drop.
• BetterHTMLexport makes automagically generating web galleries from iPhoto a snap, and provides significantly better control than iPhoto's built-in. (Compatible with iPhoto6.)
• Jumpcut, a simple, elegant clipboard extender built by my pal Steve.

These things make it easier to do my job every day, and carry the BradLands Seal of Approval.

Sunday, August 21, 2005

Of course, size doesn’t really matter…

Five years ago, I won a free TiVo during a promotion. Two years ago, I upgraded the original 30-hour unit to 203 hours. Earlier this year, I acquired a cheap 40-hour box on eBay and a couple of weeks ago ordered another upgrade kit, bringing its capacity to 230 hours. We now have three units in the house, with a total capacity of 573 hours of digital recording goodness.

There'll be probably be a fourth unit acquired before the end of the year, bringing the total household recording capacity to over 900 hours. (Before you dismiss this as some sort of compulsion or sickness, know that two of these machines are being used as part of an ongoing research project. I don't watch that much TV.)

Once again, I am pleased to recommend the products and service of the folks at Weaknees if you are seeking to upgrade the capacity of your TiVo DVR. Their do-it-yourself kits and easy-to-follow instructions make it a snap; the hardest part for me was finding a Philips screwdriver on my messy tool bench.

Friday, August 19, 2005

In 3-D!

Mena Trott and the Movable Type posse put together a nifty custom ViewMaster and reel set for a recent conference. (I honestly had no idea they still made ViewMasters. With the return of real wooden Lincoln Logs, my long-past childhood lives again!)

Behold: If Bloggers Had Been Around Throughout History.

(And yes, you can order your own—spendy!—custom ViewMaster reels and viewers.)

Wednesday, August 10, 2005

Step 1: Do not undertake this project downstairs.

How to build a Dalek. [via This is Pop!]

Stationery Orbit

Classic Star Trek business cards (Photo by Kevin Trotman).

Sunday, August 7, 2005

I feel a bit like Penfold, I do…

I had a chance this week to fiddle a bit with the new Apple Mighty Mouse and came away impressed enough to get one for each of my Macs. It feels good in the hand, although the side button is a bit awkward to work but I don't imagine I'd have much use for it anyway.

Still, I might have waited to make my purchase if I'd known this would be available so soon afterward. Crumbs!

Ah, well. I shall simply have to content myself with ordering this DVD collection instead.

Monday, August 1, 2005

‘n’ Judy

Some folks took the time to figure out how many punch cards it would take to encode an MP3 file. That's the sort of unrepentant geekery I can get behind.

I have a soft spot in my heart for the humble punch card. A couple of my first jobs required me to use them; somewhere in the basement, I still have a couple of boxes full that I liberated when they were finally retired and used as scratch paper while I was a struggling freelancer who couldn't afford note pads. They were an extremely low-density storage medium but there was something about holding code in your hand, running your fingers over the holes...in the pre-Internet age, it was a way I felt connected to information.

And, of course, they are still in use in many surprising and not-so- places and their cousins, like the piano roll, continue to survive into the digital age.

Friday, June 10, 2005

Yeah, but why only four peanuts in a bag?

I'm a pretty seasoned traveler, so I like to believe/pretend that climbing aboard a plane holds no particular mystery nor fazes me in the least. But the truth is, after all this time, there are some things I don't know or understand.

After reading the archives of the USA Today feature Ask the Captain, however, there are far fewer. It's a great read, and writer (and 777 pilot) Meryl Getline has a real knack for making the magic of jet flight less mysterious.

Wednesday, June 1, 2005

Skinning Movable Type

Customizing Movable Type's Interface with Application Templates: A guide to "skinning" the MT web application, as well as modifying its features.

Also, visual examples on Flickr.

Monday, April 4, 2005

Feed me…

I dabbled with it in the past, but with the advent of version 2.0 (now in public beta), I'm completely sold on NetNewsWire, a syndication reader that converts RSS and Atom feeds into a gorgeous digest of all the sites I love.

The latest beta build adds the promised synchronization feature—using .Mac or a personal FTP space—that keeps copies of NNW on multiple computers up to date. Since I find web-based applications for feed-reading cumbersome, that feature alone makes my registration fees money well spent.

Combined with the bundled MarsEdit for weblog editing, $39.95 is a cinch bargain for information junkies.