Monday, February 29, 2016

Review: The Intelligent Brain

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I'm of two minds about Great Courses' The Intelligent Brain .On the one hand, the first 10 lectures of this 18 part series is great,...
Tuesday, February 23, 2016

Review: Dark Intelligence

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Dark Intelligence is Neal Asher's new Polity novel, set after the Polity/Prador wars of the " Gridlinked " novels. True to fo...
Friday, February 19, 2016

Review: Scientific Secrets for Raising Kids Who Thrive

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Invariably, whenever I read or review a book on parenting, the comparison is to John Medina's Brain Rules for Baby , and the comparison ...
Thursday, February 18, 2016

Review: The Rosie Effect

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The Rosie Project was a delightful novel, so much so that I immediately placed a hold on the sequel, The Rosie Effect at the library. The ...
Tuesday, February 09, 2016

Review: Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future

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One chapter in Peopleware that always resonates in my mind is the chapter on "Spanish Theory Management": Some years ago I was s...
Thursday, February 04, 2016

Review: Nalgene ATB Bottle

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The last couple of months of mountain biking has been great. I've gone from being terrified to being able to do 2-3 foot drops and jumps...
Wednesday, February 03, 2016

Review: The Time of Contempt

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As mentioned in yesterday's review of The Witcher 3 , the video game in this case is much better than the source material. I picked up T...
Tuesday, February 02, 2016

Review: Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (PS4)

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In recent years, I'd pretty much given up on CRPGs as a genre. They pose multiple problems from my point of view: The typical CRPG ...
Monday, January 25, 2016

Review: Blood of Elves

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Blood of Elves is the third book in the witcher series, but the first novel. The previous 2 books were essentially series of short stories....
Wednesday, January 20, 2016

Review: Sword of Destiny

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I was playing The Witcher 3 on the PS4 , It's an exceedingly good RPG (and I'd actually avoided RPGs in recent years as they tend t...
Monday, January 18, 2016

Review: Wormhole

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Wormhole is the last book of the Rho Agenda trilogy. Like the Saturday morning cartoons it's modeled after, it's a novel with 3 teen...
Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Review: Focus - The Hidden Driver of Excellence

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Focus is, ironically enough, a singularly unfocused book. I checked it out of the library because I thought it would cover the mechanical a...
Tuesday, January 12, 2016

New thoughts on gearing

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For years, I resisted switching from 8-speeds to 9-speeds. I wasn't willing to upgrade until 9-speeds had become reliable (early 9-speed...
Monday, January 11, 2016

Review: Pirate Hunters

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I picked up Pirate Hunters as an audio book because it was listed as one of the "best of the year" on Audible. I wish I'd rea...
Friday, January 08, 2016

Review: My Beloved World

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My Beloved World is Sonia Sotomayor's memoir. Sotomayor was the first Hispanic (and 3rd woman) ever to be appointed to the Supreme Cour...
Thursday, January 07, 2016

Review: Soldner-X 2: Final Prototype (PS Vita)

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I doubt if my son will ever look fondly back at the side-scrolling shooter as a genre. I didn't think I looked back at that genre fondly...
Wednesday, January 06, 2016

Little Boys Are So Sensitive

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In most human cultures, the males of the species are supposed to be tough. But of course, little kids, including boys, just aren't that ...
Tuesday, January 05, 2016

Review: Until Dawn (PS4)

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Until Dawn is that rarest of games: under-hyped, under-promised, and over-delivered. Here are the following checkmarks against it: It be...
Monday, January 04, 2016

Review: Being Human: Life Lessons from the Frontiers of Science

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Being Human is quite unlike any audio course/audio book I've heard. Rather than a deep dive into a scientific topic, it's a mish-ma...
Thursday, December 24, 2015

A Return to Mountain Biking

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I gave up mountain biking for several years. Part of it was my move to Munich  (and subsequent move back) drove me to simplify the bike load...