Instant Band Night 7-11 is next week

July 01, 2019

Welcome to Corgi-Class Starship, the newsletter that will someday soon eat spicy food without a second thought again. Also, Instant Band Night 7-11 is next week, so tell everybody you know and bring some Twinkies. 

You'll Like This

Update(s) on thing(s) I made or somehow helped to bring about.Idea Factory Giveaway113 - Jet Engine Encounter"Jon (@ferociousj), Besha (@besha), and special guest Gary Tyrrell (@fleenguy) explore stupendous ideas for weaponry, entertainment, and photobooths before trading darkly amusing medical trivia."The way I like to describe my fantastic friend Gary to pals is "he's your favorite kooky uncle" and it's true, possibly the most true thing I've ever said; if you don't get that sense from this episode, you'll just have to meet him in person someday and then! Then you'll know! Also, seriously, we give away some amazing photobooth prompts in this one before we get around to gross(?) medical stories.If you haven't yet, subscribe by searching "Idea Factory Giveaway" in your podcatcher of choice (and let me know if it doesn't pop up). If you're already there, feel free to leave a 5-star rating and a nice review (it helps; algorithms, etc, you know the deal).Instant Band Night 7-11🎶 NEXT 🎶🍡 DAMN 🍡🎸 WEEK 🎸See you there 

Medium Ramble

Skippable if you're in a hurry.I admit to you all here under the eyes of the gods that I stopped watching Doctor Who (the relaunch or whatever that started with the Eccleston run in 05) about one season into the Capaldi run. This was not his fault -- he was very good at it -- but I got the distinct impression the writers were trying their damnedest to make the Doctor into a jerkass, and I was not on board. I've been told this was fixed later on, so I might go back and fill in the hole at some point, if for no other reason than sheer completionist compulsion, because I started watching the Jodie Whittaker run a little while ago. I like it. It feels much more episodic than prior seasons -- none of the classic mythos seems to have popped up yet, or even an overarching big bad -- but I don't super care. Jodie Whittaker's Doctor is very good: smart, capable, fiercely protective, a bit of a mess, the usual without being a snarky asshole. The writing is ....... a little clumsy, but I still like it enough that I watched an episode that was literally full of giant spiders. So there's your year-overdue endorsement! Check back in 2021 when I finally get around to Fleabag; I heard there was more Luther past season 3! 

#dadthoughts

Also skippable if you're in a hurry or don't care. No judgment.A couple weeks ago, Quentin got a low-grade fever and distaste for eating that we thought were signs of teething -- his last molars coming in, maybe. Then he got some weird rashy bumps on his butt, and a quick Google pointed us toward a different culprit entirely: hand, foot, & mouth disease. Funfact: hand, foot, & mouth disease is 

  • Something All Kids Get nowadays (probably due to its 3-6 day incubation period, which is some sneaky bullshit)

  • Mostly harmless save for the blisters it gives you on your hands, feet, and mouth, which aren't fatal but probably horrible for tiny children with very little experience or understanding of that kind of thing

Once again, however, fortune(?) struck, in that Quentin never got any of the hand, foot, or mouth blisters (though he of course did get the fever and appetite loss that also seem to come with the infection) -- instead, I got them. Because apparently I never got this bug when I was a kid, or at least not the particular strain of virus Quentin caught from who-knows-where. I can tell you right now that while the hand and foot blisters are annoying, the mouth ones are truly the most unpleasant to deal with. At least I never got 'em in my throat?? Which is a thing that can happen??Quentin's long since recovered completely, and my hand and foot blisters are fading to a set of small spots, but the mouth is taking longer to get there. Just so everyone knows where I'm at! Parenting, folks: it's glamorous as hell. 

Fascination Corner

I read a lot of newsletters; here are some links that caught my eye. 

  • Prominent design leader says branding carries a moral responsibility; makes sense to me. (Fast Company) 

  • You want a good longread on the art references in the John Wick movies? Yeah, you fuckin' do. (Birth/Movies/Death) 

  • Nature has a review of a book by the researcher who popularized the concept of space archaeology. (Nature) 

  • We should throw our daughters a party when their menstrual cycle begins, says one mom, and you know what, why not. (The Lily) 

  • The Brookings Institute makes an interesting argument for paid leave as a way to stimulate economic growth. (Brookings Institute) 

  • This week's "let the headline do the talking" link is "Hey Dems, Take It From This Ex-Centrist: We Blew It." (Daily Beast) 

  • It's past time. Let's have the fucking names. (NYT) 

  • We're sending an eight-rotor drone (octocopter? dual quadrotor?) to Titan! You know! Eventually! (Space News) 

  • Huh: a house constructed from recycled plastic water bottles. It's not any cheaper, but ..... huh. (CBC) 

  • The Charlottesville car attack guy was sentenced to life in prison (you don't have to click on the link if you don't want to, there's a picture of it happening in there). I can't believe Heather Heyer's parents forgave this asshole; just once, I want the parents of a hate crime victim to tell the guy to choke on his own poop and die in his cell alone. That's all I ask. (BBC) 

  • I wonder if the devs are aiming to make the new tagline for their game "EVE Online: It's Nuts In There!!" (PC Gamer) 

  • If we're going to try using bacteriophages instead of antibiotics to deal with bacteria from now on, at least we won't have to look very hard. (American Society for Microbiology) 

  • Optical computing looks like a great way to do neural network computation much faster -- like millions of times faster?? -- than digital chips. (IEEE Spectrum) 

  • That's what I'm talkin' bout: machine learning can be used to teach a prosthetic hand which nerve signals go with what movements way faster. (MIT Technology Review) 

  • If you want to learn more about tornadoes, why not huck a bunch of drones right into them? (Gizmodo) 

  • One of the coauthors of the Gaia hypothesis has some interesting notions about how the planet gets past the Anthropocene. (Nature) 

  • A weirdly compelling case exists for the ability of fast food restaurants to be our national "third place." (Atlantic) 

  • Engineered wood! Let's get on it! (Anthropocene) 

  • Should we be thinking about machines taking over the world? Kinda. (Vision) 

  • Someone is actually out there trying to figure out how to make Americans happy (first by figuring out what's gotten them down), which I find bizarrely heartwarming. (Brookings Institute) 

A Fictional Thing

Something made-up that somehow suggested itself to me and which I could not escape.A band and their albumThe Trendsmen, Perhaps a Smaller Cup Next Time 

Thanks

If you've read this far, I thank you. Feel free to forward this to someone you like, or inflict upon someone you don't.