If you’re looking for my science blog instead, it’s here.
Releasing a New Game: Less Is Morse
A couple of days ago, I released a project I’ve been tinkering with for awhile: a game for teaching and practicing Morse code reception. You can check it out here. It’s certainly different from the previous games I’ve worked on, but it stems from one of my other major hobbies.
Learn or practice Morse code with a minimalist interface.
If you’ve ever wanted to learn Morse code, or already know it and want a fun way to practice and build up your receiving speed, please give it a try.
Boss Fights: Why Making Games Is So Hard
Having played video games for almost as long as they’ve existed, blogged about them a handful of times, and even dabbled in developing them, it’s fair to say I’m a gamer. Like many, though, I often find the game development industry puzzling. Why does it take companies so long to make new games, why do they sometimes cancel or delay projects that seem to have so much fan interest, and most importantly, why does the business seem to breed so many scandals?
Learning Celestial Navigation
In my continuing effort to acquire miscellaneous skills, I took up celestial navigation a little while ago. Yes, I mean using a sextant, some printed tables, and a rudimentary grasp of the principles of spherical trigonometry to find my position on Earth.
It’s unlikely anyone really needs to do this here in the 21st century, when we all carry GPS receivers in our pockets that are accurate to a few meters, but utility isn’t the only reason, or even the best reason, to learn things.
A Sturdy Blanket Booth
I’ve been getting into voiceover projects lately, and it’s time I documented my recording setup. For those new to this subject, the key challenge in making high-quality voice recordings is setting up a “treated space.” There’s a whole literature on sound treatment, but the essence of it for this purpose is to kill all echoes in the recording room.
It’s harder than you might think.
My carpeted home office sounds like it has fine acoustics on my podcasting mic, but with even a prosumer-quality voiceover mic, it sounds like I’m at the bottom of a well.
Fast Internet
One of the things I learned from living through the pandemic was just how toxic my relationship with the internet had become. Scrolling had turned into doomscrolling, and the more time I spent on certain internet activities, the worse I felt. That led me to start cutting back. Initially I missed the addictive feeds of social media, of course - they are, after all, precision-designed to hold one’s attention. But as I noticed how much better I felt when I was off them, I cut back further.
Supporting Open Source Software by Writing Documentation
Almost all of the software I use these days is Open Source; Free code runs this blog, most of the applications I use every day at work, and many of my hobby projects. While it’s great to get all of these power tools at no cost, I do try to support the ones I use a lot. In a few instances, I’ve actually been able to contribute little bits of code myself, but more often I try to pitch in where my skills are strongest: writing.
New on The Turbid Plaque: So You Quit Twitter...
On The Turbid Plaque, I’ve offered a few suggestions for things to do now that you’ve quit Twitter. Enjoy.
Refinishing Antique Chairs
I inherited a lovely Philippine mahogany dining table and a set of four walnut chairs from my great-grandmother, but as one might expect for century-old furniture, they weren’t in pristine condition when I got them. The chairs in particular were rickety and heavily worn, with the finish thick with accumulated grime in some spots. Here’s a photo essay showing how I refinished one of them.
Initial disassembly was easy, as the seat and back were held on with screws.
Just Mow Them
As the deafening roar of leaf blowers outside reminds me, it’s time to remind my fellow suburbanites once again that leaf removal is a scam. Put down the blower, tell the landscapers to go home, and just mow your lawn normally every week.
Here’s Kansas State University’s explanation of this simple hack, and here’s an endorsement of it from no less an authority than Scotts Lawncare.
Seriously, save yourself a bunch of money and effort, spare the environment all those pointless emissions, and save me from this damned noise.
Talking to Science Teachers about Journalism
I had the privilege of giving the keynote presentation at this year’s Massachusetts Science Education Leadership Association meeting. For a long read about the science news business, the existential threat of misinformation, and what it all means for teachers, please check out the text version on The Turbid Plaque.
I Twit
I’m not on Twitter anymore. Please add this page’s RSS feed to your favorite reader to follow future posts.
MAIB, R.I.P.
The weirdest, and for my money most delightful, publication in the boating world has ceased operations. Messing about in Boats, which began as a bimonthly journal in the early ’80s, covered a broader and stranger beat than any other regularly published magazine I’ve ever encountered. Named for a famous quote from Kenneth Grahame’s The Wind in the Willows (Ratty says to Mole that “there is nothing - absolutely nothing - half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats”), the whole magazine was a sort of decades-long work of outsider art.