Oct. 6, 2017
Alistair Reynolds’ 2000 novel “Revelation Space” has long been in orbit of my science fiction “to read” list, but it wasn’t until one sleepless night (post “Command and Control”) that I came across it in Ingrid’s audiobooks. I was instantly drawn in as I listened to the opening scene about an archaeological dig facing evacuation ahead of an imminent ‘razor storm’.
“Revelation Space” is hard sci-fi set in a universe where the speed of light cannot be exceeded.
Tags: Books, Science Fiction, Alistair Reynolds, Seventeen
Oct. 5, 2017
I love making plots in R with ggplot. However, there are always a few niggles that I forget about between plots. I wrote this post so that I have somewhere to look the next time I need to tweak a few things in my plots. I intend to come back and add updates in the future as I learn more things. If I keep coming back, I might also remember a few of these too.
Tags: Programming, R, Seventeen
Oct. 4, 2017
We arrived in Reykjavík a few days after a monumental snowstorm. As such the city was still under at least six inches of snow. We collected the hire car from the airport and drove out of Keflavik. The scenery normally looks like a moonscape, but for us it was a frosty white wonderland.
After about an hour’s drive, we arrived at the Hotel Nattura. From the outside it looks like a huge secondary school but as soon as you step inside it’s warm and comfortable.
Tags: Trips, Europe, Iceland, Photos, Seventeen
Oct. 3, 2017
I had low expectations for “Hello America”, the next in the series of Ballard novels that I started reading over seven years ago. However, it turned out to be a hoot. A couple of years ago, this novel would have been a wig-out bit of standard Ballard weirdness (a bit like “The Drowned World” or “The Crystal World”) but given recent events “Hello America” is starting to take on an eerie prescience.
Tags: Books, Reading Projects, J. G. Ballard, Science Fiction, Seventeen
Oct. 1, 2017
Ingrid and I got married a month ago. It was a lovely day. We had a simple ceremony with two witnesses, our friends Sue and Andrew. We kept it quiet and small, as we just wanted to be married without too much fuss. A month on, we’re happy to report that we are glad we did it.
We’d like to thank everyone who nonetheless sent cards and gifts, and to all of those who wished us well on Facebook.
Tags: Life Experiences, Wedding, Photos, Seventeen
Sep. 30, 2017
Note: Recent months have been very busy, so this album digest combines a review of the new album by The National with a couple of reviews left over from earlier in the year.
I’ve written a few more album reviews in the past months but I’m so far behind (February and March have already been published on a considerable lag) that I’m just going to pepper forthcoming digests with additional reviews of older albums.
Tags: Album Digest, September, Music, The National, Nelly Furtado, Goldfrapp, Seventeen
Sep. 29, 2017
“Command and Control” by Eric Schlosser is about the history of nuclear weapons and their safety. This might not seem like a thrilling subject, but it’s absorbing from start to finish. I started it three years ago but only finished it more recently as the subject of nuclear weapons has become more pertinent to current affairs1. There are many people who would stand to gain a great deal from reading this book2.
Tags: Books, Non Fiction, Eric Schlosser, Seventeen
Sep. 28, 2017
We bought a cheap package holiday in the British Airways Black Friday sale. The weekend spanned Ingrid’s birthday, so it was ideal. £99 each for flights and a hotel, and we bagged a hire car quite cheaply too.
Because our flight was from Heathrow and the trains from Chichester are both expensive and inconvenient for early flights, we spoiled ourselves with a taxi to the airport. It felt very strange to be whisked through the Sussex and Surrey countryside at six am on a Friday morning!
Tags: Travel, Europe, Italy, Photos, Seventeen
Sep. 25, 2017
I came late to Orbital’s work. I knew of them through a few remixes and because as a mad Orb fan, they could not have avoided my notice could they? Apart from that, one of my college friends tried to get me into “In Sides” just after its release in 1996. The same friend got me into “Second Toughest In The Infants” by Underworld. I cannot now understand the reason, but “In Sides” just left me cold.
Tags: Understated Classics, Orbital, Music, Seventeen, Electronic
Jul. 17, 2017
In my last post, I wrote about hills. I tried to use them as a metaphor to explain nagging sense of incompletion when you single out one activity over another. The feeling that there’s always a more exciting hill off in the distance to go climb, instead of the one you’re on.
I said my next post would be about how to pick between different options, particularly when you have many to choose from.
Tags: Writing, Ideas, Blogging, Seventeen
Jul. 15, 2017
I’m a big fan of books. The way they transport you away to other places and so on. As repositories of knowledge and adventure they can’t be beat. I can think of no better way out of an existential fix than reading.
The trouble is I tend to hoard them. I’ve posted pictures of book stacks before (on more than one occasion). I could probably repeat that every month if I wanted to, perhaps even more often.
Tags: Ideas, Blogging, Seventeen
Jul. 1, 2017
I enjoyed Wonder Woman, which came as a surprise to me given my growing distaste for superhero movies. I can remember seeing the Superman reboot Man of Steel with its phallic rockets and its boring boring fight sequences. But almost everything about Wonder Woman exceeded my expectations. It’s a well-made superhero movie and better still, it gets to the heart of why these kinds of movies matter.
Whereas Man of Steel ended up levelling cities and criminally underusing Amy Adams, all while giving us no stake on why Superman even matters as a man or a hero, Wonder Woman focusses tightly on its main character and explains what matters to her, and in turn the movie then explains why she should matter to us.
Tags: Films, Seventeen, Science Fiction