I have a new blog post up at the MN Skeptics Blog!
A Bigfoot sighting in our own backyard? Cool!
Thank goodness for all of the verbal interpretation of the blurry video, otherwise I never would have know that I was looking at a Sasquatch!
Caution: Blurry video and huge leaps in deductive reasoning may cause nausea and/or uncontrollable laughter in some viewers.
To watch the video head on over to the MN Skeptics blog.
Not the work part. At work there were some things, and then there was some stuff, so the work part of Monday was just meh. But after work has been fun!
Last week I was invited to write a blog post about my experience with Virtual Drinking Skeptically, a social videoconferencing group that brings people together to discuss skeptic topics. My piece is just a write-up of a recent VDS event, but I was honored to be asked to write about it, and today it was published on the Virtual Drinking Skeptically website. So that was cool.
After work I went to the doctor for a routine check up and then I had dinner plans with some friends. My appointment was done at 4:15 and dinner wasn’t until 6:30, so I decided to stop in to Half Price Books. I don’t know why I did that; I have an entire five-shelf bookcase filled with books that I haven’t read yet. But (as always), I made a great find:
Background: So, I’m all excited about going to Dragon*Con this year, right? I’m so excited that I forced my Mom to listen while I listed and described all of the different tracks that will be available at the convention. She perked up a bit when I told her that there is an entire track devoted to Anne McCaffrey. I confided that I hadn’t read anything by McCaffery and she ordered me to go read The Ship Who Sang. I’m easy so I put it on my must acquire and read list.
I couldn’t get it at Barnes and Noble without a special order, and there weren’t any copies conveniently located at the local library. I went online to purchase an e-book, but ended up finding a free PDF of the book instead. Unfortunately there were typos in it and I couldn’t download it to my phone without paying for it. But, I started reading it on the computer and was hooked.
It’s a really interesting story: In the future those who are born with physical disabilities but healthy brains are either euthanized or turned into “shell-people”; brains that control machinery. They are individuals with rights, and are self-aware, highly intelligent and possess a wide range of human emotions. They are employed by the Central Worlds to do things like man spaceships. The Ship Who Sang is about a shell-person named Helva and the adventures she has with her various “brawns” – the pilots who accompany her on her missions.
So, to bring a long story to an end, I was very excited to find the first three books in the series at the used bookstore, and as soon as I’m done with this blog I intended to spend the rest of the evening finishing The Ship Who Sang.
This next part is a little gossipy and petty, but I like it.
After Half Price Books I still had a little over an hour until dinner. I stopped in to a Caribou Coffee to sit back in one of their big comfy reading chairs, drink a frosty summer coffee drink, read and check the Twitters. Sadly, the comfy chairs were taken up by a man and his two young daughters. And when I say taken up, I mean I think they had moved in a few days ago. They had two netbooks on the table, the girls were laying on the couch watching a movie on a third computer, magazine were strewn every which way and the dad had his socked feet on the coffee table and was reading a book. Ah well, there were plenty of the hard high-back chairs so I took a table nearby the comfy chairs in case the man and his daughters left.
About 10 minutes after I sat down I heard the Dad say, “Girls, let’s go next door and have some dinner.” So they get up and leave their shit all over the comfy chairs. All over MY comfy chair. That’s not cool! You don’t get to hog all of the good comfy chair seating in the coffee shop while you go to dinner! And they left all of their expensive stuff just sitting there for any yahoo to steal. So…I go up to the barista and say, “I just heard that man tell his daughters that they should go get some dinner, and they left all of their computers and stuff behind.” The barista gave me a look like she understood the situation perfectly, and with a slightly naughty look said, “Really? They left? Hmmm…maybe I should put it behind the counter so nobody steals it.” And she did. She gathered up all of their junk, put it in a box and put the box behind the counter. When dude came back 30 minutes later he saw me reclining on “his” chair and said, “Hey, I had a bunch of stuff over here.” I gave him big doe eyes and said, “Yeah, the barista put it behind the counter so no one would steal it. You had, like, three laptops just sitting out in the open.” He got all sputtery and mad.
And then it was exactly time to go to dinner.
Dinner was…oh, dinner was fabulous. I went for sushi with five lady-friends and we had a ball talking pop culture, books, travel, food and all of those other relaxing dinner topics. We ordered a ton of appetizers, drinks, one of those big sushi boats, and a few desserts at the end of the meal. The food was very good and reasonably priced. If you’re looking for sushi in the Lakes/Uptown area of Minneapolis I highly recommend Wakame.
And now if you’ll excuse me…the shell-people are waiting.
I have a new post up over at the Minnesota Skeptics blog! It’s about my experiences at a local Drinking Skeptically…For Night People! event.
Tonight I ended up meeting a lot of new (to me) people. Hello new skeptical friends! I met a nurse, three engineers, a past member of the Secular Student Alliance, some Tim Minchin fans, some people who are pretty excited about going to The Amazing Meeting next week, and a whole mess of atheists (deconverted Catholic over there, former Hindu over there, raised Fundamentalist Christian in that corner, past altar boy in that one – the list went on and on!).
To read the article in it’s entirety, please go here to the Minnesota Skeptics wordpress blog.
I have a new blog post up over at the Minnesota Skeptics blog!
The Challenges of Being a Skeptic
In 2009 I discovered The Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe. Shortly thereafter I started reading skeptical blogs and books and listening to other skeptical podcasts. In 2010 I found local meetups and attended my first skeptics’ conferences. Along the way there have been ah-ha! moments, but there have also been challenges. More on the challenges in a minute.
Skepticism provides for me a way of looking at the world, at evaluating the massive amounts of information that come to us every day. Skeptics have a wide range of interests – politics, medicine, economy, science, the gamut of human rights and social issues, paranormal investigation, and religion, to name a few. But what we all share is…
To read the rest of my article, please go here to the Minnesota Skeptics blog.
I have a new article up over at the Minnesota Skeptics’ blog!
A Lake Monster In Minnesota!
We love our lake monsters, don’t we? Everyone is familiar with Nessie, but here are a few you might not know:
Brosno Dragon – Lake Brosno, West Russia. Said to resemble a dragon or dinosaur, with potential sightings going back to the 13th century.
Lagarfljóts Worm – Lagarfljót, Iceland. Otherwise known as the Iceland Worm Monster. Walks on land and swims in the water, spits poison. Mean beastie, but that may be because it was thrown in a cold lake when it was just a baby monster.
Morag – Loch Morar, Scotland. Nessie may be Scotland’s best known monster, but it certainly isn’t…
To read the rest of this piece, which includes my own real-life lake monster sighting in Richfield, MN – and a picture of the beast! – please visit my full article at Minnesota Skeptics’ blog.
The Rapture is this weekend! Use this handy flowchart to figure out if you’re going to be one of the lucky ones this weekend. And by lucky ones, I mean those of us left here to enjoy the Earth and all of the available parking spaces, easy restaurant reservations and short lines at the checkout. Unfortunately, according to the figure below not many of us stand a chance of being Raptured, so it’ll still be a pretty crowded place down here.
click image to make readable
Seen on The Things I’ve Missed, A Growing List. Original source Peas and Cougars.
The Rapture is this weekend! Use this handy flowchart to figure out if you’re going to be one of the lucky ones this weekend. And by lucky ones, I mean those of us left here to enjoy the Earth and all of the available parking spaces, easy restaurant reservations and short lines at the checkout. Unfortunately, according to the figure below not many of us stand a chance of being Raptured, so it’ll still be a pretty crowded place down here.
click image to make readable
Seen on The Things I’ve Missed, A Growing List. Original source Peas and Cougars.
Like many people, my gateway drug introduction to skepticism as a vibrant, evolving community was The Skeptic’s Guide to the Universe. If you listen to podcasts and like science and skepticism with occasional side of snark, you absolutely MUST give SGU a try.
This was the end-of-show quote from episode #303 (5/4/11), and it’s stuck with me for over a week now. I really enjoy it as a persuasive statement about the use and beauty of science.
Aka: What I said at lunch today and why my lunch mates rolled their eyes and called me a party pooper.
Aka: What I said at lunch today and why my lunch mates rolled their eyes and called me a party pooper.
