Chocolate Omelets

Book Excerpt for the Day

    While cuneiform was first invented, it is currently thought, by accountants, and developed by scribes and scholars, the alphabet seems to have had much more plebian origins.  The latest archaeological discoveries suggest that alphabetic writing was the brainwave of a group of expatriate Semitic workers resident in Egypt early in the second millennium BCE.  Inspired by the pictographic Egyptian writing system we call hieroglyphs – ‘priest signs’ – they dreamt up a shorthand to use with their own language.

    (from Babylon by Paul Kriwaczek)

 

    9½*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Friday History Lesson

    Or Friday Crossword Puzzle definition.  Whichever.

Wednesday Wordplay

Superheroes

Book Excerpt for the Day

    “You’re going to let Professor Rapson tinker with your chair? You’ll probably go into orbit.  What sort of idiot are you?”

    “I’m hoping I’m the idiot who works for you, Dr. Maxwell.”

    “So am I.  You sound too good to be true.  What’s your position on chocolate?”

    “You can never have enough,” he said, pulling a handful of miscellaneous chocolate bars from mysterious depths.

    “You’re hired,” I said.  “Starting now.”

    (from A Symphony of Echoes by Jodi Taylor)

 

    9*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Science Sunday

Bestsellers

Wiccan Friday

Bilingual Thursday

Movie Tie-in Wednesday

Book Excerpt for the Day

    “Of course you can stay with us.  But I don’t get it.  Tyler, you’re a very rich young man.  Why don’t you just rent a place here for the year?  The price is like pocket change for you.”

    “My own place would mean stocking my own fridge, doing my own laundry, and cleaning my own floors.  If I stay with you, I get free room and board.”

    “So you’re a mooch.”

    “I bring you flowers and wine for dinner.”

    “You’re a classy mooch.”

    (from Bone Box by Faye Kellerman)

 

    5½*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Crop Failure

    I can!  I can!

Science Sunday

Solipsistic Saturday

Art Appreciation Friday

Book Excerpt for the Day

    It left me thinking I couldn’t make a mistake, that I had to be precise and fine, which of course was no way to go after a batter—especially a batter with the pedigree of Wade Boggs.  No, he couldn’t hurt you with a single swing of the bat, not like Jim Rice or Don Baylor, but he could hurt you, make no mistake.  Death by a thousand paper cuts, by seeing-eye singles … that’s how a guy like Wade Boggs could hurt you.

    (from Game 7, 1986 by Ron Darling)

 

    8*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Wednesday Illusion

Bilingual Tuesday

Surreal Sunday

In The Background

    Yep.  That's me.

Book Excerpt for the Day

    “Is there any reason why the boar attacked Crackling Rosie?”

    “Hard to say.  It could have been territorial; sometimes a pig won’t accept other porcines in its boardom.”

    “What?” I said, puzzled.

    “A king has a kingdom.  Therefore, a boar has a boardom,” Mr. Catt explained, smirking.  “I thought everyone knew that.”

    (from Inspector Hobbes and the Bones by Wilkie Martin)

 

    7½*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Potty Training Puppies

    We might have to try this on our newly-arrived, 6-month-old and not-yet-housebroken puppy.

Pac-Man vs. Now

    And the controller had just two button ("A" and "B") and a plus-sign-shaped joystick.

Philosophy Tuesday

Book Excerpt for the Day

    Stef and the ColU both kept a careful watch on the temperature outside; it was dropping, of course, but not dramatically quickly.  Under thicker cloud it could even rise above freezing.  “Thus proving the theory,” said Stef, “that a thick atmosphere on a world like this is enough of a thermal blanket to transport sufficient heat around to the dark side to keep everything from freezing up.”

    “That and the fact that all the air didn’t freeze up in great bergs of solid oxygen and nitrogen on the far side a billion years ago,” Liu said dryly.  “That and the fact that we are still breathing.”

    “But it’s always good to have observational confirmation.”

    (from Proxima by Stephen Baxter)

 

    7*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Sunday Sermon

Quote for the Day

Cooties

    Our weekly Calvin & Hobbes cartoon.

Bilingual Thursday

Book Excerpt for the Day

    Broak tilted his head toward me.  “Can you talk some sense into your friend?  The world is at stake, you know.”

    “You tried to kill me, you piece of shit.”  I rammed my hand around his neck, wedged my finger and thumb under his jawbone.  He did not resist.  “I’d be dead if it wasn’t for Pivot.”

    “Can we put that aside for now, dear Socket?  There are greater issues before us than a street fight.”

    (from The Discovery of Socket Greeny by Tony Bertauski)

 

    7*/10.  The complete review is here.

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Tuesday Awww Moment

Vocabulary-Building Sunday

Quote for the Day

Verbing

Francophone Thursday

Book Excerpt for the Day

    The janitor was fatter on one side than the other.  His name was Shaibel.  Mr. Shaibel.  One day she was sent to the basement to clean the blackboard erasers by clomping them together, and she found him sitting on a metal stool near the furnace scowling over a green-and-white checkerboard in front of him.  But where the checkers should be there were little plastic things in funny shapes.  Some were larger than others.  There were more of the small ones than any of the others.  The janitor looked up at her.  She left in silence.

    (from The Queen’s Gambit by Walter Tevis)

 

    8*/10.  The full review is here.

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Science Wednesday

Editing Tip for the Day

Sunday Pun Day