CircleCount helps you better understand Google+

2013-03-25 21:38:21 (16 comments, 2 reshares, 85 +1s)

Reflection of self in spherical doorknob, apologies to M.C. Escher

2013-01-22 21:03:31 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 18 +1s)

If you are on or near the eastern seaboard, consider checking out some live poetry from Rose McAleese

2013-01-04 00:08:48 (6 comments, 10 reshares, 49 +1s)

Latest from my man Teppo

2012-07-05 14:44:25 (13 comments, 17 reshares, 47 +1s)

2012-07-02 16:04:10 (15 comments, 64 reshares, 102 +1s)

Exactly seven days remaining in the CLANG kickstarter campaign. About 3/4 of the way through we have reached the 3/4 funding mark, which sounds good as far as it goes...but we need to keep the momentum going. This campaign launched with such a bang that I suspect many who heard of it in the early days have been assuming we long since blew through our goal and became one of those overfunded Kickstarters that we always hear about. But that's not the case...yet. So if you or someone you know is interested in seeing something fundamentally new happen in the world of video games that incorporate sword fighting mechanics, check out our site and the FAQs and updates we've been posting as our donor community has taken shape.

2012-06-22 00:41:33 (9 comments, 22 reshares, 70 +1s)

Doing an AMA on Reddit in 20 minutes or so http://redd.it/vdt11

2012-06-09 17:47:43 (93 comments, 322 reshares, 586 +1s)

Launched Kickstarter campaign for CLANG, our effort to make a swordfighting game that actually does justice to the art http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/260688528/clang

2012-05-22 18:57:03 (15 comments, 13 reshares, 60 +1s)

Most airports have placards and signs above the security line exhorting you to take out your laptops, fluids, etc. so that you can get through the line faster. At DSM, the same content is couched as "here are some things you can do to prevent holding up the line/slowing down other people."

Welcome to the Midwest.

2011-10-01 23:38:48 (59 comments, 4 reshares, 24 +1s)

It seems just a bit odd that Apple, with all its wealth and technological genius, cannot make a mail app that can consistently send outgoing mail using Apple's own (me.com) mail service. If that statement seems too bizarre to be real, just Google something like "apple mail can't send" and see what comes up.

Please don't respond to this with suggestions on how to fix it, since the apple tech support forums are full of folk wisdom on this topic, and none of it seems to work.

On my machine, Mail will happily send outgoing email on other services such as well.com and google mail. The only system it doesn't work with is Apple's own.

Until recently this only happened when I was away from home, and so I'd use webmail on me.com as a workaround. But now it seems to be perma-broken, so I'm reduced to using webmail all the time for me.com/mac.com.

2011-10-01 21:29:09 (22 comments, 28 reshares, 51 +1s)

Remember when we used to give them little pilots' wings?

2011-10-01 15:24:04 (40 comments, 43 reshares, 129 +1s)

I don't mean to gross people out, but: the new backscatter machines at airport security require that everything come out of your pockets, including paper. So everyone has to place their handkerchiefs and kleenexes---some of which have been used---into the bins. Also, there is the matter of shoes; official policy is not to put your shoes into the bins but this is ignored. The shoes have been walking around in airport bathrooms. The bins are recycled many times per hour and used for other people's handkerchiefs, cellphones, toiletry bags, etc. I'm not especially prissy about things like this but the epidemiological ramifications are obvious enough to give even me pause.

2011-09-30 13:38:39 (23 comments, 1 reshares, 17 +1s)

Also: the performance of Dyson Airblades must be highly sensitive to variations in installation and/or maintenance procedures, because the ones at the Eastern Iowa Airport really kick ass.

2011-09-30 13:16:05 (19 comments, 1 reshares, 31 +1s)

In a small but touching gesture, the Eastern Iowa Airport in Cedar Rapids offers a bin full of disposable slip-on booties before security so that you can walk through the metal detectors with something on your feet. I have not seen this anywhere else.

2011-09-29 21:32:59 (40 comments, 18 reshares, 68 +1s)

This is definitely in the category of first world problems and so I have hesitated to mention it, but someone needs to invent a device that will differentiate between good and bad croissants without making physical contact.

2011-09-29 21:31:28 (34 comments, 3 reshares, 29 +1s)

Owing to some kind of perverse neurological malfunction, I've had a 14-year-old Natalie Imbruglia song stuck in my head for the entire duration of this book tour.

2011-09-28 11:59:44 (31 comments, 0 reshares, 19 +1s)

Accumulating a vast oversupply of Sharpies that will disappear into thin air as soon as I get home

2011-09-27 11:56:32 (18 comments, 2 reshares, 22 +1s)

Cruising down the highway in Philly, a car blew by us on the right, piloted by a bald man who was steering with his right hand while combing his beard with his left.

2011-09-27 11:54:03 (34 comments, 6 reshares, 54 +1s)

My hotel in Philly, which is decidedly non-rustic, has locally produced apples all over the lobby as a sort of early-autumn harvest decoration. I'm not sure if this is what they intended, but it saved me from dropping what probably would have been a very large amount of money on breakfast. My favorite is the Wickson, pictured here, because it's small and tart. Apples are a food that has suffered more than most from the doctrine that anything can be improved by making it bigger and sweeter.

2011-09-25 12:55:34 (15 comments, 1 reshares, 27 +1s)

Hotel laundry forms have not been upgraded since around the time of the Great War.

2011-09-25 04:00:14 (45 comments, 2 reshares, 25 +1s)

Nocturnal leg cramps would be an awesome and never-ending source of slapstick YouTube videos if only we had infrared cameras set up to capture the behaviors of those who experience them. A lot of editing would be required, though, or else you would see hours of nothing punctuated by moments of frenzied activity.

2011-09-25 03:57:19 (19 comments, 1 reshares, 26 +1s)

Beginning to suffer Hotel Lag. It takes 24 hours for the layout of a new hotel room to be absorbed into muscle memory. If I move to a new hotel every day, then I wake up in the middle of the night in, say, New York and try to find my way to the bathroom assuming the layout of the hotel room in, say, Portland. Hilarity ensues.

2011-09-23 00:01:53 (21 comments, 3 reshares, 65 +1s)

Portland & Powell's

2011-09-23 00:01:38 (16 comments, 2 reshares, 39 +1s)

2011-09-22

2011-09-23 00:01:35 (3 comments, 0 reshares, 4 +1s)

2011-09-22

2011-09-21 05:31:58 (30 comments, 2 reshares, 48 +1s)

Good first tour day. Lots of stock signing, an appearance at Google Kirkland, more stock signing, then a gig at Town Hall attended by a few hundred courteous and happy people. Signed a lot of Kindles and a few iPads. Wish I could tell a more interesting story but it's really one of those "no news is good news" things.

Now to pack and get a few hours' sleep before heading to SFO

2011-09-20 15:32:53 (29 comments, 9 reshares, 69 +1s)

Aaaand book tour insanity begins

2011-09-13 23:04:01 (38 comments, 4 reshares, 66 +1s)

First day of full-on book tour "work." A precursor of the real deal which begins in a week. No signs of physical or psychic deterioration yet. Eyelid has not started twitching. Have not begun drinking as of 1600 local time. I know what city I'm in. Guess I've still got it.

2011-09-01 15:32:26 (86 comments, 112 reshares, 198 +1s)

First copies of the UK (left) and US (right) editions. Not sure why the UK ones are always thicker. I've always been interested in the different approaches taken by US and UK publishers to cover art. Both of them know their markets and do a fine job of reaching them, but evidently tastes are very different.