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Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Sat Aug 23, 2014 8:18 am
by Digit
Ha. 10-year-old CEO of his own book reselling company of four employees is pretty well set-up. He's got the big oak desk, the corporate stationery, the also 10-year-old marketing director who offers to get him some coffee, the employee handbook which specifies no alcohol or firearms, and even the Reagan bust on his desk.
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Mon Aug 25, 2014 9:47 pm
by Whistler
I've been reading Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (I think someone recommended it on the Board a few years ago?). It is pretty awesome! Social psychology, genetics, logic, all under the guise of an excellent fanfic. Or in Acius's words, "What Harry Potter would have been like if Harry had been a nerd instead of a jock."
http://hpmor.com/chapter/1
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Mon Aug 25, 2014 10:38 pm
by M.O.D.A.Q.
Whistler wrote:I've been reading Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (I think someone recommended it on the Board a few years ago?). It is pretty awesome! Social psychology, genetics, logic, all under the guise of an excellent fanfic. Or in Acius's words, "What Harry Potter would have been like if Harry had been a nerd instead of a jock."
http://hpmor.com/chapter/1
Thank you for posting this! A friend recommended it to me but I had forgotten about it until I saw your post.
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Wed Sep 03, 2014 6:09 pm
by Digit
An oldie but goodie came up on my Pandora stream. Bon Jovi's Dead or Alive. Slippery When Wet was the first tape I ever got. Good music.
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Tue Sep 09, 2014 9:33 am
by Whistler
the HPMOR fanfic isn't complete yet aaaaaah
also: Georgian folk songs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbsQJBx ... UmEec5NJeg
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Wed Sep 10, 2014 12:59 pm
by mic0
Does this count as something I'm reading?
A dumb but funny article in silliness: or, someone tries to really eat endless mozzarella sticks.
"Is it possible that man was not meant to ingest infinite quantities of mozzarella sticks?"
ETA: It reminds me of a modern day Notes From Underground or Diary of a Madman, but funnier.
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Wed Sep 10, 2014 1:43 pm
by Portia
Dostoevsky (um, not Solzhenitsyn, as I thought. Hobbes will send the firing squad shortly) reference FTW.
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Wed Sep 10, 2014 3:06 pm
by Whistler
I read this and it was epic. I really felt the boredom.
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Wed Sep 10, 2014 3:12 pm
by mic0
She's a good writer like that.
The boredom was palpable (and I could almost taste the mozzarella sticks, which still sound good to me, but I haven't been through the horrors she's been through).
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Sat Sep 13, 2014 5:09 pm
by Digit
Ha. CERN announcement to switch to Comic Sans. Note the last sentence when the changes would take effect.
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Wed Sep 17, 2014 8:13 am
by Tally M.
Whistler wrote:I've been reading Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (I think someone recommended it on the Board a few years ago?). It is pretty awesome! Social psychology, genetics, logic, all under the guise of an excellent fanfic. Or in Acius's words, "What Harry Potter would have been like if Harry had been a nerd instead of a jock."
http://hpmor.com/chapter/1
So, I've been reading this lately as well (Thanks for posting it!). I started it quite a few years, but I think I stopped in like the first chapter when Draco mentioned wanting to rape a girl (don't worry, it's not as bad as it sounds, but I certainly thought it was going to be). I'm ABSOLUTELY LOVING IT. Seriously, parts have entered my own HP canon, especially a reanalysis of what exactly it means to be a Ravenclaw. This one, and Pet Project are the only two fanfics I've ever read, and I've loved both of them.
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Wed Sep 17, 2014 11:12 am
by Whistler
yeah, I'm glad I have an e-reader, because I'm not sure if I would have tried reading it otherwise.
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Wed Sep 17, 2014 11:19 am
by Tally M.
I liked the first half much better than the second half...Some of the plot decisions made were not my favorites.
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Sun Sep 21, 2014 7:22 pm
by Emiliana
I just finished re-reading the original HP series (which took me only about three weeks...I suspect I should have spent more time grading papers and less time HPing over the last few weeks, but oh well!). My hunger for more, along with these recommendations, has led me to HP and the Methods of Rationality. I'm enjoying it in a lot of ways, but on the other hand part of what I like about the original series is that the magic IS so whimsically unpredictable. So I'm not sure whether I'm going to like Harry trying to rationalize it to death.
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2014 4:18 pm
by Digit
Ambition: Why Some People Are Most Likely to Succeed
Funny quote.
Most troubling of all, what about when enough ambition becomes way too much? Grand dreams unmoored from morals are the stuff of tyrants — or at least of Enron. The 16-hour workday filled with high stress and at-the-desk meals is the stuff of burnout and heart attacks. Even among kids, too much ambition quickly starts to do real harm. In a just completed study, anthropologist Peter Demerath of Ohio State University surveyed 600 students at a high-achieving high school where most of the kids are triple-booked with advanced-placement courses, sports and after-school jobs. About 70% of them reported that they were starting to feel stress some or all of the time. "I asked one boy how his parents react to his workload, and he answered, 'I don't really get home that often,'" says Demerath. "Then he handed me his business card from the video store where he works."
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Fri Sep 26, 2014 7:36 pm
by M.O.D.A.Q.
Fall premieres have begun. New seasons of TV shows. My free time is officially gone.
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Sat Sep 27, 2014 9:44 am
by Whistler
your free time isn't gone, you're just spending it watching TV!
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Sat Sep 27, 2014 11:37 am
by Emiliana
I just finished Walter Dean Myers' "All The Right Stuff," which was one of the last things he wrote before he died earlier this year. It kind of sucked...
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Tue Sep 30, 2014 1:12 pm
by Digit
It's not the visuals or even the accents, there's just something distinctly Russian about the chorals in the Red Army Choir's rendition of
Get Lucky.
Re: Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to
Posted: Sun Oct 05, 2014 8:22 pm
by mic0
Not me, but my dad just finished the Mistborn series! I got him the first book for Christmas, remembering how we read Harry Potter when I was in high school and how fun it was. He really loved them and just finished the last Mistborn book a couple weeks ago. One thing is, he always calls Brandon Sanderson "Brian" Sanderson.
I don't know if he is joking or not, but it is pretty funny.