Oldbie.org

Fantastic talk by Michael Pollan, the author of In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto and The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals.

Direct link to YouTube

Posted by Michael Harrison at 8:28 PM |
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Children's literature is big business these days. Just go to any mega-chain bookstore and check out the square footage devoted to the kids. It's fantastic that there are so many options for young readers, but the popularity of children's literature is hardly a new phenomenon.

The bookn3rd blog, which focuses on book history, has some great links and commentary for rare children's book scans from the early 20th century. My favorite is Nathaniel Hawthorne's A Wonder Book For Girls & Boys, from 1893. The color plates (see the thumbnail to the right) by noted illustrator Walter Crane are absolutely amazing.

Rare Children's Books at the Library of Congress (from bookn3rd.com)

Also see: Children's Book Online: The Rosetta Project

Cross-posted from Geekdad

Posted by Michael Harrison at 12:15 PM |
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My wife just finished listening to Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere on audiobook. She's been gushing all month about how fantastic of a reader Mr. Gaiman is--he narrated the book himself--and how he gets all the accents just right. This is something very important to the two of us, as we both love stories read aloud, but we hate when they aren't narrated well.

To prepare for our own upcoming adventures in delivering memorable storytimes--our boy is nearing the age where he'll soon appreciate such things--I thought it would be wise to gather together some resources on reading to children and getting them interested in books.

• The Read-Aloud Handbook, by Jim Trelease. This is the book for parents who want to read to their kids.  Trelease first details the benefits for reading to your kids--longer stays in school, better vocabulary and comprehension--and then goes on to discuss methodology and reading materials appropriate for kids of all ages. There's also a section of read-aloud stories for you and your kids to enjoy. Excerpts of The Read-Aloud Handbook are available online, and Trelease has an additional collection of great read-aloud stories called Hey! Listen to This.
• How to Get Your Child to Love Reading, by Esmé Raji Codell. Another good resource for finding good books to match your kids' interests. It's more than an index, though, because Codell has lots of fun experiments and activities to make lasting memories about each story.
• United Through Reading Read Aloud Resources. A few techniques and suggestions for reading to your kids, as well as some recommended books.
• The British Library Collect Britain Project. For those of you planning on reading the Harry Potter books to your geeklets, spend a few hours here listening to over 650 extracts from the Survey of English Dialects. Search by place name or date to find that perfect Hagrid accent.

Cross-posted from Geekdad

Posted by Michael Harrison at 8:07 PM |
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Trying something here to combat the glut of spam. Comments will be disabled for a little while. Sorry.

Posted by Michael Harrison at 1:29 PM |
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If you're looking for something to go with your WoW-engraved MacBook Pro, or perhaps a way to lure the kids out of Azeroth for a few precious moments, FigurePrints may be your answer. This Seattle-based startup will sell you a 3D replica of your favorite World of Warcraft toon for $99.

You just give them your server and character name, and they pull the 3D model from Blizzard's Armory service. Pick a pose and click the print button, and your statue is assembled by a 3D printer, 1/250th of an inch at a time. It's touched up by hand, a nameplate is added (not customizable; sorry, HordeKiller434), and the whole thing is mounted inside a glass display case.

Speaking of mounts: that epic Netherdrake you spent hours of your life grinding for? Sorry, but it can't be included. Neither can your pets.

Apparently the high demand for the service and the amount of time necessary to create each statue means that availability is limited. FigurePrints is handing out new models via a randomized lottery, and the average lead time on getting one delivered looks to be around 30-60 days.

Which means you've got plenty of time to grind more epic loot for your figure!

Posted by Michael Harrison at 11:11 AM |
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I seem to have written a poem. I'm not sure what to think of it, seeing as it's been about a decade since I last wrote poetry. I want to like it, but I'm so out of practice with writing that I am tentative. It's short, which works in its favor, but the device is extremely hackneyed and overused.

I do not care. I'm just happy that I wrote something tonight.

You are an asteroid, a moon, a part of me
In orbit.
Perturbations occur; the planes will shift
This way or that.

If I hold you tight, there will be drag, decay,
Then terminal velocity.
If I let you go, out you will spiral, a part of me,
An interrupted orbit.

Posted by Michael Harrison at 10:59 PM |
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Natania told me the other day that some of our friends weren't getting updates to my blog via their RSS readers, and I realized that it might be due to the fact that they're still trying to follow my ancient LiveJournal. So I finally got off my ass and set up Movable Type to cross-post.

This was a little harder than I thought, however, because every Google search I did for "cross post movable type livejournal" or "posting movable type livejournal" or any other such combination resulted in a bunch of old and outdated plugins. I didn't feel like banging my head against a Perl script tonight, so they were right out.

Luckily, on the second Google SERP, I discovered CrossPoster from Movalog.

I'm not one hundred percent sure what Movalog is, but the author, Arvind Satyanarayan, knows his MT. Lots of cool plugins, not the least of which is CrossPoster, which was easy to configure, easy to use, and totally made my evening.

Posted by Michael Harrison at 10:07 PM |
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