I promised in Episode 166 that I’d review this beer with a bit more detail than my usual quick spiel on the show, so allow me to present:
End of the World Midnight Wheat! An ale brewed with “midnight wheat, chocolate malt, chili and spice” from Shock Top (aka Anheuser-Busch)
First and foremost a special thanks to James K. for providing the bottle for this review!
Continue reading BEER REVIEW: End of the World Midnight Wheat
My grandpa was no philosopher (in fact, he was an engineer, which might be considered the exact opposite) but he used to say, “There’s always room for improvement.” Upon reflection, this may have been relevant to engineering, but I remember him saying this when I asked him why he gave our pizza a 4 out of 5 when I thought it was a fine pie. This sentiment has stuck with me, and it influences a lot about how I comport my own affairs. In my life, I too strive to constantly be improving, and have often struggled with being content while simultaneously wanting better. Now either this is a common philosophical problem for a human to have or Massimo Pigliucci is a mind-reader, but either way his new book seems written just to help people with this sort of problem out.
Continue reading REVIEW: Answers for Aristotle by Massimo Pigliucci
As much as I love visiting museums on the down-low, seeing what the typical visitor (who doesn’t write blog posts about the experience) sees, there’s something to be said for behind-the-scenes tours. And holy balls what a tour it was at the Georgia Aquarium.
First of all, a big thanks goes out to Jen Richards, our unofficial tour guide. The Georgia Aquarium has some pretty great behind-the-scenes tours — want to SCUBA dive in the whale shark tank? you can! — but I doubt any of them are as intimate as Jen’s tour was for just me and Ryan. Plus, ours was free.
Continue reading REVIEW — The Georgia Aquarium
Ryan’s been feeling pretty bummed about the sporadic-ness (sporacity? sporacitude?) of the podcast, so to make him feel better I promised I’d post another museum experience for y’all. Imagine how horrified I was to discover that I haven’t posted a thing since October of aught-eleven! It’s about time I righted this wrong, and so I bring you excerpts from my trip to the Gray Fossil Site and Natural History Museum. Enjoy!
“I was not a particularly happy camper this morning, having woken up balls-early for a road trip out to Boone, NC. Thankfully, my mood had vastly improved by the time we reached the Gray Fossil Site/Museum outside Johnson City, TN, and I was able to fully enjoy all the specimens, exhibits, and the dig site.
Continue reading REVIEW — The Gray Fossil Site & Natural History Museum
Space Chronicles: Facing the Ultimate FrontierWritten by Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson
$26.95 / Hardcover / 384 pages
Published by W. W. Norton & Company
If I had to use one word to describe Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson (other than the obvious “brilliant” synonyms) I’d say he’s passionate. His desire to help the public appreciate science crosses media barriers with a verve and energy unmatched by many modern agenda promoters. Space Chronicles reads like an attempt to distill and bottle some of that passion, and the ensuing cocktail is an invigorating delight sure to infuse the reader with the spirit of Dr. Tyson himself.
Continue reading REVIEW: Space Chronicles
I ordered a Kindle about 6 months ago. In my solstice shopping guide, back in December, I talked a little bit about how much I liked it. But, I don’t just like it… it has sort of changed my life.
It has me reading more than I have in years – but the real change was the realization that it brought me to. That realization was that I am living a life full of distractions. Email, Facebook, Twitter, various blogs, sports results, and the news cycle in general, these things all compete for my attention – and these are just the non-work related items. But, we all know this already. I knew it intellectually, but I didn’t know it intuitively.
Continue reading Mind Like Kindle
While Ryan was enjoying New York Comic Con, I decided to take the opportunity to visit some of the Big Apple’s awesome museums. I left the choice of museum up to my good friend Rick, a New York native and fellow nerd, and he ended up taking me to the South Street Seaport — think Fisherman’s Wharf, NYC-style — for a double exhibit feature, Bodies: The Exhibition [BtE] and Dialog in the Dark (to be reviewed soon). Some of you might already know about BtE, since it’s been around since 2005. Multiple variations on the theme have been around for nearly 20 years, so you may have seen Bodies: The Exhibition, or Our Body: The Universe Within, or perhaps you saw Body Worlds back when it came out in 1995. These exhibitions are all independently owned and run, but you’d be forgiven for confusing them because they’re eerily similar. Essentially, you wander through room after room of plastinated human bodies, learning about the various systems and structures under our skin, seeing comparisons of healthy versus diseased organs, and wondering how the displays were made and who on earth these people once were.
Continue reading REVIEW – Bodies: The Exhibit
Hey everyone, my apologies for not having posted a museum review in a while. You see, I’ve been interning at the Nashville Zoo and haven’t had a chance to scope out to other institutions. The good news is that in the downtime between interviewing visitors, I’ve managed to read some awesome books and comics about science, so that’s what we’re going to talk about today.
Writer: James Vining
Artist: James Vining
Publisher: Oni Press
$9.95/96 pages/Black and White
All summer long I’d been hearing about chimpanzees in the media, so now that the weather’s changing, it seemed fitting to close out the season with one of the greatest chimp stories of all time. As one might expect from a book titled “First in Space“, this is the tale of the first living being in space, a chimpanzee with the rather unassuming name “Ham”. I know, I know, just one letter off… In the late 1950s and early 1960s, the United States was lagging behind the USSR in the Space Race. The Soviets had already launched Laika (a story also available in comic form) into earth orbit, and the Americans were looking to jump ahead by successfully launching a creature into space — and successfully recovering the live specimen.
Continue reading REVIEW: First in Space
I’m not exactly early to the party on this one. Michael Lewis’ book, Moneyball, came out in 2003. I’m a bit of a Michael Lewis fan but I ignored Moneyball for years because I’m not really much of a baseball fan. The bottom line is that you don’t need to be a baseball fan to get something (I would argue a lot) out of this book. If you like baseball, you’ll probably like Moneyball, if you like math/stats/science you’ll probably like Moneyball, if you like business you’ll probably like Moneyball.
Continue reading Moneyball: Sports, Markets, and Statistics
Listener Michal sent in an e-mail containing his iTunes review. Problem is the review is only visible on iTunes if you’re in the Czech Republic. It’s also written in Czech. Now apparently I said I’d try reading German reviews if they were sent in and Michal thinks that maybe I could handle Czech too. I disagree, because this looks really hard to pronounce. Germanic languages I have a clue about, Slavic languages remain a mystery.
So on Episode 91, which also came out today, I fumble through a word or two before giving up entirely. Yet I still want to know how praise for the show would sound in Czech, thus, this post. I’m going to post Michal’s review and the pronunciation guide he sent. If you can handle it with your mouth, then call us at 312-Paleopals (312-725-3672) and read it for us! Fun times will be had by all…
Continue reading Michal’s Czech Pronunciation Challenge!
