They don’t have a rock this big.
Tag: Imported Post
I Gave the New 52 a Try
But over the past two years I’ve dropped half the series I was collecting, and the others (the ones I liked) have been canceled. I’m down to one DCU series. (Again)
The New 52 DC universe no longer feels like the same DC universe I used to follow. The tone is off (though to be fair, it had been shifting ever since Identity Crisis), and it’s now just different enough to feel unfamiliar and off-putting, but not different enough to feel like another fictional world that I can enjoy on its own terms.
A few years back I came to the realization that a shared universe I knew well, like DC at the time, was a hook that would encourage me to try more comics set in that world, while one that I didn’t know so well, like Marvel, actually discouraged me from reading it. The Marvel books I read tend to be those that are either not the Marvel universe, or set off in a corner of it. Since the New 52, the same has been true of DC.
Previously posted as a comment on Reddit
Layers by the Sea
The Palos Verdes peninsula sits at the southwest corner of Los Angeles. Parts of it are built up in old, grid-style suburbs. Other parts are of the more modern, winding type. And still other parts remain open space, due in part to the unstable geology of the area. Parts of Portuguese Bend are sliding toward the ocean, requiring frequent repairs of the main road along the coast. Way back in 1929, a housing development began sliding into the ocean. Abandoned now, the area remaining above land is known as the sunken city.
Adjacent to those ruins is Point Fermin Park, an ordinary city park that sits atop the cliffs. The Point Fermin Lighthouse (previously featured here) looks over the sea, and a fenced walkway runs along the length of the cliffs.
Looking out here, you can see the layers of rock, and understand how parts of the point could just slide away. The warning signs on the fence don’t surprise me, but I have to wonder just who would want to climb out there.
Photo challenge (WordPress): Layers
I Dream of Holiday Creep
Christmas decorations already up and it’s not even Halloween. How about letting holidays actually, y’know, HAPPEN before moving onto N+2 (what happened to Thanksgiving, anyway?)
That’s It!
Overheard on the playground:
— Well I’m going to go on the internet!
— Well, I’M going to go on the internet and READ A BOOK!
Wrong Number (Email Edition)
Have you ever abandoned an email address? Did you make sure everyone switched to your new one? If your old provider has reissued the address to someone new, your old contacts could still be sending mail to someone else with your personal information.
This shouldn’t be a surprise, but InformationWeek reports that Yahoo! users who’ve picked up recycled addresses are getting important mail meant for the previous owner of the email address.
It started off with some stuff from catalogs and clothing companies and I thought, ‘That’s fine, I’ll just unsubscribe.’…But then I started getting emails with court information, airline confirmations, a funeral announcement…
Update: Yahoo! is introducing a “not my email” button to report mistaken deliveries.
Well, that’s an interesting approach to the misdirected email problem. This might even be useful as a general solution beyond recycled addresses. I once ended up receiving someone else’s Sears receipt and promotions, I assume because of a sales clerk’s typo.
But I find myself wondering about the potential for backscatter, collateral loss of mail, and just how people will actually use it in relation to the report spam button.
And that’s just with the honest people who get the reused mailbox!
Update 2: For commercial email especially, XKCD points out the importance of actually verifying that the email address someone gave you is theirs, and not someone else’s address written as a typo, and Word to the Wise highlights some real-world cases they’ve written about in the past.
Originally posted as two link posts on Facebook and one on LinkedIn.
Lessons From a Teen Food Allergy Tragedy
Allergic Living has advice on how to respond to a severe allergic reaction, particularly when to administer epinephrine and seek emergency medical treatment.
At first she didn’t show any symptoms and her mother gave her a dose of antihistamine; but in 20 minutes the systemic reaction began. Her father, a physician, gave her three doses of epinephrine, but it wasn’t enough to stop the rapid-fire chain of events. She began vomiting, her throat swelled to the point where she could no longer breathe and she went into cardiac arrest. She died in his arms.
Natalie’s story has spiked fears among Allergic Living’s readers, in particular parents of children and teens with food allergies. It has also raised questions about just what to do in case of an accidental allergen ingestion, so we turned to two experts for answers.
The key takeaway: you can’t always be sure a mild reaction will stay mild, because it takes time for the body to absorb the food. I was fortunate enough to survive learning that lesson, exactly one week before Natalie Giorgi’s death. All I lost was an afternoon and the $200 co-pay for the emergency room. It could have been so much worse.