my.bicycle

(Thanks go out to The Other Michael )

My friend Ken sends me wisdom on turning 40, from comics writer Alan Moore: When I was just about to turn 40 I was reviewing my options and I thought I could have a midlife crisis and just bore everybody senseless by going around saying "What's it all about? What's the point? What's the secret of life?" Or I could sort of just go spectacularly mad, which would at least be more entertaining for those around me. And more worrying. And that's good as well. So I started worshiping a snake and declared myself to be a magician. "I've decided to become a master sorcerer." You should have seen the look on their faces. Half of them were frightened because they thought I'd probably gone mad, and the other half were frightened in case I hadn't. It's been immense fun.

But then, while you’re sitting on your googlechair in the googleplex sipping googleccinos and feeling smuggy smug smug smug, new versions of the browsers come out that support cached, compiled JavaScript. And suddenly NewSDK is really fast. And Paul Graham gives them another 6000 boxes of instant noodles to eat, so they stay in business another three years perfecting things. (...) And while you’re not paying attention, everybody starts writing NewSDK apps, and they’re really good, and suddenly businesses ONLY want NewSDK apps, and all those old-school Plain Ajax apps look pathetic and won’t cut and paste and mash and sync and play drums nicely with one another. And Gmail becomes a legacy. The WordPerfect of Email. And you’ll tell your children how excited you were to get 2GB to store email, and they’ll laugh at you. Their nail polish has more than 2GB. Strategy Letter VI - Joel on Software

William Gibson, during the writing of his latest novel, Spook Country , has found the beauty that is Brad Sucks music. Brad and I are BFF - or at least that's what his forum registration requires.

Condense Your Day With the Life-Hacking FAQK : So why is it called life hacking? Because a new name makes it sound like a new idea. Geeks can't admit that anything worthwhile was invented before 1981. Soon, "making cocoa" will be called "milk hacking." Does life hacking have any uses unrelated to the freshness of my appliances? Oh, sure. You can apply the term "life hacking" to nearly anything to make it sound clever and hypermodern! In fact, that last sentence was itself a life hack! You know how sometimes you just eat the ramen out of the pan instead of pouring it into a bowl? Using the same fork you stirred it with? You're life hacking, bunky!

A gorgeous, full trailer for next spring's IRON MAN movie is up at the official site . Robert Downey, Jr., substance-abuse-irony-jokes aside, was made to play Tony Stark. This looks really, really cool. (thanks, Sean !)

Most looks at the future seem to be from the 1950s, when we expected autogyros and jetpacks. How about a look at the year 2000 from the perspective of 1910 ? Robot tailors? Reprimanding the groundskeeper while sky carriages flow past your roof garden? Grinding books into electrically delivered impulses at school? Much like the Gernsbackian future, I'm kind of glad this one didn't come to pass, either. I think I'd prefer Tex Avery's version .