Mine In Mono

Strategems, gambits and wiles

Contact

  • An Atheist Attends All Saints

    On December 22, 2024, I embarrassingly missed Divine Liturgy at my parish because I slept in. Jared Smith, a video blogging atheist who visits churches and audits them, did make it. He chronicled his visit on his YouTube channel and was highly complimentary.

    In his video, Smith explains the reasons he was impressed by the church, the tradition and our priest, Fr. David. He touches on some of the reasons I converted to Orthodoxy but I especially appreciated his kind words about Fr. David (all of which, I can assure you, were merited).

    An Atheist visits an ORTHODOX Church (YouTube)

  • Dell Charm

    Nick Heer from Pixel Envy points out that Dell hasn’t lost its branding charm. When configuring a laptop on the website, he got an error message, “Composite Rule Error: Invalid selection in Processor Branding.” He was further informed about the error:

    The Chassis Option requires the matching Memory size. The 16gb Memory is only available with the Ultra 5 236V/226V and Ultra 7 266V. The 32gb Memory is only available with the Ultra 5 238V and Ultra 7 268V.

    I have often marveled at the challenging model names that PC manufacturers give their products, which starkly contrast to those from Apple. Everyday people can remember the names of their Apple devices. Not so for most of what PC manufacturers come up with.

    Read more →

  • The Revenge of Googie

    Five Points Car Wash sign via Davidag on Flickr

    Anna Kodé has a piece in the New York Times (gift article) about the early Space Age Googie style of architecture. The article is filled with eye candy and visual delights from the style, some prominent artifacts of which were still around when I was young. It brings a tremendous sense of nostalgia.

    Kodé examines why people now seems so attracted to buildings that were, just a few decades ago, disparaged as being garish.

    Read more →