Friday, 31 October 2025
Life, the universe, pies, hot-pink bunnies, world domination, and everything
Description: A general store serving the Academy, MuseBlog, and the greater Musipolitan area.
Location: The village of New Reykjavik, Hyperborea, off the coast of Iceland; with interdimensional connections to the Oasis.
Inventory: Transfinite. Inconceivable. “If we don’t have it, you don’t need it. Trust us. You really don’t.”
The cuddly Beatle and veteran of “Shining Time Station” notches up three score years and ten today (Wednesday, July 7).
Enceladus asked:
“Do they have channels in whatever graphics program you use? And if so, could you explain them? Because, essentially, there’ the one thing (aside from actual scripting) that I need to know to proclaim myself a GIMP wizard.”
Step inside our virtual tent to learn more about channels. Or just enjoy the pictures, if graphics aren’t your thing.
[*Chautauquas began in the 19th century as a sort of summer camp approach to continuing education. The events were often held in big circus-style tents. The name comes from the New York town where the first one took place. We’re borrowing the term as a convenient umbrella title for such occasional threads as might be more information oriented than the usual. Though really we simply like the name.]
The latest version of our chess software has an option for bigger boards (with squares 48 pixels wide instead of the usual 32). We’re giving it a try. Let us know how you like it. If the boards are too big now, we can go back to the smaller ones.
(There’s a sample below the fold.)
Read more »
If you’re new on the blog, please stop by this thread and say pie — er, hi.
Polly Shulman (blogname: Pollyhymnia), young-adult author, friend of MuseBlog, and all-around good egg, has a new book coming out on July 8. It’s called The Grimm Legacy. You can find out more about it through Google or on Polly’s website.
Known MBer birthdays this month:*
July 03 Kokonilly’s birthday (1996 – light blue/lime green)
July 05 shadowfire’s birthday (1996)
July 07 TNÖ’s birthday (1993 – green)
July 09 Lizzie’s birthday (1991)
July 13 Rosebud2’s birthday (1998)
July 15 Birthday of EAP (a.k.a. The Mole)
July 19 Birthday of Fio (a.k.a. La Mort) (1992 – black, silver, and red)
July 20 Silver Lining’s birthday (1997 – lime green and silver)
July 22 IBCF’s birthday (1993)
July 26 Agrrrfishi’s birthday (1994 – sky blue, navy, and bubblegum pink)
July 27 Enceladus’s 5K Day
July 28 Amelia Peabody’s birthday (1992 – charcoal)
You turn 5,000 days old this month if you were born between October 23 and November 22, 1996.
You turn 6,000 days old this month if you were born between January 27 and February 26, 1994.
You turn 7,000 days old this month if you were born between May 3 and June 2, 1991.
You will have been on MuseBlog for six months if you started posting in January.
*Note: Listed MBers who have been inactive for several months won’t appear on next year’s birthday calendar unless they show up again.
On June 21, an unfamiliar MBer called Sans Orchestre left a comment on the random thread saying that she* had posted before under different aliases but now wanted to return for a fresh start.
Searching the blog and other sources, we discovered that her history went beyond simple changes in alias. We replied that first she should tell other MBers who she had been. Since then we haven’t heard from her or seen her on the blog, so we’ve decided to post that information here.
The game cromwell vs. Jakob Wonkychair has ended in a victory for cromwell, who now moves up to second place on the MuseBlog Chess Ladder.
This is where we’ll keep track of all MuseBlog Chess Ratings, with separate “ladders” for standard chess and the two chess variants played on the blog. We’ll update the list at the end of each game. (Please remind us if we don’t.)
Last updated: 25 June 2010
Read more »
*(And assorted others.)
Nonhuman creatures we love, live with, fancy, and/or favor.
Continued from the 2007 edition.
Here’s our policy about meeting other MBers offline:
Your friends,
The GAPAs
You can pack an astounding amount of trivia into 7 volumes.
Continued from Part Two.
No, it’s not quite the 24-hour Doctor Who Buffy Torchwood Channel brought to you with Glee. But close enough.
Warning! What you are about to see — should you brave the jump — is extremely disturbing. (Robert especially should approach with caution.) We will not be responsible for any mental damage incurred.
Technical note: you will need a decent screen size to make it work. Handheld devices are not big enough. Click on the images for larger versions. Also, you may need to watch it closely for a moment or two to get the full effect (at your peril). Let your eyes move around.
Summer* officially and astronomically began this morning (Monday, June 21) at 7:28, blog time.
*Or winter, for MBers in the southern hemisphere.
WARNING! Will definitely contain spoilers!
To spare MBers reading the “Recent Comments” columns, please paste the following message in at the beginning of your posts:
SPOILER MUSE SPOILER MUSE SPOILER MUSE SPOILER MUSE SPOILER.
Let us know when your issue arrives.
NO SPOILERS, please. There’s another thread for discussing the issue.
What would we do if you sang out of tune? Sing along and help you out, of course!
To cut down on clutter, unfinished chess games in which neither player has made a move for more than a month will be considered inactive and taken offline. (We can restore them on request, though in most cases that seems unlikely.)
We’re here again, as you can see. Ice-cream sundaes for everybody at the Hare & Hedgepig!