§ My visit to NASA Glenn was surprising. The security screening process for visitors is an incredible example of Hofstadter’s law. Once through, though, the campus is infinitely larger than expected. Driving past, all of these years, I always imagined an airplane hanger and maybe one or two nondescript office towers. No, beyond the gates is a medium-sized town with roads and streetlights and sidewalks and parks with big art installations. They have their own dedicated power plant. It’s like Mountain View for rocket scientists.

§ I bought new glasses for the first time in six years. They are technically a different style from my old glasses but so similar, at least to my eyes, that I’ll be surprised if anyone notices the change by the end of next week.

I was happy to see that Warby Parker doesn’t actually require a valid prescription anymore—I could just type the “sphere” and “cylinder” values from my expired prescription right into the website. Shhh, don’t tell the optometrists.

§ Delta gave me the opportunity to try Electroplankton again, a music making game that had an outsized influence on me. It was the first time I saw hardware leveraged in such a creative, unintended way. The Nintendo DS isn’t just a handheld game console, it’s a portable programmable computer with a touchscreen, speaker, and microphone. I haven’t seen this experimentation continue with the Switch although I’m seeing a similar creative spirit bubble up in the Playdate community.

§ I found another book for my untenably long “to read” list: Leif Enger’s new dystopia I Cheerfully Refuse featuring a “sentient Lake Superior” and a “malignant billionaire ruling class.”

…Okay, I’ll come clean, I started reading it. It has crystal clear imagery as seen through warbled glass bricks. A hopeful depiction of a desperate world. There are thirty-something chapters. Each nice and short and enigmatically named—“stubby golems on the fretboard.”

§ I opened the garage door to find a baby rabbit calmly sitting on a “Bunny Esmond” box. I really didn’t want to adopt it but, if necessary, the name was obvious. I was eventually able to catch it in a butterfly net and bring it over to some shrubbery out back. It didn’t want to move from the box for the longest time but I was finally able to coax it over to the pachysandras with some lettuce sprouts.

§ Links