2017

Wrapping up 2017, and Welcome to 2018!

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Fringe

Review.

Fringe seemed at first to be another X-files clone. and though there's quite a bit 'episodic' stuff, there's also the kind of... perception shift. We'll move from Mulder / Scully reality-checks, into nutty professor territory.

Great stuff! A definite must watch!

BeeClear en de slimme meter op sluipjacht (Dutch)

Dutch. Review.

De meeste huishoudens hebben tegenwoordig een 'slimme' meter. Die 'slimheid' zit hem voornamelijk in het voordeel voor de energie bedrijven die veel gemakkelijker je meter kunnen uitlezen, maar gelukkig kun je er zelf ook wat mee.

Bijvoorbeeld sluipverbruik aanpakken i.c.m. de BeeClear.

Netfilx - Bright - A bright spot on NetFlix?

Review.

What to make of this...

Will Smith returns to the silver... no, scratch that. Will Smith returns to the small screen, in a fantasy / buddy cop cross over movie. And lots of people hate it. But in these modern times where the internet allows every idiot to spout his vitriol nothing appears to be appreciated anymore.

 So... I, for one, actually like Bright. So there.

Evan Curry - Odyssee One

Review.

Many 'space operas' have a similar theme: Earth develops instant space travel, encounters other humans in space, uses the instant travelling to battle evil space lords.

I'd suggest to skip these, unless you really like Ryk Brown, Christopher Nuttal, and the like.

Food - Erwtensoep / Snert (Dutch)

Dutch.

Erwtensoep hoort ook bij geeks :-)

Er zijn een heleboel verschillende recepten op het Internet te vinden. Dit is mijn variant...

Christopher Fowler - Roofworld / Rune

Review.

Fowler's Roofworld is like a 'light' version of Gaiman's Neverwhere. Still it is an enjoyable read. Imagine a world with its own rules, just above our heads, where drop-outs have created their own society with their own rules. It's an entertaining romp.

Good reading if you like light fantasy, though perhaps it's not exactly fantasy... some genres are hard to specify 😏

Android GPS sharing

For some reason ☺ I wanted to use a location aware app on my Android tablet, which didn't have a GPS receiver.

There are several apps on Google Play, some work, some do not. I found two apps that would work together properly: Bluetooth GPS Output and Bluetooth GPS.

Tim Powers - The Anubis Gate / Last Call / Expiration Date / Earthquake Weather

Review.

In 1995 book clubs still existed.

If, at the time, you were a member of one of those 'bookclubs' (mail order subscriptions like 'Boek & Plaat' or 'ECI')  you would have to choose something from their (too thin) quarterly catalogue. So in July 1995 I ordered The Last Card. Which takes me bach to The Anubis Gates...

Land en taal wijzigen in Amazon (Dutch)

Dutch.

Amazon is de grootste (online) boekhandel ter wereld, maar als Nederlandse gebruiker is niet altijd alles even duidelijk.

Een paar tips voor het veranderen van land, webwinkel en taal.

Kindle naar Kobo (Dutch)

Amazon heeft duizenden audiobooks en ebooks. Maar ja, niet iedereen heeft een Kindle e-reader. Wat te doen?

Kijk eerst eens rond of je geen apparaat hebt waarop je gewoon je Kindle / Amazon ebooks kunt lezen. Heb je echter een Kobo reader, dan moet je de truckendoos open trekken. 

Christopher Nuttall - The Empire's Corps / No Worse Enemy / When the Bough Breaks / ...

Review.

A human empire breaks down after millennia of corruption, and a marine detachment that escaped the downfall of humanity ends up rebuilding part of civilization in their remote corner of the galaxy. It's not a bad concept, but us jaded readers, we've seen it all.

Facts are stubborn things. Perception... not so much.

Column.

To turn things your way, you do not have to manipulate facts, you could also simply manipulate perception, which is perfectly legal.

Even Trump would get away with it. It's not even fake news...

Philip Pullman - The golden compass / The subtle knife / The amber spyglass

Review.

I'm impressed (and a little disappointed but that might be because I was expecting something else, not because the story was bad). I also would like to mention that I am one of the few people who actually liked the movie?

The Powers (that are no more)

Review.

Did you watch Powers, the show, on PlayStation?

Of course you did not. PlayStation. That's a game console, that's not a television channel like, euh, Netflix. Or Hulu. Or Fox. How right you are. But you should have.

Zelazny - A Night in the Lonesome October

Review.

With Halloween approaching I thought it would be a good moment to re-read A Night in the Lonesome October.

Late Roger Zelazny has always been one of my favorite authors. He's mostly known for the Amber series, but he did write some other great stories as well. For some reason he's not that popular, but most of his books are quite good and have aged fairly well.

Netflix - Stranger Things - Season 1

Review.

This series must be tailo- made for the 40+ crowd, as its situated in the 80's. I remember those bicycles! Promising, but I wonder how long it will last, as the target audience might be a bit too small...

Write it down: October 27, season 2 of Stranger Things!!!

Netflix - Neo Yokio smells like a space station

Review.

I just watched some Neo Yokio on Netflix. And didn't like it at all. But...

Some animator, designer, script writer or show runner must have been watching more than anime, some 20 odd years ago. There's a very special kind of perfume in a key role...

Chicken Samurai

Column.

How much Ninja Theory does a Chicken Samurai need?

Kip Samoerai Salade, aka Chicken Samurai Salad.

Which either means it's a salad for Chicken Samurai, or (shudder) it is made of chicken and samurai... Which probably requires a trip to Japan, a large blender, and a strong stomach...

Genevieve Cogman - The invisible library / The masked city

Review. 

Triggered by (again) one of Jan’s reviews, I think. Keep them coming :-)

Both books are good reads If you like some interdimensional traveling, the fight between chaos and order, some intrigue, action, a heroine with flaws and you like books then you’re in for a treat.

I’m not sure it is the setting or writing style, but both books reminded me somewhat of Zelazny’s work.

C J Cherryh - Foreigner / Inheritor / ...

Review.

C J Cherryh calls this the 'First Contact' series, but most websites refer to it as the 'Foreigner' series.

Inspired by a comment from Jan (of Dapper fame) I decided to chew my way through a couple of these.

It's a long series, but the main story is delivered in batches of three, and most of those would work as stand alone titles. I would strongly advise not to read them out of order though...

Roaming voor dummies (Dutch)

Dutch.

Bellen en internetten in het buitenland is nu gratis! Of toch niet?

Misschien toch niet helemaal...

SqueezeBox - SQB

SQB is a small tool to modify playlists, and helps identifying and correcting missing files in your .MPU3 playlists.

SQB uses SOX to export all entries in a playlists (including .FLAC) to .MP3 for use on mobile players, in cars, or for use other devices only supporting MP3.

Marko Kloos - Chains of Command (2016) / Fields of fire (2017)

Review.

In this universe the humans have encountered a (literally) giant enemy called the Lankies. And they (the humans) are loosing...

Marko Kloos writes military SF, and is the author of the Frontlines series. Currently (2017) this series contains 5 books, with a sixth one coming up.

Xbox 360... Go for the (g)old

The XBox 360 is dead.

So, let's buy one.

Seriously? Buying an XBox 360 when even its successor the (first generation of the) Xbox One is dead and gone?

You do know you can buy some great games starting from 2 bucks?

Netflix - The Defenders (I want more Jessica)

Review.

Jessica is back. So are the others.

In spite of many poor reviews I actually liked this 8 episode mini series. Yeah, there are quite some issues, but my primary complaint is simply this: not enough Jessica.

Orphan Black

Review.

And so, it ends. 5 (small) seasons of Orphan Black, and it was good. There were some poor episodes, but even when the plot got thin the actors carried the show, especially Tatiana Maslany.

A must watch.

Gaming on a shoestring

I own a PS3. A PS4. There's a Wii gathering dust, a Vita lies somewhere for the incidental Final Fantasy X session, next to a DS. There are games on my phone, on the kid's iPads, and both PC's run (of course) Steam.

And still I claim gaming is cheap these days.

De Kobo Aura 2 E-reader (Dutch)

Dutch.

Heb ik net een uitgebreide handleiding geschreven voor de Kobo Glo met de oude software (hier te vinden) komt Kobo met een nieuwe versie 😏 Maar gelukkig is deze nieuwe software beschikbaar voor alle E-readers, dus niet alleen voor een reader als de Aura 2 maar ook voor de oudere Glo!

Wifi en de Buren voor Dummies (Dutch)

Dutch.

Wifi problemen?

Deze uitleg helpt je Wifi problemen op te lossen en te voorkomen, voor zover mogelijk. De belangrijkste regel: 1+6+11=20...

Netflix - Blame!

Review.

Blame! is a new anime on NetFlix, and proudly proclaimed to be a 'NetFlix Original'.

I'm not too sure what that actually means...

Ads add up, so do the right thing

Column.

I. Do. Not. Like. Bing.

There you have it. I'm biased, so this isn't going to be a fully objective review. But it actually isn't about search engines, to be honest. It's about 'free' services that cost nothing.

Calibre + E-reader (Dutch)

Dutch.

Wanneer je een bibliotheek hebt van duizend(en) boeken is het beheer op een (trage) e-reader eigenlijk onmogelijk. Het is dan beter om alle e-books op de PC te bewaren, en daar te kiezen welke je naar de e-reader wilt kopieren om later te lezen.

Calibre is een porgramma wat je daarbij helpt. Het is een e-book reader, manager en converter. Met Calibre is het makkelijker een bibliotheek van e-books te beheren.

De Kobo Glo (Refurbished) E-Reader (Dutch)

Dutch.

MediaMarkt en allerlei andere adressen hebben nu een 'refurbished' Kobo Glo E-reader, met 2 jaar volledige garantie, voor 69 / 79 euro.

Voor de kopers wat hints en tips, want het werkt toch net even weer anders dan een (Android) tablet...

Right-sizing a home-server PSU

I am running a small, Windows 7 based home-server in my home. Its primary function is to serve music to my Squeezebox music player(s), but it also serves as my file server and movie transcoder.

I needed to replace the PSU, but what is a proper size?

Duplicate events in Google Calender

I ran into a problem with Google Calender. On my device (phone) I saw 'duplicate' events, ie. the same event twice, but in a browser the web version of Calendar showed no problem.

Root cause: renaming a calendar......

SqueezeBox Duet - Restore wired operation

I'm still using a SqueezeBox setup to play my music...

If the Squeezebox Duet gets disconnected from it's LAN cable it will move to Wifi... and will not move back automatically! To restore to wired operation the player needs to be reset. Here's how to do that.

Four weeks of Wattpad, one day of Scribophile

Writing.

On March 4, 2017, I joined Wattpad.

I'm a month older now, and my life still sucks 😊 On the other hand, I actually wrote 40 to 50 thousand words. (After several rewrites I'm probably 30% into my first novel, yeah!)

Wattpad isn't funny (but BTS is worse)

Writing.

Probably the two most difficult to answer questions ever: what makes people laugh when reading, and how to attract readers on Wattpad?

A tree hugger goes Faktum

DIY.

About paper, plastic, and re-purposing Ikea kitchens... I would never call myself a 'tree hugger' (and I have a PS3, PS4, and too many airmiles to prove that) but even I think sometimes it pays to be smart... either for the environment, or just for the money.

Netflix - Iron Fist (and 'friends')...

Review.

With over 90 million subscribers (and probably twice that many viewers) NetFlix stll isn't profitable yet but that doesn't stop them creating their own interesting shows... This time Iron Fist enters the MCU...

Aspiring Artist

DIY.

Over the years I've been painting a few murals on the walls of the bedrooms of the kids.

Me and my youngest daughter (who is already more of an artist than I will ever be) set out to create something new...

Archive

The old website is gone, but some materials may be useful (if only to me 😂, so I added a little section and will move some pages / files in there. It's not complete so more stuff is coming...

Strictly for nerds, obviously. Link: http://www.ninelizards.com/archive 

Dapper

Column.

The next installment of Dapper is coming up...

Dapper is an international APA (Amateur Press Association), written by and for SF & Fantasy fans. You can still join!

Obviously my poor attempt at a cover is a photoshop of the original DC comic The Flash number 22... all rights reserved etc. etc.

Have Hat Will Travel

Writing.

"THEY CALL HER THE SPACE WITCH. But not to her face. Jennifer knows the universal laws of conserving energy and diminishing returns also apply to space (and love and aliens). But that is not going to stop Cadet Healer Third Class Parsons bringing her own kind magic to space..."

Inverarity - Alexandra Quick

Review.

There is a lot of bad Fan Fiction out there. Alexandra Quick, though, isn't one of those. It is, in fact, very, very good.

Did I mention the Alexandra Quick stories are very good?

NightLive Memorial

Once upon a time (1994 or so) there was this idiot that had a dream: he would create a nice, well visited, popular well known bulletin board system.

NightLive was my attempt.

Where are the other eight? / Waar zijn de andere acht?

I haven't got a clue 😏

This blog is about subjects that interest me: SF & Fantasy, books and movies, computers, home automation, music, DIY... Which effectively means things may get a little... nerdy.