The Oxford English Dictionary has just announced the addition of several new words and phrases, as well as the update of over 40,000 definitions, in its most recent update. In addition to such words as “Ego-surfing” (to search on the Internet for one’s own name or business), “muffin top” (and I don’t mean the upper…
Read MoreAll articles filed in Writing
Chuck Miller’s Round Table: Featuring Speed Racer, Boo Boo Bear and Jem of the Holograms
In the past, I’ve authored several magazine columns on subjects ranging from 45 RPM records to the activities of hockey booster clubs.ย One column, however, only lasted a single showing – and that was because the magazine in which it was published folded like a cheap suit. Background. In the early 1990’s, I wrote for…
Read More30 years of pre-computer blogging
How far can you trace your blog back?ย A year?ย Two years?ย Three? If I were to count all the newspaper and magazine columns I wrote before I ever got involved in the online observational world, I could convincingly argue that I have been blogging for thirty years.ย Of course, those thirty years were in…
Read MoreHaving fun with Google Translate
When it comes to languages, I speak three languages very fluently.ย I speak American English, I speak Canadian English and I can speak Australian English.ย That’s it, mate.ย Good on ya, eh? Now there are online services out there that can translate websites from one language to another, and can translate your English websites into…
Read MoreThe day my editor got his skull fractured on the corner of Partridge and Yates Streets
No, no, not Michael Huber.ย We want nothing bad to ever happen to Michael Huber.ย Ever. Between 1995 and 1997, I wrote sports articles for a Capital District monthly sports newspaper, CD Sports.ย At the time, I was working for the minor league hockey monthly paper Hockey Ink!, and I needed a more steady gig…
Read MoreLittle Nemo, dreams and insomnia
One of my all-time favorite comic strips is the classic Little Nemo in Slumberland, the 1910-era full-color fantasy by legendary artist Winsor McKay. In the series, Nemo enters a magical world of fantasy and imagination, only to be awakened in the comic strip’s final panel – as he realizes that his magical world was only…
Read MoreMoving the Mockingbird Marathon to Stuyvesant Plaza
I got the message from the “Mockingbird Marathon: To Kill a Saturday” organizers the other day, that the event will be relocated from Townsend Park Bakery to the Stuyvesant Plaza Book House this coming Saturday.ย Okay, now there’s parking available, which is good. There’s been a lot of great things involving the Mockingbird Marathon, at…
Read MoreH.R. Pufnstuf, Witchiepoo, Joy the Bugaloo, and me
The recent passing of H.R. Pufnstuf puppeteer Van Snowden brings a tinge of sadness.ย I was fortunate to interview him in 2008, as part of an article on the history of Sid & Marty Krofft’s television shows, of which Pufnstuf was one.
Read MoreThe Canary and the Pigeon
“Hey!” the yellow canary called out. Landing on a windowsill, a brown pigeon stared at the canary.ย “What do you want?” he said, tucking his wings behind him. “I heard that pigeons are the most talented birds in the world,” the canary tweeted.ย “That they can fly and stop and dive with precision and timing…
Read More
