Events

Welcome to stop #18 on the Brews and Choos project. The tasting room closed in 2023, but FEW continues producing spirits. Distillery: FEW Spirits, 918 Chicago Ave., Evanston, Ill.Train line: Metra Union Pacific North, Evanston–Main St. (Also CTA Purple Line, Main)Time from Chicago (Ogilvie): 20 minutes, zone 2Distance from station: 200 m (200 m from CTA) Disclosure: FEW Spirits has been a contributor to the Apollo Chorus of Chicago for several years. I serve on the Apollo Chorus Board of Directors...

Via Schneier, it seems that our security services have not done a great job at, you know, security: [J]ust how bad is the CIA’s security that it wasn’t able to keep [accused leaker and former CIA sysadmin Joshua] Schulte out, even accounting for the fact that he is a hacking and computer specialist? And the answer is: absolutely terrible. The password for the Confluence virtual machine that held all the hacking tools that were stolen and leaked? That’ll be 123ABCdef. And the root login for the main...

After yesterday's perfect spring weather (18°C and sunny), today's gloom and rain reminds us we live in Chicago. Also, it's eerily quiet at work...so maybe I'll also work from home the rest of the week. Meanwhile, these crossed my (virtual) desk for reading later on: Two days before testifying at a House hearing called "Holding Wells-Fargo Accountable," two of the bank's board members resigned. A young woman in India who received two hand transplants from a darker-skinned person has baffled doctors as...

Just a housekeeping note: my post on the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was the 7,000th since this blog relaunched in 2005. (It was the 7,196th since the proto-blog began in 1998.) Thanks for reading.

Welcome to stop #17 on the Brews and Choos project. Note: closed permanently on 23 October 2022. Brewery: Empirical Brewery, 1801 W. Foster Ave., ChicagoTrain line: Union Pacific North, Ravenswood (Also CTA Brown Line, Damen) Time from Chicago: 16 minutes (Zone B)Distance from station: 800 m (1.4 km from CTA) Living by the Ravenswood Metra stop is almost an embarrassment of riches. One of those is the Empirical Brewery on Foster. They have an experimental streak that produces some epic beers. From left...

BBC Radio 4 first broadcast The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy on this day in 1978. On thus august, er, March anniversary, ponder this: "What do you get when you multiply six by nine?" The answer: 4213. This is why the universe was replaced by something even more inexplicable and insane upon the publication of Restaurant at the End of the Universe in 1980. Reagan got elected, Thatcher consolidated power, and I changed grammar schools. Have a Jinnan Tonix (or whatever equivalent exists on your planet)...

Welcome to stop #16 on the Brews and Choos project. Previously named "Ravinia Brewing" until December 2024. Brewery: Steep Ravine Brewing, 582 Roger Williams Ave., Highland ParkTrain line: Union Pacific North, Ravinia Time from Chicago: 46 minutes (Zone E)Distance from station: 400 m Actually, something does go almost as well with good beer as pizza: tacos. Ravinia Brewing in Highland Park has both. I had one pint, one taste, and three tacos while up there: The beer was their Steep Ravine IPA (7.2%, 22...

For about 50 years, the CIA and its (West-) German equivalent, the BND, owned Crypto AG in Switzerland, giving them access to the secrets of dozens of countries: From 1970 on, the CIA and its code-breaking sibling, the National Security Agency, controlled nearly every aspect of Crypto’s operations — presiding with their German partners over hiring decisions, designing its technology, sabotaging its algorithms and directing its sales targets. Then, the U.S. and West German spies sat back and listened....

My 25-year-old co-worker: "Yeah, I'm not much of a 'true believer.'" Me: Well, I'm a believer. I couldn't leave her if I tried. Him: O_O Me: Sorry, just a bit of Monkee business on a Friday afternoon. I just grabbed the Mike and twisted what you said with a lot of Tork. Him: O_o Me: You look like you're going to slip me a Micky and send me down to Davy Jones. Him: WTF are you talking about? Me: You have no idea who the Monkees are, do you. Him: Primates with tails? Me: (headdesk) (headdesk) (headdesk)

I read two articles worthy of mention about Warren dropping out. The first, by Megan Garber in The Atlantic, argues that "America punished Elizabeth Warren for her competence:" Kate Manne, a philosopher at Cornell University, describes misogyny as an ideology that serves, ultimately, to reinforce a patriarchal status quo. “Misogyny is the law-enforcement branch of patriarchy,” Manne argues. It rewards those who uphold the existing order of things; it punishes those who fight against it. It is perhaps...