ch-ch-ch-changes

Posted on by thom

In the next few days, you’ll see a fresh new face on elf-reflection. Behind the scenes, I’ve already upgraded Movable Type to 3.14; at the same time, though, I’ve decided to bring a new visual design to the site. The new index page is largely done, but I still need to apply the new style to the archives and comments and change some of the sidebar layouts and included items. I’ll also be doing away with the separate serendipity and sputnik boxes in favor of integrating all my quicklinks–serendipity, sputnik, games and toys, political, papercraft, Prius, and my del.icio.us feed–along with my Flickr photos and 43things entries, directly into elf-reflection. If you’ve been using only the RSS feed, this content hasn’t been incorporated there before, but now all my blogs will be aggregated into a single feed. Look for the new site to be up by this coming weekend.

In other news, both Jeff and I have taken steps towards re-engaging with old hobbies. As Jeff details over at Rebel Prince, he auditioned last night for the Arlington Players’ production of Ragtime (I thought about joining him, but am still a little phleghmy and not in particularly good voice due to the lingering cold); I, on the other hand, am getting back into roleplaying games. The best news about the latter is that I’ll be gaming with my very close friend and former housemate Sheldon, perhaps the best storyguide with whom I’ve ever gamed; the not-so-great news, however, is that Sheldon lives in Suffolk, Virginia, a 2-1/2 hour drive under the best of circumstances (and on I-95, “best of circumstances” is merely a dimly recalled legend), so we’ll only be gaming one weekend a month.

Last night the new gaming group got together via irc to start talking about character concepts and saga development (we’ll be playing in a world of Sheldon’s design, but using mostly the Ars Magica ruleset–Ars is my favorite gaming system of all time). I really enjoyed the discussion, discovering just how much I’ve missed this hobby.

More Air Miles in circulation than dollars

Posted on by thom

Cory Doctorow:
The pool of unredeemed frequent-flier miles is the most voluminous currency in the world, worth more than the cash supply of dollars and pounds combined.

According to a new analysis by The Economist magazine, the global stock is worth more than $700bn (£370bn), more than all the US dollar bills in circulation, and streets ahead of Britain’s £42bn of notes and coins…

A close look at the rules can expose unbeatable deals. A civil engineer from California, David Phillips, became known as the “pudding guy” after calculating that an offer of frequent flyer miles with food at his local supermarket yielded a remarkable return. He spent $3,000 on 12,000 Healthy Choice chocolate desserts and earned $25,000 worth of free flights, enough to pay for travel for the rest of his life.

Via Boing Boing