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Yesterday, some random surfing led me to Ubiquity, a new Firefox extension that promises to “connect the Web with language.” I’ve tried it, and I can say that that description doesn’t even begin to cover it. The video explains this better than I could. But I’ll try anyway. This changes the way people interact with … Continue Reading

Updated the site today with a piece from last week’s Getting Ahead (aka the section I edit, aka “my baby,” aka “I love this thing probably far more than necessary.”) What didn’t make it onto the site is a headline I wrote for another freelancer’s Change Artist piece. The guy’s a tour guide in D.C., … Continue Reading

The English Spice Index manages to combine my culinary obsession with my etymological one with an enormous list of spices, their common names, their names in 30 or more foreign languages, and of course descriptions of how the spice, herb, or fruit is used. Science nuts can get their fix, too–each spice’s chemical breakdown is … Continue Reading

Phew! And at the risk of sounding whiny, that’s all I’ll say about that. You can check out the work of “my” very talented writers online at Express’s new Web site, expressnightout.com. Getting Ahead, my baby, is here and I imagine the other section will be available this Friday when it sees print. Marvel at my … Continue Reading

On Saturday, I took a walking tour of local Alexandria restaurants. As much fun as this sounds like it was (and it was), it was work! The write-up will come out at some later date. I don’t want to give too much away ahead of time, but it was a lot of fun and I … Continue Reading

Today marks the first day that I’m sending out a query letter not for a magazine or newspaper article but for a book proposal. It’s been more than a year since I put the finishing touches on the first quarter of my manuscript, and then all these things got in the way for both me … Continue Reading

Yesterday I attended the Alexandria Archaeology orientation for the summer sessions. This means that I’m now certified to grab a trowel and help excavate artifacts. As I sat in the air-conditioned, church-basement-like room of the George Washington Masonic Memorial, memories from my undergrad archaeology classes came rushing back. Beyond the science of archaeology having some … Continue Reading

I got to write Names and Faces for the Post again, which is always exciting. For just one day, I become an expert on Britney and LiLo and Brangelina and other people who I usually try to ignore. But writing about celebrities is somehow much more entertaining than reading about them, so when it’s my … Continue Reading

Playing with graphics, HTML, and CSS is like being on vacation for me, which is why I’ve spent the day and a half since returning from my “real” vacation by messing with this blog. I think the majority of weird, layout-breaking HTML and broken graphics are behind us by this point, so feel free to … Continue Reading