Basically, it's highly processed starch, highly processed meat, highly processed cheese, candy and a sugary drink. No vegetables at all, and the fruit content is maybe some sweetened applesauce, or the kind of fruit juice that's not much different from sugar water.

I rather liked the Sheridan Delenn romance, even with the awkward scenes or cheesy dialogue. They're both fundamentally decent people, struggling through some really difficult stuff, externally and internally, and they slowly progress from colleagues to friends to a romantic pairing, in a generally gentle and non…

One of the only episodes of this that I've seen was an episode where a rather shrill girl (one of the kids) was pushing her non-virgin boyfriend to do it, and he was reluctant. He ended up discussing this with her parents at some point.

There's an interesting short story by Ursula le Guin - Paradises Lost - about a multi-generation ship and its inhabitants, exploring the idea of what happens when the voyage becomes more important than the destination.

I could see the religious caste having a peyote habit - traditional, associated with meditation and insight.

Niven did good aliens, but was crap at character development in general.   As a result, I love his short stories and novellas, but Ringworld was the only full length novel of his that didn't bore me to tears.

When you can see the pixelization in the youtube trailer, it's not a good sign.

In physical sciences in the US, early 30s would generally be post-doc, looking for a faculty postion stage.

Geordie always struck me as the type of guy who is technically very competent (not a genius, but good at his job), and not a bad guy, but lacking in the finer points of social skills.

Did you know that you can carve Totoro out of a pomelo?  I saw one at a fruit stand once.

I would rather do bread without a recipe than cake, because you can adjust bread as you go, by feel. Start with a basic flour/water/yeast ratio. If the dough is too sticky or tough, adjust it. If there's too little yeast, it takes longer to rise, if there's too much, stick it in the fridge to slow down the rising a…

I fondly remember Red Dwarf on PBS out of Seattle in late highschool and undergrad. Originally it was the whole set in one days, later stretched to a week as they got new series. No commercials, no cuts, but pledge breaks in between.

And to complete the set…

This strikes me as pretty realistic for someone in their early 20s, actually - I've known more than one person who wanted to be a writer/musician/actor, but took constructive criticism as a personal attack and freaked out in response.

About book 7, I think, when I got so irritated at all the female characters I couldn't take it anymore.

What do you define as older? I'm 40, and I've played Catan, Carcasonne, (as well as ones like Drakon and History of the World) and have heard of most of the others.

This reminds me of the time I got my hand stuck in a vending machine.

I remember some Pern ones - Crossroads Adventures, I think - that I got via the completist urge. Oddly enough, some of the endings ended up as series canon, showing up in later books. 

I mainly remember the CYOA books as an example of prose written in second person present (take that, English teacher!), and for the fact that I read them in depth first binary tree order, systematically reading *all* the possible stories.

I think this is the first time that a review has brought tears to my eyes, as I sit here four days before Christmas, an ocean away from my family, with only one parent left alive.