according to jeff

Here’s a site that is both useful and fun. Check it out: http://tinyurl.com/yek7ymx

Today is the last daily strip of Secret Asian Man, a cool comic by Tak Toyoshima. It will, apparently, live on as a weekly strip at the Secret Asian Man Web site.

In addition to this being a cool comic, the name “Secret Asian Man” also evokes fond memories. When my children were younger and heard the song “Secret Agent Man” sung by Johnny Rivers, they would heartily sing out the words as “Secret Asian Man”. When I hear the song today, I still substitute those words. I suspect they do, too!

I think there are days when we’d all want a grandpa like this: Neurotica Comic, July 9

“Fans” — click here: http://tinyurl.com/n8bm7v

This holiday, we were introduced to a game called Blokus. It’s a great game for spatial thinkers, as it involves placing tiles on the board, while trying to maximize the size and number of tiles that you play while minimizing the size and number of tiles that your opponents are able to play.

I’ve only played it a few times (and then against experienced competition). This morning was my first time to play all of my tiles.

My first completed Blokus board

I was yellow, Lu was green, Dani was blue, and the red was played by three of us.

If you enjoy spacial cames, give Blokus a try!

We saw this today; what is it?

Leave a comment with your guess. For a hint, click here. (But if you look at the hint before answering, say so!)

For extra credit, where is it?

Here’s your clues:

1. I’m on my way to Dillard, Georgia.
2. I drove approximately 525 miles.
3. Most of the drive was on Interstate highways.
4. Lunch was at Subway, and dinner was a KenTex BBQ, though I could have easily stopped at Cracker Barrel.

Extra credit will be awarded if you identify both the city and the hotel.

(Spoiler: the answer is revealed in the comments.)

OK, spot the difference fans, here’s another one for you. I made some changes to my blog last week. One is the addition of the copyright statement at the bottom. I’ll give you that one. What others can you spot?

Do you remember the spot the difference games that were in Highlights magazine that you read as a kid? There’d be two line drawings, side by side, with differences to be found between them. For instance, the mitten in the left picture was solid, while the mitten in the right picture was shaded.

Well, consider this post a “spot the difference” challenge. The sidebar has been upgraded, and includes three differences between the sidebar from earlier this week. Can you identify the three significant differences?

My daughter is the Speed champion at our house.

Speed is a two-player card game, played with a full deck of regular cards. The Wikipedia instructions are similar to what we play, though we play where the cards must alternate colors. That is, a black eight can play on a red seven, but a red eight cannot play on a red seven. We also usually play the “doubles” variation.

Bethany and I have been playing Speed a few times a week for a few minutes at a time. She beats me probably 9 out of 10 times. Today, I declared her Speed Champion of our home!

I’m older than I was a few days ago. (You are too.)

In commemoration of my aging, I received a new game: Word Sweep.

Word Sweep is a game for 2 to 4 players (or teams of players). A player is given a starting letter and the definitions of three words that appear consecutively in the dictionary. The player then attempts to identify the three words. If all three words are correctly identified, then a “sweep” is awarded, and the player is required to advance to more difficult words on the next turn. Points are awarded based on the difficulty of the words and how many were correctly identified. If any errors are made, then other players are allowed to try to “steal” the words and gain points themselves.

We’ve enjoyed two games with Matt and Bethany, and enjoyed a game last night with some other friends.

Here are the three definitions from one of the cards:

1. of, relating to, or being the practice or art of training, cutting, and trimming trees or shrubs into odd or ornamental shapes
2. a heading in an outlined argument or exposition; the subject of a discourse or of a section of a discourse
3. of local or temporary interest

The definitions for these three words were given to another team, but they weren’t able to identify any of the words. (These words were from one of the “red” — or hardest — cards.) Lu and I correctly identified word 2 as “topic”, which lead us to “topical” as the next word.

This got us to:

1. ?
2. topic
3. topical

Knowing that the first word immediately preceded “topic” in the dictionary, we were able to remember that “of, relating to, or being the practice or art of training, cutting, and trimming trees or shrubs into odd or ornamental shapes” was topiary. Thus, our answer (and the sweep) was:

1. topiary
2. topic
3. topical

If you enjoy words and friendly competition, then you’ll enjoy Word Sweep.

Click here for a good 9×9 Nurikabe puzzle from Logic Games Online. This puzzle, from June 12, is solvable by applying logic to the grid — no trial and error is needed.

If you’ve been wanting to try a Nurikabe, it’s a good one to start with!