Popular Mechanics • February 15, 2023

Prison Islands Are Desolate, Lonely Places—And Their History Is Just as Bleak

What happens when an island is taken over, turned into a prison or penal colony, and later left deserted?

Popular Mechanics • January 17, 2020

18 Things You Probably Don't Know About Prohibition

We may treat Prohibition like a joke today, but it was the result of decades of political crusading and did lead to a longer-term stanching of alcohol use. In fact, there's a lot of surprising stuff packed into just under 14 years of Prohibition.

Eater • January 2, 2020

The Cooking Show at the End of the Road

“Today on Check the Pantry, it’s a battle royale featuring mustard,” Jeff Lockwood’s voice says over the radio. Lockwood’s cooking show, Check the Pantry, which began in 2018 on the local public radio station KBBI, explores food culture one ingredient at a time in Homer, Alaska.

Popular Mechanics • October 31, 2019

When the Web Was Weird | Internet Week

In the late ‘90s, an obscure site called Superbad pioneered jarringly bizarre, often ugly, but occasionally beautiful web design. It’s taken all this time for the rest of the internet to catch up.

Amazon • September 15, 2019

Palmistry: Discover What Secrets Lie in the Palm of Your Hand

Palmistry is a primer on palm reading, from the famous heart line to the details of hand shape, finger length, planetary alignment, and more. • Details on major and minor lines, each finger and its mounts on the palm, and other features like travel lines and bracelets. • Interior pages are vivid and bright with photos, historical art, and illustrations

Tiny Cartridge 3DS • May 28, 2019

Approaching Infinity

The idea of infinity horrifies people more than almost anything else and remains as confusing and terrifying as ever. As our games get closer to endlessly detailed, I chose four designers who’ve worked on four of my favorite games of the last few years, all with totally different ways of using space, time, and more to give the feeling of an infinite playspace.

Medium • December 3, 2018

Super Paper Mario Is a Flawed Masterpiece

Nintendo threw everything they had at the third Paper Mario game, an ambitious and creative Wii showpiece with an enormous scope and story. But after that, where else could they go?

Storius • September 21, 2018

50 Years of Fleetwood Mac, in Eleven Songs

The commercial heyday of Fleetwood Mac came in the late 1970s, but the band had a long life and rotating cast long before and after that time. I’ve picked 11 songs from that 50-year period as exemplars of the shifting notion and long narrative of Fleetwood Mac.

Amazon • August 1, 2018

Learn to Code Kit (4 Books and Downloadable App)

I wrote the three included history and teaching books, created dozens of animated characters and background tiles, and designed the block language used in the app.

Medium • June 19, 2018

The Author Is Dead; Long Live the Author

My friend Hannah Moskowitz is a novelist. I read two of her novels last year and liked them both a lot — she writes vividly and with great feeling about topics and emotions that feel urgent and realistic. Over time I grew more and more curious about her personal white whale of sorts, a novel she published in 2015 called A History of Glitter and Blood.

Medium • June 4, 2018

“Sex and the City Ruined My Life” Didn’t Ruin My Life

I won’t link to the New York Post story where Julia Allison, who definitely wrote her own Wikipedia page, says the groundbreaking HBO show Sex and the City ruined her life.

Medium • October 25, 2017

An Armor and a (Spider) Leg

I’ve been researching and writing about historical and future armor, which started, as usual, with one wild hair: the Air Force cadet who experimented with non-Newtonian fluid oobleck in military armor panels. What a rad idea! I thought, and then, Wait, I have no idea what armor is made of.

The Awl • July 7, 2017

What Are We Looking For In Amelia Earhart?

There are few more enduring celebrity chameleons than Amelia Earhart. She was a very public androgyne, although she cannily femmed up for publicity photos. She married late, included with Charlotte Brontë as anecdata in Rebecca Traister’s All the Single Ladies.