Matter, Energy, and Life of Michaela A. Castello.

Category: Long Reads

Stories that take a bit longer to get through.

  • Playlist Victory

    I have established a bit of a policy that when I get new music I have to listen to it at least once. This was working well until my music collection increased 50% in nearly one go last fall. My “New Music” playlist became huge, and coupled with various new additions it has taken a…

  • Hydrogen Peroxide and a Band Aid

    Or, “I did in 60 seconds what the University of Maryland Medical Center could not do in 3 hours.” This evening went very different from how I imagined it would go as I was preparing to leave work. I was cleaning out the cryostat from my latest spate of brain-cutting and my hand slipped, slicing…

  • Inheritance Book 2: The Plagiarism Continues

    Once again, Paolini rips off the work of other talented storytellers while adding nothing new. The result is a predictable, flat story that, like its predecessor, reads like Tolkien fan fiction.

  • Eragon

    The concept of dragon riders seems like it would be cool, but I think it’s poorly executed.

  • The Office: Stress Relief

    Last night’s episode of The Office, “Stress Relief,” has got to be one of the most disappointing episodes of that show I have ever seen. After hyping it for the duration of the Super Bowl, they delivered what was at best a mediocre episode with enough actual laughs for a 30-minute episode, and an additional…

  • Test Day

    I took the MCAT today in Bethesda at 8:00 AM. Perhaps I should repeat that: I had to be in Bethesda today at 8 AM to take a five-hour test. Normally—that is, without traffic, so it’s probably more accurate to say abnormally—it takes about 45 minutes to get from my house to Bethesda. So in…

  • Reading List Inoculation

    A few minutes ago I finished reading Flowers for Algernon, one of those extremely well-known titles that I wasn’t entirely sure if I had read before or not. It was an excellent book that I would highly recommend reading if you weren’t already required to at some point. One of the benefits of being largely…

  • Left 4 Dead

    Last month three of my buddies/former roommates got together to give me a spectacular Christmas present: my own copy of Valve Software’s latest hit computer game, Left 4 Dead. Of course, the move wasn’t entirely altruistic as the game is designed for four-player co-op. Since then, I’ve been having a grand time blowing a motley…