After her death, Ursula K. Le Guin's blog eventually went offline. But it's now back and now stands as a remarkable memoir, embarked upon by the the illustrious author at 81 years old. [ursulakleguin.com via Metafilter] The same material is available in print as No Time to Spare: Thinking About What Matters. — Read the rest

Wonder where we got the sexagesimal system? 60 seconds seems awful unwieldy in our world of base 10.

It's the Sumerians.

Someone on Reddit's ELI5 forum asked:

"Why do we hit a limit of 60 for seconds and minutes, but then decimal for hours and milliseconds?" — Read the rest

Sculptor Leonardo Ugolini made this incredible timelapse video of his carving a Millenium Falcon out of sand.

Chewbacca's appearance is great. — Read the rest

After 20 years of use, the Russian space station docking module Pirs fell to Earth on July 26 in a fantastic fiery show captured on video by French astronaut Thomas Pesquet who had a terrific view from the International Space Station. — Read the rest

Press Secretary Jen Psaki managed to both laugh at Fox "News" reporter Peter Doocy and crush Donald Trump and his unethical pressuring of the Justice Department with just one line and a straight face.

While on the subject of New York Gov. — Read the rest

Enlarge / The first live action promotional image for Amazon's new The Lord of the Rings-related series. (credit: Amazon Studios)

Today, Amazon Studios announced that its new TV series based on J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings has finished filming its first season. The season is expected to premiere on September 2, 2022, "with new episodes available weekly," Amazon says.

Additionally, Amazon tweeted out one of the first visuals from the series, seen above. It depicts a person standing in a field looking out at a spectacular fantasy landscape.

Thirteen months might seem like a long gap between the conclusion of filming and the airing of the series, but a series like this is likely to involve complicated visual effects, meaning a prolonged post-production period.

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