HAVE WE BECOME a “planet of the nerds?” And is that a bad thing or not?

A COLLEGE PROFESSOR’S LIST of “Banished Words for 2004″ rightly includes “Homeland Security” and “Must-See TV.” But, alas, it doesn’t include “Bling Bling.”

AS YOU MIGHT TELL from the top left side of this page, we now have a fancy intro page to our hilarious new novel The Myrtle of Venus. It tells you all you need to know before you read the online first draft.

So now you’ve no excuse not to start reading it already!

Above and below, the former Les Piafs boutique on Second. (It moved to become the only locally-owned retailer in the city-subsidized downtown mall Pacific Place.)

Above and below, the former Land Rover showroom on Westlake. (It moved into the historic Lincoln-Mercury building up the street.)

Cardhaus, the role-playing-game parlor on Roosevelt that opened after Wizards of the Coast’s more elaborate game room closed, is just plain gone.

PAUL GRAHAM has put a lot of thought n’ pondering into the eternal dilemma of “Why Nerds are Unpopular.” Among his theories: They don’t, or won’t, or don’t know how to, play the “popularity” game.

FIFTY-ONE DAYS since I began, I’m truly, fully, completely done with the first draft of my humorous modern novel The Myrtle of Venus. An epilog chapter to the story is now online, having been completed at exactly 10 p.m. Sunday night.

As usual, the whole thing starts at this link.

WE’VE BASHED The SeaTimes a bit this year, but we love the paper’s first (annual?) winter solstice contemplation.

VOTE FOR YOUR FAVORITE anti-Bush commercial. Just don’t complain that your vote wasn’t counted.

…to that tireless provider of warmth and light, the coffeehouse.

MARK SIMONSON really hates, hates, the typeface you’re looking at now.