Here in Toronto it's actually not so bad. The bulk of the storm seems to be passing to the south: we've had some snow -- maybe four inches at most, with another two to four expected today -- and a good deal of wind-drifting, but nothing excessive.

On one hand, this makes it relatively light and easy to brush off of things. (Clearing a path from the backyard gate to the driveway was more like sweeping than shoveling. Actual shoveling was needed for the driveway, however, as that's not sheltered by a pine tree.)

On the other hand, it doesn't pack worth a damn and it *squeaks* under my boots in a way that sends shivers up my spine.

Roughly 6" and counting in the Albany NY area, and staying home today because it's supposed to get *really* nasty later,

Old Norse Reading Group, at the Higgins Armory in Worcester.

Poor Ezra didn't like bad weather it seems but there was much rejoicing in our home this morning. Snow Day!

However, I'm working from home today anyways.

I like it when snow visits, but I'm happy it doesn't live here.

"The taps spluttered, shuddered then ground to a halt yesterday in the town of Lake Cargelligo, near Condobolin.
In sweltering conditions reminiscent of sub-Saharan Africa, the local school was shut down and a hospital forced to revert to emergency supplies as Lachlan Shire Council battled to restore water to the town's 1300 thirsty residents ... Up to 12 small communities in country NSW were presently carting in water, a spokeswoman for [the Water Utilities Minister, David] Campbell, said."

On the other hand, you could just about drink all the rain we've had so far this winter.

Mitt Romney declares and we get a blizzard. Coincidence? I think not... ;-)

I hope the snow is light and melts soon.

(Yeh, there's still a chance that we'll have another bad cold snap like the mid-20's one we had last month that wiped out the established peppers, tomatoes and eggplant even though I covered them at night. But unlikely enough that replanting is worth the risk. Besides, I couldn't stand the sight of all that bare dirt.)

Here 15-minutes-metro-ride NW of Washington DC, the snow/ice is ankle-deep in places, but I couldn't check the depth everywhere because there were stretches of snow that I wouldn't sink in, or even make a bootsole impression. I felt like a half-elf (it happened about half of the time during my morning walk). I'm at the University of Maryland, and the campus has been closed since 2 pm yesterday, to remain closed today. It still feels sorta wimpyish, black ice and all, after seeing pictures of Ohio and Michigan---I think we could have opened by the afternoon, but who am I to judge?

I hope it changes to wet rain on schedule this evening, I have a date with my sweetie at a restaurant I've been really looking forward to trying!!

(Happy Hallmark Holiday to all...)

I, of course, pointed them towards this place.

Personally, I hold that it can be either, rather like "sheep".

Mid-50s here in Western Oregon, and spring is coming on fast ...

Looks like about two-three inches outside; the stuff is still coming down, and it's a bit windy. The streets are sloppy and half-plowed, but nothing unusual for a Northeastern winter. There's a possibility that the snow may change to rain later today and then the whole mess will freeze over tonight.

But the downfall is supposed to stop by tomorrow morning with clear thirty-degree temperatures expected on Friday and Saturday.

"Go, robot, go!"

In an early and discarded version of "Macbeth", Macduff's army advance on Dunsinane holding sheepskins over their heads in order to disguise themselves as a flock of animals. This is foreshadowed by one of the three witches warning Macbeth to "beware the March of 'ides!"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eRjVeRbhtRU

Hilarious....

Well since it's an open thread I'll pimp my own You Tube response to writer reality shows (scams)...

-=Jeff=-

Growing old in Cascadia is a matter of suspecting the weather is out to get me, with personal intent.

In medieval language reports, I got to use this quote from Rabelais this week in a paper: "For the codpiece is the principal and most especial piece of armour that a warrior doth carry; and therefore do I maintain even to the fire (exclusively, understand you me), that no Turks can properly be said to be armed men, in regard that codpieces are by their law forbidden to be worn."

I love my field.

Surprised to see another Oklahoman on Making Light. I mean, I personally know two others who read it as much as I do, but we're not the ones who speak up.

amb, I tend to say "Northwest Coast" by preference, and include everything from Monterey to Yakutat, or "Cascadia" to include the inland. And nothing will kill off Scotch Broom, at least not the species stuff descended from the seeds Arthur Menzies sent to David Douglas in the 1830s, that got planted simultaneously at Ft. Victoria, Ft. Nisqually, and Ft. Vancouver (Hudson Bay Company forts, not military ones). The whimpy stuff the highways beautification people put in in the fifties is another matter- it doesn't like shade on its new growth, or dry winters. (I've got family photos from before WW2 with broom filling in all the unploughed ground, and it pains me when people assert that Cytisus scopularius was introduced by the DoH).

I shoulda known.

In my own very limited experience, US ideas of bacon are so streaky that they are just lumps of fat with a faint hint of meat marbled through them. Nothing like an Irish back rasher

Galtee used to post an entire Irish breakfast to America (for a reasonable commission), until we had an outbreak of foot and mouth some years ago. Rashers, sausages, black and white pudding; add a few fried eggs, mushrooms, some buttery toast and mugs of milky tea. The perfect Sunday hangover cure, and 1500% of your recommended daily fat intake.

:)

It's not gonna happen. If you're unhappily single and you have a good day on February 14, it's despite VD (pun intended) not because of it. Even being happy on this day is not the same as having a Happy Valentine's Day; for a single person, it generally means you've successfully ignored it.

I mean, I don't really object to y'all giving each other stylized scrota as love-gifts, or all the roses, or any of that shit. Just don't get in my face with it, please.

I know intellectually that these people mean well. It still feels like they're gloating.

*Not just the sleet, but my left leg cramped every muscle last night so I had to take more flexeril and am still not alert enough to drive.

*amend as appropriate

It all depends on what part of the US your mother is visiting, but in my experience, wherever you go, there will be at least one high-quality specialty butcher serving the region. For the San Francisco bay area, that's Dittmer's. They've got rasher there.

Also, while all US bacon sold in general grocery stores is what's called "streaky" in the British isles, the less fatty meatier ones are Niman Ranch and the Canadian applewood smoked bacon they sell at Costco.

Xopher--

From my point of view, a single Valentine's day is a lot like it is when you're a kid--an excuse to buy yourself a half-price heart-shaped box of chocolates the day after. Far less stressful and fun on the whole than ones I've had when in a relationship.

When your toilet freezing and exploding is better than the other assorted suckitudes of the day....

On the bright side, tomorrow we celebrate the year's first observance of Discount Candy Day. My favorite is the Festival of the Half-Price Cadbury Egg, but this one is nice too.

Meanwhile, in a sign of spring, pitchers and catchers have reported to MLB training camps. Happy New Year!

Mostly because I'm going to bed soon.

i highly recommend today's "fresh air" (if you missed it, they have podcasts from the website): john waters' new valentine's album, plus some bonus willie nelson & postal history. i love it whenever john waters comes on (for one thing, he & terry gross are just so chummy). his show promoting his christmas album is the only podcast i've relistened to multiple times, & most want to play for friends when they're coming over to cook with me.

& i hate christmas, which should tell you that this show will make you happy even if you hate valentine's day.

unless you hate john waters. or terry gross. or willie nelson. or history, i guess.

Xopher, I recommend getting offensively drunk with rowdy friends in a romantic restaurant. It's worked for me!

If you'd like to have a valentine, will you be mine? I believe in collecting quantities of cool people to be my valentine, regardless of whether I am attached, or they are attached, or even if they have vowed lives of celibacy in the Catholic Church. Because it sucks to be alone and lonely on Valentine's Day.

Here on the south coast of Ohio, we didn't get a lot of snow, and I didn't get out and measure it before the rain started to beat it down. By the time I got out and shovelled, I was dealing with a couple of inches of dense slush. It rained most of yesterday, sometimes freezing. We just got lightly glazed, thank God; nothing like the major ice storm we had 4 years ago. Snow flurries today.

There's a gratifyingly anti-Feith avalanche happening over there. I'm not surprised that the Post gave him a platform to speak from. I am surprised that they're leaving the comments in place. (I guess I've given up on the WaPo, in much the same way I've given up on the NY Times.)

And then I thought, as they were starting the whole thing up, "Well, I won't be entirely surprised if there is a dinosaur platform somewhere in there."

And there was.

I wonder if some people are suffering from Valentine's day stress.

It's a little late, but maybe (unhappily) single people should pick one of the other saints for February 14. For a variety of reasons, I go for St Cyril.

I brought leftover candy hearts and pink cookies from a party last week (I have no problem cynically using holidays as marketing tools) to work and then sat in my office with the door locked and cried over things that have nothing to do with what day it is or the state of my love life.

Abi:

winterborn lady
snow blossoms for you today
felicitations

The link has been forwarded on to appropriate parties, as I'm still laughing over the line "God is an artist who did it for the sheer love or hell of it, not a scientist at work on a magnificently rational design that will impress his research grant body no end."

another year dawns
bound verse freed, ideation
rooster crows with joy

bummer. As I read it, all I kept thinking was "Hwhuh?"

ajay @ #28: No, no! You're remembering it wrong. The witches' oracle mysteriously told Macduff and his troops: "Be, wear the 'ides amarch!"

This often gets confused with the Roman prophet's cryptic warning to Caesar: "Tilburnum wude ducum tu dum sine eium." The Latin is so cryptic as to have been opaque to Caesar, let alone modern readers, but we can piece bits of it together as "You are [something] of the war leaders of the Tilburnii while you [are] without [that one?]" It must have been intended as a warning against Brutus, but Caesar was still puzzling over the grammar as he went to that fateful encounter on the steps of the forum.

The day started with the most astonishing sunrise, descended into exasperation and near-farce, and has now begun to improve markedly.

The kindness of friends
Is light in darkness of
Wintertime. Thank you.

In Dutch, one says not that it is one's birthday (Vandaag is mijn verjaardag.), but that one is "yearish" (Vandaag ben ik jarig.)

I think that's cool.

http://www.britsusa.com/

However it does not look like she puts the frozen foodstuff on her Web site, you may have to call and ask about them.

She also may be able to hook you up with someone you can buy direct from.

The roads vary from slushy to packed ice. Few, if any, have shoveled their sidewalks.

One of the neighborhood hawks dropped by on Wednesday morning -- big bird, mostly grey.

My mother sent me _Shogun_ on DVD for Valentines. Since we were home, we watched the first two discs.

Sean Carroll over at Cosmic Variance had some interesting things to say about Eagleton's review several months back.

The previous excerpt, which defined God as “the condition of possibility,” seemed to be warning against the dangers of anthropomorphizing the deity, ascribing to it features that we would normally associate with conscious individual beings such as ourselves. A question like “Does `the condition of possibility’ exist?” would never set off innumerable overheated arguments, even in a notoriously contentious blogosphere. If that were really what people meant by “God,” nobody would much care....

But — inevitably — Eagleton does go ahead and burden this innocent-seeming concept with all sorts of anthropomorphic baggage. God created the universe “out of love,” is capable of “regret,” and “is an artist.”

It's a lengthy post, but worth reading.

For my money, H. Allen Orr's review of Dawkins's book at the New York Review of Books was a much better take. Still, in the end, dismissive, but without being either abstruse to the point of obscurity or condescending to those who don't appreciate the sort of refined, lofty theology that Eagleton likes.

And the kind thoughts on ML helped.

He leaves no place for religion or spirituality, which would be considered a violation of Sun Tzu's rule to always leave your opponent a retreat, so they will take the retreat. If you completely encircle them, they will turn and fight.

And they have been fighting atheists for a good long time; in point of fact, I would argue that it is the atheists who had been completely encircled in modern public discourse.

That's an ... interesting ... niche for him to allow. There's a part of me that wonders if he really doesn't understand spirituality (and by extension, religion) like the sidelight article accuses. It's a minor quibble for me. It's not like people are debating whether to teach NOMA in schools. I agree with the stuff he does where it matters. What he believes internally is his business.

I would argue that it is the atheists who had been completely encircled in modern public discourse.

Yes, they have. But Sun Tzu probably wouldn't object to that, since the religious massively outnumber the aetheists. Not that it makes it morally right, just reasonable tactics.

Well, Wikipedia just deleted the page.

Grab a copy off Google's cache if you want to preserve the content!

If you read his work, or even watch him on an Irish TV comedy show, he comes across as being as mild and reasonable an atheist as, well, as me.

i also quite enjoyed the h. allen orr piece, & thought it probably all i needed to know about dawkins' book. but it might be because i'm on that side anyhow.

The Merry-Thought: or, the Glass-Window and Bog-House Miscellany

This is a collection of early eighteenth century graffiti, dirty poetry and insults.

The introduction:

The Original Manuscripts written in Diamond by Persons of the first Rank and Figure in Great Britain; relating to Love, Matrimony, Drunkenness, Sobriety, Ranting, Scandal, Politicks, Gaming, and many other Subjects, Serious and Comical.

Faithfully Transcribed from the Drinking-Glasses and Windows in the several noted Taverns, Inns, and other Publick Places in this Nation. Amongst which are intermixed the Lucubrations of the polite Part of the World, written upon Walls in Bog-houses, &c.

A representative poem and the location where it was found:

Says Sir John to my Lady, as together they sat,

Shall we first go to Supper, or do you know what?

Dear Sir John, (with a Smile,) return'd the good Lady,

Let us do you know what, for Supper's not ready.

Bridgnorth, at the Crown.

The thing I actually came by to link to is this batch of recordings by students at Dondero High School. So far I've only had time to check out the covers of "Three Cool Cats" and "White Rabbit" (sort of an animal theme here) from 1996, but they convinced me that the rest is probably worth dipping into. I don't want to give individual links -- some version of homeland security tends to hold my posts when I do that.

every time a thread around here reaches about 180 posts, it crashes (well, locks up) my firefox. 160, ok, 200, ok, somewhere around 180, crashy. it's happening now with salwar kameez. it doesn't happen with any other blogs i visit.

anyone else? any ideas?

re: 97, Belgium!

Must... sleep...

#83: I really, really wouldn't use Eagleton as an example of how someone can be Christian and still think clearly.

Dawkins makes it clear in "The Blind Watchmaker" that he, like most religious people, regards "Does God exist?" as a question of fact of the same form as "Does the Matterhorn exist?" Eagleton comes out with, frankly, a load of doubletalk about conditions of possibility which boils down to "You can't ask whether God exists; that's a meaningless question, because given that anything at all exists, God-the-condition-of-possibility necessarily exists". Fair enough, as truisms tend to be. But it's worth pointing out that this puts Eagleton in a tiny, tiny minority of believers.

And, as pointed out above, he then goes on to say that his philosophical-concept God was none the less incarnate in first-century Palestine, and is capable of human-like emotions such as love - none of which, obviously, are necessarily attributes of the condition of possibility!

Today's theme, Most Memorable Hair Days. And the nominees are...

* Brad Pitt in Legends of the Fall
* Fredric March in The Adventures of Mark Twain
* any cast member in Close Encounters of the Third Kind
* anybody in Logan's Run...

I'm voting for Logan's Run.

"Renew! Renew!"

What is surely true, however, is that the world’s four billion or so believers-in-God don’t have recourse to any supersubtlety on the question. Surely for the large majority of them God exists in a straightforward way. And when Eagleton says ‘for Judeo-Christianity, God is not a person in the sense that Al Gore is’ he surely means ‘for a certain kind of theologian, God is not a person in the sense that Al Gore arguably is.’ There are of course currents of twentieth-century theology that develop this point. But in both the Judaic tradition (where, say what you like about God in the Torah, he’s a pretty lively character, with a face, backparts, a temper, and the kinds of interpersonal relationships that even Al Gore can manage) and most especially in the Christian tradition Eagleton’s position is spectacularly wrongheaded. The point about Christ is that, though still God, he was indeed a person; and moreover a person in pretty-much the sense that Al Gore is a person. It is this ‘personification’, in a strict sense, that enables the faith of many Christians.

The curious thing is that I don't know whether Eagleton is at all religious. He's apparently a long-standing Marxist "critical theorist," which sort of implies he's an atheist. But it doesn't require it (for example, liberation theology was partly an attempt to combine Marxism with Catholic faith), so I don't know if he's arguing from a position of genuine (if perhaps atypical) religous fatih, or just from some kind of aesthetic appreciation of abstruse theology for its own sake.

Maybe not every believer is as naive as Dawkins seems to think, but there are certainly quite a few, and a few influential ones, in this country who are starkly (if selectively) literal...

I love the Berrymans. And Peter not only writes songs, he writes about songwriting.

My jacket is disappointed. I'll explain the facts of life to it later.

Management hasn't gotten anybody here to shovel, but I emailed the book group and a husband and wife came to shovel. It was going to take forever since it's frozen to three inches of ice, but one of my neighbors came over with a ice chopper and they made me a trail to my van. Then the husband started pounding the ice on top of the van and it came off in giant chunks. They've finished the windshield except one of my wipers is frozen and he wants to work on that more. If I can't get the van over the snowplow ridge, they'll come get me tomorrow so I can go to book group.

(Hmm. My birthday is the same as LBJ's. Not that anyone would be interested...)

(Hmm. My birthday is the same as LBJ's. Not that anyone would be interested...)

In that game the pea is never actually under the shell, and I'm not sure the meaning is ever in Eagleton's words either.

I am not an atheist (though I don't usually commit myself as much as to even say that) but my belief in God/the Void/whatever-you-wanna-call-it is personal and experiential, and I don't expect others to be persuaded by my own intensely personal experiences. I get all cranky when I read apparently sophistic arguments for the existence of God, whether Anselm's or Eagleton's. They seem to me designed only to persuade people who already believe, and what's the point in that?

oh. my. GAWD.

That was fricken awesome.

Say... I've been looking on YouTube for the opening credit of 1972's Silent Running, to no avail. That's rather surprising because how many SF movies are there out there that begin with an original song by Joan Baez?

Tbe Berrymans also have a small connection to fandom, via having done concerts at WisCon twice that I know of. I don't remember the first one very well, as it was in 1978, but the second one was only three or four years ago. They had the audience all clenching their teeth together and singing along on the refrain for "Gadeng Vadoo"...good times.

R/
Duncan

You mentioned an image of the beloved in Song of Songs/Song of Solomon that took the metaphor literally. Do you have a link for that?

Also, I was particularly struck by your remarks on the unreality of religion in many works of genre fiction. Have you considered a short-story anthology focused on realistic religion in SFF, from the bake sale by Dionysians to the schism in the human sacrifice cult between those who insist upon universal donors v. the blood-type-agnostics to future Christian or Jewish sects?

In a similar vein, have you read Tanya Huff's short story "In Mysterious Ways" (collected in Stealing Magic)? It includes the god of minor conveniences, and what happens when you tick that diety off... Given some of your comments about what followers get from a religion, I thought you might appreciate it if you haven't already read it.

I thought I'd make a greek dinner out of it, and stopped by Trader Joe's for spinach pies and stuff grape leaves.

On the way out, I played the name of the main course over in my mind. One of those words that just sounds funny, like it should be meaningful.

I'm not sure if stifado should be:

* A fish soon to be battered and deep-fried into extinction by Red Lobster.

* A medieval torture.

* A service offered by Italian sex workers.

That's not too bad of a sharp crest for that neighborhood. Go a couple of blocks north and there are places where, when you stop at the corner, all you can see is sky. I imagine that it's the closest to being an astronaut I'll ever get.

It's hell on the ankles though. (I've walked up and down some of those hills. Next time I'll get hiking boots first.)

If the limo driver in Marilee's post @ 137 had had one, we'd all have been spared a chuckle.

Meanwhile, on the Oakland side of the Bay, I've walked many times from Montclair all the way down to the Rockridge BART Station, and that's quite steep. Luckily, I've never had to walk back up, because, by then, public transportation is up and running. (I usually take a bus from the TransBay Terminal back up to Montclair. Be warned that the view from the top deck of the Bay Bridge is the surest way to fall back in love with the Bay Area.)

I spent my teens in a house not far from Montclair, and I came to like our hill -- good view too, even if the people across the street had it better. I'm back near the top of a hill now, and actually like the climb better than the descent, perhaps due to my stocky build (or sheer nostalgia?). And the views are great!

As this is the Open Thread, here's my verse #2 for the New Year*

Lucky & Newberry are under attack
Anxious adults are starting to quack
“We must be strong,
Because it is wrong
To use the correct word for a nutsack”

*My Year of the Pig resolution - I have to write a piece of verse every day.

Andrew Willet @152
My dad had much the same rule, but there was a street in the East Bay he used. I went backward down that hill about six times before I mastered the uphill stop.

Serge @156
Somewhere north of the Golden Gate Bridge, yes. But the alternative was to have the characers drive to Monterey, and have you seen Kirk drive? (Hint: A Piece of the Action)

It was a lovely walk, sometimes. The rhythm of walking brought on a number of poems, and I loved seeing the trees and bushes I passed - each one a piece of the essential wildness that I so often missed when we were in the city.

Other times, it was an opportunity to perfect my hitchhiking skills, most often with the chemistry teacher who got me into fandom proper, or the charming guy I had a crush on for four years running.

My much younger sister got driven up every morning (she was much better at wheedling than I was). I often think that each individual convenience added up to an essential impoverishment, like sweets that taste good and don't nourish.

(via Neil Gaiman's journal.)

Well, somebody needs to say it:

MY walk to school was uphill both ways. (But you try to tell my kids that, and they won't believe you....)

Pounds, feet, gallons-- they are dead to me.
Stone? Furlongs? Chains?

"Insufficient facts always invite danger, Captain."

Meanwhile, yesterday, while I was getting things ready for our tax guy, South Pacific was on Turner Classic Movies, and that's when the realization hit me that, thanks to Star Trek, I am only a few degrees of separation from Rodgers & Hammerstein... Or did nobody else recognize Bloody Mary's daughter as being played by France Nuyen, aka Elaan of Troyus?

But Lawless is the odd gal out, even in the screwy, cobbled-together world of self-made experts, Sunday soldiers, and putative patriots that is the anti-illegal-immigrant movement. The Bay Area transplant's a lesbian pagan, a former high priestess of a Dianic Wiccan outfit named the Sisterhood of the Moon. In fact, she once placed a hex on homophobic orange-juice-hawker Anita Bryant. And though both the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Anti-Defamation League have made hay linking her to neo-Nazis, she remains a pro-choice feminist in a movement fueled in part by high testosterone and backward, archconservative he-man values.

Her flag burnings in Tucson and Phoenix have made international news, drawn the denunciations of the Mexican government and local officials, and caused her to be reviled and ostracized by activists on both ends of the political seesaw. Yet, Lawless' oft-loony views and activities are belied by the spirited, well-read conversationalist who dreams of writing screenplays for Hollywood and whose psyche may be best explained by fan fiction she penned in tribute to one of her all-time-favorite TV shows: Xena: Warrior Princess.

On the other hand, I've yet to see a convincing in-canon explanation for why the same springboard-logged stump shows up next to the road on every planet in the Stargate universe, plus in the universes where Xfiles, Dark Angel, and Eureka occur.

And I'm still recovering from the hash "Grey's Anatomy" has made of emergency response in Seattle.

(Don't mind me, I spent way too much time yesterday trying to figure out when SciFi is going to start showing "Painkiller Jane." Not March 1, which is imdb's answer. It's making me cranky).

You forgot to include Galactica's Caprica in the list.

As for the universe apparently being filled with British-Columbia-like planets... I remember an episode of StarGate where SG1 has stepped thru the Gate into yet another BC forest, and Colonel O'Neill makes a comment how it's a green universe Out There, and adds an SCTV "Eh?"

That's changing. Parking supply is slowly declining, while demand continues at its normal growth rate. The new MTA organization expects to raise revenues without raising MUNI fares, and that means increased parking fees and fines (though, they won't say that openly yet).

And yeah, maybe most people don't walk the hills much, but I do. I routinely make the hike between West Portal and my home near the top of the tallest of the hills in the Black Ridge Range (south of the museums in Golden Gate Park). With a 30 pound toddler on my back.

Yes, I have to take a shower after a workout like that.

On another topic: anyone know the name or author of a story set in Eden, where instead of blaming Eve, Adam tells God essentially to grow up? And they live happily ever after in Eden?

A friend of mine is looking for it for her stepdaughter.

I didn't think I'd get a harder one so soon, but I did: After two months, Riverbend has just posted a new entry. It's... at some point there's no point comparing atrocities. I'll just say be warned before reading this:

http://riverbendblog.blogspot.com/

I'd get up and look for the book, but I'm stoned on NyQuil right now. Email me if you need actual facts.

"Final Version" by John Morressy

Collected in the anthology 100 Great Fantasy Short-Short Stories edited by Asimov.

Painkiller Jane's on my "I'll try it..." list. I didn't particularly like the comic character, based on very limited exposure, but I expect the TV version to be totally different.

I will put this disclaimer: I am not a comics fan, and have found before, with "Birds of Prey" that this makes me prone to like stuff which drives comicsfen crazy.

News From Nonsequitiria: My "read a book a week on average" new year's resolution is going nicely. Two out of my last three have been Making Light regulars, and I am entirely happy with the experience... no,I'm not telling who. Because I want ALL you guys to write more books.

The title and era of story sound right, so I just ordered it. Hey, even if it's the wrong story, I'm bound to find a bunch of great ones in this anthology. Please thank the ML folks for me.

Lately I have been eyeing those light alarm clocks -- the ones that awaken you by slowly brightening the room over half an hour or so, rather than the traditional approach of suddenly jarring you out of REM sleep with loud noises. They generally sell for at least $100. (1) Does anyone sell clocks like this for less than $50? (2) How hard would it be to build one cheaply? (3) These lamps need to be able to cover a continuous range of brightness, which in my experience means they need to use dimmer switches, which means they need to use incandescent bulbs. Is there a way to achieve the same effect while using a more efficient light source, like LEDs?

As far as building your own with the continuous range, rather than one bright blast, you'd probably be able to fake it with a number of timer plugs set slightly apart so the lights come on one by one.

I achieve the same effect by the use of an ultra-efficient (and free) light source known as the sun. Take the curtains off your bedroom window and you can do likewise.

(Yeah, yeah, completely unhelpful, but irresistible...)

A graticula is:
1. a grate
2. a lattice
3. a torture
4. a basket
5. all of the above

Finally figuring that one out was so exciting I need a cigarette. And I don't even smoke.

Dawn simulators, though, are. I love mine dearly. I don't know if I would have kept my job these past few years without it.

In terms of an inexpensive solution, the notion of multiple LEDs, going on one by one at regular intervals, is a very, very good one.

Sunrise is now just after 7 AM here in Seattle, and they're going to push it out by an hour. Maybe I'll just try to put my workday on DST too. Waking up in the dark is what really messes me up in the winter. Maybe they'll change it back next year. :-/

At least they can't take away the two additional hours of daylight we've gained since the solstice.

**

Re: the Anthony Bourdain particle, I'm shocked to find that I actually agree with him at the 90% level. The comments are worth a read too.

Diatryma @190, abi @194: Multiple LEDs, switching on one at a time. I like that idea.

Larry @195: How come I'm not hearing about the Daylight Savings Time adjustment messing up everybody's computers, a la Y2K? From where I'm sitting (in Honolulu), I always have to remember whether North America is 2-5 hours ahead (winter) or 3-6 hours ahead (summer) of Hawaiian Standard Time.

Actually, I was reading about the possibility of computers being messed up just this week. Try this one (I don't thinks it's the same one I was reading):

Daylight-saving change could confuse gadgets news.com.com/Daylight-saving+change+could+confuse+gadgets/2100-1041_3-5823792.html

I, too, have been working too hard on my Kalamazoo paper, and I'm getting ... nay, I have gotten ... slightly loopy. Or loopier.

The week of the switch, I'd be careful to mention the time of appointments in the body of your message just in case the recipient is using non-updated software.

Disclaimer - Anything I'm saying here is my own opinion and does not reflect the opinion or make any representation on behalf of my employer. (Whew!)

Now we just need to get all of our customers to upgrade.

#198: "The lamp's advantage is that we don't have to let it out of the house to answer Nature's Call."

Ah. It's circuit broken, then.

Ba-da-bing.

I achieve the same effect by the use of an ultra-efficient (and free) light source known as the sun. Take the curtains off your bedroom window and you can do likewise.

unless, like me, you have a ground-floor bedroom facing the street. i would looove more sunlight, as i'm seasonally affected, but we've had a couple of peeping toms since we moved in.

The scary thing is that this isn't actually for Kalamazoo, though it will be useful for that as well. I decided to put myself under reconstruction pressure by simply promising to teach particular dances on particular dates. Like, um, March 4th. The deadline pressure is spurring me to figure out stuff I've been working on off and on for years, plus a few other things that seemed related. This was a major hump to get over in the nonPhD nonThesis. I went out to dinner to celebrate.

Tori Amos covers "Total Eclipse of the Heart" on one of her recent live albums...you can find it on Itunes. It's both hilarious and awesome.

(Thanks for the tip, MacAllister.)

And btw, I read Land of Mist and Snow on the train home from Boskone, and loved it. More please!

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: Snobbery is bullying. The end of smugness and snark, however elegantly-phrased, passing for "critique" is a day that cannot come fast enough.

And: Being knowledgeable and well-travelled is not any excuse for acting like a dick.

The lamp modules did allow dimmer control (yes, it did require incandescent bulbs), and you could program on/off times through a timer control, although I don't remember if you could program light levels. There had been computer interfaces provided for this system; perhaps that would give you more control (although leaving a computer running to function as your alarm clock does seem like overkill).

The individual lamp modules look like they might sell for $12-16. You can get a basic starter kit which has one lamp module and a control keypad for $20; but that wouldn't be enough to do what you want.

And Jim MacDonald! Happy Birthday!

Dan Layman-Kennedy: it is not misogyny to accurately critisize frightful people who happen to be female; it is misogynistic to refrain from expressing true criticism of Rachel Ray and Sandra Lee because they are women. Tony Bourdain says what the women of my household have been saying about the Food Network for the last two seasons.

I'm not quite as down on Rachael Ray as he is, maybe because I like her accent and think of the stuff she makes as practical last-minute weekday cooking.

Bourdain's piece is sharp and sarcastic, but, for me at least, fairly accurate. I'm not sure if it was in the article or the comments, but there was even a point that Bobby Flay is a great chef (I really like Mesa Grill, and it's still good after all these years) but he's kind of smarmy as a person.

Maybe I need to re-calibrate my misogyny meter? Did anyone else read that article that way?

***

BTW - Happy Birthday Mr. Macdonald. (And make sure you have that emergency kit handy - you never know what can happen around a birthday cake. Knives, fire, slippery goo. Scary stuff!)

I didn't read it as at all mysogynistic. Elitist, perhaps, but elitism in the defense of good cooking is not at all a bad thing. I suspect it's what a geek does when zie gets into food: get all worried about technique, recipe history and all that.

Food Network has been getting seriously dumbed down and eliding the geek factor. There seems to be some "homeyness" trend going round; I notice that Cook's Illustrated responded by putting out Cooks' Country, but they still do rigorous testing of recipes and techniques in both magazines.

Yes, I've seen Sandra Lee's show; I find it personally more or less unwatchable, but for reasons that have nothing to do with the fact that her ingredients come from cans. Her personality grates on me, but yanno, that's my problem. Paula Deen's show is mostly not my thing, but I'm not offended by it, ffs. And her relatives that Bourdain's so contemptuous of? Those are my in-laws and the families of friends. I'm not going to pretend I have a lot in common with them, but venom about Southern and country culture is a kind of short-sighted bigotry particularly endemic in the Left, and it's time it fucking stopped.

Mostly, I am frigging done with this notion that food is only worth making by slow laborious process using only the very finest ingredients. (Yeah, I'm looking at you, Alton Brown, even though I mostly like you.) I love cooking; I am a big fat guy from a big fat Eye-talian family, and I take joy in a lovingly crafted meal. But I also, a great deal of the time, have books to read and writing to do and music to play and family to spend time with and, oh yeah, a day job, and I don't have the time or the scratch or the energy to make everything a masterpiece. So I am solidly a Rachel Ray supporter, even if her bubbly enthusiasm doesn't always read as the most sincere. The notion that satisfying food requires neither arcane skill nor great investments of time is a cause I can get behind. According to Bourdain, this makes me some sort of unwashed idiotic junk-food addict. As far as I'm concerned, he can take his roasted goat and his still-beating cobra heart and blow me.

I agreed with most everything in his review. I've disagreed with other things he has said and written, because I'm willing to compromise in areas he's not. My brain editorializes with "Pull that stick out of your bum, Bourdain" and other comments along that line.

*He's said that he's been a jerk about Emeril, and has lightened up about "The Ewok".

I stand by the rest of it, though. I have no problem with someone having contrary opinions. People interested in civilized discourse say things like "this doesn't work for me for x various reasons." (As folks largely do in the Fluorosphere - although I avoid the Donaldson discussions.) Bullies and jerks sneer and spit bile and get their fans to applaud them for being "blunt" and "brash." I remain unimpressed.

I'm more or less amused by the fact that it's the women who are finding Bourdain's opinions unexceptionable, and at least one man all et up with outrage over his rather mild snark (compared, say, with discussions my sister, daughter, and I get into over Martha, Rachael, Sandra, and others, which are frequent, vehement, and frequently obscene).

I can make easy food quickly without thinking too much about it: I was taught in the hard school of feeding teenage boys working long hours in the hot sun. I want to learn things I don't know, and, on The Food Network, the opportunities to do so have become more and more rare.

I think Bourdain's a jerk, but he also nailed my reasons for not watching the Food Network. Bring back Biba's Italian Kitchen and Taste! Down with the perky fake evil! I want to learn things, dammit!

And JESR, if you're gonna slag Rachael Ray, can I come over and help? I'll bring the beer.

Happy birthday! Here's to cake and good booze and much celebration -- and many, many happy returns.

Make a wish! You absolutely deserve one. Actually, you deserve several, so make a few of them. Cheers!

So, Bourdain: Not a sexist. Still an asshole.

I agree with Tony's review of the FN,

Why does it seem like all de Pomaine's recipes start with "Boil a pot of water" even when the water never gets used, as near as I can tell? This is definitely one of life's little mysteries. (I should add that it takes more than ten minutes for my gas stove to bring any quantity of water over a cup to anything resembling a boil, so that the "10 minutes" thing is already toasted by definition.)

OTOH, his comments on table manners and the like still charm me, twenty years or so after I got the book.

It's Ms. Ray's voice, in tandem with her tedious perkiness, which gets all of us. That and the way she's prone to waste perfectly good ingrediants with just that much too much stuff; in general, we cook stuff which is more sophisticated, and faster, without being so fiddly.

It's so much easier with a microwave. Or an electric kettle. (I lived in an apt with a range like that. I'd boil the water in the kettle, then dump it in the pan on the stove.)

Dang, now I'm all hungry.

Yup.

I admit to liking "blunt", because I spend too much time with people that expect me to be a mind reader, or to understand what they're trying to say without having to come out and say "it". Whatever "it" might be. Then they are disappointed because we aren't communicating well. Le sigh.

On a food/cookbook related note - has anyone here seen the Au Pied de Cochon cookbook? The illustrations are hilarious. I haven't cooked anything yet, but I'm enjoying the reading.

Well, there's blunt and there's blunt. I agree very much with your point that saying what you mean is a good thing. I draw the line at using it as an excuse to be as unpleasant as possible. I think some folks start to use it as a schtick, especially if they get good feedback for being funny. I find this distressing, though I realize this makes me a minority in the Age of Snark and Irony.

And I know I'm a dreadful old wet blanket. I have issues with taking delight in hating; I think it diminishes us and leaches joy from the world. And I'm afraid snobbery is a big old hot button for me, which is why this sort of thing winds me up more than it probably ought to. A preference is not a virtue is one of my credos. But I suppose I'm not really expecting to make any converts here.

Had I known it was so near, I would have saved you an igor bar at Boskone...

Part of my wanting blunt was fueled by the audio conference I was held hostage in for three hours this morning. I was ready to start ranting like a crazy woman after the first forty-five minutes.

Snobbery and elitism sometimes put me off, but the one that makes my hackles rise is condescension. There are some few occasions where condescension is appropriate, but they are few and far between.

KIRK: I always thought Spock was a bit of a pirate at heart.

SPOCK: Indeed, gentlemen. May I point out that I had an opportunity to observe your counterparts here quite closely. They were brutal, savage, unprincipled, uncivilized, treacherous -- In every way, splendid examples of homo sapiens, the very flower of humanity. I found them quite refreshing.

KIRK: I'm not sure, but I think we've been insulted.

McCOY: I'm sure.

http://www.acts17-11.com/snip_song.html

Dave 239: Exactly. (The same principle applies, of course, to any statement that starts out "I know this isn't very PC, but...")

This was announced at the time as "Turning the corner in the War On Darkness."

But a microwave always feels like cheating! I mean, I use it for frozen food; any other use involves frozen cooties. Or something.

But then, my last microwave lasted for 22 years, and only got replaced because husband wanted something that revolved, with a little more power.

Shiner Bock ice cream? Where do I find this? Or do I have to make it myself? (And is it really ice cream, or more of a sorbetish thing?)

Revolving would be nice. Except if (like the one here at work) the little wheels keep coming off the turntable.

My market has started carrying 'Taste of Thai' noodle meals, where you get the packets of ingredients in a takeout-type box, and then nuke them in the box. Three to five minute meals, and tasty too. 'Simply Asian' is doing them also, with soft wheat noodles instead of rice sticks.

Unfortunately, we don't like Amy's; the texture reminds us of spackling paste with lots of sugar in. Maybe I'll hunt up a recipe, or better yet, a recipe involving stout.

*gripe*

(courtesy of Smart Bitches, Trashy Books)

If this one doesn't already exist, it should.

The first pairing it generated was the Morgendorfer sisters; I'm willing to bet there are several stories in Quinn/Daria on AFF.net.

"Langley Instrument Business Apparel". Does your Langley Series 25a Airflow Meter need a three piece suit or will business casual do?

That's really piling on the badness. But I guess it's akin to saying "out of nothingness."

Plus, Geddy so totally rocks the Ricky.

Dave: that's justifiable smugness. I'll settle for being mildly jealous that Patrick found it before I did.

Normally I am in favor of complex music, but that performance ('scuse me, I need a hot soapy shower)(Hot Soapy Shower w/eyeball disinfectant) caused me to dredge the MC5 up from memory to clear my palate. Um, tympanum. You know.

Also, while "accommodate" is correct, if you ever want to find somewhere cheap to stay, googling "accomodation" and the name of the place often works wonders for discovering budget accommodation. I found this out by mistake, but it really works.

And just when I actually watched the Oscars, trying to tune out the tedium and notice things like Gore's "My fellow Americans" joke (as the music swelled), Melissa E.'s thanks to her wife, and the rampant internationalism....

http://www.masondixonknitting.com/archives/2007_02.html#001816

Check out the knitting mockumentary.

Don't make me sic my big brother on you lot.

http://www.thepeacealliance.org/

Who decides what is Societal Discord?

So, I'm watching TV the other night, and they were talking about a "40 years of Star Trek" auction that the studio had at Christie's auction house. They were basically pulling out some of the cool stuff from the prop house and selling it.

Christies website for the auction

The TV show followed some of the items that sold pretty high. They had the model of the Enterprise D that was used for the TV show. The thing was like eight feet long or something. Christie's catalogue listed it in the potential range of 5-15 thousand dollars. It sold for half a million dollars. The original Enterprise A went for a quarter million.

Did everyone else know about this but me? i'm always out of the loop....

Oooh, and ouch. I never want to get into a flame war with you. (I still number some bits of Yes among my guilty pleasures, but I'm quite aware of their shortcomings and pomposity.)

Normally I seem to store information in written form- that is, I don't read things out loud, in my head, I just read them. Also, I store foreign language bits visually. However, every time I see that list I start reading it aloud, mentally. It sounds like NPR.

... now my brain is making up spelling-bee style sentence fragments. "Delany. Without further delany." I fear for the future.

"It's cheese wonton," he replied. Mind you, this was over the phone, and he had to repeat himself several times, because what I was hearing made no sense.

I have never heard of such a thing. Dairy in Chinese cuisine is an abomination unto the culinary dieties (Hestia etc.).

Has anyone ever heard of cheese wontons before? I've never seen anything called a wonton that wasn't meat.

Wanton, yes. Wanton and cheesy often go together. But not wonton.

http://www.flixxy.com/animusic-resonant-chamber.htm

I couldn't even get through the Rush video.

Randolph: So, I'm watching that video without sound (because I just discovered there's something screwy with my headphones, but anyway), and there is something about it that creeps me out. Maybe the experience will be different once I get my headphones working again.

I have always wanted to learn how to run the various tools in a machine shop (mill, lathe, etc), but I couldn't justify the time and expense because I never had anything I really wanted to build. That would be an interesting device to try to construct.

I don't believe in guilty pleasures, though. The feeling that one ought to be ashamed of the things that make one happy is a nice way to make the soul die a little bit.

I'm-a go listen to "Limelight" now.

That's not quite how guilty pleasures work, Dan. A guilty pleasure is something that I know will have others roll their eyes (at best) upon finding that I enjoy it (*), to which my response (mental or physical) is "It gives me pleasure and it's none of your bleeping business that it does."

(*) For example, 1980's Flash Gordon. and 1976's At The Earth's Core.

(I won't nominate if I'm not familiar with the work in question, but I am tremendously spacey about remembering any given year's greatest hits.)

Can't nominate him for his short-form work, since I haven't picked up an issue of F&SF all year so I've no idea how good it's been.

Can't nominate him for the Tiptree bio, which is what I sort of had in mind, since I'm not aware of three other long-form things he's edited in the last year.

Anyone want to tell me a good reason I'm wrong? I'd like to be wrong.

I won't discuss why he's in there. I don't have enough information to judge his guilt or innocence. But even assuming he's fully guilty and deserving of his sentence, the punishments he receives should be those prescribed by the law, not consequences of bureaucratic stupidity or personal malice. The letter which I received from him in November of 2006 says that the prison system is failing, very badly, to live up to that standard. I've known him long enough to have confidence that he would not make up this story.

The heart of it is a fairly simple matter. He has psychiatric issues; the fact that he's in that facility says that the prison system is aware of them. Because of these issues, he finds it impossible to eat with the other prisoners; but he is not allowed to take food back to his cell. This means that unless he can buy his own food in the commissary, he can't eat. His financial resources are limited; lately I've been sending him some money to help remedy this. His one recourse to avoid major malnutrition is to get himself put into solitary. He does get treatment for a while if his malnutrition becomes severe, but then the cycle starts over again.

The fix to this should be simple; let him eat in his cell. Surely that wouldn't cause a breakdown of the punitive system or let him feel he's living in luxury. But they won't do that.

He was allowed to eat in his cell in a previous prison--I don't know if what he's up against is an individual decision or policy of this particular prison.

He needs about $75/week to get commissary food.

Money for him should be sent to:

Federal Bureau of Prisons
Theodore Wells
12561-050
Post Office Box 474701
Des Moines, Iowa 50947-0001

The payment must be a money order -- no personal checks. Postal money
orders work fine. The money will be credited directly to his account,
rather than the money order being delivered to him, so don't enclose any
correspondence when sending money to that address.

Full information is at http://www.bop.gov/inmate_programs/money.jsp.

Good point. The word guilty does let 'them' define the situation. I guess I still use it anyway because it's an easy short-cut.

Anything in the fine print that'd allow Making Light's nomination in the fanzine category, Susan?

3.3.12: Best Fanzine. Any generally available non-professional publication devoted to science fiction, fantasy, or related subjects which by the close of the previous calendar year has published four (4) or more issues, at least one (1) of which appeared in the previous calendar year, and which does not qualify as a semiprozine.

3.3.13: Best Fan Writer. Any person whose writing has appeared in semiprozines or fanzines or in generally available electronic media during the previous calendar year.

I'm a little bugged by the aura of award-for-dying, but Mike Ford would be eligible and strikes me as a very suitable nominee in the latter category. I will think about this - I have four whole days to ponder nominations.

Regarding the fanzines themselves... Yes, the issue requirement is a problem. I guess it's a matter of a minimum volume for a publication. Then again, if one were to print one month's worth of Making Light, it'd probably be way more than the equivalent of four issues. As for the 'devoted to SF' clause... Even when ML doesn't talk about SF, the latter permeates the site and is there even when we don't refer to it directly.

I think.

Body parts found in San Diego may be connected, police say

  http://mrdeity.com/

They're pretty amusing.

There's also "God, Inc", also short and mildly funny. Office politics meets theology!

Brazil nuts concentrate alpha emitters. That's just one of the things physics students learn. Now the rest of you are in on the secret.

I don't remember about the hockey stick, sorry.

Bob is very funny, but different, in the books. He's not a ghost, for instance, but an incorporeal air spirit with a disconcerting inability to tell the difference between right and wrong. He's obsessed with romance novels (for the hot sex) and with getting permission to get out of the skull to go corrupt the coeds at various institutions of higher learning in Chicago.

The National Library of Ireland

for receiving a first inquiry about a 300-year-old book last Wednesday and managing to locate it, copy it, and get the copies out the door by Thursday for me to receive yesterday (Tuesday).

Curing grief by shopping; received yesterday:
- photocopy of aforementioned 300-year-old book of dances

- nice comparative edition with translation of a couple of early 1600s English dance manuals in French (well, one manual and its preplagiarization)

- two books about Jane Austen's world which are laden with quotes and pictures (and completely free of footnotes or anything else scholarly that would help me track them down), both of which use the same cover picture (misdated by one), and both of which have errors and major omissions in their one page (each) of notes on dance (different errors, at least, but the same omissions)

- original 1879 dance manual from favorite antiquarian book dealer, which contains nothing I didn't already have (since I already had it in photocopy), but it makes me happy to hold it and, um, pet it

- really fetishy lace-up platform shoes with spike heels

My post office thinks I've gone insane; I don't usually get my mail in a bin.

San Antonio: Monday-Wednesday next week. Is there anything non-obvious and interesting I should do in San Antonio?

Minicon via work sending me to conference: predictably, no-go from boss; maybe next year.

Readercon: under consideration. Suspect it is also a con full of the "right people" I'm not part of, and creeped out a little by the fact that the website makes it a Deep Dark Secret who actually runs the thing, but debating whether to go anyway because it's close, for once I can make the calendar work, and I can always bring a good book.

The judges have chosen a winner for last month's Exhibitionists
Progress Limerick Competition, which asked for a limerick to
honor the following study:

"Progressive Phases in the Group Therapy of
Exhibitionists," J.L. Mathis and M. Collins,
International Journal of Group Psychotherapy,
vol. 20, no. 2, April 1970, pp. 163-9.

The winner is investigator Joanne Leary, who wrote:

Therapists noted for treating
Those who would show off their seating
Have marked a progression
From urge to obsession
In all who attended a meeting.

And here is the latest from Limerick Laureate Martin Eiger:

In the first phase, the flasher denies,
Then accepts, then is angry, then cries.
Would the problem, some day,
Simply vanish away
If others averted their eyes?

Tiller vibration is the subject of this month's limerick
competition. To enter, compose an original limerick that
illuminates the nature of this report (which was brought to our
attention by investigator Tom Gill):

"Vibration Characteristics of Walking and
Riding Type Power Tillers," Bini Sam and
K. Kathirvel, Biosystems Engineering, vol. 95, no. 4,
December 2006, pp. 517-28.

(Will abi take up the challenge?)

(Excerpted from their newsletter)

PRIZE: The winning poet will receive a (if we manage to send it
to the correct address) a free, and almost vibrant, issue of the
Annals of Improbable Research. Send entries (one entry per
entrant) to:

TILLER VIBRATION COMPETITION
c/o marca AT chem2.harvard.edu

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m47Fpw_NIcs

The three things a limerick should be: Fast. Funny. Filthy.

I'm not sure mine's all that funny, but 2 out of 3 ain't bad, as Meatloaf is wont to remind us.

A tiller while tilling her tilth
Had some thoughts that converged upon filth.
She'd shimmy and shake
In the farm machine's wake,
'Til her tiller had thrilled her, that sylph!

You're officially the best thing that's happened all day. I shall now recommence giggling.

Argentina and Brazil have some fun with letters.

Or, if we're doing limericks:

Brazil and Argentina did play,
In typographical ad-spot melee.
The Argentines bragged their footie
Would claim all Brazil's booty,
But instead they got kicked in the "a."

Schmucks are idiots,
And so is the putz.
Diff'rence is, the putz's drivin',
So said actor Alan Arkin.

The most obvious unobvious thing for you is currently in limbo: the Hertzberg Circus Collection folded its tent and is now in storage.

But: the Witte Museum has an exhibit (closes March 18) of Roaring Twenties fashions.

Recommended: Schilo's Delicatessen, 424 E. Commerce Street (downtown a half block from the Riverwalk), with 2-layer cheesecake to die for.

If you have access to a car, the non-Alamo missions are well worth the effort, especially Mission San Jose and Mission Espada.

Wandering around the King William District is fun, and there was an article a couple months ago in the NYTimes (probably the 36 Hours thing) on the area just east of that.

http://cooking4theweek.blogspot.com/

Glad I don't have to go out. Laptop is currently not plugged into anything, we have a wireless router and we still have power.

Sometime on the overnight it's supposed to snow (though it is NOT supposed to go below about 35 degrees).

Oooh, neat (or something like that), sounds like it is pouring and hailing again....

If you're ever here and at a loss for things to do (I doubt it, if you know about Fort Scott...) drop me a note. I also enjoy meeting people face-to-face that I've 'met' here.

Especially to Patrick: sorry?

Y'all are too fun to give up. Also, I wanted to say that Avram's White Rabbit/Trek thing at #314 is hilarious.

You mischaracterise the situation to your own detriment.

Welcome back. I've been hoping you'd return.

it's good to see you, you squirrely little gay jew, you!

(& i mean that in the nicest possible way, if it wasn't clear to everyone. & it is by way of a reference to an earlier conversation here. & it may have been a tiny bit funny, if i hadn't felt the need to disclaim it so much.)

ethan is back! Hurrah!

Writing verse every day is hard. In case I haven't mentioned it before - I bow down before abi and Fragano.

::genuflect::

Tonight, on the SciFi Channel, Harry Dresden fights the Lord of the Rink.

"One puck to bind them all..."

Paula @330: We've got at least two more hours of storms trained to hit us.

I'd think if you had trained storms, they'd be instructed not to hit people's houses ;)

Hope you weathered the storms okay.

I remember these things by the song.

- the English Civil War
- turn left and march to the wall
- Poul Anderson
- Canada

I'm almost inclined to see that as a badge of honor.

Where do we go to do that?

My answer?
None of the above.
I think of Rupert Everett.

(seen on N.Y. Times main page)

Thanks for the tip on the exhibit at the Witte - hopefully I will be able to get there either Tuesday night or Wednesday afternoon.

I won't have access to a car, unfortunately.

I called the phone company about something. They sensed a sales opp. They present purchasing cell phone service for $29.99/month as a way to SAVE MONEY! I ask if they will then take $29.99 off my normal phone bill. Long silence. Negative response. I ask if I should drop my normal phone service in favor of the cell. Flustered, negative response. I ask very politely how spending an extra $29.99/month is saving me money. Long silence. Hemming and hawing. I get bored and hang up.

(My normal phone service, including local, long distance, and broadband internet service, only costs me about $50/month - their definition of saving money is more than a 50% price increase!)

Phone service was so much better before we got Belled.

"...Gardner Dozois told me I was never going to get a cover illustration for one of my stories unless I put some spaceships or dinosaurs in them..."

We'd call our friend a Tolkien in minuscule,
except that he sees himself as a Gandhi;
we'd give him credit, it's our usual rule,
but he tells such fine stories when he's randy.

The new millennium seems a total bust
but we look for a new tale by Delany,
filled with excitement, envy, and some lust,
deeply sociological, we'd say, not zany.

There's no embarrassment, we tell you meekly,
in having written poems on Making Light;
it won't get you into Publisher's Weekly,
but on your web-page it will look just right.

An odd occurrence, that is what you tell of,
when you found the first edition of a book
written, it turns out, by the great Asimov
behind the chair in your old reading nook.

We'd accommodate you in our hierarchy
since you'd otherwise be the ghost at the feast,
but, since this is a Dahlian polyarchy,
you'd have to become a deity at least.

A pharaoh you are not, of that we're certain,
Teresa's mocked you for your petty pains;
you retire in indignation past the curtain,
your tears come down as moderate spring rains.

It's fortunate that you aren't like The Donald
and injure reputations for a lark,
you'd have to deal then with good Jim Macdonald
and its ten to one that he'd put out your spark.

ETHAN's BACK!

And his front too! More importantly, his words!

*44 bars of Happy Dog Dance*

Fragano, Fragano, Fragano. Very good—but you misspelled Publishers Weekly.

Yeah, it's Prisoner of Zenda for me too. I'm completely flummoxed by all of the presented options - I'm not even sure what the Poul Anderson connection is.

Yeah, it's Prisoner of Zenda for me too. I'm completely flummoxed by all of the presented options - I'm not even sure what the Poul Anderson connection is.

P.S. Welcome back, ethan! I must have missed out on the fooferaw.

Immediately? Walking in a clockwise circle, but soon thereafter marching into the wall. Or, if I'm feeling especially silly, holding my left hand next to my ear and looking sharply to the left ... Stone cold sober, too.

Xopher #361: Eek!

The Last Mimzy is indeed an adaptation of Kuttner's (and Moore's? — I know they collaborated on nearly every written work) Mimsy were the Borogroves, as noted on the movie's ImDB writer's page.

When I first saw the trailer for the film, I got down my copy of The Best of Henry Kuttner, and re-read the original short story. It's rather subtle, and perhaps a bit slow-paced. It feels a bit like a quiet horror piece, with themes of loss, abandonment, and the unknown. It would probably work well as a Twilight Zone conceived as a radio drama.

But I have zero expectations that the movie will have much in the way of the original story.

Random Hollywood Suit: "Hey, this has kids and toys! Lose the creep factor and make it kid-friendly, so we can make a mint!"

<eyeroll>

For "It would probably work well as a Twilight Zone conceived as a radio drama.", read:

It would probably work well as a Twilight Zone episode; I wonder if perhaps it was conceived as a radio drama.

The is a Very Strong front, a child died in Missouri, and a number of high school students died in Alabama, as well as others. It's getting to be the scary weather season....

Everyone at large, thanks again, and Clifton #363, I was trying not to make a fooferaw of myself again. Guess I'm just special.

NYC By Night

Steampunk Star Wars

There's a Poul Anderson novel set during the English Civil War that features Prince Rupert as a central character. First thing I thought of, mainly because I have no idea what the other two options refer to.

In the meantime...

If you read "Evil does not wear a bonnet!", who do you think of?
a. Lady Catherine de Burgh
b. Doctor Doom
c. Mister Tinkles
d. Senator Palpatine
e. all of the above

Doom and Palpatine, therefore, have hoods, not bonnets. In fact imagining Palpatine in a bonnet ("In my Easter bonnet, with the ribbons on it, I'll be the only Sith Lord at the Easter Parade!") is very amusing.

*Well, the reconstructed 14th Century—I have one in my closet.

I think at least one person has caught each of the Rupert refs, but in full:

English Civil War - Prince Rupert, the historical personage

turn left and march to the wall - notable element in the 1651 dance "Prince Rupert's March", inspired by that Prince Rupert

Poul Anderson - his novel A Midsummer Night's Tempest, featuring that Prince Rupert and a cast of Shakespearean fairies

Canada - place which happened to be featured on the CNN website under travel yesterday under the banner "All hail Prince Rupert", which made me think of the former three references

omphaloskepsis (om-fuh-lo-SKEP-sis) noun
Contemplation of one's navel.
[From Greek omphalos (navel) + skepsis (act of looking, examination).
Ultimately from the Indo-European root spek- (to observe) which is also the ancestor of suspect, spectrum, bishop (literally, overseer), despise, espionage, telescope, spectator, and spectacles.]

Today's word in Visual Thesaurus:
http://visualthesaurus.com/?w1=omphaloskepsis
-Anu Garg (words at wordsmith.org)

"Readers whose main interest is literary how-to or criticism can look elsewhere, in places specifically dedicated to those matters. Doing too much of it here would smack of omphaloskepsis."
Stanley Schmidt; About Science Fiction; Analog Science Fiction & Fact (New York); Jun 2001.

My copy, seen directly over my monitor, says just _A Midsummer Tempest_. I guess night had not yet fallen?

I've just been slyly informed that if you go to YouTube and search "march penguins viral" you will see good things. Unfortunately, they filter out YouTube at my day job, so I can't indulge until this evening. Someone want to tell me if it's worth the bother?

Cool. The little laptop cozies may be just the thing, since my laptop is a couple of inches too small in every dimension for the cozy it's currently got.

(I am, inter alia, surprised that "vote" is indeed cognate, but I suspect that their verb formations are a bit dodgy? TexAnne?)

Bunnies aren't just cute, you know, like everyone supposes. They've got them hoppy legs and twitchy little noses. And what's with all the carrots? What do they need such good eyesight for, anyway?

The backpack has little clips ready and waiting to anchor any of their laptop cozies into place, which is a nice feature. As soon as my current financial crisis is dealt with--anybody looking for a writer/editor type based in NYC? anybody? because I need a new gig, like, yesterday--there will be a tech upgrade, and a genuine Bihn laptop cozy to go with.

Xopher, abi: "I'm not exactly quaking in my stylish yet affordable boots, but there's something unnatural going on, and that doesn't usually lead to hugs and puppies."

No word on whether they have frozen alligator croquets.

Is the deadline in 8 hours or 32 hours from the time of this post? Because "Midnight PST Saturday March 3" mostly says 8 hours to me, but not unambiguously, and I don't want to rush my final decisions if I don't have to.

And have you seen good discussions of potential nominees? If so, where? I know of the Hugonominee Livejournal discussion, but that's about it. I've got the Locus directory and my own list, but checking out discussions could be helpful (always a bit hard to remember stories read 14 months ago, vs 1 month ago).

I don't know if it is good discussion (I enjoyed reading it...), but Scalzi & co have had a few discussions in the last month or so.

The Homophoner*

*yeah, I'll let other people make the obvious joke

Someone call the doctor
Someone call the nurse
Someone call the lady
With the alligator purse.

On a different topic, unfortunately Atlanta seems to have had a bus plunge. It's almost enough to disrupt the all Anna Nicole Smith, all the time coverage.

Alligator hats. Very difficult decision to make under time pressure. Is one embodying the alligator (scroll down to the bottom) or is it enough to simply wear the alligator?

This is a very important decision. It involves....tango.

Per Kevin Standlee, who generally knows, "one minute after 23:59 on March 3, 2007 in PST (GMT -8)." That would give you 32 hours from your post.

I have come up with a nice list evenly divided between people/things everyone will nominate and who will make the ballot and people/things no one else will nominate who will not.

I'm sooooo glad I don't look at streaming video at work (they are pretty liberal about Internet usage, but I don't abuse it with that kind of thing).

Oh. my. farking. ghu. Really. Oh my little emperor. Yikes.

I'm sooooo glad I don't look at streaming video at work (they are pretty liberal about Internet usage, but I don't abuse it with that kind of thing).

Oh. my. farking. ghu. Really. Oh my little emperor. Yikes.

Yes, that was brilliant.

It was either that or Brittney Spears's shaving of her head.

Meanwhile, I scored an execrable 37 in the 50 states particle. I used to have a very battered wooden jigsaw of the 48 states (it was old), and even though Rhode Island and some other teeny-weeny states had to share pieces, I could name all 48 back then.

In fairness, it's probably 35 years since I did that jigsaw. And nobody was timing me, either.

Re: States, I did it in 3:24 and probably spent about 15 seconds figuring out what I was supposed to do. Last state recalled, Iowa.

Now, if it were state capitals, I'd probably have run out of time.

Looking at Cher's hair in some of her early 70s videos - or maybe it's a wig, or several wigs - I wonder if I can use rag curls to make mine do that. I probably don't have enough hair.

Patrick #455: Thanks. I am too. And I'm glad you're glad. And so on!

I suspect the speed limit has gone up since then. Still...

I was planning to claim that this was good going, considering that I am not now and never have been an American, but actually most of the states in the "You forgot..." list have me wondering how I missed them.

(Oklahoma. How the heck did I not think of Oklahoma?)

This is particularly easy once you get past the Great Lakes, since for much of the rest of the map, the states really do come in tidy columns.

It's always interesting finding the limits on ones ability to enumerate ones own knowledge.

Not a bad drama, but dang, folks, if you're going to do a drama rooted in real world engineering, get the facts straight!

Sorry, Farmer; your neighbors are right. You can't do it. Not without a lot of help from ignorant scriptwriters.

An Atlas missile runs on LOX and kerosene, not on some vague "high efficiency rocket fuel." And you need more than 5 tons of it. More like ten times that. And your barn would have burned down.

The "fall over and zoom around" sequence was so goofy that I thought at first that it was Mrs. Farmer's anxiety dream.

Patrick does not want it generally known that he is a slan. While he could easily deal with the resulting mobs with pitchforks and torches, it would disrupt Tor's smooth editorial operation.

You could try Purpose Games. I'm awful at it (I usually get under 50% on the US states one) because spatial relations are incomprehensible to me, and the "memory" aspect of it for the ones I get wrong also doesn't work out so well for me.

Oh. and I know another reason I don't like dolls. This movie.

Ah, yes, the flesh-eating dolls...

ObAddlFontLink: It's in German, so I'm not entirely certain, but this page seems to be a list of the 100 Best Fonts, as determined by designers. Note the link at the bottom right, which leads to a PDF of all of the capsules.

Wow.

First time I watched it without sound (my wireless headphones just keep crapping out), and I could hear Samuel Jackson speaking the words in my mind anyway.

pretty cool.

The linked article is pretty good in general, but it makes a couple of absurd claims, like when it refers to "the punctuation of possessive plurals (where, however, no possessive s is pronounced)."

Children's. For one.

Today's lead article on that site claims that Ann Coulter didn't call John Edwards a faggot, because she said "It turns out you have to go into rehab if you use the word ‘faggot,’ so I'm kind of at an impasse — I can't really talk about Edwards."

She didn't say "John Edwards is a faggot," but there are more ways of killing a chicken than wringing its neck. I've been called a faggot many times, and what Coulter said IS calling Edwards a faggot. Use and mention really are the same thing in that kind of context.

I grabbed it, planning on either giving it to a relative (if powerful) or to Goodwill (if mediocre).

It's mediocre, but in finding out I discovered that it has an intact Windows 98 install, with lots of personal information, including Christmas budgets and school papers.

I'm wondering . . . should I write a friendly note to the former owners (if I can figure out which apartment they're in) suggesting that they remove or erase their hard drive in the future?

Too nosey? Too preachy?

They tried having comments once, for a few weeks, but then gave up. I think they got annoyed by some off-topic rants, and decided they didn't want the headache of moderating.

The linked article is pretty good in general, but it makes a couple of absurd claims, like when it refers to "the punctuation of possessive plurals (where, however, no possessive s is pronounced)."

The thing I found absurd was the point when he decided to touch on the question of "one space or two between sentences?" -- since that isn't an issue of orthography or punctuation at all.

I do also think that he doesn't give enough credit to the possibility that maintaining consistency within a single work (article, magazine, or book, say) has the potential advantage of not confusing the reader. I certainly wouldn't want to read a story where the author (or printer) bounced back and forth between British and American rules for single and double quotation marks.

This is actually a dicey situation; once the throwers-out figure out what could have happened to them, they may start wondering if it did. Particularly given that you were able to do enough research to figure out who it was. Just send them an anonymous flyer for some computer-security outfit.

Me, I'm trying to figure out how heroic a set of measures I have to do on a bunch of 8-year-old floppy backups before they go, in a plain black plastic bag, into the landfill as part of a weekly garbage pickup. (IOW, *not* prominently displayed on the front porch.)

What you want, assuming the disks are still readable at all, is 'secure delete' or 'secure erase' software. Google 'software' and either of those terms and you'll get lots of hits. (I have, somewhere, an old DOS utility called 'nuke' that does a secure erase.)

What this does is multiple passes writing across the disk, all ones, all zeros, alternating ones-and-zeros (and reversing the pattern), and random ones and zeros. It might be possible to get information off the disk afterward, but it's at a level of difficulty that's beyond the reach of most people.

How about putting them in an oven at low heat until they warp enough to be unreadable?

I think it's pretty good for someone who never memorized a list, learned a song, drove cross country, or spent much time on it in school.

I went round the circumference [got a little stuck on the middle of the north side between Illinois and N.Dakota], also filling in the Obvious Known Adjacencies [i.e. did Vermont and New Hampshire at the same time, or W.Va and Va.] and then flailed around, filled in what I could of the far west and mississippi area, thought about what places I'd been and where I'd changed planes...

it was a very BUSY ten minutes.

I'd like to thank http://furious-george.net/ (at least eight years old, that site... yikes) for what education in American geography I possess.

But I beg indulgence. I don't live there. For extra credit, name the Australian states and territories.

However, finding the address would mean more prying.

I find looking at other's stuff to be very unseemly.

I hope to clean up the machine this weekend (it's literally filthy, full of icky gray clotted dust and mud), and install Fedora Linux.

Just, cripes:

I asked him what was wrong, a question that I immediately knew was kinda dumb, I mean the guy is dying. He pointed to the TV which was looping video of young Marines in some city in Iraq kicking in doors and tearing up civilian homes. Women and children, frightened into silence stood by as these young Marines tore their homes apart and arrested their men. In a barely audible voice he said, "What have they done to my corps? What have they done?"

But, you all *do* know that the Girl from Auntie is using Cthulhu to count the rows in her knitting projects, don't you?

Corroborating evidence: I happened to walk by David Hartwell's dealer table at Boskone. Now, he doesn't know me at all, but he "somehow" deduced that I had not yet renewed my subscription to NYRSF. Without my giving a name, too.

Should have checked for tendrils.

So I was a little bit nonplussed when I saw Arnold Zwicky slide rather insensibly from discussing the punctuation into the whole "one space or two between sentences" issue, which (as I said) seems to me an issue of typography and design, not punctuation.

Patrick @ 497: As for relative "which" vs "that" -- oy, veh, you've just reminded me of a paper I submitted to the Astrophysical Journal, which came back from the copyeditor with every single instance of relative "which" converted to "that", apparently on the grounds that authors can't be trusted to follow the Chicago Manual of Style's fussy (and linguistically unjustified) rules on that subject correctly. Grumble, grumble, grumble...

And since we're actually on the topic of spelling, among other things, can I gently point out that my last name is spelled (or possibly spelt) "Erwin" rather than "Irwin"? (Admittedly, the latter is the more common spelling...)

http://www.sarahleavitt.com/word/?p=137

[*] We have used them in the past when donating old computers to schools.

I ditched about 95% of my 3.5" floppies last year. Old versions of DOS and windows, rescue and setup disks for PCs I hadn't had for years, drivers for peripherals I'd thrown away, backup sets using obscure backup software. I boiled it all down to a few CD-ROMs which I made multiple copies of. Again, lots and lots of unreadable disks.

The dumpster I pitched it all in was full of really foul stuff and collected rain.

I really wasn't worried.

If you want to make them really unusable, cut the 5" with scissors, and pop the cases (or the sliding covers) off the 3" ones. I'd recommend industrial-strength scissors, though. An industrial-strength degausser or tape eraser will also do, but they're harder to find.

"I am for the separation of Church and Hate."

I am still in pain, thinking about it.

A "Find" for the apartment complex road turned up nothing. Also, no documents newer than 2003. This was probably a closet computer, ditched during spring cleaning.

I just started a Linux install; the old contents are way gone by now.

Hmmm. Fedora just scolded me for being chintzy on memory. Deal with it, Fedora! I'm not putting any money into this box. You'll have to swap and like it!

http://www.gocomics.com/speedbump/2007/03/04/

This will become time-inaccessible to non-subscribers in a week or so. To posterity, I mention it concerns an author signing books. Thanks, Dave Coverly; your work over the years has been enjoyable, even if I let my ucomics subscription lapse because of inbox fatigue.

If anyone is throwing away computer equipment, I know of an excellent way to make sure no one will ever peel data off your hard drive: give it to me. I have no interest whatsoever in reading it. I'll disassemble it, use any magnets that turn up to stick things to my refrigerator, recycle the coils of copper wire into jewelry, and add the platter to the collection I've been amassing.

If you take a hard drive platter (the older sort, at least) and hang it up so it's only supported by the rim of its center hole, and then give it a good sharp tap with (say) a plastic pen, it'll chime like a bell, and hold the note like a tuning fork. I've been collecting platters in varying sizes with the idea of someday making at set of wind chimes from them.

Syntactic variability is a virtue of most programming languages, too.

I've been thinking of having my wife's old desktop cleaned up (in all meanings of the word) so that we could then safely donate it to a charity or a school, but the thing is almost 10 years old. I'm not sure anybody would want it. I'd send it to you except that the shipping costs would be rather prohibitive.

Speaking of recycling electronics the way you do... This reminds me of 1991, when we went to a crafts fair in Pacifica (south of SF) where someone had for sale bolo ties made from printed circuits.

That's actually a very poignant image. Gigabytes of data; the arguments, learning, ideas, chat, entertainment, love letters, and work of thousands of people, hanging in the breeze and crumbling. All those moments will be lost in time like keys down drains.

That's actually a very poignant image. Gigabytes of data; the arguments, learning, ideas, chat, entertainment, love letters, and work of thousands of people, hanging in the breeze and crumbling. All those moments will be lost in time like keys down drains.

It reminds me of the way that the glass negatives from the Civil War were sold off for greenhouses, so that the sun slowly bleached out the images of dead husbands, fathers and sons.

Early slow glass?

Although the image is a beautiful and poignant one, I have never found the irreducible heart of it, the grain of sand that makes the pearl.

It's in the treasure-box of images and ideas, but the time is not yet right for a sonnet.

I would just punch it down and let it rise again. The wee yeasties will keep eating sugars and making their gases (and generally living in a yeast version of Utopia) for as many hours as you need.

Baking yeast bread is biology, not chemistry. Treat it as a living thing and you can't go far wrong.

I'd punch it down a maximum of one additional time, Y+baking time before you want it to be ready.

Thanks!

Just so all y'all can get vicariously hungry, there will be many specks of speck (smoked ham from Alto Adige) on it, maybe some Provencal black olives, and I'll put some grated Fontina on at the last minute.

Let us know how it works out.

All I remember from high school chemistry is that the teacher was the one in charge of fire drills, and I had him in his retirement year, so he was easily swayed.

In any case, the oiled ball is reposing in its glass bowl in the fridge, loosely covered by plastic sitting on the top of the bowl, as it's now finished its first official rise. At about 5:30, I'll take it out of the fridge, spread it into the pan, and give it an extra half hour for the second official rise (normally 45 minutes).

I shall report tomorrow on how it comes out, with thanks where due.

(And it's not like I'm without sin, since I remember mangling Fragano's last name a few months back...)

UK military awaits Skynet launch (with a picture caption reading "The Skynet system brings an increase in power and bandwidth.")

Thoughts:

1. Alone, either loud plaid suit, or frenzied dancing, is enough to give a compression algorithm fits. In combination, it just breaks down weeping. I knew this already, but the video might be a good thing to show to students.

2. I never even had an inkling that music had ever been performed on tuned Flit guns. But I would have voted Spike Jones was The Boy Most Likely To. ("Quick, Henry, the F Sharp!")

3. Is a Whisperado performance anything like this?

The man was a genius. And I hope it will not offend anyone here if I say he was also a meticulous musician.

Uh, wait ...

Oh, and in case anyone is wondering...

After cutting "I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus" Spike cleared the studio of anyone but band members and cut--well, let's just call it "I Saw Mommy Having Carnal Knowledge of Santa Claus." Spike Jones Jr. found the acetate in what few of his father's effects that didn't end up being auctioned off and destroyed it. So, yes it did exist, but no it doesn't any more.

I didn't punch it down before it went into the fridge, just turned it over, but the true second rise is in the pan, with lots of finger indentations (this is actually a schiacciatto), so it got a good punching there. The extra rising time to warm it up from the fridge (with the last half hour being on top of a stove that was preheating) produced a lot of expansion to the point where the indentations mostly swelled back out, so I had to make a new set before the baking.

All in all, I liked the results enough that I may just continue making it that way, experimenting perhaps with whether to bother with the fridge at all.

Thanks to all for reassurances and suggestions!

What a bad person. Crimes against art; there really should be a Hague tribunal.