The most recent 20 comments posted to Making Light by Neil in Chicago:

For a long time, I've said that sf is almost the only literature dealing with the present. One of my frequent responses to "good" mimetic/mainstream fiction is severe claustrophobia. It seems to be dealing with one ten-thousandth of humanity.

When I read Frankenstein, I was startled that there's nothing whatsoever about Victor's actual techniques. The reanimated graveyard stuff is pure Hollywood.
And the discussion needs a gesture toward the heavy Freudian layer, too. Mary Shelly's mother had had nothing to do with men for most of her life, fell in love late -- and then died in childbirth (or was killed by doctorly filth to be more retrospectively precise). So the motif of the creator being destroyed by the creation was very personal.

@Charlie #23: The trouble with teaching in parables is there's always someone who thinks you're talking about sheep.

ItIsATruUnAckThaASinManInPosOfAGoodForMustBeInWaOfAWif

An analogy just came to my slower-sometimes-than-others mind.
One of the aspirations of the spacer movement which peaked in the Eighties was that out there, if you don't like it, you can leave. Unlike being stuck on this one limited planet. Yeah, cyberspace is the same. The most notorious example at the moment is the migration from MySpace to FaceBook.
Anarchistic voluntary organization is a norm online.

I read “ . . . audience of some 500 people, . . . . $1,297” and my brain goes 500 times 1300, four zeroes, 5 times 13 is 65, 4 zeroes, get the comma in the right place [$650,000] two-thirds of a million, minus costs, net of half a million for just one weekend  shit
It was a tragedy long before it was a calamity.


Then there's the earworm: Pe-eggy Sue, Pe-eggy Sue, les Fantomes de do-de-do . . .
Were are the filkers?

“There are two kinds of music – good and bad.” attributed to Richard Strauss and Duke Ellington, among others.

abi @12
I can't find a citation for the line I recall of Timoty Leary's that, "The only reasonable political position is down on all fours."

from my .sig file:
There's also been some speculation about the Pre-Joycean Fellowship. The best explanation I can make is that we exist to poke fun at the excesses of modern literature while simultaneously mining it for everything of value. Does that help? I didn't think so.
-- Steven Brust

Teresa @23
Especially at #23, that ought to have been "The Mgt."

And yes, Shakespeare was a hack pandering both to the pit and to whoever might be of use to his career. I mean, does Macbeth suck up to the new king, or what? And as soon as he had an "income", he went back to Avon and never wrote another line.
& John Mark Ockerbloom @90
"I think one aspect, touched on above, is that 'good literature' must not be escapist."
So Shakespeare's comedies are right out, then!

Teresa @47
Does that make Tom Jones hysterical realism?

Oh, please, don't go to Latin. Google Translate doesn't do Latin.

Sean Sakamoto @59
Then the notorious popularity of the pomo inversion, which makes the critic the most important participant, among critics, is due to putting the critics on Top?

[Found in moderation queue and edited by JDM to add (presumed) URL of broken/missing link. --JDM)

the best cartoon I've seen

You're rebutting Charles Krauthammer? Why bother??

The Right's view of government and the Left's view of big business are both correct.
-- Robert Anton Wilson
I've never understood the liberto/o/n/arian axiom that there's a Platonic difference-in-essence between political power and economic power. Concentrated political power can't be good; concentrated economic power can't be bad.

And he got confused at various times about who he was supposed to be.
Waidaminnit. He can't even operate a sock puppet? His license to operate a keyboard ought to be revoked.

“Industry news is my soap opera.”
Really, what does afternoon television have that can match it?

((first reaction)) So does that mean that Vernor Vinge is British and Ken MacLeod is American, or that they don't exist?

The prohibition against mixing seeds is of a part with the many other separations which are a cornerstone of Judaism. "Holy" and "separate" are cognate. Look at the creation story which begins with separations. etc.
The specific commandment against sowing two kinds of seed in the same field is discussed in the Talmud near the chapter on hermaphrodites. (which seem to have puzzled the rabbis) (This has nothing I can see to do with the discussion, but it's interesting.)

Xopher @ #87 et seq. The commandment against mixing linen and wool in the same weave may well be a reference to pagan priestly garments. There was something similar in the garments of the Temple priests, and I actually have seen an archaeological fabric swatch of linen with a red wool stripe woven along the border, in the Rosicrucian museum in San Jose.

Lee @ #22 -- You beat me to it. Our local Indo-Pak boulevard has a place with "the only halal Chinese food in Chicago".

Dragoness Eclectic @ #28 -- I've eaten at the kosher Cajun place in New Orleans. It's an expat Iranian Jew.

Stefan Jones @ #42 -- I don't know the current proportion, but at one time, 85% of all the donut stores in California were Cambodian.

Hey, if Australia can have a national pet rock, why not? And theirs is a lot more remote, although that applies to the continent in general . . .

Reminds me of the invention of Bermuda Triangle Punch, the signature drink of the Bermuda Traingle in '88 bid.
It seemed a no-brainer that since we were doing a Caribbean thing, our drink ought to be some sort of rum punch, so the trimvirate got together one night, each bringing with anything from their respective kitchens which might, possibly be an ingredient, and we experimented . . . Bill Hebel, Alexia's husband, got home later, and later said he thought we were pretty funny, but I was the one keeping notes, and my notes were functional, so there.

Our final recipe included a tip which might be useful to other experimenters. It was:
2 cans red "Five-Alive" frozen concentrate
partially re-fill the cans with rum (half to two-thirds, judgement of the bartender)
1 2-liter bottle 7-Up
*dash of tamarind concentrate*
serve into small ice-filled glasses ((portion control))

The dash of tamarind completely cuts through the syrupyness of the 7-Up, and darkens the color.

How did the comments get so far without anyone simply pointing out that “I was only following orders” is no excuse?
I mean, c’mon, Yom HaShoah is tomorrow.

The Thomas Cook Rail Schedule R!U!L!E!S

Y-a-a-y!

The observation has become something of a commonplace that one of the things which preserves the separation of the community of observant Jews, while also binding the community itself, is kashruth, the dietary regulations which make it effectively impossible for a Jew to eat with a gentile.
It's also been said that the archetype of the Jewish holiday is, "They tried to kill us all. They failed. Let's eat."

I'm a bit disappointed here.
The crowd has been lazily entertaining itself repeating that the low quality of troll here is indeed of low quality.
But has anyone mentioned the odds against “merkin” actually knowing what a merkin is? N-O-O-o-o-o.

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