Lee #356:
Cui bono? The government would love to be able to prosecute a murder, let alone make a point of "don't mess with government workers", so they have little incentive for a "cover-up". The guy himself, however, had an obvious (insurance) benefit for his family, and a probably-terminal disease to boot.
Minor Amusements: I just found a letter in my mail-pile whose return address read "Durbin, South Africa". For a moment, I thought it was from our B. Durbin, occasioning some wonderment. In fact, it was a birthday card from my peripatetic stepmother, who was visiting the city of that name.
green_knight #167, Paula Lieberman #168, Lee #169:
The shorter version of the above would be P.T. Barnum's line: "There's a sucker born every minute".
An update on something from last thread:
David Goldfarb OT131-#893:
Here's an amusing little link I just randomly came across: http://www.sonokids.org/wikifun/. It's inspired by a Japanese performance art café; you type in a search term, and it returns the Wikipedia article...that the previous person searched for. The next person gets the result of your search.
Mystery Google does the same thing.
Two words: loose cannon.
Who's busily holing her own ship.
Re: Small Beer Horizons Particle: Ooh, that's good nasty fun. Favorite lines:Q: I have a lot of money and I want to write.A: Hmm. Oddly enough those two things have nothing to do with one another. Also, as to the latter: bum on the seat.
It may be nominally relevant (though late), but the "name" and link are spammish.
The next question seems to be whether or not Harlequin will actually pay attention, or just keep digging....
Steve Taylor #55: OK, that "flight of fancy" was cute... and a good warning for writers!
xeger #177, and all those with vari-colored soups: The old MIT slang was "rainbow snarf". I saw a fair bit of that at the Harvard co-ops, too.
The idea that the parent company was the driver on this makes sense. I suspect somebody up in the bozosphere there went from "why shouldn't we get some of the profits from the vanity market" to "... and we'll get synergy by linking it to our established brand!" But not being actually involved in the romance-publishing business (aside from owning it), they failed to realize that it does matter how you handle these things, and that there was a damn good reason why Random House hadn't tried to exploit that "synergy" with Xlibris.
So instead, they (1) get dysergy instead of synergy, (2) shack up with an outfit that's well known as sleazeballs... and (3) may well kill their original brand altogether.
If they'd started off with a proper "Chinese wall" like Random House, they wouldn't be in this fix (but would Author Solutions have accepted that?). Now, I suspect they'll need to dump the whole deal ASAP if they want to salvage anything at all.
Newsweek isn't taking her too seriously either.
Serge #160: I concur: "Beginning?" Not the first time, you've even gotten me going on occasion!
Velma #124: I am feeling oddly flat much of the time.
Um, that would be exhaustion! Try to get some sleep when you can, and once he's home, do your best to recharge.
I'm still wishing you the best.
SylvieG @7: My condolences. My cat is around 15 years old, and I'm dreading the time when she passes. All I can say is that as with humans, your pets live on in your heart, and so you are more for having known them.
Whew. I'm wishing strength to both of you.
Dammit, not again! I don't have anybody to pray to these days, but I do hope things work out for the best.
Paula Lieberman #830: Indeed, those are the main issues why I just went to Bed Bath & Beyond for a kitchen scale, and bought a bunch of other kitchen stuff while I was there (bamboo cutting boards, mixing bowls, measuring cups). I didn't even consider the "gourmet" or specialist type stores, much less hunting through downtown C-ville. This despite the sensory overload I always get in big-box stores -- at least I could find what I wanted quickly! And being able to look up online what scales BB+B had was also a major plus....
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