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Lazy Sunday, Cat Style

May. 18th, 2008 | 08:56 pm
posted by: [info]scalzifeed

No idea where Zeus is. Probably off leaping on something.

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vee_ecks

Awesome OOP Anthology You Likely Haven't Read

May. 18th, 2008 | 05:42 pm
posted by: [info]vee_ecks



A discussion of Glengarry Glen Ross on [info]ellen_datlow's LJ brought this to mind, a themed athology from the nineties I liked an awful lot and have given to several people I liked since, readers in sales in particular. It didn't sell well and is currently out of print.

Luckily for all of us except the editor and contributors, though, that means you can get used copies for next to nothing, plus shipping. Even if you only end up liking three stories, and one you've already got in another book, two bucks a story isn't bad, and I'm pretty sure anybody who reads seriously is going to find a lot more to like in this collection than three stories.

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The Manolo Week in Review

May. 18th, 2008 | 03:33 pm
posted by: [info]manalos_shoe

Manolo says, here is the best of the week from the Manolosphere.

Glinda…

There was nothing else but this infant and their momentary bond. Which is touchingly sweet, and yet is at the same time a wee bit creepy.

Spirit Fingers…

Did nobody tell these two that they are supposed to be promoting the launch of another money-spinning fragrance?

Plumcake…

I feel that many of my shoes really need a yacht to truly be shown to their best…

Raincoaster…

Loyal TeenyManolites know that we’ve long kept a beady eye on the jaded escapades of debauched homunculus known as Elmo. The back alleys of Hollywood swarm with the tainted, broken bodies of those he has used and tossed aside.

Diable…

Sí, efectivamente, si usted pensaba que ese pequeño hombrecillo al frente de la banda Radiohead era un alienígena en la tierra, pues estaba muy equivocado.

Isidore Gallant…

Izzy wonders whether Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia is a card-carrying member of NOMSBH.

Mr. Henry…

For longer than he cares to say, he has been promising to buy Mrs. Henry a proper set of knives, forks, and spoons in everyday stainless steel, a set that balances nicely in the hand, lies beautifully on the table, and washes easily in the dishwasher.

Francesca…

Francesca cannot repeat often enough: Make friends with a seamstress!

Twistie…

Claude was flying his B-29 on a bombing raid over Yowata, Japan in August 1944 when the engine of the plane caught fire. He and his crew bailed out with their nylon parachutes. During the night while they waited rescue, Claude used his trusty parachute as a blanket and a pillow. After he and his men were rescued, he kept the parachute. When he proposed to Ruth in 1947, he handed her the parachute and suggested she make her wedding gown out of it. She did.

Never teh Bride…

Creating your own moon garden is simply a matter of populating a patch of earth with flora that fulfills its true potential when the sun goes down.

Diablesse…

La mayoría de los amantes de la moda y empedernidos espectadores de Sex and the City lo esperaban con ansias locas (si no pregúntenle a Diable) y por fin el anhelo encuentra un poco de papel couché y corona a Sarah Jessica Parker como portada de VOGUE USA.

Patri…

Me voy a repetir una vez más en Manolo Moda: ¡ADORAMOS los zapatos! pero no solo los destinados a cubrir el pie femenino, sino a cubrir el masculino también y que mejor manera que buscar por toda la red la selección de las romanas pero en versión masculina.

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gregvaneekhout

More writing, more snacks

May. 18th, 2008 | 01:52 pm
posted by: [info]gregvaneekhout

Breakfast at the breakfast joint across the street, then writing at the coffee joint in Hillcrest. Still refining the book proposal. I thought I would hate writing book proposals -- mine consists of a pitch paragraph, a synopsis for each of the two books, and four sample chapters from the first book -- but it's actually been really fun to work on. I'm shocked. Shocked that I'm having fun.

So, basically, everything is more writing and more snacks. Not very interesting to blog about, but I'm having fun, and I hope you are too.

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highway_west

Dylan and Dream Pirates Word Count

May. 18th, 2008 | 01:13 pm
posted by: [info]highway_west

Zokutou word meterZokutou word meter
42,000 / 75,000
(56.0%)

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highway_west

(no subject)

May. 18th, 2008 | 01:02 pm
posted by: [info]highway_west

I've been napping on and off today.

I've had to get up at 6 in the morning the last two weeks and it doesn't work for me. Well, it would have it I could have gone to sleep early enough.

[info]insatia went to Eastern Washington to help out a friend Saturday morning. I was hoping to sleep after I drop her off at the airport. I almost made it home when a friend called and needed a place to hang out. So I hung out with Clay all day and then we went to the Dark Reign Chronicles game.

Sadly, my big paycheck did not arrive Saturday as promised leaving me very poor. However, it should arrive on Monday. That's the pain in the ass of contract work.

I am hoping that the interview I did on Friday results in a job. I think I would like working there. I can't say where it is, but imagine one of the biggest companies you can think of with a stellar, prim and proper reputation. Of course, the guy I interviewed with talked like Al from Deadwood. I lost track of the number of times he said cocksucker.

After the Dark Reign game, I was treated to afters. It was very kind. And then, it was still hot and I couldn't sleep.

Today is offically nap day! I'm hoping to do some writing later this afternoon, but for now I'm in the nappy haze. And later, I'm going to actually have to cook for myself since I can't afford fast food. It should be good for my fat ass anyway. :)
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blue_underarms

(no subject)

May. 18th, 2008 | 12:48 pm
posted by: [info]blue_underarms

If you close all the blinds and keep the lights dim inside while listening to a pre-recorded rainstorm-with-thunder on repeat, it's almost like it's not going to be 106 today. Yesterday's interior fake rainstorm affected my energy levels until I had enough oomph to tear apart the living room, but then I ate the edible sausage gravy and had to take a nap and watch From Hell, so today I'm hoping a repeat of the rainstorm will give me enough oomph to put the room back together again.

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For You Europeans

May. 18th, 2008 | 07:36 pm
posted by: [info]scalzifeed

I’ve been led to understand that Bebo is one of the more popular social networking sites over there on your fair continent, and several folks there have asked me to put up a Bebo profile, because the inability to friend me on their social network of choice is causing them unspeakable amounts of angst and pain. Well, fine: Here you go. Hope your angst gets better. Tums help.

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elisem

pondering similarities

May. 18th, 2008 | 02:26 pm
posted by: [info]elisem

It just occurred to me how much the identification with the middle class if you aren't in it resembles vanity publishing.

Seriously. You gotta believe you're in it, and if you fail, it's because you didn't do enough self-promotion and you didn't work hard enough. Or maybe somebody else is out to get you.

Must ponder this more.

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NYU student shares his "virtual girlfriend" with the world

May. 18th, 2008 | 01:22 pm
posted by: [info]boing_boing


NYU Interactive Telecommunications Program student Drew Burrows, 28, engineered a "virtual girlfriend," and showed her off at a recent Tisch School of the Arts show:

It's simple to behold — a single mattress, tucked into a dark, curtained back room of the showcase space. On it: a lithe brunette. She's perfectly quiet, but once you sit or lie down, she responds to your every move. Lie on your back, she snuggles up right next to you in a log position. Curl up in the fetal position, she spoons. The only hitch: She's 2-D. "Yeah, you can't feel the girl. That's the thing," Burrows explained as he demonstrated his invention, an "infrared sensitive" light projection (meaning it reacts, and the projected woman moves, based on an infrared sensor) called INBED. "Still, it's so nice if you're tired and worn out to have someone to curl up with."
Link (thanks, Jessica Coen, image courtesy Drew Burrows)

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Social Networking map of the world

May. 18th, 2008 | 01:15 pm
posted by: [info]boing_boing


A visualization of the purported marketshare of various online social networking services. It's super interesting, but incomplete: I wonder where the data on China is? Click for larger size. From Le Monde, via Azeem Azar on twitter, via Tim O'Reilly's blog. (thanks Jolon Bankey!)

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Web Zen: leftover bacon zen

May. 18th, 2008 | 01:12 pm
posted by: [info]boing_boing


hover bacon
tux
bra
salt
mints
cups
coffee
vodka

previously on web zen:
bacon zen

Link, Web Zen Home and Archives, Store (Thanks Frank!)

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US Postal mail rate hikes screw micro-publishers: Thanks, Time Warner!

May. 18th, 2008 | 01:11 pm
posted by: [info]boing_boing

Snip from "Going Postal," a feature by Callie Enlow in the New York Review of Magazines, on how a recent US Postal mail rate hike reportedly pushed-for by Time Warner is killing tiny 'zine publishers. (Note to the digital chirren: 'zines are like blogs on paper. They're what old people used to read before god gave us LiveJournal. Boing Boing once was one.)
Ben Scott had better things to do than listen to a bunch of little magazines rant about their unreasonable postage bills. As the policy director of Free Press, a group that specialized in fighting media concentration, he and 10 co-workers in Washington were wrapped up in defending internet accessibility. But in late February 2007, Scott’s phone started buzzing with accusations from panicked publishers of small-circulation magazines. The United States Postal Service, they said, was hammering the last nail in the coffin of independent publishing.

Periodicals with circulations of fewer than 250,000 (some with much fewer—even in the hundreds) had just discovered that the rates they paid the USPS for postage were about to skyrocket, and they had only eight business days to dispute the proposed increase. While these independent publishers had expected the rates to rise, they believed it would be by about 12 percent, which had been the USPS’ own suggestion. However, during an arduous 10 months of hearings on postal rates in 2006, during which the small-magazine community was conspicuously absent, the stakes changed dramatically.

Instead of a simple markup, the entire rate system was overhauled, imposing a cost-based structure on a branch of government originally established to provide a public good, one that the Founding Fathers deemed vital to our democratic society. The Postal System was built on the premise of promoting the free flow of ideas by giving preferential treatment to their most common method of conveyance: the printed pages of periodicals.

Of particular concern to Free Press was the discovery that the biggest force behind the formula by which rates were to be increased was none other than Time Warner, the largest magazine publisher in the United States, which had been working overtime to influence the outcome of the hearings.

Link, illustration courtesy NYRM. (via Ned Sublette)

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stephanieburgis

Horse country

May. 18th, 2008 | 07:25 pm
posted by: [info]stephanieburgis

One of the reasons why I don't watch horse races, despite the beauty of the animals...via [info]suricattus and [info]ellen_datlow, here's a really good NY Times article on thoroughbred rescue organizations, why they're so desperately needed, and why, no matter how hard they try, they still can't meet the existing demand. Patrick temped at a horse rescue organization down near Bristol several years ago, which was my first real introduction to the issue. The article is very good and makes me wish I had extra money to donate to the various organizations it highlights.

Meanwhile, the horses in our neighborhood have been trotting up and down the street all day - Sunday is the day that the local riding school really turns out in force, so we sometimes have 12 or 13 horses in a row clattering past our house. Even on weekdays, horse sounds like neighs and hoofbeats are normal background noises if we leave our windows open. It's a big change from the kind of neighborhood I grew up in in East Lansing, a relatively urban college town with no horses in sight except the occasional police horse, usually brought out when the cops wanted to intimidate groups of frat guys hanging out downtown. It used to be a big treat for me as a kid to take a full hour's drive out to the countryside, maybe once a year, maybe less, to ride a horse for an hour at the closest riding stable (which unfortunately closed down when I was only 10). I do miss having coffee shops and bookstores within walking distance - growing up in a college town left me really spoiled that way - but I like sitting outside our house and watching lines of horses pass, or walking down the street with Maya to watch the baby horses gallop, with knobby-kneed and clumsy joy, around their field.

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snurri

Rules for Life and Writing, #3,407

May. 18th, 2008 | 01:34 pm
posted by: [info]snurri

When in doubt, start a riot.

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cmpriest

May 18, 2008

May. 18th, 2008 | 01:04 pm
posted by: [info]cmpriest

This afternoon at 2:00 p.m. Cory Doctorow will be at the library, signing books and being cool. I know his schedule says the “Seattle Public Library,” but it’s not the downtown one; you’ll find him at the Ballard branch, 5614 22nd Ave NW.

I’m going to zoosh out and pick up a copy of Little Brother as soon as I’m finished with breakfast, so I’ll have something new for him to sign.*



* Yes, I know what time it is, thank you very much. And alas, his other books are still in storage at my dad’s in Kentucky, where I stashed some of my finer favorites before making the cross-country drive.

[Crossposted to/from my website. If you'd like to comment, you can do so either here or there.]
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ellen_datlow

A second life--for some racers

May. 18th, 2008 | 01:49 pm
posted by: [info]ellen_datlow

Now THIS is something that depresses me--not the saving of course, but the poor horses that have NOT been saved:
Saving Horses, One Thoroughbred at a Time

Thanks to Suricattus

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A Tale of a Pot

May. 18th, 2008 | 04:45 pm
posted by: [info]languagelog

A third century C.E. toddy pot from Tamil Nadu with an inscription in Tamil Brahmi

A few days ago an unusual article appeared in The Hindu. It is about the fragment of a pot shown above, a pot used for collecting toddy (palm sap, modern Tamil கள்ளு) made about 1800 years ago. The writing on the pot is in Tamil Brahmi, a writing system that only fairly recently has come to be well understood. It says: n̪a:kan uɾal, Old Tamil for "Naakan's (pot with) toddy-sap". In modern Tamil writing this would be: னாகந் உறல். As the article points out, the fact that a poor toddy-tapper would write his name on a pot is indicative of mass literacy at the time.

The article is interesting to me in part just because of the photograph. I've seen photographs of Tamil Brahmi texts before, but never in color, and having never been to India, I've never seen such a text in person. The other interesting thing about the article is the authorship. Newspaper articles are usually written by reporters. As we not infrequently note here on Language Log, there are a few good ones, but all too often they get things wrong. Well, this article is not by reporters; it is right from the horse's mouth. The authors are S. Rajagopal, retired senior archaeologist with the Tamil Nadu State Department of Archaeology and Iravatham Mahadevan, an eminent student of early Indian writing and leading authority on Tamil Brahmi, author of the Early Tamil Epigraphy volume in the Harvard Oriental Series, which belongs on every shelf. This is like having a newspaper article on physics written by Stephen Hawking. I hope it's the beginning of a trend.

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kevin_standlee

I'm Not a Genius, But...

May. 18th, 2008 | 10:35 am
location: Klamath Falls, Oregon
mood: chipper chipper
music: IPL Cricket
posted by: [info]kevin_standlee

There's not a significant time pressure on me today, so I took it easy this morning, taking full advantage of the breakfast bar and bringing it back to my room to watch the IPL cricket. I could do this because, to my surprise, there appears to be sufficient bandwidth to actually pull the streaming video. (Although as soon as I wrote that, it started hiccuping, so it's not foolproof, although by this point in the match, the results seem to be a forgone conclusion.)

After a big breakfast like that, I needed some exercise, so I went for a walk around the neighborhood around the hotel. On the way back, I admired the nice view of Mount Shasta, clearly visible to the south. I figured I'd earned another soak in the hot tub, so I put on my swimsuit and headed to the pool, where unfortunately I found a large vat of Screaming Children Soup instead of a hot tub. I did ten lengths of the swimming pool (slowly) instead, which certainly got my blood flowing. The walking and swimming had the desired impact on my blood sugar, so even though I had one of their cinnamon rolls, I didn't feel guilty.

Now I need to finish packing and hit the road. Google Maps says the 380 miles from here to Fremont should be done in around 6 hours. Given how I drive, I expect it will be more than 9, but that's okay with me.

[The subject line, by the way, is a reference to an advertising campaign for Holiday Inn Express. It ends, "...but I did stay in a Holiday Inn Express last night."]
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hazelwindows

My Father's Help

May. 18th, 2008 | 09:59 am
mood: happier happier
posted by: [info]hazelwindows

I'm doing a little better now. I went to a meeting and I talked to my dad. The people at the meeting were very kind to me. What I'm really processing from is the things my Dad had to say when I called in desperation for advice. He said some really wise things that applied well to my internal and external situation... it touches me how much he has grown... things he did not used to believe in, he was now advising me to think about.

I'm willing to take his advice and let myself enjoy the sunny weather, a good book, or whatever comes up to be enjoyed today. What Dad said translates into not attempting to step onto the bank of the far shore when you are still wading through the middle of the river. He said to give it time. He said that I already made my best resolutions and ideas about the heartbreaking situation of yesterday, and that now all thinking about it does is run me down inside. So true. Dad said that it's a fallacy to believe that a human mind can completely sort out and resolve a situation in life of this kind. Only living through it resolves it. (Is this Larry speaking here??) I asked him why time is needed, and he said that time gives the parts of your personality, your feelings, and your input from other people and other life experiences during that period a chance to influence the outcome you reach just like currents & eddies directing you as you are crossing through a river. You can't think your way across, you have to wade in and go with the flow.

I understand why my dad has always seemed so powerful to me. He has a lot inside of him. *choked up*

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