| Lis was walking across the Mass Ave bridge the other day . . . |
[Jul. 13th, 2009|08:57 am] |
Lis spent part of Saturday at the Boston Public Library, but decided to walk to MIT to wait for me to pick her up.
As she was crossing the bridge on Mass Ave, the tune of "Seasons of Love" from Rent kept going through her head.
So I finished it up for her. Feel free to take it for filk rooms if you want it.
Three hundred sixty four point four Smoots and an ear
Three hundred sixty four point four lengths plus a smidge
Three hundred sixty four point four Smoots and an ear
How do you measure the length of a bridge?
In car-lengths? In footsteps? In minutes to bike it?
In wind-chill? In heatstroke? In weakness or strength?
Three hundred sixty four point four Smoots and an ear?
How do you measure interminable length?
How about Smoots?
How about Smoots?
How about Smoots?
Measure in Smoots.
A bridge of Smoots.
Three hundred sixty four point four Smoots and an ear
Three hundred sixty four point four lengths of a man
Three hundred sixty four point four Smoots and an ear
Who came up with this furshlugginer plan?
From Cambridge to Boston
Or Boston to Cambridge
Walking over the Charles
To the end of the bridge
Tho' the bridge is named Harvard, that name's not so great
So it's been called the "Smoot Bridge" since 1958.
Remember the Smoots! Remember the Smoots!
Measure in Smoots!
Oliver Smoot! Oliver Smoot! |
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| If they're doing reboots of various properties . . . |
[Jul. 11th, 2009|03:05 pm] |
So, yeah. It started with the 1979 property Battlestar Galactica. The reboot went REAL well. But they've now done Transformers, and are doing GI Joe, and there's a rumor that Tim Minear is going to be doing something with Alien Nation . . .
How about a Max Headroom reboot?
Lis and I were talking about this in the car, today. First: it wouldn't have to be set 20 Minutes Into The Future -- it could be set contemporary (although, obviously, with a few science fictional elements). Edison Carter wouldn't need that HUGE HONKIN' CAMERA any more -- something the size of a digital camera would be MORE than sufficient. A Bluetooth earpiece would allow him to communicate with Theora Jones, who would be able to hack into things that, in reality, wouldn't be possible, but that'd be one of the science fictional elements.
He wouldn't work for "Network 23" -- the concept of an actual network doing genuine journalism is obsolete -- but he could work as a webjournalist. And Blank Reg would also run a website.
Bryce might be an independent hacker/cyberpunk rather than working for a corp. And he'd create Max Headroom just for the heck of it. Max would be a computer worm built off of an AI/intelligent agent concept, being, of course, the OTHER important science fictional point. He'd be hunted by various agencies, including counter-cybercrime/cyberwarfare organizations, censorware providers, and even just plain old decent, hardworking anti-virus software folks.
All that is pretty easy.
But what if we go a little further?
What happens if we re-imagine Edison Carter as Chinese, or North Korean, or Iranian -- and female? Places with strong governmental restrictions on information?
Even if you kept Carter as British, those would be good places to set stories, of course. You could even do a Max Headroom show WITHOUT Edison Carter, where Max could go and help other underground journalists in repressive regimes like that. I like the idea of a repressive regime having trouble tracking down exactly WHO the upstart who's revealing what's actually going on -- because she wears a burqa, just like every OTHER woman. |
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| The kitties have now discovered my desk. . . |
[Jul. 7th, 2009|07:28 pm] |
They HAD been just messin' with Lis and her laptop when she was computing on the bed. But they've now discovered the desktop, too.
Nick still has a cold, and is sneezing a lot. Nora continues to be a lap cat ONLY on her own terms -- if SHE decides it's time to sit on a lap, she will, whether you like it or not, and if it's NOT time, she won't. Nick, on the other hand, is happy as a shoulder cat -- in fact, our downstairs neighbor Ben was up visiting them, and Nick climbed up his trouser leg and shirt in order to sit on Ben's shoulder. |
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| Overprotective parents are to blame for Michael Bay. |
[Jul. 7th, 2009|04:02 pm] |
Okay, fine. It's just a hypothesis.
But think about it.
The reason people go to see Michael Bay movies is to see pretty explosions. Well, maybe "pretty explosions" and "plausibly attractive people in proximity to pretty explosions."
Which is fine. I think that a desire to see pretty explosions is a perfectly natural and healthy part of the human psyche. It's one of the reasons fireworks are so great.
But I think that almost anybody would rather see a REAL explosion than a PICTURE of one, even a moving picture with Dolby Surround Sound.
When I was a kid, we blew things up and set things on fire sometimes. Because we COULD. I mean, sure, Mom got mad that time I nearly burned down the garage, but I DIDN'T burn down the garage after all, so that was fine.
Some hobbies that involve fire and/or things that go boom include shooting, camping, pyrotechnics, model rocketry, cooking, building bonfires, chemistry, and tying firecrackers to your GI Joes and Barbies.
And I believe that children can engage in all of these activities with some degree of safety, with a certain amount of adult supervision.
I believe that, given a chance to ACTUALLY blow shit up, most children and teenagers would choose that over watching a movie in which things blow up. As "most teenagers" includes "people that other teenagers might consider plausibly attractive people", this would even cover the "plausibly attractive people in proximity to pretty explosions", it would even cover THAT part.
Therefore, if we gave our children and teens a healthy outlet for these desires, we could potentially stamp out the scourge of Michael Bay movies forever. |
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| A musical question: |
[Jul. 5th, 2009|06:46 pm] |
So, it occurred to me: my friends list is chock-full of both musically literate people and curmudgeons -- sometimes both at once.
So here's my question: is it possible to dislike Aaron Copeland music?
I mean, I can totally see liking other stuff better -- but is it possible to just not like it at all? |
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| (no subject) |
[Jul. 4th, 2009|07:56 am] |
To everybody in the world who uses a Gregorian calendar: happy 4th of July!
To people in the United States of America: in addition, happy Independence Day! |
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| Nick isn't a lap cat, precisely . .. |
[Jul. 3rd, 2009|06:29 pm] |
(Okay, I was hoping to be able to do a larger pic than this one, but this is the one that appears to be possible. Click on it to see the full sized one.) |
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| A photo of the kitties |
[Jul. 3rd, 2009|12:49 pm] |
The following picture, of our kittens, was titled by the male kitten, who was typing at the time.
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| Ah, cat ownership, how I missed thee! |
[Jul. 2nd, 2009|09:43 pm] |
Plus: we collected the stool sample from one of the cats.
Minus: we quite literally had to light a match afterward. (I don't think Lis had realized that that actually DOES work. . . ) |
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| Technically, nobody's ever ready for a new cat. . . |
[Jul. 2nd, 2009|06:28 pm] |
Lis and I just decided that we're tired of NOT having a cat.
We now have two kittens.
There will probably be photos at some point, since that's what one does with a blog and kittens.
They came from the shelter with the names Caleb and Lucy, which are both perfectly reasonable names; we'll see if they keep the names, or if they get new ones. |
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| Yes, this IS basically a theoretical question. |
[Jul. 1st, 2009|10:13 am] |
So, it is an honor just to be nominated for a Hugo award, even if one doesn't win.
However -- does it remain an honor if the category in which you're nominated gets voted "No Award"?
(The Hugos allow the vote of "No Award" for the situation in which you HAVE read all the nominees, and you just don't think that ANY of them are good enough to deserve a Hugo. If the majority of the voting population thinks your whole CATEGORY sucks, INCLUDING your piece, is it still an honor to be nominated?) |
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| Visited my folks yesterday |
[Jun. 29th, 2009|07:12 am] |
My father's about sixty, sixty-five now. And he's fallen in with a bad crowd. Every morning, he goes out around sunrise to go swimming in the local lake with a bunch of long-distance swimmers.
He's been swimming miles in open water. He's been doing this for a while now.
So, I visited them yesterday, and Dad was wearing a t-shirt -- I've usually seen him, recently, wearing mainly long-sleeved shirts.
I hadn't realized: Dad is ripped1. I could see hints of a washboard through the t-shirt, and his arms are really toned and defined.
Dad has not been in this good shape in DECADES. Possibly since I was a baby. Possibly earlier. I mean, I think he's in better shape than when he'd just come back from Vietnam and was working physical labor.
1: "Ripped" adj: having well-defined, toned muscles |
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| I talked to my shrink about my existential fears. |
[Jun. 27th, 2009|06:37 pm] |
So, the deal is: if existential fear gets so bad that I am avoiding going to sleep to avoid facing it, I can raise my Lexapro dosage by half a pill per week.
However: if it ever gets to the point that I can have thoughts about the immensity of the universe and the smallness of humanity WITHOUT any significant emotional context, I'm to LOWER my dosage by half a pill per week.
I am to attempt to regulate my medications to make sure that I am feeling awe and even fear at these thoughts, but at a level which I can tolerate. The ACTUAL treatment I'm being prescribed is, when the existential fear becomes so great that it's hard to deal with, I'm to focus on my connections with other people, both people I'm close to like my family and friends, and ALSO my shallower but still important connections with people I work with, neighbors, and my community in general. I'm to consider myself as part of a social network which includes people who jog by my house, and the barber down the street, as much as my close friends and family.
Also -- I printed out and showed him stuff from this post.
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) browngirl: he LOVED your story, and recommended that I focus on the lessons in it as part of my treatment. He thought it just absolutely NAILED the importance of both considering the universal questions AND dealing with everyday life and social interactions.
Speaking just for myself: have you considered looking if anyone publishes historical short-shorts? I could see that in The New Yorker or something. |
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| At least my week's been okay . . . |
[Jun. 27th, 2009|01:13 pm] |
This has been an awful week. Deaths of loved ones on my friends list, my aunt had a (thank G-d, very minor) stroke, my cousin had surgery (which, again, thank G-d, went very well, but still), breakups of relationships that had lasted for YEARS.
Just . . . truly awful.
You know. The kind of week that almost makes me feel guilty for having nothing significantly going wrong in my life. (Knock on wood, kein ayen ha-ra, and so forth.)
But. Yeah. |
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| A mystery |
[Jun. 26th, 2009|11:52 am] |
I dislike tap water, unless it goes through the Brita first.
So how come water from the hose tastes so dang good? Water from the kitchen tap = icky. Water from the outside hose = amazingly yummy. |
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| Something I just posted as a comment in someone else's livejournal. . . |
[Jun. 26th, 2009|10:59 am] |
She asked, rhetorically, "Why is it when my mom is visiting, I inevitably regress to seventeen?"
I said:
Because EVERYONE regresses to seventeen when their parents are visiting.
If you have practice, you can avoid regressing for, oh, about twenty-four hours. Some people manage avoiding it for forty-eight hours.
Having a trained partner with you who can help keep you In Adulthood can add a bit to the time.
With all that, there can therefore be a few people out there who can manage three days with their parents without regressing. And making sure that you're spending no more than, say, four hours a day with parents, because you are doing independent touristy things, or they are, can stretch it out even further.
Thus, it is a good idea to limit parental visits to no more than, say, four days under absolutely optimal conditions. And that's stretching it. For most people, one day is perfectly sufficient.
Lis, for instance, LOVES her father, and he loves her, and they get along FAMOUSLY. For about two days. After which they begin butting heads. Unless they make sure to schedule in time away from each other during the visit. So Lis makes sure to visit with her brother, grandparents, and so, on her own. Which is good for its own sake, and also extends the non-head-butting time.
Me, I live close to my parents, so I don't have any extended visits -- I can just go over for an afternoon. But when my sister comes up to visit from Florida? After four days or so, KA-BLAM. Mom and Leila love each other deeply. And shorter visits might be a good idea. . . .
Lis and I just came back from a three-and-a-half-day surprise visit to her parents in Florida. And that was about as long a visit as would work well. We all had a great time, and didn't end up in conflicts, and had we stayed longer, we would have.
Because that's what happens. Even in families with excellent relationships. |
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| Pest control thoughts |
[Jun. 15th, 2009|03:05 pm] |
So, around here, a couple of pest control issues that show up -- squirrels in walls, and geese everywhere. Pigeons can be something of a nuisance, too.
What do these three nuisance animals have in common?
They all taste good.
The biggest thing is geese. Canada geese are quite annoying, even somewhat damaging to our local ecosystems (especially if you count "a golf course" as an ecosystem, but even if you're being reasonable -- the amount of goose poo they leave around actually does cause algae blooms in local ponds).
I think that we should allow permanent, year-round knife hunting season on geese. If you can get close enough to a goose to slit its throat, you should be allowed to do so and take it home and eat it.
This will NOT significantly reduce the number of geese, I don't think, but it ought to make them less aggressive toward humans. . . . |
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| I was busy yesterday, so I didn't post this. |
[Jun. 14th, 2009|10:55 am] |
Ten years ago yesterday, I did the best thing I ever did in my life. I married Lis.
I said the following:I pledge myself to you -- body, mind, and spirit. I promise to respect, honor, and cherish you. I promise to listen to you and be trustworthy towards you. I promise to be honest with you. I promise to support you physically, emotionally, and spiritually.
I promise to stand by you and to back you up. I promise never to shame you. When we fight, I promise to fight fair.
I pledge that, as of this day, I shall put us as a couple, and any children that we have, above all else. I pledge that our family will be my primary concern. And I pledge to provide a Jewish household for our family.
In all things, I promise to be your equal and opposite -- the other half of our now-mended soul that was split at the beginning of time and is only today being made whole.
Without you, I am not complete.
So: today is the day to check how I'm doing.
I've actually done pretty darned well this year. I am doing MUCH better at the physical and emotional support. I'm taking better care of the house, making a better home for us.
Lis sent me a SomeECards:
http://www.someecards.com/viewcard/c1954204d1586533ea4c5f1ef548f959
It says, "Let's never give up on trying to change each other."
The thing is -- we actually DO manage to change each other, and for the better. As You Know, it's a TERRIBLE idea to enter into a relationship with the expectation of changing your partner -- but we do. She's made me get my depression under control. She's made me learn to be more what I ought to be. I couldn't do these things without her. |
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| Existential fear is a lot like food poisoning. |
[Jun. 12th, 2009|11:02 pm] |
No, really. It is. They feel mostly the same.
You know that feeling when you've got food poisoning and you are lying in bed, and you start to get nauseous, and you know that this is going to either be miserable for a while, or be miserable for a while and then you'll end up puking, but you're not puking yet, and maybe, if you're VERY VERY STILL, it won't get to the "puking" stage. And your skin breaks out in cold prickly sweat and you feel simultaneously hot and cold.
Yeah.
It's EXACTLY that feeling. The actual stomach part feels SOMEWHAT different, but even that is similar. There are times when I've woken up with food poisoning, and it's taken me a couple minutes to figure out whether I've got food poisoning or existential fear.
Last night, what triggered it was thinking about the Pyramids. And how, when they were built, they were faced in limestone, so that they were gleaming white monuments shining across the sand.
And that the ancient Egyptian culture was a culture. With people in it. Who had entire lives. That an ancient Egyptian peasant who farmed the banks of the Nile had a life. And experiences, every bit as real as mine, in a world every bit as rich as mine.
As did a Roman citizen. Or someone living under the rule of the Golden Horde, or in the Caliphate.
And that all those lives are real, as real as mine.
And that, therefore, mine is only as real as theirs.
And that ALL of these lives happen on a single planet, in an amount of time that is insignificant.
And that, in fact, it's quite possible that the universe itself keeps collapsing and reforming, with different basic universal constants.
That EVERYTHING is insignificant.
That my life is finite and tiny.
And, at night, I feel that.
And it feels like food poisoning.
The thing is -- Lis, for instance, can think all these same thoughts. And they don't bother her. Because, well, why SHOULD they?
I have no explanation as to why I feel the insignificance of our universe, our planet, our time, humanity, all human endeavor, and my own life, so viscerally. And I MEAN "viscerally". "Viscerally" means "relating to the viscera" -- the internal organs in the torso. And that's where I feel it. In my guts. As nausea.
There's no way to think my way out of this. The nausea-inducing insignificance is real. I see things in perspective -- and that IS the perspective.
And so I don't understand why other people DON'T feel this. Why isn't every single human being a quivering mass of horror, quaking at the sheer enormousness of the universe?
. . . but why SHOULD anyone feel this? In realistic, everyday terms, none of this matters. So why can people like Lis focus on the fact that this sheer vastness of everything is basically irrelevant to our lives, and other people, like me, can't? |
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| We have achieved lilac-a-tude! |
[Jun. 5th, 2009|06:56 am] |
Yesterday morning, I picked up ten lilac bushes from Syrigna Plus, a lilac nursery in West Newbury, MA. And I planted all ten.
I now understand the purpose of the fieldstone wall. "If I spent this much effort GETTING this damn rock, it damn well better be WORTH something." The very first bush I planted -- I started digging the hole, and needed to pull out a rock the size of my head.
I've been keeping all the rocks I'm pulling out. Because those rocks BETTER be good for something, given how hard they are to get. I've got a pretty darned big pile of 'em. |
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| I just talked to a guy who had a worse day at work than you did. |
[Jun. 1st, 2009|12:22 pm] |
Not TODAY, but a while back.
A guy came by to check out our squirrels/tribbles in the wall situation, and we were talking. There was this one time that he was hired to remove a raccoon. Anyway, it's the middle of the day -- the thing breaks out of the trap. And it's rabid. He's grabbed the thing and is desperately trying to keep it from biting him, while attempting to beat it to death, or at least senseless, before he's bitten. The thing is screaming a wild banshee rabid raccoon who wants to eat your face off kind of scream.
He finally gets the upper hand on the monster, and gets a chance to get a couple good whacks at it. Which is when the lady of the house comes by, to see him beating this screaming raccoon to death.
So, really, that's going to be my new baseline for "how bad could it be, REALLY?"
"Is this job better or worse than being observed beating a screaming rabid raccoon to death?" |
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| Online Flash time-wasters. |
[May. 31st, 2009|08:07 pm] |
The longer frozen rain keeps getting blown upwards in an updraft, the bigger the resultant hailstone is.
Let's face it. If you were Storm from the X-Men, at least ONCE you'd destroy a city with hail, just for fun
http://www.kongregate.com/games/aeiowu/effing-hail
Who says penguins can't fly? I have gotten this penguin to fly 6000 feet (one "data mile", or just about one nautical mile), in only 17 days, my best time so far.
http://www.kongregate.com/games/light_bringer777/learn-to-fly
And, of course, this old classic -- it's more dependent on luck than the other two -- I managed to launch a hedgehog out of the atmosphere in only 6 days once, but that was with a VERY lucky setup in the first couple days.
http://www.kongregate.com/games/ArmorGames/hedgehog-launch |
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| I figured out what Obama had meant by "empathy" as a qualification for a Supreme Court justice |
[May. 30th, 2009|11:15 pm] |
He meant "Lawful Good." He wanted to nominate someone Lawful Good to the Supreme Court. The people who were upset by that felt that the Supreme Court should be filled with Lawful Neutral people.
Well, except for the usual suspects who were holding out for Lawful Evil, of course, but, basically, "empathy" doesn't mean "likes abortion" -- it means "Lawful Good." And you can make a reasonable argument that the Supremes should be Lawful Neutral -- and, in fact, that's what the handful of people who a) were against the "empathy" term, b) not raving loonies, AND c) actually managed to get their opinions reported were claiming. Mind you, Fox News, for instance, prefers to focus on the folks who were wanting Lawful Evil, (which makes sense, since they're owned by Rupert Murdoch, who is Lawful Evil, after all).
But. Yeah. That's the real distinction: does society run better when its laws are, at the highest level, run by people whose only concern is the law -- Lawful Neutral -- or who are concerned with the law as it effects people how they live, and their quality of life -- Lawful Good? |
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| Shavuot stuff |
[May. 27th, 2009|10:38 pm] |
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So -- anybody coming to Temple B'nai Brith for the before-dinner part of Shavuot, and for supper? I know the overnight parts are at Tremont Street, but we've got stuff from 5:30 until 9, with the overnight starting at Tremont at 9:30. Gonna see any of you at TBB? |
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| We have squirrels in the walls again. |
[May. 26th, 2009|11:52 pm] |
I think squirrels move into our house every two or three years. I don't remember any last year, so I was hoping that we'd gotten it taken care of for good.
Nope. Yesterday morning, Lis and I were woken by scrabbling in the walls. I phoned the pest control people, and they can't get to us until Monday -- and, given that we don't have an attic with human-sized access, this may be a problem.
Last time this happened, they found the squirrel hole, and sealed it with a one-way flap -- squirrels get out, can't get back in.
But, as they explained today, on the phone, that only works in the fall. If they're just adult squirrels looking for shelter, and you exclude them, they'll find somewhere else to go. But if they've got babies inside, they'll get back in. And if they don't, you've got dead squirrels in the wall. Which is even worse than live squirrels.
I told Lis this, and she said that it didn't SOUND like there were baby squirrels in the walls, and we had been hoping to get them out BEFORE they started nesting.
Then. .. this evening, Lis called me into the bedroom.
"Listen," she said.
Adorable chirrups and purrs were coming from the walls.
"We've got a tribble infestation." |
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| More racial alt-history musings . . . . |
[May. 23rd, 2009|07:57 pm] |
Lis has been reading Race: a history beyond black and white by Marc Aronson. It's a book, written at a high-middle-school through high school level, discussing the history of the concept of "race", and ideas of racism, through Western history to today. And it's very well-written, thought provoking, and we're learning a lot from it. I mean, we were aware of most of the facts that he's talking about, but he puts them into a more coherent context and historical narrative.
Anyway, in a section discussing how America defined "whiteness" with respect to American Indians, he brings up the Cherokee Nation, which was deliberately assuming all the external markers of "whiteness" in America -- a Western-style court system, agriculture and business, Christianity -- and, when the US and the Cherokee came into conflict, the Cherokee turned to the courts for redress, and won the Court battle. Nonetheless, Jackson defied the Supreme Court, and used Federal troops to remove the Cherokee, in order to give their land to "white" settlers.
He finishes the chapter as follows:Yet had Jackson stood by the Court ruling, it would surely have sparked a Civil War, with federal troops fighting Southern whites over the rights of Indians. As appealing as it is to imagine that alternate history, it could never have happened. Not enough "white" Americans, least of all Jackson, would have been willing to die for that cause. .
Well, he's right. It IS appealing. And Jackson never would have let it happen.
So, if we're doing alt-history, let's make a different divergence point.
In 1828, Jackson defeated the incumbent John Quincy Adams in order to become President. That John Quincy Adams who would, in 1841, defend the rights of the black people captured and put on the schooner Amistad, arguing that they were full-fledged humans born with, and holding all, human rights and freedoms.
It's not much of a stretch to speculate that a J Q Adams who could, in 1841, claim that blacks were humans with human rights and court protection, might have, in 1830, believed the same thing about Cherokees. Okay, figuring out a way for Adams to win the election is a bit of a challenge -- but, let's set that aside for the moment, and look at the possibilities of President Adams following the will of the Supreme Court and protecting the Cherokee against "white" encroachment.
Is Aronson right that it'd be hard to get white federal troops to fight for this? Maybe. What other options would the United States have? Hire mercenaries? Maybe, but the US was pretty cash-poor. Any other options? Could the United States find any people who might be willing to be hired to fight for something other than cash?
In the time period, the Western status quo divided humanity into five groups -- white, black, brown, yellow, and red. So it would be natural for them to conclude that, if whites shouldn't have to fight for the red man, why not hire the red man to do it?
What if the United States hired Sioux and Iroquois mercenaries? Would any of them go for it? Could they be paid in land, training, an official position in the United States military? Could we end up with the Great Plains settled by Plains Indians loyal to the United States, using Western-style agriculture? Is that even possible?
What happens to the Civil War? Do the abolitionists get any strength out of the weakening of a "White Man Uber Alles" mindset? Does the slavery issue NOT come to a head, without the question of "expansion of slavery into the new territories" made out of the Cherokee lands?
Any thoughts? We're well out of the area of American history that I know a lot about -- I know NOTHING about American Indian politics in the period, either among or within tribes. I have no idea what different tribes would go for or not. |
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| Clearly, American Idol uses Diebold. |
[May. 21st, 2009|09:08 am] |
Apparently, the winner in American Idol was somebody from Arkansas. And, in fact, that person won largely because he got 38 million votes from Arkansas.
The population of Arkansas is 2.8 million. Which means that the average person in Arkansas voted 14 times for their hometown boy, for American Idol.
Of course, odds are that it was a much smaller percentage of those 2.8 million people voting a much higher number of times.
Betcha there are at least a thousand cases of RSI showing up in Arkansas today. |
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| Annual physical checkups in the UK |
[May. 19th, 2009|08:58 pm] |
So, someone on my f-list was wondering how you even TELL if you're basically healthy in the first place. I suggested that she go to her primary care physician, and have an annual checkup, Pap smear, and the rest of it.
She's in London, so she's on NHS. But she says that annual checkups aren't covered, and that NHS basically only covers critical care and not preventative care.
That can't be true, can it? So how do you go about getting an annual physical? |
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| Sharing art |
[May. 18th, 2009|07:34 pm] |
One of the great joys in life is seeing a friend's first encounter with a piece of art which you love. (Provided that they enjoy it, of course.) Whether it's Bach, or Firefly, or Satchmo, or Hamlet, or Star Wars, it's just a heck of a lot of fun to watch a friend's reactions. You get the vicarious pleasure of the first time.
( Pride and Prejudice spoilers ) |
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| On why there are no discrete changes in alt-history |
[May. 14th, 2009|09:36 am] |
Patricia C Wrede has just published a new novel, an alt-fantasy YA in which humans never came across the Bering Land Bridge, never founded any pre-Columbian civilizations in the Americas, and, also, in which pleisticine megafauna existed in the Americas up until modern times. And then her story takes place in the Americas with European settlement during the Westward Expansion.
Now, that COULD be an interesting world to write in, but a lot of people are upset because of WHY she was trying to do this -- largely because she didn't want to deal with the ethical and moral issues of genocide -- so she pre-genocided all pre-Columbian people. A lot of people are feeling that "preventing people from existing in the first place" isn't really that much more emotionally comfortable than "killing them all off".
And this discussion has all sorts of tentacles.
But the part which interests me, right this second, is the question of, "So, is there anything worthwhile in the Americas if you don't have Americans?" I mean, as far as I can tell, every single thing which made Europeans WANT to settle the New World was created by pre-Columbian humans. If there weren't any people in the Americas, Columbus would have shown up in the West Indes and . . . what? Found nothing at all worth going back for. He would have found giant ground sloths and wooly mammoths and stuff, in Wrede's world, but that's just not economically valuable enough to set up trading colonies.
Other people have been pointing this out: Wrede's world doesn't have maize, potatoes, tobacco, or peppers -- all developed by humans. So why would anyone go there in the first place?
But Lis and I have started to try to play the more DIFFICULT version of "The Thirteenth Child Doesn't Have . . . "
No corn, tobacco, tomatoes, potatoes, or chiles -- that's the LOW-hanging fruit.
Let's go for some more fun ones -- what are some other effects of not having pre-Columbian Americans?
The Thirteenth child has no treatment for malaria.
Oh -- how about this one? The bird that we know as a "cardinal" isn't called that.
Why? Because cardinals in the Thirteenth Child's world don't wear red. Because until the 19th century, all red dyes were based on cochaneal, an insect-based dye which was developed by the Aztecs.
Any others? What are some good unexpected effects of never having pre-Columbian humans?
Edited to Add: It has been pointed out by several people that I'm just plain wrong about the red dye thing -- that cardinals DID wear robes dyed with madder long before cochaneal dyes -- and that cochaneal itself ALSO existed in Poland. So. Um. Ooops. |
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| Why I'm generally hopeful, even when sucky things happen in the world. |
[May. 13th, 2009|02:54 pm] |
See, I teach kids at the Hebrew school.
And, this past Sunday, I was chatting with one of my students, who's nine. He was telling me that one of his friends' parents have this really big yard that they just can't do anything with.
So they turned it over to the neighborhood kids.
And they've built camps there. With forts. The camp that he and his friends have has a fort in it. And a fire pit. With a "What's that word for the thing where you put meat on it and it spins around?" "A spit?" "Yeah -- a spit." And a catapult that they built.
And they were digging holes the other day, and discovered a gold mine. No, better than gold. They discovered CLAY. And they've been trading clay with the other camps. They're trying to work out making pots and then trading the pots to the other camps. He's also got this rock that he's managed to bash into being a pointy rock, and is trying to work out how to make it into a spear.
This is why I can't feel too disheartened about the world. I work with nine-year-olds who, for fun, teach themselves stone-knapping, pottery, and catapult-building. And fort-building. No matter what else happens, if a world has nine-year-olds like that, it's got a chance. |
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| Anyone wanna sanity-check a physics idea my father has? |
[May. 11th, 2009|10:08 am] |
My dad's an amateur astrophysicist, and has been tinkering with a little bit of the math on red shift and the "missing mass" problem. He just emailed me a couple of his notes, and was wondering if I knew anyone who could sanity-check his math, see if there's anything in it, or if it's something someone else has already worked on. Anyone want me to forward it to them to check through it?
(I don't have the background, myself. I can more-or-less FOLLOW his argument, when reading it written out in the notes, but I have neither the background in the theory, or the skills in the math to have a clue whether it's true or not.) |
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| On books about interpersonal communication and influence |
[May. 11th, 2009|08:45 am] |
I read somewhere the opinion that there are only two books in interpersonal communication, negotiation, and so forth that have ever been written. And that all other books are just re-treads of the same two.
The argument was that EVERYTHING is either a re-tread of Dale Carnagie's How to Make Friends and Influence People or Machiavelli's The Prince. Or both.
But that, if you've read both of those, you've pretty much covered Getting to Yes, What They Don't Teach You In Harvard Business School, The Games People Play, and everything else in the genre. |
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| I just remembered this story from my elementary school days |
[May. 10th, 2009|06:43 pm] |
Someone else on my friends list was talking about her elementary school in the Sixties, and it reminded me of a story from when I was in elementary school.
I went to a Montessori school for kindergarten through second grade -- five years old through seven years old. Then, when I was eight, I transferred into my local public school system. That was 1982.
And, in general, I really feel that I got an excellent education there. Most of my teachers had been teaching since the Fifties, so my educational experience was more similar to that of my parents than that that children around here have now. But the teachers had gotten to the point that they allowed some intellectual freedom in the classroom -- my experience wasn't one of grinding conformity, not to the extent that you'd expect, anyway. We said the Pledge of Allegiance every morning, but if you didn't say the "under God" part, that was okay. We didn't have any prayer in school, but we DID have a Moment of Silence, in which you COULD pray if you wanted -- some of my classmates would use it for the Lord's Prayer, I'd use it for the Sh'ma, and most would just veg out for half a minute or so.
There was only one teacher in elementary school who I really butted heads with. The music teacher. (Freshman year of high school, there was my English teacher, whom I TOTALLY butted heads with over her interpretation of Merchant of Venice, but that's another story, and, now that I'm an adult and have learned more, well, I STILL think I was right, but I can see her point a lot better than I did then.)
But, yeah. The music teacher. Specifically the Christmas Winter concert. Which, of course, WAS a Christmas concert. But with "I Have A Little Dreidel" stuck in.
( Read more... ) |
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| My take on the Manny Ramirez drug suspension situation: |
[May. 9th, 2009|08:31 pm] |
So, Manny tested positive for human chorionic gonadotropin, which got him the 50-game suspension. Now, people are saying that HCG could be used to artificially stimulate the production of natural testosterone -- steroid use one step removed -- or, to get one's testicles to start working again after they've shut down because you were already taking artificial steroids.
However, I think that maybe we should give Manny the benefit of the doubt.
Ramirez said, "Recently, I saw a physician for a personal health issue. He gave me a medication, not a steroid, which he thought was OK to give me." So, what WAS the "personal health issue"? I think most people are assuming that it was impotence based on his testicles shutting down because of steroid use.
But the primary use of HGC is as a fertility drug.
And, let's be honest -- if there was ONE player in MLB who is trying to get pregnant, it'd be Manny. |
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| The good news is that the spider is eating a grain moth. |
[May. 6th, 2009|07:58 am] |
I hate grain moths.
Last year, I made the mistake of buying a package of organic rye flour.
Since then, we've had an infestation. We're keeping it under control by throwing out lots and lots of stuff, and because vonbeck is giving me professional-grade grain moth traps, but it is nonetheless really annoying.
Serves me right for buying organic stuff. . .
We DO have a couple spiders in the house, and we LIKE spiders. They're good luck, and symbols of wisdom, and they EAT GRAIN MOTHS.
Grain moths seem to have displaced centipedes in my list of "bugs I dislike." At this point, if we've got house centipedes, and they'll eat moth larvae, (and I never, ever, ever actually SEE the centipede), I'd be cool with it. |
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| I'm still not good at classroom discipline . . . |
[May. 3rd, 2009|08:32 pm] |
I DO have moments when I handle things well, though.
One of the students was doing something -- I honestly don't remember what, even though it was only ten hours ago -- to be deliberately oppositional. It wasn't anything important, or relevant, which is why I can't remember what it was. But he was glaring at me, with a sort of defiant "you can't make me" look on his face.
And I made myself look like I was trying not to crack up. I mean, I sort of WAS trying not to crack up, but I played with it.
And he broke first, and cracked up, and, after he laughed, he went ahead and did his work. Somehow, the recognition that I recognized that he was just messing with me, and that I wasn't offended but still wasn't going to let it pass -- that was enough. He KNEW what he was doing, he KNEW it was basically ridiculous, and, as long as I knew it, too, it was all good. |
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| Theatre@First's production of The Winter's Tale |
[Apr. 30th, 2009|10:41 am] |
Let me start with the most critical. Any production of The Winter's Tale lives or dies on its portrayal of King Leontes. Leontes has to be someone who you can believe is so blindingly jealous that he can imagine his wife and best friend sleeping together, and then believe that everyone who tries to convince him that he's deluded is plotting against him -- someone whose jealousy edges into paranoid schizophrenia, drives him to be willing to murder his friend, execute his wife, kill his daughter. And yet, he simultaneously has to be fundamentally a good person, and a good king -- genuinely sympathetic while being monstrous.
That's a nearly impossible task.
Jason Merrill nails it.
That's partially because Merrill isn't left to carry that task by himself. Leontes is surrounded by honorable, decent people with integrity, who believe that their king is better than he shows himself. And when those characters are played believably -- played as people who are smart, perceptive, and decent -- we as the audience are willing to accept that, perhaps, their opinions might have merit. So long as Leontes is played so that such a thing COULD be possible.
It's a very difficult task, and it requires Camillo (Joshua Nicholson) and Antigonus (Doug Miller) to be spot-on, as well. Leontes' monstrosity in giving both of those men unbearable tasks is met by those characters' integrity and love of their king -- which, when done right, leaves the audience somehow believing in both the king's monstrosity and his worthiness of their love.
The set, lighting, and sound design help, too. Sicily is present as bare and austere, with harsh, cold lighting, Bohemia, in earth tones -- browns and yellows, with warm light.
And the music deserves a mention or two. We didn't buy the CD of the music Michael J Veloso wrote for it, but now I'm thinking that maybe I should have.
We've seen The Winter's Tale three times now, and two of the productions were good. And, of those two -- Actors' Shakespeare Project and Theatre@First -- I think I liked this one somewhat better.
Remaining shows:
Thursday April 30 8:00pm
Friday May 1 8:00pm
Saturday May 2 8:00pm
Unity Church of God
6 William Street, Somerville, MA 02144
$12/ticket |
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| Actual review to follow |
[Apr. 29th, 2009|11:44 pm] |
Lis and I just came back from seeing the Theater@First production of The Winter's Tale, which I'll write up in a bit.
But, driving home, we were talking. Lis was talking about Leontes and Polixnes growing up together, and a couple of their lines early on, and she said, "Leontes/Polixnes -- Rule 34?"
IAN: It would add another layer of depth to Leontes' jealousy. . . on the other hand, it would create an obvious solution . . .
LIS: Three-way?
IAN: Yup. And Hermione would go along with it, even if she didn't really want to, for Leontes' sake.
LIS: She's just that kind of sub.
IAN: How many other Shakespeare plots can be derailed with kinky sex?
LIS: Dream is obvious. . . you know, come to think of it, Paulina HAD to bring that carving to life.
IAN: Oh?
LIS: Otherwise, it would have been statuatory rape. |
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| Talk Like Shakespeare Day |
[Apr. 23rd, 2009|01:39 pm] |
Today is Speakest Thou Like Shakespeare Day!
The observèd day of our Bard's birth
April 23 -- Saint George's Day --
Is a day that Will might have been born
So, for lack of a better choice,
We choose this day to celebrate his birth.
And one way in which we celebrate
Is to speak, today, in ways he might have done.
And, according to our own dear papersky,
It's also a day for online works --
Literature in electronic forms
Available for free, for all to read.
Today's a day we celebrate
A Pixel-Stained and Technopeasant Wretch
So, let's all raise a glass and toast and drink
To those who write on screens as well as ink. |
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| Mumps in the modern First World. |
[Apr. 21st, 2009|07:36 pm] |
So, nine students at Northeastern University have mumps. At LEAST nine students. One of whom has been hospitalized.
I seem to remember that, when I went to college, I had to present proof that I'd had my measles-mumps-rubella shots. Do they no longer require that? When did they stop?
If all nine of these students are from third-world countries where childhood vaccinations are unavailable, then I have deep sympathy for them.
If any of them are from odd religious cults that forbid modern medicine, then I'm weirded out, but somewhat tolerant.
If any of them are from normal, middle-to-upper-class American backgrounds and their parents chose not to have them vaccinated, well, I kind of hope that this results in sterility for them. It's not fair to THEM that they have moronic parents, but their genetic line needs to be truncated, anyway.
EDITED TO ADD: According to what people are saying, I forgot the actual most likely situation.
If the mumps vaccine doesn't take in 5% of cases, well, shit happens. Looks like I was being all angry and hostile at PEOPLE when I should have been angry and hostile at STATISTICS. Could well be that all those people DID have all their shots. And that 95% of the people who were exposed to the mumps were immune. And that those nine people who got sick are just that other 5%.
Now I feel kinda bad at ill-thinking people who were most likely just the victims of statistics. |
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| Some Pesach thoughts |
[Apr. 21st, 2009|11:04 am] |
- This Pesach, I had to do something I'd not had to do before -- throw out my shaving cream and moisturizing lotion. They had oatmeal in them. Stuff works great, but is unquestionably chametz. (Anything with wheat, oats, barley, rye, or spelt that ISN'T matzah is chametz. Aveeno products with Natural Colloidal Oatmeal pretty definitely count.) I'm glad to get back to my preferred brand: not putting oatmeal on my face for a week was much more difficult for me than not putting it in my face.
- I can think of two GOOD consequences of the custom of kitnyot (Rabbis in Eastern Europe decided to treat beans, legumes, corn, and rice as if they were chametz, as well, even though they're not -- that custom is called "kitnyot". Therefore, in the United States and other areas, people whose ancestors came from those ancestors still follow that custom, and people whose ancestors are from Spain, France, northern Africa, and other places don't have the custom.)
First is Pesach Coke. Since corn syrup is made from corn, it's kitnyot (except for people who follow the ruling that it's not). So, for one week a year, you can get, in the United States, Coca-Cola with sugar instead of HFCS. Tastier, and, as we're finding out, somewhat less unhealthy. Somewhat.
Second is the Maxwell House Haggadah. In 1937, General Foods put together a decent, bare-bones Haggaddah with a big ole Maxwell House Coffee logo on the front.
Why?
Because they wanted to get the word out that coffee "beans" were actually berries, and therefore not kitnyot, and therefore, Ashkenazic Jews could still drink coffee on Pesach. So they made a real simple, real cheap Haggaddah which they gave away free with purchase of certified-kosher-for-Passover-Maxwell-House products. And they still do so today.
And this means that ANY Jewish family -- or non-Jewish family that is interested in the Passover Seder -- can get a cheap free, perfectly serviceable Haggaddah so they can have a seder. Are there better haggadot out there? Heck, yes. Pretty much every haggadah out there is better in some way or another -- because Maxwell House sets the baseline. If you're not better than the free one, you don't play. And, because the free one is perfectly acceptable, it means that EVERY haggadah has to be at least that usable. And it wouldn't exist without a coffee company needing to let people know that coffee isn't made from actual beans.
- I don't follow the laws of kitnyot for myself. And Lis does, and I respect that. So we don't have kitnyot in the house. But, if one doesn't follow the rules of kitnyot, one has to actually actively not follow the rules of kitnyot at some point during Pesach.
I had a bartending gig during Pesach at the MIT Faculty club. Okay, on the last day of Pesach. (Which is technically a holiday on which one is not supposed to work. Ooops. But the gig didn't really get going until after sunset. So, even though I STARTED work before Pesach ended, I didn't actually handle any beers until AFTER Pesach . . . ) Before my shift, I got food at the nearby food court.
I got ma po tofu over steamed rice. No chametz, nothing treif, but 100% kitnyot. I thought that was amusing.
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| Robins are almost SWARMING my neighborhood. |
[Apr. 21st, 2009|10:37 am] |
Seriously. I don't think I've EVER seen this many robins in this area. I passed a dozen within the last block of my drive home.
And the red-tailed hawk population continues to do well.
The thing is -- growing up in the Seventies and Eighties, I think I almost never saw a hawk. The population of urban raptors really didn't start to recover, that I saw, until the Nineties. So, even though Lis and I see four or five hawks every day that I drive her to work -- that's four or five DIFFERENT hawks, that we see twice, once driving to, and once driving from work -- we're STILL excited by every single one.
And robins are the same way for me.
I think Lis and I grew up during an ecological disaster, out of which we are now recovering. Which is one of the reasons I'm mildly an environmentalist -- I grew up during an environmental disaster; I don't want another one. |
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| The Superheroine Monologues |
[Apr. 19th, 2009|11:04 pm] |
Lis and I saw The Superheroine Monologues at The Boston Playwrights' Theatre today. (Downtown, near BU.)
It's a sort of parody of The Vagina Monologues, I suspect, though, having never seen The Vagina Monologues, I can't be sure. All I can do is take it on its own merits as an experimental play. And, as such, it works. Mostly.
It's a series of eight scenes, each set in a different decade, each with a different superheroine telling her story. Each decade having a different way that the culture interacts with women -- and specifically, strong women, such as superheroines. And I felt that about four of the scenes really worked. And the other four? Well, none were bad, but they weren't up to the others.
( Read more... ) |
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