Regarding the Engadget Mystery Box - I'm still sitting on a post about it; however, because the world stopped caring about Iran all of a sudden, as well as the fact that I had swine flu or something half of last week, as well as etc. etc. etc. bawww, I have not finished said post yet and have not set up an ebay auction and still don't know where to donate the eventual ebay proceeds.

( Instead, have a boring life update! )

"Friends in Need", the Little Story That Could, has at long last gone live in the first issue of the relaunch of e-magazine Tekka. Many thanks to Mark Bernstein for tracking me down last year and asking to read it. :)


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*okayenoughbeingprofessionalsqueeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee* <3

Whodathunk that something I drafted in the beginning of '03 would still be making the rounds six years later?




Someday, somehow, I will write again.

- Weekend plans: Carpooling up to housewarming in NewYorkNewYork by way of Swarthmore. Friday I have a doctor's appointment and then alexpshenichkin, arctangent and I drive to Philly. There I'm assuming hanging out will happen (at least of a Jamisonian persuasion) and crash space will be found. Saturday we ditch Alex's car in Swat for 24 hours and zip up to NYC with Jamison for house(mumbly_joe)warming, and crashing happens once again. Sunday we Megabus back to Philly, find the car and drive home.

- arctangent is even now on his long and perilous way to the East Coast, yay! Example of peril: mechanical trouble*, meaning a switched flight, meaning now he's coming into the airport that's 40 minutes away by car, at night, instead of the one that's 15 minutes away by train, in the evening. Am being bad and skipping karate again tonight, since I won't have the energy for both an hour of strenuous exercise AND an airport run. Though I was already considering it because I am freaking exhausted. Also almost my entire morning tomorrow is booked solid with meetings and such so I have to get to bed as early as possible. Bleh.

- Need another worksnack because I am ridiculously sick of cereal bars. They're either solid granola (a texture I dislike) or so cloyingly sweet I almost gag when I eat them now. I'm thinking almonds.

- Thinking about registering [my name].net (.com has been camped since 2000 and damn if I'm going to give some camptard money) and making, like, a real website, even a bare-bones one. It doesn't cost that much and I've been itching to get back into web-design dabblery.

- Have started carrying a notebook again thanks to, of all people, David Sedaris. It's mostly shopping lists ("ibuprofen, flashlight batteries") and crazy ideas ("INVEST IN ZEPPELINS") but I find I actually enjoy having it around now that I don't feel like I have to keep a journal in it all the time. Bonus!Creative!Ideas need lots of cruft in which to nest.

*EDIT: There was no mechanical trouble, he was just faking me out so he could surprise me. Jerk. :P At least I didn't have to drive to Dulles.

Because I am busy and/or stupid, I wrote a couple of "haikus" (conforming to bastardized English basic 5-7-5 structure but pretty much nothing else of traditional Japanese poetry) for an agency-wide contest, then missed the deadline to submit them. The theme was "promoting environmental awareness". Lest they languish forever in well-deserved obscurity, ( here they are. )

Remember my post about TheGreatHatsby? Well, I forgot all about it for a while, but I decided this morning to see what had been happening for the past eight days. It appears that the community started for "hatting" victims has already descended into chaos and betrayal. The more you dig, the more confusing it gets, and we see only parts of the story, mostly enacted over AIM and transcribed to LJ. Some people are hailing The Hatmaster as a sort of internet deity, others are decrying him/them as stupid pranksters, but at heart it appears to be a simple experiment in social engineering gone slightly out of control. (Although they do appear to have made a good effort to control it.) The community's been around less than two weeks and already it's had schisms, heretics, cults and merchandising. I can't say I'm not tempted, my shriveled little obscure-novelty-t-shirt-collector heart racing at the thought of being one of maybe a thousand people in the entire world who truly understands what the fuck I'm wearing, but I don't like white shirts as a rule. >.>

I just want to point out that if I went back in time, to, say, 1970, and pulled even the most credulous SF reader aside to say "In 36 years, the Internet will exist and people will receive strange messages from artificial intelligences under human control and then band together via electronic billboards to explore the heart of this mystery," they would probably say, "Hey, nice character-oriented story, very New Wave, yah, but could you make it at least a little feasible?"

Still, there's gotta be a story in here somewhere. This is like an ur-SF short, all the ideas there but garbled and out of order. People are amazing(ly convoluted/weird/stupid) creatures. :)

( D&D - no fanfic, just thoughts. )

( Random creativity keeps me sane. )

EDIT: Jesus McFuck. My neighbor, his long-suffering guitar, and what sounds like a dying okapi are at it again. Does he not realize that he can't sing to save his life? He can play the guitar passably well, so he can't be entirely tone-deaf, right? Argh. Retreating to Alex's room.

...In which I mostly waved my arms and blathered at him for a little over an hour about a multitude of subjects. So many ideas! So much to write! I half-pitched a story to him as "magic realism, but with robots", but realized later that I couldn't remember exactly what magic realism is, only that reading it gives me the same sort of brain-feeling as this story I'm planning to write. So now I have to look it up and read some Borges or Marquez or something and figure out whether I really want to write the story in this style.

( Conclusions, arrived at over iced tea on a warm spring day )

Shit. Now I want it to be summer. Damn you, homework! *shakes fist*

( CASSIE! WE'RE GOING BACK TO FLORIDA!!!!!! )

...!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

:):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):):)

Woke up, went to a rather disorganized SWILMeeting which nevertheless proved enjoyable. Went to D&D, where the party stormed the giant bone-tower (construction phallus!) and massacred a bunch of minions. The wraiths proved rather difficult, but everyone breathed a huge sigh of relief after Alex remembered that you get a Fortitude save to resist those eight points of Constitution drain (happened to two people in a row!). Finally, met a giant, hyperintelligent fish from the beginning of time, which had been captive in the tower for perhaps several thousand years. Which is pretty much an eyeblink to a halfway-immortal entity, but it wanted out - we agreed to free it if it would answer all our questions. We asked it all sorts of things, and will probably think of more things throughout the week, and it said some interesting stuff, though nothing with a direct bearing on the major boss battle we're about to enter in a few minutes/next Saturday.

I grumped about people leaving early in the previous post. Let me clarify: I feel like we lost considerable momentum over break, and it takes us a while to get up to speed. We're getting better about it every week, but I feel like we spend a lot of time building dramatic tension and then just let it all go when it's time to leave. There are always extenuating circumstances, but if we could plan a longer session for a week we know is going to be pretty intensive, then we could steamroll right into major battles instead of doing all the buildup and then wandering away.

I keep feeling the homework itch, but I'm determined not to do any on my birthday. Relax, dammit!

(But I can't, because it seems like everyone I know is angry about something or at someone and I don't know why or how to help. Alex says that early February is always the time when everyone is horrible to each other, but I've never noticed this before, or if I did then I don't remember it. And, dammit, that can't be true! The worst part is when I think I can fix it. If I could find the answer, a few more data points, a working hypothesis, a statistical relation in the complex or simply imaginary variables of social glue, then I wouldn't feel like such a horrible friend this evening. I try to play the asshole, but I love you, I love you all, and I want you to be happy more than anything in the world.)

Gack! Thhthpbthh! I think I swallowed some angst!water. Time to hole up with some South Park and rediscover schaudenfreude. Screw you guys, I'm going home.

Happy Goddamn Birthday.

( My thought process in the shower last night, in abbreviated form )

So now I'm thinking about The Novel again, and this one snippet of text has opened up a whole can of worms relating to Knock's culture, festivals, social acceptance of divorce, close-knit poor communities, etc. Maybe I'll post a bit on the Sweepers, the ones who come out every night to clean the streets of the continual rain of black dust which drops on the city at all hours. They're so goddamn awesome.

Now, though, it is time to watch Serenity. ON DVD OMGHOLYCRAP.

I haven't written an English paper since high school. Even then, my teacher gave me free reign, often letting me turn in stories in lieu of "actual work". All this has returned to bite me in the ass - this week I couldn't for the life of me remember how papers happen, and have spent portions of the past several days angsting about how in the world I'm going to write the damn thing. It's not even that long, maybe seven pages.

But this evening, sitting down and forcing myself to really think about what to write, I found old mental muscles flexing, working out the kinks. Oh, right. It's an English paper. I can pick a vaguely-analytical-but-interesting topic like "How Angela Carter Turns a Regular Fairy Tale into a Modern Fairy Tale", compare-contrast-and-bullshit for several thousand words, and finish up with something about feminism. It's not hard, just annoying. Maybe I can write the first draft tonight. Although I should really go to bed earlier than usual so I can get up early to take that physics exam, which gives me the afternoon and evening to study for the other physics exam, clean up/entirely rewrite the story-for-class, and skim everything having to do with my Short Story in the US exam Thursday afternoon.

I'm leaving Friday, around noon. While I'm not particularly looking forward to leaving all my friends and favorite activities for a month, the cool-down will be greatly appreciated. By the end of the semester I always feel like I should pour icewater on my head to keep my brain from overheating.

I have many, many half-formed plans for next semester which need to coalesce into real plans so that I can begin to implement them before I again become tired and busy. SWIL. Holy shit. I'm president of my favorite club. We need to make plans. What fun and awesome activities are we going to have for meetings? What should we use for lottery prizes? The concept of illustrating SWILNews fills me with excitement. There need to be more amusing SWIL-sponsored events. We need to decorate the bulletin board, and keep it updated, and shit I should read the Panic Book again because there is administrivia for us to do. The presidents need to figure out a good way to always keep each other appraised of what administrivia is getting done, something as simple as always CCing emails to the presidents mailing list.

Let's see that again, Instant Replay:
1) Meeting activities - make interesting but not disruptive.
2) Events - need more (esp. on-campus).
3) Board - decorate! Update!
4) SWILNews themes? Unnecessary, but fun!
5) Read Panic Book to more fully understand pre-semester responsibilities.

Crazy-Ass Idea #1, since it's not really too early to be thinking about something in mid-February:

lula_vampiro, remember that idea you threw out last year about the Ninjagram service? What if, in lieu of creating and maintaining a time-consuming service which is always available, we made Ninjagrams a Valentine's Day event? We could advertise, even table. Give us money, write something or email this special address (ninjagram at swil.org?) with the text and pertinent information about your intended, and then the afternoon/evening before Valentine's Day (so as not to conflict with the Massacre), a small group of highly-trained nerds with black t-shirts over their faces goes around hand-delivering printed notes. If we can't find the recipient, we slip it under the door. If we track them down, then perhaps we leap out and yell "Ninjagram!" or some such silliness, but instead of assassinating them, we hand them their note, bow, and leave without another word. I might be biased because I find the pop-culture conception of ninja quite amusing, but I think there is nearly infinite potential for hilarity here.

The fee would be small. We could pick a charity, even include it in our advertising. For example, if we chose the Animal Coalition of Delaware County: "Ninja for Kittens". "Ninja for Puppies." We could also work with any number of campus organizations on this. Thing is, in spite of my only SWILTitle, I would probably not have time to organize all this and would need a trusted ninja lieutenant to handle the logistics. This will, of course, be brought up in Meeting.

Hell, if it's popular, we could even try it again next year, but I don't want to get my hopes up too much.

[[10/5/09 - NINNNNNNNNNJAGUURAMMMMMM!!!]]

And this is my fandom. Joy!

( Philcon Friday report )

This was the first year I made it on a Friday; it was interesting to see the con setting up instead of winding down. Next year, perhaps, I might even see it in full swing. I was thinking of going back today as well as tomorrow, but while wasting two solid days on fannish activities is fine, I draw the line at three. Instead I'm going to work on my paper, my story-for-class, and my assloads of physics, like a good student. Not going screw around on the internet and work on the OTHER story. Nuh-uh. Not going to doodle, either.

[[10/4/09 - I never really feel like I fit in at cons anymore, but I do miss them. Maybe they'll be in the budget sometime soon.]]

Ah, Shakespeare. I would fain bear thy offspring if thou wert not dead.

As you may have guessed, the physics midterm? Not so good. I figure I get to bomb one test a semester, and this was it. I need to talk to Amy about extra credit to see if I can try to bump my grade a little, because I'm fairly sure that "I can do problems and research and will work my ass off for you but I fall apart completely on written exams for no apparent reason" isn't going to cut it with the major grad schools. I decided to treat it like a phobia this time around, and tried to deal with it the way I deal with spiders - namely, I imagined the exam as a spider the size of a large dog, and proceeded to mentally beat the crap out of it. Unfortunately, this did not help my ability to do problems while sleep-deprived.

( My weekend in a nutshell. )

Does anyone have an old magnetic poetry set they would be willing to donate for science? Jerome brought back a set of American Physical Society magnetic poetry from the conference last week and, while containing such hilariously unusable words such as "tokamak" and "American", it sadly lacks most of those words which glue a sentence together. I may try to purchase a cheap set somewhere (the bookstore?) but it would be even cooler if we could get it for free. The Physics Common Room is going to have some culture, dammit!

We inaugurated the set with some creative efforts.

deathbysnusnu: Heheheh.

"Dirty peer fusion with biological fluid."

Me: Uncultured swine. *haughty sniff*

"She is time and science
A fiery perturbation
In each excited state."

I want to tell the world how beautiful physics can be.

[[4/30/09 - lol title pun.]]

I have a cold that is making me miserable. I'm sneezing constantly and sometimes my inner ear goes crazy and I can't stand up.

I have some physics due tomorrow, and I was so busy with the physics due today that I haven't started it yet. Big surprise there. :/

However, tomorrow is the SWILoween get-together, and the day after that is D&D, SWILMeeting AND inaugural Parrish Parlours gaming to celebrate the fact that Parrish Parlours exist again. My ulterior motive, of course, is that most of campus is coming to ML Saturday night to trash the place in the name of "Halloween Party", so I'm going to purposely suppress mental images of my home burning to the ground and go to campus in order to be as far away from said party as humanly possible. My one reason for looking forward to this is that if enough drunken assholes get arrested this year, they're totally never having a gigantic party here again. *crosses fingers*

Thus, life is pretty good. I have to write a Beowulf-related story this weekend. Maybe I'm just paranoid, but I feel like every time Craig mentions that nobody has yet written the definitive story of Grendel's Mom, he gives me a Significant Look. I'm just not feeling Grendel's Mom. She's too amorphous to really understand from the original poem; it's like building a character from the ground up John Gardner-style, and right now I don't have a quarter of the energy required to do that. Creation is an exhausting process. However, I feel like Craig has certain expectations, and that because he is grading me for this, I should at least consider attempting to meet them. Maybe on Sunday night when I'm starting to get desperate...maybe. Right now I'm thinking of something short and philosophical about Beowulf the Diplomat rather than Beowulf the Big Strong Asshole, and my head is killing me, so I'm going to sleep.

[[4/30/09 - I ended up writing something short and philosophical about Beowulf the self-loathing diplomat that I don't think anyone liked but me. I still like it, though. I can't remember whether this was the last year of the ML Halloween Party or whether there was another one.]]

A quickie-doodle before physics eats my brain for the rest of the evening. Rawley vs. a cat, and yes, the melodrama is all his.

( Cats get to pick where they sit, end of story. )

( I don't do this often, but - a meme. XP )

October Break is coming, and with it the first wave of midterms. Took a 24-hour break from physics, which somehow fixed all of my homework-related angst. The fact that I was writing instead of calculating probably has something to do with it. The story is not as polished as I would like, but as I had approximately two minutes to proofread before our supposed deadline, I think it turned out all right. Cranked out a passable set of four fragments which, when overlapped and interwoven, tell some version of the full story of Beauty and the Beast from two different perspectives in four similar but distinct universes. Do I just enjoy screwing with my readers?

( Yes, yes, I do. Here is the first fragment in its 'entirety.' )

I resumed physics this evening to find my head clearer and my understanding greater than when I last put it down. Finished Coyote Cowgirl, a coming-of-age quest which I would never have looked at twice - had it not been reviewed in F&SF a while back, had it not been enticingly cheap at ICFA last March. I started skeptically, but the direct and seemingly unpracticed prose quickly grew on me, and it metamorphosed into a page-turner. When I finished, I felt lighter, happier. I returned home to learn of sorcerygenius and skalja's fuzzy little visitor, whom I shall visit at the first opportunity, in spite of the fact that they live just about as far away from ML as is humanly possible. *shakes fist* Just realized that I'm the local kitten-rearing expert - how did that happen?

I slept late this morning, so I guess I'll buckle down and do some more physics for a while. I have an English exam on Thursday, but I just can't summon any sort of angst about it - bullshit about Eudora Welty for an hour? Hell, I'll do that for free, no grades attached. I'll study, of course, but I refuse to get excited. I really need to roll around in some more of her work - my mental librarian says I have a "complete works" collection of hers sitting on the bottom shelf of my "Read Urgently" bookcase...Ah, the joys of being a collector. One is never without material.

*sigh* Eating stale Special K straight from the box is all well and good, but this stuff is starting to taste a little odd. I should probably find myself another snack food until I can make a grocery run.

[[4/19/09 - That fragment turned into "Your Silver Eyes", which was a runner-up in the Dell Award the year I didn't attend. I've never tried to sell it, because it still feels broken and incomplete somehow.]]

"Write down the first sentence or paragraph of every work of fiction you've currently got sitting in a file waiting for you to finish it." This is actually an embarrassingly long list, so I'll just post some highlights:

( Some Highlights. )