Robert recalls:
This may be my favorite issue of Muse, starting with the cover, which I discovered in an out-of-print Tolkien calendar just as Muse‘s editors were despairing of finding affordable Middle-earth art. Inside, Nancy Kangas introduced Ble, Larry Gonick extended his “Kokopelli & Company” LotR parody through the whole issue, and there were articles on Middle-earth languages (including a handy Elvish phrasebook), special effects in the movies, and dragons — great fun all around.
Ideas for future random threads are still welcome.
And lo! The magazine that brought me to Muse! My friend brought it to school, and I read almost the whole thing and decided I wanted to get the magazine too, even though I didn’t subscribe to anything else. A tipping point in my life, considering how long I’ve been here now.
Wow, it’s May already!
I was trying to figure out why there was a new picture…..Then I realized that it was a new month. o.0
Also, reason I came here: I just realized my surgery professor has a Kokopelli belt buckle, lol
So, random question. Is it just me, or does the blog move at a much slower pace now than it used to (as in, fewer number of posts per day)? Because I feel like it used to be, I’d check in in the morning, and by the end if the day all the comments in the recent comments bar would be new, when now I might come back in 2 days, and there are still comments Ive seen in the bar. I actually kind of like it
Luna: It’s not your imagination. We’re getting about one-third as many posts per day as we were a year ago.
Oh good. I’m not going crazy, then.
Huh. I guess these things go in cycles. I remember when people were complaining about the blog going too fast.
I actually really, really enjoy the fact that the blog has slowed down again. I stopped posting here for a long time because I felt that there were too many new people I didn’t know and the blog was moving way too fast for me to check in once every day or two and still keep track of everything that was going on. I like the pace that it’s at now — it feels very homey and closed-in and laid-back (which I suspect it is, since our in-trickle of new MBers seems to have gradually slowed to a complete stop since the ‘blog was taken off Google).
Luna – I was just thinking that too!
So, wow, it’s May. I’d be quite happy to wake up and for it to be June already. May equals exam month equals cram season.
My first oral exam is tomorrow; my first written exam in less than two weeks. Somebody please just throw me in a pond or something.
Aside from all the stress though, I’m in an inexplicably good mood. It results in an odd combination of contentment and panic.
I know the feeling. I have four finals over the next two days and it’s insanely stressful, but I’m actually in a brilliant mood. Which is weird, because its not like finishing these finals means summer vacation, it instead means 8 more weeks of school before vacation, with even harder classes
I hope all of your exams go well for you! Oral exams sound terrifying
Good luck for your finals! My last exams are on the 23rd, so…three weeks of hell to get through, and then I’m free(er).
Oral exams in Chinese are horrid, because it’s a surprise topic and I worry I won’t have the vocabulary. However, we do get 15 minutes to prepare for a 5-minute conversation, which should be enough time. I’m much less (ie not at all) worried for my French oral, which is next Tuesday.
Agh, you poor thing- but I’m glad you are, at least for the moment, feeling good! June is just four weeks away. You can do it.
Thank you, Chok. My self-made exam revision timetable is up on my wall now. They’re all I can afford to think about until the 24th. If I seem a little manic in the next few weeks, you’ll all know why.
My blogiversary is on April 30, but the thread always closes so I am shamelessly hijacking the new May thread.
Five years. Wow! MuseBlog has made my life better. It might have changed it, too. Thank you all for being there for each other!
Happy 5th blogiversary!
Thank you for being here too!
Happy Blogiversary!
Yay, new thread!
On another note, some of my English class and I went to see a production of “Much Ado About Nothing!” I really really liked it: the actress who played Beatrice was spot-on, and the scenes in the garden were priceless.
I am thrilled that Elon Musk is a TIME 100 Most Influential honoree (For the second time, which I can’t recall any other science-related person having done before), with extra happy points because he’s on one of the issue’s variant covers, and a few more happy points because he’s listed not under “Pioneers”, but “Titans”, which seems to suggest the difference between emerging and having arrived.
Also, super stoked that said “Pioneers” section includes Curiosity mission scientists Richard Cook and Peter Theisinger and asteroid tracker Don Yeomans. Between all of them AND Gabrielle Giffords in the “Icons” section, it’s like a spacy takeover of the list!
Plus, Aung San Suu Kyi and Malala Yousafzai (who rocks another of the variant covers– the issue I happened to pick up in the convenience store had her variant as the front one.)
Oh my space squids the school year is almost over.
And then, if all goes to plan, Nebraska… I have a hard time believing summer vacation is so close.
Oh sweet koko the semester wil end in a few weeks whether I’m ready for it or not (hint: I’m not. At least not academically, emotionally I’ve been over this semester for awhile). Also in a couple weeks I will be 21, again whether I’m ready for that or not (hint: I’m not). I’m excited, because it’s my birthday and because it’s one of those legal milestone ones, even though I don’t think it’ll actually change my habits all that much.
Que existential crises and too much stuff happening to deal with and no sleep.
In which Fern only writes half of the comment she meant to do.
Warning: sentimentality ahead
This was my first issue of Muse. I remember being really disappointed, because I wasn’t a LOTR fan despite my attempts to be. I thought the articles were super interesting though, which gave me hope but I also felt like I didn’t really have the right to be interested in them because while I was fascinated with the creation of a language for a story and the programming that went into computer-generated “actors” for massive battle scenes, the main subject was something I was nowhere near as into as everyone else who’d be reading the same articles.
Since that time I’d like to think that I’ve gotten a better grip on not feeling ashamed for being interested (or not) in things, and Muse was one of the ways I learned to do that.
This is where I really start getting disgustingly feelings-y
Also the other day I found myself thinking about Museblog and its effect on my life, and realized again how profound your presence has been in making me who I am. I came to Museblog at a time when my “irl” social life was nearly nonexistent, so the ‘blog became my main outlet for connecting to people my age, to bouncing ideas off of people, for expressing myself, and for having fun with friends. That was about 7 years ago, and some of the people who originally flung pastries at me have become people that I genuinely consider some of my best friends, both online and in real life. I still talk to you guys, we still get together whenever possible to be together in person, and not only have you witnessed a lot of major changes in my life, you’ve supported me through them, and for that I am eternally grateful.
So, even though we’re virtual friends, the impact you’ve had and continue to have on my life is very real.
OKAY ENOUGH EMOTIONS.
Thanks y’all.
(Also, froods, it’s been a long time since I’ve seen any HPBs around here. We have awesome emoticons available ONLY HERE, let’s bring ’em back, yeah? GROSS NOSTALGIA, AWW YISS!
)
♥ ♥ ♥ ♥
The first paragraph there is also a description of me, except for it being my first issue.
Waah… i noticed that too, Luna
The blog is becoming a place to just post your problems and random things to brag about.
No, no, no, no. It’s becoming a place inhabited by a small group of close friends who can carry on a conversation and keep up with each other, instead of it being full of so many people posting so many things it’s not possible to even begin to get know everyone and know who they are.
I really like it better at a slower pace like it is now, because when I was last on, it was being inundated by posts from dozens of people (most of whom were new-ish), and it was very overwhelming.
To clarify: I didn’t mean to suggest that having posts from newish people was bad, just that there were so many posts from newish people that I couldn’t even begin to get to know them.
I find it depressing how I’d totally forgotten about the last few people who posted. As in, I remembered them once I was reminded, but that’s it.
But if I had something left to protect, whatever it matters compared to what some have, I’d agree with you. So I guess I just agree with you.
Yeesh, maybe this is the wrong thread.
So, confession, one of those ones that might get you pied on the ‘blog, a bit like confessing you’ve never read H2G2 (which, actually, come to think of it, I’ve only read 2 of them, at most……). I’ve never read any of Neil Gaiman’s books, quite honestly, I’m not even sure if I”d heard of him before he was writing the episode “Doctor’s Wife” for Doctor Who two years ago (wow, has it really been two years? Time passes too fast), and at that time “everyone” on the blog was freaking about how amazing he was and how it was so awesome that he was doing Doctor Who, etc.
So I liked his episode and my understanding is that at least some of what he writes is fantasy, which is my preferred genre. And basically, if I have time this summer, I want to get back into reading. Before starting college and realizing just how many hours of television there was to watch and that could be watched in one day (I watched over half of Firefly in one day, and went through one or more seasons of US shows in under a week in undergrad), and before starting vet school where there just in’t *time* to read, I used to read at least half a dozen books a week, if not more. Now? I’ve maybe read half a dozen books in the past year. Maybe. And I want to get back into reading, because it’s fun and brilliant, etc, and so basically, to get to the point, I’ve heard good things about him, liked his Who episode, and like fantasy. Any suggestions on which of his books to read, or even completely unrelated books it the fantasy genre?
I know a lot of you like Terry Pratchett, but I dunno, I tried a couple of his books, and never really got into it, but maybe I wasn’t reading the right ones.
So basically, fantasy novel/series/author/etc suggestions. I’m sure some of y’all’s suggestions I will have read, but I’m sure others I won’t have, or possibly haven’t even heard of, so….
((can you tell I have exams to be studying for? you know, by the fact that I”m writing long posts on here instead……))
Hm. As far as Gaiman goes… Stardust, Neverwhere, and American Gods were all fantasy novels I enjoyed, though American Gods was a bit more ponderous than the other two so you may not want to start with that one.
Can you give us some examples of fantasy novels you have enjoyed, to get a feel for tone?
You know whenever somebody asks you a question that you know you should know an answer to, and then your mind completely blanks and you can’t remember anything about the subject the person was inquiring about? Yeah.
But let me see if I can think of some of the authors/series I have read and enjoyed…..
Harry Potter
LOTR
Narnia
Mercedes Lackey’s fantasy books, pretty much a nything she write (just realized she has several new books I haven’t read, plus some old ones that my library did’t have that I don’t think I ever read…..)
Tamora Pierce’s book when I was a teen (Circle of Magic, Circle Opens, Alanna, and I forget the other series’ names, but there were several)
Anne McCafferey’s Acorna series, but I never really got into Dragonriders of Pern, perhaps I was too young when I tried to read them
Wizard of Oz (loved all the non-official offshoots when I was a preteen, haven’t read any of them in ages)
Eragorn (I liked the first two, and then never got to reading the next one, b/c I couldn’t remember the content of the first two very well and didn’t have time to reread them)
I know I’ve read about a thousand zillion more series/books than that, but that’s all I can think of off the top of my head.
also the diana wynne jones books that I ahve read (I especially recall enjoyig dark lord of derkholm)
enchanted forest chronicles by patricia C wrede. *loved* that series.
princess and the goblin (george mcdonald)
Brian Jacques’ redwall books (not exactly fantasy, I guess,but still)
John bellairs Louis Barnavelt books (which apparently there are a lot more of those than I ever read or even knew exacted…..the wonders of the internet…..)
I don’t remember which series, but some of David Eddings fantasy books
And I need to stop avoiding studying….my first exam is in less than 9 hours and I have lots more studying to do….. bleh
hunger games
is this a good time to talk about when I was between the ages of eight and twelve, and my mother took me to the used bookstore and asked the person who worked there for books with strong female leads, and somehow I ended up with the Vows and Honor series by Mercedes Lackey? (those are the ones with Tarma and Kethry). I mean, I still love them, but those are not exactly children’s books in content.
Also if you like Anne McCaffrey and haven’t read anything in Dragonriders of Pern you could start with her young adult Pern books, the Harper Hall trilogy (Dragonsong/Dragonsinger/Dragondrums). I remember liking those, but looking back on them the main character was a bit whiny.
You could take a look at other books by Patricia Wrede, she wrote Mairelon the Magician/Magician’s Ward, or the Sorcery and Cecelia aka Enchanted Chocolate Pot book she co-wrote with Caroline Stevermer, which both took place in fantastical London.
I completely understand where you’re coming from, though — I took out four young adult books from the library last week, three of which I’d already read multiple times. (for those who are curious: So Yesterday and The Last Days, both by Scott Westerfeld; Homeland, Cory Doctorow’s sequel to Little Brother [I’m giving him one more chance to interest me after the disappointment that was Rapture of the Nerds]; and The Diamond Age, Neal Stephenson, which I don’t actually expect to finish.) Finals do that sort of thing to you.
Diamond Age isn’t exactly young adult.. Also Cory Doctorow and Scott Westerfield have the same problem, which is that they have these amazing setups and then can’t finish them off in any sort of satisfying manner.
You’re right about The Diamond Age, although the main character is a young adult… I just grouped it in mentally for some reason and now I’m not sure why.
My problem with Cory Doctorow is that his fiction all feels the same. It’s like, I think he’s thinking, “I don’t know what to do with this main character… maybe they should be… unfairly imprisoned? or maybe lose something incredibly important to them? Yeah, sounds about right.” When I went to a talk he gave it was interesting, though… if I don’t like Homeland I’ll probably give up on his fiction regardless of how interesting his ideas are(and from the blurb on the back of it, that seems likely).
And I can see where you’re coming from with Scott Westerfeld, but I still really enjoy his earlier works. So Yesterday is one of my favorite young adult books, I think it was more satisfying than the trilogies of his I’ve read (Uglies, Midnighters).
Stephenson said in Some Remarks that he doesn’t give more speeches or correspond regularly because the quality or quantity of his work would diminish. Doctorow decidedly walks the other side of that line.
Oh, so basically like the last two Doctor Who episodes?
I think I was probably around 12 or 13 when I checked out one of the Valdemar books from the library (actually, I think my mom may have checked it out, by means of pulling random fantasy books off the shelf). It was the first book in the Mage Storms trilogy, I believe (one of the very last trilogies in the internal chronological order). I remember being very confused when it was implied that two of the characters were involved with each other, because I had been sure that they had been both referred to as male earlier in the story. ((I’m sure I was aware that same-sex couples existed, at least on some level, but I don’t think I’d ever read any books, or really even heard it talked about much, thus spending 15 minutes looking back through the chapter trying to figure out why I thought they were both male, b/c that couldn’t be possible. And then it was like, oh, huh, I wasn’t wrong. Okay. Whatevs. *continues reading* Actually, I think those books may have had a big part in shaping my view on homosexuality and it just being not a big deal. Anyway. random tangent.))
I read a couple books in the Pern series, but I don’t remember which ones. They never really drew me in, but I think I was probably under 10 years old when I tried, so that could have played a big part in it.
I’ll definitely have to look int Wrede’s other books.
I was the exact same with Eragon.
Try: Pamela Dean’s Tam Lin, Patricia Wrede’s other books (I’d start with the Mairelon books but I forgot what the omnibus of them is called. I think it might be called A Matter of Magic?) Have you read Sabriel by Garth Nix? When the King Comes Home by Caroline Stevermer. The Priviledge of the Sword by Ellen Kushner. Kalpa Imperial by Theodora Goss. The Secret History of Moscow by Ekaterina Sedia. Un Lun Dun by China Mieville.
For Neil Gaiman, Stardust is straight-up-fairy-tale-happy-pretty-fantasy. I would also say it’s not really representative of his writing. American Gods is, I think, his heavy-hitter and it’s a really great book – you may have some trouble with it if you’re religious in a conservative way, I don’t know. Neverwhere is basically an immature American Gods. Anansi Boys is in some ways a continuation of American Gods, but it’s a great story in its own right. The Graveyard Book is written for younger people so it’s an easy read, but it’s a really fun, spooky, creepy read – ditto Coraline. He has two short story/poetry collections: Fragile Things and Smoke and Mirrors. They vary greatly in quality and thematic material, and it really hits home how Gaiman can turn on a dime from incredibly sweet to absolutely horrifying (cf: Chivalry, Babycakes). I like his short stories in general, though. Also I’d call him fiction rather than fantasy, with the exception of Stardust.
For Terry Pratchett, I’d start with his later books – Small Gods, Soul Music, Thud, etc. I feel like his books that center around the University tend to be weaker than the others.
Other authors, most of whom will probably be in the young adult section because that’s when I read fantasy: Have you read any Ursula Le Guin? or TA Barron? Susan Cooper dark is rising? Cornelia Funke. Philip Pullman (but not his mystery series).
I agree!
I don’t think anyone has mentioned Good Omens yet, it was written by both Gaiman and Pratchett. It felt more like Pratchett to me, not as dark as Gaiman’s writing, but then I haven’t read Dodger yet.
The His Dark Materials trilogy is Pullman at his best. Apparently he’s not accepting award or going anywhere through 2014, until The Book of Dust is done. I can’t wait!
I believe I have read some books by Ursula Le Guin, and TA Barron sounds familiar, but I’d have to do a google search (later, not now, going to bed soon, even though that’ll be 5-6 hours earlier than normal). Susan Cooper dark is rising also rings a bell, but not sure if it’s because I’ve read it or just heard of it. Cornelia Funke, I think I’ve read at least a couple books by her. And I read Pullman’s series w/ the Golden Compass, etc (the name escapes me for the trilogy)
“The giant squid has never been seen alive” is the “present tense reference to the Soviet Union” of books dealing with oceanography. No matter what other merits the book has, that one line instantly dates it to the contemporary reader.
Still, it’s cool to read that and think “Man, only X years ago nobody had ever seen a giant squid alive. I live in the FUTURE.”
X = 9. (More precisely, X = [current year] – 2004)
Oh certainly, and it’s not a knock on any of the books, just something that makes you realize they were written before 2004, in the same way the references to the Soviet Union in Cosmos make you realize it was written before 1991.
I just accidentally wrote “enslaved in school” instead of “enrolled in school.” Oops.
Wait, you mean we’re not enslaved in school?
also, side note: You can’t spell studying without “dying”.
And school is definitely some form of slavery, or at least some kind of indentured servitude…..
I once announced I was doing a “counterproductive” proof instead of a “contrapositive” proof.
I typed “explore” instead of “explode”, but it happened to be the 125th anniversary of the National Geographic Society’s founding, so it was a very appropriate typo.
Have you ever read The True Meaning of Smekday?
I have!
I understood that reference.I love that book!
yessssssNot yet.
I always confuse my words with one another. I reffered to George Lucas as John Lucas once.
And my world history teacher was talking about how Lenin was the ruler of Russia/The USSR (I can’t remember which one it’s supposed to be) for a while, and then someone brought up John Lennon, causing her to mix up and say “When John Lennon was in power…”
3 classes done, one to go. Hoping it goes as brilliantly as the one this morning. If only I could just take it now, but half of it is at 11, the other half at 1, so stuck here for awhile before I can start my weekend to chill out before next block starts……
Done with finals!!!!!! Managed to keep my two As that I was barely scraping, so I’m happy even if my gpa is still going to drop slightly
Crazy to think I’m officially done with my second year of vet school and now considered a third year vet student when classes resume on Monday. Although since we won’t have a summer break until July, I won’t really think of myself as a third year til next block is over and we come back in August
But still. Crazy crazy
Congratulations!
Thank you!
Congratulations seconded!
That’s great, Luna! Congratulations on the A’s and finishing finals!
Have kidnapped a GAPA and and after 39 hours with 1 hour of sleep I am on the Isle of Skye.
Mwahaha.
These things happen.
Ooh, tell us how it goes! My great-grandmother was from the Isle of Skye!
I worry too much about inconsequential cake, and end up apathetic about the actually important stuff.
So, on a random note, and it’s not quite as funny without the picture that accompanied it, but:
One of the professors we had in our Toxicology course we just finished is uber hyper and loud and bouncy, etc, etc (as evidenced by the fact that when he lectured us about repro pharm in pharmacology, everytime he talked about pro-pregnancy hormones, he would lead the class in a cheer of “Gooooooooo, pregnancy”).
So anyway, he was lecturing to us about toxic plants, and one of the ones he was talking about was White Snakeroot, which apparently killed Abraham Lincoln’s mother when she drank the milk of animal that had eaten the plant. So on every slide with a picture of the plant, he had an accompanying picture of her grave stone.
At one point, he was telling us all the other names for the plant, one of which was “morbeo lacteo”, and then he switched to a ppt slide with the caption “Morbeo lacteo. You killed my mother. Prepare to die”, with Lincoln’s face shopped onto that of Inigo Montoya from The Princess Bride. I swear at least 50% of the class was laughing SO HARD.
It was awesome. although the awesomness was dulled a bit by the girl I sit next to and am situational friends with going “I don’t understand why everyone is laughing” or something along those lines. (This is the same girl who brags about her computer illiteracy almost 24/7, and who is convinced that if you have a cold and are exhibiting symptoms then you are no longer contagious, which is why now, thanks to her, I”m spending my free weekend sick. So really annoyed at her right now, although that’s unrelated to this post.)
Gonna be a loser and go watch Iron Man 3 in 3D by myself this evening….Never gone to a movie by myself before. :/
I hope you still have fun!
I did! And then I went grocery shopping at 1 in the morning at the stores was pretty much totally empty and it was great.
Don’t feel too bad, I did that just last week. Upstream Color at IFC. It wasn’t the first time, and it probably won’t be the last.
I like going alone. You can sit wherever you like without worrying about finding seats in a row, and you never have to share your food.
How was Upstream Color? I’ve been thinking about seeing it because Shane Carruth is a genius, but I’m slightly on the fence on whether to wait for the DVD.
Upstream Color was amazing! Definitely of the same caliber as Primer, but in different ways. I debated just watching it at home too, but I’m glad I saw it in the theater because the sound was encompassing, which really pulled me into the shots (beautiful, but sometimes hard to follow, which should be no surprise). I’ll be interested to hear what you think of it!
So, wait, Superman is an alien? Are all superheroes aliens? I thought superheroes were just….humans with super powers. (In case you haven’t figured it out, I never did the comic book thing, and the only super hero movies I’ve seen are ones that came out in the last 2 or so years, and except for tonight’s movie, they were all with my now ex boyfriend, cuz he liked ’em. And I figured I’d seen the first Iron Man’s and like ’em, so why not 3).
Cuz there was a Superman movie preview before the movie, and it had Superman as an alien? And said it wasn’t an “S” on his front, but the word “hope” on his home planet, plus they started the trailer by showing that he was alien, etc. Anyway. I’m probably the only one in the universe that didn’t know he was an alien. Whatevs. I live in a cave.
And then there was another movie preview, it had just started, and there was a girl saying something about the movie preview that was about to come on (or maybe it was a scene from the movie where she’s talking at the camera? Not quite sure, doesn’t matter, but I’m sitting there going “where do I know that girl from, I recognize her, what have i seen her on“, when I suddenly realize, “OMG It’s Sally Sparrow!!!!!!!!!!“. So yeah. That was totally awesome. And then it launched into the preview (Great Gatsby, if you were wondering))
So yeah. bed now. getting up in slightly under 7 hours, whoops.
Yes, Superman is an alien from the planet Krypton, and he has been since his debut in the 1930s. Most superheroes *are* humans with superpowers, although a few others besides Superman are altruistic aliens pretending to be human as they protect their adopted planet– the Martian Manhunter, most famously (it’s right in his name that he’s a Martian!), the 1960s versions of Hawkman and Hawkgirl, Marvel’s first Captain Marvel hero (as opposed to the Fawcett/DC Captain Marvel, who’s a human with magic powers), and, more recently, Karolina Dean of the Runaways.
There are also some superheroes who are of non-human races but not strictly extraterrestrial, like Thor and Hercules (gods from other dimensions), and Aquaman and Namor (Atlanteans– a seperate human species who have evolved to live underwater.)
And then you have mutants like the X-Men who are “the next stage in human evolution”, so they’re humans, but not Homo sapiens.
I haven’t seen Iron Man 3, so POSSIBLE IRON MAN 3 SPOILERS? MAYBE? I DON’T REALLY KNOW. POSSIBLE IRON MAN 3 SPOILERS? MAYBE? I DON’T REALLY KNOW. POSSIBLE IRON MAN 3 SPOILERS? MAYBE? I DON’T REALLY KNOW.
In the Iron Man comic books The Mandarin was a human descendant of Genghis Khan, but he got his rings/powers from an alien dragon! I heard that in China he’s being called The Man Daren, so I’m guessing that they cut the Chinese national symbol as a mentor to the villain.
POSSIBLE IRON MAN 3 SPOILERS? MAYBE? I DON’T REALLY KNOW EITHER.
I have the comic book in which the Mandarin was introduced. It’s odd that Iron Man, the embodiment of technology, repeatedly faced a villain whose powers were blatantly magical. Maybe they changed the character in the movie (as they did with Doctor Doom in the Fantastic Four movies, making him more Magneto-like).
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
Also indistinguishable from a weak plot device.
Without spoiling anything, all I can say is that I really loved the movie’s take on the Mandarin and I think they did some interesting and creative stuff with his character.
Well, a human who gets powers from an alien is another category of hero (or villain in this case) entirely from those I addressed above, one that I considered to fall under Luna’s general description of “humans with superpowers”.
I would expect that they would cut the dragon not just because of the symbolism but because the dragon in question is considered to be a little silly even by comic book fans (in an affectionate way, though)– for starters, his name is Fing Fang Foom. The general idea that The Mandarin got the rings by stealing them from a crashed alien spaceship can probably be conveyed pretty well without having Triple F show up at all.
Fin Fang Foom, I believe. As I recall, he started out as a run-of-the-mill monster in one of the “scary” comics Marvel put out before the superhero revival. (I have a copy of that one, too.)
That’s what I get for going on MB when I should be studying.
That’s what you get.
(Making typos, I mean, not being corrected, I’m perfectly fine with being corrected when I’ve made a typo.)
Superman is an alien, yeah. He was sent to Earth right before his home planet was destroyed, so he gets to do the “last of his kind” thing.
And yes Iron Man 3 was so good. Have other MBers seen it yet?
The only reason why I haven’t seen it yet is because my family hates opening weekend crowds.
But I will see it soon…
I’m planning to see it at the local drive-in theater once finals end, but…. I still haven’t seen Iron Man 2… Is it a necessary prerequisite to enjoying 3?
I don’t think so. I can’t even remember what happened in Iron Man 2, it’s been 3 years since I saw it. There were some references to the Avengers movie, that make it slightly confusing for the first little bit if you forget that Iron Man was in the Avengers, but I don’t know that even it is really a prereq for enjoyment.
The reason I haven’t seen it is that I don’t like loud noises.
I just had an interesting dream last night– a variation on the “time travel via your mind/spirit winding up in the body of someone in the past” idea like in “Max and Me and the Time Machine”. (You know, the time traveler is like “What’s going on?” and everyone’s like “Wow, Captain Jones, that was quite a bump on the head you took if you forgot that you’re leading our group of Union soldiers here at Gettysburg!”) Anyway, here the twist was that the person woke up in his own body, had the same name, was the same age, had been born in the same place, etc., but had lived their entire life until this point as a resident of that time period.
(So, for example, John Smith, born in New York City in 1990 and lived a perfectly normal life until 2013, trades places with a version of himself who is identical except for having been born in 1890 and lived a normal life until 1913.)
I Dreamed that He-Man was fighting a mob of giant Octerocks
Help, I think I’ve found another British sci-fi show from the Eighties that I might actually want to watch! Someone needs to talk me out of it before I end up as a hopeless fan of yet another time-traveling alien saga!
Mr. Baker, this is all your fault! (I happened upon one of your posts on the Geeky TV Shows thread, and the site I watch Doctor Who on also has Sapphire and Steel.)
If you’re looking for fun British sci-fi shows, Blake’s 7 was really good.
No, that’s the opposite of what I was hoping for!
The last thing I need is more TV-related obsessions!
I would just point out that there may be other opinions regarding the quality of Blake’s 7.
SAPHIRE AND STEEL!! I watched that with Paul when I visited a few weeks ago, it was awesome. Watch the railway station episode.
I do apologise. Sapphire and Steel could spread through Museblog like a plague. I really must be more careful about what I say on here. Although, several Musers have experienced Liz Night, so it was bound to leak out.
It seems amazing and very intriguing. but I’ve decided not to watch another old British show about time-traveling aliens until I’ve watched all of the Old Who. Must… Stand… Firm… Must… Not… Let… Resolve… Weaken…
Adventure of the day: sprinted from Paddington to Marylebone and onto the next train back to school two minutes before it left. If I hadn’t run like the devil I’d probably still be wandering the streets of London, lost. (Never mind that I would have caught the next train; it’s poetic licence.)
A friend and I once ended up sprinting through Kings Cross Station because we couldn’t find the correct platform. Not to mention that we were headed back to our (exchange) school… But anyway, part of the problem was that we didn’t quite dislike the idea of being left behind in London.
So I just explained to my mom what shipping is and what memes are to my dad. I don’t know if this is good or bad for them…
I had to explain shipping to my mom when I mentioned in conversation that somebody had shipped me with somebody (I use the word ship when others say “thought we would make a cute couple” I have no idea) and she said ‘NOBODY IS ALLOWED TO SHIP ANYBODY OR BE SHIPPED’
(My sisters’ OTPs are always whatever boy I happened to mention in conversation “OOH IS HE YOUR BOYFRIEND”)
A little late there, Mom…
DID YOU KNOW
The IRS’s hold music is identical to that used in cheesy ’80s workout videos, i.e. 8-minute abs, etc. I have had the unique opportunity to experience this for the past half hour, with no end in sight.
~~~THE MORE YOU KNOW~~~
Howdy, all! Been a while since I was last on the blog at all. I have been drawn to post once more for two reasons:
1. I have totally, completely accidentally met another Museblogger (she was on around 2008 but didn’t post much). I met her first semester and we have been friends since and we sit next to each other in history, but I did not know she was a Museblogger until I showed her…
2. My One-Act Play that I had to do for creative writing. The play is instead of a final and we will be performing them on Thursday. Since my professor isn’t really counting the play grades-wise, and since I didn’t have any other ideas, I wrote a play entitled, “Bunny Apocalypse: The One Act Play”. When I showed my friend the play she said, “Hang on – did you read the magazine called Muse?”
This all goes to show that the world is teeny tiny.
By the way, would anyone be interested in reading the play if I post it?
I would be very interested.
Of course, I wonder who she could have been: peary moppins? MARFwarrior? Hypatia? Beedle the Bard? Maybe we’ll never know…
It would be so great to hang out with Hypatia again, she was so much fun to geek out about Carl Sagan with.
If I recall correctly, she said something about astronomy…I can ask her.
Also, here’s the One Act Play. Notes: I-Man, if you still lurk on the blog, I apologize if you go out of character. Also, the ending is totally unrealistic in terms of what actual HPB Resistance fighters would really do, but I was rather rushed for time. Oh, and there are lots of geeky references
Characters:
Kitty, I-Man, William I, Groundhog & Assorted Voices
Setting:
Late 21st century, hideout in Palo Alto. Technologically advanced. Under attack by an HPB regiment.
Props:
Backpack, two laptops, cell phone, two tables, projector screen, rubber duck
Scene: Command Ops of Resistance Hideout in Palo Alto, CA. Characters frozen in position on stage. Kitty is standing next to the stage right console, holding a communicator. I-Man is at the stage left console. At his feet is a backpack. The Red Alert lights are flashing. Groundhog is at center stage.
Groundhog: In the late 21st Century, a new species of rabbit with hot pink fur was discovered. Scientists thought they would quickly die out, due to their eye catching fur. They couldn’t have been more wrong. Within a year, these hot pink bunnies, HPBs for short, had shown their true purpose: to dominate earth. Thus began the Bunny Apocalypse. Small numbers of humans vowed to eradicate the magenta menace from their midst, despite the odds. They called themselves the Resistance.
Groundhog walks off stage and characters unfreeze. I-Man types feverishly.
Kitty (frantically): HQ, this is Palo Alto! Come in! HPB regiment is advancing, requesting backup! Commander William is at the fore, repeat, William is at the fore! Do you copy?
Communicator: We’re out of coconut doughnuts! We’re out of doughnuts! Who is responsible for this outrage?!
Kitty stares at the communicator, nonplussed.
Kitty: Hello? Can you hear us? We need backup!
Communicator: Who is this? It was you, wasn’t it! You took my doughnuts!
Sounds of blaster fire grow louder
Kitty: WE’RE UNDER ATTACK!!!
Communicator: I don’t care! I want my doughnuts!
Kitty throws down the communicator in frustration. I-Man walks over and puts a bracing hand on her shoulder.
I-Man: Kitty, face it – we’re on our own. What have we got?
Kitty (grows more frantic as she talks): Let’s see…two blasters, a useless communicator, a patched together computer system and assorted depigmetizer darts with no dart gun. Oh, and did I mention that the shield doors are irreversibly locked, so we’re effectively TRAPPED IN HERE!
I-Man: Calm down, Kitty. I’m sure–
He is interrupted by the voice of William, whose head has appeared on the projector screen. Both turn to look.
William: IT IS I, WILLIAM THE FIRST, SUPREME LEADER OF THE HOT PINK BUNNIES!
I-Man and Kitty (bored exasperation): Yes, we know who you are.
William: RESISTANCE IS USELESS. SURRENDER, AND WE WILL WELCOME YOU WITH OPEN ARMS.
I-Man: Of course you’d welcome us – after we’d been bunnified! You just want more minions. Give it up, William – we’ll never surrender!
Kitty (whisper): I-Man, we can’t surrender anyway, we’re sealed in!
I-Man (whisper): Oh, shut up.
William: FOOLISH BIPEDS! YOU DO NOT STAND A CHANCE. PREPARE TO BE EXTERMINATED.
William’s head vanishes and control room background returns. Sounds of blaster bolts very close now.
I-Man: Status report
Kitty: Shields are holding up for now and some of our blaster arrays are offline, but the external sound system is still intact. We could blast music in ¾ time to delay them – they’ll be too busy clutching their ears to move.
I-Man: Make it so!
I-Man walks back to the stage left console. Kitty presses a button on her console and we hear strains of the Blue Danube Waltz, followed by screams of agony.
Kitty: YES!
I-Man: Take that, you insufferable lagamorphs! (presses keys and fires external blasters)
Suddenly the music is cut off
Kitty: Cake it, there goes the sound system. (looks at console) And external blasters are nearly gone. We’re running out of firepower!
A loud crack and the room shakes. I-Man clutches the table to stay upright, Kitty falls over. She picks herself up and brushes her hair out of her eyes.
I-Man: Do we have any pies left?
Kitty: Two catapults are undamaged. Firing now.
Whistling, followed by loud SPLATS.
Kitty: Shame. What a waste of good blueberries.
I-Man: Hold on, let me see what else I can find in my bag (leans down and rummages through backpack) Aha! A hand-held pie thrower! (rummages more) And a bio-bomb detonator, minus the bomb…and a rubber duck.
Kitty: A duck?! (slaps hand over eyes) I-Man, when was the last time you cleaned out your bag?
I-Man (insistent): You misunderstand – these are all weapons! The duck is actually a combined scanner and tracking device. And it’s waterproof! (fondles the duck)
Kitty (exasperated): For Muses sake–
She is cut off by the booming voice of William, who has reappeared on the view screen. I-Man drops the duck.
William: YOU FIGHT VALIANTLY, HUMANS, BUT OUR VICTORY IS INEVITABLE. SURRENDER AND WE MAY SPARE YOUR LIVES.
I-Man (glaring at view screen): Never!
William: THEN YOU WILL BOTH DIE…MEHEHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!
William’s face vanishes. Insistent beeping from the stage right console. I-Man glances at it.
I-Man: Shield is down. Now all that’s left between us and the hordes is this building.
The room shakes violently as blasters fire again, this time very close. Both Kitty and I-Man fall to the ground. I-Man grabs the communicator that is still on the floor.
I-Man (while pulling self to feet): HQ, if anyone can hear us, this is Palo Alto. Position is nearing critical. All that remains between us and certain death are a few flimsy hallways and sealed shield doors. Please send back-up!
*static*
I-Man: Cake. They’ve jammed our communications.
Kitty (stoically): I guess this is it. Just us and our blasters (she holds up her blaster)
I-Man (trying for humor): And a handheld pie thrower…
Kitty smiles. They stand back to back, blasters (finger guns) aimed at the doors. Blaster fire is very near, and constant. Alert is still blaring. Then they turn around to face each other, putting their guns down.
Kitty (softly): I-Man, since this is the last chance I’ll probably get to say this…I love you.
I-Man (sincerely): I love you too, Kitty.
They kiss. While locked in embrace, there is a clanging noise. Groundhog enters from stage right, hurrying.
Groundhog: Guys, sorry for the delay, but your transmissions were sent to R&D by accident. No time to delay – get through the escape hatch that I just climbed through. It will take us to the BART system tunnels and I can lead you back to–
She breaks off and sees that Kitty and I-Man aren’t listening, too busy kissing.
Groundhog: Guys! Quit snogging and get out of here! We’ll have time for mushy stuff later when you’re out in one piece!
Kitty: It’s no use, Groundhog. We are going to die here. And if we must die, would it not be better to die in a loving embrace?
Groundhog (irritated): You won’t die if you leave NOW.
I-Man: We cannot leave. It is our destiny to die tragically at the hands of the HPBs.
Groundhog (muttering): deluded lovers…(normal volume) Well, you’re not dying on my watch! Leg it!
Groundhog grabs I-Man and Kitty by the arms and proceeds to drag them off the stage. Lights darken and all sounds end.
THE END
Repeat as needed, ad infinitum.
I didn’t read this until now, and it’s FANTASTIC.
Also, crazyquotescollector? You ran into crazyquotescollector?!?!? If you see her again, will you tell her Randomosity101 said hi? (Even if she doesn’t remember me.)
I asked her: she was crazyquotescollector. She wasn’t on much, but she says that she remembers agreeing with cromwell a lot.
I remember her well. MuseBlog records show that she posted 44 times as astronomerrox! between December 28, 2006, and July 26, 2007, and 408 times as crazyquotescollector between November 23, 2008, and December 8, 2009. With 452 comments in almost two years on the blog, I’d say she was considerably more than a casual poster.
Correction: She was on plenty, I just never bumped into her since I basically never left the Bunny Apocalypse threads.
I must get out more…
Wow – meeting another Museblogger by sheer chance? It is the stuff of fairy tales. Or at least, my fairy tales.
I know – it was totally bonkers. We just sat there for a few minutes in history thinking, MIND. BLOWN.
Better get used it. It’s bound to happen more often as your destinies become more and more tightly intertwined.
You think your area is getting back to normal and then Metro Boston has a story with the subheading “Pervert Cannibal”…
Oh and by the way guys I’m in a musical.
Only in the pit. But it’s still kind of exciting because I only got called in for it last week and opening night is next Thursday…
anyway, life is good right now.
That’s awesome, AL!
Congratulations! What is it?
It’s called Pippin. I don’t know if you’ve heard of it.
I saw that on Broadway with John Rubinstein, Ben Vereen, Jill Clayburgh, and Irene Ryan, when I was 16.
I have not seen or heard any of it yet, but I have heard of it. It’s been on my mental list of musicals to look up sometime. I know there’s a reason I’m interested… Weren’t the lyrics by Stephen Schwartz? I really like his stuff. I also feel like someone I’m a fan of was in it, but I don’t remember who, and I don’t recognize any of the names Robert listed… *looks up* Oh, the lyrics are by Stephen Schwartz, and there was a concert production with Terrence Mann and Kate Shindle! That seems like a good reason to be interested. I’ll let you know what I think of it when I get around to listening to it, which might be two days from now or several months.
Woohoo! I was in the pit orchestra for my school’s musical this year. Our trumpet players suggestively waltzed around the pit every time they had a solo; it was great fun.
Congratulations!
25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee’s finished.
I’m really kind of speechless. This is the last play I will ever do with J, R, H, B, and S. (I’ve mentioned a few of these people by name before, but abbreviation seems appropriate here.) It’s not even like I’ve known these people my whole life like some people I know, it’s just that they are who I’ve looked up to this entire year, and I honestly don’t know what theatre will be like without them. Especially considering that now we have five guys, give or take.
This has been a good year.
2013 Scav Start!
The theme this year is Space Jam. And lack of the number 13.
One of the items is a link to a specially made 10-hour long video of Space Jam the song played over and over. We suspect there’s some hidden message in there somewhere. One person downloaded it and is listening to it sped up from the beginning, while another person and I are listening to the actual video in hour-long intervals starting from the end. And it’s only worth eight points…
The Space Jam… it’s so infectious.
Are there any beeps that could be Morse Code? The music video for “The Challenger” has a secret message in it according to its creator, and I’m pretty sure that it must be the beeping sounds at the end of the video as the radio transmission loops, but I don’t know Morse Code, so I can’t find out if I’m right.
It was actually something we missed entirely… The item is worth eight points, so someone went to the 8-hour mark after I went to bed and found it about five minutes in. D’oh!
Hello, Museblog!
It has been ever so long. Today I found myself thinking of this place and initially dismissed posting, thinking that those I remembered from the blog would have disappeared. However, it would seem that the blog has slowed down and retains some familiar names! This, as we say in California, ‘most certainly merits a posting’.
Anyway, all sorts of things are going on, but I suppose I’ll just start by poking my head out and say hello!
What are things like around here?
Welcome back! I’m in a good mood because I just finished my last final of Sophomore Year.
*virtual high-five*
It’s one of the best feelings around to know that a source of stress has just vaporised. What do you plan to do now with all of that now-available time?
Read and write, read and write, read and write, visit museums, and make Photoshop art.
Ooh, photoshop art! I’m a fan. I tried my hand at digital painting just a little while ago, but using anything short of a proper tablet feels close to impossible.
This is more manipulations of existing photos than starting from scratch, but it really is cool what effects I can create.
*envy envy envy*
I’m not done until the 29th. Speaking of which, I really have homework to be doing now…
Good luck with your homework and finals!
Thanks! Resisting urge to watch more Star Trek…
Resist!
Ooh! Hello! Welcome back to the wonderful world of posting and words!
Hello! I don’t believe I had the pleasure of your acquaintance before. Pleased to meet you!
Pleasure’s mine i’m sure.
I remember you! Or, at least, I’ve read older threads with your comments. I’m not sure anymore with some of the returning MBers.
It’s weird to think that soon I’ll have been here for, what–three years? Four years?
…I think it’s four years. Ohmykokopelli, where did the time go???
Though I was most active around… 2008… (probably?), I was on and off following that and I definitely recall your name. It is pretty odd to think that this place is pretty much a piece of my childhood more than something recent. Heck, tomorrow it will have been six years since my first post. Bizarre. All a part of time’s slow march forward, I suppose.
Hi, Gimanator. I don’t think I ever met you on the blog before because in my six years here I’ve rarely left Bunny Apocalypse, but I did see your name the other day when searching around the blog. Pleased to make your acquaintance and welcome back!
I’m quite pleased to make yours, and thanks!
MuseBlog’s more than just a website, these days, it’s a huge family. Or that’s how it feels to me. It’s amazing how much everyone here has changed my life.
In a way, that’s also what scares me most about it. There are so many influential people on here, but there’s the fear that they’ll always just remain anonymous, and eventually disappear with no way of reconnecting. Already so many names I’m familiar with may not ever show back up on here. If they do, I hope, I’ll be around to see it.
Ah, I remember you! You were, I think, really active when I joined, or shortly before.
Great to hear from you again!
Indeed, sounds like right around when I was here! And thanks – it’s nice to feel so welcomed back!
Breaking with my self-imposed 2-week hiatus (exams beckon) to say: welcome back!
I am not sure if you know me; I joined in 2009, I think? All the same, it’s good to see you, and I hope you stick around.
I do know your name – it seems my lurking on and off has at least made me familiar with some folks around now. And I definitely plan to stick around! Thank you!
I have been in the habit of making popcorn by putting plain kernels in a paper grocery bag and microwaving it recently. It’s worked surprisingly well. However, today I decided it was too much work to try to mix in Vegemite after the corn was popped, so I took a shortcut by adding it to the bag before microwaving.
– It caught fire
– By which I mean I opened the bag and it was literally full of flames
– This was not how I wanted to find out that none of the smoke detectors in my house actually work.
I hope that now that I’m done with this semester, I’ll have more time to post on here. Finals week was crazy, but it’s all done. Now I just need to figure out what to do with my summer, since my internship applications were rejected. I have some good ideas regarding volunteering opportunities, though, so I won’t be completely wasting it. Also, I have a semester abroad to look forward to and prepare for!
Also, it keeps on surprising me that I am twenty. Yeah, I know maturity is over-rated, but this is just…a surprisingly long amount of time? It says something when I have to keep on mentally correcting my age.
I know exactly what you mean about 20 feeling strange.
Do you guys have any poetry recommendations for me? Not heavy stuff, just… I’m sort of having a bit of an existential crisis and want to look for beauty in the world while cuddling my cup of tea and wondering what to do with my life.
I suggest The Acreage of the Heart by Ruthven Todd, but it might be more negative than what you’re looking for. Anything by Ralph Waldo Emerson is good for finding beauty in the world!
If you like current poetry with elements of folklore, fairytale, and fantasy, take a look at Goblin Fruit. It is on the web for free! So is Stone Telling. Strange Horizons has stories but also many poems. Through the Gate is also online and Mythic Delirium has recently started an online version (though that hasn’t launched yet.) Hope you enjoy them!
Greetings from Rivendell!!
Kind of. I’m in Lauterbrunnen, Switzerland; which is where some hypothesize Tolkein based Rivendell on. It’s got the towering cliff walls (because it’s in a valley that was formed by glaciers), and there are no less than 72 waterfalls. I haven’t been counting specifically, but I’d say I easily saw at least 25 this morning on my walk down the valley (I can see 12 from the window of my hostel right now). Among these was the tallest waterfall in Switzerland, (a different) one that a lot of famous people came to see and wrote about (Byron, some… German names… and another two I recognized but don’t remember), and one that’s been working at cutting it’s way through rock for hundreds of thousands years by the looks of the canyon it’s made around it (you go inside the cliff to see it).
It’s gorgeous, to say the least. I went for a long walk this morning and saw the above waterfalls, and then took a cable car up to the top of the valley and did a short (hour long) walk from the town, to another nearby town. Unfortunately it’d been rather cloudy all morning, and the clouds were about level with the cliff tops, so visibility was… almost nothing. And then it started to actually rain, though I was well prepared for that sort of behavior from the weather at least. Although I hadn’t expected it to actually start snowing in ernest. Anyway, I’d been planning to do another 2-hour hike along the top, but it wasn’t going to be worth it at that point so I just took another cable car back down. I’ll get to do it tomorrow though, as well as go to Schilthorn.
I left Galway at 1am yesterday, flight to Geneva left at 7am and landed at 10 (local time), then trained all the way here. I’m here till the morning of the 14th, when I’ll head to Zurich to meet a (non-muser) internet friend before flying back to Ireland. And then I only have like, 3 full days before I have to return to the states
So Much Ado casting came out. And I’m Don John. Remember I said I probably would be?
I spent about half an hour really upset because I really wanted to be Beatrice (Eleven is Benedick as I suspected and this really doesn’t help) or at least a girl because I am really sick of getting crosscast all the time, and in any case I didn’t want to be Don John because everyone hates him and he doesn’t really interact with anyone (I know my Conrade from other places and I don’t really like him) and I was convinced that this was pretty much going to mirror how my summer was going to go. And then it occurred to me that I am not in fact my character and I am certainly not going to have any social interaction if I act like I am, and while it would certainly help things if I was Beatrice, it doesn’t mean I can’t hang out with people I don’t talk to in-play.
The social environment of this particular theater company just tends to suck out my self-confidence — not because people aren’t nice, just because they tend to not interact with me much and I don’t know much about the pop-culture things they talk about all the time. So I guess this year will have to be practice in self-confidence. Welp.
On the plus side, I am fairly sure that Eleven and I still have a lot more in common than Eleven and Ginger (aka Beatrice)… so I guess that’s good.
Villains are fun to play, but Don John will be more challenging than most. He’s so twisted and spiteful and mean.
Yeah, actually, now that I’ve gotten over the emotional wave, I’m rather looking forward to it. It’s going to be an interesting challenge — I’ve never gotten to play a villain before, and Don John is definitely a leap into the deep end. I spent a lot of the morning reading through the play trying to find a motivation for him, and the best I could come up with is the old spurned-lover thing — that he was in love with Hero and she rejected him. Which is not exactly original, I realize, but it provides a more pointed angle for him to be twisted and spiteful from than just general I-hate-everything.
Also I think I might ask the director if I can play the role as genderqueer in some way rather than just crosscast. It’s probably selfish of me to not want to accept getting cast as a guy all the time (I mean, it’s Shakespeare, it’s going to happen to most girls at one point or other) but I am being completely serious when I say I have played three female characters (and two of them had four lines or less) and ten male ones in my Shakespearean career, and… I think maybe it’s time to try something different.
Don John’s main motivation seems clear: he is illegitimate and has unsuccessfully tried to overthrow his half-brother the king/prince, Don Pedro. Now Pedro has pardoned him, but he’s still resentful and determined to cause trouble. (“You have of late stood out against your brother, and he hath ta’en you newly into his grace.” “I had rather be a canker in a hedge than a rose in his grace.”) I don’t remember his having been in love with Hero. Which lines allude to that?
If I were directing the play, I’d make it clear to the audience that Don John is still on probation and isn’t free to go wherever he chooses.
It’s not textual in any way, it would be a complete actor-choice thing. It’s just a clearer motivation to me than ‘I’m evil because I like being evil and am mad that people won’t let me be evil.” I know that anything to do with Hero is not his actual textual reason; it’s just that in the play, he’s pretty much a plot device and not a three-dimensional character, and thus doesn’t need much of a reason other than resenting his brother and wanting to cause trouble. Which is a good reason to be grumpy at the people in court, sure, but not, to me, a good reason to break up the marriage of two people who really have very little to do with his brother or his brother’s household in any way.
I like the probation idea, though. I’m going to have to wait and see what the director wants to do with me, I think.
It seems more likely that he’s trying to get revenge on Claudio, the king’s “right hand.” Don Pedro hasn’t met Beatrice before, so it seems a stretch that Don John would have met Hero.
Anyway, you’ll figure something out. There’s plenty in the text to work with: his illegitimacy, his introversion and taciturnity, the fact that others who meet him (such a Beatrice) don’t like or trust him even though they don’t know exactly why, and the humiliation of having staged an unsuccessful rebellion and now having to placate the golden-boy brother he tried to usurp. Their sibling rivalry probably goes back a long way.
</Shakespeare_geekery>
That seems something like as plausible as Iago wanting to do what he does to Othello because the other guy got promoted over him. *eyebrow raise* But there’s the problem with trying to ascribe motivation; sometimes there isn’t all that much to work with. I guess I generally take the shipping approach — too much internet. Which is why you should never put me in charge of a production of anything ever.
Out of curiosity, is it textual that Don John tried to overthrow his brother? I know he mentions having been out of favor with him and being on a relatively tight leash, but I don’t remember there being anything concrete as to why. Then again, I haven’t read the play in depth for a while, so I may be forgetting something obvious.
(I enjoy geeking out over Shakespeare quite a lot. Should do it more often, really.)
You’d be amazed at the intensity of resentment and anger that can be caused by promotions, firings, and other job-related slights. People have killed over it, burned down workplaces, you name it.
It’s purely textual. At the beginning of the play, Don Pedro and his soldiers (including Claudio and Benedick) return from a successful battle to celebrate and recuperate in the court of the provincial governor, Leonato. There’s no talk of future battles, so it’s evident that the war is over and that Don Pedro won. Claudio in particular distinguished himself in combat and has become a great favorite of the king.
Next, immediately, we meet Don John, Conrade, and Borachio. Don John is gloomy and says he has every reason to be so. Conrade notes that Don John recently “stood out against” (challenged) Pedro and should at least try to act more cheerful, because his future depends on how he behaves himself now. When Borachio says he’s found out that “the king’s right hand” is going to be married, Don John knows he’s talking about Claudio and starts plotting mischief.
I suppose you could assume that Don John is sad for some unspecified reason, that Don Pedro defeated some unspecified foe, that Don John “stood out against” Pedro with some unspecified insult, and that Don John sets out to wreck Claudio’s marriage out of sheer random wickedness. But things don’t hang together very well that way, whereas they do if Don John was the vanquished foe and Claudio the officer chiefly responsible for his defeat. Shakespeare’s plots usually make sense, and in this case I think he offers plenty of clues to what he has in mind. If I were the director or the dramaturge, that’s certainly how I’d tell the story.
So the battle at the beginning is between Don Pedro and Don John? That doesn’t add up for me at all — for one thing, Don John comes back with the returning forces, not as a political prisoner, but as a fellow soldier, and nobody comments on this. The members of Leonato’s household don’t necessarily like him very much, but all they say is that he’s quiet and melancholy, and Beatrice says that he and Benedick together would make the perfect man — nobody refers to him as a traitor, which they almost certainly would had he just attempted to politically overthrow Don Pedro.
For another, it doesn’t seem to me like Don John would have enough political power to raise an army to overthrow his brother, especially given the lower-class people he (seemingly) gladly hangs out with and confides in during the play. It also doesn’t seem to me that Don Pedro would be naive enough to let someone who did raise an army against him keep hanging out in his household and, moreover, succeed in convincing him that a lady like Hero is cheating on Claudio, without becoming suspicious. And I’m not all that sure Don John is specifically zeroing in on Claudio with his evil plot — he’s just trying to create havoc in Leonato’s household, and the marriage is a convenient device to carry that out. If it had been Benedick and Beatrice, say, getting married, I doubt he would have been any less happy to break them up.
I know Shakespeare can be subtle with his plot points, but it seems like that one is rather too subtle to textually hang a whole characterization on. It would hold up just fine in a production, though. Motivational theories don’t necessarily have to be originally intended in order to make sense.
I agree that Don John isn’t much of a leader and couldn’t have raised a very big army — and if my interpretation is correct, he didn’t. Don Pedro’s forces fought just a single, almost bloodless battle (“few [casualties] of any sort, and none of name”), and then it was all over. So Don John couldn’t have mounted a full-scale civil war aimed at seizing the throne of Aragon (Pedro’s kingdom); but he might have been trying to carve off a piece of Sicily, where the play is set — an island in the Mediterranean, a thousand miles away, which Aragon ruled for hundreds of years. John probably could have found enough Sicilian malcontents to fortify a castle and declare independence from Aragon for a while or something. Maybe they (either John or the people he led) even had some legitimate grievances against their distant king.
Anyway, the play makes it clear at the outset that Pedro has pardoned John for whatever he did and has given him a second chance (on a rather short leash). That’s not so unlikely, either. Our own Civil War was extremely bloody and involved considerably more than one battle, but at the end we didn’t hang all the Confederate troops and send Robert E. Lee and Jefferson Davis back to Washington in chains. And as the rest of the play shows, Pedro is a very nice guy.
And if you’re still not convinced that politics, power, and resentment are strong enough motivations, there’s always John/Hero shipping.
Watching the finals of Fischoff competition, and I’m SO proud of my classmates.
And, they won grand prize
AP Bio test tomorrow.
Good luck.
It went okay.
Multiple choice was fairly easy; more often than not, the answer was in the question, which was nice. I had a little trouble with the free response, but I gave it my best shot.
Now to play the waiting game.
Hurrah!
I remember when I took it, one of the 3 long-response essays was on the endocrine system. Which my teacher had skipped because “it never shows up on the test.”
I literally wrote the word “insulin” at the top of the page, and then “
I’m sorry” at the end.Anyway, even with that mishap I still got a 4, so I’m sure you did fine!
I used the extra time to draw dinosaurs into the diagram given for the last prompt.
I drew dinosaurs on the formula page and the place where you put the seal on the multiple choice booklet.
I had that today too! We’re not allowed to talk about it in detail, but I agree with your assessment. Not too bad.
Wow, I haven’t been on MuseBlog in a while. Not sure why I decided to come back on today.
Laying out… Listening to some cool beats, Reading a book, Having snacks, Looking at nature… I feel pretty relaxed today!
Home, and it feels great.
It took me a long time to get around to this, but I wanted to thank everyone for their sympathies on the last thread. It really means a lot to me.
In other news, I completed my first formal test ever on Friday. AP English Language. I’m pleased with how it went, even if my brain went a little bit mushy towards the end.
I also changed my Gravatar. For the first time in… Months? Years? I don’t know.
I know i brought up the subject a few years ago… but we have gotten some new bloggers since then, so i want to ask again…
How did the MBers think up the ideas for their names? Like, Is it something the like doing for a living? Is it something they just came up with to look cool? What?
(ICAII: I got mine because in my spare time i love thinking up stories with my Catwings character, here.)
You know, I don’t actually remember. I think I joined back when I still really liked looking at cat memes, and the name just popped into my head. I use it for almost everything now.
(ooh I love telling this story)
I was on a robotics team called the Red Lightning Brick Association, and there were four people on the team and since I was the one making the t-shirts and there was one word for each shirt, I gave myself the lightning shirt and started associating myself with it.
Then later I did some sort of secret-agent role play thing on the Internet (actually it was the Muse magazine website) because it was fun and I chose that name.
(Later my friends and I all went through a secret-agents phase and that’s where Agent Hippie’s name comes from.)
Mine was based in part on being Harry Potter obsessed and liking Luna. Actually, my original name was just my own first name, but the I went on hiatus for awhile and decided to change my name on return to be more anonymous.
“Luna the Lovely” was actually a truncated version of a name I had made up (for what reason, i don’t remember anymore. boredom, maybe?) which was “Luna the Lovely, Sorceress of Misty Marsh”, but that was a bit long and pretentious so I shortened it to Luna the Lovely, which come to think of it is kind of long and pretentious in and of itself, and I’ve been considering truncating it to just “Luna” for years now, but haven’t because I like having my name ranked high on the who’s posted how much page and changing my name would affect that, otherwise I would have shortened to Luna awhile ago…..
I used to be Kokopelli52; I decided that this was a bit childish later. I recall making a mental list of possible names while I was wandering through a shop that sold scented soaps, so they were all things like “Tea Tree” and “Citrus Peel.” I eventually went with Chocolate Orange because I love the smell of oranges and I was sort of hungry at the time, and some older, wiser MBer suggested I go with Choklit instead.
I like your name, Catwings!
My first one, e~a, came from Elasse~Adael which was derived from Tolkien’s Elvish, my real first name in pig latin, and a nickname a friend gave me. I invented oxlin after awhile as I liked the short sound of it and I like the sound “ohx” in Oxford and things. Lin just seemed like a good thing to add on the end and now I’m oxlin. I rather like the name.
POSOC stands for Prarilius Oob Sir Ozlips Canix, a merge of my three former aliases (Prarilius Canix, Oob, and Sir Ozlips).
Prarilius Canix grew out of captain_cynomys, and was my primary name for a long time. I liked prairie dogs a lot back then, so Cynomys came from their genus name. And I joined for the Pie War, so I had a military rank. Prarilius Canix was a retool of that name in the style of the Edge Chronicles, a series of children’s books I liked very much at the time.
Sir Ozlips was an alternate name that I initially used to say silly things in ALL CAPS without anyone knowing it was me (except, in hindsight, the GAPAs). Ozlips was a small, cute, voracious alien in a series of comic books. Later I appointed “him” the ruler of my particular province of Museica (I think Chocolate Cream? I can’t recall the flavor) so that I could handle governing duties and simultaneously have dashing adventures as Prarilius Canix aboard the Black-Footed Ferret in the Ships’ Logs thread.
Oob was just a random silly-sounding syllable that I used when I was ruler of the Tupisodaloric Groves on the Pieceful Pie Planet.
…
None of that probably makes any sense to you. In any event, I eventually got bored of separate names and amalgamated the initials into the more dignified* POSOC, which I’ve kept ever since. There’s probably an alternate universe where I realized that putting “Sir” at the beginning made more sense and today I go by SPOOC or SPOCO.
*At least I thought so, until MissSwann started calling me Socky. Everyone who’s known me since my early neophyte years just calls me PraCan or PC anyway.
Your gravatar is very apt. I’ve only just noticed.
It popped into my head randomly one day – I don’t know why, I don’t know how, but I like it. Quafflebird is likely inspired by Quidditch.
In eighth grade, we were doing a project where we shared our poems and artwork online with kids at a school in Turkey, and we all had to come up with usernames for our class blog. I had been reading a lot about Kai’luani, a princess of Hawai’i during the late 19th century, and so I wanted a homage to her name. Then I thought of some other historical figures I admired who I could reference in my name and I thought of Jacques-Yves Cousteau.
So I came up with KaiYves, which sounded cool and had exotic letter combinations like “ai” and “yv”.
Gimanator grew out of a cousin’s ‘Spithanator’ username I saw when I was probably about 12. I barely realised that it has a sort of terminator association and I liked the sound so I created my own. Gim just happened to have an appeal as the new prefix and it has been my username ever since, on more than just MB. I doubt said cousin even realises they had that much influence on my internet alter-ego.
I love my AP Stats teacher right now. We’re doing an end of the year project now that our AP test is done, so he randomly assigned us groups. The names:
Interquartile Rage
Margin of Terror
The Shoutliers
Linear Aggression
Soyuz crew landed safely! Welcome home, Tom, Chris, and Roman!
Most interesting thing I’ve accomplished this week…..accidentally made homemade alcohol. More precisely, I now have a half full water bottle of hard apple cider. The apple juice that I had sitting in it and forgot to put in the fridge (although refrigeration a not required), fermented into a fizzy rotten alcohol smelling substance
It’s my newest unintended food experiment. A half loaf of white wonderbread from before thanksgiving that has yet to go moldy but is very stale is another….
Going to leave my accidental moonshine to sit a few more days (or weeks, knowing me and my lazy non-cleaning habits) and see what happens.
In the meantime, highly amused I accidentally made alcohol
That’s funny. I always get vinegar.
Apple cider vinegar is just apple cider that’s been allowed to continue fermenting.
We had lots of fresh, unpasteurized cider growing up, and it wasn’t unusual for hard cider to develop. Though if I recall correctly, once it starts to ferment in earnest you have to pay attention to catch it before it goes all the way to vinegar.
I’ve made hard cider before — with unfiltered cider, champagne yeast, and beer-brewing equipment — but my “inadvertent” experiments have always resulted in vinegar. Different microorganisms, or different stages of the same process? I don’t know.
I don’t know that I have “succeeded” either in my adult years. Unpasteurized is harder to come by now than it was when we were kids, so when I do get it, I don’t leave it sitting around long enough for experiments.
Oh, and in not fun news contrary to my previous post, I have to go get blood drawn tomorrow to make sure I still have an adequate titer if antibodies against the rabies vaccine I got a year and a half ago. I don’t like needles…..hopefully I have a sufficient titer it else I get to get revaccinated. I think I have to get the titer redone in a year, anyway. Not sure how frequently we’re supposed to check and make sure we’re still protected…..
Yay for needles. Hope they have better luck than the last person who tried….I don’t enjoy being used as a pincushion
Ooh
I don’t like needles either…
I guess i just don’t like anything exept my body parts being under my skin
Best of luck to you!
Sounds about right.
Thanks!
Good luck!
Urgh, a rabies vaccine…I thought I had to get one for my study abroad trip in Costa Rica, but it’s not mandatory and kinda expensive. I am relieved that I don’t have to get the triple set of vaccinations. At the same time I am worried that I am depriving myself of some serious protection, even though it’s not necessary and therefore infection is probably not likely.
I hope your titer went well.
I’m guessing if it’s not required, they’re probably not too worried about you getting exposed and infected. I don’t know how prevalent the disease is in that part of the world, so can’t offer a valid opinion on that….
However, if something should happen on your trip, and you get bitten by a wild animal, don’t wait for symptoms to develop before seeking medical attention. The post exposure vaccine and immunoglobulins won’t work if you wait until your symptomatic. But I’d hazard a guess unless you’re going spelunking in bat caves or working with animals, that you’re highly unlikely to be exposed.
And for that matter, even if you’ve been vaccinated, my understanding is you still receive the post exposure vaccinations if you get bit (although you don’t have to get the IV immunoglobulins, because you would already be producing your own).
I won’t find out the results of the titer for awhile (not sure what the turn around time is, it’s human medicine, so I”m guessing weeks, as opposed to days), but the actual blood draw went well. They only stuck me once, and while I do have a lovely bruise in the crook of my elbow as a result, other than having a brief surge of nausea when I let my imagination picture the vacu-tainer they were drawing my blood with, it went well.
What are you studying on you trip to Costa Rica? I always though study abroad sounded like it would be really fun, but it never fit into my life schedule (I couldnt’ do it as an undergrad, because all my undergrad ahd to be completed at the school where I”m going to vet school, or else my early guarantee of admission would have been revoked, and I wanted to spend summers at home because I was horribly homesick).
Tropical Biology, and Environmental Policy in the Tropics, as well as a course on Latin American culture. There’s also an independent research project for students involved. I am really excited about that. I’ve never done research before and I want to see if it’s something I like. The course also involves a lot of outdoors work and hiking in the rainforest and staying in biological field stations (♥!), which is why I was somewhat worried about contact with animals. It said in the course handbook that the rabies vaccination was only necessary if you wanted to handle bats, and since we’re not supposed to be sleeping outdoors the likelihood of a random vampire bat attack shouldn’t be too high…I do know that you should get treated immediately if bit, however. Rabies is still a disease with nearly 100% fatality.
I still need to get the regular travel immunizations, against typhoid, etc.
Even if you don’t do study abroad, there are plenty of other opportunities to travel, like the Peace Corps or something. Or something–hah, I’m so specific.
That sounds like it should be lots of fun!
So relieved to be done with one of my history exams (Russia) as of just now! Short break, then I have to get cracking on revising for my next exams – I have three more this week, then five next week, then I’ll be done.
Quietly spontaneously bursting into the song “We’re All Mad Here” in the middle of a public library.
And immediately remembering you’ve lost your voice.
Trying to sing with a sore throat is the worst.
That is so true.
Luckily for me, even though my voice is lost , my throat is not particularly sore.
By the way, to completely change the subject, my parents were watching a Jeopardy marathon this evening (they record it) and there were several questions about space. Every time I got one wrong, I thought or said “I really need to talk to Kai more often.”
Do you remember any of the questions/answers? (You know how it is with Jeopardy!, the “questions” are in the form of answers and the “answers” must be given in the form of questions.)
The only one I remember was asking who it was that they named the spot where Curiosity landed on Mars after.
(Who is) Ray Bradbury.
Yep. I wouldn’t say I’m a huge Ray Bradbury fan, since I haven’t read all that many of his books, but I am enough of a fan to have felt quite disappointed in myself for not knowing that.
Pretty sure orthopedic surgery is by far the most interesting course (or section of a course, I don’t think surgery this block is all ortho) I’ve taken so far in vet school. General small animal surgery is probably runner up.
Glad I put it down to take as an elective when we start clinicals next year, should be fun if the lectures we’ve got so far are anything to judge by…..
Actually, wait, I was wrong. This entire block of surgery is orthopedics. Guess we’ll find out soon if it’s the subject or the prof that I find interesting…
Today my violin teacher came very close to telling me, in all seriousness, “Do or do not, there is no try.” He used different words, but the meaning was exactly the same.
Transcends all mediums, Yoda’s wisdom does.
Is there anywhere better to be on a rainy spring afternoon than a library?
None that I’ve found.
So in surgery lab today, one of my lab partners, L, (both are guys) was asking me and our other partner, G, if we’d seen some movie, and I offered that I hadn’t even heard of it (Don’t remember what it was called, sanctum, maybe? is that a movie?). he looked kind of flabbergasted (or as much as you can when only your eyes are visible) and wanted to know what movies I had seen, and I was trying to think of movies, b/c I just don’t watch that many movies, but “I don’t know” wasn’t cutting it as an answer for him.
And then I mentioned I’d seen the Hobbit movie, and he said something about it not being that good, and G and I were both like, it wasn’t that bad, I actually kind of liked it. And L started saying something about what was up with Smeagol? Why/How is he there? And is the ring *that* ring? and osmething about thinking he was supposed to be Frodo’s dad (Smeagol or Bilbo, I”m not sure which one he was talking about), and I’m just getting horribly confused, and I”m just like “Did you not read the book? It is that ring, the Hobbit is essentially a prequel to the Lord of the Rings”. And L is like “No, of course not, and no wonder you haven’t seen any movies! Put down the books!”
And then he asked about Star Trek, and seemed horrified that I hadnt’ seen any previous ones or much of the show at all, and I mentioned that I was going to see the new one, and then he wanted to know why, and so then we had the awkward moment where i disclose to two guys who I’m lab partners with for the next two months and barely know, that I’m going to go seed the Star Trek movie merely b/c there is a guy in it that I think is hot. I think the convo went about like this:
“I’m going to see it because I think Benedict Cumberbatch is hot.”
L: “Who?”
Me: “He plays the bad guy.”
L: “So do you only watch movies with him in it?”
Me: “No, I’d wouldn’t hardly see any movies at all if I did that.”
L: “Ben–what did you say his name was again?”
Me: “Benedict Cumberbatch”
L: “I’m just going to call him Cucumber Patch.”
It was freaking hilarious. Pretty sure that’s the best nickname I’ve heard for him
I’d never heard of Sanctum. Rotten Tomatoes rates it 1.5 stars, out of 5. L sounds really annoying.
Nah, L really isn’t particularly annoying. I don’t know him very well, but I find him entertaining. He’s pretty easy going and laid back, but with sort of an outgoing sort of personality. He’s what I’d consider an “I” on the DISC personality test we had to take before vet school, even though he got ranked a “D” on it.
He was in my group at orientation prior to vet school, and he seemed pretty fun to hang around.
Jadestone’s “Frumious Bandersnatch” wasn’t bad.
I must have missed that.
(MY CURRENT NICKNAME IS BENNEDRAGON CUMBERSMAUG because I am still really excited about Smaug, but that remains one of my favorites for him)
My nickname for Kristen Gillibrand (one of New York’s Senators) is “Killifish”, because when her confirmation hearings took place, I worked at a nature center where we had a tank with some killifish inside it, and the name “K. Gillibrand” looked kind of like “Killifish” to me. I swear it’s intended politely– after all, as our display showed, they live in the waters of her state!
That’s our Jade…
I walked out in the dew in the grass at dawn this morning, as the fog was burning off. Across the way a fox and a cat froze, couldn’t look away, the magnetic field from pole of bushy tail thru pointed noses to bushy tail. The fox twice as large as the cat, standing and inquisitive; the cat crouching, static energy. The tabby sprang then feinted right, to duck left into a rhododendron. The fox, disinterested, dusty and reddish, sniffed the mulch around a tree, pawed some dirt, then trotted off in the other direction. The fog had lifted.
Kinda wish I hadn’t made plans to see Star Trek with a friend….because that means it’s going to be a week before we go. And I the movie comes out tonight, and I’ve developed a thing for midnight showings ever since starting college and having gone to one freshman year. It’s totally the way to do things, but I agreed to go with a friend over a month ago, so I’m obligated, so I can’t go at midnight, and I was totally okay with that until I saw a classmate’s comment elsewhere saying they couldn’t wait for popcorn in two hours, and I”m sitting here going “Popcorn? In two hours? What’s in….Oh. midnight. on Wednesday. New movie. OH. Star Trek.” And then I got this horrible pang of sadness in my stomach that I”m not going to a midnight release
My brain finds the strangest things to care about when it’s tired.
Is there a theater near you that will be playing the “We Are The Explorers” NASA trailer before the film?
Hmmm, I really don’t know. Just googled that, because I wasn’t sure what you were referring to but I don’t know if the trailer will be played before the film at either of the theatres in my college town.
Oh, okay. I’m really excited about that campaign because I donated money and it seems to have generated a lot of popularity. Hopefully, it will create a big buzz when it starts playing before the film tomorrow.
You know what’s crazy? To think that exactly two years from today I will graduate from veterinary school. And that I’ll finish my last clinical rotation 2 weeks before that. I’m half way there.
It’s mind boggling, and terrifying, and kind of exciting.
And I clearly have a *lot* of homework I need to be working on, judging by my sudden flurry of activity on here…..
For fans of birds and wildlife cams, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s heron cam is currently tracking the hatching of five eggs. The first hatchling appeared yesterday and can be glimpsed occasionally.
My chemistry class has been watching that cam for a while now! We named the first hatchling “Megan” after a girl in my class who has a laugh like a heron. My friend Katie has called having “the cute one” named after her. It’s a lot of fun.
Bonus: nice to have the sounds of nature as a home soundtrack. Three chicks now! Two of them seem to squabble a lot.
Those heron chicks look exactly like miniature ostriches.
We don’t usually make announcements like this, but those of you on Twitter might want to check out @Kokonspiracy.
Wait….you’ve made a Twitter account? An official MB twitter account? WHAT IS THIS HAVE WE GONE MAINSTREAM WHAAAAT
Just for fun. And if it isn’t fun, we’ll stop.
Speaking of the We Are The Explorers campaign, I do hope you’ll do your part to get #gospace trending tomorrow…
I’m happy to do what I can.
Mucho obligato.
Hm, retweeting is a lot easier than finding things to tweet. Joss Whedon gets to tweet about cast parties and actresses from his SHIELD movie. Life is more sedate here in GAPA-ville: “Hey, look! There’s another post to moderate. #dutycalls”
We are sorry to bother you, but we LOVE YOU!
If it wasn’t for a GAPA this thread would be… poop
If it weren’t for the GAPAs, this thread and this ‘Blog would be nonexistent! And I’m glad that’s not the case. Love seconded.
I don’t have a twitter account and don’t plan on getting one, but I will definitely lurk there and see what’s up.
Actually, lurking is probably the best strategy. We’re following a lot of interesting people (and plan to change the mix often for the sake of variety) but don’t have time to check and retweet everything that looks interesting.
Yeah, I have an account but I don’t really tweet – I’ll probably just lurk too, rather than follow.
Next major decision: should we follow all of the MBers who are following us? The Kokonspiratorial possibilities are tantalizing, but do they really want us to? And how will we feel if they turn us down?
I have learned I can fit in both of the cupboards under the bed as well as crab-walk into the one above the drawers from the floor if I go onto the suitcase, then the chair, then the bed, and manage to get a good grip on the handle with my toes.
I have also sorted all my coins into piles by country and denomination.
I
am really bad at packing
The Office is over.
And wow, what a great episode. It was sentimental, heartwarming, and funny all at the same time.
It feels strange that it’s over. Like, The Office was the one fun thing that my mother and I did together. Every week we would sit down to watch, ever since season 2. My first episode was “Casino Night.” What an episode to start on! But yeah, every week. I just… I don’t know, the show represented my relationship with my mother. And what it used to be, compared to what it is. Like, what are we going to talk about now? We don’t have anything in common anymore.
Guys… guys…
I may be rich in a couple of days;
My grandma came over with an old book she found in her basement, and she gave it to us to sell on eBay or something.
But in the back of the book, we found an autograph of someone.
And unless it’s a perfect forgery, it would be James Buchanan’s autograph! Not kidding!
all the facts lead to it, It looks exactly like his other autographs, and the book was made when JB was living.
Dad looked up things on eBay that had JB’s signature written out, and it was worth something like $11,00 for the selling price…
I may actually be worth something to my friends now, go me!
If your friends require you to have money or autographed books of famous people in order to value you, I’d question whether they’re really friends at all…..
Haha, it was some joke
But still… there is still the possibility that my AUNT (Who always sponges money from other people) Will like us even more
Anyway, on a less negative note, that must be really exciting to find something like that, so hopefully it turns out to be the real thing.
When I was a kid I use to fantasize about finding buried treasure (as in, actually buried in the ground as opposed to in a grandparents’ basement). And by fantasize, I mean “spend hours digging in the ground”, convinced that if I dug enough or hard enough I’d find something…..
I just realized I use to have so much fun as a kid, having adventures, etc, outside. And now the highlight of my life is junk food, getting a full night sleep (never happens), and watching TV. And now I’m being depressing again…. :/
Is there something stopping you from still having adventures now?
Real life. While in school I don’t even have enough time to get more than 4-5 hours of sleep a night, and this summer and all my (minimal) breaks between now and when I graduate in 2 years, I have to do a bunch of externships and preceptorships, etc, and then in 2015 I graduate and become an Adult, and have to do adult things and have responsibilities, and I don’t imagine that being a fresh newly graduated veterinarian that I”ll have much time, money, or opportunity to do anything adventurey, although hopefully I’ll catch up on my sleep deficit.
Well, yes, but you seemed to be saying that what you did as a child was more fulfilling than the things you did for fun now, like TV. I guess you were speaking in a general sense and meant you would want to do something somewhat similar, except different because now that you’re an adult your idea of adventures is different?
I think that is what I”m saying, that the imagination-y and adventurous things I did as a child were more exciting than my “for fun” life now….But to be honest, I”m not really sure what I”m saying anymore half the time…. :/
That’s what I’d thought to begin with, but I got confused because it seemed to me that those things would probably not require much, if any money, and that if it was more enjoyable than what you do for fun now, you could do it in the time you would otherwise spend on other fun things. Maybe I’m missing something.
I agree with Luna, but that is an awesome find.
So, my theater class has divided into groups, and each group is performing scenes from musicals to the dance class. I wanted to do The Sound of Music. As per my usual luck, nobody else did and I ended up in a group doing scenes from Grease.
We have two males and two females in the group. We’re performing the scene at the drive-in movie, and one of my groupmates and I are doing the voices in the movie… genderbent.
See, he really wanted to play female roles exclusively, and I don’t care what gender my character(s) is/are.
Then, because two of the people in my group are not actually visible in that scene, we have to perform a second scene at least with the two of us. And in that scene, I’m playing… a cheerleader. What.
I leave Galway in about an hour and a half
I am not ready
Safe journey, Jadestone! I have a feeling you’ll be back.
Aww, Jade! You’ll be fine
*Gives companionship squid*
Travel safe!
I was thinking about the issue of Muse about sound, and can’t help but wonder: I am in the habit of listening to music the entire time I’m on my computer, whenever I’m on my computer and regardless of what I’m doing. It actually helps me concentrate. I listen to my music at a volume that is entirely comfortable to me, and my friends all say I listen to it way too quietly. But is such constant exposure to sound still damaging to my hearing? Because I definitely want my hearing to be as good as possible for as long as possible.
I don’t think you’ll have problems as long as you keep the volume down. Even short, one-time exposures to very loud noises can damage your hearing, but I’ve never heard that moderate volumes will affect it even with constant exposure.
Thank you. That’s a relief.
I am wearing a moustache and pearl earrings along with ripped jeans and birkenstocks to clean my room/pack my life into as few boxes as possible). Clearly I have a Good Handle on fashion.
And then I have to go grocery shopping, because I have food, but it’s all ingredients for things and no actual things I could sit down and eat, or even prepare into any sort of edible thing. (I might be able to make gravy over rice right now. That is one meal I could do from the ingredients at my disposal.)
I’m looking forward to cooking for myself, but the dorm kitchen is still super gnarly. I guess once I’m done cleaning up my own wreckage zones, I’ll see what I can do about that in order to not starve to death until I move to the field house.
Back in America, after a long day of travel. Got home around 4 hours ago.
In the continuing trend of my mother changing the house while I’m gone and not telling me, all of the bathrooms have been redone.
Also, it is really nice and sunny out and I am wearing shorts and everything is flowers so that is helping. I did miss being warm.
Lucky. Here everything is rain.
It snowed back home today, two or three inches, and there is still ice on the lake–none of which is even remotely normal for this time of year.
Every year when I’ve gone home in mid-May for summer vacation, the trees would be budding, and there’d be no ice. It might be chilly wet and rainy (50ish maybe cooler), but snow, and that much in May is not at all normal.
I can only think of one time I remember it snowing in May (because it was my sister’s birthday), and it was just a few flakes falling from the sky, but there was no snow on the ground, and even then I remember thinking how bizarre it was.
The weather is beyond whack this year.
When did my scissors become magnetized? I have a feeling that they weren’t like this originally. Now I put them on my desk and safety pins and needles stick to it.
…at least it’s a good way to keep them form getting lost?
Graduation: Survived.
Also, having a huge hippie street festival fair thing in front of my apartment is kind of cool. I just kind of wish they’d all go away. I’m tired of listening to 60-year-old men play rock covers.
Okay, so I like the street food and vendors and all. I do not like the constant noise. And I really really really do not like the people doing firespinning right next to my apartment. Go away go away go away go away
I’ve done nothing today except sleep, make and eat pancakes and tea, and internet. It’s awesome.
The grades for all but one of my classes have been posted, and I got all a’s and one a- and I am relieved.
In sum, you’re a good student but a lousy prophet.
Happy birthday-and-a-bit, by the way.
There’s still room for soul-crushing dispair! My Renaissance and Reformation grade hasn’t been posted yet. I MAY YET WAIL OVER MY GPA.
While I think that grades are absolute hogwash and not an accurate measurement of my knowledge or progress in a subject, I still worry about them. I guess part of it is because I never had them before so I assumed that I got through just because I didn’t have grades. Doing “proper” school and doing it well, whether I think it’s silly or not, is a challenge, and apparently I am way more competitive than I’ll ever admit or than I previously knew. Which is weird, because I also have a pretty impressive lazy streak.
[/mini-academics-rant]
A-. Okay, I’ll admit that a 3.91 GPA for this semester isn’t bad and I didn’t fail everything and you were right and maybe I shouldn’t drop out just yet due to futility.
*hurumph*
A 3.91 is much better than not bad. And you’re totally right even if it weren’t: grades are not a measure of your worth as a human being. You’re doing a great job. *hugs*
Driving home from a family friend’s, singing along to the CD of The Sound of Music with your whole family, is fantastic.
New least favorite category of people: hippies who plan street fairs / music festivals in residential neighborhoods.
I CHANGED MY MIND
IT IS ONLY LIKE 78 BUT I AM MELTING
how am I going to survive this summer it will probably average like 90º in the town I’ll be living in and I will not have air conditioning I am going to die
Ireland you have broken me
That Irish mist is good for your skin, too.
It could also have something to do with sitting in a mermaid tail in meltwater from a nearby snowline, with an air temperature of about 6C. One acclimatises.
My French teacher gave me a Terry’s Chocolate Orange today.
♥
Be not afraid. It’s part of my overarching world domination scheme. I’ll make sure I have some kind of mass name recognition before I lead my campaign for Empress.
IT TOOK ME LIKE A FULL MINUTE TO GET THIS NAD NOW I”M SO ANGYR
All I want to know is, who is Terry and what else have you been hiding from us?
I plead the Fifth.
You plead the pith?
*mental image of an orange made of choklit begging tree tar for something*
WARNING, THE FOLLOWING IS AN UPDATE ON CATWINGS’ LIFE!
Ok, hi Museblog! I was gone for a few weeks but i have returned.
FIRST OFF, i… am in an obsession with everything Anime/Manga (Im sure more musebloggians other than me also share this wonderful obsession) I have read a bunch of manga books over the past few months, and have looked up quite a few videos on YouTube.
I also must mention, i have apparently developed a disease toward pollen… i call it “Chokasneezeithera” (Choke-a-sneeze-a-theory-ah) because lately i have been choking and sneezing a lot. (L-O-T!) Maybe because we have the windows open a lot because we are MELTING in here, (95 degrees out earlier!!!! IS THERE NO GOD?!) and pollen and dust gets in through the windows and i breath it in, and the rest is self explanatory.
So… yes… the (Reply) button is above… in case you feel like using it. Happy to be posting again! i was gone for a week… and not much has changed!
Yes… awkward ending
Do you take allergy meds? The girl I sit nest to every day in class gets pretty bad allergies from about the time everything first starts to bloom until it frosts in the late fall. I’d suggest talking with a parent and/or doctor about trying some allergy meds to see if it helps.
That’s our Luna… Always reading the bright side of things
Piggy’s the one to ask about anime! Haven’t seen him in a while, though.
I’m finally getting around to watching Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood after being convinced that I wouldn’t like it because I thought the original series was so good. Well, I was wrong! Having about a year gap between the two helps, too; I hardly remember anything specific about the original series!
The only other anime that I watched religiously (besides Madoka, but that’s really short) was the first incarnation of Yu-Gi-Oh. Heh.
Have you seen Death Note? It’s awesome. I also really liked Hikaru no Go.
I think i’ve heard about Hikaru no go! I forget, is it about like someone who has a ghost in him that makes him smart, or something? im not sure…
I think it’s about a guy who has help from a ghost in playing the game “Go”.
The ghost of an old Go master who desperately wants to play again.
Seconding Bookgirl, Hikaru no Go is great! My brother actually got a really nice go board for Christmas and got very serious about playing for a time; he hasn’t played in a while, but now he’s taking a mini-course in it at camp this summer! It’s a great game to learn.
The only other one I remember reading/watching all the way through was Whistle, which is a soccer manga I highly recommend if you like soccer. (Sho is pretty much me, so no wonder I liked it so much!) I read a great deal of Yu-Gi-Oh, too.
Oh, and I’m two episodes into watching Dragonball Z. It’s a summer project with my boyfriend!
We actually have an anime thread that you can search for. It’s got lots of recommendations for good series. And while I don’t watch as much anime as I used to (not enough time, sigh), I’d be perfectly happy to discuss the series that I have seen with you.
Well… technically, i was interested in Anime when i was around 2, But didn’t realize it at the time. I used to be SO into “Hello Kitty” and they are actually an Anime show… And i would watch it nonstop for about 8 months. So, maybe i am destined to be a great Anime person?!
Then when i was like, 9, i used to watch SonicX like it was steak for my eyes. So that was interesting for a long time. Then, i kinda stopped for awhile after my cat-wings grew. (Around the time Lisa left) then i read some Manga books that i was (and still am) hooked on. So i wanted recommendations for a new series i can watch.
The first anime I ever watched was Digimon. But it was the Arabic dub, and I didn’t understand much of what was going on. The first anime I ever went out and watched on my own was Sailor Moon.
Here’s the link to the anime thread, and all the recommendations on it, if you haven’t looked at it already. https://musefanpage.com/blog/?p=3869 I don’t think I could personally give you recommendations without knowing a bit more about what you like, like action, comedy, romance, whatever.
Whenever you are indoors or away for certain from pollen, take some deep breaths. I get a little chokasneezeithera at the start of spring, and I have a very mild cat allergy, yet I have one large and fluffy cat whom I adore. I’m okay, though. Hope you get better!
Your names are becoming all the more short…
Can anyone explain Advanced Dungeons & Dragons to me? I mean, friends have sent me a link to a rulebook (I think?), but it’s 577 pages in PDF format and I’m supposed to be studying.
Finished with all my AS exams at long last! It’s been a stressful month but now I can finally, finally relax. I can’t overstate the feeling of extraordinary relief. I can’t believe I’m actually done; somehow I’ve managed to get through all 13 alive and (reasonably) sane. *contented sigh*
Im… trying to think of that one show that… had that one guy in it…
How incredibly specific.
It’s a refrance to MAD magazine’s letter from someone, saying what i just said
I thought maybe a GAPA would guess.
SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER SPOILER
You mean the episode in which those people went to that place and said those things about that other person? We know all about it.
YES!
Guess the show, or guess the MAD reference?
Both.
aaaand now I am packing for a three day trip to collegeland to see most of my friends graduate, and also for leaving for the summer on the 1st.
It’s frustrating that my housing and job both start on the same day, so I can’t be driven up with my thigns the day before because I would have… no where to put them or to sleep… and there’s not enough time to drive there day of.
Thankfully, I can stay at the boyfrined’s house for a night or two before my job starts so I can, you know, arrive day 1 reasonably well rested. And then mom will drive the rest of my belongings out on the 5th.
So I have to pack for this short trip, the 5 days when I won’t have most of my things, and also get the rest of my things ready for mom to bring since I won’t be there to put them in the car before I go.
I leave for the first trip around 6:30 or 7pm, and am mostly busy visiting my grandmother and a few friends between when I get back the 27 and leave on the 1st.
Which is why I’ve spent the afternoon watching internet television instead of packing, you see.
I HAVE CHANGED MY MIND. I DO NOT WANT BENEDICT CUMBERBATCH TO PLAY THE DOCTOR ANYMORE. I WANT HIM TO PLAY THE NEXT MASTER.
That is all.
Well, that and I just watched Star Trek obviously, and well, cake, as if I needed something else procrastinatory to do, I’m now thinking of watching Star Trek. I’ve seen all of about half a dozen episodes tops (and they were all from whichever version of the show had the Reading Rainbow dude on it, whose name escapes me, and who I always just call the “reading Rainbow dude”, anyway, so yeah, and I only saw those because it was at the time when i watched reading rainbow and he had an episode about all the makeup and stuff for his character on star trek and yeah). But yeah, like I need to add somethign else to my TV watchign list, I’ve already placed watching every back episode of ER on my list, plus the seasons I did see, and that’s a lot of TV, but if I were to add in Star Trek, that’s like watching Classic Who all over again,w hich is something els I”m considering, and oh my god no wonder I dont’ get any sleep it’s because I waste all my study time, and then still don’t study enough and bleh.
Oh, and Kai Yves, no, they did not play the NASA trailer thingy before the Star Trek movie at the theatre I went to.
And I asm so super hyper, between a week of sleep deprivation (3 hours last night, then a 2 hour nap before hte movie), and more soda than anybody should drink in one sitting (large sodas at the local theatre are freaking huge, and I let htem con me into upgrading my medium popocorn to a large for “75 cents mroe and free refills”, and a large is the size that at home, would be spilt between myself and a parent, and I consume at least half of it during the movie, and I’m probably going to be sick later as a result, because half of a huge tub of super buttery popocrn because I loaded it with butter form the butter pump, as the only food i’ve consumed all day, as I missed breakfast because I never eat much for breakfast and had no snacks to bring to class this morning, and all i had was a mountain dew during class, and no lunch b/c nap befor emovie, and then overload of popocrn and soda in movei, and did i mention i am really really really hyper and you are getting stream of consciousness thoguht here right now? b/c yeah, super super hyper.)
and anyway yeah. good movie, benedict cumberbatch is the freaking awesomest and yeah. BENEDICT CUMBERBATCH FOR THE NEXT MASTER!!!!!!!!!! WOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Crashing now…..hyperness wearing off……
Whew!
But now nausea from too much popcorn is setting in.
Maybe you should go to bed.
pssh, too early for that. it’s still in the single digits.
Actually, joking about the time aside, if I were to go to bed while still feeling nauseous, I’d be waking up in a couple hours for a date with my toilet
I’m thinking some real food to settle my stomach, and bed by midnight so I can get a full night’s sleep and then start on the week’s worth of schoolwork that my three exams this past week put me behind on when I wake up tomorrow.
Actually, more accurately, it’s still in the pm, since I’ve been going to bed in the single digits most nights for months, just the ones in the am….. 5 more weeks til summer.
And of course when I say “get to bed by midnight”, I really mean start making my way toward bed at about 1am….
Goodnight, sleeping blogizens.
LeVar Burton played Geordi on Star Trek: The Next Generation.
Star Trek as various tv series aren’t nearly as fast or flashy as the movie (not that i didn’t like that in the film!), but it is more philosophically interesting, which I think sci-fi has, if not an obligation, then at least an opportunity. I was let down by Into Darkness in that regard.
Aw, bummer. You can find the trailer online, though. Just search for “We Are The Explorers NASA”.
took a week and a half long break from practicing after school ended, and so I started playing again a few days ago. Just finished reading through the Bach sonatas and partitas in an attempt to get my fingers to remember where they go – I think the a minor is hardest for me, although probably if I hadn’t done CM this year that would be the worst. I should do this more often.
79 (Lizzie)~ For the past semester I’ve only had my fiddle out twice a week on average, and I’ve not done any actual practicing in forever. The other day I tried to play a few tunes and it was shameful.
WHOO FRIDAY NIGHT TIME TO DO LAUNDRY AND PACK UP EVERYTHING IN MY ROOM AND GET GOOD SLEEP FOR THE DRIVING TEST I HAVE TOMORROW.
My college is going to entrust me with the lives of up to 15 people at a time by making me drive a minbus around. A BUS. In real life, I’m pretty sure you need a commercial driver’s licence to drive one of those, but here you just take an online course (read: watch a hilariously bad 4 minute video after looking at some slides and then take a road test) and you’re good.
What are institutions of higher learning I don’t even.
And also I need to pack all my stuff up (buh) and store what I don’t need (buuuuh) and then crash in my friend’s room, because I don’t actually have housing for the next three days, because on Tuesday I’m moving into the field house…but tomorrow I need to move out of my semester room.
You know how I joke about being frequently homeless in preparation for afterschool? Yeah, I’m actually not really joking. That’s a theme in my life, apparently. Whatever, haven’t died yet.
I just finished Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood.
My love for Col. Mustang knows no bounds.
I disapprove of his moustache, though.
Ignore the mustache as being non-canon. Everyone else does.
Haha, will do!
This is quite amusing to read in the Recent Comments bar without knowing the context.
STFP: I was posting under a different name than usual! My precious post count! *I still care what is wrong with me*
I finished my first week of work successfully! I’m still amazed by how tired I am after spending all day sitting at a desk in front of a computer, with occasional meetings — I wake up at 7:30am in order to get ready to be there at 8:30- 9am, and I was asleep by 9pm pretty much every night this week, after a struggle to stay awake past 8.
Everyone’s been really nice, and I’ve almost finished the project I was assigned on Monday, which they seem to find impressive, even though it wasn’t that hard. (My project was basically to translate error logs from foreign languages to English, using translation files containing the error messages in every language. One of the main challenges was an error log written in Japanese — I never actually figured out how to make it appear as Japanese characters on my work computer, so I couldn’t match it to the Japanese characters in the translation file. After a day of reading about various ways of encoding text, and staring at the hexadecimal representation of the bits the file was composed of, I gave up, and asked if we could get a known-good Japanese error log, which I am still waiting for.)
(and by “work” of course I mean my internship — it’s full-time hours, and paid. The only difference is that it ends at the end of the summer.)
Half-term! I’m currently en route to Herefordshire. I seem to spend copious amounts of time on trains.
Life is so much more enjoyable when one isn’t stressed. We’re going to some events at the Hay Festival in the coming week – I think I’m seeing talks by Simon Blackburn, A. C. Grayling, possibly Muhammad Yunus. All in all it should be a pleasant week, especially if the sun stays shining!
Went to bed at 1:45am. Set my alarm for 10:45am. Catnapped in 10 minute to one hour intervals until 5:45pm. What’s wrong with me??????
Severe sleep deprivation?
*manic laughter* probably.
I had a nice day at the aquarium today, they put some of the animals back in the main Giant Ocean Tank with new coral, and it was really great to walk up the spiral ramp that goes around it.
That sounds like an awesome aquarium I will have to visit sometime.
They have leafy sea dragons, too!
I spent a really interesting day at the Hay Festival today (just inside Wales) – heard talks by Simon Blackburn on public trust in government/media, A.C. Grayling on his latest book The God Argument, Hans Blix on nuclear weapons and disarmament and his role in the investigations into Iraq’s alleged WMDs, and a talk on Edmund Burke by Jesse Norman MP (I also got his book). Grayling in particular was really excellent I thought, though Blix’s discussion was fascinating too. Tomorrow’s programme includes Jack Straw and Stella Rimington, former head of MI5.
This is a great way to spend a holiday, everyone; I certainly recommend you do so if you get the chance.
And this is the one who is afraid she might be ordinary.
Jack Straw this morning was typically evasive on all the questions about Iraq. It was still interesting to watch a politician clearly not very at ease with many of the questions being thrown at him (though none of them were anything new, really, considering it’s been 10 years since the fateful decision on Iraq.) It was all the more fascinating as just yesterday in literally the same pavilion was Hans Blix speaking on almost the same topic – though obviously from a different viewpoint! – and it was clear from some of the questions that much of the audience was also at Dr Blix’s talk yesterday.
Stella Rimington though was just fantastic, really interesting (I’m running out of synonyms!) She gave much more straightforward answers than perhaps one would expect (as I did) and it was all absolutely fascinating.
Sweet, Selenium!
Is there a word for when you think two characters should be best friends? Because there should be.
The most commonly used one is BROTP, I think.
Yeah, I’ve heard brotp (how to capitalize it??) used a lot lately.
I’ve seen “friendshipping” and, less-commonly, “platonic shipping”.
All of my hair is gone.
And you’re beautiful. (You can’t deny it; I’ve seen pictures.)
You cut your dreads?
It looks good.
Happy Memorial Day!
Three finals down, feature article done, two finals to go and then FREEDOM! Or at least a summer job.
Brava!
Thank you.
Have any of you folks ever made a toy raft from sticks and twine? A little one, I mean, about a foot square or smaller, not one that you could actually ride on.
I think I’d like to make one to sail in the Storrow Lagoon, with a long string tied to the mast so I could get it back at the end of the day (the lagoon is open at both ends– it’s really just a part of the Charles River between the shore and a very long artificial island, so there is the very real possibility of having a boat be carried away by the current if it isn’t remote-controlled or tied to a string.)
I can watch SciShow for hours on end. I have, in fact, done that. That, some anthropology blogs I’ve been following lately, and some thoughts I’ve had for a while but have been unable to express have coalesced into a desire to evaluate the accuracy of human/hominin facial reconstruction based on skulls. I realize that a lot of it is just artistic interpretation, but how much of it, exactly? And how much of it is due to pre-existing internal biases regarding what the face you’re reconstructing looked like, and what’s due to scientific evidence?
Basically, I want to take the skulls of people who have died recently, whom we have photographs of, and give them to facial reconstructors, and compare what they think that person looked like compared to what we actually know what they did look like. And maybe tell them different things–like, oh, this is a Neandarthal skull (would any of them be fooled by that?) Or, this is the skull of an Egyptian mummy. And then see just how much artistic interpretation is at work. I mean, obviously, there’s some, but I think it would nice to quantify that and also have something to quote when people come up with new facial representations of historical figures.
I know that for one of the more recent facial reconstructions of Tutankhamen’s mummy, the same skull model was given to one team of forensic reconstructors aware of who it was, and one that was unaware, and pictures of the models were printed side-by-side so readers could compare them.
That would be pretty interesting to see. Do you know where I could find it?
That was the National Geographic issue for, Uh *looks up* June 2005. The “royal” reconstruction is the cover photo, the comparison is inside.
I have a lot of back issues of National Geographic; I may actually own that issue. I will have to dig it out of the basement. If not, well, National Geographic has its articles online. Midnight Fiddler (and anyone else interested), you could probably find it there.
aaaand back home again. At least my computer is fixed?
I leave again on friday. I accomplished nothing today really but I did sleep a bunch.
also I’m covered in bruises because Matt was like
“wanna fight”
and I said “sure”
(we’re friends though so it’s all cool)
I’m getting a weird feeling right now… that kind of feeling you get when you realize you’ve been awake for 32 hours straight. I feel tired, but I want to stay awake. I mean, I feel tired all the time, but actually doing work during the day (like I did yesterday [today?]) makes me feel really good. Like, really, really good. I don’t know why I don’t do it more often–it’s definitely getting started that’s the trouble. It’s just so easy to not do work. But then I get behind and bluh.
Well now I’m feeling a little less exhilarated (definitely not the right word; more toned-down and way more tired, but still a little crazy). But there’s just something about being tired; it decreases my ability to care and thus makes me more social and feel more like writing.
I’m definitely feeling this, though. Usually it’s just like staying up really late after getting six hours of sleep or so so I’m still kind of normal. I’m starting to halfway hallucinate, I think? I mean, I thought my phone vibrated when it definitely always makes a tone. I thought my ears weren’t working. And then I keep thinking my roommate’s asleep and moving around in her bed but she’s not even here. But she literally just entered the room and I flinched at the door opening (unexpected sound) when I usually don’t. Heightened tension? Heightened flight or fight instinct? I watched a show on Discovery once about a guy in a hot air balloon over Antarctica who didn’t sleep for three days from sensory deprivation and lack of human contact. Then he fell asleep and the balloon drifted downward–an alarm sounded, he woke up, and in his delirium almost jumped out of the balloon. Not to mention that he was seeing and hearing things during his second day.
See, I told you, I like writing and talking and stuff when I’m tired. Less inhibited.
Well I gotta clean off my bed; there’s textbooks all over it.
P.S. I still haven’t done my sosc response. I have no idea what to say about diversity. Topic is multiculturalism vs colorblindness and whites’ feelings of exclusion in multicultural initiatives. Also political correctness a bit. Suggestions for this poor tired frood?
My step-cousin, a Sandhurst-trained Army officer, has just been told that she’s being deployed to Afghanistan for seven months from September – ironically, to assist with the withdrawal of troops.
Her daughter is five.
I don’t really know what to feel about this.
Thankfully, the order’s just been rescinded so she won’t be going after all! It just goes to show, though, the volatile and changeable nature of army decisions and who’s assigned to do what, where and when.
Sixty years ago today, Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay made the first confirmed ascent of Mount Everest!
Additionally, a hundred years ago today The Rite of Spring premiered. I think it’s kinda cool that those two things happened on the same day.
And it was JFK’s birthday, too.
93 (FantastyFan)~ Yes! I’ve always wanted to do that too. I think it’d be really interesting to be able to compare facial reconstruction produced without photographic help with someone who’s appearance was known (just not to the people doing the reconstruction). I’d be interested in that article Kai mentioned, too.
I’m all settled where I’m living over the summer, which is really nice. Work is so much more interesting now than it was last week in the lab. Even though it’s hot as all get out and there’s dirt everywhere and not much shade and the water from the coolers tastes weird, the days go by so much faster. Next week field school starts, which will be fun I guess. It’s kind of weird to think that while I’m working now I’ll be switching over to student mode again for a month, and then back to working.
I’ve been cooking for myself, and it’s AWESOME. I like the cafeterias at my school, but still…although grocery shopping isn’t as much fun when I don’t have an already-stocked kitchen (read: mom’s kitchen with all those spices) or an endless supply of money, it’s nice being able to set my own meals.
Other things I’ve been thinking a lot about lately have been body issues, and gender/orientation stuff. It’s been really interesting, and I’m still trying to figure out how to put it all into words.
Does anyone else feel sometimes like they choose their gender presentation on a daily basis?
[/life update]
The apartment directly above mine was burglarized last night. Kind of scary. I don’t know why they robbed that one and not mine, since mine’s ground floor…
Jeepers! Stay safe!
I spent an inordinate amount of time this afternoon learning how to use and messing around with Windows Speech Recognition. It was both really awesome and really frustrating.
Ah. The issue for this random thread is also my favorite issue of all time.
Anywho, I’m extremely happy because I got a job at a vet clinic that I thus far have enjoyed immensely! This time it’s not an emergency clinic so it’s a lot more chill than my last job. I’m so relieved! A tip for pre-vet students… when you apply to work at your first clinic job… if you can help it don’t go to an emergency clinic. Start out at your typical day clinic and after you’ve worked there some, then you should try out an emergency clinic. I did it backwards. It wasn’t a good idea. If I wasn’t as stubborn as a mule I may very well have switched to a different major…
I can’t remember, are you still in highschool or are you an undergrad?Nevermind, looked up your birthday on the ‘blog. So since you have November birthday, would you have just finished you sophomore year of undergrad?If you can, try to work/shadow in a variety of different fields–as in, even if you’re interested in small animal, for instance, I know my school at least strongly advised having 100+ hours of experience (minimum) in small, equine, and food animal. Not to mention, once you’re actually in vet school, getting thrown in to classes on equine and food animal (when you know next to nothing about them) is extremely overwhelming.
I would definitely suggest taking an microanatomy (histology) course in undergrad, because getting thrown into that class as a first year was pretty panic-inducing and a just a huge volume overload on information and I think having had a foundation to build from would have made it a lot less stressful to do well in that course. I mean, you can definitely do well without having taken any previous microanatomy, it’s just more challenging.
And also immunology, I think that’s another one I would have liked to have had some knowledge base to build upon, rather than being thrown into it with no previous knowledge of the subject, beyond one might be taught in in your typical biology course (which really isn’t much).
Actually, come to think of it, anatomy is another one that if your undergrad institution offer it, it wouldn’t be a bad one to take. That’s one of the most challenging courses you take your first year. Again, certainly possible to do well without any previous anatomy classes, but I’m guessing it would have been way less stressfull if I had taken anatomy as an undergrad.
Also, I’d strongly suggest when you apply to vet school to try and get your application completed during the summer between your junior and senior year even though it’s not due until October/November-ish, because having to worry about the application and your current coursework would be unnecessary stress to subject yourself to.
If you ever have any questions about vet school stuff, definitely feel free to hit me up and I’ll help if I can.
Kai, you might already know about this but I thought of you when I saw it on other Internet places – the NASA History Office is offering internships for undergraduate/graduate students (deadline June 1st I believe?) On reading through it I just thought you’d be a perfect applicant for it.
So one of my good friends who I don’t see much anymore just got back from a mental hospital.
I’ve never actually had to deal with something like this before, but I know some MBers here have, so does anyone have advice on how I go about “dealing” with this? The extent of my knowledge is “don’t make a big fuss,” but is there anything further I should know, or can do?