Becca Stareyes

Well, this was Dumb

2009-11-16T15:59:43Z

I am this close to asking my aunt if I can spend Thanksgiving Break camped out in her sunroom (or the garage) writing and drawing, and be excused from dinner prep and family socializing. Because, despite not doing NaNo, I am feeling overwrought with projects. I did finish my scifibigbang fic (only two weeks after I was supposed to do the rough draft), and am working on my slayers_request fic. The outline looks long, so I might have to go at NaNo rates to get it done in time to edit. Plus, I need to rewatch some anime for yuletide, and I missed MAX entirely*, and gah!

It didn't help that I spent this weekend feeling sick to my stomach sporadically -- tea and quiet time away from the computer seemed to help. And I'm not entirely sure it isn't stress, since it's coming back as I write this. So now I get to spend today doing grading that I meant to do over the weekend -- if I didn't have group therapy, I'd be camping in Borders to avoid the Internets**. And tomorrow there's dinner with the DGS, which I am tempted to skip work before so I can bake and get my kitchen clean enough that I can call in someone to fix my garbage disposal and find out why the sink drains so slowly.

* As much as I love the Anniversary round, I might drop MAX until January just to give myself time to recuperate. And bow out of mrcaex in December as well.

** A lot of the off-campus coffee shops around here have a 'fifteen minutes every hour for free' policy. Their firewalls don't block ssh or ftp programs, though, so I can still remotely work from them, just not use email or my web browser or chat programs.

Book Review: The Charmed Sphere by Catherine Asaro

2009-11-13T20:37:59Z

I haven't done one of these in a while... it's book review time!

So, in an effort to branch out, I've been trying to read new authors. Plus, this gives me things to tell my mother when she asks what I want for Christmas (sequels!). A couple of weeks ago, I read The Charmed Sphere by Catherine Asaro. I was a bit wary, as I always am with new authors. But it did have pretty, pretty cover art.

So the basic premise is that protagonist Chime was found to be a powerful mage and asked to study at the capital (and hopefully marry the heir to the throne, since it was customary for the consort to be a mage). Of course, there are all kinds of problems -- the original heir is dead, his son is missing, and the cousin who is the current heir is seen as a flake. Plus, the neighboring kingdom -- which has had a sort of uneasy peace with the kingdom -- is up to no good, they might have a mage themselves, and people keep trying to kill Chime and Mueller (the cousin).

Anyway, I had some problems with the magic system while thinking it could have been neat. The magic was based on shapes and colors -- mages had to focus through regular polygons or polyhedra and each kind of spell had colors -- for instance red spells called light and heat, green spells let the user sense emotions, orange and yellow spells soothed physical and emotional pain, and indigo and blue spells healed physical and emotional wounds. You could also reverse the spells to do the opposite -- cause harm and agitation -- but considering most powerful mages were wired into others' emotions, it wasn't a good idea at all. The shape aspect came in because mages need to focus through shapes, and the higher level mages could use different shapes for more power (triangle, square, regular pentagon... up to circle, then regular tetrahedron through sphere).

So, first problem. I somehow suspect the author needs to think a bit more about geometry. So, she specifies that regular/perfect shapes work, and imperfect shapes disrupt concentration (except for Mueller). For polygons, I assume that means regular ones. For polyhedra, I'd assume it meant the five Platonic solids (regular tetrahedron, cub/hexahedron, regular octahedron, regular dodecahedron, regular iscosahedron) , except one mage uses a square pyramid, and another uses a 18-sided shape. So maybe it's just 'shapes made of regular polygons', which seems a bit odd to me, since those don't really approach a sphere as the sides get infinite and are much less regular. (The Platonic and Archemedian solids do, but that limits you to 4, 6, 8, 12, 14, 20, 26, 32, 38, 62 and 92 faces -- I don't think anyone got higher than 20 without going to a sphere.) For that matter, you get 'box', 'cube' and 'hexahedron' all being used in the book, with no real reason as to why the difference in terminology.

So, second problem. The book suffers a bit from Planet of the Hats syndrome. So there's shape magic. It's common in the royal family and shape mages are revered, with them often wearing crystal polyhedra marking their rank and serving as a magic focus -- the more faces and the higher-frequency the color, the more powerful the mage. The royal family decorates with mosaics, which makes sense, since they are mages and the constant use of shapes will mean they always have a focus at hand. The nobility and middle class folks copy this, because royalty are trendsetters. The non-magic folks use shapes as rank like the mages (and boy howdy did I get sick of shape-title in ranks). The army is trained to march in formation so the mages can supplement them -- and here things got a bit silly, since each unit does a separate shape, and it's mentioned that losses causes problems in keeping the formation supported via magic, especially since you can't transfer guys from other units out. Here is where I'd like to see some concession to actual military tactics -- do something like the hoplites or Roman legions where you put all your dudes in lines with shields as a wall (you can get hexagons if you stagger the lines). That way, everyone knows whats what, the army can fill in holes, tactics match the formation, and you can use your archers or cavalry to keep the enemy from trying to get around your army. Jeez, no wonder the kingdom gets nearly taken over,

Third problem has to do with the Planet of the Hats syndrome. I can buy mages shaping things... except later we find out that:
-- There are, on average, only a couple green to indigo mages born per generation, plus the Royal Family. And the Royal Family doesn't seem to be spreading the blood around by having younger siblings and marrying them off to nobility.
-- No one bothers to train the red to yellow mages, despite the fact they are much more common, and the spells are still useful. Sure, they can't heal, but they can block pain and fear, and still use the army formation as a focus.
-- Somehow, having under a dozen mages makes up for the fact the Angry Despotic Kingdom to the north has a competent and larger army, and this kingdom... doesn't. Also Angry Despotic Kingdom doesn't have mages -- the mage they employ turns out to be a refuge from the Protagonist Kingdom.

It feels like the book tries to have its cake and eat it too. Magic is special and elite, but it also influences everything. Generally, that doesn't work.

(It does get pluses for showing that, despite a pretty ordered magic system, all the four mages we meet have unique talents and work in different ways.)

Also, the plot. It avoided a few of the cliches (Oh, look, the heroine meets the prince in disguise while she's upset about being pressured to marry the prince. How long can the author string this out... oh, good, she finds out right away and we don't get stupid melodrama), but it felt like the author was pretty much bouncing from plot point to plot point without giving time for things to develop. I think she could have gotten two books out of this if things were developed better -- the relationship between Mueller and Chime, the location of the missing heir and discovery that he was a bit crazy, and then the war (okay, battle) with Angry Despot Kingdom.

I also liked the protagonist, but the author really needed to lay off the 'she is so pure and good that the antagonist puts conquering the kingdom on the line to get her'. And here I'm going to go into ending spoilers...

Okay, so Angry Despot King and Crazy Mage try to conquer Protagonist Kingdom. They are stopped by Our Heroes, who decide... hey, let's give Angry Despot Kingdom to Mueller and Chime, while the Missing Heir and his wife rule Protagonist Kingdom. Which was like... did Angry Despot King get hit by the Idiot stick and not leave some guys back home? And are they okay with this? And are the people, even if they were taxed horribly, okay with being taken over by the kingdom to the south? And did Angry Despot King's wife and son -- only mentioned under the 'he had a treaty marriage but was so bad that his wife went home' -- okay with this? Not to mention the neighbors, who might be a tad upset by Protagonist Kingdom taking over Angry Despot Kingdom, even if the ADK attacked first.

It was kind of a fairy-tale ending tacked on so that it would be happy, but the author didn't sell it to me.

Yeah, this was an interesting world, and I didn't mind the characters, but the plot was an Idiot Plot. I might read the next one, but it's definitely going on the 'buy used or get as gift' list. And it might improve with practice -- a lot of first-in-series books can be shaky.

WTF... my health

2009-11-13T19:03:02Z

Me: Ugh, my stomach. *emails boss saying she feels like crap and won't be in for group meeting today, then goes to rest*
Nausea: *clears up*
Me: ...

I'm starting to wonder if its some kind of fried food thing. Yesterday I had potato chips and made some fake fried rice -- basically it was rice with veggies and scrambled eggs. Yesterday night, I felt miserable -- hungry one minute and bloatedly full after I ate a normal snack. And today my digestive system is registering its displeasure with me.

(I still have to head out and drop off some anime at the club's business meeting -- we only had the first two discs of one of the shows we show, so that meant buying the rest.)

Two Memes, no Waiting

2009-11-13T17:37:06Z

Comment and I'll give you three fandoms, for which you must answer these:

01: What got you into this fandom in the first place?
02: Do you think you'll stay in this fandom or eventually move on?
03: Favorite episodes/books/movies/etc.?
04: Do you participate in this fandom (fanfiction, graphics, discussions)?
05: Do you think that more people should get into this fandom?

I got Harry Potter, Star Wars, and Vision of Escaflowne from corellianrogue.

What got you into this fandom in the first place?
- HP: I think it was around the hype about Goblet of Fire. mirisa_ardruna had read the books, so I decided to give them a shot. Plus, I was still sneaking into the kids' section for Animorphs books, so I didn't feel silly grabbing them. I bought the first three and read them on a family outing to Chadron. What can I say -- they were fun.
- Star Wars. Sophomore year of high school, crisi83 discovered I had never seen Star Wars, so she loaned me some of her spin-off novels (the Young Jedi Knights, IIRC). So I have to be one of maybe five people who got into the canon via reading. I eventually saw the first (in the original trilogy) movie in my sci-fi lit class on a sub day, and rented the rest of that trilogy later, when TPM was coming out, so I could watch them.
- Escaflowne. Totally blame yuuo. She was a big fan, and said I needed to watch it. I'd seen the first few episodes -- enough to know the premise -- but we watched the rest over finals week one semester in my dorm room, with mirisa_ardruna and Paul.
Do you think you'll stay in this fandom or eventually move on?
- HP: I thought I had moved on since I hadn't read the books since Deathly Hallows came out and the muse demanded I write Narcissa & Andromeda reconciliation fic, but then I did a Harry/Ginny drabble a week or so ago. I think it might just be something that occasionally strikes my fancy.
- Star Wars: I still take an interest in new developments, but I haven't made an effort in ages to either read the EU or see the movies. I do like the RPG books, though. Star Wars is a great RPG setting. So, I think I'll stay move on, but still enjoy the original trilogy.
- Escaflowne: I might, but it does seem to have staying power.
Favorite episodes/books/movies/etc.?
- HP: Goblet of Fire. I think it both did a nice job of setting up the turn of the series for the darker, and in creating an ambiance that shows that Harry and Dumbledore and their crowd will have to work alone, without the Ministry of Magic.
- Star Wars: A New Hope. Mostly because it works as a stand-alone movie in my regard. Well, so does The Phantom Menace, but I like ANH better, except for special effects and art direction. (I will say this about the prequel trilogy -- they were pretty, pretty movies. Oddly enough, this especially goes to Naboo and the Gungans. There -- one good thing about the Gungans was that their visual aesthetic was nice and suited them.)
- Escaflowne: Hard to say, because I don't really remember it by episode or not. I kind of see it as one thing, because it came across as a very tight arc.
Do you participate in this fandom (fanfiction, graphics, discussions)?
- HP: The fandom is huge and scary. I'll write fic on occasion and do meta, but I prefer to keep to occasionally throwing out HP fic to multi-fandom communities.
- Star Wars: Nope. I can discuss it and it makes a nice RPG setting, but I don't seek it out or do fanworks.
- Escaflowne: Yes to the fic and meta. I like writing fic for Escaflowne.
Do you think that more people should get into this fandom?
- HP & Star Wars: Look, unless you are a young one or never got into books/SF movies, you probably already know if you like it.
- Escaflowne: Oh, hell yes. The fandom is old and fic has slowed down to a trickle, and it keeps being bounced back and forth as Yuletide Eligible or not. (I'd say in a couple of years, it should get in by the second definition -- old fandoms that have fic, but little new material.)

Name a fandom and I'll tell you
- three pairings I love,
- two pairings I consider shipping,
- and one pairing I hate*

* In my case, this will be probably 'dislike' or 'would probably never read unless a good friend and awesome writer wrote or recced it to me'.

So, you can either name fandoms for me to answer questions about shipping, or have me give you fandoms to answer about your involvement.

Stir Crazy

2009-11-12T18:51:36Z

I'm a bit stir crazy at work. Not that I don't have plenty of stuff to do, but it's the inability to focus. That and I have a lot to do this weekend:

1. Finish my MAX picture.
2. Make sure everything I need done by Dec. 1 is started. That includes my mrcaex and yuletart pictures -- even a sketch would be nice.
3. If my scifibigbang story isn't done tonight (I have 3 scenes left -- a climax and two denouement scenes, and about 4k words to hit the minimum), then it better be done by Sunday. I need a short break before I edit this sucker to let it gel, and it was supposed to be done two weeks ago. I also need to make sure my artist doesn't hate me for this, since I haven't given much direction (which can be good or bad).
4. Make a start on various holiday things. I've finished 1 of 5 gifts that I'm making and have a good start on a second. I also signed up for four holiday exchanges (two Slayers and two general ones).
5. My kitchen and bathroom are starting to get scary. I need to fix this. And also buy food for the week and make some food for the potluck on Tuesday.

I also need to decide if I'm going to go to anime club, go to Ask an Astronomer Live (I'm not on the panel, but I can help field any observational astronomy questions), or stay in and play in the RP event the game I'm in is putting on. This is why I hate events on Saturday nights -- it seems like everything happens then. And all of these run from the same time window -- Ask an Astronomer is from 8 to 9:30, Anime Club is 7 to 10, and the RP event starts at 7.

I am this close to taking next Wednesday as my 'stay home and get crap done' day, since, as far as I know, I don't have any reason to be on campus except for work. Heck, I'm this close to going home and working on non-work stuff just in hopes that it calms my nerves.

Dear Yuletide Writer...

2009-11-11T03:27:41Z

Dear Yuletide Writer,

Okay, so here goes. Some general information about fics I like. I'm a big pusher of cute genfic, especially ones that spotlight friendships and families. Action fic is also awesome as is humor. Crossovers are fair game, though if you manage to combine any of these, I will be shocked.

For folks only knowing one canon source and/or wanting to try something new for Yuletide, the first is four books and some online fiction, the second is a trilogy (current edition is sold as a 3-in-one), third and fourth are 26-episode anime series, though the fourth is also a five-volume manga.

Request 1: T A Pratt - The Marla Mason series
So, Marla is one of my favorite characters. And Spell Games left her on kind of a cliffhanger, heading out to fix a problem at the end of the book. (Being intentionally vague for spoilers here.) So, a story that takes place after, with Marla trying to fix things somehow, would be good. Or pieces set during Marla's tenure as Chief Sorcerer, showing some of the problems she only kind of alludes to (like the elves), or as her time as a freelancer. Anything's good.

Octavia E Butler - Xenogenesis Trilogy
Okay, one of the things that really fascinated me about this series was the aliens and how they interacted and changed humanity. We only get three looks at Lilith's family -- once when she starts it, once when Akin is growing up and once when Jodhas is coming of age. So some missing scene fic filling in domestic life in the village of Lo would be nice. Also, colonizing Mars. Do other constructs come to help out, and how do they feel about the project? What's life like there and can humans overcome what the Oankali see as their fatal flaw?

Exploration of the Oankali themselves and things they did before coming to Earth or what they will do after leaving is also interesting.

Lost Universe
Another series where I thought the ending was ambiguous. I would love to see a fic dealing with that. Or, alternately, other adventures of the crew of the Swordbreaker.

PlanetES
Another series where fic about the crew of a ship would be my favorite thing to get. Fic about Fee and her family would also be great.

I hope that helped,

Becca Stareyes

Fanfiction.net Meme

2009-11-06T01:37:51Z

I stole this from galuxkitty.

1. How many words of fanfic have you submitted?
315,071

2. Your profile page URL?
http://www.fanfiction.net/~beccastareyes

3. How many people have faved you?
13

4. Which fandoms do you write for?
Digimon, Slayers, Escaflowne, Dragaera, Dresden Files, Fullmetal Alchemist, Harry Potter, Avatar: Last Airbender, Earthbound, Misc. Books, Crest of the Stars, Miles Vorkosigan, Star Trek: 2009, and Legend of Zelda.

5. How many stories have you written?
41 posted to ff.net, which is most of my long work that is not so old as to be crap.

6. Which story of yours would you recommend for people to read?
Depends on the fandom. On the ones I write a lot, I'm fond of Watch and Review Please (Avatar), Monster Slayer (Escaflowne), Xellos ex Machina (Slayers), and Movie Night (Dresden Files).

7. Which story are you most proud of?
Monster Slayer is one of them, as is And Then There Were Two (Earthbound). The Kite Flying Woman of the Dragon's Teeth (Avatar) was also just a fun story to write.

8. Which one was your biggest challenge?
Masking the Symptoms (FMA) refused to end in a settled way. It was supposed to be a problem story, but not for the author, dammit. Rain and Mist, Shadow and Storm (Slayers) had a bit of the same problem in that it was written for a contest that had a 5,000 word maximum and it lost a lot to keep it below that. I should have written it long and edited, or just ignored the contest.

9. Which one had the most reviews?
To Be Human, one of my ancient Slayers stories, back when I wrote multi-chapter fics. Of the one-shots, it was Twas the Night Before Solstice a Slayers holiday poem parody.

10. Which had the least?
Ripples of Change a Sharing Knife fic I wrote for the Bujold ficathon, and Sticks and Stones, my Escaflowne/Laundry crossover.

11. Which story do you feel deserved the most reviews?
I dunno. Among the Ice (Avatar) has a boatload of hits, but only 4 reviews. But, really, I like reviews -- more is nice.

12. Which story was your longest?
To Be Human

13. Which story was your shortest?
Twas the Night Before Solstice -- I don't generally post my drabbles, so it's one of the few that was substantially below 1,000 words.

14. Which story was a surprise hit?
None so Blind a Slayers/Avatar fusion I wrote on a plane ride because I was bored and imagining what Rezo and Toph would say to each other about being blind. Only 3 reviews, but two wanted 'Avatar cast in Slayers world' to be a series of fics.

15. What story are you most known for?
Dunno.

16. What fandom are you most known for?
Slayers, probably

17. What pairings are you most known for? Zel/Amelia, no question. Not sure on the rest.

18. What is something you will never put into your story?
Porn, probably. Not just because I don't generally write it, but because if I did, I wouldn't be posting it to FF.net. Unless the rules changed to allow it.

19. What do you think your trademark is?
Rare fandoms and cute, character-centric gen.

20. Give us a hint of future stories!
The FMA AU I'm procrastinating on.

Today

2009-11-02T00:36:14Z

I was all set to spend today cleaning, except then I developed the headache from Hades after going to the grocery store -- the same one that kept me in on Halloween. It's gone now, but it was enough that all I got done was spending the afternoon passed out on my bed asleep*.

Well, and a drabble. Added a new fandom to 'stuff I have written' -- yay for drabbles about book fandoms. (Suddenly you see why I took to Yuletide like a duck to water -- writing for odd fandoms is one of my favorite things to do.)

I am not adapting to the early darkness at all. For an astronomer, I sure hate the dark. No, that's not quite true. I like the dark when it comes on after I eat dinner and can sip my decaffeinated tea and watch the sunset, then go out and look at the stars. Not so much when I come home from work in the dark, or have to wake up before the sun.

* My normal response to pain is OTC painkillers and sleep until they take effect.

Tomorrow work should be busy -- I got a lunch seminar and a meeting with my advisor on 'where I am going with research**', and a lot of paper-writing and stuff.

** Basically, I'm done with one major project, unsure if I should pursue the other one further or just finish and publish, and suspect that I might need a third project to get enough dissertation writing material, but I'm going to ask my advisor. Also mention something someone mentioned to me at DPS about something I brushed over in my talk, and maybe calculating a lower limit on something. (Except I don't know -- or am not sure -- how. Maybe that, plus the F-ring feature thing that I'm helping Matt with, but is low on his priority list, would be enough stuff -- 'cept the F-ring stuff is Matt's project, and I'm just giving him the data from my data set to add to the data he has.)

My Brain is a Strange Place

2009-11-01T16:15:39Z

As in, it thinks doing a Kino's Journey/Slayers fusion fic would be a good idea. Or even a crossover type dealie taking Kino, Hermes and the feeling of Kino's Journey* and bringing it into other settings. Just as kind of a series of one-shot crossovers to play with settings/characters of various series and to write Kino and Hermes.

* If you like thoughtful anime, I recommend this series highly. Basically, the premise is that Kino is a traveler who only stays a few days in each town she visits and Hermes is her motorrad (think motorcycle with AI). A lot of the episodes are stand alones or two-part arcs, and they're very concept oriented. For example, the first episode, Kino visits a town where the inhabitants developed an ability to read each other's minds. As time passed, they discovered that knowing the innermost thoughts of even loved ones was making it impossible to live with them, so they all isolated themselves and used robots to do everything. The one person Kino meets tells her this, then invites her to stay, since she's the first person he's talked to in a while and he wants to live with people who he can't read. It's a very matter-of-fact anime, showing great beauty and kindness, but also great suffering, irrationality, and brutality. (Oh, the ending...) "The world is not beautiful, therefore it is."

I really liked it, because it was... I guess because it wasn't depressing for the sake of angst, but because it was matter of fact, showing the world which was. It's on my list with Haibane Renmei and Mushishi for cerebral anime that I liked from club and want on my shelf.

Language Peculiarities

2009-10-31T02:04:23Z

In English, a queen can be a Queen Regnant (a monarch), a Queen Consort (the wife of a monarch) or a Queen Mother (the mother to the monarch). But a king is always a King Regnant -- the husband of a monarch is a Prince Consort. I don't think the father to the monarch has a title. Then again, reading Wikipedia indicates a lot of it is because Britain -- who tend to be what sets usage of noble titles in the English language, since most English speaking countries either look to Britain for their nobility needs or don't have nobility -- has only had two reigning queens in the current era. Victoria outlived her husband and Elizabeth II is still alive, so that means that 'widower of previous monarch/father to current monarch' has never needed a word, and apparently Victoria couldn't get Parliament to call her husband king since he wasn't British. (Elizabeth II made her husband, Philip, a prince, but not Prince/King Consort.)

Now, the reason I think about this is for fantasy writing -- or non-English-language fanfic*. I mean, if I have a country that didn't have the tradition of men inheriting first, then the courtesy titles for spouses and parents should be consistent with that. So, either one has to go with Queen/King as only meaning a monarch, and Prince(ss) being a term for 'member of monarch's immediate family or direct descendants, who is not the monarch him/herself' -- so you end up with this being the Prince(ss) Consort, former Prince(ss) Consorts/now Prince(ss) Father/Mother, and the 'normal' children, grandchildren, and siblings to the monarch. Or you could have King/Queen be the term for a spouse/widow(er) of a monarch as well as the monarch him/herself. (This would also extend downward -- so a Duke or Duchess could be ruling a Duchy or the spouse of the ruler of the Duchy.)

Or you can just use the male terms as unisex terms, and use the Consort as a title for a spouse. I know for my tweaks to Green Ronin's Blue Rose setting, I'm changing it to drop King/Queen as the title of Aldis, and just go with Sovereign (the name of the office), with the Consort (or Consorts) being any spouses.

* I specify the language since a lot of politeness and titles and stuff translate better figuratively than literally.

Annoyance

2009-10-28T14:20:06Z

Today is a rainy and gray day. But that's not what I'm here to complain about.

So, last night, I finished my first read-through of papers and went to the fabric store and out to dinner. I get home around 6, and go to my computer.

Me: *attempt to wake the computer from sleep*

Computer: *no response*

Me: *tap on the keyboard and wave the mouse around*

Computer: *I'm sorry, were you doing something?*

Me: *sighs* Fine. *restarts the computer*

Computer: *Mac start up chime, but shows a folder with a question mark on it instead of the Apple logo*

Me: Shit, that's not good. *finds the OS disk and puts that in*

Computer: *working well enough to bring up the Install/Disk Utility windows*

Me: Okay, let's see what's wrong with you. Verify the hard drive.

Computer: Hard Drive needs repairs.

Me: Okay repair it.

Computer: *runs* Hard drive repair failed. Recommend you erase and restore from backup.

Me: ... Good thing I have backups*. Okay, erase the hard drive.

Computer: *runs* Disk erased.

Me: Restore from the external drive.

Computer: *runs*

Me: *does other stuff*

Computer: Restore failed.

Me: Shit. Fine, re-install OS 10. I'll restore my applications and files later.

Computer: *runs* Reinstall failed.

Me: ... Shit. You stupid piece of junk. Fine, let's hope the backup is in good condition. *runs the Disk Utility on the external drive*

Computer: Disk OK. No need for repairs here.

Me: *checks the install DVD*

Computer: Disk OK. Install OSX?

Me: Fine, yes. *tries again*

Computer: Install failed.

Me: ... -_- *tries several times in hopes that somehow the computer fairies will smile on her*

Computer: *you do know that doing the same thing and expecting different results is a sign of insanity, don't you?*

Me: ... I'm going to bed.

TLDR: Desktop at home is borked. Considering I tried at least a half a dozen time to either restore from backups or reinstall the operating system, with no helpful results, I think my only recourse is to send it to Apple and let them deal with it. (It's two years old, so no longer under warranty, and I don't live near a place that is certified to repair Macs. I could ask at Best Buy, or somewhere, since it's not like I can void the warranty by taking it elsewhere.)

I have the laptop, so I can head home tonight and do something (and get my files off the external drive), but expect me to be slow about everything computer-related in the next couple of days.

* Seriously, the computer is set to backup the disk every hour when I'm at the computer. I even have a program (Time Machine) that remembers the changes I make between backups, and keeps track of it, so I can essentially browse my hard drive as it looked in the past. Reminds me that I should get an external drive for work.

sigh

2009-10-26T18:26:11Z

90% confident I won't do NaNo this year. I'm just too drained these last couple of weeks. I might sent a NaNo-esque goal, but something less like a sprint in that I won't need December to recover. Maybe to write every one of the 31_days prompts for a different fandom, or to take a month where I draw every day. In the state I'm in, I'm just not in the condition to do something intensive like NaNo.

In other news, my officemate can't find someone to open the observatory for her lab students. Normally one grad student handles these things, but he's not answering the phone. If he doesn't show up by the time I head to group therapy, I said I'd come by and help. Which will probably mean taking the late bus home and just passing out. I already didn't sleep well, since I feel bad about not doing much for Ben's birthday this weekend, and I'm still trying to work out what to do about the whole holiday thing*, besides to buy my tickets for Boston. (I found out that Shortline offers a special bus from Cornell to Newton over the break, and I can get the T from there to a couple of blocks from my aunt's house.)

* By 'the holiday thing' I mean that Dad wants me to visit Florida with him and Marjorie**, Mom wants me to visit Nebraska with her, my siblings and my friends. Both of them have said it's ultimately my decision. Dad had assumed I'd be in Nebraska for Thanksgiving -- I don't know why, since I don't go home over that break, though I did visit him in Florida once.

** I don't know if the invitation applies to Ben, but Dad is asking Jenn and Matt next year, since he can't put up all four of us in his condo.

To NaNo or Not to NaNo

2009-10-25T17:43:27Z

So, this week I have the following I would like to do:

-- Finish my drawings for MAX and mrcaex
-- Finish Winry Rockbell, Martian Space Pilot! (a Fullmetal Alchemist AU) for scifibigbang
-- Put together two Halloween costumes. I'm going as the Virgo Cluster as a Museum of the Earth volunteer and as Tetra from Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker for CJAS's Halloween party. I might also repair my Amelia costume for CJAS Costume'd Kareoke on Friday.
-- Clean my apartment.
-- Help with some RPG stuff and get my activity for the Museum event ready.

Work is slow, and the thing I really need to do there (besides grading) is sit down with my adviser and have a 'Let us plan where I go next so I can get my PhD in a timely fashion'. He's out of town for Tuesday and Wednesday, so I could get away with taking that time off for home (and grading) if I finish everything in my office tomorrow.

Next month, I'll have yuletide and yuletart, doing some art for scifibigbang, and slayers_request. Plus, finishing Christmas gifts and ag_over_18 will probably do a Secret Santa.

I wonder if maybe I should take a break from NaNo and maybe just do something like mekosuchinae is doing -- pledge to write every one of the 31_days prompts, which still gets me writing, but lets me work on other projects. Plus, I have one unfinished NaNo already, that doesn't suck and isn't fanfic. (I have three in total: the one that needs massive editing to salvage (if it can), the fanfic which needs its third part, and the one that really just needs a second half and some editing.)

But, that does kind of make me feel left out, since I really like the NaNo community. I like going to write-ins and such, and it would break my winning streak. But on the other hand, I don't want to win just for the sake of 50,000 words and a cute banner and certificate. I want to turn some of my scribbles into things other people can read. (Well, they can read them now, but it would make me cringe.)

And doing scifibigbang is making me realize that my writing has gotten somewhat more stable -- in that, a lot of my older writing from several years ago doesn't look like it sucks. For a while, I was improving fast enough that reading my old writing was painful. Now it looks like a lot of my drafting skills are stable enough that drafts look good when I re-read them, even years later. Which might mean I need to take more risks and start editing to see if I can improve myself more.

Signs that I, Becca Stareyes, hate myself...

2009-10-23T02:04:08Z

Reading comment threads on:
-- Same-sex marriage on any political site (in this case, 538.com)*
-- Anything relating to feminism/civil rights, unless on a dedicated site
-- PunditKitchen (ICanHazCheezburger's site for news/poltics image macros)
-- Anything relating to vaccination/evolution/chemotheraphy***/the moon landing/Obama's birth/9-11/the Kennedy Assassination...

You know what? I should just stop reading blogs, except for the ones with pictures of puppies and kittens and humorous pastries.

* No, seriously, Willfully-Ignorant One, same-sex marriage will not cause humanity to die out because, believe it or not, gay people have children too. Frankly, even if every gay/bisexual person decided to not reproduce (unlikely -- in fact I'd say that same-sex marriage would be prone to make gay folks more likely to reproduce, because it would protect parental rights of the non-biological parent), there just aren't enough of us to bring the population down to replacement**. After folk have told you this twenty times, while insinuating that you are closeted for assuming that same-sex marriage will cause enough people to have same-sex relationships to alter the birthrate that much, do not move the goalposts to the 'if same-sex marriage is legal, churches will be forced to perform them'. Yes, and I can kick down the door of the local synagogue with any guy from work, and demand they marry us, regardless of not being Jewish (in either ancestry or religion) or ever having been in a synagogue before.

** Current world birth rate is about 2.5 kids per pair of humans. 2.1 kpp is replacement (because it needs to account for people who die in childhood). Gay folks make up somewhere between 2 and 10% of the population -- let's assume 10%. If every gay person stopped reproducing because of same-sex marriage, the birth rate goes down to 2.25. Face it, most human beings are below 3 on the Kinsey scale -- they prefer the opposite sex.

*** Yes, there are folks who seem to believe that cancer can be cured by diet, vitamins, positive thinking and shoving coffee up their rear ends (warning, Wikipedia link), and that chemo is what kills cancer patients.

Nothing in Particular

2009-10-22T13:45:59Z

Well, it appears a lot of my previous health-bitching may have been PMS, though my digestive system is still filing protests.

Anyway, yesterday was a good day. I was running late, so I went out for lunch, and the dessert was enough to keep me from eating a snack at coffee break time. I did some copy-editing on a report that is nominally internal, but that a couple of professors who expressed interest in the project might see. Then hit on a major error in some of the theory that I'll be fixing today, but it makes me feel better, since now the theory and the models give similar answers.

When I got home, sadly I couldn't make chili for dinner, since I discovered that the big pot I couldn't find was hiding in my fridge with month-old soup*, so got to be soaked in bleach before I used it again. So I'll make that tonight. I also got some writing done before I passed out early, and now I feel wide awake, even before I had my tea.

* Well, at least three-weeks old soup, since it was before I left for DPS, so it was made in September sometime.

It's amazing about mood. I mean, thinking back, if I had been in a crappy mood, the bad things (like the soup, or finding that error) would have outweighed the good things (a nice lunch, finally getting sensible answers, writing 1000 words). Hopefully the mood will maintain -- some of it might be the weather. It's doing the Ithaca fall thing where it's nice and sunny and the leaves are all pretty colors, and you know in a couple of days it'll dump rain (possibly snow, or 'wintery mix') on your head.

Writing

2009-10-21T15:33:40Z

At this rate, I'll be approaching a NaNo-writing-rate just to get my scifibigbang story done before NaNo starts. A rough draft is due in a week and a half, which gives me 11 days to write 14,000 words. (At least I pegged a story that has a natural length of 25,000 words.)

NaNo Rate: 1,667 words/day
Rate to Finish: 1,260 words/day

(Oh, anyone who likes FMA fanfic and is not having his or her life eaten by NaNo is welcome to beta this -- caitycat said she'd try, but couldn't guarantee timeliness, and I really need it done in the first couple of weeks of November. I can start sending chapters now.)

Also, yay for 1 November falling on a Sunday. It means I can stay up late on Halloween night and start on midnight. My normal NaNo strategy is to get as much of a lead as possible in the first week or so, while I'm still excited and know where I'm going.

Twitter Melodrama: A Play in One Act

2009-10-20T23:46:53Z

Twitter Preacher: “Know God... Know Peace. No God.. No Peace!”

TP's Followers: *retweet*

Twitter software: Huh, a lot of people are saying that. ::automatically picks phrases out, including 'no god':: Better put it on a trending topic.

Chorus (including various and sundry pagans, atheists, troublemakers, and various people just sick of fundamentalist Christians): Hee! Let us play with this. *tweet*

Fundies: What... hey, that's not funny, guys! Damn atheists making 'No God' a trending topic.

Chorus: Guys, you started it. We just picked up the trend and ran with it.

Fundies: *curious mix of death threats and glurge*

Chorus: *botherbotherbotherglee*

Fundies: Twitter, make them stop!

Servers: WTF, this is bad! Red alert, red alert, too much stuff going on!

No God Trending Topic: *suddenly vanishes from the top position*†

Chorus: OMG Censorship!

Fundies: HA! SUCK IT, HERETICS! (Only not, because that would be gay.)

(Sourced from here -- I expect a second act when more blogs get into this, probably within 24 hours of this post going up.)
--

† Friends advanced the position that Twitter might have done this as self-preservation to keep the servers running. I submit this is about the equivalent of tossing water on a fire only to realize some wag filled it with gasoline. If there is one thing that will get internet folks up in arms, it's censorship. Heck, it would have been better just to take down the entire Trending Topics widget for a day, just as sort of an even-handed thing, or even take the server down, in hopes that folks would lose interest if you cut off the instant response.

... And also a family rant.

2009-10-20T19:08:04Z

Not quite a rant, but more a frustration I'm trying to work out.

Dad just emailed me to invite me to spend Christmas and his birthday in Florida with him and Marjorie, my stepmother. Normally I spend Christmas in Nebraska -- Dad lives there, Mom lives there, neither of my siblings have moved out of state, and I still have friends in Lincoln. But Dad and Marjorie have taken to spending winter break in Florida for the weather. Dad apparently thought I did things closer to how we did things as kids -- I'd spend Thanksgiving with one parent, and Christmas with the other, so he offered to pay for my plane ticket down to Florida, assuming I'd see Mom next month.

Well, except I don't feel like flying across the country for a long weekend, so I normally take a bus to Boston and visit my extended family there for the Thanksgiving holidays. So, if I take Dad up on his offer, I save some money, get to see him for Christmas, and get to spend Christmas on the beach. On the other hand, I won't see Mom or my friends -- and probably Jenn and Matt, since my sister both has to deal with spending time with Matt's family and if given a choice between Mom and Dad, will choose Mom. (I don't know about Ben -- he doesn't like having his routine disrupted*, but he also does like seeing Dad, though, unlike me, he sees Dad regularly.)

* And Christmas morning at Mom's is traditional -- normally either we go over Dad's the night before, or for Christmas dinner. Or, more recently, a later weekend.

The only compromise I can come up with is to visit Dad for a week or so for Christmas, and then maybe take a week off for my birthday to visit Nebraska.

Health

2009-10-20T17:51:42Z

I'm home today. Not really intentional but this morning, my lower digestive system decided it was going to gum up the works and make me feel like I was going to have to expel everything from the other end. I'm better now, after spending the better part of 3-4 hours either in the bathroom, curled up feeling sick, or asleep*, but this is part of a long line of annoying minor complaints I've had for the past two weeks.

Though, there is something. I had my yearly blood test last week. Since I'm on anti-anxiety drugs, the psychiatrist wants to make sure any feelings of moodiness, anxiety, depression or lack of energy (not to mention the side effect of feeling sleepy) were due to a busted brain and 15 mg of Lexapro, rather than everything else, I have to get blood drawn yearly. Except the only time this actually happened was when I was first medicated in '07. In between, the lab started testing Vitamin D levels.

Yesterday, I got a call from the nurse noting that my Vitamin D levels were low, and could I please come in next week to consult? I figure this is probably a mix of me not drinking milk and the fact I'm not eating as much fish as I used to. On the other hand, one website says as little as 10 minutes in sunlight should give me enough Vitamin D, assuming my body isn't breaking the parts that make it. Especially considering I have fair skin.

Before then, I hit up google for Vitamin D deficiency in adults. Rickets is what happens in kids, and it's apparently a lot less fun in people who are trying to grow bones than people who just need to maintain them. Adults just start bone softening, and are at increased risk of osteoporosis later on. Also, apparently you get pain from this, and fatigue. It would be really nice if the aches and pains were just from 'crappy diet' and would clear up if I start taking a multivitamin.

Bah, all my bitching about health makes me sound like an old woman. I'm not even thirty yet.

* Sleep is generally how I deal with feeling crummy, unless it's too crummy to sleep.

I am annoyed

2009-10-18T21:05:15Z

Dear Immune System,

Quit it. Seriously. I'm sick of days where I feel feverish but am fine, or feel achy, but it's not the flu, and it goes away after an hour or two. Because this makes it hard to plan anything, or know if I should stay home as a preventive strike against seasonal flu/swine flu/mono/cancer/it's-never-lupus/lycanthropy/etc. -- mostly because my co-workers would rather not be sick.

Now I spend an hour of my cleaning time feeling nauseous and wondering if I should bother making my slides for Planetary Lunch Seminar tomorrow. I already held off in making chili in exchange for boring pasta and cheese, because spicy foods and uppity digestive system. On the other hand, it could be nothing, and then I will be cranky. And, if I miss Planetary Lunch when it's nothing -- not to mention a psychologist's appointment and a meeting to plan a Halloween astronomy event -- I will also have to deal with the anxiety levels from screwing up an obligation.

So, seriously. After dinner, I want to be either fine, or obviously sick enough to send an email to everyone I have to talk to on Monday telling them that we will have to reschedule. Or even settling for Monday morning.

Just pick something! At this point, I don't care what as long as a couple of days' bed rest can fix it.

-- Yrs,

Rebecca

Letter to the Muse

2009-10-12T18:42:18Z

Dear Muse,

Between Yuletide, NaNoWriMo, and scifibigbang (plus possibly slayers_request which is restarting, maybe), I am quite booked until the end of the year. I do not need more plotbunnies. Yes, a story or series about Sheik!Zelda's adventures while Hyrule is occupied and Link sleeps would be fun. So would writing Reg Shoe's adventures into paranormal romance in an attempt to advocate for Dead Rights* -- heck, it would give me a chance to poke at paranormal romance, NaNo (and anti-NaNo people), self-publishing/publishing scams**, and writing in general. But, as you can see, I don't have time, and would prefer the plot bunny list to STOP GROWING,

No love,

-- Rebecca

* Why should vampires get all the sex appeal, after all?

** PTerry got this a bit in Maskerade with Granny Weatherwax trying to get the profits made from Nanny Ogg's 'cookbook' (which she had published mostly so she could pass on her advice to folks outside the mountains, and to have a nice bound and collected copy, and ended up being a best-seller).

Travel Woes, Part n

2009-10-12T15:59:06Z

So, who wants to hear another travel story?

I like to joke I have strong travel luck -- the two times I missed flights, I was able to travel on standby and get there only hours late. This makes up for the missed connections, and so on. I've only had to overnight once and it was paid for by the airline.

This was clearly the tail end of the distribution for my travel luck. As in, I had luck, but it was bad.

So, I got up at 6 AM in San Juan, with a headache. I decided I have enough time, so I took some Tylenol and laid down for ten minutes to wait for it to kick in. Two cups of tea later and I was checked out of the hotel and getting a taxi -- despite the fact the hotel's coffee shop was supposed to be open at 6:30, it was still dark, so I decided to take my chances at the airport.

I get to the airport, and go through security, which seemed to be unusually strict. Partly because the government has a couple of regs regarding plants and animals you aren't allowed to bring off the island. I had to go through an extra machine at the security checkpoint -- something that shot puffs of air at me. I don't know whether it was looking for contraband mangos or explosives or what.

But I get in and grab a muffin and eat. Boarding is a bit late, but such is travel. Then we sit for a while. I'm mostly asleep at this point, but the pilot does occasionally mention what's going on. Turns out there was an oxygen leak on the plane that they traced to a emergency mask in the cockpit. While the plane probably could have flown fine without it, it would really suck if there was an emergency and the pilot passed out from anoxia.

Finding and repairing this takes two hours, of which we all sat in the plane. Since my connection in Philadelphia was about an hour and a half, I'm pretty much assuming I'll have to take a later flight.

So, anyway, we land in Philadelphia, and the counter has boarding passes prepared for everyone who missed their flights. Turns out there's several people on the Syracuse flight that were coming from San Juan. One of them happens to be Sara, a Cornell student who works on Cassini stuff -- not part of my group, though*. They hand out the boarding passes, and happen to switch mine for someone else's. I do not notice this at the time.

Meanwhile, I enjoy the first nice surprise of the day -- free wireless. And surprise number 1.5 -- enough time to have lunch. Considering the prices for snacks on the flight from San Juan, all I had was that muffin at 7 AM and it's now about 2. And I realize that I never worked out how to get from Syracuse to Ithaca. I call my normal source, who tell me that because I didn't book in advance, the last van to Ithaca will leave a half-hour before I'm supposed to land, and that they won't send a van out for just me. They will send a car at three times the price. I decide to see what my options are, and debate sending out a call for assistance via the astro mailing list.

So, the flight is late coming in from Newark, so it's late boarding -- we might have got on the plane at 5 PM. We all board, and here's where it's noticed I have the wrong ticket. Seems the woman with my ticket did notice and ask for a reprint. So, we both try to sit in the same seat, eventually sort out what happened, and then I move to an empty seat on the plane, assuming it's mine.

So, about 20 minutes into the flight, the pilot gets a warning light about one of the engines. The pilot decides that not crashing is a desirable thing, and they are close enough that turning around to get to Philadelphia is better than pressing on, and that the aircraft is sufficiently stable that means we don't have to land in the nearest small airport. (Which would mean that if the aircraft was broken beyond the ability to repair quickly, we probably would not get to Syracuse that night.)

So, we land. My name is called, because US Airways figured out that there were two tickets for Woman X and none for me, so they wanted to make sure it was just a case of me having the wrong ticket, and not some third party hitching a ride to Syracuse and leaving me in a ditch or something. We get told to stay near the gate until they figure out if the plane can be repaired quickly enough to send us on. Sara and I at this point decide to band together for moral support in the light of Severely Bad Travel Luck. Plus she offers me a ride home when I mention I don't know how I'm getting back to Ithaca -- nice surprise #2, as I no longer have to pay for a ride home**. While we're waiting, I check out bus options in case we have to choose between overnighting versus pressing on via road. Turns out it would take 6 hours, and the last buses to New York (and on to Ithaca) would depend on us getting the call soon, then booking it to the Greyhound station. Plus, Sara had her car at Syracuse, so would later have to head up there to retrieve it from airport parking.

So, the flight can't be repaired tonight. Around 7PM they tell us that we'll be taking a jet out to Syracuse, but we will get there that day. They also call out names one at a time to make sure we all get our tickets, which is slightly more efficient than making 50 people stand in line. I debate wandering off to be sure I get food, but they are taking IDs, so leaving would hold up the whole process. Sara and I get our food, and have enough time to eat before changing terminals again and boarding. Surprisingly, the jet to Syracuse and the drive home are painless -- we keep waiting for the other shoe to drop.

So, I arrive home around 11 PM. I expected to be home by 4PM or so, with enough chance to get a meal and do the grocery shopping, and maybe laundry. Instead, I say hello to folks on the internet, then pass out.

This means I am karmically owed at least two uneventful trips for Thanksgiving and Christmas. Or maybe just one unexpectedly nice trip.

---
* She does satellite-surface stuff, plus is one of the Mars rover staff.

** Okay, NASA has to pay for my ride home. Still, NASA only gave my advisor so much money, so being frugal is good. Especially given what I've paid to eat this past week.

More Puerto Rico Incidentals

2009-10-08T17:43:19Z

One thing I forgot to post is how noisy outside gets after dark. I'm told that it's because of the coqui, which are frogs that are native to Puerto Rico. At night, they start chirping, and you hear it everywhere. You can even hear it faintly from inside our room. They aren't much to look at, being a gray-brown in pictures and only about 1-2 inches long. I haven't seen one. I have seen little lizards on the path during the day, and Janet, who is a sociologist who studies scientists*, found a crab the size of her hand roaming around outside the room. Her room was closer to the waterfront, while I'm close to the pool and the conference center.

I took a swim yesterday before lunch, and that was lovely -- the weather feels much nicer when you spend a half-hour in water, and the pool was the perfect temperature. It looks like trying to settle my stomach this noon means I can't take another one, except maybe before dinner. The session I want to go with lets out early, so that would be fine. Getting to the beach is a bit more of a pain -- the hotel's waterfront is built up and all the beaches are on an island offshore, which means it requires an excursion.

Speaking of excursions, Dan invited me along on kayaking a bioluminescent bay this evening. I don't know if he got my email, but it sounds cool and worth seeing. Hooray for boating and interesting microbes.

Last night was the conference banquet, but I didn't go. I was just going to have a quiet evening in my hotel room with take-out pizza, but Janet (see above) saw me checking my mail and asked if I wanted to come to dinner with her and a couple of friends. We went down for drinks, and then ate at a reasonably fancy restaurant -- enough that if I had thought ahead, I would have went back for my skirt. Also, the people she meant were scientists working on a Cassini instrument (CIRS), and some rover folks, and Alan Stern (principle investigator for New Horizons, and used to hold a big position at NASA). So, yeah, that was worth the extra money. The food was pretty tasty -- I had dorado, and some apple crisp for desert. Also shows the value of serendipity -- now if I interview for postdoc positions at JPL or Colorado (or a couple other places), I can say 'yeah, we talked at DPS'. Hooray for networking!

I also met a few new people interested in my work. A couple of dynamicists (including the person who predicted volcanoes at Io, and they had to rush his paper into print so it would beat the spacecraft there) and some of the CIRS folks I mentioned above. Plus some people I met before at other conferences. It really feels like I'm starting to become someone other than 'Phil's student' -- I still am, since most people in the field know my adviser**, but now I'm also known for my work. Now, to get it published.

* She and I both attended Cornell, though she's a bit senior to me, and were both in student government. She also did work at processing images from Mars -- her thesis was on the Mars rover team, and now she studies the Cassini team for NASA. She had some really interesting ideas about how teams relate to their robots and each other -- apparently, she's one of the few (if any) sociologists studying modern planetary science teams, and one of her goals is to figure out the best ways to get us all working together with minimal friction and maximum science. And, yet, she once told me she was a bit envious of us getting to work with such cool projects -- if it weren't for a couple of bad math professors, she might have tried planetary science herself.

** Someone at dinner last night described the planetary science community as a small town, in that we all know someone who is dating/shared an office with/collaborated with/etc. someone else, and that DPS is as much a venue to talk about science as it is a community. Everyone agreed. There was also the discussion about how mission drama during Galileo (which was active when I was in high school) is still shaping the outer planets community. So a bit of me is always going to be Phil's student, just like how I'll have ins to the Mars and Moon geology and asteroid communities because I've shared office space with and TA'd with their grad students. Or even outside of planetary science, because I did extragalactic astronomy at Nebraska and Wyoming, and still talk to the other groups at Cornell. Trust me -- you get two astronomers in the room together, and they will find their five degrees.

--

I still haven't given you a science report, but I will -- I was kind of inactive yesterday after working off post-talk nerves, but I did get to Rings, Irregular Satellites and Icy Satellites so far, and some scattered Exoplanets talks. This afternoon is Origins of the Solar System from 2 til 5. I don't know what I'll do tomorrow. Also, expect photos and such -- on Saturday, I get to go to the World's Largest Telescope before coming home on Sunday.

Also, for those of you in Europe or up early in the morning on Friday (tomorrow), at 7:30 EDT, NASA will be dropping a used rocket onto the South Pole of the Moon to look for ice in the debris cloud. There will be a probe (LCROSS) watching it, then following it down, as well as Earth-based telescopes. I'm sure there will be streaming video on NASA's website. I'm going to watch it from the conference room here -- they've been making a big deal about it, and the registration gift was a mission patch. Which will be going on my jacket next to my Apollo 40th anniversary one. Perhaps I can find some more patches in the Arecibo gift shop.

Puerto Rico Not-a-Vacation

2009-10-06T17:16:49Z

I have a bit more than an hour before my presentation, so I thought I'd do some blogging to relax.

We got into San Juan around 3 on Sunday, and drove to Fajardo. The hotel I'm staying at is a resort, which the only reason that it is remotely affordable is because I have a roommate, and NASA (through my adviser) is footing the bill*. I still have the interesting problem of finding cheap food -- while, technically, I will be reimbursed assuming I don't go crazy, I'm trying to keep my incidentals down to under $30 a day. So far that means lots of sandwiches and pizza, the occasional hike off-site, and being sure to help myself to the free pastries at coffee breaks.

Anyway, this place is both beautiful and immense -- seriously, there's a funicular down the hill to the coast, and a boat to a private island. There are also about a dozen restaurants and stores on-site, including a Starbucks. Also the wireless doesn't work in the rooms, which is disappointing, considering my half payments are about the price of a single at a reasonable chain motel.

I'm gonna head out sometime and get pictures. I took a few, but not that many.

The weather throws me a bit, because my Midwestern thunderstorm sense is thrown by seeing regular thunderstorms in the evening, that may or may not hit, and usually pass within an hour. Plus, the humidity makes me think that something is coming as soon as I see the clouds off the hill. It's also 90°F and humid no matter what time of day it is. I wore a skirt today, and it's the first time I don't feel coated in sweat. On the other hand, the rooms are all over-air-conditioned, so I get cold if I'm in a skirt and open-toed shoes.

It's now 15 minutes until session start, so I'll post this and give an update on the science later. Maybe I'll have a seat after the session end and chat then.

Until then...

* Your tax dollars at work.

See you later, everyone

2009-10-04T01:32:15Z

My wireless decided it was going to crash, which meant I had to reboot things so that the modem and computer would talk to one another.

This does not bode well for the conference. See, every time I have stayed in a conference hotel, it has intermittent wireless outages, especially during the weekend. It's like hotel staff do not realize what having hundreds of scientists in one place will do to data networks, since 90% of them probably have laptops, and at least a quarter of them will be doing last minute talk touch-ups, which may well mean working with ginormous data files stored in Arizona.

Here, since we're staying during the week (presumably with fewer other people, and IT staff on call), maybe it won't be so bad. If I drop out of contact more than normal, that's why.