Stained Glass Wings

2:05am: writing: The Third Ether
part 3: 10,625 words.
total, 60,264 words.

Yep, that's 8400 new words. Writing from about 16.40 in the afternoon to about 1.30 at night with an hour or so's break for dinner.

OK, so this section wants to go A-B-C-B-A-B-C-B, where A is present time action, B is snippets of mostly conversation between two specific people from bits along the timeline of the section, and C is longer chunks of stuff leading up to A, some tight third, some the deranged omni narrator in full flow, and some a bit of both. When I started today I had two chapterlets and most of a third; I now have thirteen and the first line of the fourteenth. I also have at least two major things that need to go in earlier in the section in some detail at some length, which is going to be charmingly difficult to do given this structure.

Why does my brain so want to work on something that feels like it will at best be one of those books a dozen people love and nobody else can get into ?

1:44am: rather belated books for June
( Like June bugs, only more literary )

2:20pm: OK, some things have actually happened
$sysadmin says the paper-writing thing I need has been set up on a machine somewhere, but it can only support one instance at a time, so I need to negotiate with the person who uses that machine most of the time; I am awaiting email to confirm this.

[ ETA 15:39; this does not actually work, I need to poke $boss2 on Monday. Damn it. ]

Also, I got my expense cheque from the DC folks; they have happily paid for my flight and a useful little bit extra for my daily expenses, but it's a single cheque so I need to talk to the $bosses about preferential means of getting most of this money back into the Louse operating account and the little bit that is mine to me. I could always put the cheque in my bank account and pay them back later, but want to check that is actually acceptable first.

1:20pm: the lack of progress is palpable
No sign of $sysadmin, of the development server, or of the paper-suitable setup $sysadmin undertook on Wednesday to sort out for me. That leaves this week as in total possibly one of the least productive work weeks I have ever had.

It is however very lovely to have everyone home, and I am really appreciating that just now.

Also, The Third Ether has just let me know that one of the things it is about is dealing with metaphysics that behaves like physics, at the level of gravity not actually caring what your opinion is. Will probably be writing tomorrow.

12:02pm: the bit with Louis XIV and the helicopters was definitely a dream
papersky and zorinth are home safe and sound; the apartment was de-encavified before their return, which seems to have worked. Surprisingly, they were fed on their flight such that they did not actually want to go out for dinner with me, so I went out and had sushi by myself last night afterwards.

This morning I got a slice of salmon feuillette in the patisserie, which turned out, on consumption, to contain a layer of salmon, a layer of rice, and a thin layer of either non-crisped seaweed or spinach. This was a bit odd, basically worked but was a bit on the dry side; and of course when trying to eat it the loose rice gets everywhere. It does if you are me, anyway.

No major movement on work stuff today, but we do have rather a lot of Exotic British Chocolate. Go us.

3:06pm: any sufficiently irritating technology is indistinguishable from unsympathetic magic
It would seem that poking $sysadmin about having access to a Windows emulator that can use the program I need to use prompts doubt and shaking of heads, whereas actually folding the whole damn shebang up and mailing it to myself at gmail with the intent of seeing whether it can be made to work on my home machine prompts $sysadmin to mail saying "am setting you up an account on another machine that has a suitable emulator, will let you know when it is available."

11:24am: stuff
+ I finally mopped the kitchen floor.

++ Saw The Dark Knight yesterday.

+ with Watchmen trailer.

+ also Terminator: Salvation trailer.

+ All of this plus finishing my book makes me feel like I am moving forward and therefore less of the last-couple-of-days cramped feeling described yesterday.

- If I had wanted it to rain this much of the time for this many days in a row I would not have moved here.

-- Still no sign of my development server, which at this point means I am going to be delayed in the next Louse release no matter what.

-- Still no sign of $sysadmin doing what I need done to continue work on the paper.

-- After finally getting time to wash and dry a sheet, while making up the appropriate bed I knocked over a glass of apple-grape juice onto the freshly washed sheet, so straight back into the wash with it.

+ At least the glass did not break.

11:44am: lassitude come home
- It's odd how two days on my own in the middle of the natural flow of things feel like plenty of time and space, whereas two days remaining of three weeksish to myself feels sort of cramped and rushed and that I must not forget any of the things I meant to do while I was on my own, which I currently can't remember.

- Except to mop the kitchen floor, which I still have not remembered at a time when actually in a position to do something about it.

- It's probably not helping all of this to have started rereading a thousand-page-plus Steven Erikson which I am not going to get finished before everyone comes home.

+ It will be really nice to have everyone home again.

- Scraped my leg rather painfully on the base of one of the columns in the long room.

- Appear to have done something bruisingly hard to the tip of my left index finger without noticing.

- Rain for the forecastable future means the pile of t-shirts for washing will not diminish any time soon.

- Kalinka has closed and been replaced by an uninteresting-looking Mexican restaurant.

- Why did Matter fall off my holds list at the library ?

+ $bosses away all week, so I am not going to have unexpected new wodges added to workload.

- $bosses away all week, so I have no traction for expediting past any of the current problems.

+ I had one apple thing from Dunkin' Donuts yesterday and then stopped.

Conclusion: I think I will go see The Dark Knight tomorrow when it is half-price.

11:55am: observation
Every time I notice the copy of Thurber's The Years with Ross on papersky's inpile, I have a pang of wanting to live in the timeline where that title is a later volume of Oscar Wilde's autobiography.

11:13am: happy birthday
Happy birthday frostfox, hugs and best wishes for the year to come.

Also, if the "On This Day in History" thing in the Metro this morning was to be trusted and I read it right in my pre-caffeinated state, happy 40th birthday to the microprocessor, and try not to have a mid-life crisis any time soon, OK ? Come to think of it, maybe that's what the popularity of the notion of the Singularity is.

9:56pm: counting down..
Watchmen trailer !!! Look how much is right !

[ c/o larabeaton ]

Yes, I am aware of how much of my annual allotment of exclamation points I have just used up.

2:35pm: No, there is too much. Let me sum up.
Visiting daharyn: lots and lots of fun. Biodome. King penguins in the water. Musee de Beaux Arts. Commendable restraint was exercised, notably in the matter of bookshops.

Coping with daharyn's bag being pinched Monday; gruelling, took many hours, ultimately about as successful as coping could be in the circumstances. Stuff cancelled online, emergency passport obtained at US Consulate, outside the which I was required to stand, not being a US citizen. (Insert depressingly unsurprising comparison with helpful, courteous and efficient Montreal police here.) daharyn successfully placed on train this morning.

Went to bank. Obtained money order. Went to far end of blue line. Stood in line outside high school for somewhere upwards of two and a half hours. Successfully registered Z for repeat exam. My feet hurt.

Principal development machine back, seems to be working. $programmer out sick.

My father contacted us a couple of days back wanting to organise my mother's travel right away. He appears to have taken onboard that it wants to be second half of September or so relatively easily, this time; the subject of my not travelling in September was entirely avoided. Finalisation of plans awaits my mother finding out precisely when in October the art show in which her graduation pieces are being shown actually is.

$bosses' somewhat-less-than-twice-and-more-than-once-yearly bring-family houseparty happens the same day papersky is off to Denver.

9:50pm: too much is happening to post about
So meanwhile, have some video links:

My favourite new mash-up: Du Hast 99 Luftballons.

Two reasons why video mash-up is the only thing to do with Disney's travesty of take on Winnie the Pooh.

Also, I have found the actual video of one of the Three Questions the Internet Has Never been Able to Answer For Me: Who is singing the cover version of "The Passenger" in this ad ? Anyone ? Anyone ? baldanders ?

3:00pm: happy birthday
Happy birthday to hawkwing_lb, hugs and wishing you lots of fun in the year to come, and let's just stop thinking about how "serious life milestone X attained by person that many years younger than me" makes me feel right now.

2:03pm: a precious cup, a stone or some such
It is irritating to pop awake quite a bit earlier than normal, think "Oh. This means I have time to go get breakfast at place A before work instead of the patisserie again", go to place A, find them out of the thing you actually wanted there, think of a nearby place B, find they don't open until 11, and have to give up and drag to work without time to go back to the patisserie in question. [ Work canteen is open, so I am not starving, or forgetting to have breakfast, as some people worry. Just not having a very interesting one. ]

Went through a brief period of having three of my key machines down this morning, am now back up to two. This is not helping with most of the things I actually want to get done.

The emotional reaction "This could be really wonderful, but there's a high likelihood it won't work out, so let's stake it through the heart now to save ourselves the potential upset of seeing it fail later" is one of the most alien to me that humans do, and that hitting me by surprise can really infuriate me.

Also, when I say "Disintegration is the Best Album Ever !!!" I am in fact quoting the Mecha-Streisand episode of South Park, for reasons which admittedly are often somewhat obscure, rather than expressing an actual opinion. (Obviously, in reality The Future is the best album ever.)

12:27pm: OK, cheerful now anyway
The lost bits of Metropolis appear to have been found.

[ link c/o moominmuppet ]

12:17pm: time is like a bullet from behind
Principal development server is away for repairs.

New version of EndNotes does not work with existing Windows emulator. Asked $sysadmin yesterday evening to set up other Windows emulator. Machine hosting Windows emulator is today also semi-down and unusable. Causal connection here unclear.

Database curator home with sick child yet again.

Programmer's schemata and flowcharts need to be massively redone, as it is clear he has not actually been taught old-school formal flowcharting with the marking of decision points.

Did not get to mopping floors last night as was distracted by people being interesting and articulate online. (Did however do the moving of furniture and the brushing underneath thereof.)

Am rereading Sorcery and Cecelia. It is comforting.

12:43am: writing: The Third Ether
part 3: 2277 words. All new.
Total: 51,915 words.

OK, it wanted to go off into a discursion about the demi-scoundrel who founded the firm who do assembly-line magic-mirror production by whom our protagonist is now employed, but it feels solid to me.

8:24pm: as you have all been waiting with bated breath for a decision...
Thus far, the successful applicants for "what to do with my evening" have been buy beer on the way home, clean the apartment, read my book, and water the plants. It all seems so much more interesting when I get people to vote on it.

The bath is coming next, probably not that hot because of it being 30 with humidity to 36. The writing may come after that, depending, but going out again will not because right now I really can't face the idea of putting clothes back on. Also, mopping the kitchen floor, which wants to be the last thing I do before either going out for a bit or going to bed.

4:33pm: writing noodle: sampling error
This containing things I have been mulling over for some time, and recently again because of shweta_narayan's recent posts on race:

One has a story. The story takes place in a world that is complex in realistic ways.

Given that there is a general preference for stories to contain characters, who are individuals (ideally well-developed ones), it is inevitable that each given character will have a specific ethnicity, gender, age, somatype, sexual preference (OK, there are stories where that last need not be visible, but it would seems unlikely to fit most stories for all of those to be invisible to the reader), and... specific values of other traits where human beings vary, and where at different times in different ways some values of each trait have been considered more positive than others. (Excluding for the moment the option of setting one's story entirely among angels, aliens, AIs, or nonhumans beginning with any of the other letters of the alphabet.)

Given also a standard-sized novel with a relatively restricted number of characters (I love 253 but it does not strike me as a mode with which there is that much to be done as a general option), one is going to have a limited sampling, in one's heroes and in one's villains, of all those traits. Given any realistic world's culture and history, there will be some skews in that sampling; whatever the people of Generic Small Isolated Fantasyland Village should happen to look like, it would break my suspension of disbelief for them not to look like each other, to a first approximation.

The problem; how then to write a story with protagonists and antagonists, who are kind of inherently sympathetic and unsympathetic respectively, that is as proof as possible against people saying "This villain is ethnicity X, this hero is ethnicity Y, they are clearly meant to reflect thus-and-such real-world ethnicities and therefore you're a racist," or "This ethnicity that is oppressed in your world must be judged on how well it reflects the reality of this ethnicity which is oppressed in the real world," or "Your world does not have problem A in it so therefore you are denying that problem A happens in the real world" and so on. (There is an awful lot of discussion on this subject online to which my considered response to "well, I think X is clearly the issue that matters here" is "That's because you are an idiot", but this does not tend to make for constructive discourse so I avoid such debates.)

I write in genre specifically because I do not feel real-world settings are of necessity the best way to address real-world things worth talking about; one of the great things SF and fantasy have to recommend them is being able to talk to things from outside, or to address some aspects in depth without getting entangled in endless ramifications in other directions.

1:59pm: addendum
OK, so why do so many of you think I would like Wall-E ?

1:37pm: work is the curse of the drinking classes
Poll #1219892 something new to fiddle with.
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

What shall I do with my evening, o great and wise internet ?

12:05pm: more mutterings
+: what a wonderful modern age we live in, particularly with reference to communications technology.

+: friends.

-: missing most friends most of the time as an inevitable consequence of the size of the planet we live on.

-: poor impulse control combined with wonderful modern communications technology leads to sleep-shortness and not getting so much house-cleaning done as I had intended.

+: raccoon wandering around behind the office yesterday.

+: meeting with $boss2 and $sysadmin about needing more disk space.

-: $sysadmin still insistent that we clean up existing disks some more before he will give us another actual disk; this less than entirely useful because a) we have not permissions to clean up accounts for people who have long since left, and b) the amount of extra space we need really is more than this can possibly retrieve.

+: single-city cultural victory to the Sumerians last night.

+: patisserie open this morning.

-: $programmer not yet in because of car issues.

-: Principal development server still down because of power source issues.

+: Third part of The Third Ether feels ready to go.

-: hardware for transferring stuff from writing laptop to anywhere else is in Britain with papersky.

2:22pm: home alone week 2
+: woke up earlier than normal going-to-work time in order to have time to get to the patisserie and buy breakfast

-: patisserie unexpectedly closed all day

-: problem with power unit on principal development server.

-: need new EndNotes from $boss2, who seems not to have had the ten seconds free that would make asking him to send me the thing possible yet today, unless he did while I was out at lunch.

++: I just managed to catch Speed Racer yesterday afternoon at 15.15. Very very shiny; the plot subtlety and character depth are appropriate for a film for small children, but I am so glad I saw it on a big screen, because it will be nothing on a small one. Thank you rezendi for convincing me this was worth doing.

-: not getting so much houseleaning as I wanted to do done last night owing to poor impulse control.

10:30pm: "C'est mon journee off, la."
+: redbird is here.

+: light dinner in Chase just right for the heat.

-: visiting lemurs in Biodome in an environment normally a children's play area look sadly ghettoised compared to the regular environments there.

+: very statue-like lynx.

+: beaver awake.

+: capybara swimming

+: power officially off to my entire wing of the appropriate University building all weekend, so no likelihood of panic-laden mail from $boss1.

+: no mail from DC folks saying "you buggered up on our travel forms so we won't reimburse you."

-: no mail from DC folks saying "we received your travel forms and all is correct."

+: the Gazette appears to be showing up again.

-: $boss1 sending me email saying "please fix X" when X is an issue she has been told more than once to fix by the simple procedure of asking $programmer or $database_curator to restart the appropriate server, which semi-regularly falls over for no reason beyond running an insanely complicated and Cthulhoid set of software that my group inherited and that nobody here understands.

?: Speed Racer showing in Cinema Dollar at 15.15 and 19.10 this week. On the one hand, visually pretty, I missed seeing it anywhere sensible because of how briefly it was out for, and rezendi's review made it sound really worth seeing on a big screen if at all. On t'other hand, 15.10 is too early Sunday given the timing of redbird's flight home, and also, infrequency of buses between Namur Metro and Cinema Dollar on a Sunday, and the notable pedestrian-hostility of that area.