The Real Happiness

So Elizabeth Bear wrote earlier this week that she didn't think the rest of the Promethean Age books were going to make it, as Roc was getting very weak sales on the third one, Ink & Steel. (Which I enjoyed the heck out of, but I am used to being a marginal market)

Today she has a theory why.

I already bought my copy, but wow. If a nifty series can be killed by a data entry problem, it amazes me that anyone goes into this crazy business.

In the meantime, if you like Elizabethan drama, court intrigue, and sexy devils, you should go buy Ink&Steel.

You know you want some nice turkey, stuffing, potatoes, pumpkin pie and all that. It's a long time until the traditional season.

So you should come over to our place Sunday afternoon. Arrive anytime after 4, food around 6ish. Games. Desserts. Wii.

We'd love to feed you.

Many of my books are still in boxes. I try hard to be a good sport about this, but sometimes I crave something I know I own, but is in a BOX somewhere. (Imajica, I'm looking at you!)

Today's passionate craving is for one of the few plays I own in printed form (besides a very large Shakespeare book, and The Lady's Not for Burning): Arcadia. I'm not sure how it is that I remember watching it with Del (rich godfather character). If it came out in London in '93, and I left Seattle in mid '94.... and yet I do, vividly, and I know I have also seen it in MSP, but that was a sadly sub-par production. The Thomasina, meh.

I want the wit and the fizz and the casual references and the sheer Stoppardliness of it.

Sigh. I miss watching theater. It's not that the tickets are so prohibitive, it's that the babysitting is.

I would like to give a big smiley-face sticker to Numbers, a show which I watch pretty regularly. The head of Charlie's math department is a woman. A woman with a penchant for displaying her cleavage and looking good while doing it, which might seem to invalidate the smartness of being a math professor. But for bonus points, she is what is sometimes known as "a woman of a certain age". She is dating Charlie's dad. She is zaftig, smart enough to keep up with Charlie, and a much savvier political player. I love you, Millie!

I don't want to lick her as much as I want to lick Abby from NCIS, but she still makes me happy.

I have a cold. I have a low fever, and my skin hurts, and I am a whiney bitch. Be glad you are not around me. I want orange juice and appeasement. Orange juice, and Sprite. And clean sheets.

When Wall-E came out, I asked silmarian why the robot was gendered at all, and even if it had to be, why it couldn't be a girl. And he explained that they get taught in school that making a female character an object of laughter is dangerous, and way less funny than making the man bumbling. And I thought about it, and he's right. I am frequently offended by the way we choose to show women as funny/helpless/losers. So instead we end up with the Simpsons and Family Guy, and a hundred sitcoms where the woman is smarter and more competent than the man. And I want to apologize to my son.

BetaCandy wrote this excellent/sad piece on why so few movies, even now, pass the Bechdel test. (Two named female characters, talking to each other, about something other than a man.)

I think about it. I don't follow it. That is, I go to a lot of movies that fail the test, because I still want to see them. But -- Hancock? Fail. Hellboy 2? Epic fail. Wall-E? I haven't seen it yet.

Mr. & Mrs. Smith passed (why hadn't I seen that before? It's awesome!). House frequently passes. CSI, sometimes, CSI: Miami more often, because more of the team is female. Numbers, sometimes.

As for what I may yet see this summer, I am almost certain the Mummy 3 will fail (why should it be an exception?). Mamma Mia, I don't know if it will pass or not. It's a lot of women, but it looks like they may spend all their time talking about men. Dark Knight, Quantum of Solace... I'm not even sure there are female characters. I want to apologize to my daughter, who is stuck with useless princesses and the empty space where women should be.

Transformers passed, and for a big-explodey movie, was surprisingly feminist.

I feel like apologizing to my kids. "We thought it would get better."

( mulling on the sermon and service last Sunday )

I dress my blonde, blue-eyed daughter in a fair amount of pink, because she likes it, and because we can't hand her brother's clothes down to her, and to be fair, because she looks great in it. (not quite as good as she does in dark blue, but she likes it better) This morning we had a pitched battle because I put her in a blue sundress and did her hair in pigtails with blue elastics. "No, mommy! I want PINK-tails. Not BLUE-tails."

Daddy, bless his heart, took a few minutes to explain to her that sometimes she has blue clothes because she has pretty blue eyes, just like daddy does, and when she wears blue, they look even prettier. Mommy, surrender-monkey that she was, just put on an extra set of elastics.

Kay thinks daddy's eyes are "gween".

In this icon, she is wearing her much loved blue velvet dress, and a winter jacket that is burgundy on the outside with pink lining. Her brother's was burgundy with grey lining.

( a book review )

( armwaving about Hellboy 2 and Hancock, with spoilers )

( kids, fair, movies )

Today, sil picked me up after work, and we drove back to Kent where he dropped the kids and I off at Shari's and he went off to the movies, and Baz and I had french toast and Kay had sketti. That was very pleasant. And then we al walked back to the apartment by way of a long stop at the playground, but both kids were whining about woodchips in their shoes. They had a bath and I started excavating the kitchen. I helped Baz with an art project and Kay ate her cookie. Which I got her to pronounce as "cookie" and not "tookie". She has the phoneme now, just not the habit of using it. Then we read books and picked up their room and read more books and brushed teeth and sang songs and now they are in bed.

Sil is out watching a movie and getting some time off.

The nuts part? I worked a full day, and then did three hours of reasonably intense childcare and now I am sitting on my ass and my only thoughts are about what chores I could be doing, and how much I don't want to right now. Like I could go at least start the dishwasher. And I should fold laundry. Or I could put some of the clean laundry from the suitcases away. Or I could go read a book. Which would mean starting a new one, and when I am BUYING books, in the middle of the day, I am all excited about thoughtful books like the new Elizabeth Bear with Kit Marlowe. Or Finder. Or Octavian Nothing. Or The Orphan's Tales. None of which appeal to me at 10 PM, which is when I have time to actually start new books. Or I could watch tv, but then I should be doing chores.

I would really like to reconcile my brain so I could either enjoy being slack or feel motivated about working.

Once again, they make me happy. Day before yesterday, I ordered Ink & Steel. Yesterday, it arrived. WHOOSH. And if I want to buy and send someone a book, it's easy-peasy, and cheaper than going out to coffee. For some reason, having the Prime account and not paying shipping lowers a lot of my boundaries. And given my schedule, I just don't get out to stores.

Awesome faux-news profile of Tony Stark:
http://www.butcheredart.net/Fiction/Kids.html

My spicy-food aversion served me well: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121521047990229423.html

I wish I had someone in town to take out to the Dahlia Lounge. I am dressed ok for it, and have nowhere I have to be tonight, but there is a level of restaurant fanciness where I will not take a book and read alone.

I bought a loaf of the bread they serve there. It is very chewy and nutty, and there is a whisper of rye, and I wish I could sit down and eat it over a white tablecloth and debate between seasonal fish and pork with asparagus and whatever else there is.

I miss my family.

I'll go home tonight and use the bread as a base for welsh rarebit, like I'd planned. It'll be tasty.

But I wish I had someone.

I was on three panels this year, and that's about all I went to, except for Iron Artist.
( Phillip Pullman: The Anti-Narnia )

( Guilty Pleasures )

( The Influence of Classic Literature on SciFi )

( Iron Artist )

In which I mention things I did on my vacation in the charmingly optimistic belief that I will go back and fill in a vacation's worth of details.
Pre-con sewing: two vests, and one and 7/8ths shirts.
Pre-con knitting: finished the damn socks.
Pre-con LT: How we went and did tourist things in Seattle, and sewed.
My convention - Panels: I was not as smart as I was at Wiscon.
My convention - clothes whoring
My convention - various sights and work
My convention - never enough anything
My trip home
Why ADP is on my shit list

Resolved: I will learn to make ponyfalls and wear them more often.
Resolved: Tomorrow I will clean the carpets. Or maybe go out to a movie. Or both.
Resolved: Different cons serve my different needs.

My flight was on time.
My luggage came through.
For the modest price of $1.50, I got a bus from the airport to my preferred bus stop, with no waiting.
Sunrise was beautiful.
I have a maple bar for third breakfast.

I have three hours left, and then I am outta here.

First I go collect sil and the kids and take them to the airport. Have fun, family!

Then I loiter around the airport and collect LT, who is coming in on the plane that my family is going out on. Very efficient, that. She is giving sil her car keys. She and I have wild plans, including dinner, and maybe a movie. Tomorrow, companionable housework, napping, and sloth. Saturday, tour of Seattle, probably including The Market, The Monorail, and The Fremont Troll (assuming the internet tells me how to find it). I thought about scheduling all that to coincide with Pride, but it seemed like work.

Sunday, sewing and packing and having a vacation. Monday she and I fly out to MN where I re-unite with my family. The middle part of the week is in flux, depending on how much time family stuff takes. Maybe my kids will go hang out with Res and her kids on Wednesday. On Thursday, the children are off to The Cabin, and sil and I are off to The Con. EEEEE!

And then the following Monday I catch the super-early flight back to Seattle.

PAID VACATION. I am excited.

Nitesh Dhanjani is an actual reincarnation of Dawkins' Spaghetti Monster, Nitesh Dhanjani is also a rare type of Blowfish that is poisonous to phishermen across the world. Once netted, Dhanjani's poison quickly disables the phishermen and spreads to the their prized lines and lures. Currently, only two individuals, namely Chuck Norris and Bruce Schneier, are known to handle this toxic poison without fear of death.

I expect this to be funny to relatively few people on my list, but... bwahahaha!

I was interested and happy reading this article about Vista security at BlackHat....
right up until the part where one of their panels was titled "How To Impress Girls With Browser Memory Protection Bypasses". It's not that I don't want to impress girls with my security knowledge, it's that there has to be a way to make panel titles funny without being sexist. Really.

... I wish I had the chops to go to BlackHat....

ETA: For a good example "Bad Sushi: Beating Phishers at Their Own Game"

I find that now that I commute primarily by bus, I get much less NPR in my day. And as a side effect, I am less inurred to it. So I knew what was going on in Zimbabwe in a distant way. I still have my BBC feed, after all. But last night I heard an interview with Mugabe's spokesman and it made me so angry. He said:
1) The opposition candidate is neo-colonial and regressive, and Zimbabwe is a mature society and doesn't need that.
2) The run-off election this week will be valid, and represent the will of the strog and independent Zimbabwean people.
3) The previous election was wrong about the will of the people, as they are cattle and "voted with their stomachs"
4) Which is the fault of Western powers, for setting up the embargo.

Yesterday, I had a picnic with my parents and brother and kiddos. We went to the park up on the hill and it was all quite pleasant.

Also, my brother is AWESOME. Not only did he avoid setting my children on fire, but he CLEANED MY KITCHEN. And VACUUMED.

And then sil and I watched the season finale of NCIS (yeah, I'm slow). !!!! Goodness. Also I worked on his socks. If they are not long enough now, he is out of luck. I am binding off on the bus ride home.

Last night, I took mom to the airport. She and I talked about her sermon. She is preaching on "I believe, help thou my unbelief." I told her it was like roller coasters. I know they're safe, but at the top, I do not have unshakable faith about this.

FrameMaker had better behave if it knows what's good for it.

Post 3 things you've done in your lifetime that you don't think anybody else on your friends list has done.

See if anybody else responds with "I've done that."

Ask your friends do this in their journals to see what unique things they've done.

* I had a waterbirth.
* I nursed someone else's baby.
* I habitually drove twisty moonlit roads with my headlights off.

I think it's interesting how much trouble I had coming up with these. Not because I am uninteresting, but because all of you are interesting. Discarded because I'm pretty sure someone on my list has/was:
Gotten an 800 score on the SATs
Won a poetry contest
Done most of the adult-rated things I have
Written 50 pages in a day
Helped start a knitting website
Ordained at 16
Went to the national church meeting
Corresponded in greek transliteration

( crafting pictures within )

I skipped church yesterday. The kids hadn't fallen asleep until 11, and summer service is at 9:30, and I was unmotivated. Instead, sil let me sleep until some deliciously late hour that might well be described as midday. Then I got up and I made lunch and Kay and I went to the fabric store. We got interfacing, and buttons, and zippers, and frogs, and all those little things that one needs to actually FINISH garments. (and some more of the fuschia brocade, because it is THAT GOOD). It is a lot of fun to take her shopping right now. She sits politely in the cart, talks politely to other customers, and advocates buying buttons shaped like bunnies.
( sewing notes )

Pictures later.

Baz, who is supposed to be ASLEEP, called from his room:

"It smells like a swimming pool in here. And I know why. You're cleaning with poison. (deep inhale) I love the smell of poison."

What: Game Night!
Where: Our place (write for directions)
When: Saturday the 21st of June, 7 PM
Inducement: I'm making ginger creams, and if I get some RSVPs, either lemon cake or fudge


I know, late notice, but it'd be lovely to see you.

After work, I walked over to the Seattle Center and met sil and the kids at the International Fountain. On hot days, it is a welter of people dashing in and out of the gouts of water. This time, I noticed how very accessible it is -- there is a zero barrier entrance, and a ramp down to the very base of the fountain. The floor of the fountain is flat and textured for better footing. Even the transition from street to sidewalk to grass at the center is sloped and not abrupt. When I was a kid, the fountain was a bunch of spikey protrusions, but they have covered it with a smooth, pretty shell. It's possible I got a little wet, too. Kay needs another new swimsuit. She is doubly cursed with long-torso genes. Both of my kids are skinny. Honest, we do feed them. Despite all of their bones showing.

The fountain is timed to music of all sorts, and the patterns vary a lot. At one point, the floor-jets were doing quick bursts, so there would be sort of a clump of water that fell all together. It's hard to describe, but it made me think about fluid dynamics, as all the best fountains do.

Then I piled them in the car and came home. I had to wake them up. Sandwiches for dinner as it was 90 degrees in Kent when we got home. I love that they are growing up so well. I left them home alone went to get milk. When I got back, nothing disastrous had happened. No, they had eaten their food. That was it.

Then we watched 90's cartoons with outdated political jokes. "The president has had his lips on this whistle." "Like THAT makes it special."

And now we are discussing bedtime snack.

After I get them to bed, I plan to alternate housecleaning and BoomBlox. Which is a pretty awesome Wii game. Sort of actiony, sort of puzzly. And there's a lot of housework.

( contains spoilers for <i>Dust</i> and/or <i>Fool's War</i> )

I finished Dust and my reaction is complicated. I liked it overall, and there were some interesting left turns at familiar trope crossways. It's hard to talk about without being all spoilery. I think I need to go find some book that does not involve quite so much Dying For The Cause.

I am working. I am doing the release notes. I can go to bed when the release notes are done, and I can get up in the morning and go into work and finish pulling together everything else, which is mostly done, only now that I really stop to read it, APPALLINGLY outdated. Exchange 5.5 and NT-outdated. Oh, well, too late to fix it now. It all has to be ready to go at 3 PM or I slip the deadline. And I am not ok with that.

Have I mentioned that release notes are really not my favorite thing to write? They are very fiddly. Release notes are intended for the people who are trying to decide if they want to install this version. They probably already have the previous version, so they want to know if you have fixed That Thing that is pissing them off. They flip straight to the "Problems Fixed" section. Other people want to know if you have added the new feature their sales person promised months ago, and which they have been waiting for (FrameMaker multi-level undo, I will always want you!).

Here is how I construct release notes:
1) Extort from the powers that be a list of the user-reported bugs that have been fixed, and a list of the bugs we are not gonna fix and they just have to deal with.
2) Look up each bug in the bug database.
3) Read at least three times, until you are sure you know what the problem looks like in the wild. Not what causes it, but what the symptom is.
4) Write a tactful, neutral, minimizing statement about how you fixed that minor little glitch.

For example, fictional bug 689:

Bug entry 689:
( long but maybe funny )

LT and I were going to watch Mr. & Mrs. Smith last night. Only I screwed up and instead of ordering up hot assassins, I ordered Hitchcock romantic comedy. Which would have worked if she didn't have Angelina Jolie. Ah, well. Instead we watched the first Pirartes of the Carribean movied. Still funny. We laughed uproariously.

Before that, I had tasty dinner with my family. After that, I did the dishes. After the dishes, I started trying to work, but was thwarted by people not sending me the stuff I needed. So instead I sent a cranky note at 11 and went to bed.

Tonight I have kid-duty and OMG deadline, so expect to see me until all hours.

Caught the bus home last night. sil had made fried rice for dinner, and I wolfed that while watching Iron Man cartoons with the kids. Then I zipped around and assembled stuff to work on at crafty night.

As I was leaving, at their bedtime, Baz said, "You're going already? I hardly got to see you! I miss you, mommy!". Aaaagh guilt-trip. I left anyway. He saw me all weekend.

I asked my eye-in-the-sky for directions to the Federal Way Jo-Anns, as I am having a plumbing problem with the vest. You know how any plumbing project entails 3 trips to the hardware store (and let me tell you how annoying that is when you live in Mineral)? Well, this vest demanded the same. After I bought the backing, then went back for the interfacing, I still had to go back for ENOUGH backing/lining. So I went to Jo-Anns, and they are currently having the mother of all sales, AKA Firefly Days. In addition to 2.5 yards of polyester charmuese for the vest, I got a yard of pre-gathered little-girl dress material in navy with white (50% off made it 14/cents inch, which made it cheaper than any dress I could buy her, a novel experience), and 3 yards of a chinese brocade in shocking-fuschia-Cabell-pink. Which should be enough to make this dress for Kay. Not the boring brown one, the awesome little Chinese number, although I am contemplating seeing if I can figure out how to do cap sleeves instead, because I oppose the poofiness.

Other dress patterns I got for Kay:
Halter dress with dorky hat
And one I can't find, that is designed for "ornamental hem sheers"

She rejected this one because it was silly. Smart kid. I lobbied for it briefly as she is at The Age of Flashing and more underwear coverage would be good. But it is silly.

The brocade was normally $10/yard, but 60% off. I am so tempted to go get more. It matches my HAIR.

Then I showed up at church-lady craft night. Where, despite a few 'math is hard' moments having to do with circles, I managed to complete all the parts for my Dante's Purse. I could have assembled it, but I want to block the knit part first, and add some Timtex to make it a bit more stable. Should do, though. The church ladies stayed later than usual so I could get done. It was very sweet. There was gossip. That's how you know you are integrating into a community -- gossip. They were both working on a quilt which I thought was kind ofappalling. I would point you to a link, but evidently, no one who has made this quilt has put it up. It's a Lewis & Clark block of the month thing at Hancock, and the neutral fabrics and some of the blocks are ok, some of them are FUSCHIA AND ELECTRIC BLUE, which I think clashes with the overall parchment look. Just me.

I went home and sil was watching Iron Chef America: Battle Olive. I don't know why I watched. I hate olives. The judges were especially contentious, which was funny. Then we went to bed, and he informed me that I could find the Trinity in a ham sandwich. Well, yes. I own my relentless rebranding. This is what I use my litcrit for, in adult life. I also do feminist analysis of M*A*S*H episodes. It's a feature.

And at work today, I got another warm fuzzy, in that the PM says that I have written "the best release notes ever". Huh. This would be even more impressive if the release notes actually contained that key release note feature: BUGS. Which the PM has not yet given me, and I am forbidden from guessing at. But! Best release notes ever, he says. I can live with that. Also, I bugged him to give me a time it was going to be useful to call him, as he has been least-in-sight.

I'm reading Elizabeth Bear's Dust. I am on page 73. The ship has angels. And it is called Jacob's Ladder. It has bioengineered angels, and the logo is a double helix. (dies of happy)

Dear Warren Ellis:
( minor spoilers for Global Frequency )

( in which our heroine takes a lot of naps )

This weekend, I mostly supported sil's hedonistic lifestyle. It was nic ethat end-of-quarter and father's day coincided like that.

I hate zombie day. I understand the premise, but it still violates my general assumption that everyone is a reliable narrator on lj.
( writing stuff down so it is not banging around my head )

In a TechRepublic blog, Andy Moon wrote an entry on reducing spam by verifying people as real and whitelisting them based on identy. He says,

The central authority could be managed by the FCC and people who wanted to restrict their e-mail to only those who verified their identity could subscribe to this whitelist.

The part that really struck me was in his comment:

My email could be treated differently once I am verified, based on what each individual or company decides. If you only want to hear from people who have verified their name, address, and banking information, you can have it that way.

( my thoughts on that )