Archives: October 2007
Fri Oct 26, 2007
Sit Down for the Constitution
This is a political movement that I could get behind. Monthly, patriotic, sit down vigils for the constitution.
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Sat Oct 20, 2007
A Tall Ship
Last Sunday I was invited to sail on The Lynx, a new ship that was built as a modern replica ofLynx which served in the War of 1812. You can see a short movie which depicts very closely what my experience was right here. Even though it was cloudy, getting out on the bay is always a treat. More...
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JKR Reveals All
The Leaky Caudron has posted a preliminary transcript of J. K. Rowling's remarks at Carnegie Hall. I just love her sense of humor, and you can hear it throughout her answers to fan's questions. The most surprising revelation is that Dumbledore is gay. "If I'd known it would make you so happy, I would have announced it years ago!"
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Wed Oct 17, 2007
Why I Don't Dance in Bars
Today at work I drove the company car that we share, and the last driver had tuned the radio to a classic rock I never listen to. I heard a song called "Long Train Runnin'" which goes: "Without love, where would you be now? " More...
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Earthquake Day
October 17 is Earthquake Day. It's been 18 years. This morning I read aloud to myself one of the greatest poems ever written, "Geology" by D. A. Clarke. It is about earthquakes, and love of a woman for a woman. I quoted from it in my essay on the earthquake which I've linked to before. As the poem says "what I thought mere poetic metaphor metamorphoses subtly into literal truth, the ground shifts, angles walk the earth, and a certain protective pessimism melts reluctant as glaciers altering whole landscapes where it recedes." This day transformed my world, my life. Besides the actual physical changes, it stands forever at the end of my youth, as the metaphor of sudden, permanent, and altogether natural change. And the power of earth, and the power of love.
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Sun Oct 14, 2007
Magic
Yesterday I visited some Open Studios. Some were better than others, and two artists that I loved, I learned later that they influence each other. Ray Gwyn Smith, Hildy Bernstein, Andrew Purchin. That a human being can take colored paste and apply to fabric, and then make us feel this way is supernatural. I just look and look and these paintings. More...
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Andrew Molera
I've only stopped at Andrew Molera, never camped. Yet another think to add to my list of places to visit. I didn't know there were so many great hikes. I thought it was just a place to camp.
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Wed Oct 10, 2007
What Science Writers Would Like to Write
I tried to write a few stories about large science projects back when I was a science writer. For instance, I once knew more about the super-conducting super-collider than anyone should ever know. Anyone who has seen a presentation about the fusion reactor in France will recognize this graphic in this Onion story : "Scientists Ask Congress To Fund $50 Billion Science Thing." More...
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Lesbian Utopias
Several lesbian novels explore a world where women create babies without male gametes. In them, some kind of apocalypse makes it possible and required for women living along together to figure out a male-free reproduction strategy. My favorite from the 80's was Charnas's Motherlines which not only delivers on a lesbian desire to sire their own children, but uses the young woman-horse bond in a way that delivers on other desires as well. Last week I read an interesting story in SciAm which I can't find on-line yet. More...
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Coe Park Fire: Maybe Not So Bad
Now that the smoke has cleared, naturalists and rangers step forward to say that the Coe fire last month may end up benefiting the park. And the woman who started it? by burning her garbage? She's distraught. It cost $13 million.
More...
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Abundance Consciousness
I've read some TechDirt articles on economics of abundance, and I like them. Since I have no formal economics training, I read things like this from a relatively dim perspective. That said, statements like the following make sense to me. More...
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Two Essential Skills for the Post-Apolcalypse World
Opening a padlock. Starting a fire.
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What are the Democrats and Atheists Doing to Get Off?
You all already heard about this the I'm sure. The "friend of Falwell" who was found dead in his house, tied up, and suffocated while he was having sexual fun. I don't know why, but I read all five or six pages of the autopsy report. On the last page we find this short and final list:
"Personal effects: One yellow metal ring intact on left ring finger, one dildo. "
More...
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Mon Oct 08, 2007
T and L and G and B
I have to say that I agree with a so-called conservative and uninformed opinion about transexual rights and the employment non-discrimination act. If a man wants to be a woman, or a woman wants to be a man, and they think that they can get there with surgery, hormones, and talk-therapy, then god bless them. But they aren't part of my revolution. yet. More...
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On Loving Oneself
Cary Tennis gives advice to a woman embittered by self-doubt. Cary Tennis, self-love drill sargent: More...
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Thu Oct 04, 2007
Tutorial
The other day a friend of mine said, "Writing is like oral sex, a dark and lonely business. " (I think I may be misquoting him slightly but since he reads this blog, he may correct me.) I hadn't heard anything like that before about oral sex. (It does seem to fit for writing.) I thought that sentiment means you're doing it wrong. I'm not sure how I found it, but a few days later I came across an advertisement for a book that claims to teach men lesbian sex secrets. A whole manual that tells men they have been doing it wrong. All of "it." More...
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Republican Iconography
I liked Dan Savage's interpretation better than Kos. Go look at it, I don't even want it in my blog.
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We're All Americans Here
A syndicated column by Gustavo Arellano called "Ask a Mexican" is starting to grow on me. I like the questions. I love most of the answers. Some of the questions I unknowingly had asked myself. Others of them are so patently racist, I like learning what is going on in the culture around me. (Do people really wonder about that? ) I can never predict the answer. Recently, he posted a list of reader-contributed nicknames for the children of "Mexicans" and other nationalities. More...
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Wed Oct 03, 2007
Nothing But Anxiety and Guilt
via ebogjonson (which is on hiatus) I found this witty and perceptive essay "Against Email." I want to email it to everyone I know. More...
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Suppressed Laughter
I haven't linked to mimismartypants in a while, but yes, I'm still in love with her; and yes, you should read her blog as much as you can. More...
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Art Car Fest
Saturday and Sunday, the Annual ArtCarFest was held in Santa Cruz rather than San Jose where it has been for most of its history. I loved seeing the cars. Where some women may have a biological clock ticking away, I long for another art car of my own. More...
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Rock, Paper, Sissors Biology
This is the sort of research that science writers love: surprising reproduction strategies which may have foreseen relevance to human beings. And it was reported by UCSC science writers. More...
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