Originally posted 18 February 2010 at 18:15.
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"On The Other Claw...."
Your Obedient Serpent
18 November 2019 @ 06:15 pm
Originally posted 18 February 2010 at 18:15.
07 January 2013 @ 06:56 am
A reference to my cubicle as my "cube" brought to mind the 1997 classic of that name, and that, in turn, brought forth an image of that shifting, shuffling maze being made of office cubicles, each one identical save for differences in clutter, and, rather than increasingly-lethal death traps, each one is inhabited by increasingly-annoying co-workers (including regular appearances by the manager who keeps telling you to stop wandering around and get back to your desk).
And then the ultimate crossover sprang unbidden from my brow like Athena from the Brow of Zeus.
This is a concept that need never be made; just the conceptual existence of OFFICE CUBE is enough. Anyone who's seen both movies -- and worked in an office -- will immediately Understand, and Be Enlightened.
Though the idea of this as a computer game -- text-based or visual RPG -- also has an appeal. I might even PLAY that one.
If I didn't play it five days a week already.
And then the ultimate crossover sprang unbidden from my brow like Athena from the Brow of Zeus.
This is a concept that need never be made; just the conceptual existence of OFFICE CUBE is enough. Anyone who's seen both movies -- and worked in an office -- will immediately Understand, and Be Enlightened.
Though the idea of this as a computer game -- text-based or visual RPG -- also has an appeal. I might even PLAY that one.
If I didn't play it five days a week already.
25 August 2012 @ 02:42 pm
Former U.S. astronaut, Neil Armstrong, the first man on the moon, has died at the age of 82.
Godspeed on this journey, Commander. You gave us all, the whole human race, a gift beyond measure, and someday, perhaps, we will finally allow ourselves to inherit your legacy.
I feel: 
melancholy
melancholy15 July 2012 @ 06:21 am
Savannah beach! It's been a full month since I posted ... or, I'm afraid, cracked open my Friends List. I'm not sure how it happened -- I simply forgot!
At this stage, I must apologize: I'm not going to try to catch up on the backlog on my Friends List, and so that means I'm probably going to have missed Important Stuff.
My last post was a bad one to suddenly vanish on, too: "Oh, hey, emergency room, hospital, chest pains, SILENCE".
For the record, I've just been busy and distracted. The "clean bill of health" is, more accurately, "nothing immediately life-threatening -- see your doctor", which I have done.
At the moment, there's no solid diagnosis as to why I've had these "flipping" sensations in my chest for two months. They've ebbed and flowed, but at their worst, a month ago ... well, let's just say I don't plan to see Prometheus in the theaters.
My regular physician is arranging a referral to a cardiologist, but because all this happened literally days after switching from a PPO to an HMO program (all under the same provider), that hasn't happened yet. My new card finally arrived on Friday, though, so on Monday I can make things happen.
Right now, the likely culprits include Premature Ventricular Contractions [PVCs] and esophageal spasms, possibly related to my chronic, lifetime reflux issues -- I have a family history with both.
(I also have had symptoms that are clearly digestive; on the other claw, whilst hooked up to a heart monitor in my line of site after a thallium treadmill exam, I got hit with a couple of "flips" -- and I saw them on the monitor.)
I am trying very hard not to self-diagnose, but it's a difficult thing; I have the kind of mind that isn't happy until it's constructed a narrative. I want to make sure the cardiologist has all the relevant data when I go to see him; unfortunately, that means my brain is trying to filter just what data is relevant, and that turns into subconscious judgment calls whether I want to make them or not.
(As a minor grumble ... there's more than just one set of symptoms going on, but every medical professional I've talked to has tended to latch onto the very first set I describe, without letting me finishmy litany of hypochondria the rest. This happens no matter what order I list them: it's always the first thing. "Okay, what can we do about this?")
... that said, at the moment, it looks like all this can be managed or even resolved with just a few tweaks of diet, a bit more exercise (but not too much more), and maybe some nutritional supplements.
Oh, and losing a goodly bit of weight, if for no other reason than to avoid the knee-jerk diagnosis of "he's middle-aged fat guy, I can stop thinking now".
So don't panic. There are probably a few more decades in this old dragon after all.
At this stage, I must apologize: I'm not going to try to catch up on the backlog on my Friends List, and so that means I'm probably going to have missed Important Stuff.
My last post was a bad one to suddenly vanish on, too: "Oh, hey, emergency room, hospital, chest pains, SILENCE".
For the record, I've just been busy and distracted. The "clean bill of health" is, more accurately, "nothing immediately life-threatening -- see your doctor", which I have done.
At the moment, there's no solid diagnosis as to why I've had these "flipping" sensations in my chest for two months. They've ebbed and flowed, but at their worst, a month ago ... well, let's just say I don't plan to see Prometheus in the theaters.
My regular physician is arranging a referral to a cardiologist, but because all this happened literally days after switching from a PPO to an HMO program (all under the same provider), that hasn't happened yet. My new card finally arrived on Friday, though, so on Monday I can make things happen.
Right now, the likely culprits include Premature Ventricular Contractions [PVCs] and esophageal spasms, possibly related to my chronic, lifetime reflux issues -- I have a family history with both.
(I also have had symptoms that are clearly digestive; on the other claw, whilst hooked up to a heart monitor in my line of site after a thallium treadmill exam, I got hit with a couple of "flips" -- and I saw them on the monitor.)
I am trying very hard not to self-diagnose, but it's a difficult thing; I have the kind of mind that isn't happy until it's constructed a narrative. I want to make sure the cardiologist has all the relevant data when I go to see him; unfortunately, that means my brain is trying to filter just what data is relevant, and that turns into subconscious judgment calls whether I want to make them or not.
(As a minor grumble ... there's more than just one set of symptoms going on, but every medical professional I've talked to has tended to latch onto the very first set I describe, without letting me finish
... that said, at the moment, it looks like all this can be managed or even resolved with just a few tweaks of diet, a bit more exercise (but not too much more), and maybe some nutritional supplements.
Oh, and losing a goodly bit of weight, if for no other reason than to avoid the knee-jerk diagnosis of "he's middle-aged fat guy, I can stop thinking now".
So don't panic. There are probably a few more decades in this old dragon after all.
14 June 2012 @ 05:13 am
... an hour after my last post, I was in the ER for chest pains.
An overnight stay, lots of bloodwork, and a treadmill exam, and the cardiologist gave me a clean bill of health, at least as far as the ticker is concerned.
So it's all good, more or less; I just wish I'd held off before dropping a fairly hefty chunk of change on closing out that student loan, because now: MEDICAL BILLS.
Yay!
An overnight stay, lots of bloodwork, and a treadmill exam, and the cardiologist gave me a clean bill of health, at least as far as the ticker is concerned.
So it's all good, more or less; I just wish I'd held off before dropping a fairly hefty chunk of change on closing out that student loan, because now: MEDICAL BILLS.
Yay!
12 June 2012 @ 05:55 am
04 June 2012 @ 05:28 am
31 May 2012 @ 09:58 pm
Why do people pretend that summer isn't just a little taste of hell?
Let's leave out the fact that the waking hours and the working hours and the bleeping COMMUTING hours are a stifling, uncomfortable sweatbath. I HATE having to sleep with my door open to avoid baking. I HATE watching my computer get slower and slower as it gets hotter and hotter. I HATE not being able to wear my big black pea coat or anything else with a modicum of style and flair.
I like longer days, but that's IT. You know what? I can turn on a damned LIGHT.
And there we go: the one thing I LIKE about summer -- Daylight Saving Time -- is what everyone else WHINES about.
I swear, the next time I hear the radio blurt something inane about 90-plus temperatures being "nice weather", I am going to turn my car around, drive to the station, and PUNCH someone. It's only "nice" if you can get OUT of it; if you don't have AC, it's just heatstroke.
Don't think I don't know about "real weather" because I live in California, either. That's by CHOICE, and not a choice made in a vacuum. I've traveled a LOT. I've spent summers in Texas and Arkansas and any number of places that get HUMIDITY.
Yes, they're even worse. The weather in every place east of Interstate 5 is more loathesome than where I live. I know that from experience.
Don't tell me not to bitch, though. Ebola is worse than the bubonic plague, but that doesn't mean that blackened, swelling lymph nodes are PLEASANT.
Especially when it happens three to five months out of every single year.
So yeah. Bleep this. Bleep this in the censored with an expletive deleted wrapped in barbed wire and bathed in the blank of blankitty blank bleep.
Let's leave out the fact that the waking hours and the working hours and the bleeping COMMUTING hours are a stifling, uncomfortable sweatbath. I HATE having to sleep with my door open to avoid baking. I HATE watching my computer get slower and slower as it gets hotter and hotter. I HATE not being able to wear my big black pea coat or anything else with a modicum of style and flair.
I like longer days, but that's IT. You know what? I can turn on a damned LIGHT.
And there we go: the one thing I LIKE about summer -- Daylight Saving Time -- is what everyone else WHINES about.
I swear, the next time I hear the radio blurt something inane about 90-plus temperatures being "nice weather", I am going to turn my car around, drive to the station, and PUNCH someone. It's only "nice" if you can get OUT of it; if you don't have AC, it's just heatstroke.
Don't think I don't know about "real weather" because I live in California, either. That's by CHOICE, and not a choice made in a vacuum. I've traveled a LOT. I've spent summers in Texas and Arkansas and any number of places that get HUMIDITY.
Yes, they're even worse. The weather in every place east of Interstate 5 is more loathesome than where I live. I know that from experience.
Don't tell me not to bitch, though. Ebola is worse than the bubonic plague, but that doesn't mean that blackened, swelling lymph nodes are PLEASANT.
Especially when it happens three to five months out of every single year.
So yeah. Bleep this. Bleep this in the censored with an expletive deleted wrapped in barbed wire and bathed in the blank of blankitty blank bleep.
03 May 2012 @ 05:55 am
One:
I've finally figured out my utter dis1 for DC's recent business model of resurrecting Silver Age characters who got killed off in the '80s and '90s because they couldn't sustain their own titles.
As I mentioned the other day, I don't like zombies.2
Certainly, remembering, as one example, the long, dragged, out "Trial of the Flash" that closed out Barry Allen's run months before he met his end in Crisis on Infinite Earths is not that far removed from having the fragrance of three-month-old sea lion carcasses waft unbidden through one's amygdala.3
At least when Marvel turns its colorfully-costumed characters into shambling undead mockeries, they're occasionally honest about it.
Two:
DC is releasing a series of prequels to Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' classic graphic novel, Watchmen.
I reserve judgment on whether or not this is a bad move; really, I'm finding myself far too tickled by the outrage of the fandom (and Alan Moore) to really have many objections myself (and besides, one of them will have Darwyn Cooke art).
However, something occurred to me the other day:
Watchmen is older than most of the "old comics" it was based on were when it was published.
1disinterest/disappointment/distaste/disd
2I wanna shoo-oo-oo-oot the whole trend down!
3I have a dread suspicion that that storyline, which seemed to take forever at the time, might seem a masterpiece of snappy pacing compared to the "decompressed" storytelling of today's "decompressed".
01 May 2012 @ 08:58 am
Your Obedient Serpent has a coconut allergy. They don't normally do immunization shots for food allergies, but because coconut oil was so ubiquitous in the 1970s, they included that in my weekly cocktail of joy.0
It seems to have taken, since I don't seem to react to inadvertent doses of coconut in my cuisine; over the holidays, I had a big bowl of my sister's black eyed peas that (unknown to me) had been made with coconut milk, with no noticeable ill effects.1
On the other claw, it doesn't seem to have done a thing for my skin sensitivity, and as I've grown older, that's either started to increase, or I've become better at noting cause and effect.
The hell of it is that, near as I can tell, almost every brand of liquid soap and shampoo on the market contains at least one coconut derivative, and usually several. Cocamide? Cocamydopropyl? I can't believe it took me decades to twig that those were coconut derivatives. No wonder Head & Shoulders wouldn't touch my dandruff problem. I now use bar soap with carefully-vetted ingredients in both sink and shower, and a coal tar-based psoriasis shampoo that has nothing with the letters "coco-" chained together.
This winter, I found myself with another case of Badly Chapped And Cracking Skin on the backs of my hands. I'd assumed was due to cold, dry weather ... but as an experiment, I stopped using the Softsoap in the bathroom dispenser at work.2 Voila! My hands are happy.
Liquid soap is now pretty much off of my list. There are some that say "palm oil OR coconut oil", and Trader Joe's "Next To Godliness" gets cagey by listing "Natural and Plant-Derived Surfactants", but that's as close as it gets to "safe".
Yes, even that Doctor Whatsisname's Big Wall o' Text liquid soap that you can get at Whole Foods.
This isn't all about me, however.3 It's something I've noticed as a result of this:
Believe it or not, they don't label the ingredients of dish soap, the ubiquitous squeeze bottles of thick, brightly-colored goo that sits on every kitchen sink. Everyone uses it, even people with automatic dishwashers: those pots and pans won't wash themselves, after all.4
"Oh, but it's not for human consumption! It's not a cosmetic, or anything of that nature! We don't need to label things like that!"
I don't know about you, but it takes me longer to wash even one pan than it does to wash my own hands, or soap down in a shower. Generally, there's more than one pan -- and a if you don't have a dishwasher, you have to do all of your dishes by hand.
This means that a significant proportion of the population gets exposed to dish soap for substantially longer periods of time than someone using hand or body soap (unless you take a long, leisurely bath in a tub of soapy water).5
That's not even counting the people who wash dishes professionally at restaurants.
There's a better-than-even chance that I'll be moving into a place without a dishwasher when I finally get a place of my own. I guess it's time to invest heavily in rubber gloves. Nitrile, maybe.
Still ... what is everyone soaking their hands in these days? you may not have any allergies, but if something spends that much time on your hands, I think you should be able to find out what it is.
This is a big, nasty glitch in the regulatory system, and one that needs a-fixin'.
0For values of "joy" equal to "five years of weekly jabs in both arms with a mix of everything my system reacts badly to, from the ages of 11 to 16". And still, totally worth it.
1I was a little congested, but not unusually so, and given that my sister owns two big dogs ...
2I've compensated by making sure to wash my hands for no less than 45 seconds after every use. The friction and the action of the water contribute more than the soap, anyway.
3Although this is MY journal, and if you don't want to read about me, you're totally in the wrong place!
4I have an extensive body of empirical data supporting this hypothesis.
5Just keep the candles out of it, and nobody has to get hurt.
It seems to have taken, since I don't seem to react to inadvertent doses of coconut in my cuisine; over the holidays, I had a big bowl of my sister's black eyed peas that (unknown to me) had been made with coconut milk, with no noticeable ill effects.1
On the other claw, it doesn't seem to have done a thing for my skin sensitivity, and as I've grown older, that's either started to increase, or I've become better at noting cause and effect.
The hell of it is that, near as I can tell, almost every brand of liquid soap and shampoo on the market contains at least one coconut derivative, and usually several. Cocamide? Cocamydopropyl? I can't believe it took me decades to twig that those were coconut derivatives. No wonder Head & Shoulders wouldn't touch my dandruff problem. I now use bar soap with carefully-vetted ingredients in both sink and shower, and a coal tar-based psoriasis shampoo that has nothing with the letters "coco-" chained together.
This winter, I found myself with another case of Badly Chapped And Cracking Skin on the backs of my hands. I'd assumed was due to cold, dry weather ... but as an experiment, I stopped using the Softsoap in the bathroom dispenser at work.2 Voila! My hands are happy.
Liquid soap is now pretty much off of my list. There are some that say "palm oil OR coconut oil", and Trader Joe's "Next To Godliness" gets cagey by listing "Natural and Plant-Derived Surfactants", but that's as close as it gets to "safe".
Yes, even that Doctor Whatsisname's Big Wall o' Text liquid soap that you can get at Whole Foods.
This isn't all about me, however.3 It's something I've noticed as a result of this:
Believe it or not, they don't label the ingredients of dish soap, the ubiquitous squeeze bottles of thick, brightly-colored goo that sits on every kitchen sink. Everyone uses it, even people with automatic dishwashers: those pots and pans won't wash themselves, after all.4
"Oh, but it's not for human consumption! It's not a cosmetic, or anything of that nature! We don't need to label things like that!"
I don't know about you, but it takes me longer to wash even one pan than it does to wash my own hands, or soap down in a shower. Generally, there's more than one pan -- and a if you don't have a dishwasher, you have to do all of your dishes by hand.
This means that a significant proportion of the population gets exposed to dish soap for substantially longer periods of time than someone using hand or body soap (unless you take a long, leisurely bath in a tub of soapy water).5
That's not even counting the people who wash dishes professionally at restaurants.
There's a better-than-even chance that I'll be moving into a place without a dishwasher when I finally get a place of my own. I guess it's time to invest heavily in rubber gloves. Nitrile, maybe.
Still ... what is everyone soaking their hands in these days? you may not have any allergies, but if something spends that much time on your hands, I think you should be able to find out what it is.
This is a big, nasty glitch in the regulatory system, and one that needs a-fixin'.
0For values of "joy" equal to "five years of weekly jabs in both arms with a mix of everything my system reacts badly to, from the ages of 11 to 16". And still, totally worth it.
1I was a little congested, but not unusually so, and given that my sister owns two big dogs ...
2I've compensated by making sure to wash my hands for no less than 45 seconds after every use. The friction and the action of the water contribute more than the soap, anyway.
3Although this is MY journal, and if you don't want to read about me, you're totally in the wrong place!
4I have an extensive body of empirical data supporting this hypothesis.
5Just keep the candles out of it, and nobody has to get hurt.
30 April 2012 @ 05:06 am
I wonder how much of my disinterest in the zombie trend and its associated media and phenomena stems from having substantially more contact with dead things than most modern urbanites and suburbanites?
You want a lasting visceral reaction, spend some time working with a sea lion carcass so foul and decayed that seagulls won't eat it anymore.
That'll take some of the charm out of dressing up like a rotting corpse for a flash mob.
You want a lasting visceral reaction, spend some time working with a sea lion carcass so foul and decayed that seagulls won't eat it anymore.
That'll take some of the charm out of dressing up like a rotting corpse for a flash mob.
29 April 2012 @ 08:21 am
If you haven't heard, D.C. Simpson has a new comic, and a syndication deal with Universal!
It started last Sunday, and has been getting very good reviews. Thus far, it's got that same combination of charm and bite that characterized Ozy and Millie.
===== The comic starts =====
===== HERE. =====
clicky clicky clicky
Congratulations, Dana!
-- Athelind Long, Honorary Llewellyn
It started last Sunday, and has been getting very good reviews. Thus far, it's got that same combination of charm and bite that characterized Ozy and Millie.
===== The comic starts =====
===== HERE. =====
clicky clicky clicky
Congratulations, Dana!
-- Athelind Long, Honorary Llewellyn
27 April 2012 @ 08:16 pm
They'll regret the day they laughed at me!
They'll all regret it!
Beware the wrath of ...
DOCTOR HEDGEHOG!!
27 April 2012 @ 06:26 pm
Unbreakable.
One: It was early enough in M. Night Shyamalan's career that his name wasn't yet synonymous with "twist ending".
Two: The best twist endings recast everything you've just seen in a different light, and ideally, it should make even more sense in the light of the twist. Shyamalan's The Sixth Sense did that, but Unbreakable did it even better -- when it hits, both viewer and protagonist are overwhelmed by the horrific implications of the revelation.
Three: The twist -- and I won't spoil it here, on the off chance that a reader of my journal hasn't seen it -- relies heavily on the tropes of the comic-book superhero genre. I am intimately familiar with those tropes; superhero comics are My Thing. Despite that, I did not see it coming. I was utterly gobsmacked.
21 April 2012 @ 09:09 am
It's Saturday morning.
I am sitting in front of the television with a big bowl of cereal, watching cartoons.
It's not all that different from a Saturday morning 40 years ago, except ...
All in all ... Yeah, to heck with nostalgia this morning. More like relaxed contentment.
Did I mention coffee?
I am sitting in front of the television with a big bowl of cereal, watching cartoons.
It's not all that different from a Saturday morning 40 years ago, except ...
- Coffee!
- Laptop computer. I mean, seriously. This thing wasn't even a concept in 1972.
- Coffee.
- Vastly superior cartoons. Avatar: the Legend of Korra, the Thundercats reboot, Green Lantern and Young Justice vs. ... well, this.
All in all ... Yeah, to heck with nostalgia this morning. More like relaxed contentment.
Did I mention coffee?
14 April 2012 @ 08:56 am
Originally posted by 
paka at More signal boosting for Internet Privacy.
paka at More signal boosting for Internet Privacy.Originally posted by lupagreenwolf at More signal boosting for Internet Privacy.
lupagreenwolf at More signal boosting for Internet Privacy.Originally posted by evieeros at More signal boosting for Internet Privacy.
evieeros at More signal boosting for Internet Privacy.Originally posted by keladry_lupin at More signal boosting for Internet Privacy.
keladry_lupin at More signal boosting for Internet Privacy.Originally posted by why_me_why_not at More signal boosting for Internet Privacy.
why_me_why_not at More signal boosting for Internet Privacy.Originally posted by apiphile at More signal boosting for Internet Privacy.
apiphile at More signal boosting for Internet Privacy.Originally posted by alizarin_nyc at More signal boosting for Internet Privacy.
alizarin_nyc at More signal boosting for Internet Privacy.Originally posted by dameruth at It Never Ends...
dameruth at It Never Ends...Originally posted by jjpor at It Never Ends...
jjpor at It Never Ends...Originally posted by abbyromanaat Signal Boost
abbyromanaat Signal BoostOriginally posted by clocketpatchat Signal Boost
clocketpatchat Signal BoostOriginally posted by calliopes_penat CISPA is the new SOPA
calliopes_penat CISPA is the new SOPAOriginally posted by ![[personal profile]](http://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
spikedluv at CISPA is the new SOPA
spikedluv at CISPA is the new SOPAOriginally posted by velvetwhip at CISPA is the new SOPA
Here's their next move: The Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act, or CISPA, would obliterate any semblance of online privacy in the United States.
And CISPA would provide a victory for content owners who were shell-shocked by the unprecedented outpouring of activism in opposition to SOPA and Internet censorship.
The House of Representatives is planning to take up CISPA later this month. Click here to ask your lawmakers to oppose it.
SOPA was pushed as a remedy to the supposed economic threat of online piracy -- but economic fear-mongering didn't quite do the trick.
So those concerned about copyright are engaging in sleight of hand, appending their legislation to a bill that most Americans will assume is about keeping them safe from bad guys.
This so-called cyber security bill aims to prevent theft of "government information" and "intellectual property" and could let ISPs block your access to websites -- or the whole Internet.
Don't let them push this back-door SOPA. Click here to demand that your lawmakers oppose CISPA.
CISPA also encourages companies to share information about you with the government and other corporations.
That data could then be used for just about anything -- from prosecuting crimes to ad placements.
And perhaps worst of all, CISPA supercedes all other online privacy protections.
Please click here to urge your lawmakers to oppose CISPA when it comes up for a vote this month.
Thanks for fighting for the Internet.
-Demand Progress
velvetwhip at CISPA is the new SOPAHere's their next move: The Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act, or CISPA, would obliterate any semblance of online privacy in the United States.
And CISPA would provide a victory for content owners who were shell-shocked by the unprecedented outpouring of activism in opposition to SOPA and Internet censorship.
The House of Representatives is planning to take up CISPA later this month. Click here to ask your lawmakers to oppose it.
SOPA was pushed as a remedy to the supposed economic threat of online piracy -- but economic fear-mongering didn't quite do the trick.
So those concerned about copyright are engaging in sleight of hand, appending their legislation to a bill that most Americans will assume is about keeping them safe from bad guys.
This so-called cyber security bill aims to prevent theft of "government information" and "intellectual property" and could let ISPs block your access to websites -- or the whole Internet.
Don't let them push this back-door SOPA. Click here to demand that your lawmakers oppose CISPA.
CISPA also encourages companies to share information about you with the government and other corporations.
That data could then be used for just about anything -- from prosecuting crimes to ad placements.
And perhaps worst of all, CISPA supercedes all other online privacy protections.
Please click here to urge your lawmakers to oppose CISPA when it comes up for a vote this month.
Thanks for fighting for the Internet.
-Demand Progress
13 April 2012 @ 10:10 pm
You know, Friday the 13th is bad enough, but when I got in my car to head home from my carpool, the trip odometer read 66.6 miles.
I got home, went back into my room, and the thermometer read ... 66.6 F.
I'm at two decibeasts and counting.
I got home, went back into my room, and the thermometer read ... 66.6 F.
I'm at two decibeasts and counting.
26 March 2012 @ 06:13 am
This is one that's been popping up with increasing and irritating regularity, so I'd just like to state for the record:
"Versus"
is not a plural,
and its singular is not
"Verse."
This is more of a verbal error than a written one, thus far, largely because in writing, everyone tends to use "vs." -- but it's one I keep hearing more and more often, from people who should know better. "Pirates vs. Ninja" gets pronounced as "Pirates verse Ninja".
is not a plural,
and its singular is not
"Verse."
This is more of a verbal error than a written one, thus far, largely because in writing, everyone tends to use "vs." -- but it's one I keep hearing more and more often, from people who should know better. "Pirates vs. Ninja" gets pronounced as "Pirates verse Ninja".
Let's see what Your Obedient Serpent's Grammar Guide says about this:
Yes, both "Verse" and "Versus" can be abbreviated as "vs.", but they are not interchangeable!
Stop it at once. Where did you learn this?
Yes, both "Verse" and "Versus" can be abbreviated as "vs.", but they are not interchangeable!
Stop it at once. Where did you learn this?
24 March 2012 @ 10:14 am
Sing along!
Greeeeeeeeeeeeeen Lantern is in space, you see
FaaaAAAAAAR out into the galaxy!
Stars spreadin' out so far and wide
Keep Coast City, just give me those nebulae!
... that last line needs work.
10 March 2012 @ 06:03 pm
Oh, to heck with them. They can get their own damned journals.
Some of'em have, actually, but I hardly ever read them. We're not on speaking terms.
And, jeez, the persona with the day job has a Facebook page. I don't even ... It's like I don't even know me, man.
08 March 2012 @ 01:38 pm
Songs and song titles make great adventure seeds. In the past, I've had GMs who constructed entire campaigns around albums by Jethro Tull or King Crimson.
It's especially appropriate for comic book games -- Stan Lee loved to play on pop music for his story titles. The right combination of words and the songs they describe can suggest entire, baroque scenarios. It's kind of like the way Silver Age DC (and Golden Age Pulp SF) editors would commission a cover, hand it to a writer, and say, "I need a story to go with this."
The questions to ask when you try this:
So, LiveJournal HiveMind, Your Obedient Serpent has the request lines open: give me song titles that you think would make good adventures, particularly superhero adventures.
Don't feel like you have to be obvious, but don't feel like you have to be obscure, either. "Eve of Destruction" is obvious; "Winds of Change", a bit less; "I Don't Like Mondays" sounds like a Garfield punchline unless you know the song and the story behind it.
Give me titles; if you feel like it, give me the scenarios that come to mind when YOU hear them -- or just toss them down as a challenge.
My players all read this, so I'm screening replies!
*"But that trick never works!"
It's especially appropriate for comic book games -- Stan Lee loved to play on pop music for his story titles. The right combination of words and the songs they describe can suggest entire, baroque scenarios. It's kind of like the way Silver Age DC (and Golden Age Pulp SF) editors would commission a cover, hand it to a writer, and say, "I need a story to go with this."
The questions to ask when you try this:
- What kind of scenario does the title suggest?
- Does it describe an event? An adversary? An ally or a victim? Just a general mood or theme?
- How much of the song itself can I lift to help flesh out the adventure?
So, LiveJournal HiveMind, Your Obedient Serpent has the request lines open: give me song titles that you think would make good adventures, particularly superhero adventures.
Don't feel like you have to be obvious, but don't feel like you have to be obscure, either. "Eve of Destruction" is obvious; "Winds of Change", a bit less; "I Don't Like Mondays" sounds like a Garfield punchline unless you know the song and the story behind it.
Give me titles; if you feel like it, give me the scenarios that come to mind when YOU hear them -- or just toss them down as a challenge.
My players all read this, so I'm screening replies!
*"But that trick never works!"
07 March 2012 @ 02:09 pm
A few weeks ago, a friend of mine posited a question in a locked post:
If you could go back and talk to your high school self for ten minutes, what would you say?
And this is what Your Obedient Serpent would say to his younger self:
If you could go back and talk to your high school self for ten minutes, what would you say?
And this is what Your Obedient Serpent would say to his younger self:
- Everyone tells you that you have to control your temper, but nobody tells you how. Well, here's the secret:
You are not your temper. Your temper is not you. It's a physiological response, not a personality flaw.
Nine-tenths of your "temper problem" is that when you feel that anger welling up inside you, you get frustrated at the anger itself, and that makes you angrier, and that makes you more frustrated. It's a feedback loop.
The next time it flares up, tell yourself, "This isn't me. It's my body. What do I want to do right now?" - You do not require a college degree to validate yourself as a human being, or even to "live up" to the (preposterously overinflated) intellect the standardized tests all insist you have.
You're not going to "waste your potential" if you don't immediately push to get a degree right out of high school. If you do because everyone expects it of you -- or because you have some comic-book, Reed Richards notion of being a SCIENTIST, in capitals, italics, and boldface -- you just might be wasting potential you don't even know you have.
You don't know it yet, but you're a very hands-on person. You don't know it yet, but you're a very outdoorsy person.
Yeah, you have lofty, long-term goals for yourself and for humanity -- but you really thrive when What Needs To Be Done is right there in front of your face. At this stage, that sheepskin isn't tangible enough to keep you going full-bore.
If you want fulfillment, if you want to do something that both applies your intellect and provides tangible benefits to humanity, you could do a whole lot worse than to enlist in the Coast Guard, become a Marine Science Technician, and stick with it, wringing every drop of education you can squeeze out of Uncle Sam while you save lives and protect the planet.
That got your attention, didn't it? I know what's really going on in there, better than you do right now. Whatever you think right now, you're not about Science for Science's Sake. You're not about Pure Intellect. Science isn't a goal. It's a tool. I know what you really want, and what you need if you want to drag yourself out of bed for the next thirty years.
You want to help people. You want to know that you've done everything in your power to make the world a better place.
You want the never-ending battle.
That brain of yours may never be Nobel Prize material, kid. You know it and I know it. It's still a pretty impressive piece of wetware, though.
You've got the lever.
Go find a place to stand.
23 February 2012 @ 06:02 am
The local radio station just did a phone quiz about "frauds and hoaxes", and after questions about Milli Vanilli and the balloon-law-chair kid, the grand finale was a question about the Y2K Bug.
So here's the take-home lesson: if you identify something that might be a problem well in advance, and spend huge amounts of money and effort trying to fix it before it becomes a problem, then, when it doesn't become a problem, it's obvious to everyone that it never was a problem!
Does anyone else have a problem with that?
You didn't succeed, code monkeys of the world: you defrauded everyone. Thanks for all your hard work!
This is a radio station in Silicon Valley, mind. I guess the classic rock isn't aimed at the code monkey demographic.
Parallels between this and the effectiveness of environmental regulations are left as an exercise for the class.
So here's the take-home lesson: if you identify something that might be a problem well in advance, and spend huge amounts of money and effort trying to fix it before it becomes a problem, then, when it doesn't become a problem, it's obvious to everyone that it never was a problem!
Does anyone else have a problem with that?
You didn't succeed, code monkeys of the world: you defrauded everyone. Thanks for all your hard work!
This is a radio station in Silicon Valley, mind. I guess the classic rock isn't aimed at the code monkey demographic.
Parallels between this and the effectiveness of environmental regulations are left as an exercise for the class.
21 February 2012 @ 06:37 pm
I will allow the possibility that corporations might be considered people as soon as I see one marched to the guillotine.
Parading its head on a pike is optional.