My astrological sign is *facepalm*
Original content is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, unless otherwise noted.
Writing: The Good Stuff, Collated | Tag Cloud | Ask me anything | Archive | RSS
This blog is adorable—it’s run by a bookseller who posts what he finds in old books. Family photos, recipes, tickets, letters…they’re really interesting glimpses into the lives of the books’ past owners. The coolest thing I’ve ever found in a book is the post-it in the front of my copy of Le Morte Darthur. I guess it’s not really a bookmark—it was supposed to be an inscription. I have a whole headcanon about the relationship between the man who owned the book and the woman he was giving it to, and how it ended up at a used bookstore, but I’m not ready to share. They’re like my secret muses. ^^; I bookmark things with old computer punch cards that my grandfather gave me. The cool thing is that he gave me several hundred, and he still has tons more, so I don’t have to constantly worry about losing them—whenever I use a real bookmark, it’s gone before I’m three-quarters of my way through the novel. I’ll be sad when I finally do run out, though.
Conventional wisdom says that alcohol added to a dish gets cooked away, but in fact, a large percent of alcohol still remains in the dish, depending on your cooking method, according to a study from the USDA’s Nutrient Data Laboratory. O_o I really hope restaurants don’t start carding for boozy food, because that would be tragic. (At least until my birthday—after that I don’t care. :) ) I love dishes with really strong signature flavors, especially when they’re paired with subtler flavors in a surprising way. Alcohol, coffee, chocolate, ginger, cheese…give me sushi containing one or more of those, and I will just die! tl;dr The article’s interesting; ignore the awful title of awfulness. (Seriously, I thought I was bad at naming things!)
I have to reread this—I remember that it made me laugh and think, and I remember that I loved it, but I barely remember the actual plot. It’s been way too long.
If I write any more fanfic I’ll post it there, and then maybe just link to it from here. So if you have an account on there we should be friends! Um…there’s like a 2-day waiting period before I can actually upload anything, so at the moment my account is empty. This is just to let you know that it is a thing that exists. Sorta. ^^;
!!!!! I can’t believe I hadn’t heard about this—this is so cool! Baen Books is a mainstream publishing house, but they’re putting some of their books online for free because “any kind of book distribution which provides free copies to people has always, throughout the history of publishing, eventually rebounded to the benefit of the author,” according to the introduction. Basically, these are people who Understand the Internet! In publishing! My mind is blown. And they’ve got Lois McMaster Bujold and Mercedes Lackey and and—holy crap!—Larry Niven and I’m just going to spend the rest of my life reading these now. This is awesome.
When feminists complain about “chivalry,” what we’re talking about are actions that treat women differently than men based on the assumptions this article refers to as “benevolent sexism”: “attitudes that idealize women as pure, moral, pedestal-worthy objects of men’s adoration, protection, and provision.” We’re NOT talking about general politeness, where people try to be helpful to other people regardless of gender. And the reason we’re getting up in arms about this is that it does seem—based on this study at least—to cause actual harm; feminists have been speculating that chivalry would be harmful for ages now. According to the article, “when led to expect benevolently sexist help in a masculine workplace, women became unsure of themselves, got distracted, and consequently performed poorly.” This is one among multiple negative consequences the article claims have been tied to benevolent sexism. Unfortunately, the article doesn’t site any sources beyond this one study, and doesn’t even link to it properly. Anyway, I’m just posting this here because I keep seeing people on my dash (and irl, and pretty much everywhere) gushing over how great chivalry is. If they mean chivalry as in benevolent sexism, then no, it’s not great—it’s actually pretty awful. And if they mean chivalry as in politeness, then that’s not what feminists are complaining about, so I don’t understand why they spend so much time defending it. Although I do wish they would stop calling it “chivalry”—imo, that word has always connoted inequality and sexism, and probably always will. Let’s get rid of that word and just all agree that polite people are awesome.
LISTEN!
!!!!!!!! When I was 12 or so, I used this site to learn some Quenya. (High-Elvish in Lord of the Rings) And then I lost interest, lost the link, and when I finally looked for it again, couldn’t find it. I’d assumed it had been taken down, and couldn’t remember enough about it to find it in the wayback machine. BUT HERE IT IS. Counterintuitively, even though learning Elvish was by far the geekiest thing I’ve ever done, it was also the one thing that people gave me props for in middle school. I guess it was so completely different than what everyone else was doing that they thought it was kind of interesting. Conversations about LOTR are about the only good memories I have of that place, and this site was responsible for that. </maudlin>
Seriously Alabama? Now I know that being stuck in church every Sunday morning for many feels like jail but how can they really be allowed to do something like this? What’s the alternative for anyone of no faith or with a religion that doesn’t use a traditional church or one that you can’t find in a small town in Alabama? This makes absolutely no sense to me, but that’s probably because I’m trying to look at it from the logical, reasonable, realistic side of things. The city judge in Bay Minette (AL) will let misdemeanor offenders choose to work off their sentences in jail and pay a fine; or go to church every Sunday for a year. If offenders select church, they’ll be allowed to pick the place of worship but must check in weekly with the pastor and police. If the one-year church attendance program is completed, the offender’s case will be dismissed. Bay Minette Police Chief Mike Rowland says the program could change the lives of people heading down the wrong path. So far, 56 churches are participating. Wow, Alabama. Have you not heard of the First Amendment? Really? I’d insist that they let me join a pastafarian or satanic church or something. Has someone talked to FFRF about this? Somebody should! Based on the FAQ on their website, it seems like they’re prepared to deal with this kind of case. (It talks about AA, but I assume this would be the same sort of thing…) The trend of current case law shows that forcing a prisoner or probationer to attend A.A. or N.A. or other religiously centered rehabilitation program is increasingly seen as a violation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment. Courts from the 1st, 2nd, 4th, 7th, 8th, 9th and 11th Circuits have all explicitly or implicitly ruled that this is true. In order to establish such a claim, prisoners must generally show three things: (1) that the program is religious; (2) that if they do not attend the program they will either (a) lose some benefit they are otherwise entitled to or (b) be subject to some detriment or punishment; and (3) that there is no secular alternative available. They have a form for reporting state/church violations right here. I don’t know if it’s helpful for someone not in that jurisdiction to report it, though…is anyone in Alabama? Please pass this along! (via brashblacknonbeliever)
Court-Ordered Participation in A.A.:
