...but the prospect of an economic breakdown in China triggers my "major global disaster" sense. Many people have noted that in many ways China, as the world's foremost manufacturer, occupies a spot analogous to the US in the 1920s. Add to that the trillion dollars of US debt held by China, and today's economy could look like paradise compared to that in two or three years.
Fortunately, my track record on these kinds of worries is not particularly good, but if you do have a spare minute and some plans for weathering this Great Recession, they may be worth reviewing.
As for me, I don't know what I would do anyway. If I had a house I would start collecting cardboard, bits of string, and scrap pieces of metal and other things that you might be tempted to throw out, but since I don't even have that I guess I will just need to learn how to fish the Mississippi River.
Showing posts with label Talking about other things entirely. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Talking about other things entirely. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Monday, March 2, 2009
Sometimes
Sometimes I cannot tell the difference between Christ and Quixote:
The Legend of Master Legend
Even if you've read this article before, it's worth re-reading. Here, I'll post another link:
The Legend of Master Legend
It's a Rolling Stone article about real-life superheroes.
The Legend of Master Legend
Even if you've read this article before, it's worth re-reading. Here, I'll post another link:
The Legend of Master Legend
It's a Rolling Stone article about real-life superheroes.
Social Skills
So there is this ad going around on the tubes with the text:
My first thought was how few social skills one would need to have to say something like "I'm popular. You're not." Then I thought that someone who had poor social skills might think this is a good thing to say, so the ad is actually extremely well targetted. I am flummoxed.
I'm reminded of a sign on the door of SCUM -- the Society for Collegiate Undergraduate Mathematics -- at the University of Calgary. When I first arrived, the sign read
I liked the blatant nerdiness on display there, but the next year I noticed a change:
That was somehow disappointing, but another year later it changed again:
The only undergraduate mathematician I ever knew well was Robert. His opinions, in fact, were rarely a mystery. I asked him one day about the sign, and he told me. I cannot quote Robert on a blog read by my family, nor even paraphrase him because his speech is essentially a long string of vulgarities punctuated by descriptions of obscene acts. I survived middle school and high school but Robert showed me that it was still possible for language to shock me. So really the best I can do is give a paraphrase of a translation from Robert-speak to normal-person-speak.
In short, Robert admitted that both changes to the sign were his fault.
The first time he had managed to say, or do, something so awful it shattered the limits of SCUM's tolerance. He was banned and the sign was changed from "No social skills" to "SOME social skills", that word SOME in uppercase and underlined multiple times. After meeting other members of SCUM it horrifies me to imagine what this could possibly have been. Robert would not tell me.
The second change occurred when Robert was elected president of SCUM and had the sign changed to "Few social skills" as a rational compromise.
I had a class with Robert my last semester there as he was trying to finish school. He spent most of the semester in a drug-induced haze, skipping classes and dressing as a pirate, until he realized that he needed to pass all his classes in order to graduate. In an astonishing period of a month he was able to finish his backlog of homework and tests, complete his final projects, and, also astonishingly, beg and plead the professors he had been verbally insulting for mercy.
I left school to live on the river, and Robert left Calgary to work on a doctorate at the University of Toronto. He said his real calling was to become an evangelical missionary, and a PhD would lend authority to his claims that science does not disprove the existence of God.
He is one of many Calgarians I miss dearly.
I'm popular. You're not.
#1 Guide to Social Skills.
My first thought was how few social skills one would need to have to say something like "I'm popular. You're not." Then I thought that someone who had poor social skills might think this is a good thing to say, so the ad is actually extremely well targetted. I am flummoxed.
I'm reminded of a sign on the door of SCUM -- the Society for Collegiate Undergraduate Mathematics -- at the University of Calgary. When I first arrived, the sign read
Welcome to SCUM!
No social skills required.
I liked the blatant nerdiness on display there, but the next year I noticed a change:
Welcome to SCUM!
SOME social skills required.
That was somehow disappointing, but another year later it changed again:
Welcome to SCUM!
Few social skills required.
The only undergraduate mathematician I ever knew well was Robert. His opinions, in fact, were rarely a mystery. I asked him one day about the sign, and he told me. I cannot quote Robert on a blog read by my family, nor even paraphrase him because his speech is essentially a long string of vulgarities punctuated by descriptions of obscene acts. I survived middle school and high school but Robert showed me that it was still possible for language to shock me. So really the best I can do is give a paraphrase of a translation from Robert-speak to normal-person-speak.
In short, Robert admitted that both changes to the sign were his fault.
The first time he had managed to say, or do, something so awful it shattered the limits of SCUM's tolerance. He was banned and the sign was changed from "No social skills" to "SOME social skills", that word SOME in uppercase and underlined multiple times. After meeting other members of SCUM it horrifies me to imagine what this could possibly have been. Robert would not tell me.
The second change occurred when Robert was elected president of SCUM and had the sign changed to "Few social skills" as a rational compromise.
I had a class with Robert my last semester there as he was trying to finish school. He spent most of the semester in a drug-induced haze, skipping classes and dressing as a pirate, until he realized that he needed to pass all his classes in order to graduate. In an astonishing period of a month he was able to finish his backlog of homework and tests, complete his final projects, and, also astonishingly, beg and plead the professors he had been verbally insulting for mercy.
I left school to live on the river, and Robert left Calgary to work on a doctorate at the University of Toronto. He said his real calling was to become an evangelical missionary, and a PhD would lend authority to his claims that science does not disprove the existence of God.
He is one of many Calgarians I miss dearly.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
I haven't left bed yet
But I did finish the Fall of Endymion. I guess I will get my annoyances with these books out of the way first.
My impression of this series overall is that Hyperion is a very strong, character-driven work. The Fall of Hyperion is a satisfying conclusion. Endymion and the Rise of Endymion have amazing settings which are generally let down by the plot and characters.
I guess I should get up now and start on my own poor writing.
UPDATE: I forgot the most important thing, which is while browsing Dan Simmons website I ran across a link to this.
- Raft and kayak travel is too fast in this series. A canoe or kayak is rarely faster than walking speed plus current speed, while a raft is locked to the speed of the current; a river like the Mississippi rarely exceeds three miles per hour. Still, they sometimes travel more than 100 miles in a day. I wonder if Simmons is conflating experience from a short canoe trip with a long motorboat trip. I did enjoy these elements but I felt they were too short.
- Way too much retconning. Simmons denies most of the major revelations of the Hyperion books, and the Rise of Endymion even ignores things in Endymion. There is a very humorous scene at the beginning of Endymion where one character makes a list of ludicrous demands of the hero, in such a way that you know these things are meant to be accomplished by the end of the series. However, at least one of these demands is never accomplished, nor mentioned again by either character, although there were at least good opportunities to bring it up.
- The characters in Hyperion sparkle with rivalries, which they mostly resolve by the Fall of Hyperion. The inter-character conflict is not as compelling in Endymion. The protagonists are simply too nice and the antagonists have no apparent motive for the political intrigues. I wasn't given any reason to care which of the multiple bad factions came out on top, and I wasn't even sure why the baddies cared. If you are lusting for power it is presumably for love or hate or at least change, but none of the characters seemed to have significant plans for how to use the power they plotted for.
- Everyone blinked. A lot. I started to think I was in the land of Tink Tonk.
My impression of this series overall is that Hyperion is a very strong, character-driven work. The Fall of Hyperion is a satisfying conclusion. Endymion and the Rise of Endymion have amazing settings which are generally let down by the plot and characters.
I guess I should get up now and start on my own poor writing.
UPDATE: I forgot the most important thing, which is while browsing Dan Simmons website I ran across a link to this.
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Saturday Considerations
Okay, if I don't get to the Minneapolis Institute of Art today I will probably die.
Also, I'm reading The Rise of Endymion. Dan Simmons's Hyperion books were definitely stronger. The Endymion series demonstrates the weaknesses of an alternating plot structure. In Endymion every other chapter was written from the antagonist's perspective and ended with the apparent destruction of at least one protagonist, which you know can't happen because the author has clearly fated the characters to greater things.
With an alternating structure, if one of the storylines is more engaging, the other will feel like filler. If they are equally engaging, then you still need to decide if you really have two works there instead of just one. Hyperion was more than the sum of its parts, but Endymion isn't. The Rise of Endymion adds to the flaws by increasing the number of sides I don't care about, and I am just skimming some pages completely.
Still, I have to hand it to him for creating a universe in which
Also, he apparently floods the entire Earth just so he can have a character kayak through the St Louis Arch. I appreciate that.
Oh, in other news the next adventure post concerns the library in Winnipeg. I want to include lots of special effects and it is hard to do on a blogger's budget, so it is likely to be delayed.
Also, I'm reading The Rise of Endymion. Dan Simmons's Hyperion books were definitely stronger. The Endymion series demonstrates the weaknesses of an alternating plot structure. In Endymion every other chapter was written from the antagonist's perspective and ended with the apparent destruction of at least one protagonist, which you know can't happen because the author has clearly fated the characters to greater things.
With an alternating structure, if one of the storylines is more engaging, the other will feel like filler. If they are equally engaging, then you still need to decide if you really have two works there instead of just one. Hyperion was more than the sum of its parts, but Endymion isn't. The Rise of Endymion adds to the flaws by increasing the number of sides I don't care about, and I am just skimming some pages completely.
Still, I have to hand it to him for creating a universe in which
- Characters can be resurrected in a long, error-prone process.
- Instantaneous interstellar travel is possible, but...
- ...it's fatal
Also, he apparently floods the entire Earth just so he can have a character kayak through the St Louis Arch. I appreciate that.
Oh, in other news the next adventure post concerns the library in Winnipeg. I want to include lots of special effects and it is hard to do on a blogger's budget, so it is likely to be delayed.
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