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MikZ's Friends' LiveJournalsMik's friends' 32 most recent LiveJournal entries Note that when I read my friends' journals, I usually don't see all these entries. I use filters so that I only see journal entries written by certain people; the more time I have, the less pretentious the filter I use is.
The issue of course requires limitations. Because when people ask for the "If you had a million dollars, what would you spend it on" answer they're not looking for the answer "Hire a good accountant and maybe an investment broker, donate a substantial amount to charities I support instead of my usual $20 to $50 blibs, and pay off the mortgage". Well, maybe some people are looking for that answer. I don't know. It always feels a bit like a "You have these resources that must be used" question, often a "that must be used on yourself", and often a "right now!" ( Weirdly introspective materialist-universe ramblings. ) 1 Comment—Post your own comment for
So Jaym Gates linked to this piece – The Ten Commandments Of Flirting, Or: How Not To Be Creepy At Atheist Conventions. She said, “I want to include these rules in every con packet EVER. These rules aren’t just for atheist conventions.” So of course, I clicked, because I really don’t want to be That Guy, and was pleasantly happy to realize that (I think) I follow all of them. This quote on respecting people’s time stuck out, however: “If you want to tell someone else an anecdote, make it short and get right to the point.” As someone who tells a lot of stories, I realized that there are certain tales I just don’t tell at conventions. I’ve learned that my more involved tales (like this little doozy) won’t work, because con space really doesn’t allow a story of over a minute; people are coming and going and interrupting to say hello to old friends, and other folks are wanting their space to share, and if there’s a lot of setup then you basically have to arm-wrestle the table into listening to you. It’s not like a dinner, where if you say, “This one takes a bit,” you can get some room for a five-minute monologue. As people’s attentions wander, you’ll get a third of the way through the story and get to the first punchline, and people will think you’re done. So if you’re committed, you have to either wave someone to shut up, or start up again after they tell their story, both of which are kind of dickish. No big deal. I just tell short stories. And in the hullabaloo, sometimes I don’t even finish those. It’s cool. I’m there to listen to other people, not to spout my old tales to other people. But it’s a little weird to realize that subconsciously, I’ve not only got enough stories to tell, but I have marked many of them as space-appropriate. This one’s a good con story. This one’s a good one to tell sitting in my living room. This one’s a good one to tell in a crowd of four to six people. I can think of a story and instantly know what social milieu I think it fits into, which is an odd thing to realize about how much I think about stories. Then again, I’ve sat at the con when That Guy keeps going, “No, no, you gotta listen, and then – get this – this happened.” And at a con, no tale is amusing enough to be worth hijacking an entire table’s worth of people for ten minutes. Just trust me on that.
Cross-posted from Ferrett's Real Blog. This entry has also been posted at http://theferrett.dreamwidth.org/216037.h4 Comments—Post your own comment for
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Originally posted at my Dreamwidth account. LJ is not trustworthy as a blogging platform, so please comment there. Ask me for an invite code if you need one.
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the act of making a woman feel guilty or inferior for being sexually active, having multiple sex partners, or acting or dressing in a way that is deemed excessively sexual, often by calling them a "slut" or other derogatory terms. Slut-shaming is based on the idea that women should follow one sexual norm, and that any woman who deviates from this norm is inferior to other women. (Wikipedia)(No need to point out it's not just used against women please - it's used overwhelmingly against women.) Possibly in reaction, I think there is also prudery-shaming in some sex-positive contexts. I'll go with Wikipedia again: [...] Another use of "prude" is as a label and an insult directed to anybody having reservations resulting from standards of modesty or even any moral standards and beliefs or which are not shared by the offender.I think there's also "squick-shaming". Responding to polite respectful squick with "I loved it", "it was really hot" or "art needs no explanation" needs care to avoid being taken as thinly veiled accusation of prudery and "you're not sex-positive (enough)". This entry was originally posted at http://australian-joe.dreamwidth.org/448 5 Comments—Post your own comment for
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Nisan told me that the meet-ups that we hosted changed his life in a really positive way. He's even going to be working for CFAR! Pretty awesome to see this sort of change from something I've done and reap so much unintended benefit :) Post your own comment for
He used to be a baby! 5 Comments—Post your own comment for
Why do I feel like I haven't done anything? 1 Comment—Post your own comment for
N and I have admired the ubiquitous drainage system in courtyards to collect water for cisterns. In its way, something of a social comment about how things have been, and are, done in Venezia -- with a sense of practicality and social obligation. In Venezia, the water pouring out of fountain-plinths in squares, however traditional it might be, jars against my Australian sense that water is scarce. But we are in Europe, water is not scarce. A friend, staying in the English countryside, had her hosts state that the dry weather was being hard on the plants. "Well, you could water them" she said. Apparently, they looked at her as if she was from Mars. The thought of Venezian water traffic being done like Sicilian road traffic is just scary. Saw a t-shirt that had the Rialto bridge, Michelangelo's David and the Colosseum on it; loved the subtext--Venezia has canals and the glorious city built on land we created; Firenze has the wonders of Renaissance art; nothing worth mentioning has happened in Rome for about two millennia. The narrow, weaving, curving streets of Venice between three-story buildings making navigating through said streets an adventure, particularly as many of the alley ways are not even marked. Looking at the venerated, mummified remains in glass-sided coffins in Catholic churches, the Salafist accusation that Shia are "corpse worshippers" comes to mind. Looking at the opulence of Catholic Churches, Catholics really are the Hindus of the Christian world. (The Orthodox even more so, but there is very little theological difference between them.) Our menu Italian generally interacted fine with serving staff's menu English. Thursday Got up, wandered off to Theatro San Gallo to buy tickets for the Story of Venice performance that night, then on to St Maria del Miracella which is a late C15th church, effectively the first Renaissance church in Venice and the most beautiful church I had ever seen. We, as recommended by the Church guide, on to Santa Marina de Formosa as the "next step" church. It is bigger and aesthetically much less coherent--the altar area does no really work (no where for the eye to rest). Then on to the Venezia Casino (since 1638) to try and get a casino chip for N's brother-in-law. Communication was challenging, but the burden was come back at 3.30pm when the tables opened. (I was much more confident than N he would be able to, since it was in the Casino's interest to sell a chip that never got redeemed--unless they were awfully worried about counterfeiting.) Then onto the Ghetto and the Jewish museum. The pieces were mainly late C17th and later, but there were some C16th printed books. The room presenting the history was very well done. One of the themes of the history of the Jewish Ghetto was that the Jews would be get along and getting ahead (e.g. being pioneers in high quality printing), and then the Papacy would put the boot in (e.g. ban the production of Jewish religious texts). Had lunch on the Carneggio canal (the only canal apart from the Grand Canal that is big enough to have waterbuses) at Ristorante Gam Gam. At first, thought it was a remarkably narrow part of the Grand Canal, but no. We were were near a routes 4.1/2, 5.1/2 waterbus stop; it was really striking how many waterbuses went through one after another. We had been told that, if one wanted to eat, do it around the old Jewish quarter (which still has a strong Jewish presence. I never had kosher Italian before, but the meal was lovely. I had tagliolini with salmon (which was lovely) and N had a very fine roast chicken with vegetables. We shared bianca vino and my chocolate cake (which was lovely--light, fluffy, a rich sauce), N only had a small portion. Then did a big wander through sections we had not been to before, going up near the railway station, which helped get an even better sense of the city (since that was where we came in). The route 1 waterbus back to San Marco. N wanted to go the island of San Giorgio. Trying to work out the intricacies of the waterbus system led to some failed to and fro on route 12 before N gave up because it was clear you had to go the long way around. Then back home for a potter and wind down. Took ourselves off to see The Story of Venice, grabbing a nice wrap (me) and toastie (N) at Al Vecio Penasa on the way. There was a BBC film at 7pm, which took itself somewhat seriously and was very Venezian in its point of view. Then a break during which N got a Bellini cocktail and read the rather fabulous program guide. Then onto The Story of Venice, which was a male and two female actors taking on various roles, two come in go out light relief, with backdrops projected onto three walls and set pieces projected facing the audience. Was lots of fun. Then we raced off trying to get to Ristorante Bandierette. In a miracle of navigation, N got us there but it was a quiet night, so they appeared to be getting ready to close up. So N then tried to navigate us back to more active areas near the Casino which, after a bit of trial and error, he succeeded. We had dinner at Trattoria da Gianni. I had a fine plate of spaghetti di nero (black sauce, i.e. cuttlefish sauce) and N some carbonara, we both had bianca vino. Then we shared (well N had a piece) a formaggi misto which, while not quite as ample as some, was excellent in quality. Then off t the Casion; I waited outside, N bought a ticket, went through the signup rigmarole and then left. We then wandered home by foot and waterbus. The Grand Canal is magical by night. Architectural magnificence from the high medieval to now. Friday Packed our luggage and tidied the flat. Leaving our baggage upstairs from the lockable grilll that separates the top storey, we wandered down to the Museum of Naval History. The 50 anniversary of the naval school (I thinK). Under set up pavilions there were fantastic models of the aircraft-carrier Garibaldi and amphibious support ship San Guiste. We went in, starting with the top story and worked down. The top story had a great exhibition of Swedish naval history, including its links with Italy, which date back to the C17th--Venice and then Italy having similar issues--dealing with an aggressive imperial power in enclosed seas. There was also a lovely exhibition of shells and coral, but N and I were more interested in the things that go bang. There were a few more models of contemporary Italian naval vessels on the ground floor and there was no cleaning blocking access to the c17th fortification models on the ground floor. I also go to enjoy the model of the Korean turtle boat again. Wandered out to the Via Garibaldi and had a couple of wraps; the wraps and sandwiches have been consistently excellent--nicely flavoured, fresh ingredients. Then collected our luggage, got a waterbus to Lido. After some toing and froing trying to work thngs out, got tickets on the Alalaguna service to the airport. It turned up almost on time (4 minutes late) and had a leisurely trip across the lagoon to the airport. One gets a much better sense of how large the lagoon is from that trip. And how many water taxis there are. The airport was straightforward; apart from an Indian couple in front of us who seemed to have enormous difficulty understanding the perfectly normal airport security instructions from staff.
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I'm getting close to caught up, although not there yet. I've unpacked all of the boxes in my room, although still have a fair bit of rearranging and putting away to do. I've unpacked most of the boxes in the living room and bathroom, but have quite a bit of bathroom stuff to sift through and get rid of, and a lot of kitchen stuff to deal with. I've started working on getting the hot tub set up - I've been in touch with electricians today, and almost ordered the tub, but the site I was going to order from is down. Not sure if I want to wait for them to see if they come back or order from somewhere slightly more expensive. I think I might want to go with something less sketchy and pay a little more. Our place is awesome. I'm really happy that everyone seems to like it. Nisan was very appreciative of the place and the work I put into getting it, which was awesome. I like being appreciated, and am quite proud of my work :) I'm pleased with a new division of labor between Peter and I - I've agreed to give him a ride to the Bart in the morning in exchange for his doing the cooking. Those who know me know how much I hate cooking and what a great deal this is for me. Our sharing food is going to be very good for me - I'm actually eating vegetables again! I am generally really liking the division of labor I've had lately - I enjoy things like shopping for hot tubs and electricians, but not so much putting together storage racks or cooking, and at least as of lately, I've been managing to mostly be doing the tasks that I want to and not the ones that I don't. My room is fucking awesome. I feel like such a princess. It has windows on two sides, and is pretty huge. I have a nice open space in the middle, and am shopping for a rug to put down so that the kids can sit and play in here. On my night stand I put up the picture Tovar made me for mother's day. Peter installed my remote control dimmer for me :) I'm the only one of the four of us who has a car, and there is one parking spot, right in front of the house. The garage is converted into a washroom, which we put a bunch of storage racks into. Nisan put the last of them together and rearranged them today, and they fit with just about a centimeter to spare so that you can open up the door to the laundry machine! The light in all four of the bedrooms is gorgeous. The living room not so much, but we'll make it work. The small not so well lit common space is definitely the low point of the place, but even that I'm getting pretty used to and feeling more warm fuzzies about. Peter wanted a twin bed in his room instead of a queen so that he could fit a lot of stuff like the electric piano that Alex's mom lent us. It makes for a nice space to expand into if we have a party, for when the kids are visiting, and for having guests. The place is generally pretty quirky. One really nice thing is that it has double pane glass windows! I really did not think I'd find another rental property with those after moving out of Skullcrusher, but this place has them! Eliezer had warned me that I might get woken up by the train at night, but with these windows I didn't even notice it until being here for almost a week. When I was in the yard the train whistle was quite pronounced. Now I just need to find my nail clippers... they're the one item that I haven't found yet that I've been really wanting - the claws are getting quite ridiculous ;P Will go work on that now. Post your own comment for
 Just one week to go before Granite State ComicCon! A wondrous gathering of awesomeness awaits! Drop by my booth and say hello! You a Facebook user, perchance? Spread the word!
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Coupla weeks ago I met up at last with Sandra Ordonez, who had the joy of being the Wikimedia PR person in the last period before it finally got its shit together as a professional and functional organisation. I told her the stuff in the Nonprofit Kit for Dummies post above and she got that post-charity stress disorder look in her eyes. I also met the Bacon Queen. We are off on holiday tomorrow! To deepest darkest Wiltshire for Freda to see her grandparents, who are over from Australia. Don't expect me around till next Monday (unless the Internet works there). Older teen left her Nintendo DS behind, so it's Freda's now — Java 6 EOL December 2012. There's no OpenJDK 7 for 10.04 and no good PPA ... so it's either make our own deb of proprietary JDK 7 the way we do proprietary JDK 6, drop in debs from Debian or a later Ubuntu, or compile from source (hah!). So, what are you doing for Java 7 on Ubuntu 10.04? (Useful discussion on my G+.) (The small joys of fish as a server name theme: getting to call the new webdev box "mudkip".) Dear Google+: if I'm one of the few people who actually bothers going to plus.google.com to look at you, please stop with most of the frickin' time putting me into a screen to please please please spam everyone I know, most of whom just created an account for the sake of YouTube. It's annoying and just looks desperate. This entry was originally posted at DreamWidth and has for
What if it was to help terminally ill children have the vacation of their dreams? Well, my friend Angie is both crazy and brave, and will be headed down to Cedar Point next week to spend the weekend bobbing up and down at frightfully high speeds to raise funds for Give Kids The World, which gives free vacations to very sick children. This sort of bodily abuse something I could never subject myself to, but this is just one of many reasons I admire Angie. In addition, Angie is wise and realizes that incentives are needed, so she is offering a $25 Amazon gift certificate to anyone who donates and correctly guesses how many laps she will do over the day. For your calculations:
So. Donate some money to sick kids, and bet on Angie’s stomach. You’ll be doing some genuine good in the world, and you have a chance to win some nice merch of your own. Cross-posted from Ferrett's Real Blog. This entry has also been posted at http://theferrett.dreamwidth.org/215659.h7 Comments—Post your own comment for
Originally posted at my Dreamwidth account. LJ is not trustworthy as a blogging platform, so please comment there. Ask me for an invite code if you need one.
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![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=92.2){kind=small} sovay asked me five questions:1. Which job has given you the best stories? 2. Which superhero's alter ego would you choose to be? 3. What colors do you find most expressive? 4. Which item of clothing do you most wish would come back into fashion? (What item of clothing do you most wish would go away?) 5. With which plant do you feel the most affinity? ( Answers ) If you want five questions, leave a comment, but I may not be able to provide them; I am so busy right now it is unreal. I encourage you to leave questions for one another instead or in addition! You're welcome to comment on LJ, but I'd rather you leave a comment on the Dreamwidth version of this entry. The current comment count is
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whipchick helped me out by jumping through the LJ Idol hoops for me. So you can find my story about God and leviathans here if you're interested in reading it.
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I don't think I've ever made a video of myself juggling before. I think one of the best parts is the bit at the end of the second run where I throw a ball right down the stairs to the right of the frame. I recorded some runs of 5, but I don't think they're good enough to subject you to. 2 Comments—Post your own comment for
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Littlelio http://littlelioness.net/?p=4741
There’s only so much herbal tea one can drink in a day. So, in search of a milky fix, without caffeine, I’ve headed down the path of cinnamon. Yum.
So this morning, I’m drinking hot almond milk, with a tsp of brown sugar and a few shakes of cinnamon. And it’s doing the trick :) Get your button on my sidebar for June and July by making a donation to the Steve Waugh Foundation! More details in this post :D (I was sent a couple of cartons of the unsweetened and original Almond Breeze to try out. I think the unsweetened will end up being better for on cereal, but the sweet original one works well with more sugar and cinnamon ;) Though I suppose it didn’t actually NEED the sugar :p) And with that I’m going dark for the weekend! Seeya Sunday night! xx Other Awesomeness:
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admittatur arrondissement guetapens
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saccharolytic
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western bluebird at Ardenwood @ebrpd 1 Comment—Post your own comment for
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Kitchen and bathroom are spotless. I'm going to go get a new belt for the vacuum cleaner today. We're getting rod of more things and finding more things to sell. I have tons of clothes to get rid of of mine, of Kiddos and shoes and stuff like mice and so on. I found the back up drive I lost a few weeks ago and now I'm backing up on it now. So I'll have two working back ups, which is what the back up folks recommend. That's really exciting actually. Tomorrow we'll work on the desk and probably start on the filling cabinets. Cleaning is a lot of damn work, which it's really hard for me to get to. I also think I'm struggling with depression or something. I wake up ready to go, but just a little while in to my day I feel totally overwhelmed and completely unmotivated. :( Going to the outside place now. Post your own comment for
 I just made the above schedule, printed it out and taped it to my bathroom wall. Hopefully, physically checking off each day will help motivate me to stick to the plan. I don't have any races planned until September, so it's all about discipline and consistency this summer. Post your own comment for
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