Everything2 New Writeups

An Introduction to a Ghost Tour: On Truth, Myself, The Nature of Ghosts, and The City of Charleston (how-to)

2013-06-18T06:59:53Z

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Shadow of the Giant (review)

2013-06-18T01:46:23Z

Shadow of the Giant
By Orson Scott Card
Tor books, 2005

Shadow of the Giant is the fourth novel in Orson Scott Card's Ender's Shadow sub-series. It is immediately preceded by Shadow Puppets, and followed by Shadows in Flight.

This is the story of the major world powers sorting themselves out after the end of the Formic War (with a lot of help from the Battle School crowd), Peter's ascension (back) into power, and Bean and Petra coming to terms with Bean's disease. There is absolutely no point in reading it if you have not read the preceding books, specifically Ender's Game, Ender's Shadow, Shadow of the Hegemon, and Shadow Puppets.

Following Shadow Puppets, Achilles is dead and the Battle school kids are free to return to their home countries. Naturally, they are seen as powerful military weapons and are put to use sorting…

Love and Hate (idea)

2013-06-18T01:25:56Z

You cannot love whom you do not know; neither can you know whom you hate.

Apartment therapy (thing)

2013-06-17T23:35:49Z

Book/Website from Maxwell Ryan, 2003/2007

The idea is that the state of an dwelling reflects its inhabitant. Set designers know this implicitly: if you wish to show, perhaps, the mansion of a washed-up pop star Rita Rhinestone (in the opening scenes of a new rom-com), the place might be austerely luxurious in feeling, but it will also show signs of neglect, if not disrepair.Â Her long-lost high school sweetheart Tom Docker, (a humdrum widower with three children) will have a suburban home in apple-pie order, even if the walls are covered with kids' crayon drawings and the bookshelves with sports trophies. In reality, the pop star might actually have a cleaner house (she might have a cleaning service and/or just be a neat adult, the widower might not be able to keep house, especially with three kids complicating things), but for dramatic purposes, it's obvious which house is going to belong to whom. If the designer wants to really make it look like Ms. Rhinestone hit bottom, as…

Wreck-It Ralph (review)

2013-06-17T23:04:46Z

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Peter Dinklage (person)

2013-06-17T19:25:36Z

Peter Dinklage is an actor of American origin, perhaps best known for his cromulent performance as "The Imp" Tyrion Lannister on HBO's TV adaptation of George R. R. Martin's "A Song of Ice and Fire" novels, known on TV as "Game of Thrones". In 2012, after the airing of the first season of that series, he won the rather cumbersonly-titled Golden Globe Award for "Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Series, Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television" and the Emmy Award for "Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series".

Born June 11, 1969 in Morristown, New Jersey, Peter is not what most would consider a typical actor. He was born with achondroplasia, a condition that commonly results in dwarfism—his adult height is 4'5" (1.35m). Both his parents and an older brother are of average height. He has been married to theatre director Erica Schmidt since 2005; they have a…

The three golden rules of user interface design (idea)

2013-06-17T18:24:53Z

I received a message from Theo Mandel, letting me know that he was the author of the rules. Find his website at http://theomandel.com/resources/golden-rules-of-user-interface-design/.

The Limits on Executive Power in Disney's Aladdin (essay)

2013-06-16T18:10:15Z

"The law says you must be married to a prince by your next birthday."
- The Sultan of Agrabah

I am not about to claim that Disney put any significant time or effort into constructing a self-consistent universe for its retelling of Aladdin. This article is meant more as an exercise of Law in Literature, of deriving a consistent system from observation of behaviour, than a definitive statement of fact.

Real world systems have only a passing relevance to the Aladdin universe. The story takes place in the fantasy medieval sultanate of Agrabah. Apparently in the Arabian desert, and somewhere east of the Jordan, but with heavy central Asian and Indian influences, it is as far removed from an actual time or place as King Arthur's Camelot. It appears to follow Islamic traditions, with frequent references to Allah, and minaretted mosques prominent, but the government…

3eanuts (thing)

2013-06-16T04:28:13Z

What is it?

3eanuts is a webcomic based on a simple premise: Take Charles Monroe Schulz's popular comic strip, Peanuts and intentionally omit the last panel (basically, removing the punch line)

The result is often a mix of existential sadness, desperation and humor (and, depending on the reader, Schadenfreude)

Who does this?

Obviously, the primary author is Charles M. Schulz, who drew and wrote Peanuts during its almost 50 year run (from October 2 1950 to February 13 2000). He is often cited to be one of the most influential cartoonists ever due to his unique writing with sarcastic jokes, his minimalist style of drawing and the control he kept over his work (he insisted on not hiring assistants to do colors or letters because "it would be equivalent to a golfer hiring a man to make his putts for him.") A more complete biography can be found on the Schulz museum here.

…

Alma Ata (event)

2013-06-15T20:44:33Z

Coincidentally Similar to Alma Mater
Â Â Â Â (Nourishing Mother)

Never knew we were living in a world,
With a mind that could be so sure.
Never knew we were living in a world,
With a mind that could be so small.
Never knew we were living in a world,
And the world is an open court.

Maybe we don't want to live in a world,
Where innocence is so short.
We'll make it up to you,
In the year 2000...
_{Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â --Daniel Johns}

Alma Ata (Alma-Ata), (locally Almaty) the capital of Kazakhstan, was also the name of a conference held there by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) in 1978. Of course this location was part of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. And in spite of the Cold War between communist countries and those embracing free enterprise, an urgent need…

And neither have I wings to fly (person)

2013-06-15T16:44:24Z

There is a ship

This might be easier to write about someone else's ship,
perhaps the Danish sea captain's, on my mother's side of the family,
or the aircraft carrier that took my sister's husband
to the Persian Gulf, while she was pregnant,
but the truth is in the simplicity of the phrase.

It could be anyone's ship, or no one's, like the Ghost Ship, last seen
far from Fukushima, drifting, off the coast of Alaska, sinking.

I choose to visualize for myself, the last ship model
my father started and didn't finish, a Viking ship.

And she sails the sea

His ship will never sail, listing starboard on a shelf, meticulous details,
half finished, gathering dust instead of barnacles,
There are no people on his ship.

She's loaded deep, as deep…

Your bed is no longer here, but the windows are (poetry)

2013-06-15T14:16:09Z

Hasty exits usually translate into
objects left behind, but you were
unusually conscientious.

Carefully removing almost every trace of yourself
(almost).

I have found two boxes of tea,
English Breakfast.

One slipper,
the one the dog did not eat, and

a single tube of lip gloss (mocha)
found accidently, while looking for car keys in the couch.

Lastly, you should know,
the sun still comes through the eastern window in
the bedroom.

It lights up the minature stained glass hanging there,
reflecting green and blue on the opposite wall,
every sunny morning.
Still.

She said the dance is a prayer. A prayer to toss into the tide all the weight of oblivion and humiliation. This is not a dance for one, fool - where are you? (poetry)

2013-06-15T03:01:45Z

To be honest,
she is no more real to me
than sleep

I can't pretend I understand it
Or that I know myself
for the duration

I can only trust myself
to know when it is necessary
and believe it will exist
without me

Believe she is there
wandering
Believe she will be whispering in my ear
telling me she can't stop and won't until
this whole town is in love with me
Believe she will be
holding up my little skeleton when
the day comes that they read the palms
and strike the matches and say no,
there is no other way
Believe she is running her fingers
through my hair
slowly, as though she was
trying to keep me awake

and failing miserably,
to be perfectly honest.

Bishops' Bible (thing)

2013-06-14T19:51:44Z

The Bishops' Bible was a translation of the Bible produced by a committee of bishops of the Church of England in 1568; it was revised in 1572, again in 1577, and then replaced by the King James Bible in 1611.

It was published in response to the Geneva Bible, which had been published by the English Dissenters in 1557 (Old Testament) and 1560 (New Testament), and which included commentary that did not reflect well on the established church. The Geneva Bible was also one of the first Bibles to be printed on a mechanical press and widely distributed to the public, and was disturbingly popular.

For about 40 years, the Bishops' Bible was the official Bible of the Church of England. It was much more grandiose than the Geneva Bible, with over 100 full-page illustrations, but without the commentary of earlier Bibles. It was used as a pulpit Bible in the Church of England, but didn't make much headway against the Geneva Bible in private…

Eighty Days Yellow (review)

2013-06-14T18:56:01Z

Is another terribad mommy porn novel. Apparently if I liked "Fifty Shades of Grey" this is right up my alley, according to the sticker on the front. No prizes for guessing what it's ripping off, hm?

(Speaking of right up my alley, my housemates forgot to buy bogroll again. This'll do in the interim.)

Still, it's suitably execrable for this series of writeups, however, since I've reviewed so much bad erotica by now it's all starting to blur together, and no doubt will be blurring together in the mind of you, the reader, I thought I'd do something a little... experimental... this time around. It's written by a Vina Jackson who is actually two people, one a woman who works in the City and the other being, allegedly, some sort of celebrity writer who'd rather remain anonymous. And after this, I'd rather remain anonymous as well.

Executive Summary

Violins and BDSM.

A bit more detail, if you wouldn't mind?

Well... I think I'm…

A short story about a relative (personal)

2013-06-14T01:22:33Z

I have seen Mary's death certificate many times, my older sister who lived and died, all in two days. She was not talked about when I was younger, but I remember a white wicker bassinet in the corner of my parents' bedroom, in Levittown, Long Island. Empty except for a small mattress covered with a pale yellow sheet, a baby blanket folded into a perfect square, a fluffy toy lamb with a key for the music box inside that played, "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star".

To this day, my mother blames herself for vacuuming and tripping on the electrical cord, falling a few days before going to the hospital. I've told her countless times the official cause of death, "lacerations of the fontanel", would have occurred at or during birth.

There were other times the bassinet stayed empty. Once my older brother and I found a dresser drawer in my parents' bedroom full of newborn baby clothes, mostly white, a few hand embroidered bibs, blue crocheted booties…

How to love again (how-to)

2013-06-13T19:01:22Z

Topic suggested by Tania, the only person awake and online on Facebook when I created my account on E2. Blame or credit her for the inspiration.

This was also posted on my alternate blog here: http://scriptogr.am/andycyca/post/how-to-love-again

True Love. One of life's greatest quests. Achieving it is easier said than done: even though the concept of Love is more or less the same between everyone on Earth, our needs and expectations can easily get in the way and ruin a relationship.

Love is a fragile thing that can be broken unexpectedly. Sometimes it's a matter of seconds, sometimes love is eroded over a decade, but it's almost a fact of life that one will experience a heart break at some point. Recovering from it is not only possible, but crucial to building character, self-esteem and more importantly, to get closer to experiencing true love.

So here I present my humble point of view based on my own experiences on how to love again.

…

Los Gatos (personal)

2013-06-13T18:45:30Z

There are many things happening in the world and the cats are staring. Unemployment is near 50% in Spain. The Russians and Hezbollah are getting involved in the Syrian civil war. Asteroids are near-missing the planet. The Japanese economy is imploding. Weather is killing people in Oklahoma.

The cats are staring at the wall.

The big black dog is having none of it. She's wondering when we're going to eat the cats. She's resting up for it, and every day comes to me with tail wagging and a forlorn look.

"Today? They would be so tasty and it would be fun."

I tell her no. We're not killing the cats. Stop with that talk. The woman likes them. Besides, I pay money to take them to the vet and it would be a waste.

CNN is replaying the Boston Marathon bombing and scenes of the destruction in Oklahoma. The cats stare without blinking. Occasionally a bug goes by and they snap their heads around to track it briefly. Then they…

I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin. (idea)

2013-06-13T18:36:46Z

"All eyes on the hidden door", she said.

She stood in front of the huddled group, in the midst of the outcrop, before the flat rock face. The steep slope fell behind them all; their ropes remained. Any one of them could have given up and gone down, easily enough, yet none of them had. Yet none of them were going forward, either.

"All eyes on are on us," she said. "All eyes look up to us."

Â She whirled to face the group, who cowered before her gaze. "Look, damn you!" She gestured to the green valley below. "You want comfort, you want safety, you want security. I want freedom to walk amidst the cold wind. I want the goodness that comes from free choice, so that it means something." The wind blew fiercely, yet she did not waver. "I want God to know that it was my choice," she said, "that I was able to choose rightly…

Willow cat (thing)

2013-06-13T17:22:36Z

Willow cats refer to (at least) two different species of catfish. This can be confusing, but matters are simplified by the fact that one is a good eating fish, and the other is used only as bait. Both senses of the term are in common use in the American South, and the former is also used in Texas and on up into Ohio.

If you're looking for a fish to eat, Willow Cat is one of the many common names for the large Channel Catfish. Webster believes that it is specifically a member of the species Ictalurus anguilla, although in common usage it is probably more frequently used to refer to the Ictalurus punctatus. Other common names include fiddler, spotted cat, speckled cat, and chucklehead (this last is also used, outside of the American South, to refer to the Copper rockfish).

How this fish came to be known as the Willow cat is a bit of a mystery, as they prefer to hang out in fast moving channels. It is possible that the name first applied to other…

Editor Log: June 2013 (log)

2013-06-13T14:31:10Z

Every so often I try to let everyone know what I'm doing. Generally, I'm not doing anything too exciting, and certainly not anything new. Last time I mentioned that I had been reordering writeups within nodes -- something that I do at least a couple of times a month, and sometimes more frequently. This may not exactly qualify as exciting, but I did receive a lot of messages about this, both from people who thought this was a good thing and those who thought it was a bad thing. I don't believe that anyone was confused about why I was doing this, but because it is a bit of a controversial topic, I thought I would address it briefly.

Editors have the ability to reorder wirteups within a node. There are no absolute guidelines as to what we should or shouldn't mess with -- the assumption is that we have enough common sense to figure these things out on our own. It is also easy enough to reorder (or just reset) writeup order if someone does something dumb. …

Good Guys (opinion)

2013-06-13T14:16:38Z

You've probably seen this scenario played out a hundred times in cop shows:

The cops want to enter a bad guy's house, but don't have a warrant. Cop 1: "Hey, did you hear someone inside call for help?" (wink, wink). Cop 2: "Yeah. Yeah I'm sure I heard a cry for help!" They kick in the door and storm in with guns drawn.

Most people don't even bat an eye at this because of course these characters are the "good guys" and so the end justifies the means.

The fine folks at the NSA are undoubtedly…

Drug Studies (personal)

2013-06-13T05:09:56Z

Â Â Â I awoke on the floor of an apartment. A post-collegiate bachelor pad. I raised my face from the floor and rubbed my cheek, stippled by the carpet. I grabbed my phone from the coffee table and flipped it open. No messages. It was 5:30AM. I set my phone back on the coffee table. We had been out the night before celebrating until Fargo bar close. We celebrated our freedom.

Â Â Â 28 days before, 50 people walked into PRACS Institute. 50 people willing to subject their bodies to the unknown because they were desperate or degenerates or just down on their luck. PRACS conducted clinical trials for pharmaceutical drugs previously untested on humans. We had an initial blood test to make sure the results fell within their accepted norms. 50 of us stayed overnight hoping that we were normal. If we weren't, we would be sent home. If we were normal we would stay and ingest a drug cocktail to see if we had night terrors, or hallucinations or thoughts of stabbing…

A short story about a relative (fiction)

2013-06-13T01:00:38Z

Twenty two years, give or take. That is the last time I had seen my brother. He moved out west when I was 10 or so and although my parents said they talked to him once in a while, I didn't believe them. There were no phone calls, no letters and then, as I got older I stopped asking about him altogether.

He quit high school at 17, then got ticked off a few years later after he lost his job as a mechanic. He said he knew someone who knew someone in Montana and he was "going there to find some work and get some fresh air."

He would still be there, undisturbed by his family, I suppose, except for the funeral and my odd sense of duty. When our Dad died I took it upon myself to go and find him.

I put together a rough map based on Google and the last phone number my mother had (she finally admitted it had been more than ten years). I flew into Bozeman and headed south, in the general direction of the small town where he…

Feed (review)

2013-06-12T19:42:41Z

Feed
By M.T. Anderson
Candlewick Press, 2002

Feed is a YA dystopian Science Fiction novel, a psuedo-transhumanism tragicomedy. It is a fairly good example of YA cyberpunk, although completely lacking in hackers.

Titus is a perfectly normal teenager -- he goes to School^TM, he buys what his feed tells him is brag, and he talks like a lobotomized chimp. But one day, while on a trip to the Moon (which completely sucked), he meets a strange girl. Violet reads, she uses words like 'suppuration' and 'autumnal', and she intentionally tries to manipulate her feed... There's really no reason for Titus be be attracted to her, but he is.

Which would be brag, except that what really meg-sucks is that some old dude at the club zaps them with some kind of thing that completely shuts down their feeds. Titus, Violet, and Titus' various other friends all end up…