1. Chad has real books! (On shelf Dec. 22; see dogphysics.com for more information.)
2. Rubin Museum of Art: excellent new (2004) museum focusing on the art of the Himalayas. Explanatory text that comes close to the Asian Art Museum's (in San Francisco) for clarity and informativeness. If you like that kind of art, go.
3. Bronx Zoo on an unseasonably warm November Saturday: thumbs-up. Even at 60F, some of the colder-weather animals were more active, and most of the warmer-weather animals we looked for were out. Very close looks at tigers (hello, gorgeous top predators!), a red panda (hello, animate stuffed animal!), etc. But even on a usual November weekend, I bet it would be worth going: the winter signs make a point of saying which exhibits are in heated buildings, and as long as it wasn't too cold to walk between them, with quick pauses to admire the cold-weather animals on the way, well, I think it would be pretty cool.

And now, the stack of mail, and unpacking, and brief-writing, and so on and so forth.

Once again, while I've offered beta services for a short list of small book fandoms over at yuletide, if you know me and think I might know your fandom, feel free to ask. Comments are screened; leave me an e-mail address so I can continue the conversation privately.

(Yes, I'm appallingly busy but I like beta'ing for Yuletide, so I'll manage.)

SteelyKid is 15 months old today.

( developmental update )

Scroll down.

Dad's birthday, Mom and Dad's anniversary.

I miss him.

Reading summaries of the last Wheel of Time book before bed results in dreams consisting of long lists of difficult names and an omnipresent fear of betrayals.

(ETA: In other news, it was very very difficult to click "next" past leighdb's spoilerific post just now. Oh, the desire to find out What Happens Next, it is strong!)

My mom is selling two laptop systems and a Wii with Rock Band. She's willing to ship the laptop systems at cost to the buyer, but the Wii stuff is too big. She's in Eastern Massachusetts.

The computers are in good condition, have been wiped clean and reinstalled with the OS and original software, and come with the original discs for repair/reinstall. The Wii is in like-new condition.

Here's the details:

1. HP Compaq nx7400 Business Notebook PC (system specs) with a docking station (PDF), a 15" flat-screen monitor, a keyboard, and a carrying case. $450.
2. Compaq Evo Notebook N180 (specs) with a docking station (specs), a 13" flat-screen monitor, a keyboard, and a carrying case. $350.
3. Wii game system, including: 3 controllers and 3 nunchucks; Wii Fit system; complete Rock Band (guitar, drums, microphone) and Wii Sport; plus "Wonder World Amusement Park", "Order Up" and "Spy Games: Elevator Mission." $450.

Leave a comment or e-mail me at knepveu at steelpips dot org if you're interested.

Work is now at whatever's past the "deluge" stage, to the point where the only thing keeping me from literally writing "have nervous breakdown" on my work calendar was that I wasn't sure how far into December it would be. So I will be very much less present on the Internet for the next couple months. I expect I'll skim LJ but not participate in conversations, ditch most of my RSS feeds, and probably stop reading Twitter and Facebook except for immediate family. So if you need me, e-mail.

SteelyKid is 14 months tomorrow, and while work has turned into the deluge, I am carving out fifteen minutes for a quick developmental update because there's a lot to report.

( words, teeth, and books )

Last post for tonight:

I'm selling a PDA on eBay, a used HP iPAQ 210 Enterprise (wireless, big color touch screen, Windows Mobile, etc.).

I'm auctioning off help with fictional legal matters over at care_faith_hope, a fundraiser for the medical expenses of faithhopetricks and her husband; they have no health insurance and no savings, and faithhopetricks's husband requires immediate heart surgery.

There's a lot of other cool stuff there too, so go look; bidding closes October 10, 2009, Saturday, 11:59 p.m. Pacific time.

Chad is participating in a fundraiser for DonorsChoose, and will give away one copy of his forthcoming book How to Teach Physics to Your Dog to the highest donor, and at least one book to a donor chosen at random (you can also get your question answered on his blog for $20). Check out the classroom projects he's raising money for and then, as it says on his blog, forward your confirmation e-mail to orzelc@steelypips.org to enter for the prizes.

Behind the cut, two pictures of me with my new glasses and, more importantly to most, SteelyKid:

( two images )

How common are empires in fantasy that are oppressive or unjust (ETA:) and whose oppressions are a plot concern, but are not run by Evil Deities etc. and do not exist to be the opposition for the protagonist's polity? I'm thinking of David Anthony Durham's Acacia trilogy, a book that's not out yet so I'd prefer to avoid discussing it in case it's a spoiler, and . . . ?

I suspect, not very, as fantasy is well-known for its aristocratic preferences, but I thought I should ask.

It appears that the reason I had such a hard time finding an S-video to component converter is that the resulting picture is absolute crap.

(I was hooking my old laptop up to the TV and wanted an arrangement of cables that allowed me to have the laptop and the DVD player connected simultaneously. Now I'll just have to swap out the audio cables when we watch DVDs, which is rare these days between the DVR and SteelyKid. And yes, I am quite sure what connections I have usefully available, thank you very much. (None of the equipment in question is new or even new-ish.))

And since I have spent more time doing that than I should considering SteelyKid's cold (she's getting better, but the past few nights have been very short on sleep), g'night, everybody.

There was a brief security breach caused by content in embedded Flash files (which is why most embedding is currently off); check the most recent posts in your journal to make sure they haven't been edited without your knowledge. See this post for more details.

SteelyKid is thirteen months old today! Yes, I missed her one-year developmental post; her birthday was while we were in Montreal, and since then it's been busy busy sick busy sick busy travel. Which means (a) I am determined to get this up tonight, though I don't have a lot of time to edit and so forth, and (b) I will try to note at what point during the last months the new developments came.

( developmental update )

( links to pictures and videos )

We just caught up on the second half of Burn Notice's summer season. Quick reaction behind the cut:

( spoilers for most recent Burn Notice episode )

Oh, that was Paul Blackthorne (Harry Dresden) as the Irish baddie, and Ben Shenkman (Louis in HBO's adaptation of Angels in America) as Strickler, which last was driving me nuts.

Because maybe we're just having a bad run of luck, but Pampers has not been working the last few nights (including, as you can tell, this one).

I've been seeing some links to fanhistory dot com for a quick summary of what's been dubbed SurveyFail. Please don't link to that site: it is run by a woman who outs fans for profit, literally. She has even less respect for fandom than the "researchers," I would argue, because she knows the fannish ethical norms she is violating.

Instead, here's a short survey by tablesaw, and a longer one over at FeministSF (among many others; see the SurveyFail tag over at linkspam). I also highly recommend this eloquent response, before the fail began multiplying, by eruthros.

ETA: I am reliably advised, by someone who does not wish further public attention brought to the matter for obvious reasons, that fanhistory has very recently demonstrated that it has not changed its ways.