Every year that we can, I like to take the Coeur d’Alene lake supper cruise for my birthday, with friends, and we are booked with temperate and clear weather, which is nice, because I like to do it in the open air of the upper deck, where we do get wind.
And because we’re going to do it a day after, I still the the free steak the Swinging Doors offers on your birthday. 😉 And even if I have to slice it paper thin, I am going to have that steak! 😉 Happy birthday to me!
Jane and I are purging boxes of old books, stuff we’ve gathered and read over the years, because we have no more room for things, and clearing things out in general. Scanning old pix into computer files (amply backed up) and generally getting rid of detritus. We have a modest-sized house for as much ‘stuff’ as we have, and in order to really enjoy it—we need less ‘stuff.’ So it is going. THat is how we’re spending our copious spare time.
The garden is a mess, but winter will solve that and we’ll get a clean start next spring, hopefully with less clutter in our lives.
Early happy birthday!
HIPY PAPY BTHUTHDTH THUTHDA BTHUTHDY!
I was promised a steak for my last birthday, and spent that birthday in the hospital with pneumonia. I never have gotten that steak!
Hope you get yours and it’s melt-in-your-mouth tender — and hope the weather is just perfect.
Good news! Saw my oncologist who reviewed my CT scan from the 6th. He said, I’ll see you again in January after your next CT — which means I’ve won this battle. No more chemo at least until January. Not so good news: Unfortunately, I get to have incisional hernia surgery the 12th, and I finally found out what’s wrong with my knee — torn medial meniscus — which means more surgery (arthroscopic). Thankfully both surgeries are “same day.” Now if my cardiologist will just let me have the surgeries . . . .
WOL, what great news to hear that you’ve won this major round — and hopefully therefore the battle — with the cancer!!! Thank you for letting us know.
Good luck with the surgeries, a major bother, yes, but these are “repair” surgeries rather than “poison your body in hopes the cancer will be poisoned more” treatment. Bodies belong in good repair.
Amen, and let’s hope this round of chemo is the last you’ll need. The knee cartilage is something our janitor just had fixed; a pain in the okole, but doable, especially after the last mess you’ve been through!
Last year about this time, we were on the Coast Starlight heading for LA. Smoke from wildfires in Canada followed us almost into California. Glad your smoke is finally dissipating.
Great news WOL, about winning the battle with the cancer!
Maybe a celebratory steak dinner is in order, if the queeziness from the chemo had passed?
I hope your repair surgeries get okayed and you get relief from those pains too. My sister had knee surgery for torn ligaments and a broken (chipped and cracked) meniscus 8 years ago, and had some remaining issues with it being painful if she stood on it too much, needing to keep it elevated in the evenings. She recently got physio for that and was prescribed specific exercises to strengthen the muscles around it, which have helped her enormously – no more pain in the evenings.
Happy birthday to CJ! Isn’t it nice of the rains to clear the smoke out before your planned outing, and then to clear up themselves in time for your party? So considerate of the weather (this once)!
Well, yay—sounds as if they’re fixing you up good and proper!
I’m sure my mom got that ‘un a lot!
Happy turn toward autumn, everybody!
Yay, WOL!
(I’m beating mine – so far. Last mammo, done two weeks ago, is officially normal. But I still have 14 more infusions and 17 radiation sessions. Infusions run into next June. Then the port will have to come out – I hope!)
Congratulations on your clear CT scan! I had my first mammogram since my diagnosis last September and also got a clean bill of health. Yay! Am finishing up monoclonal antibody infusions, but only 4 more to go. Like PJ, I am really looking forward to getting my port removed.
Hope everything works out for the surgeries you need.
The infusions I’m getting are a mab. It’s to keep things down long enough for all the problematic bits go away, I think.
One of the things they *didn’t* tell me about was just how itchy skin gets coming out of chemo, and the flaking and peeling that come with it. (My sis-in-law told me about ammonium lactate; you can get it OTC in pharmacies (some, anyway) in the skin-care section as Amlactin – there are a couple of other brands, but that’s the one I’ve seen.) The only places that haven’t been itchy are the ones without hair and my face.
I had that itching thing too, and one of the other oncologist in mine’s practice suggested Aveno Body Therapy eczema lotion — The stuff is like $17 a 16 oz bottle at Wal-Mart, and since its for eczema, it should control the itch. Really helped with the dryness, too.
-mabs, monoclonal antibodies, are great things. I remember when they were first making news years ago. Of course, back then we didn’t know when they could and couldn’t be effective, but it was clear they were a “game changer”.
Thank you for the definition; I didn’t know if it was something I was supposed to be familiar with, a typo or something else (and I didn’t want to be nosy and ask).
Good to hear that all of the salads with chemo seem to be doing well this fall (‘salads with chemo’ sounds like an exotic dressing).
They can be very effective, but looking at the numbers on the Medicare statements – they’re eye-watering. Even after the reduction that Medicare applies, ouch.
Also, as biologicals, I doubt they’ll get cheaper any time soon. I gather mice are involved in some way.
And the mice are avaricious? I always suspected Mickey.
(Medicare HMOs can be a bargain in some areas, and some doctors are available through multiple plans or companies. I’m not positive this is still a thing but in an HMO, you had an out or two: you could make an emergency change to the best HMO in your area–if you were not in it; or you could make an emergency change to standard Medicare.)
Everyone get/stay healthy, please!
Good to hear that you, Teegan and PJ Evans, are also doing well on your treatments. I hope things work out well for all of you.
Great news about your cat scan!
WOL, good news about your results; I hope your other medical (knee and hernia) go fine.d
CJ, an early Happy Birthday! I guess your mom took “Labor Day” a bit seriously! (OK, you’ve probably heard that one before, heheh.) Apparently, my great-grandmother did also.
—–
I went to Google Translate for a few words for a possible font (typeface) name. One result puzzled me until I thought of one of the root words. The others had mixed results, and I think I can get a name from two of these.
Google Translate says “chisel” is cincel in Spanish, but wasn’t kind enough to say el or la, un or una; I presume «el cincel,» masculine. In French, it’s “ciseau,” which is a bit too close to “les ciseaux,” scissors. (So not only do we get the word from French, but that’s why it’s plural, as if each blade half counts, rather than viewing scissors as a unit. English does this about pants and trousers and shorts, for some reason, but not shirts or jackets. English, however, assumes hair is both a singular hair and a collective plural (thus singular). French, however, insists, “les cheveux,” hair is always plural, unless you need to specify a single hair. Languages get picky that way.
Cincel appeals to me more than ciseau, but maybe that’s because I’m thinking of the cutout silhouettes in black paper which were a thing for…I can’t recall, but a famous French artist or writer. (Matisse? Cézanne? Hmm.)
But then I got to the Greek, and that turned up some cool stuff.
For chisel and for carvings, smile, smileuô or smilevô depending on transliteration, smileumá; and it took me a minute before I recalled, Smilodon, the saber-toothed great cat. I thought smilê, which looks like smile or smiley or smilie, would not fit, haha. Sort of a toothy grin, you might say, though.
Carver came up as kharaktês, so there’s some Greek association / connotation of one’s character or nature being carved or shaped? I think I should have recalled hearing the meaning behind the word character in English before, but this association seemed new to me. Interesting, but not too conducive, when a “character” has a specific meaning in typography jargon. It’s the same as a glyph. (More on that in a second.)
For cutter, it gave, kóptês, which has me thinking there could be an association with the Coptic Christians, Greco-Egyptians, as “cutters?” Er, I will skip that, but it might have to do with early Judaeo-Christian debate, which Peter and Paul disagreed on.
Back to carver; what about sculptor, sculpture, and carvings, again? A carving or some carvings? Glyptá. Sculptor: Glyptês. Sculpture: Glyptikê. Aha, that one fits the -ica habit for some typefaces, and “Glyphic” is a category that’s also referred to as lapidary or flare-serif.
I can’t help but notice that glypt- and glyph- are related, so sometimes Greek P, T, K and PH, TH, KH are from different root sources (back in pre-Greek Into-European days), but Greek must have had a thing where you could add an H-aspirate or else mash it together with the stop consonant, and omit a vowel between them, so you’d get P, T, K + H that way.
Glyph- or glyphia — is/are “writing(s)” in Greek; hierogphics are “sacred writings.” So glyptikê from a glyptês, is related to glyphia, writing, and early writing was often either carved into stone or wood, etched into soft clay or hard wax, or inked / painted onto papyrus, leaves, parchment or hides, and so on, before paper and paper-making were imported from China from the Silk Road trade. — And I wonder if “glypt-” is a past tense root form, similar to Latin -atus, -ata, and English -ed, -en.
Oh, but then I had to try one or two more, even though they’re not quite what I’m after for this. I got a surprise there too. Pottery: keramiká; oh, hadn’t remembered we got that from Greek via Latin. But the weird surprise was: Potter: aggeioplastês, where that first g stands for an n for some reason only the ancient Greeks decided on. So, angeioplastês, angioplasty (-ia), and I had to remember -plasty is something like, to shape or mold, like in clay. I didn’t recall what angio- is and will have to look that up. But the idea that a potter shaping clay would be the word used for a medical angioplasty, shaping a bodily repair, huh, that was an odd extension, and yet it fits the Biblical notion of humans being made of clay and shaped by a divine potter…and that connects to the Chinese clay army, even though those don’t seem likely to be related. Could the idea be that old, that it was shared by most ancient cultures, or that it traveled back and forth across Eurasia in all those thousands of years? Maybe.
So, a few minutes fiddling around with Google Translate really gave me food for thought on language and meaning.
Oh, I also picked up a few guesses about Greek grammar. -ês, the equivalent of -or, for someone who does a thing, an actor or agent, one who does this or that thing. R and S/Z can go back and forth at times. -ikê, seems to be something like, a practice or subject, a thing done, a field. That’s poorly expressed by me. The suffix meaning must be a shade different than that. -á and -é or -ê (short stressed and long stressed or unstressed E and A) seem to mark a neuter or feminine plural, or maybe masculine plural for A, although I’d thought plurals were ordinarily -ai and -i / -oi in Greek. That -t- that might indicate a past particle or some past form, or an adjective or adverb from a verb form.
So, I thought the results were curious enough that you all might get a kick out of them.
I am not yet sold on “Glyptica” or “Glyphica” as the name, but learning those words relate to sculptors and sculptures and carving was of interest.
This reminds me to look up marble and brass and bronze, for Greek and Latin words.
My french teacher in high school was a war bride, native Parisian. It always puzzled her that in English you said “hair cut” As she’d say, “Wouldn’t you want to cut all of them?” When you say “hair” in English, you can, depending on context, be referring to either just one, or all of them as a group (collective noun, like “people.”) But then you get a phrase like, “Even the hairs of your head are numbered” (Luke 12:7-9 KJV) where you are referring to them both individually, and as a group.
(A pair of) tweezers is another “always plural” noun — I think it’s that same quirk of mind that makes (a pair of) pants plural — because there are two pieces at the “business end”.
I remember back when I was editing medical transcription I was always going round and round with transcriptionists about misspelling a group of muscles whose proper medical names ended in “-ceps” (meaning “head” – the attachment the muscle pulls toward when it contracts) — the biceps, triceps, and quadriceps muscles. Doctors would dictate stuff like “the left quadricep muscle” and the transcriptionists would transcribe it that way. (You’re supposed to correct such egregious errors) –I’d have to correct it, and then I’d always leave the note “(whichever)ceps always ends in “s,” not because it’s plural, but because it’s misspelled if it doesn’t. So, flexing that upper arm muscle and calling it a “bicep” is ungrammatical (and a spelling error!). It’s always “biceps,” even if you just have one.
“angio” would be “vessel” — blood vessels, we call them in English. “Aggeioplastês” would be a “vessel maker”. I took a medical language course right when I started working as a transcriptionist, where we learned the meaning of all the prefixes, suffixes and roots, so that we could literally break a complex medical word into its parts and figure out what it meant. “-plasty” is used to mean “fix or repair” as in “plastic” surgery.
That changing of an “n” to a “g” in the Greek may be a pronunciation thing — hard for Greeks to pronounce “ng”. Spanish has something similar in words that have the letter combination “inv” where it’s spelled with an “n” but pronounced like “m” — “Invierno” (winter) is one such word that comes to mind.
Thank you, WOL!
Great news WoL!
Happy Birthday (early) CJ!
CJ, have a happy birthday. So glad the smoke has cleared out; I remember how bad it was in 2015. Sounds like you and Jane are doing what I need to be doing – getting rid of “stuff”. DH & I are thinking about a kitchen remodel and tearing out walls to give us an open kitchen/family room. So I need to decide how much of the stuff in the current kitchen will need to go in a new one.
I think I’ll go read a book instead.
Happy birthday, CJ. Cut that steak thin and small and savor every bite!
And that is the greatest news, WOL. Congratulations! Now when you have the surgeries, you will be just about as good as new — something to look forward to after what has to have been a miserable year. So happy for you!
Thanks, all! I’ll be happy to get this year behind me.
Happy Birthday, CJ. We sent you greetings from Shejidan, as well.
Happy Birthday CJ.
My computer took a nose dive out of my electronics backpack on Wednesday. Now it is a marvelous paperweight if you don’t mind glass splinters. I’m trying to reconstitute a new machine, but the going is slow, because The old tablet’s screen has splintered and the capacitive touch screen has gone blind to most of the screen and doesn’t respond to touch or about 90% of mouse-mediated clicks. I’ll be mentally present for the Coeur d’Alene cruise and the Swinging Door celebrations but the expense of the replacement computer has dictated a much reduced travel season. Many happy orbits around the system primary!
Well! I’ve almost completed the first draft of one font weight, for the “OpenType Standard” 279 character set. I’m still not sold on the name, and several characters still need work. (I don’t like the ‘5’ and it and the ‘3’ need to agree in form; several other characters may be tweaked before I’m really happy with them.) The Light weight is, yup, lighter than I want for a regular Book weight, so I have to figure out something with this. :-/ But overall, pretty happy, and I think by bedtime tonight or else sometime tomorrow, I’ll have the 3 and 5 fixed up so I don’t dislike the 5.
But right now, the ol’ brain is mush. Gotta have a break for creativity; tired from concentration and creative output.
I think a video is in order. Got a small backlog of episodes, or a rewatch of something. — Gotta see if my Blu-Ray / DVD player wants to play nicely with my Mac, so I can watch a disc.
I just spent several minutes looking for the missing power adapter. Will have to search again tomorrow. Phooey. (And the fool device wants 2 USB ports right together and a powered port and a plug for the AC adapter, which may or may not be special. Grr. Looks like I’m going to order a power adapter and a _powered_ USB hub. Double phooey.)
Happy Birthday To You from Germany. May there be many more years in good health for you and many more books in exceptional quality for us.
Happy Birthday!!! And be careful on that scary boat ride.
Lol—we have no desire to take a swim, for sure: nights are in the 50’s and we plan to take coats for sitting on the deck!
Happy Birthday!
THank you all!
Perhaps it’s being an Aspie, but (given that even though the US is well down on the list of least childhood mortality, mere survival during childhood was once worthy of celebration, but is reasonably assured for now*) since high school it has all seemed backwards to me. I didn’t “do” anything, more “done to”, don’t remember any of it, had no choices in the matter to make. It has seemed rather mothers should be the ones being celebrated–they’re responsible for it all.
If I must partake in a celebration, then I don’t want cake! If I should have a choice in the matter, I want a blueberry pie.
* Between the overuse of, and widespread resistance to, antibiotics, and the diminution of “herd immunity” by the increasing resistance to vaccination, that is NOT an assured future.
My four brothers and I all had our birthdays within four weeks of each other. So one summer, my stepmother asked me, the middle one, what kind of cake I wanted as my birthday was in a few days and she wanted to go shopping for the ingredients.
I told her I didn’t want one because I hate cake. She gave me the weirdest look and said “Well, you have to have something. It’s your birthday!” I told her I wanted a strawberry chiffon pie. She made me one every year after that.
Years later, she said she was so glad to have a break from all those cakes.
A chiffon pie? Something like a whipped version of a key lime pie, i.e., using sweetened condensed milk as one of the main ingredients? Hmm, I’ve never made one, but think that’s what’s involved. Looks like a trip to YouTube for an example is in order.
A strawberry chiffon pie (or blueberry or cherry or, oh, in general) sounds terrific, though. I (ahem) bought some blueberry cheesecake ice cream last time, half gallon, and am, (ahem) rationing it. Good stuff!
—–
The junior cat, something like a virtual cousin to Shu, super assertive and always wanting attention and food — misbehaved in a major way _twice_ yesterday evening and once about a week ago. Serious misbehavior, so much so that I gave him a timeout in the bathroom as much for me as for him, while I cleaned up the mess. (Never mind the details.) I’d changed their litter box about half a week ago and he thought it was too bad to use, and chose elsewhere rather than next to the box.
I was mad enough I considered giving him away. The only other two times he’s misbehaved so severely as to provoke my temper, he was much younger, adolescent, and I understood the one incident as, he didn’t yet know boundaries and got carried away with aggression. The other, he kept pestering me and misbehaving so much that it got to my temper, while I was busy working on something. I later regretted that, but he did behave better afterward.
This time, I stayed pretty mad while I cleaned up everything (oh, it was bad) and listened to his protests at being confined to the bathroom. (They rarely have any limits.) This did shake him up enough to maybe get through to him he’d done wrong in a serious way. — I went in to recheck the litter box (hmm, not bad, but did clean it up) and that and checking on him meant I had a pang of, oops, OK, mitigating circumstances and he’s a cat, not an adult human, and so maybe I’m the one overreacting here. (That meow and the look was pretty pitiful. Got to me. And he’s the one who was a street rescue, so he went from very scared of me to very bonded as a surrogate papa to him.)
After I got everything cleaned up (and had gotten out the cat carrier, thinking of crating him for the night or keeping him in the bathroom overnight, still that mad at him) — Well, after everything was cleaned up (and bleached and mopped the area, ugh) — OK, cat, blast it, I let him out, with the idea that if he misbehaved again, for spite or at all, now that the litter box was clean (and pointedly shown by putting him in it summarily) — He (as far as I know) did not misbehave further, and made himself very scarce for a few hours. Good; I was in no mood still, though my resistance had cracked a little.
Some while later, he showed up again, and so did the senior kitty, who rarely misbehaves and not severely. Sigh. OK, OK. I told him it was OK, but I was still mad and he’d better not do that again. I got a contrite look.
A little later, and he’d bedded down on the clean laundry in the basket which had been forgotten in all the hullaballoo. Meaning, as much as he was scared by my actions, what did he do? He sought refuge on my clothes, by then a few hours out of the dryer, but my clothes. That’s where he chose for a safe bed, and curled up very unhappy.
I saw that and felt very chagrined. Not entirely unjustified at being angry, but not so pleased with my overreaction either. I spent a couple of minutes telling him he was OK and petting him, and that helped us both. It wasn’t lost on Goober, the senior kitty, either, who also got petting for reassurance. (Incidentally, while all the fuss was going on, Goober was out of the way but didn’t hide. He got petting from me during that, telling him he was a good kitty, not to worry. I think this got through to him; but I’m sure he also could tell I was very mad at Smokey, the junior kitty.)
So, with things resolved, we ended the night after I stayed up a while to let my temper cool further and consider the goings-on, my side and my cat’s side of things. So it had not been a good night very rough on all of us.
This morning, I was up early, then went back to bed for a while. The junior kitty showed up, got on the bed, asking for attention. Was he OK, was all forgiven, was I still mad at him? (I am not sure how long they remember what they’ve done as connected to misbehavior or human reaction for discipline.) Well, I spent a good while with him and he curled up with me, soaking up the attention, as I mulled over things again, his actions, mine, the right and wrong of it, implications, everything. I was not too happy with him, but not too happy with myself either.
I came to the conclusion that maybe we’d both learned a valuable lesson from it all. He is still my kitty, still has a home and a family; I still have him as part of my home and family. — And somewhere in there, in the last many years, I have gotten so used to feeling put upon and having to fight back (not literally, but figuratively, through work or whatever I have to do to get through things) and so used to having people leave my life or not be reliable or the friends I’d believed them to be — that I reacted like that toward my cat for a serious misbehavior, but my reaction was, well, not entirely in proportion or appropriate, to think of giving him away. (Or other angry thoughts I did dismiss while thinking them.) I somehow acted as if, if he was going to act that badly, then that was it, no more. — And that was not right or just, for me to do. — I was almost ready to give up on the relationship and give him up.
Instead, I did relent from his simple little reaction last night, and just the fact that he’s a cat, and cute, and even if he does know better, well, I did relent and had let him out and made up last night, somewhat. — So I suppose I’m not entirely a lost cause either.
We both learned we still have a home and family together, a friendship. I think somewhere in everything I’ve been through the past several years, I’ve gotten so used to feeling outnumbered, alone, and so on, that the anger and hurt had built up, and he somehow got it right out there at its worst in retaliation from me, very nearly so.
Instead, last night and today, I guess we learned that lesson that people and family and friends do make serious mistakes, do fight and disagree, and yet can forgive each other and keep on loving and being friends. I think I needed that, and the makeup of affection and reconsideration this morning, to see he still loved me and wanted a place with me, to be forgiven, to belong. Something so very, very simple and basic and deep down where we all live, where even a cat or a human have such feelings, the need for more than food and shelter, the need for companionship, friends, love, belonging, a group; call it a pride or a pack or whatever it is.
The little blighter is doing OK. The big blighter (me) is doing OK too, and has much to think of. And I hope I have that out of my system and never do that again.
One of my biggest worries, as a teen or an adult, was not so much that my parents might kick me out for being gay, but that they simply wouldn’t understand, wouldn’t truly love me for who I was, and therefore, it set up a lifelong small wedge between us, a distance I was never sure of, whether I was truly loved and accepted as I was. I believe my parents chose not to see this about me. Why they couldn’t bring themselves to say or do anything to let me know if this was all right with them, I don’t know, and never will know. But even as a young man, I had not reached the point where I could come out to them. (During my first run through college, I did have one of the only really serious arguments we ever had, and I was so unhappy and angry and hurt, that if I’d had enough money to move out, anywhere, I would have. That I did not, and was not independent and out on my own was, ironically, a point of the argument, and they wouldn’t budge. I gave up on it, but stayed unhappy, and that stayed with me the rest of our lives together.) It was, unspoken by me, because I was too scared to say it then, also a point from my side, that I was gay and needed my freedom anyway from them. — I have wondered many times in life, what would’ve happened if I’d been rash enough or bold enough to leave. I considered asking my grandmother, but dismissed the idea. I didn’t know anyone I thought I could seriously stay with, who wasn’t tied to my family some way. (And at the time, I was sure I was right about my side of the argument. I did not know then that if I’d talked to a few of our family friends, that I was indeed right and my parents were wrong, and family friends, adults, might could have intervened, interceded, or at least given me a way to move out and a place to stay until there could’ve been a more permanent solution.) If that could have happened, and could have worked, I think it would have really helped me. — It was a few months later when I had to return home from that first run through college, asked to leave because my GPA had fallen so far down — because I couldn’t yet see clear to get help or to come out.
So, well, that and later events with friends dropping out of my life as my parents’ health and then my grandmother’s health took their toll, and I ended up how I did, bereft, with just my two cats and hardly anyone locally in my life to fall back on for support or friendship, fellowship, that belonging thing. So the two cats had become crucial for me.
I a considering that maybe this brought things to a head and let some steam off the ol’ pressure cooker, and so maybe I’ve faced something and let it go.
At any rate, Smokey is forgiven, and I’m hoping he won’t misbehave again on that. But I think my perspective is back and my temper’s a little worn down to sensible again, I hope.
All’s well that ends well. We are still family. When it came right down to it, I couldn’t stay mad at the little guy when he reacted how he did, and simply being who and what he is. This belonging thing, and family, friends, companionship, is hugely important to me, and I really need it. And so do my two cats, who’ve done nothing in life to warrant being made homeless or given away. — And yes, last night, I also considered that I have never before given a cat or dog back after taking them in, and consider that a point of principle, a line I don’t ever want to cross. I nearly did last night. But I managed not to, thanks in part to the cat himself. — I still cannot understand how it is that parents can kick a kid or teen out for being gay, or most of the other reasons they do. And whatever my parents did think, they didn’t do that either. I had a home with them, even when I needed to be on my own, up until they were both gone. — And how all this ties in to each other, I am not too sure, but I see that it does, in one big ball of trouble that I want resolved. — But whatever my parents thought, no, they never did kick me out. (Of all things, a discussion about a song, when I was in college, gave me the idea they might have a limit on that which spooked me in a way I never quite shook, though. I still think they misunderstood both the song and my take on it.)
So — my cat is OK and I am OK and my other cat is just fine, through all of this. (His place was assured anyway.) — And I’ve had a lot to think about, a roller coaster of feelings, and a rough night last night. But things are better today, there’s some perspective and a lesson, food for thought, and things are reconfirmed: my junior kitty still has a home and family with me, I still do with him, and maybe a problem I didn’t know had gotten so bad has come to a head and let off steam and might be resolved, or at least on the way to it, in one way at least.
This is not what one might typically post in a birthday thread, I know. I did give birthday wishes earlier. — But I thought that, for an author and a community of fans, maybe the message, a life lesson, was worth telling about here.
I am glad I still have the little guy. I would have regretted it terribly if I’d given him away. — Han, and he just hopped up to get attention again, and to say it’s getting toward suppertime. (I messed up one day a couple of weeks ago and fed them early. Thereafter, both cats have been campaigning for this to recur as the new habit, haha. They are wearing me down.)
So the little guy is still loved and still belongs here after all. I wish it could be better like this for everyone who needs that belonging. And for those who need to strike out on their own, to find that independent way and new people and places, well, I hope they find them. Some people prefer the life, moving around, a kind of freedom they like, but they still find people to fill their needs. So good for them, and I’d hope that can be for those who need it.
Life can be so strange, filled with rough times that last for years. But every now and then we get a glimmer of something good happening that helps make the bad times worth it. I would like to think that my cats and I found a bit of that last night and today. (And my junior cat is sitting on my lap, purring and very happy with things now, haha.) If only it were that easy to please all of us humans. Hmm, supper will be here soon enough, kitty. For now, some attention’s a good thing.
— Happy Birthday again, CJ. — Thank you for the many times your books have given me things to think about, adventures and companions to share for a time, when they were very welcome and needed. — And my younger self needed that and my older self has now been through enough in life to further appreciate those stories and characters. I think I’d very much like them if we ever met, but they’re in that story-world and I’m in this one. That’s fine; that’s how it should be. Still, they’re appreciated for the chance to go along for the ride and learn and have an adventure. Thanks, CJ. — Looking forward to the new books when they get here!
On an impulse, I checked the Large South American River, and they have a release date showing for Alliance Rising: January 8, 2019
@CJ and @Jane —
They are now showing cover art for the Kindle edition, an orange background and a spacesiited figure holding something above his/her head, either a helmet or some equipment, one infers.
However, for the hardbound edition, they are still showing a dark cyan / teal cover with silver-grey lettering, only the title and author, not the cover art as above.
Have the folks at DAW missed something, or was this a decision for a very spare book jacket for the hb? Just in case it needs to be updated.
My Kindle and hardbound copies still show on pre-order for the date as PJ just said.
Ah, also, a minor thing — There is a title clash with a 3 book set by Gini Koch, Alliance Rising – Books 1 – 3 of the Martian Alliance Chronicles, it says, available in Kindle or Paperback. I did not check for the publisher. This could be her self-published or pro-published. I personally don’t see it as an issue, merely an annoyance for both y’all and her. Then again, if it boosts sales of your book and her book(s), well, cool. These things do happen. I also didn’t check when that was listed as published. I would guess there’s also no reason to postpone your book’s release on the title, as you’ve had that title announced as in the works for a year or two, at least.
Hmm, I hope her books are good too.
—–
Personal Note: I have a font idea that can’t make up its mind whether to be formal or very casual, and so I may have to do two sets to satisfy that itch. I’m still figuring out details between the idea on paper and as drawn on the computer. Not sure yet if I’m going to scan in sketches to work from. But so far, so good. If the idea will settle down into a more firm design, it’d be nice, but sometimes it’s like that. Happy, though, with how it’s turning out, just…man, I’ve been pushing my work the past couple of weeks. Going to need a break tonight. — And the part I needed (AC adapter etc.) came in today, so I may be able to convince my old blu-ray player to work with my iMac. Not sure I have blu-ray player software still, and will likely have to buy and download. (Apple for no sane reason does not include blu-ray software with a Mac, and would really rather you skip DVDs also in favor of streaming files. This is not cool, and so I’m going to double-check about Mac compatible software, free or low cost or purchase.)
I use the VLC media player for PC, and it’s also available for Mac OS–which I haven’t used.
https://www.videolan.org/vlc/download-macosx.html
There are 2 books with Alliance Rising. THis happens in publishing. No publisher tends to know what the other is doing. So buy the other one too.
Happy belated birthday, CJ! Glad you and Jane took the Coeur d’Alene dinner cruise, and by all means celebrate with as many free meals as you can get!
About mid-morning and already I’ve learned a thing or two. One’s frustrating, the others,progress of a sort.
The font program doesn’t want to make a change I want/need without insisting on scaling the heights (metrics) and the letter drawings themselves. No, I want the one, but not the other. About the only way around that is to leave it as is or scale down to fit in the new size, which is, oh, ugly. Or else I have to redraw half the letters I’ve done in that idea, so as to avoid scaling. — I even tried setting up a new file from scratch with the settings I wanted, then copying characters from the old into the new file, and…no, it still wants to scale. Oh, drat. So…I will figure this out some way. (Likely I’ll leave it as is.) Better luck next time. This was an unplanned change, but wanted/needed. Oh well.
Other things went better. I woke up with the wild, every which way at once idea having settled down into three separate directions, one for the existing idea and two further ideas, which are new. So now I have the directions to go in that I wanted. Yay!
And on the side, I have this weird idea for a new take on at least one and possibly three font-families, which would add an entirely new dimension, serif versus sans or vice-versa. One of those may have copyright issues I’d have to research. The other two font families are so old, they’re old standards. There are, of course, licensed and unlicensed copies of all three by multiple legitimate, professional font foundries. But I’d need to ask about that if I wanted to pursue it, and I am, so far, still unpublished, but working towards that faster again, making some progress. If I were to do so, I’d need to look carefully at existing designs to see how I’d want to make the changes so they’d be harmonious and still keep the feel of the overall classic designs. One additional oddity: I discovered there’s a sans take on one of them, but whoever chose to do that did not do what I would have done and would like to do. It doesn’t entirely lose the feel of the original, but that other design ‘s choices, in my opinion, miss something of what makes the design so appealing.
Alternatively, another two old classic designs are similar and could be modified in the way I’m thinking. — However, all three (five?) of these date from the 20th century, early 1900’s to either 1950’s or 1960’s or maybe 1970’s, not sure when the last of them was released. So I am not sure if I can do what I want to do. Other designers have done new designs based off of old font designs, notably including two of these, so I’ll want to ask someone who can explain it. Oh, I just realized, one of those does date back ultimately to the early 1800’s.
I can mull that over and sent off an email, and meanwhile work on my own stuff. — And if the answer is too fraught with thorny, hairy issues, then I could fall back on drawing something from scratch, which might be the better idea. But if other designers can do a new design based on an old classic, what in music might be called a new arrangement or a new version of an old piece, then hmm, I am not sure of the rights issues involved, but if I could do it, I’d have to abide by those, because, well, there are ethical principles as well as legal and monetary issues associated with things like that, and I don’t want to get squashed by any big company, thanks. So I’ll see what kind of answers I get.
Back to the drawing board (computer, mostly) literally, to work on fonts. — I need to do more on some of the existing fonts I have further along, but for now, this week, I want to work on what I have going now, and at least sketch on paper so I don’t lose the ideas of what I want to do with the others.
It is great to have all these ideas coming in, and to know with good certainty what I want to do with them, but there is the problem of getting them actually done, and that takes time. My speed and proficiency have increased, despitee that I ran into that problem. And my confidence is up some. I want to research how to do a few cool features I want in some fonts, and haven’t yet found out how those are done, involving alternate glyphs and style sets, as well as any less ugly method of starting small-caps which appear to be stored in a weird way, because they are not technically a part of the character set. — And why they can’t sort the characters so I could get the uppercase, small-caps, and lowercase in that order, for a given Latin / Greek / Cyrillic letter, I really, really don’t know and wish they’d provide for that, with an easy way to see what’s going on for the small-caps and others.
Phooey, talking shop. — But excited at the progress toward my goals of finished fonts producing income for me and being used by people out there to enjoy beautiful, useful type designs. — “Craftsmanship,” or “artisanship,” producing a useful, wasted or needed thing for people, and making something that is beautiful while doing it, this is one of the best things about art. I like the practicality of it. Oh, I also love art for art’s sake. A painting is a marvelous thing, for instance. It is not strictly “necessary” or “useful,” except as decoration and something to contemplate, but it is beautiful in and of itself, and depicts something wonderful from life or imagination. Likewise other forms of art. I guess that, since I grew up with an artist in an art shop, I have always seen both the aesthetic and decorative side, and the practical and useful side, of artwork, things made by others. Whether furniture or ceramics or clothing, or architecture or sculpture or paintings, or authoring books or designing media, graphic design and fonts and such, or music and theater, or any of the things we rarely think of, there’s beauty in this. (And all those STEM people out there who are engineers who produce useful things which have a beauty in their function and form and their mathematics, hey, I learned to love higher math, and my dad was an engineer, so I see a form of art we don’t usually think of in these things. A ship, for instance, or some very common object, can be beautiful and useful at the same time, for instance. Though I think I might classify a ship as rather different. Still, that ship or that house depend upon those well-designed and math-based and geometrically elegant forms, the parts that make them up. So…I think I prefer STEAM to STEM. Include art as necessary to human endeavors, please. Especially in education.)
Back to font-making.
Some Prii are under recall, made between June 2015 and May 2018, but I think only plug-ins.
From Toyota:
Customers can also access current information on open safety recalls by entering their Vehicle Identification Number (VIN) at: http://www.toyota.com/recall
I have the corresponding URL bookmarked for my car since it was equipped with Takata airbads. (Decided to leave the typo.)