...is Dec 31. I will be going to the hotel with a list not long after that, so please remember to get your forms in, folks. There will be another reminder between Xmas and the New Year.

In the interests of not getting snarled up in the snow and postal issues around Christmas, we /will/ accept hotel bookings by email to vanderfilk@contabile.org.uk, as long as there's a paper copy in the post as well (or you send us a scanned copy of the form).

Let's go out with a bang, shall we...?

• Twisted Sister -- "O Come All Ye Faithful"
• TV Pigs -- "Merry Christmaquazika"
• Lou Monte -- "Dominick the Italian Christmas Donkey"
• Fred Figglehorn -- "Christmas Cash" and "Christmas Is Creepy"
• Rather Good Stuff -- "Communist Christmas" and Merry Squidmas" (kinda gross)
• Just 'cause I found it while cruising YouTube, the literal-video version of "Safety Dance"

Tomorrow and Friday we'll do some of the good ones. :)

Most web sites' comments threads are full of trolls and idiots. Football Outsiders is a happy exception:

[from the main article, a collection of quotes:]

HOW BIG DO YOU THINK THE EARTH ACTUALLY IS?
"Now you all had two weeks to do y'all's talking, let me do mine. I've been in this league twelve years man, and I've been through a lot. And these shoulders that I have on my body, you could put the earth on it. So just to let you know, I bounce back."
-- Patriots wide receiver Randy Moss. (WEEI)

[in the comments section, reordered slightly:]

5 Re: Randy Moss by AnonymousA (not verified) :: Tue, 12/22/2009 - 11:11am

What I don't get is the title for his quote (about how big the Earth is). Moss was making a reference to the mythological character of Atlas. It wasn't exactly a perfect analogy, but it's certainly not dumb reply.

8 Re: Randy Moss by Paul R :: Tue, 12/22/2009 - 11:18am

Atlas played for the Titans, though.

21 Re: Randy Moss by Gruntled (not verified) :: Tue, 12/22/2009 - 12:56pm

And he was great, but nobody remembers anyone else from that team.

30 Re: Randy Moss by Kevin from Philly :: Tue, 12/22/2009 - 3:53pm

That's not true. Saturn was a hell of a player - only guy on that team to get a ring.

33 Re: Randy Moss by Hurt Bones :: Tue, 12/22/2009 - 4:05pm

Saturn played for the Romans. Uranus is the only Titan with a ring.

22 Re: Randy Moss by Hurt Bones :: Tue, 12/22/2009 - 1:09pm

I seem to remember that Prometheus was the OC.

24 Re: Randy Moss by Gruntled (not verified) :: Tue, 12/22/2009 - 1:24pm

Forgot about him; didn't he do some time for burglary or something? I think he might still be locked up.

25 Re: Randy Moss by Hurt Bones :: Tue, 12/22/2009 - 1:52pm

Yes, his appeal on the grounds of cruel and unusual punishment didn't succeed.

38 Re: Randy Moss by the silent speaker (not verified) :: Tue, 12/22/2009 - 5:48pm

But as a player Prometheus wasn't that great. It seemed like the Eagles would pick on him all the time.

Yesterday shortly before 5 PM, I went down to the Harvard subway station to get to the commuter rail station at Porter Square, and a T employee was telling people there were no trains going in that direction. A robotic voice announced repeatedly that service toward Alewife was being diverted to shuttle buses at street level because of "a disabled train at Alewife." (Alewife is the terminal station in Cambridge.)

It was unpleasantly cold, or I would have walked the mile to Porter. Rather than wait for a shuttle bus on the street, I went to the sheltered underground area where the 77 bus departs. Naturally, there were lots of people waiting, and I wasn't able to get on till the second bus. Some people were thoroughly confused and slowed down boarding as they discovered that the 77 doesn't go to Davis or Alewife.

Near Porter Square, traffic slowed down dramatically. The traffic signals weren't changing, and there were no police directing traffic. About two blocks before Porter Square, I and a lot of others got off and covered the remaining distance faster than the bus. I was able to catch the 5:30 train. While waiting, I noticed that the subway entrance was taped off.

That part of the Red Line is known to be in bad shape and isn't being fixed.

Had the good luck to see a repeat of Howard Goodall's television programme on Carol history and traditions the other night. I reckon the only reason I did not see the original transmission, (Christmas Day last year), was my being too heavily engaged in conversation and feasting at the Family gathering.

Anyways, Howard's one-hour presentation was a most welcome precis on the subject - taking in many choice performers and scholars, and, I'm glad to say, the Traditional Carol singing that goes on in certain Yorkshire Pubs. It set me to thinking on how the musics offered up in public around Yuletide can compass such a gaping chasm of quality, in particular, supermarkets.

Oh yes, I could not help but reflect on the positive response our (CESP) efforts had (as in my last entry), and my observations the next day in my local branch of Tesco...

I think the total inadequacy of the sound equipment was at the heart of it; a PA system that can just about produce sightly distorted announcements for staff and customers was *not* up to relaying music. Now, this was compounded by the material put through the sound system, a seasonal melange of startling banality that had its thinness made more evident by the tinny Tannoy. The 'vocals' came across as anonymously annoying, probably an ex-winner of the double Y-chromosome Factor - in the Hicksian rhetoric: ball-less, soul-less, gutless, a veritable sucker of Cowell's Cake.

The thing that puzzles me is how such seasonal medleys inevitably feature descending scales on the tubular bells, sounding nothing like the chimes from the parish bell-tower, I can only imagine they are there to elicit some sort of sub-Pavlovian response in the punters? At the sound of the bells supermarket customers will salivate and feel *compelled* to grab several more raspberry Pavlovas from the shelf. I don't think so. As I looked around at my fellow customers, there seemed to be a universal indifference to the retail sound-track; they might as well have been playing Death Metal over the PA or, preferably, nothing at all.

All this occured to me as I stood before the bottles of Spirits, wondering which reduced offer to use my Tesco tokens on. Reckon it was the cheapo remix anthology that got to me, hearing Slade's "Merry Christmas Everybody" redone in an anonymous Schlock/Waterhouse/Aching mashup being the last straw. After all, the original Slade single was designed to still sound good when played over the little hand-held trannies of yesteryear. Having the cheerful vulgarity of the original taken away was a bit like drinking Amaretto with the alcohol taken out.

As it was, I bought a bottle of Grand Marnier.

Woke up and couldn't sleep, but I think I'll head back to bed now.

I've also decided to take the week between Christmas and New Year's Day off work. I need a vacation. :)

Since it's only a few weeks to Van Der Filk can we please start thinking again about what is to be done with all the tapes and books Gytha left. I would also like to know if anyone wants to give a home to a couple of old Atari ST systems. Working last time I fired them up and come with built in midi.

Apart from anything else I want to start thinking about my travel plans and this pile makes the difference between train (which I like to book in advance for cheap tickets) and car.

I have never been a regular movie watcher.  I've never owned a television, so I only rarely see movies on home video.  I used to see movies every now and then in the theater, but my inner cheapskate almost always thought they were too expensive.  And then they brought commercials (not trailers for other upcoming movies, but ads for cars, beverages, or whatever) in, and that pissed me off so much that I went from going rarely to just about never going.  I think the last thing I saw in the theater was The Two Towers.  So the fact that I'd heard enough about James Cameron's Avatar to be seriously interested in going, only through NPR and conversation with friends on line and in person, should be an indication that there's a lot of buzz about this movie.

Part of the reason I wanted to see this film is that I've never seen a modern 3D movie.  I've seen a little (I don't think ever a whole movie) with the red and green goggles, and I never had anything good to say about it.  But I'd heard that this technology was better.  I had some trepidation, because I had heard that a few people have motion sickness problems, and I thought I could be one.  I have a little trouble with Imax.  And I was worried that the 3D would still be a gimmick, something to try to make you jump.  I'm pleased to report that I didn't have either of these problems.  The 3D effect was very definitely real for me, and it brought me into the world, but not so far into it that I got sick.

Another part of the reason I wanted to see this movie is that it's almost entirely done in CGI.  A very long time ago, I worked professionally on state of the art PC graphics, and I knew something about the more advanced stuff that ran on dedicated systems.  I haven't kept up with it, but I like to at least see what people are doing these days.  I stand absolutely amazed.  All of the rendered scenes, from the whole planet view from space through the scenic panoramas to the background of the close up action to the occasional close shot of an alien jungle plant, were heartbreakingly beautiful and, at least from my perspective just watching the movie, not really trying to see through the illusion, utterly realistic.

I have to divide my feelings about the movie into two parts.  The movie gives us a world where the story happens, and a story.  The world is incredible.  Despite being a long film, there's very little exposition of the (pseudo) science behind it, and we're left just trying to see it.  It is a little weak in terms of fundamental believability, but it seems to be fairly consistent given its basic assumptions.  I don't think it holds up as hard SF, but as a fantasy with spaceships, I'm not going to complain.  The visual realization of the world is so rich, and the animals in it are so beautifully done, that I'm writing this post as therapy because I think it's probably better than crying myself to sleep on the couch because it's so beautiful, and I can't go there because it's just a movie.  The story told in that world, the movie at the level of the individual characters, is not so perfect.  If you want to dislike it, you'll certainly be able to; it's preachy, it's trite, and a lot of the characters are just too pat to be satisfying.  To me, it feels as though somebody put a whole lot of effort into making a really wonderful world, and then Hollywood came along and dumbed down the plot.

( Now for some spoilers )

It was a Christmas theme, so I learned a couple of Christmas Songs, and something WILDLY not Christmas, mostly because there was someone in the audience who I wanted to hear it.

Christmas At Ground Zero - Weird Al
Last Ride - Toyboat
Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer - Elmo and Patsy

I was pretty bad ... my lack of solo time onstage really showed. I need to get back up there more

Boo, I just called in sick for tomorrow. Don't WANNA be sick! Wanna STAB people! But I'm dizzy when I stand up and uh... no. Boss Lady teased me when I called in, saying she bet there would be a flurry of people and she'd overtake me in injection count! But she's done about 75 and I'm at 490, so I think my Stabby Crown is safe. Especially since we only have 150 doses in the fridge, heh.

I tried not taking the codeine on the theory that I'm totally all better and I was just dizzy from the drug, but alas, now I'm still dizzy AND my throat feels like I gargled a liquid pain solution, so so much for that. So! More codeine down the hatch and back to bed with me. If I can stand up long enough I might make some KD, which I feel certain has therapeutic properties, or anyway is pretty slimy and easy to swallow. I'm totally going to have to send Joe out to do all the christmas shopping, so everyone's probably getting 500-packs of resistors and herring snacks.

The moon is totally smiling at me! Go look outside!

When I'm awake I'm watching TNG episodes. I think I have a crush on Ensign Ro. I'm blaming my fever. Meanwhile, Dr. Crusher, who was always my favourite character, is so totally annoying this time through. I know enough about medicine now to be really irritated by the bad science she gets to pronounce. "It's some kind of... histaminic reaction." "Is there anything you can do, Doctor?" "No." WHAT! LET ME FAX YOU AN EPI-HYPOSPRAY. And while Patrick Stewart and LeVar Burton can salvage even the most retarded technobabble line, Gates McFadden really can't. But really I think this is all about my transition from the shy, quiet girl I was in 1990 to the outgoing cranktopus I am today.

La la la! Meanwhile while I'm not awake I'm still having pleasantly odd fever dreams. In the last one I was diving in and out of an enormous grid of celtic knotwork. Each square between the knots led to a different alternate pocket universe - a bit like Drywall from Scud the Disposable Assassin was having a pagan phase and bought a celtic coverall at a ren-faire. Anyway, each tiny universe had one inanimate object on display - my favourite was the eggplant universe. I don't like to eat eggplants generally, but they are very handsome vegetables. The paperclip universe was beautiful but dangerous (there were paperclips small enough to breathe in accidentally) and the national anthem universe was like being in a kaleidoscope. I woke up several times in the middle of this extended dream and I'm hopeful it will still be there when I fall asleep again soon. We'll see.

And today, the Wyndham O'Hare, which hosted Windycon until a few years ago, announced that it will close on January 1st.

They're dropping like flies!

My energy level the past several days has been off. I've been sleeping late, doing a few things during the day, and going to bed early. I'm not sure why. I don't know if it's because I'm not taking my vitamins, or if I'm not eating right, or if it's symptoms of depression. I spend my evenings in the bedroom as it's the warmest room in the house.

My sleep schedule is completely whacked. I'm up for 1-2 hours during the night, and I refer to "first sleep" and "second sleep". I think my sleep schedule is matching that of my cats.

Sparkle wants to play soccer in the house, all thanks to Shaun the Sheep, from those wonderful folks who brought us Wallace and Gromit.

Shaun the Sheep "voices" are all mumbled, or animal baaas.  I've been listening as Sparkle watches tonight, and she's started to make statements out loud as to what's going on: "The baby sheep is having a baby pizza," and trying her bit at Irish line dancing along with the sheep, bouncing on the sofa.

I also am wondering if I can learn the banjo dittys played  in-between  the story bits!

Dear Boris,

I took a day's annual leave today. I had not planned to, but I needed the sleep, having eventually gone to bed after midnight. Why am I telling you this? Because, you stupid chump, your idea of being prepared for snow meant that yesterday evening's journey home from work, which normally is a 40 to 50 minute bus journey, took *five* hours. You heard me. *Five* hours. Traffic was stop/start all the way, with more emphasis on the stop. It took two and half hours to get to Medlar Street where they change drivers, and guess what? There were no relief drivers! They were all stuck in traffic... So we waited, and I tried walking on ice, found myself slipping on ice and so got back on the stationary bus. Finally a driver decided to drive the bus in front, but only got as far as the next stop, where we were all turfed off. All buses were terminating at Camberwell Green, he told us. No buses were going up Dog Kennel Hill. All three routes that go past my house have to go up Dog Kennel Hill first. There were a lot of passengers at Camberwell Green who needed to get to East Dulwich and other places past Dog Kennel Hill, who were not happy at the cavalier attitude of the bus companies. Neither was I. So I tried a different route, i.e. the bendy bus through Peckham to Dulwich Library, which avoids Dog Kennel Hill. Unfortunately they were only going as far Peckham Rye. I did not understand the driver's reason for why they weren't going the extra mile and a quarter - something about being too heavy? So when I saw a taxi with its "For Hire" light on, I hailed it. Initially the driver didn't want take me, because his meter would be running and with the traffic in Dulwich almost at a standstill, the journey would be expensive. Well, I was not going to walk around Peckham in the dark on icy, untreated footpaths wearing new spectacles that I'm not used to. Plus my journey at that point had already taken four and a half hours. I was tired. I wanted to get home and go to bed. And when I explained exactly where I wanted to go, he (of course) knew the back ways and had fun slipping on the icy roads. (He said he was a big child when it came to driving in the snow. He also told me that the reason Dog Kennel Hill was closed, was that six buses had broken down, blocking the road in both directions.)

But Boris, it's not as if you didn't know that snow was forecast for yesterday afternoon. The rest of us did. And it we only had an inch or so, not that much. And the traffic meant the main roads stayed clear. And the buses are all German makes, and the Germans know about snow, so the buses should continue working in snowy condidtions. So why did six buses break down on Dog Kennel Hill, blocking the road in both directions? Has the maintenance budget been cut? I think we should be told.

Five miles is not a great distance, Boris, but I don't cycle, and certainly not in London. It's not that far to walk, but in the treacherous conditions underfoot yesterday, I didn't like walking five yards. I am not impressed by you concept of being prepared. Not at all. And neither is my cat, who had to wait five hours for her dinner.

Perhaps I should report you to the RSPCA...

Recent article in the New York Times: Sorry, Vegans: Brussels Sprouts Like to Live, Too.

ObFilk: Carrot Juice is Murder (the Arrogant Worms).

Who has front stairs? BROOKA HAS FRONT STAIRS! Hooray for my home insurance company.

Also, who has celery, ice cream, children's tylenol, and cucumbers? Brooka does! Hooray for my husband, who understands that the key to my heart is bringing me food. (Or is at least very susceptible to the pathetic meeping noises I make when I'm sick.)

Our kitchen smells heavenly. Anne's cooking onion soup from James Martin's recipe book....

You will need
25g (1oz) butter
6 white onions, peeled and chopped
2 cloves of garlic
8g (1/3 oz) plain flour
175ml (6 fl oz, 3/4 cup) white wine
600 ml (1 UK pint, 2 1/2 cups) vegetable or chicken stock
200 ml (7 fl oz, just under a cup) double cream
110g (4oz) grated strong Cheddar (proper cheese, please, American readers)
20g (3/4 oz) chopped chives
salt and pepper

Melt butter, in large pan over medium heat. Add onions, garlic, sauté for 2 mins without brownng.
Stir in flour, pour in wine and stock. Bring to boil, stir, simmer for 6-8 mins.
Add cream, purée with hand held blender.
Return to pan, heat through gently. Season with salt and pepper, serve with cheese and chives sprinkled on top.

Based on my commenting on her "resistance meme" journal entry, the lovely and talented phoenixpdx responded with several interesting questions, a month or so back. Such as:

1. When did you first get involved in filk? How did that happen?

2. What's your favorite favorite FAVORITE food?

3. Can you ride a bicycle? When was the last time you did?

4. If you had no constraints at all (not money, time, energy, etc), what would you do with your time?

5. Tell me a funny anecdote about one (or both) of the children, please?

( answers beneath the cut )

Still sick! Harrumph. I have resorted to T3s, which finally make my throat feel like it isn't trying to secede, but which also rob me of my ability to use apostrophes correctly.

Still have a fever and adding codeine on top of that makes me sooo sleepy so naturally I have a case of THE FEVER DREAMS! They are not very different from my normal dreams, except they seem more real or anyway I'm worse at telling if they were dreams or not.

1. I have stolen Avi's baby, for the second time, and taken it on the train to Portland to try to sell it to Powell's Books. I remembered the enormous hall of cans from before, a sea of multicolored cans which are simultaneously paperback novels. But alas! Unlike the jolly free-for-all of prior years, now they've sorted the cans by colour and used them to pave the hall in an orderly way, and while they will technically still allow you to buy a can/book if you spot one you like, they unofficially disapprove of it, since it will leave an annoying gap in the flooring of the book stadium. Hmph! I bought a few hardcovers from the indoor sections and took the baby and left. I went to a football game where Avi was waiting longsufferingly for me to give back his baby. I left it in a basket in his box, with an apologetic note. "Boy, he puts up with so much from me," I thought. I was all set to apologize again on IM this morning, only, er, wait, Avi doesn't have a baby.

2. Oakridge shopping centre has a secret passage to Juli's house! My camera has broken in two, but Juli fixes it with an astounding yoga move. She feeds me carrot sticks and pats my head while I lay upside down on her bed trying to decipher a national geographic map on the wall, which turns out to be a cunning forgery - there isn't actually a country called the Corivatican, and so it is no surprise that the chart of their principal exports is somewhat fanciful. I am busy trying to decide if I'd rather take the Amtrak train the long way home or go through the secret passage and take the Canada Line home when I wake up and am rather annoyed to realize that there /isn't/ actually a short-cut to Olympia.

Oooh, I can have more tylenol now! Yay. I think this dose will make my throat not-hurt enough to actually eat some food. I am craving celery so hard.

I hope I'm well enough to work tomorrow - it's injection clinic day, damnit! But also don't want to cough on people coming in to my store for a preventive intervention, so well, we'll see.

A note to people who write non-fiction books: not all of your readers are complete dummies.

When I pick up a technical book, I usually know something about the topic even though I'm looking to increase my knowledge. If the author is obviously getting it wrong grammatically, factually, and conceptually while dealing with the simple bits in the introduction, it's unlikely that I'll trust the writing enough to ever read the advanced part.

Title: Tidal Creatures.
Rating: PG.
Fandom: Irish Mythology/Talis Kimberley's "Still Catch the Tide." This is a story structure called a literary echo.
Synopsis: What are the holidays like for the ones left on the shore?

( What are the holidays like for the ones left on the shore? )

Today's fandom suggested by judifilksign. To suggest a fandom, pairing, or situation for tomorrow, please comment on this post. Only comments on THIS POST will be considered for tomorrow.