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Eggs and Endorphins

Higgledy Piggeldy, Joshua Kronengold

5/12/12 10:28 pm - Game meetup, 5/12

Parade: I've played his before once, but didn't remember it well. Simple strategic card game about not taking cards, with an Alice theme. Won with -13 points.

Shadows Over Camalot. Been hearing about this for a long while--a mostly collab with an authrurian theme. Liked it a lot--it's a lot more individual (and collab, rather than "one guy runs the game") and the nightly quest shine works well, and while there are similarities to Lord of the Rings, I found it a lot more enjoyable.

Citadels: At my request, we played with the Witch over the Assassin (I think the Assassin is simply too powerful. Naturally, I managed to hose myself with the Witch three or four times during the game, and came in second to last (I think) out of six with 18 points.

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4/11/12 05:21 pm - Me, Mneme memes merilly and moves it pnumatically

The only kind of meme that I find interesting is the "write something you don't ordinarilly write about meme. So, it's the only type I'll occasionally do, too. In this case: "Comment to this post and I will list seven things I want you to talk about. They might make sense or they might be totally random. Then post that list, with your commentary, to your journal. Other people can get lists from you, and the meme merrily perpetuates itself."

I haven't done one of these for a good long while, so I asked the always entertaining [personal profile] redfishie to give me a list. She gave me:


  • The harp
  • Filking 101
  • Larping archetypes that I love
  • NYC versus the rest of the world (ok, she blurfed and gave me Boston, but we worked that out in post)
  • Things that inspired me as a kid
  • What everyone should know about historical dance
  • My favorite Prachett


Some people seem to space these out into separate posts and all that. I, however, am systemically incapable of this -- my motto for the 21st century is "do it now, and if you can't, break it down into things you -can- do now, or it Won't Get Done." So instead you get short. Ish.



The harp )
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2/21/12 02:46 pm - filk poem

[personal profile] uwf linked to Natalee Caple's "Happy Animal", commenting that the words were included for their sound rather than their meaning.

I agreed, but commented that were I writing it, I might have done more with the structure. So as an example, I wrote this.

Sappy Shamble

Copyright 2012, Joshua Kronengold (Inspired by Happy Animal by Natalee Caple)

Green birds love clean words,
And red birds love time,
Gold birds love old words,
And blue birds love rhyme.

Lizards love wizards,
And camels love sieves.
Night owls love light fowls,
And foxes love thieves,

The world loves the furled wing,
The moon loves the claw.
The sky loves the wry sting,
Of a thorn in my paw.

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2/2/12 11:42 am - Crackdown: Do not Want

I received a (predictable) letter from Senator Gillibrand saying that while consensus could not be reached and Protect IP 2011 was dropped, that "All New Yorkers should be able to agree on the shared goals of cracking down on the illegal piracy of copyrighted material without any unintended consequences of stifling the internet or online innovation." My response follows.

Dear Senator Gillibrand,

Thank you for writing back to me regarding the Protect IP Act of 2011.

That said, I do not agree on the shared goal of cracking down on the illegal piracy of copyrighted materials. The establishment of copyright has a history and purpose; it is (or has been) a necessary evil -- not a goal in and of itself, established for the common good of encouraging creative work and the sharing thereof.

As such, as technology, commerce, and society change, it is very well worth reexamining the purpose and role of copyright.

It has long since been known that in some ways, copyright is an unalloyed bad. The folk traditions -- long the primary means of creation -- relied on building upon the works of both the recent and distant past, but copyright makes that activity illegal -- an activity one might even consider central to human creativity, as we climb upon the backs of our fellows.

I submit that the widespread violation of copyright -- often, though hardly always, by children, and often by those who are spending as much of their income as possible on media -- indicates not that new, harsher measures are called for, but that copyright in its current form may have outlived its usefulness -- and that it is our responsiblity, not to attempt to enforce it even if that means global empire or import censorship, but to come up with new models for ensuring that creators can reap rewards for their creations that do not rely upon the (now false) assumption that reproduction is a valid place to put this reward model.

This -- and putting the works that have been stolen from or denied to the public (and the public domain) back where they should be and where they can do the most good, should be our aims going forward -- not attempting to stick more fingers in a dam that has long since burst.




FWIW, for clarity:

I don't habitually pirate things myself.

I don't think the measures in place now are sufficient to reward/compensate creators when their works are pirated.

I don't think copyright being abolished would suddenly make the world a better place.

However, I think the issue is vastly oversimplified in common discourse and common press, and that widespread piracy is a symptom of something deeply wrong with how copyright works relative to the world, rather than a sign that a substantial population is bad/wrong and needs to be corrected and/or punished. If we stick to didactic enforcement of copyright as a goal going forward, rather than attempting to find a solution to the basic problems, there's pretty much nowhere to go other than tyranny.

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1/18/12 01:13 am - Health alert, hugs

[personal profile] drcpunk was diagnosed with scabies after Arisia this past weekend. Scabies has something like a 1 month incubation period.

Scabies spreads through skin to skin contact. You know, like hugs.

This means that if you got hugged by me or Lisa at Arisia, or GaFilk, or any of the holiday parties we attended, you probably want to go through the (not painful; yay, but annoyingly thorough) anti-scabbies treatment.

Talk to your doctor, and stay safe (and non-itchy/contagous).

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12/9/11 11:39 pm - NerdNYC

(The carpet game) Marrakech: Lovely simple area control game. Came in 2nd of 4, had a blast. Rules summary are for my benefit, but have fun trying to decipher: 12 1x2 carpets per player, directional pawn, 8x8 board with loops around the corners and on the edges, and a 1,2,2,3,3,4 die. On your turn, turn the pawn a right angle or don't, then roll the dice and move the pawn that number of squares. If you land on an opponent's carpet, give them money (points) equal to the size of the contiguous group that carpet is part of. Then play a carpet orthoganally adjacent to the pawn--you can cover someone else's carpet, but you can't completely cover an entirely visible carpet. Game ends after everyone is out of carpet, points are visible carpet squares + gold. 3-player you get 16 carpets instead of 12.

Eminent Domain: I taught emenent domain. It was fun. Also, I lost. And yet--so fun to play. This is a cross between Glory to Rome and Dominion, more or less (closer to Glory, really)

Kingdom Builder: Wonderful area control game with different public goals every time.

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11/13/11 02:58 am - Board Games in Whole Foods, review of Ninjato

I had a brain fart and thought that waltzing was today. It wasn't; the Big Apple Waltz waltz-mazurka and cross-step waltz are tomorrow. Whups! Having cancelled my contrary plans for tomorrow, I'll be there.

So, I checked to see if there was a board game meetup today. And there was. more behind the cut... )

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11/1/11 02:21 am - Essay-let: Myths, Fairie Tales, and the Prohibitionary Relationship

There's this thing that shows up in faerie tales. Some of my favorite faerie tales, really. Actually, you can trace its thread from myths through faerie tales, through modern renditions of same, subversion, and probably plenty of modern stories I'm not looking at because I don't have time (not right now, anyway). It goes something like this:

Two people meet, and get together. Maybe they fall in love. Maybe it's an arranged marriage, maybe it's a promise from a person of power [that's kindof an arranged marriage, though], maybe something else. Maybe it's not even a sexual thing at all -- though that's out of scope enough that I'm going to consider it a related category, but out of scope for this essay. But they're together.

Except that there's something wrong -- something you just can't let rest (no story can, nor most humans) -- one of the lovers (usually the man) has a secret. And naturally, there's a prohibition somehow related to the secret -- if the prohibition gets broken, the relationship is doomed.
Click here for more Beauty/East/Psyche/Bluebeard/Macha thoughts )

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10/11/11 12:45 am - The Application is still king on the phone

An acquaintance recently bought an Android phone and complained that accessing that using Gmail from the browser on the phone, while it worked, interacted badly with multitasking; if he switched applications while composing an email, on his return the email in progress would be gone.

When you get down to it, I think this comes down to a big conceputal difference between the modern ultraportable device (a smartphone or similarly speced out web tablet) and a general use device (a desktop down, to most netbooks (as they usually run laptop/desktop OSes).

and I go on on this topic for a while )

tl, dr: Use the browser on netbooks and better, but use apps on phones.

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8/24/11 02:56 am - Confluence, Gencon, Worlcon, not a writeup (or even three writeups)

Keeping with long tradition, I'm not going to writeup Confluence, Gencon, nor Worldcon. (The statue of limitations has probably passed on Origins, Contata, and Dexcon)

But I guess I should say something about them. So...

These aren't writeups! Really! Ok, mabye a little )

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8/8/11 02:40 pm - "Mary Sue" considered harmful

The amazing [info]blackholly has posted an excellent response to the use of "Mary Sue" when referring to female protagonists here.

My response follows:

I hadn't touched the feminist issues (partially because IMPerception, people use "Mary Sue" just as much regarding male characters as female; this is probably a flawed perception), but I was remarking a few weeks ago that -except- for "self-insertion character" (the only legitimate "Mary Sue" hallmark, IMO), that the traits associated with a Mary Sue were exactly the traits associated with a protagonist in an adventure story.

That the slur is more often applied to female characters than male ones is, once you point it out, obvious, and very problematic as well.

I'm happy to use "Mary Sue" (or "Gary Stew") specifically for obvious authorial self-insertion characters in fanfiction who warp the story such that it's a fantasy, not a story. And only that.

It is lazy and deceptive to use Mary Sue (or equivalents) when referring to characters in non-fanfic; if the character is unbelievable or an obvious self-insertion fantasy, that should be criticizable without using the misappropriated shorthand.

The only exception I'll allow is when a writer has apparently written fanfic in their own universe (such as late Charles de Lint), in which case treating it as fanfic might make some sense [obviously, there's also commercially published fanfic; the Wizard of Karres, the Peter Pan sequels, various Oz things, etc].
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8/2/11 02:42 pm - Worldcon

Doing Gencon, then Worldcon a couple of weeks later. Who's going? What'cha doing?

BTW, anyone need Worldcon memberships? I currently know of two memberships up for grabs.

7/25/11 02:46 am - New song: Bunny Eared Girls

I first heard [profile] talis_kimberley's "Cotton Tail Girls" in a Lady Mondegreen concert or oneshot -- with Batya, Merav, and Seanan kicking it out of the park with a triplicate lead and fantastic multi-part harmony. I'd not hear the original--didn't even know there was an original, but it was great stuff.

But, here's the thing about me and music:

I can't pay attention to everything at once.

So..I love clever lyrics, and rhythms, and harmony and melodies--but the first time I hear a song, I'm going to miss some stuff. So while grooving on Cotton Tail Girls for the first time, the only lines that really stuck were the chorus and demi-chorus, plus the lines about hearing for miles and about how if Hefner hadn't chosen a rabbit for the Playboy theme animal, the "Girls" would have been relegated to working in the cotton mills instead of the Playboy club.

This? Made me at first assume that the girls had some attributes that made them -particularly- well suited to working as Playboy bunnies. Of course, that's not the song Talis wrote. OTOH, it doesn't make a bad song idea...

Bunny Eared Girls
Joshua Kronengold
Heavily borrowed from and inspired by Cotton Tail Girls (Talis Kimberley)
To the tune of Cotton Mill Girls (c) Hedy West
(Note that the first verse has one extra stanza before the chorus)

(Jess)
Well, the silver screen has always made me swoon,
'cause my Pa was a human but my Momma's a 'toon, and it's

Hard times, bunny-eared girls, hard times everywhere.

(Betty)
I was born in a test tube in back in '93
When they tried to make a woman who could leap a tree, and it's

Hard times, bunny-eared girls, hard times everywhere.

(Luna)
I got bit by my boyfriend on a Saturday night,
Then I found he was a a rabbit when the moon was bright, and it's
Hard times, bunny-eared girls, hard times everywhere.

Hard times, bunny-eared girls, x3
hard times everywhere

(Betty)
I serve plenty of drinks, I make plenty of quips,
I give plenty of winks, I make plenty of tips, and it's

Hard times, bunny-eared girls, hard times everywhere.

It may look like you can break me but I kick like a mule,
(So) If you think you can take me, you will end up the fool, and it's

Hard times, bunny-eared girls, hard times everywhere.

Hard times, bunny-eared girls, x3
Hard times everywhere

(Luna)
I have to change my style as the moon grows brighter,
I can hear for miles, but my hair gets whiter, (and it's)

Hard times, bunny-eared girls, hard times everywhere.

My teeth are scary, but I don't eat meat,
My legs are hairy, and I've got big feet, and it's,

Hard times, bunny-eared girls, hard times everywhere.

Hard times, bunny-eared girls, x3
hard times everywhere

(Jess)
The ears are natural, but the tail's brand new,
As for my little black nose, well, I ain't telling you, and it's

Hard times, bunny-eared girls, hard times everywhere.

I work my tail off from five to one,
Then you can find me at the drive-in till I see the sun, (and it's)

Hard times, bunny-eared girls, hard times everywhere.

Hard times, bunny-eared girls, x3
hard times everywhere

(various, as appropriate)
You may think it silly that I (we?) wear these clothes
But we're glad it was a rabbit Mr Heffner chose, and it's

Hard times bunny-eared girls, hard times everywhere.

Cos if he'd had a spider or a lizard as a pet
We'd all be in a freak-show and we couldn't pay the vet, and it's

Hard times bunny-eared girls, hard times everywhere, yeah,

Hard times bunny-eared girls, hard times everywhere.

Hard times, bunny-eared girls, x3
Hard times everywhere


Older Lyrics behind the cut )

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7/11/11 02:46 pm - Life. It's what's worth living

Ok, so [personal profile] drcpunk's posted about most of this, but I've been kinda checked out. So...stuff that's happened.

We ran a con! It was awesome! The guests were awesome, the music was awesome, the conversation and attendees were awesome -- and since I was handling money, playing Vice-Chair, and involved in the Rocky Horror Muppet Show production as Porky Horror, I missed a lot, so I'm quite sure there was a lot more awesome. Come to Concertino next year, with the amazing Playing Rapunzel, as well as Partners in Rhyme, Ariel Cinii, Peggi Warner Lalonde, and much of the filking community on the East Coast -- and to whatever we run in three years!

While this was going on, there was a fire in the apartment across from ours (eg, 3R for Rear whereas ours is 3F for Front), resulting in the gas, hot water and some of the power getting shut off, our door getting bashed in and becoming unlockable (because, you know, we weren't home; we were in New Jersey, sleeping), the ceiling in our kitchen getting its ceiling destroyed (so the nice firemen could make sure the fire didn't spread to our apartment), a window getting broken (smoke, probably), and a hole made in the ceiling of the library (who knows? Probably just to check that there wasn't fire there that didn't touch the kitchen. Or something.

We're fine (New Jersey, remember?) and our stuff/apartment is now secured with a padlock. But we've been staying at friends' houses, while the landlord waits to get approval (which it sounds like he -finally- has -- Monday, the 11th of July, only 8 days after the fire!) from the insurance to begin working on the building. We can't move back until the apartment is, well, habitable by humans. The silver lining in all this is that we've found out how much we -don't- need most of our stuff (even if we like it), and how much our friends and family love us; we've been positively buried in unsolicited offers of temporary housing (although we've turned down or delayed most of them in favor of whatever we could come up with that was most convenient -- we spent one night at [profile] maraphile's place in Jersey, then went to Dexcon a day early so I could telecommute for a day and then hit the con straight from the hotel, and are currently staying at [info]crash_mccormick and his wife's place for a few days.

Finally, we have a crazy idea that it would be fun to go to Gencon. We didn't =plan= Gencon, of course, because it would be totally insane to plan Gencon -and- a 5 day Dexcon -and- Worldcon -and- Origins. (and we did Dexcon and Worldcon, and will do Worldcon). But...it -would- be fun. Anyone planning on doing Gencon (yeah, there's that planning thing again) and have a space in a hotel room with, you know, a bed? Hey, can't hurt, right?

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6/14/11 01:14 pm - Filk Fragment: Slaying Wizard

Has anyone else noticed that some of their best work is in response to someone else trying something similar and missing the mark or abandoning it? No? Probably just me, then.

Anyway, someone posted a not quite coherent version of this on Enworld, so I responded with this. So far, I've enough willpower to avoid filking the entire song...

Slaying Wizard
ttto: Pinball Wizard, by Pete Townshend
lyrics: Joshua Kronengold

Ever since I was a young elf, I've wanted to stand tall,
From Fallcrest down to Nentir, I must have fought them all,
But I ain't seen nothing like him, in any bar or hall,
That deaf, dumb, blind assassin, sure wields a nasty maul.

He stands like a statue, hides himself within plain sight,
Blends into the background, if it's dark or if it's light,
He shrouds his foes in darkness, while he stands back from the fight,
That deaf, dumb, blind assassin, sure wields a nasty maul.

He's a slaying wizard, there's got to be a catch,
A slaying wizard, I've never seen his match.

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6/14/11 12:58 am - Housefilk! Queens, Sunday, June 19, 2011

In honor of "we haven't had a housefilk in the NYC area in ever so long" and "Contata's at the beginning of next month, holy *%~@#!", the lovely [personal profile] drcpunk and I are holding a housefilk at our home ("The Bookery") in Queens this Sunday - June 19th, 2011 (the day after [personal profile] drcpunk's birthday), noon to 6pm -- those who come early have volunteered to help set up; those who stay late have volunteered to attend the following concom meeting.  .
 
The Bookery
48-38 48th ST APT 3F
Woodside, New York, 11377

Directions:
Take the 7 local train to 46th. Exit at the 47th street exit.
Coming out of the stairs, you will be in the middle of Queens
Boulevard, with street on both sides. Turn right.
Also, if you find that you are facing brown awnings
with the "Sunnyside Grill" or the Starbucks, you're facing the
wrong direction, whereas if you see the "Sunnyside" sign (on
46th) or a cigar shop, (on 47th), you're probably facing the
right way.
Cross Queens Boulevard, and continue along 47th street to 48th Avenue.
Turn left (facing east).
Walk one block east, to 48th street. Turn right.
Go about 2/3 of the way down the block, and ring the top-left buzzer,
which is marked 3F.

If you get lost, call the house phone: 718-937-8919

Do RSVP if you can--and while I'll try to get some snacks before the day, if you want to make sure you can get snacks you like, I reccomend bringing them.
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5/1/11 10:50 pm - It's May! It's May!

May is here! This means a number of rituals that I usually don't follow, but I'll see what I can remember.

First--Happy Beltaine, and Bright Blessings!

Second--I have no idea. I was going to say something witty here, but I just forget what it was. So I'll instead say that _Grimm Legacy_ is a lovely romp, set in a loaning museum in NYC, with magic and fairy tales, that I've finally played Loyang and find it a very good competitive development game (and much less like Havre and Agricola than those two games are like one another), that I've been playing Desktop Dungeons (mac and PC) and find it quite good--though they should really do an android/iphone port, and that you all should come to Contata in the first weekend in July (Contata).

Third, to honor the spirit of license and openness associated with the month, I bring you a song (basically worksafe):



Fourth, to honor the spirit of growth and sharing also associated with the day of the month, I bring you a different song (worksafe? Are you kidding? No.):



Fifth and finally, happy birthday, [personal profile] akawil (in 3 days, anyway)!

3/14/11 05:38 pm - Late Eclipse

This and the following post were originally intended to be a single post; a
spoiler-free micro review with a spoilery review behind the cut.

Then, because I'm not a complete idiot, it occurred to me that that was
tantamount to disabling comments on the outer post, so here we are.

Late Eclipses (Seanan McGuire, 2011, DAW) is an excellent book
and you should read it. However, since it's the fourth book in the Toby
Daye series, you probably should read the other three books in the series,
and I'm not reviewing them today.

Should you read the prior books, however, and go on to read Late Eclipses,
here's what you'll win:

* Nasty, nasty, sidhe politics
* Real and significant movement in the series plot.
* A badass heroine with a brain (who uses it, even).
* Heroic urban fantasy in a De Lint mode, with the mystery-flavor-of-the
book (yep--different this time too) being something I'll label as "killer
thriller".

12/5/10 08:30 pm - Dominion: Personal Best

If this isn't my highest scoring Dominion game ever--it's damned close. 186 points -- 169 of them vp chips.

Of note: I did not extend the game to try to improve my score--I ended it at the first available opportunity!

And yeah -- every single "highest scoring dominion game ever" includes Goons in the mix -- and probably always will unless they make a card that allows even more ludicrous scores.

http://dominion.isotropic.org/gamelog/201012/05/game-20101205-110841-b515eccc.html.gz

(edit: putting the entire game in, behind a cut, just for archival purposes)

click for game long. Note: it's long )

9/30/10 01:01 pm - Strowlercon

So...we've decided that we're going to Strowlercon. Too much love there not to go, right?

So...is anyone going up from the NYC area? We'd love to be transported, natch -- but also, we have an object we have a crazy plan of bringing up which isn't really practical to transport by hand.

9/5/10 02:27 pm - Marilynn Padol -- June 29, 1943 - September 5, 2010

[personal profile] drcpunk's mother passed away this morning, September 5, at 8:10 AM.

Funeral arrangements are still to be made (as Lisa, her brother Eric, and I are all on vacation at the moment), but are likely to be on Wednesday morning.

A bittersweet farewell (as Marylinn had been in the late stages of dementia and entubulated for the last few years of her life; a living death), but it is what it is.
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8/17/10 01:14 pm - Recent Reading


Feed -- Mira Grant (aka Seanan McGuire)


I waited until I was in the right mood before reading this—and as much as I enjoyed the novel, I'm glad I did. Whatever it is (a political thriller with a blogger protagonist, in a world plagued by the ever-present threat of zombies), it's not all bunnies and kitties.


Instead, we've got a book that combines three themes I'm not particularly into -- zombies, political thrillers, and near future sf (ok, I am somewhat into the latter :) into a single book that totally engrossed me. Were there quibbles? Sure; in particular, I don't buy a techonlogy price curve that would have the same person carry a 10 meg wristwatch recorder and a 5 terabyte handheld (it's just too many orders of magnitude--if the 5TB handheld is plausible, a 16gb or even 32gb wristwatch is close to free; we're close to there now, with .5tb handhelds and $7 1gb cards the size of a fingernail)--but while that pulled me out for a moment, it just wasn't important to the story.

The twists and turns in the story are believable, engrossing, and (usually) unexpected; the zombies are both hugely important and not actually on screen enough to make the book "a zombie book"; the themes of the book are both subtle enough not to overpower the story and present enough to grant it weight, and the characters -- both major and minor -- are nicely differentiated and interesting.

One note on this book vs. the Toby books (Rosemary and Rue, A Local Habitation, with more to come): As much as I like them, the Toby books know what genre they're in (Modern Urban Fantasy with a significant romance subplot) and nail it. But Feed? Feels like listening to/watching the author geek out about one of her favorite topics (i.e., global pandemics), with the added bonus of having all that other stuff (plot, characters, etc) in there too--which is awesome.

The best part of the book though? Is that there's more where that came from.

White Cat -- Holly Black

I'll have a better idea of what I think of this after the next few books came out, but it's certainly well written, and pretty fun to read.

Think of this world as one of those "everyone has a unique hidden magical talent" books gone horribly right. Magic is uncommon, but well known, with some people/families having hidden, powerful magical talents...also, magic is illegal, so most magical "curse workers" are lone criminals or, more frequently, work for the mob. Our hero is the lone person without magical talent in a magical crime family, and...you know how this usually goes.

There are a couple of interesting factors here. First, there's "the con". For reasons that become obvious, our hero is an accomplished con artist--and the use of "the con" pervades the book in a number of interesting ways.

The second is that of likable characters. The protagonist -is- likable, in a fashion, but not exactly a nice person (maybe?). On the other hand, this is one of a small fraction of books about teenagers where the teens do what -my- set did as teens -- play D&D, read sf & fantasy, and geek out -- and while most of that is our hero's friends, a fair amount is him, which is nicely refreshing (far too often, it seems like even SF & F authors, feeling they have to show their protagonist as a "normal" teen, pretend this stuff doesn't even exist, probably bending over backward in an effort to avoid having things get too autobiographical or making everyone in the world look like them). So one can partially identify with the protagonist, certainly identify with his friends, and at least for me, feel that the teens in the book are "our set" however different their world is.

The Dragon Hoard -- Tanith Lee

This is a nicely short book (162 pages; I started it this morning and finished it over lunch!), and quite enjoyable. Very much a YA adventure novel in the "fairy tale" genre, our protagonist's wicked aunt (or is she a cousin?) curses him and his sister in a fit of pique, setting of a chain of adventures that result, eventually, in multiple marriages, evil enchanters defeated, and, generally, people getting what they deserve. Not deep, but fluffy and fun; very much a nice change after the previous two novels!
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7/25/10 02:27 pm - Fresh Philk: Strike the Rail

Strike the Rail
Joshua Kronengold
(ttto "Strike the Bell" -- trad)

You're heading for an interview--and starting to run late,
You hope they'll offer you a job, and don't want them to wait.
You swipe right at the turnstyle,
Hear a beep, head forward, when,
The turnstile goes ke-chunk and stops,
it says: "swipe again!"

"Swipe again at this turnstile"
It says repeatedly,
A line forms quick behind you and they murmur angrilly.
You try to calm your heartbeat, raise your card once more and then,
You hope for "Go" but still it says to you: "Swipe again".

You're heading to pick up your date, and due at half past six,
In one pocket's a metro card--the other Broadway tix,
But at the only turnstile, there's a line and you can ken,
That at the front there's someone getting "please, swipe again."

"Swipe again at this turnstile"
It says repeatedly,
A line forms quick behind her and you murmur angrilly.
She tries to calm her heartbeat, raise her card once more and then,
You hope for "Go" but still it says to her: "Swipe again".

You've gotten to a worldcon, and you're paying at the door,
You hope the con will rock, and that your roomate will not snore.
You strike a conversation with a girl whose badge says "Wren",
When the volunteer at reg says "could you please swipe again?"

"Swipe your credit card again--it didn't seem to scan,"
You know the volunteer means well, but this was not your plan,
You don't want to be on line, but join the other fen,
And so you hope, that you won't hear these words: "swipe again!"

"Swipe again at this turnstile"
It says repeatedly,
A line forms quick behind you and they murmur angrilly.
You try to calm your heartbeat, raise your card once more and then,
You hope for "Go" but still it says to you: "Swipe again".

5/5/10 12:19 pm - Lisa, books

Lisa's getting rid of books! Help here out here.

5/3/10 01:27 am - Anyone want some games?

Spring cleaning season is here -- AKA "time to put the air conditioners in" season.

As such, I've decided it's time to finally get rid of all the stuff that had been moldering in the "time to get rid of this" pile. Anyone want anything? Here's the list:

Z-Man B-Movie card games: Bell Bottomed Badasses, Kung Fu Samurai, Graverobers, and Skippy's Revenge (Grave Robbers II).
Gother than Thou
Basari (a pretty cool gem-trading game marred by my dislike of the "pick one of three actions, you're screwed if you pick the same action someone else did" mechanic)
Lowenherz (a version of Domain with the same mechanic).
The Order of the Stick (Cool chrome, and the game captures it well. But...it takes long after it stops being fun to end. Maybe the expansion (called "the Shortening" for some reason) fixes it? I didn't bother to find out.
Grand Tribunal: Pretty interesting game, except for the lack of components lining up with rules. It's possible that the post-eratta game is good; I don't know, I can't get anyone to try it.
Dungeoneer (Undead): This is actually a really fun pseudo-RPG in a card game. But I've not played it since the Origins I bought it at, so out it goes.
Nanoficitionary (Beta): I've got the regular game, and I'm not much of a collector. So out it goes.

Anyone want anything? Make me an offer -- including "I'll pay shipping" or "bring it to Games Club/Gencon/Conterpoint and I'll take it" as well as cash/trade offers, and we'll talk; anything I can't get rid of quickly goes out, along with many many books.

4/9/10 02:21 pm - Rapunzel's Revenge

When in the library, I spied a copy of Rapunzel's Revenge, which I'd seen recommended earlier. And...yeah. Kick-ass Rapunzel, no need for a prince to save -her-, pretty cool worldbuilding, good storytelling, and nice role-reversal. Not to mention, hair used as a lasso. What's not to love?
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3/8/10 04:50 pm - Gaming-originating silliness: Yes of the Beholder

[personal profile] drcpunk, in our regular PBEM, managed to typo "Eyes of the Beholder" as "Yes of the Beholder."

Which might, I suppose, explain why I responded with this:

"...I was a Globe of the dungeon yes when I put the gold twixt my eyes like the Draconian tyrants used or shall I wear a red yes and how he gazed at me under the dragon's cave and I thought well as well him as another and then I asked him with my eyes to ask again yes and then he asked me would I yes to say yes my golden grapes and first I sent my rays about him yes and drew him down to me so he could feel my orbs all perfume yes and his central eye was twisting like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes." (From Eyelisses, by Janus Jocular)

(with apologies to Mr. Joyce).

3/5/10 03:00 pm - A Local Habitation comments (Spoilers)

I had some thoughts I wasn't comfortable putting in a review, so here they are. If it's not obvious:

Warning, there are spoilers for ALH and R&R here. )

3/5/10 02:42 pm - Read This: A Local Habitation

I'm a little fried, so I'm going to try not to go into depth -- but I finished Seanan McGuire's ([info]seanan_mcguire's) A Local Habitation -- the second October Daye novel -- and very much enjoyed it.

(no cut tag, but even a spoiler-free review has to say -something- about the work, so reader beware)

Seanan describes herself as an "old-school horror girl", and boy do she show it here, as our protagonist enters combat with a classic combination of horror tropes in a battle to the last murder and last revelation. This time, I, at least, found the mystery (or parts of it) to be fairly obvious -- but there's enough misdirection and stage business to keep you guessing about the details -- and to keep at least -some- surprises for the end.

Unlike the first novel in the series, Rosemary and Rue, where I had some questions about motives that I needed to reread the novel in order to resolve for myself, here, any similar questions are asked and answered in the text (I do have some quibbles -- but I'm a pretty careful reader and unless I close my brain, I nearly -always- have quibbles); this is a tight story with strong characters, a good unity of place and time, (unlike the first novel, where on reread I noticed that we largely rotated among 5-6 sets, this one takes place almost entirely in a single set--but a big and varied enoug one that it -feels- like we're in a different place almost every chapter), and satisfying developments in at least some of the the ongoing storylines established in the first novel in the series.

If you like well written Faerie-themed Urban Fantasy/Horror/Romance/Mystery -- or think you might, read this book!
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2/25/10 01:04 pm - Larp Opportunity

Anyone free this weekend and interested in LARPing?

We've had some drops at the last minute in 1897, Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee (enough to entirely run through the waitlist and then some, and could really use
replacement players). The game's running at RPI -- near Albany, NY.

Since I'm speaking from a privileged position of having read most of the game and being a GM...this is fantastic game (and one of the very few opportunities you'll have to play in a full weekend game this year).

2/11/10 11:29 am - D&D 4e -- Design that could have been

I've got a new piece in the labcats ljblog here on an issue that's been bothering me with D&D. Check it out!
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12/9/09 11:04 am - crash space, next saturday evening

To folk in Boston (particularly those going to Fezzwig's Ball), does anyone have crash space available for [info]drcpunk & myself?

Also, see peeps at Fezzwig's & the tea dance in Boston the day after!

Still not sure what we're doing -this- weekend.

11/22/09 01:13 pm - Arms

Dan IMed me when I was offline. When I finally got back to him, I was on AIM with several pages, looking at a bunch of different web sites, brushing lsa's hair, and trying to figure out what to do for the day. So...

(11:19:09 AM) DanNKapp: What's up?
(1:04:10 PM) mnemesys: I need more arms.
(1:05:08 PM) DanNKnapp: arms are useful.
(1:05:15 PM) DanNKnapp: but too many of them seem like they would get in the way.
(1:06:08 PM) mnemesys: Sure, but 4 or 6 would be viable. Maybe 4 tentacles plus two normal arms? The tentacles can handle tasks farther away; the arms can handle the "in front of me" jobs?
(1:06:17 PM) DanNKnapp: that makes sense to me.
(1:06:17 PM) mnemesys: yes, I'm aware of what this leads too. :)
(1:06:22 PM) DanNKnapp: the primary problem is shoulders.
(1:06:28 PM) DanNKnapp: which tentacles do help to solve.
(1:06:31 PM) DanNKnapp: what does this lead to? :)
(1:06:38 PM) mnemesys: Fighting spiderman, apparently.
(1:06:41 PM) DanNKnapp: haha.
(1:06:42 PM) DanNKnapp: fair enough.

What's scary enough is that until I expressed the tentacle idea (mostly, to handle the close/far issue and that you mostly want extra arms to handle tasks you're not looking at, so you need a lot more swivel than your regular arms have) it hadn't occured to me that I was reinventing a popular Marvel Comics villain.

10/26/09 08:59 pm - OVFF

Back from OVFF.

That was awesome!

10/18/09 11:08 pm - Yummy Mandarin Duck, tasty ice cream

[info]grinnellian2001 was reading a book on food that I thought was written by the blogger who helps run the Chinatown Ice Cream Factory, so I shanghaied (sorry. not intentional) her, [info]stakebait, and Mary Alice (has an lj, don't remember it) after the Elegant Arts Tea and Games event today to go down, grab Chinese food in Chinatown, an hit the Factory for dessert.

Since I was (naturally) put on the spot to pick a restaurant, I chose Mandarin Garden (on Mott Street, a bit north of Wo Hop and south of Canal), which I've -mostly- done for dim sum, but which I know some in our circle (possibly even me) have done for dinner and never complained about. The first dish we settled on was Peking Duck -- which it developed, none of my fellow dinners except Mary Alice had tried, and which is one of my favorite dishes (even if it's served differently at different places). To round out the meal (keeping in mind that the duck was priced as two dishes and advertised as a two course dish, so we figured it could serve as two), we got Lotus & Veggies, and to accommodate both my fetish for spicy and [info]grinnellian2001's desires to have something safe on the table, a quong bao (eg, kung pao, as I'm used to seeing it) chicken.

The duck was ordered and arrived first--and was -totally- worthwhile. The first course consisted of the traditional sandwich buns, hoisin sauce, scallions, and the skin of the ducks with the drumsticks, and was delivered with all due ceremony (not quite the same as what we got at the Peking Duck House, up the street, but different and cool). The duck meat, delivered with the rest of the meal, was worked into a delicious dish, with a nice savory but not significantly spicy sauce.

The other two dishes also worked well -- the veggies were a really tasty mix, with a lot of mushrooms, along with the lotus roots and snow peas, and the sauce had a slice spice edge to it. And the kung bao (which, to be fair, is one of my favorite "simple" dishes) was perfectly spiced--enough bite and pieces of hot pepper to keep me interested, but not so much as to be a problem for those of us with a lower (but not nonexistent, of course) taste for heat.

The dinner a success, we headed for the Chinatown Ice Cream Factory, right off of Mott--an establishment so old that my first memory of them is discovering that I was (not permanently, fortunately) allergic to mangoes there at the age of, perhaps, 8 (if so, that would be 1980), and only later rediscovered them a few years ago as what they are now (at least, I don't -think- they had quite the variety of flavors they have now then, though they always had some oddball ones)--an excellent boutique ice cream parlor that makes their own, albeit with a regrettable lack of chairs, nestled in the heart of Chinatown. I can't speak of what anyone else got, (though they were out of pumpkin pie, I tasted the zen butter, which is butter with a taste of coconut, and I'm sure that [info]grinnellian2001 got the lichee and some other flavor (they do split their smalls, as all right-thinking boutique ice cream places do)) but I decided I didn't need to be adventurous this time and got the mocha chip and the green tea, which made a lovely combination.

The only issue, of course, was the "standing outside eating ice cream" factor (oh, -that's- why the haagen daaz nearby gets any business!)--I've got to get a better idea of where one can get a seat near the CICF (even if it's outdoors).
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9/14/09 06:28 am - Shiva directions

[info - personal] drcpunk will be sitting Shiva at our place tonight from 5pm and tomorrow from 7pm.

Directions will follow in a locked post; email/comment if you don't have access and want them.
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9/13/09 01:16 am - Brian Padol -- 1938-2009

Lisa's ([info]drcpunk's) dad died today, about 3 weeks after he went into the hospital with what turned out to be multiple major organ failures. The funeral will be tomorrow (or maybe monday) at a time to be determined Monday, at 10:30AM, on Staten Island (directions are here).

9/1/09 04:56 pm - Life imitates Life

(stolen from http://www.aisb.org/~ddj/)

http://news.cs.cmu.edu/article.php?a=1029

Summary:

RHAT, sponsoring an open source, OS promoting lab at CMU...in the Gates building, built by a grant from Bill Gates.
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8/31/09 03:10 pm - Review: Rosemary and Rue

(This is the "mostly avoiding specifics" review of Rosemary & Rue. I might do another with a lot more spoilers, or I might not (I'll likely put it under a flock, though))

Review Ahoy! )
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8/4/09 05:05 pm - Filk: The Ruined Tower

The Ruined Tower
Joshua Kronengold
ttto Under the Gripping Beast
inspired by Horsetamer's Daughter

With a circle made of horses, and a plain first level screen,
I fought and beat the wizards who would rule what they had seen
They granted me an eight domain, which was not theirs to give,
And I shall strive to keep it free as long as I can live

Inside the ruined tower, my horses run and play.
Inside the ruined tower, the wizards stay away.
My people love my power, for it keeps the plains folk free
As I have won our freedom, so shall we forever be.

I know that I grow older, so I search the land for power,
I hate to be the only one--alone within my tower.
But though there's power in the land, there's no one here like me.
No one with strength that's great enough to make the wizards flee.

Inside the ruined tower, I pace upon the straw
Inside the ruined tower, time is an open maw,
For I'm an only child, and I dare not have a babe,
For I would lose my power, and my land would be enslaved.

The years have fallen on me, and I know my sun will set,
But my people still have freedom, for I have not fallen yet,
I know the lords will rule again as soon as I am done.
Each day that I can have is like a year that I have won.

Inside the ruined tower, the horses come and go
Inside the ruined tower, I stand against time's flow
Though he yet hunts my footsteps, still I will not yield to death.
My power keeps my people free while I can take
a breath
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8/4/09 04:53 pm - The Grand Tour

Lisa and I are not -actually- doing a grand tour--but we are doing enough cons this ye\
ar that one could argue it anyway. Spring cons included Lunacon(Rye, NY), Concertino \
(NEfilk Massachusets), Origins (Columbus), Dexcon (NJ), Intercon (Mass.), Balticon (Ba\
ltimore), and this past weekend, [info - personal] drcpunk and I took a quick flight over to L\
ondon to make HarmUnu (and Unicon in general, as we did have non-filking UK friends in\
attendence). (and in terms of trips, I suppose I have to count my cruise with [info - personal] pocketnaomi to Alaska, with Seattle on the way).

It was great. Expensive in both money and energy, of course, but much fun and we got \
to both reconnect with old friends from that side of the pond and meet and chat with n\
ew friends. I even got a few games in.

This coming week, naturally enough, we're planning on taking a train up to Montreal t\
o attend Worldcon.

And we -hope- to also make PiCon this summer...not that we've planned for it even a li\
ttle bit--it just sounds fun.
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6/23/09 03:59 pm - Concertino 2009, a brief con report

At Concertino, I


  • Got to sing a fair bit
  • Played a lot of set (including with some very good opponents)
  • Met some new (to me) people. Cool new people!
  • Got to have good conversation with people (hi, [info]fiddledragon and Kate, among others) I don't usually get to talk to
  • Wrote a new song (see adjacent post)
  • Gave/got many, many hugs
  • Had fun


Thank you, everyone who was part of any of this, or part of making the con a reality!

6/4/09 12:56 pm - Cadhla wrote me a Palimpsest poem!

I participated in [info]cadhla's latest Iron Poet, giving Chocolate, Quarters, and Blood (as they were, well, what came to mind). And then forgot I'd done so -- as I'm wont to forget so many things sometimes.

And what did she write? What lovely, Catherynne Valente's Palimpsesty thing did she write?

See for yourself

Wow. Just wow. Thank you, Cadhla!
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5/26/09 01:21 pm - Balticon, Collesium, dw codes

If you still need a DW invite (and know me), talk to me. I've got quite a few.

Balticon was fun, if odd. Friday night, I came in, saw people, ate dinner with peoples, changed, danced like a madman, went back to the room, and crashed. Saturday, I caught half of [info]quadrivium's concert, did Patches' excellent Renn dance (where I ended up being her demo partner = fun), gamed most of the day (once I was awake), got a nice dinner with [info]selki, [info] - personaldrcpunk, and Pamela, gamed a bit more, stopped by some parties on the way to the filk room...and found that the filk had ended sometime before 2:30AM. So it goes. So I played a bit of Werewolf (annoyingly, a game soured because a player didn't realize they weren't a werewolf, the mod announced a werewolf innocent to the seer, and the mod didn't have the brains to -correct his mistake- before endgame was hit. So the seer looked at all three werewolves and lived to talk about it, yet the town "lost") and went to bed. Sunday, I gamed all day, had dinner with [info] - personaldrcpunk, [info]nancylebov, [info]esrblog, and [info]cathyr19355, and went directly to the filking -- so actually got a few good hours of filking in (even if I did torture Gwen's Like Their Feet Have Wings mercilessly; I'm not usually -that- bad on the words or even the chords; I think I brain was cramped [and I do try to sing songs with the words even when I know them, but my laptop was in for repair this weekend and I neglected to arrange a replacement for the con]). After filking broke up WAY TOO EARLY, I went over to the gaming room and got a few hours of Dominion and Race for the Galaxy in before bed.

Monday, I hung out in the gaming room for a bunch of hours. Where I was introduced to Colosseum. Which kicks ass.

Colosseum is a Wolfgang Kramer game -- and it shows. But while there are clear connections to Princes of Florence (eg, it's a art-themed financial game with the same style of auction, and a separate-but-related score track), I like it a lot better. For starters, it's a well-designed game with many of my favorite game elements -- development, trading, money management, auctions, as well as some other interesting ones (screw-the-leader, -aid- the leader (yes, both -- the leader gets a +3 on all further scores and has one of her pieces stolen from her in each of the four preparatory rounds), collections, and game win by best-score (which is why I refer to it as 4 preparatory rounds and one final round--as, unless you're playing badly, your score in the final round will dwarf your previous scores. For example, my round 4 score was 40 and my round 5 score was 85, and I won by 3 points).

I like it a lot, and have gone ahead and bought myself a copy (along with Le Havre, which is a bit long, but as the sequel to Agricola, I must own if nobody else in my friendship circle has it, and nobody does).

5/6/09 02:30 pm - D&D4 play -- RPGA

I've never been into "organized play" of a roleplaying game -- but by my lights, D&D is only -somewhat- a roleplaying game, (the other part being a character construction wargame), and I've been hankering for putting the 4e books I've been buying to some use, so I showed up to the RPGA meetup yesterday, packing a female 1st level Deva (eg, multiply reincarnated angel) Avenger named Isa Sunrise.

And you know what? It was fun!

Apparently, you can choose "easy" or "hard", so we picked "hard" as, Living Forgotten Realms tends to be (supposedly) a bit easy. Three encounters, two fights.

The first one was a big mess against a large, well-balanced enemy party, where the party's two clerics and the swordmage took the brunt of the damage and someone made two death checks before I took a break from knocking enemy rogues and made a heal check.

The second was glorious. A boss (elite, probably) that felt like 9th level or so and a giant pile of minions. I got targetted early (and before I got a chance to "oath" the boss so I could get a benefit from all the attacks--avengers do extra damage if they're attacked by other than their target), going from a really hefty 34 hp to low teens, and was the bunny throughout the fight, once only avoiding unconciousness because of 3 temporary hp I'd been granted. The minions were nicely handled by various bursts, blasts, etc from the multi-attacking ranger, the swordmage, and the wizard, the clerics mostly kept me upright and hit the boss with a few attacks (I used a reroll to let one hit the boss with an encounter power), and I? In three attacks, I managed to crit with my daily and my encounter for a total of 50 and 42 damage, respectively (avengers, if properly positioned, get to roll twice on every melee attack, so this is only slightly less likely than 1/100), then, with me back in "one hit from unconciousness" territory, I managed to hit once more (a 25 didn't do it, so I used the Deva encounter ability to add a d6 to the roll and hit with a 31) and finish the bastard off.
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4/22/09 10:30 am - Dreamwidth

Yeah, I've got a Dreamwidth account. It's mneme (no, no x. The x is a disambiguator).

I've heard a lot of alarmist "why is everyone going away" bits, so I figured it was worth explaining what -I- like about Dreamwidth -- at least in concept.

First and foremost, I'm not planning on leaving LJ or the LJ community. But that's part of the point. Among the tools and improvements DW has promised are features (some implemented, like journal import [though...is that disabled atm?] and journal crossposting and better OpenID suport, some not, like the ability to embed your friends page on other lj-like sites in your friends page for DW if you want) that let the "community" spread beyond a single site -- and isn't that the point? Why -should- we lose access to our friends posts or have to follow them with Yet Another Login whenever they move sites? Why should our communities be owned by an external entity -- rather than merely hosted by them?

So, I don't want everyone leaving lj and going to dw instead. I want a world where people post wherever they want -- and I can be part of their community if they're "my people" anyway. But supporting DW is a step in that direction -- hopefully a very large part.

Second, they seem to have a good, sustainable plan not involving selling out their principles or assuming large bags of cash will fall from the sky.

Third, their attitudes are more or less a direct response to a lot of the ljfail we've seen over the last few years; not "everyone gets to see everything", but "we can handle adult/spam/financial issues without treating our users as criminals or children."

Fourth? LJ used to regularly come out with new features -- you know, ones I used. But over the last few years, that has slowed to a crawl or less -- instead, all their new features seem to be things that benefit someone else (like advertisers, or whatnot)...which might be fine except that features -I- want; ones that make it easier to communicate with people, seem to not happen. DW, in a small number of months, has implemented a huge set of my wantlist for LJ (not least: separating "access" and "readlist" and getting rid of the "friend" designation), plans to implement a lot more, and in general, has proven very response to suggestions.

So yeah, I have a DW account. But don't worry, I won't be going anywhere.

4/3/09 05:11 pm - oh, CPAN, thou hast failed me

Less cryptically, why isn't there a perl-usable (pure perl or just something with perl wrappers; don't care) distributed locking system that's worth a damn? What's so hard to understand about "locks should only EVER be given out to one client, and clients need to know instantly if their locks become unreliable?" that causes everyone to get it wrong?

IPC::Lock::Memcache: memcache is a caching system, and may drop your locks on the floor without telling you; also, netsplit will hose you, also, dead clients don't auto-unlock=useless.

IPC::Locker: single-server (not ideal, but fine -- although it lets clients specify a group of machines that DON'T TALK TO ONE ANOTHER, which is worse than useless unless you -want- a high likelyhood of false locks), handles dead clients well via timeouts and checking for pid existence (though if pid server isn't working, probably can timeout longrunning locks while they're working = bad), but locks don't hold connections open. Which means if, say, your lock server reboots, instead of what -should- happen (all your processes holding open locks get signals and can decide this means they have to relock or dump all their work on the ground, as they no longer, well, have an exclusive lock), things go on happily having lost your lock. Checking for a lock before every atomic stage of a critical section? Not good.
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3/30/09 04:54 pm

Helped run Dragon at RPI (e.g. spent most of the weekeend in a room making moves on a map and running a Play By Mail war/trading game; pretty fun, particularly when the troops decided they were smarter than whoever was giving them orders; they were usually
right, too).

Still in NYC, still filking and gaming and reading and getting paid for programming.

NOT DED.

3/15/09 04:59 am - The Word Meme: cards, smile, shoes, quiet, home

From [info].

cards )

Smile )

Shoes )

Quiet )

Home )
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2/25/09 05:54 pm - 5 Things

You know the drill.


[info]sweetmusic_27 asked about: 1. Filk 2. Waltzing 3. Garth Nix 4. Scotch 5. Gadgetry

filk )


Waltzing )


nix )


scotch )


gadgetry )

So, you know the drill. Ask me more stuff if you like and I'll see if I can answer it -- or ask for words and I'll see what I can do!
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