Thursday January 22, 2015 According to the Minnesota Daily (the U's student paper,)the Governor and others want to rebrand Minnesota as part of "the North" rather than "the Midwest." The change would supposedly make Minnesota more attractive to businesses and workers who might be looking for a place to move.

This kind of word magic has a long history. for example, the naming of Greenland.

***Picked up 6 Linux books being held at Southeast Library. One of them turns out to be useful.

***Installed Chromium (non-proprietary variant of Google's Chrome browser.) So far, I like it better than the current version of Mozilla Firefox.

***ACA (Adult Children of Alcoholic and Otherwise Dysfunctional Families) meeting. This was the annual Group Conscience meeting. Mostly discussing and voting on decisions made in the last business meeting (held after a regular meeting); but with a bit of other business.

***Forthcoming book: "Political scientists John Ferejohn and Frances Rosenbluth's TUG OF WAR, tracing the evolution of modern democracy through centuries of warfare, concluding that, even today, democracy might need war to ensure its very existence..."  From Publishers Lunch's daily newsletter.


***comment from al_zorra,:  "O my goodness -- I literally just finished the last edits and revisions to the Faulkner section of my annual essay on the previous year's most significant reading!
  
"I was reading along in what you had quoted and came full stop at 'riggers,' because that isn't Faulkner.  I knew it immediately".
 
[So did I, and I hadn't read Faulkner in years.]

***don_fitch (don_fitch) replied to a comment left by don_fitch (don_fitch) in your LiveJournal post (http://dsgood.livejournal.com/1298773.html). The comment they replied to was:

"'Oooh, I _like_ that bit about statistics of birth re. May Day... and the practical reasons (-"it's too cold to screw in the woods on May Day"-) for them.'

'And yeah, I don't like to consider myself Alien to any or many non-sociopathic groups ...but for some reason a whole lot of the things Computer Geeks consider "helpful" are things I try to turn off as soon as possible. Unfortunately, they also turn off a lot of things _I_ consider helpful.
 
'(I recently bought a new Macintosh computer. It has a big screen, and was ridiculously expensive. It does not have a way to plug into a telephone land-line to connect to the internet (or for highest-speed transmission via Usenet). It does not have a way to read, directly, CDs. It does not allow dropping documents into open windows but requires doing it into Icons, It does not do several other things that it used to do well & conveniently. Despite the presence of a Learning Curve, I expect to move to PCs in the future.)' 

Their reply was: "Oops! I seem to have hit 'Send' before mentioning that, yeah, many, many of the 'helpful' features on computers nowadays are annoying, at best."

[As were "helpful" features on older computers.]

Thursday December 18, 2014.  Seen:  "Silent Night" rewritten to make it more Christian.  Posted at the Willey Hall bus shelter.

***Had venison chili for lunch, thanks to Waite House.

Friday December 19. Venison pizza at Waite House.

***To Community Emergency Service for produce giveaway.  Brought bags for other people to use.

Monday December 22.  Email:  "Cute girl wants a normal guy."  Doesn't know much about me.

Wednesday December 24.  Santa Claus impersonator riding a tall bicycle down Southeast Como Avenue.

From Marty Helgeson 12/14/14

"'Adam and Lilith lived happily ever after. So did Eve and the Snake. Should we classify this group as Christian?'

"You didn't say who/what the group is, not that it really matters.  I assume your question was rhetorical."
   
The only group I've named so far is the Martian Israelites, who present another set of problems.

The group faced with this question decides to refer it to the Religious, Spiritual, and Philosophical Council -- which thereby comes into existence.

"Adam and Lilith lived happily ever after. So did Eve and the Snake. Should we classify this group as Christian?"

Saturday November 15 (more) to Sunday November 23, 2014

Saturday 11/15/14:  Forgot to include:  Reading by Jason D. Wittman at DreamHaven Books.

I won a prize:  a DVD of Planet of the Cats and Revenge of the Mice.  Err, Cat People and Curse of the Cat People.

***Thursday 11/20/14 From Lee Gold:  "Sunday 11/16/14.  World and Future Building MinnSpec meetup at Black:  Coffee and Waffles.  It worked well, despite my poor planning.  (I thought Black would be uncrowded on Sunday. Figured about 5 people would attend, and there were about 13. Acoustics rather less favorable than I realized.)

"It devolved into several conversation groups.

"Note:  Black has black coffee, but doesn't seem to have black waffles."

Blackberry syrup? (I may suggest that, but it's only a partial fix.)

"Wednesday 11/19/14.  -'Cold Weather Hits All of US,'- Star Tribune story listing, front page.

"So, how well did Honolulu do at snow removal?"

Los Angeles didn't have any snow either.
Or any special cold weather last night.

***Friday 11/21/14:  Outdoor Adventure Expo at Midwest Mountaineering.  Earned one raffle ticket, entered one prize drawing.  Picked up swag, including a device originally designed for cleaning horses' hooves and repurposed for cleaning camping footwear and other equipment.

At a sled dog table, petted a puppy not old enough to pull a sled (nine weeks.)  At the "adopt a Siberian Husky" booth, petted a full-grown husky.

***Sunday 11/23/14:  Back to the Expo.  Attended presentation on Croatia and Slovenia, by someone who conducts tours there.  I visited Croatia, back when it was part of Yugoslavia.  The presenter's taste was somewhat different from mine.  (Not unexpected; he warned the audience about taste differences when he began speaking and showing slides.)

***Bought an exercise device:  a thick rubber ring meant for developing hand, finger, and forearm strength and for stress relief.

November 16-19 2014.

Sunday 11/16/14.  World and Future Building MinnSpec meetup at Black:  Coffee and Waffles.  It worked well, despite my poor planning.  (I thought Black would be uncrowded on Sunday.  Figured about 5 people would attend, and there were about 13.  Acoustics rather less favorable than I realized.)

It devolved into several conversation groups.

Note:  Black has black coffee, but doesn't seem to have black waffles.

**(Monday 11/17/14.  At the Wedge Coop, a toddler and I pretended to menace each other.

Wednesday 11/19/14.  -"Cold Weather Hits All of US,"- Star Tribune story listing, front page.

So, how well did Honolulu do at snow removal?

***Decision: Use much more description in writing.  Synesthetic, straight sensory, emotional.  Starting in January; in fiction, nonfiction, this journal.

Why not start right away?  I'm scared.

***At Walker Library, I took out:  Richard Kadry, The Getaway God.  -"My name is Death. And it appears that I have been murdered."-  That's the most interesting passage; unfortunately, it's a teaser for the next in the series.

The nasty old gods who God stole the universe from want to take it back.  Which means everyone on Earth, in Heaven, and in Hell will die.  Their supporters and opponents include humans, angels, demons, vampires, and four of the five persons God has split into.  (The fifth is dead.) 

Moderately good story.  There's too much background detail explained rather than shown, and too many wisecracks, for my taste.  Theological accuracy not guaranteed.

Charles Stross, The Rhesus Chart.  Haven't read it yet.

Wednesday November 5, 2014 As I expected, Minnesota's Independence Party has lost major party status.

The party had one real success:  Jesse Ventura's 1998 election as governor.  The Republican and DFL (Democratic-Farmer-Labor) parties got him elected, by choosing unpopular candidates.  (Note:  Back then, it was the Reform Party.)

***Freelancers Union Twin Cities After Hours event at CoCo Coworking Uptown.

CoCo's business is one which no futurist or science fiction writer predicted (to the best of my knowledge.)  It provides a place for people to plug in their computers and work together.  Or to work alone.  They provide free coffee and tea, and there's a kitchen.

There were about 13 people at this After Hours.  Largest group:  people with computer-related skills.  Second largest:  writers, editors, copy editors, etc.  Some attendees were both.

A dog attended part of the meeting, but did not give its profession.

There was an agenda, set nationwide for November After Hours.  Formal (sorta) discussions were followed by socializing.

I believe some connections were made at the meeting.