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Re: A Tight Fit – Evolution and the Armadillo’s Shell

EMoonTX — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 20:49:13 -0000

Thanks for an interesting article.

Armadillos can sprint with surprising speed when startled--often faster than a human can sprint in the same terrain (around here, rocky, with brush, cactus, etc.) and then dig themselves in when they get enough of a lead. Their running style is peculiar--bouncy and erratic--and dogs chasing them often miss a snatch at the 'dillo even if they catch up. (Also, bites on the back usually skid off--personal observation of dogs chasing 'dillos.) Armadillos can't, however, maintain speed over any great distance--but they usually don't have to, as they make use of any burrow (their own or another species, quickly enlarging it if it's snug.) If cornered where they can't dig, they're vulnerable to anything that can flip them over, exposing their soft bellies.

Baby nine-banded armadillos (the kind we have in this area) are pink and soft-looking when they first come out of the burrow; they acquire the taupe coloration gradually over the first month or so as their carapace stiffens--but it's clear they aren't as rigidly confined as adults until they're full-sized.

Chili, by the way, is a dish generally cooked a long time....so making sure chili (armadillo or other) is well cooked just means making sure it's really chili and not some chili-powder-flavored creation from another part of the country. Chili is what you do with old, tough, or suspect meat.

Re: How to Reform Copyright

EMoonTX — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 00:44:09 -0000

As a writer whose first book (published in 1988) is still in print in the US--and in a number of other countries around the world, along with the other 20-something...) I don't think copyright needs reform. It needs a) respect and b) enforcement.

Copyright is under attack because it's inconvenient for those who wish to profit by someone else's work without paying for it. This is not a matter of so-called "orphan works"...it is a matter of theft, plain and simple. Such theft is not new--but that doesn't make it right. When university libraries collaborated with Google to create a vast digital library (from which Google intended to profit), the argument was that this was a public service, making "orphan works" available to the public.

In fact, libraries disgorged--and Google digitized--whatever it could. So instead of "out of copyright" and true orphaned works, Google digitized mine and those of many other writers: works protected by copyright, in print, and on the shelves in bookstores. Were we all hard to find? I certainly wasn't--a Google search on my name brings up my website--with current contact information--at the top. No one did the search. No one asked my permission to digitize a number of my books. In fact, all my works were already available in digital form. No one offered me a chance to proof the digitization (and everyone who's tried it knows that book to scanner to digital file does not produce clean text.) But Google was ready to sell access to my copyrighted works without compensating me (or my publishers)--to use my work to boost its income.

When the University of Michigan announced its plan to digitize its libraries and produced a list of supposedly "orphan" works it could use without permission, the Author's Guild discovered that a number of live, easily located authors' works were listed, including that of a Pulitzer Prize winner who was currently negotiating with a publisher for a new edition. It took the Author's Guild only minutes to find out he was still alive, and not much longer to track down his publisher, agent, and then the man himself.

So all the claims about the size of the problem of "orphaned" works needs to be given a gentle corrective. Claimants should detail the searches they made before declaring the work "orphaned." Searching may cost money. It will take time. But why should not those who wish to make use of someone else's work be the ones to put in the effort?

As for the decline in value of published works, research based on publications first copyrighted in 1934 is not relevant in that regard. The market value of a book is no longer defined entirely by the book's success with its original publishers. Authors are now publishing books whose rights reverted (books considered useless by the original publisher) as e-books, and finding that this produces sufficient income to make the effort worthwhile. The "out of print" book now has definite value to its author for a much longer period. It will be some years before it's possible to see how much longer the long tail is, but it's certainly going to be more than ten years. The problem has always been that the cost of maintaining a large inventory has set the level at which books went out of print, and thus books were not kept available . Now, once a book is formatted for e-readers, that cost is gone...and authors can keep their books available as long as they want.

The "monopoly" argument seems silly when comparing the individual creator to the vast conglomerates that want to steal the work and profit from it. But there's a strange notion that creative people should not profit from their work...that although a farmer may plant an apple orchard and sell the apples from it for the rest of his life--and his heirs may continue to do so--someone who writes a book and profits from the sale of copies of that book should be arbitrarily reft of that income-producing property at a definite term. Why? If society isn't harmed when the farmer sells apples from trees he planted, how is society harmed if the author profits from sales of a book as long as demand for that product lasts? Why is copyright a "monopoly" and farming, not? Why are authors considered selfish for wanting to make a living from their work, when farmers are not? Why is the person who creates something so disrespected that the work should be taken away even before the person's death? Why are authors supposed to suffer because some people are angry with Disney?

Well...because it profits someone else to do so. Who? Not the public...unless you think everything a large corporation does profits the public (in which case...any arguments against Disney or Time Warner could be equally applied to Google, who has been a major player in attempted theft of copyright from individuals.). No, it profits the person who wants to use it to make money, and he will make more money if he can arrange that I have lost my claim to what I wrote. From the thief's point of view, the homeowner's claim of ownership is an impediment that puts him at risk of jail. From the thief's point of view, copyright is an impediment that puts him at risk of a lawsuit. So of course the thieves want to "reform" copyright to make it harder for authors to protect their own property. The pretence that copyright needs reform (and thus authors need to lose control of their work) because of the evil nature of large entertainment corporations is nothing but an attempt to steal--from those who did the work--the fruits of their labors.

I wrote the books. I--an individual, not a big corporation--own the copyright. I support a family with the income from what I write. Nobody should steal it from me just because it's inconvenient or they're ticked off at a media corporation...that's...(suppressing terms I learned in the military) ridiculous. It's an excuse.

Re: Remarks by the President on a series of uprisings

EMoonTX — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 11:14:42 -0000

We don't have a representative democracy because (for instance) none of my supposed representatives represent me or my views, or pay any attention to the frequent emails, phone calls, and letters they've received from me and those in my district who agree with me. We were redistricted (by the Texas lege at the demand of Tom DeLay and the Bush Administration) whose intent was to make every district GOP safe. They made it with us. The GOP representatives and senators at both state and national levels are immune to us--bought and paid for by far deeper pockets than we possess. Then there are the lying scum who--in a period when we still had a chance--ran as Democrats but turned Republican as soon as they were elected.

And of course there's the control of the media so that the continual lies from Fox and the silences or soft questions from the alphabet networks leave many people convinced the lies are true. Convinced that we still have a representative democracy and not a tightly controlled oligarchy. ..an oligarchy that does not intend to allow democracy to have a chance. The last thing they want is a representative democracy--hence all the new restrictions on voting access, the redistricting, and so on.

Re: Parents Who Hid Child's Gender for Five Years Now Face Backlash | NewsFeed | TIME.com

EMoonTX — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 15:18:43 -0000

As a 67 year old woman who was a tomboy as a girl--who didn't mind being a girl but did mind being told she shouldn't climb trees, shouldn't outrun the boys as it would hurt their egos, should hide her intelligence, should flunk math tests on purpose so the boys' egos wouldn't be hurt--I think rigid gender rules and beliefs about men and women hurt both females and males. There were boys being told what colors they couldn't wear, what toys they couldn't play with, that they weren't "real boys" if they wanted anything other than what society said they "should" want.

We are individuals. There's a wide range of natural abilities, talents, interests that both girls and boys (and men and women) share. When someone insists that "women" are all alike and all different from "men"--that's just ignorant. When someone tells a girl or woman that she's not a "real" girl or woman because she doesn't fit their notion of femaleness--that's rude. And the same for boys and men. I'm genetically and physiologically female, and I'm fine with that--never thought of changing sex. I've been married for over 40 years to a great guy. But my interests have often been those approved for guys (machinery, science, technology, etc.) and I refuse to accept the label of "less a woman" or "not really a woman" or any more scolding about how I shouldn't be who I am. Being a woman or a man is not about the clothes you wear or the job you do.

Re: Does Spelling Count?

EMoonTX — Thu, 14 Mar 2013 20:05:03 -0000

The article assumes that poor language skills are commonly associated
with great ideas--that those judging must choose between "good language
skills" and "great ideas"--between content and style. That's a false
dichotomy. How are "great ideas" judged? By the skill with which
they're communicated. Mathematicians admire especially those whose
proofs are elegant and clear over those whose proofs are awkward and
hard to follow. Cooks follow recipes they can understand--that make
clear what ingredients to use, how much, when to add them by what
technique. The content of thought transfers from human mind to human
mind by communication--the greater the idea, the more the quality of
communication matters. And those with good language skills are better
able to communicate the ideas they have (great or not), making them
understandable to those who read or listen.

Some classes of error confuse a reader, interrupt concentration on
content: the incorrect spelling of words that sound alike but mean very
different things (such as "you're" and "your," or "it's" and "its")
forces the reader to pause and reconsider. Critical to clear writing is
the right word in the right place...writing "you're" for "your" is not
just a spelling error, but a mistake in vocabulary. "Teh" for "the" in
"Teh dog ran away" is misspelling. "Pleaze" is misspelling. Neither
impairs meaning, but confusing a contraction and a possessive does.

The writer who really wants to convey an idea clearly will revise the
work, being alert for such errors, to serve the readers better with
writing that prevents misunderstandings, however brief.

Re: B&N vs. S&S: Keep Authors Out of It

EMoonTX — Tue, 26 Mar 2013 18:18:11 -0000

When publishers and booksellers fight, writers and readers lose. Readers lose the opportunity to find titles in the stores, make those fortuitous discoveries while browsin, explore new writers. Writers lose twice--not only the lost sales from that bookseller, but too often the loss of a contract when (due to no fault of the writer or the book) the sales figures drop and the publisher declines another book by that writer. Those in the business of selling books should not take revenge on publishers books by refusing to stock their books. At base, booksellers should understand that if they damage publishers (as by demanding larger discounts or setting lower prices) they are damaging writers, some of whose careers will not recover.

Re: Women in SF&F Month: Jacqueline Carey

EMoonTX — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 00:42:32 -0000

It would help writers understand their readership if you could identify precisely what works for you with male-written books, and what throws you out of a story in female-written books. Certainly books should be interesting & entertaining, but those are blunt terms, and what interests one won't interest someone else. "I prefer books with more action than talk," or "I don't like books with multiple viewpoints" are data points a writer can understand. Also, if you know the details of what's holding or not holding your interest, you can probably refine your search for books that will rock you.

Re: Women in SF&F Month: Jacqueline Carey

EMoonTX — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 00:49:04 -0000

Certainly books by women are reviewed differently than books by men. Male writers get extra points for including elements female writers usually excel at, but not the reverse...and male writers may be lauded for "redefining" a subgenre when women have been doing what he did for years. Some publishers are unwilling to take on women's epic fantasy at all (one writer I know was told "anything but epic fantasy.")

Re: Bungee, Take III

EMoonTX — Fri, 05 Apr 2013 12:32:13 -0000

I am so with you the bungee idea. Jump off a perfectly good solid surface and trust a rubber band and get yanked around? No. (I will rappel. I think it's fun, the few times I did it. But that's *different*. The idea is control.) I think you're amazing to have done it at all and am very glad your spine didn't get yanked around too much.

Re: Beagles in the Office…or Not

EMoonTX — Sat, 06 Apr 2013 12:25:50 -0000

What on earth do they think is under the carpet? (And that must be tough carpet!) But yeah, both the face and the digging would be distracting. Very, very distracting. BeagleBoys need to do their cute face thing and their burrowing outside.

Re: The Wind, the Sun, and Dart’s Agility Days

EMoonTX — Mon, 08 Apr 2013 11:31:29 -0000

Wow, that's a lot of good work by dog and dogmom! Congratulations to both of you. Love the pictures, thank you!

BTW, in the fifth picture (first jump picture) is the dog outside the ring watching Dart watching in an aggressive way or just an interested way?

Re: The Wind, the Sun, and Dart’s Agility Days

EMoonTX — Mon, 08 Apr 2013 16:17:30 -0000

Ah--couldn't tell sex, but thought the gaze was intense w/pricked ears. Thanks for info. (I do not have your experience with, or ability to "read' dogs.)

Re: An open letter to Larry Swanson: Why it is important for neuroscientists to debate the Brain Initiative in public

EMoonTX — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 10:41:10 -0000

Speaking as a taxpayer and a citizen with some years of interest in neuroscience (but no degrees in that field) I completely agree. There are anti-science elements in our culture who will treat lack of openness with their usual conspiracy theory approach...already at work on this. Yes, they will quote and misquote scientists expressing cautions or doubts about the Brain Initiative, but they'll do the same with anyone they can find...and will then treat apparent solidarity among scientists as proof of the conspiracy to hide something diabolical from the public.

Be open. Conduct the open discussions professionally, certainly--stick to the issues, the known facts, the concerns about competing funding. Demonstrate the kind of clear, rational, critical thinking skills you would like the public to use. But be open above all. Doing so will appeal to, and reassure, the intelligent and educated among the non-specialists, who then become your "points of light" in the larger number of those who think neurology has something to do with neuritis but they aren't sure what.

Re: A Snow Snit

EMoonTX — Thu, 18 Apr 2013 16:09:32 -0000

I love the way he "presents" his snit to an audience. He clearly knows where upstage and downstage are, and doesn't waste time throwing a snitfit in that far corner--that's only for turning around in, the better to make a dramatic entrance/re-entrance to center stage. "You! In there! Audience! DO SOMETHING!"

Re: Rally Me!

EMoonTX — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 09:52:52 -0000

Glad to see the pictures of you being Good Connery. I believe you are Good all the time, but it is always a pleasure to see pictures of you out in the sunshine on a course, reminding everyone how Good you can be. I hope yourmom finds other places for you to have fun. (You are right, it is Not Fair for DartBeagle to have all the fun and you to have all the boring busywork. Yourmom's probably told you Life Isn't Fair Sometimes, and she is right, but it is hard for anyone to understand why this is. Scritches and hugs and cookies help with the "It's not FAIR!" feeling. Try a beagle kiss on her and see what happens.)

Re: Rally Me!

EMoonTX — Wed, 24 Apr 2013 10:39:46 -0000

I hope it gets better for you, Connery. You are a Very Special Beagle.

Re: War Horse

EMoonTX — Fri, 26 Apr 2013 10:56:30 -0000

Wow! That is some horse...er...puppet of a horse.

Re: Rena Beagle’s Big Adventure

EMoonTX — Sat, 27 Apr 2013 10:49:16 -0000

Welcome, Rena--and you'll soon be happy again. You look a little wary, pleading, and embarrassed in your crate (yes, your newmom told us--nobody's upset with you.) But you are such a pretty beagle-girl, and I love your expression in your frog-dog phase. It won't take you long to make friends with the beagle-boys. Wait until you find out that you're in a home with other performance beagles--are you as fast as Dart? As wise as Connery?

Re: Rena Beagle’s Big Adventure

EMoonTX — Sat, 27 Apr 2013 11:56:33 -0000

But of course. She will need to assure herself that every detail is Right, and announce the need to fix it if it's not. To my inexpert eye, she seems to be built a little different than the boys, esp. Connery. Is that true, and if so, is it sex or bloodline difference?

Re: Smackdowns, Demon Blades, and Rena

EMoonTX — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 16:52:45 -0000

I like the way she's paying attention and also her stride. That's one very nice beagle (at leas to me the non-beagle expert) and once she gets over been yanked away from familiar people, dogs, and places, she looks to have a great attitude.

Re: Two-year-old shot dead by brother, 5, with rifle he was given as a present

EMoonTX — Thu, 02 May 2013 11:17:43 -0000

"Accidents" don't happen: they are caused. This was not an "accident" but the predictable result of letting a child too young to have any judgment have possession of a deadly weapon. Predictable. Has happened before. Firearms should not be manufactured or advertised "for children." They should never be accessible to children. Responsible gun owners (and there are many) make absolutely certain that no child living in the home, or visiting the home, will "accidentally" find a firearm and ammunition. They don't display them, or talk about them in a way that minimizes the dangers or makes it sound "cool" or "fun" to have them.

Parents who give kids guns are unfit both as parents as and as gun-owners. Parents who have guns where kids can get to them are unfit as both parents and gun-owners. I grew up in a household where there were guns--not accessible to me, with ammunition in another inaccessible spot.

Re: At Least 71 Kids Have Been Killed by Guns Since Newtown

EMoonTX — Thu, 09 May 2013 10:23:50 -0000

None of these deaths were true "accidents" as they're listed....every "accident" represents criminal negligence by the gun owner involved...having a loaded weapon where a young child could get hold of it. People who leave loaded weapons around where children can find and use them are not fit to own them. They define "irresponsible gun owner."

I grew up in a gun-owning household; I had no access whatever to guns until I was old enough to understand more about them. That was the rule in other families with guns in the house--they were not accessible to young children, and used by older children only with one-on-one adult supervision. I own guns: no gun in this household has ever been accessible to children, including (after our son moved out) visiting children.

Accidents don't happen...they are caused. They are caused by human carelessness, laziness, ignorance or greed. Shooting "accidents" are caused by the same factors--and with children shooting people (children or adults) they're caused by the gun owner's refusal to foll0w standard gun safety rules. Criminal negligence.

Re: At Least 71 Kids Have Been Killed by Guns Since Newtown

EMoonTX — Fri, 10 May 2013 19:17:56 -0000

Why? We live in a rural area and have livestock. In the years we've been here, loose dogs and/or feral dogs have attacked livestock and people, killing two people (student walking on her parents' property and an elderly woman in her own farmyard) as well as killing and injuring sheep and cattle. Irresponsible dog owners are a big problem--city people dumping unwanted dogs, or moving out to the suburbs and deciding their dogs "like to run free" and "it doesn't hurt anybody." Some are just ignorant--they don't know their "sweet, friendly, never bites" dog changes personality running with a pack in the open--and some don't care. Most loose dogs will run from gunfire--they don't like the noise--even if they'll charge a person with a stick. Dogs in a pack are predators with no fear of humans. A healthy coyote will run from me. Dogs have run _at_ me.

We also see sick (neurologically sick) wildlife, some of which may be rabid, as rabies has been found not too far away. Feral hogs have started showing up within 20 miles of us and are expected to move into our area. Coyotes are a problem for some landowners nearby. If we have a problem, we'd shoot a coyote. (Better than putting out poison or traps that could kill something else.) Finally, we kill and process our own meat. One shot to the right spot kills a sheep or young bull instantly, with minimal stress to the animal. More work for us, of course. Should I see an animal in distress (friend shot a prize heifer because she had a badly broken leg) I would be able to end its misery.

For farmers and ranchers, guns are a management tool unrelated to the kind of paranoia that drives people to "stock up" on guns that aren't good for anything but killing other people, and believe they need a loaded gun on their person everywhere they go.

Re: Battle over Confederate flag license plate rages on

EMoonTX — Wed, 16 Jul 2014 00:04:49 -0000

The Confederate flag is an enemy flag, the flag of traitors. It has never stood for liberty and justice _for all_; it has always been the flag of racism, hatred, violence, and slavery. The VP of the Confederate States said so himself, in the early days of the war--they fought to save slavery. Only later was the excuse of "states' rights" hauled out. Yes, many Confederate soldiers were brave men. That's true in any army. But they were terribly, tragically wrong in their choices, and it's past time that their descendants gave up celebrating what should not be celebrated: the culture of the South was toxic...and it is toxic today whenever and wherever it shows up. That flag should appear only in history books.

Re: Favorite Horse Movies

EMoonTX — Fri, 18 Jul 2014 12:53:07 -0000

Sylvester. I liked the brave and difficult teenager trying to care for her little brother after her parents died, struggling with the child protective people (you're too young, you can't do it right, you should be in school), with sexual harassment where she worked (moving cattle & goats at a livestock auction barn), and falling for a horse brought in...and the old coot who owned the place, who'd been in love with her mother who married someone else (that was a loser) and so on, who recognized both her talent and the horse's, but was embittered. Moreover, the novelization was done by a late friend, Ann Crispin, one of the best novelizations of a movie I've ever read. It has some delightful and spot-on cultural bits between west Texas and the eastern sport horse establishment. And it has horses galloping across open country (OK, alongside the road, in one case) which is one of my prime things for a good movie (galloping horses, swordplay, and great scenery. If a movie is missing any one of those it better have both the others. Although...The Full Monty is another of my favorite movies because of the many kinds of love in it. Also funny.