Dr. Phil's Dreamwidth Journal

As I've said before, this blog is as much for my own journal as it is to inform and have fun and rant with y'all. So this entry is definitely in the You May Not Notice Or Care About This.

Back in December 2011 I added a Dreamwidth blog to my LiveJournal blog. They're the same, actually. But I write in Dreamwidth and crosspost to LiveJournal, because DW is easier and doesn't burden me with crap. I then put a link to Facebook. Originally, I kept linking to LJ and not DW, because Facebook/Dreamwidth was very irregular about including either icons or pictures with the link. But then I realized that if you don't have a LiveJournal account and you're not logged in or have a cookie set, then LJ is rather nutty about putting up pop-ups begging you to join LJ. And since I hate having to deal with crap like that myself -- I didn't see it normally because I have a permanent LJ account -- I switched to putting the Facebook link with Dreamwidth.

Whew.

Bottom line, I had changed my links because it was nicer to you guys.

You may also have noticed that at the bottom of posts for a while, there has been the following block -- this one taken from the previous post:

Posted on Dreamwidth
Crossposted on LiveJournal

This serves three purposes: (1) It's consistent with a lot of other blogs, which list WordPress or LiveJournal or Dreamwidth or their own blog. And identifies the original source. (2) If you came to the entry on say Dreamwidth and wanted to make a comment where you have an account on LiveJournal, it's easy. (3) It means I have both LJ and DW links available to me ***, for when I want to link to...

Say the previous post (DW).

HOWEVER...

Effective with the previous post (DW) (LJ), I have now officially reversed the order and specifically label both links as DW and LJ respectively.

On the first of April LiveJournal suggested that you Invite your friends back to LiveJournal!. That this attempt to regain some of their eyeballs they've lost over a number of bonehead moves and updates, especially since LiveJournal Release 88 (see icon above), ON THE FIRST OF APRIL, tells you why I choose to help my three readers by directing them first to the Dreamwidth post, but still give them the LiveJournal option.

For those of you on LiveJournal, most of my (very few) comments I get on posts come on LJ. Or Facebook. Only a few on DW. So I am on LiveJournal checking Recent Comments and Friends Page daily. Rest assured, that's not going to change.

Whichever is convenient for you, the dear reader. But I did want to mention the change.

That is all.

Dr. Phil

*** NOTE: There is a small window of time where I have to post a new entry to DW and the following fields don't have the link addresses in them yet, because the post number isn't assigned until it's posted... And then I have to update it. Got it? (grin)

Posted on Dreamwidth
Crossposted on LiveJournal

An Amusing Meme Used Before

Which I got from Mary Robinette Kowalski in 2011:

This is one of my favorite memes. It’s a look at the last year, through the first line of my first blog post of each month.

The thing about LJ memes is that you don't always know where it'll take you, so I'm willing to give this another try. I modified this, giving the blog title and the first line(s) or paragraph(s). This is all cut-and-paste, typos and all. If you want to see the context or whole posts, or just the whole year, you can go to my 2014 LiveJournal page or 2014 Dreamwidth page.

Dr. Phil's First Lines of 2014

1 -- Happy -- I am home.

I am healthy.

I can walk.

I can stand.

2 -- Pay Attention! -- But I Worked Five Days

Long strange week. Monday was a snow day. Tuesday was half a snow day -- GVSU closed but WMU didn't. I guess that makes Monday three-quarters of a snow day, since WMU closed and GVSU closed at 2pm. Anyway, on Tuesday I declared it a Too Dangerous To Drive day. Lest you think that this made it a three day work week for us, Mrs. Dr. Phil busied herself by reviewing for a journal and other stuff for classes. I worked and even Skyped in my lecture on Tuesday.

3 -- The Long And Short -- Wavelengths, that is.

I've been meaning to do this for a long time. I have two sibling camera setups. The Nikon D100R (a D100 converted to infrared use) with a 28-80mm f3.5-5.6D (New) AF-NIKKOR and a regular D100 with a 28-80mm f3.3-5.6G AF-NIKKOR. And I wanted to shoot them essentially side-by-side or rather serially, so I can see the same image in visible and IR

4 -- Ah, Deadlines -- What's the quote? I love deadlines -- I love the sound they make whooshing by.

Nice of the Kindle Fire HD spellchecker to have "whooshing."

5 -- May Day May Day May Day -- It's the First of May. 2014. We've managed to get through an odd April, only to have May weather start out equally unsettled.

6 -- The News We Knew Would Come -- By now everyone has probably heard the news. Checked my Friends feed this morning on LJ and there was official news about Jay Lake and his long battle with cancer.

Jay passed this morning, June 1 at 5:45 (PDT). Lisa and friends were with him. He will be missed.

Jay Lake had many, many friends -- he was generous with his time. And thousands more who, like me, saw him at a few cons and voraciously read his daily blog posts. His Link Salad -- a term I stole for my Astronomy classes -- was a daily fixture. And several times items I came up with were linked by Jay.

7 -- HBO 20 -- Lost In Space -- The Matrix -- Twentieth session: Lost In Space (conclusion)
There is a semi-time travel motif to the third act of Lost In Space. And they even manage an Omega-13 do-over. The second act is a Don't Go Down Into The Basement movie. Hint: you have a giant robot and have found a strange ship which may be from the future with no people but the power is on. Send the damn robot.

Any signs of intelligence in the first act are pretty much gone by the third.

8 -- Please Release Me Let Go... I Don't Love You Anymore... -- As if there aren't enough reasons to hate phones and telemarketers, there's a new and disturbing issue that has been building for a couple of years... And getting worse.

9 -- The Dread Pirate Roberts Goes To College -- Most weekends we do movies on Saturday. But this is a three-day weekend -- the last three-day weekend of the year -- and the official end of summer. So with rain forecast as possible on Saturday and Monday, we decided to see what the options were for Sunday. There's the new Daniel Radcliffe movie, but at Celebration North it would be in the evening, otherwise we'd have to go to Rivertown. We've talked about seeing Guardians of the Galaxy again, but that's a low priority. In the end, there was one amazing movie to see. A little early, so we didn't finish the Sunday paper first, but a nice day for a drive.

10 -- Foreign Objects / Aliens / What The Hell...? II -- Huh. It happened again.

While up at Michigan Tech, there was a new bruise, area of bleeding, but on the back and side of the heel, not the bottom. Mrs. Dr. Phil had joked that maybe it was that other missing piece of hydraferra blue that went missing trying to get out. But really, we thought it was irritation of resting on the back of the heel in the AFO orthotic during twelve hours of driving.

11 -- A New Theory -- Thursday morning gas was $2.96.9/gallon for regular, $3.11.9/gal for midgrade. No coupon. (Sigh)

12 -- It's Official -- Sabbatical 2.0 -- I'm adjunct. I don't get sabbaticals, unless I want to declare one.

Statistics

Health -- 3
Teaching -- 2
Writing -- 2
Rants -- 2
Other Topics -- 3

Of course cherry picking just the first post of the month misses lots. But it's like posting the first lines of story -- you never know what you get. And it amuses me.

Dr. Phil

Posted on Dreamwidth
Crossposted on LiveJournal

An Amusing Meme

via maryrobinette Mary Kowal Robinette:

First lines of 2011

This is one of my favorite memes. It’s a look at the last year, through the first line of my first blog post of each month.

The thing about LJ memes is that you don't always know where it'll take you, so I'm willing to try. I quickly modified this, since my blogging format includes boldface headers to sections, so I give you the header and first line after that, though not the blog entry title. I also didn't include any links. This is all cut-and-paste, typos and all. If you want to see the context or whole posts, or just the whole year, you can go to my 2011 LiveJournal page or 2011 Dreamwidth page. (Yes, when I added Dreamwidth in late December I ported over the whole LJ blog, comments and all, and currently crosspost between LJ and DW.)

Dr. Phil's First Lines of 2011

01 -- Scarce -- Yeah, I haven't posted much in the last six weeks or so.

02 -- IT'S THE END OF THE WORLD -- Well, the weather people in West Michigan have been hyping this winter storm for nearly a week.

03 -- Yes, I've Been Very Quiet Here Lately -- I just made it back from my third round-trip drive to Greensboro NC, after the ones on Thanksgiving and New Years.

04 -- Ah, The Capriciousness Of Reality -- As we currently watch our local PBS rerun of Ken Burns' awesome The Civil War, the men's NCAA Division I basketball championship has just gotten underway.

05 -- Forty Years Ago... -- Saturday 1 May 1971, the results of the 1970 Railpax bill are the formal start of operations of the National Rail Passenger Corporation, more commonly known as Amtrak.

06 -- Mmm... Pizza -- As regular readers and friends of Dr. Phil know, I am a huge fan of Chicago stuffed pizza.

07 -- Happy Canada Day! -- It's July 1st and that begins a whole month of national holidays.

08 -- Some Awesomeness -- jimhines posted about people who are awesome.

09 -- Milestones Continue To Accumulate -- Today, Saturday 3 September 2011, I shipped my 400th submission to any market.

10 -- October Already? -- September ended cold and rainy and gusty.

11 -- Realms of Fantasy Closing -- I've already written this obituary -- twice -- here and here.

12 -- Writers of the Future 4th Quarter 2011 -- Just got an email from Joni Labaqui that my story "Andromache" has earned a Silver Honorable Mention in the Q4 2011 WOTF contest.

Statistics

Writing -- 4
After Being On The Road -- 2
Weather -- 2
Other Topics -- 4

Though these don't directly mention teaching, my long commute means I have to stay weather aware, especially in the winter. And in 2011 I made four road trips to Greensboro and one to Atlanta. Since each of those road trips run about ten days and four days of driving, I spent over a month and a half on the road in the service of my family during 2011. And writing!

Well that was amusing to me. (grin) Later I should repeat an old meme -- give the first lines or first paragraphs -- of the stories I worked on in 2011. What about you?

Dr. Phil

Warily Looking Around To See If The Buzzards Are Circling Yet

Dreamwidth is bringing new servers online.

To handle the load of setting up new accounts.

And it pisses me off that LiveJournal doesn't seem to understand the damage they've done.

The thing about blogs, communities and social media is that they become personal. It's how we access friends. News. Business.

Dr. Phil

PS- Dreamwidth has been letting users know about progress and delays with traffic and importing LJ sites. Typical comment: "You're awesome, DW staff! ".

Now go to LJ's latest news and look at those comments.

Do the night.