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Post by Afgncaap5 on Jan 1, 2009 0:40:31 GMT -5
While mumms pointed out that he stole the idea, my thought is that good ideas are worth stealing.
Anyway, on with the blog.
It's turning into the New Year as I post this. I'm excited and a little bit scared, I admit. Sure, I'll be the same person when I wake tomorrow that I was when I woke today, but it's still neat to think that a year has passed since this time last year (that's true no matter when you eventually read this. Yes, I'm talking to you.
This last year, I've seen a lot of good and bad things in my life. I feel like I'm actually becoming a writer. I mean, sure, I've always said that I wanted to be a writer. But the past few months, I actually feel as though I've been, you know, writing. And that the stuff I've been writing hasn't been too terrible.
I also feel a little scared about the job and money. I mean, it's not a great job, but the guy who gave it to me has been willing to let me keep it even though times have been tough all around. So, I do hope that I can find a better position somewhere else, much as I love the folks working where I'm at now. Hopefully something where I can entertain people in some way, but I'm not too picky.
Not sure what else to say. Here we are at the new year, and we're halfway through the twelve days of Christmas. I don't want to push Christmas down anyone's throat, but at the same time I think it's a time when people do tend to act nicer towards each other.
So maybe it's not a terrible thing to remind people that Christmas lasts all the way through January? I mean, the commercial part of Christmas is well over, and the stress levels are receding. On the other hand, if people knew just how long Christmas lasted and the knowledge was widespread, might that part of Christmas become commercial too? Impossible to say for sure, though marketers know how to pounce on trends (or to create ficticious ones. I mean, Sweetness Day or Sweetest Day or whatever it's called? What's up with that?)
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Post by Afgncaap5 on Jan 1, 2009 0:42:23 GMT -5
I'll just go and reserve this second post as the "table of contents" post that mumms mentioned in the rules for this subboard. Not sure if I'll need it, but we'll see.
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Post by mummifiedstalin on Jan 1, 2009 23:21:47 GMT -5
While mumms pointed out that he stole the idea, my thought is that good ideas are worth stealing. Theft...imitation...flattery...there's no real difference. As for Christmas seeming "over," I blame that on residual childhood feelings that Christmas is done when the presents are done. People who can't stay with the season past the day of gifts are just keeping that materialistic spirit alive! But then, I have been accused of remaining jolly for far too long.
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Post by Afgncaap5 on Jan 2, 2009 20:04:47 GMT -5
Better jolly for too long than too little.
Otherwise you get visited by ghosts who terrorize you until you *are* jolly.
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Post by Afgncaap5 on Jan 2, 2009 20:11:21 GMT -5
Lost Lexicon alert!
When I was really little...kindergarten, maybe later than that...someone told me that sometimes, when the stars are right and the world smiles upon you, the letter W can be a vowel.
It's hyper rare. More rare than Y (and let's be honest, is the usage of Y as a vowel *really* too uncommon? It's more that Y is a sort of either/or thing.)
For years I searched for times when W was a vowel, but couldn't find anything. The closest I got were those times where W acts as a sort of...vowel amplifier? It served to help out other vowels, but was never a vowel itself. So I began to think that that, perhaps, was what this guy meant.
But now, friends, I can tell you that I have such a word. A word where W is indisputably a vowel.
Crwm!
That's right, Crwm. It's a word that, at first glance, looks like a typo, but no, it's a real word! It's a word for a special type of stringed instrument. From the descriptions I've gotten, it's sort of like a mandolin or other similar archaic guitar-type stringed instrument.
So relax friends, Crwm is out there, and W finally has its chance to shine as a vowel. More importantly, it's renewed my vigor to go and search for other words where W is a vowel.
So, fellow language nerds, rejoice!
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Post by CBG on Jan 4, 2009 9:58:54 GMT -5
HAZZAH!
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Post by Afgncaap5 on Jan 5, 2009 16:52:49 GMT -5
Another thing to celebrate: I just activated the new cell phone that someone gave me on the 4th Day of Christmas! I can finally join the cell phone bandwagon.
Which means that someone's going to invent a newer, more hip method of communication. Probably like the iPhone but better.
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Post by mylungswereaching on Jan 8, 2009 11:27:57 GMT -5
Lost Lexicon alert! When I was really little...kindergarten, maybe later than that...someone told me that sometimes, when the stars are right and the world smiles upon you, the letter W can be a vowel. It's hyper rare. More rare than Y (and let's be honest, is the usage of Y as a vowel *really* too uncommon? It's more that Y is a sort of either/or thing.) For years I searched for times when W was a vowel, but couldn't find anything. The closest I got were those times where W acts as a sort of...vowel amplifier? It served to help out other vowels, but was never a vowel itself. So I began to think that that, perhaps, was what this guy meant. But now, friends, I can tell you that I have such a word. A word where W is indisputably a vowel. Crwm! That's right, Crwm. It's a word that, at first glance, looks like a typo, but no, it's a real word! It's a word for a special type of stringed instrument. From the descriptions I've gotten, it's sort of like a mandolin or other similar archaic guitar-type stringed instrument. So relax friends, Crwm is out there, and W finally has its chance to shine as a vowel. More importantly, it's renewed my vigor to go and search for other words where W is a vowel. So, fellow language nerds, rejoice! Thank you. I remember aeiow and sometimes y and sometimes w from when I was a kid and when I've mentioned it to other people they thought I was crazy. Now I've got some great words to use in scrabble. I found out that the words that use W as a vowel were originally Welch.
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Post by CBG on Jan 9, 2009 8:14:51 GMT -5
You mean Wlch.
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Post by Afgncaap5 on Jan 10, 2009 21:59:08 GMT -5
Yeah, I'm learning that Welch words are the ones to go to when you need W as a vowel. Whenever I've spoken to people about my findings this last week, they seem all impressed...until I say that a Crwm is a Welch instrument, and then they roll their eyes and say, "Oh, well yeah, if you're gonna count Welsh words. I thought you meant English."
I would argue, though, that the names of things, until they are given an English word to describe them, count as English words.
I mean, how many Latin words are in the common vernacular? Or German? Gesseundheit (I refuse to look it up to see how it's actually spelled) is an incredibly common phrase.
By the same token, I think that counting established proper names should count for this type of thing. Quite some time ago, I learned that there are a whopping 6 words that can only be spelled with one letter.
A and I are ones that everyone know. O is a bit more obscure (mainly used by poetical people who are trying to say "Oh") but isn't unknown.
Then it gets interesting with Q being an archaic word for a type of obsolete Brittish coin.
Then the last two words are Y and E, and these are the ones that everyone disputes. E is a town in Michigan, and Y is a river in either Scotland or Ireland (I forget which one just at the moment.) At this point people normally sigh and say, "You can't go around saying that proper nouns count. Otherwise I'm going to name my car W and then you can count W as a single letter word. We'll call it a single letter word from Wales if you like."
My argument is that a substantial number of people have to acknowledge the word, though. Y has been the name of that river for quite a long time, and it is listed thusly on a decent number of maps. Plus E is a town, and I gather that people actually, you know, live there, and living there kind of acknowledges the town's name in my opinion.
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Post by Afgncaap5 on Jan 10, 2009 22:24:40 GMT -5
Okay, so far I've had thoughts on Christmas and a fun little conversation about the English language. Proving now that I don't have any specific goal or purpose for this thread, I figured it would behoove us all if I started something called... [glow=red,2,300]THIS! WEEK! IN! WEBCOMICS!!![/glow] Okay, webcomics fans, it's time to give you my thoughts on the heights of what I read. As regular viewers of our 1 broadcasts so far know, I read approximately 30 webcomics regularly (with others that I have retired and others waiting for me to have a clear afternoon to tear through their archives.) Naturally, spoilers will be lurking around every corner and will attack without warning. So, what's worth taking a look at? Wait no longer... My highlight of the week? Sluggy Freelance! Holy freakin' cow, this story's got Oasis, heretiCorp, AND Sam the Vampire? I knew that Pete said this was gonna be his biggest story in a while, but come on man, that's so much awesome story potential right there. In my mind, this story can't go wrong. Few Sluggy fans think that "That Which Redeems" was bad, and while many were put off by the "Oceans Unmoving" arc, I personally thought it was an amazingly imaginative (and intriguingly drawn) story (so it always surprised me that Pete himself said that he felt Oceans Unmoving was too slow. What gives, Pete? Stick to your guns!) Regardless, so far in this story we've had Dr. Schlock continuing to fit into his bad guy role at heretiCorp and Sam back on the run from other vampires. Not much else I can say. (Note: new viewers will likely be very confused by the current story at sluggy.com. While I recommend Sluggy to everyone, don't hit the ground running. Enter it slowly...slowly...) Next up, on the comedy watch? Well, while Shortpacked!'s current story is amazing to watch unfold (more on that below) my vote will go to The Adventures of Dr. McNinja. A new story is beginning, and while I liked the whole year we took to see McNinja hunting Dracula, I'm kinda glad to be moving away from it. This story, titled "Death Volley," hasn't really indicated what directions it's gonna go in yet, but I highly recommend taking a look at it (and unlike Sluggy Freelance, Dr. McNinja *is* something you can hit the ground running on. ...as long as you're willing to get a little bumped and bruised and such.) Adventure watch? A few tough calls on this one, but...I'm going to give the nod to the final installment of The Wotch's latest story. The story ended well, with all the right mixes of of closure mixed with "What? How dare you end the story like that! I gotta wait a whole weekend now?! GRRRR!" And I feel incredibly sorry about Ivan's plight. I like it when Anne takes a story to just let the main characters relax a bit, something that most writers don't stand for. And finally, let's end it with a Blank Label watch, because the six (well, five...) comics from the Blank Label creators have been having a pretty interesting week. Greg Dean of Real Life Comics is still settling into his new apartment, the high space station drama at Schlock Mercenary is going hilarious as the fire near the dangerous fullerene deposits has forced Captain Tagon into action, Shortpacked! is at its wild best with Sydney Yu's attempted revenge on the toy store while Galasso is still locked in his cage, and Monica (and friends) at Wapsi Square are getting closer to the Calendar Machine after Monica's near fatal encounter with the smugglers. About the only comic that I'm not singing the praises of just now (apart from Melonpool which hasn't updated in forever) is Ugly Hill. However, the story is still just beginning for all the monsters at Ugly Hill, so I expect it's gonna shine once it gets rolling.
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Post by Afgncaap5 on Jan 14, 2009 3:12:38 GMT -5
Well, I just learned that a few of the webcomics I read qualify for a new Hugo category! That’s right, the humble world of webcomics qualifies for the most prestigious award that sci-fi has to offer! And I’d like to give special attention to two of them. First of all, Phil and Kaja Foglio have an elligible story. Their 8th volume of the Girl Genius comic, “Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones” is beautifully drawn and magnificently written (which isn’t really a surprise as it is, after all, a Girl Genius comic). The story is a fun and slightly creepy adventure. The other story I’d like to point out is Howard Taylor’s “Schlock Mercenary: The Body Politic.” Now, while Howard’s artistry isn’t quite as breathtaking as what you see in Girl Genius (by his own admission), and while his stories have comedic elements highly infused throughout all the serialized drama, I think that it actually surpasses Girl Genius in a few ways. To begin with, while both stories are fun and adventurous romps through science fiction, I think that Howard Taylor’s work meets more of the qualification for the “science” half of the science fiction combo. Girl Genius is a gaslight fantasy, a sort of wild extrapolation of what Jules Verne might have given us. A lot of the sci-fi elements within are actually well-disguised elements of fantasy that hide behind the “Heisenburg Compensator Gambit.” (Star Trek fans and physics students probably know what I’m talking about when I mention Heisenburg Compensators, and the physics students could probably tell you why the name sounds sciencey but is in fact fantasyey.) Now, that isn’t to say that Schlock Mercenary is completely devoid of Fantasy elements, especially not considering the story that The Body Politic presents. Though in general, Taylor’s military space opera has a firmer rooting in science than the sparks and mad scientist who play in Studio Foglio’s gaslight world. Still, that’s the rub isn’t it? It’s very tempting for me to judge the Entire story of Schlock Mercenary against the Entire story of Girl Genius, but that’s not what’s elligible. The elligibility falls to fairly well defined aspects of those two stories, chapters within the larger framework. Regardless, I would love it if either of these webcomics won a Hugo. That would rock so many kinds of world. Seriously, M Class on down. For those who might be interested in reading these two stories that I mention (though there are, of course, other options. I should look into it and see if the Zap! webcomic would qualify in any way…), here’s a couple links. Knock yerself out. And if you’ve never read Schlock Mercenary or Girl Genius (or Zap!) before? Then you’re in for a major treat. Here be the stories themselves… www.schlockmercenary.com/d/20070520.htmlwww.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20080204And here be the websites proper. www.schlockmercenary.comwww.girlgeniusonline.comwww.zapinspace.com/And for the record, Howard Taylor has started offering this particular story for a free download to anyone who doesn’t want to go through the hassle of clicking through his archives. Excellent move, if you ask me (I initially said, “Dude, doesn’t a large part of your income depend on people buying your books?” Then I said, “Hey, self, the books are already available easily anyway, this won’t hurt the dead tree sales.”) www.schlockmercenary.com/TBPHugo.pdfSo, I hope you enjoy the worlds of Schlock Mercenary and Girl Genius! Congrats to both. Here’s hoping that a webcomic takes home a Hugo! Seriously, even if it’s a webcomic that I never read I’ll probably cheer for joy. Though yeah, it’d be more awesome if it was one that I did.
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Post by Mighty Jack on Jan 14, 2009 5:56:05 GMT -5
I freely admit that when it comes to comics I'm very narrow minded. I like superheros. I'm a caped crusader geek and I make no apologies about that.
Buuut every once in a while someone will turn my head and get me reading something different (Gaiman's Sandman, Alan Moore's work). So I took a gander. Girl Genius looks very sharp, I have a hard time reading comics on the 'puter but I will definitely dig into this more fully.
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Post by Afgncaap5 on Jan 14, 2009 19:59:22 GMT -5
Well, if it helps any, Girl Genius wasn't originally a webcomic. Girl Genius began as an independantly published graphic novel that had a volume published every year or so. About three years ago, Phil and Kaja Foglio decided to experiment by manually turning it into a webcomic. So now, in addition to the volume that comes out roughly once a year, they also get the regular income that a webcomic gets (in, in fact, a webcomic's income could be called regular.)
Schlock Mercenary, meanwhile, has always been a webcomic, but also appreciates the use of Dead Tree Editions. Recently Howard Taylor has started releasing the major storylines into books (which fit because they were in book form in his mind when he wrote them anyway, with the exception of the first couple of years.) So far his published books include The Tub of Happiness, The Terraport Wars, Under New Management and The Blackness Between.
So if reading a comic strip online is too antithetical to your idea of what a comic is all about, then I'd highly recommend buying one of their handy-dandy dead tree editions. For Schlock Mercenary I think my favorite edition would be The Terraport Wars, but it might not be the best to start with. The Blackness Between would probably be a good starter.
And for Girl Genius, I'd recommend starting at the beginning. Though honestly, no matter where you start, you'll feel like you've been dropped right in the middle of something that you should understand more of (which is why I love it so much. The world is so clearly defined beyond what we get to see.)
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Post by Mighty Jack on Jan 15, 2009 0:48:54 GMT -5
Oh no, it's nothing about ethics, it's about my eyes. Even with my glasses on I get headaches if I stare at a computer screen and read for too long. I tried to read a Jane Austen book online and just couldn't do it, I had to go buy it in book form (which is easier for laying back and reading in bed too, my fav place to kick back and curl with with a novel or comic)
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