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Hey, LiveJournal legal brain trust: riddle me this. You know that guy in Cleveland, Anthony Sowell, who's suspected of being this horrible serial killer? They've found the remains of at least 11 people in his house, but he's only being charged with 5 murders.

What's the story? Do they think the other six bodies were there when he moved in? I mean, I know a D.A. will only charge the crimes he thinks he can get a conviction for, but it seems like if you can prove the dude killed five people, it shouldn't be hard to convince a jury to tack on the other six corpses you found in his house. Or is it some kind of paperwork thing, where they've only charged him with five murders so far?

Your help would be appreciated in clarifying this matter.

Requests aren't done, they will be popping up as we go, but honestly I do not need annnyymooreee! I was looking at the Wonder Women that I drew last year and started drawing her again, because she's pretty fun to draw, and surly Wonder Woman here came out. Don't settle for being a tits and tits heroine ladies, be yourself! Poor Nibbles.


Hey Montreal! I'm going to be at Expozine this weekend! You should come.

Store!

Amy and Laura ran 13.5 miles. Kyle and I took photos, wrangled kids, and lamented our cardio inferiority.

The whole set:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/pantharos/sets/72157622646072767/
 

When I'm the only one here, I will sometimes pick up the general line, I never know what is going to come my way. We always say, if you have a problem call the help desk, but if you have a project call us.

Caller: Hi. I have a memorial exhibit to be installed in Germany, where we are projecting visuals onto a physical book and we decided we wanted an audio track. We're editing in Final Cut, but here's the trick, we want to have both an english and german track running simultaneously to two different headphones. It's needs to be simple because we don't have lots of time or equipment. But is also has to be in sync with the visuals, and self service.

Me: OK well, I know very little about Final Cut, but I know you can place both audio tracks in the project appropriately and send one to the left channel and the other to the right channel, separate an ordinary pair of headphones, so that each person has only one side, and that should give you the effect with no other hassles. That is, if your project can tolerate having one-eared headphones.

Caller: Aaaahhhhh! That would do it, wouldn't it. Great thanks.

Okay, you know what? I've held out for nearly three and a half months now, but I am nearly at my breaking point (even though we are now in the home stretch). I am SICK of not having my own computer to work on. There are huge disadvantages to sharing a computer that you just really don't even think of until you have to do it yourself. I HATE logging out of everything every time I walk away from the computer, because the hell I'm leaving my email accounts vulnerable to prying eyes. And on your average day? I need to be logged into LJ, JournalFen, Yahoo email, Gmail (with Reader and Documents), Twitter, Delicious for bookmarks, Pandora, a couple of message boards, and my file storage account; my life would be infinitely easier if I could just stay logged in. So I HATE dumping the cache and the cookies and the browsing history and even the SEARCH history if I so much as duck out for a glass of tea, and I HAVE to do it, because you know why? You know why? Researching the @#$%*&@ e-book footnotes, that's why. If I didn't, you'd go to the Google drop-down search box and get "bella's felted womb," "dead from coke," "edward lipstick," "gq motherfucker," "total eclipse sex scene," 5000 Twilight articles, and "twincest." And there is NO WAY I am letting my family know I spent that much time looking up shit about Twilight.

I can't do a whole hell of a lot on this computer either, since it's like eight years old as it is--in excellent condition, but it's only got 30GB storage, you know? You can infer from that what the processor thingamawhatever speed must be like. It just can't do a lot. It can't handle Skype, for example. And I don't have any of my pet programs (Semagic for LJ, TweetDeck, ACDSee photo organizing, and probably a ton of others I've forgotten because IT'S BEEN SO LONG SINCE I'VE USED THEM), because the computer either can't handle a given program or it can't handle them all together. And we THOUGHT it had Photoshop, but apparently not, and while I'm pretty handy on that, I apparently am too stupid to operate MS Paint. People keep telling me how to crop and I just. can't. manage it. And then I go back to Firefox and accidentally hit "home" instead of "new tab" and I lose my entire LJ entry draft, because whenever it tries to recover a "saved" draft, it gives me the previous entry I already posted. HATRED.

And then I can't really save images (no room, plus other people looking at my shit) or watch videos (I hate being walked in on while I'm trying to watch whatever weird-ass thing someone just linked on Twitter. Mostly I just don't have time because I'm under the gun to get anything done before someone else needs the computer), assuming I could get the video to work at all. Because I physically can't get time at the computer as much as I'd like, my Google Reader news items just sit and pile up, so every morning I have "1000+," and one day I cleared 600 items and STILL had 1000+. I keep having to star things I want to go back and use in the footnotes or save pictures from, and I am TIRED OF IT.

If I didn't have the iBella--which at least has a camera, an mp3 player, and apps for Twitter, Pandora and my email that I DON'T HAVE TO LOG OUT OF--I would have gone insane by now. The day I figured out how to copy-paste links on my phone, I nearly wept for joy. Even there, I can't really answer emails or LJ comments at any length--if it's going to be a short reply, I can tap it out with a minimum of head-meeting-wall, but y'all know how wordy I am. We get to more than two sentences and I just can't manage it; I have to wait to answer until I get to the (shared) (family) computer. And then I have to log into umpteen thousand things all over again but then someone else needs the computer RIGHT NOW and I have to dump everything and hope no one noticed that I was at that moment searching "vampire sex toys." Oh, and blip.fm just doesn't work on the iPhone at all. RAAAAAAAGE.

Only one more week until [New Computer's Name] arrives. I will console myself with a peppermint chocolate chip milkshake from Chick-fil-A, I think.


ETA: THE MILKSHAKE MACHINE IS DOWN

WHY GOD WHY


(Zomg e-book! The Annotated Movies in Fifteen Minutes: Wizards!)

We haven't had one of these in a while...

Poll #1482931 Critical End of Decade Poll Time is Now
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 65

Yes, this is truly a golden age for...

2009 is/is not the last year of the 2000s.

I am going to make the following my personal crusade in 2010:

My favorite fictional caveman is:

Who should win Time Magazine's Man Of the Year?

Feed twice daily.
Empty skimmer overflow & replace with fresh saltwater when necessary, about once every two days.
Supplement alkalinity when it needs it -- about once every four days.
Once a week, or therabouts, refill my top-off bucket and mix in kalkwasser.
Scrape the tank walls once or twice a week, depending on how lazy I am.
Make new saltwater when necessary, about once every two weeks.
Check salinity, calcium once a month.
Once a month, clean the filter sponge on the return pump.
5 gallon water change once a month or two.
Once every three months or so, clean out circulation pumps.

Note the nearly-complete lack of testing or daily maintenance other than feeding. I used to do water changes once every two weeks, but by emptying the skimmer overflow and replacing that with new saltwater, I effectively do small, rolling water changes over the course of the week.

I ~never check alkalinity; I just go by the pH and the amount of fluctuation that occurs due to the day/night cycles in the display tank. Since pH is linked to alkalinity levels, it serves as a reliable indication of when it's too low -- but you can't tell anything from a point test, you need to look at the trends. What this generally means is that when the pH goes below 8.1 in the middle of the night, or if it's not up to about 8.45 by the end of the day, I add alk. Both calcium and alkalinity are provided through the kalkwasser in the top-off water; however, the tank seems to lose alk faster than it loses calcium.

Oh, and I've gotta pull out frags when necessary -- about once every month and a half to two months for the Xenia, significantly less time for everything else.

...Anybody in my area want some Xenia?

Parris will soon be on her way home to take care of the cats, before they start rioting and have wild parties. So I'm pressing on by myself. Arrived in London a few hours ago. Signing at Forbidden Planet on the 11th.

Current Mood: lonely

Well, I used a lot of the suggestions that came my way from that post the other day! I was pretty pleased with the turnout of readers for that question, I must admit. I guess it's because you hear a lot that people don't give a darn about history in this country, if depressing yearly polls from the Dominion Institute mean anything, but it's clearly not the case among my livejournal followers. You guys are great!

I had to do a general sweep that involved a good range of places, professions, backgrounds and time periods, so you know, not everyone's favorite author is going to be in there but I sure did like the range in suggestions. Looking at it now I wish I had someone from the NWT (not one! for shame) and New Brunswick. Stompin Tom is from New Brunswick but he's also sort of from everywhere.  I could have put the Irvings in there, I think they control history in NB as well as anything else.

I was all crazed out with strep throat while I did this, but listening to Radiolab shows and a burning passion for Canada I guess(?) kept me going.  You can find the image in today's National Post, along with an article about the Historica/Dominion merger! Interesting stuff.


( picture is under the cut because it's huge )


Here is the legend, the rows are sort of wonky but you'll figure it out:

Row One (bottom):
James Wolfe, Louis-Joseph de Montcalm, David Suzuki, Louis-Joseph Papineau, John A. Macdonald, Terry Fox
Row Two
Emily Carr, Joseph Howe, Joey Smallwood, Robert Bartlett, Louis Riel, Joy Kogawa
Row Three
Marshall McLuhan, Samuel de Champlain, Marilyn Bell, Wayne Gretzky, Emily Murphy
Row Four
Rene Levesque, Sam Steele, Farley Mowat, L.M. Montgomery, Susanna Moodie and Catherine Parr Trail, John McCrae
Row Five
Pitikwahanapiwiyin (Poundmaker), Oscar Peterson, Rush, Pierre Berton
Row Six
Les Filles du Roi, Mary Pickford, Skookum Jim Mason
Row Seven
Charles Best, Frederick Banting, Pauline Johnson, Mordecai Richler, Tecumseh, Stompin’ Tom Connors
Row Eight
William Hall, Tommy Douglas, Marc Garneau, Roberta Bondar, Rosemary Brown, John Diefenbaker
Row Nine
Shanawdithit, Louis de Buade de Frontenac, David Thompson, William Shatner

More to come, later

Depression, I have often said, is like an influenza of the soul. A spiritual hamthrax, if you will. I has it. Do not want.

It's actually starting to worry me a little, the intensity of this go-round--it's not the usual stone-cold ennui. Normally I'm not this bad off until after New Year's (well, except for the pity party I throw myself every year in the weeks leading up to my birthday), and, again: that's more of a seasonal apathy-funk. This involves a lot of dread and distress and, at times, actual panic involved. I have to think this is because things are just generally bad around here at the moment, and have been for a good while now. Two different family members are having job-related crises, for example. I'm having performance anxiety in terms of trying to write, I don't have a dependable place to work, I'm just generally very unhappy. But it's taking on a hysterical edge that makes me uncomfortable--I keep having urges to act out in some way. I don't mean harm myself or anyone else; I mean, like, throw a gigantic melodramatic fit du shit. I know I had that minor meltdown where I started throwing shit earlier this summer, but that is the ONLY TIME IN MY LIFE I have ever done anything like that. So I'm not used to having the urge to, like, flounce from the internet for the hell of it or something. And that's why I'm sitting here talking about it so calmly, because I feel like the only way to combat irrationality is with detachment. Take an overview of the thing, recognize what you're doing, shove it into the light of day. So... yeah.

(By the way, laptop has been ordered; money has cleared checking account. It will take about two weeks from November 3rd for Dell to build and ship it, what with the custom art and the crazy-ass 17" facial recognition screen. I don't even know. I spent a ridiculous, extravagant amount of money because I could, and it felt GOOD.)

A little Twi-spam for the hell of it, since Sparklemas is fast approaching:

( T-REX, VAMPIRES CAN HAVE KIDS AND LITTLE DINOSAUR VAMPIRES SOUNDS PRETTY CUTE TO ME )


(Zomg e-book! The Annotated Movies in Fifteen Minutes: Wizards!)

People sometimes ask me, “Leonard, if you’re so smart, why don’t you run your own business?” Except they leave out the part about me being smart. My answer is multifaceted.

1. I do run my own business; I am a freelance writer. Just because I don’t have any employees doesn’t mean it’s not a business; just ask the IRS. Er, actually, on second thought, please don’t ask the IRS, or even mention my name around them.

2. It’s not that I don’t have any ideas about running my own business; it’s just that they’re all stupid. I tend to judge ideas I come up with for new products not by how well they would sell, but by whether or not they are hilarious.

3. My own personal prejudices interfere with most of the skills one needs to run a business. I am bad with money, I don’t like telling people what to do, and I get along poorly with others, all of which are essential skills for running a business; more specifically, my occasional urges to open up a bistro are stymied by my logistical deficiencies, and I always think it would be fun to run a bar, but the older I get, the less I relish the idea of staying up until 4AM every day.

4. Most of the businesses I would be interested in starting are guaranteed money-losers (starting a magazine, opening an independent bookstore, running a small press) or so abstract they would be unlikely to attract customers.

5. Being my own boss would mean working more, not less.

All that said, if you have a good idea for a small business, and are interested in 'partnering' with me, please PayPal a large sum of money to leonard dot pierce at gmail dot com, and I promise to spend some time at a tropical resort hotel thinking about your idea.

Who's been putting minicomics together?

spoilers removed

And here we are in Dublin. Ireland has been exciting but exhausting. We had a huge turnout last night for the signing at Eason's, with a queue that seemed to go on forever, but I finally scrawled everyone into submission, and afterwards I signed all the stock as well. If you missed the signing, or happen to live a thousand leagues away, you can still get an autographed copy of the SONGS OF THE DYING EARTH hardcover or any of the Ice & Fire paperbacks by phoning, emailing, or dropping by Eason's on O'Connell Street. They even have a few trade paperbacks of DREAMSONGS.

Afterwards we adjourned to a nearby pub for a lively evening of Guinness and conversation with the local fans. I met the good folk who will be running next year's Octocon, where I'll be GOH, and hoisted a few with the hardy survivors of the Eason's event. Didn't stagger back to the our hotel till after midnight, by which time Temple Bar was roaring. Ah, if only I were twenty years younger...

The Belfast event on Tuesday was also a hoot and a half. The crowd was much bigger at Dublin, but in Belfast some of the cast of the HBO pilot dropped by to sign books and meet the fans as well. My thanks to Ron Donachie, Richard Madden (Best Dressed Man in Scotland), Alfie Allen, Kit Harington, Maisie Williams and Sophie Turner (and their moms) for joining the festivities. And to the lovely Ros, Esme Bianco, who dropped by McHughes afterwards for the moot. Matthew Hughes, one of the authors who contributed to our Vance tribute anthology, also turned up at Eason's to help me sign SONGS OF THE DYING EARTH.

In between signing and mooting, I've been hanging round the shoot, trying not to get underfoot. "How is it going?" everyone wants to know. I think it's going great. Wednesday's location was amazing, so real I could hardly tell where the real castle ended and our fake castle began. I saw Bran and Tommen swatting at each other in the yard, Joffrey taunting Robb, the Hound growling at Ser Rodrik, while Arya displayed her wretched needlework to Jon above, and it all looked wonderful. Saw some of the footage from the crypts too, and that looked amazing as well. Yes, some things are not exactly as they were in the books, that's inevitable with any adaptation... but these are my characters and this is my story, and it's thrilling to see 'em come to life.

Last night in Belfast I got to meet two more of the cast, quite unexpectedly. Some of the Moroccan players were in Ireland for costume fittings. I ran into Ian McNeice for a brief moment outside the hotel, as we were waiting for our rides, and the night before we bumped into Dany -- the amazing Tamzin Merchant, who is even more beautiful in person than she is on screen -- into the dining room. What a terrific cast Nina Gold has assembled.

Also toured the Paint Hall, though we didn't do any shooting there while I was in Belfast. Some of our sets are going up, and look great. And in another part of the building the huge castle sets from the big budget (compared to us, anyway) feature YOUR HIGHNESS are still standing. Their great hall is pretty eye-popping and they built an impressive castle yard as well.

Tomorrow I'm off to London . Signing at Forbidden Planet on the 11th, Then it's off to Marrakech.

Life is magical and full of joy (but no, I have not been seeking out football scores, so don't tell me. TIVO is getting all my games).

Current Mood: excited

Noah Biorkman is a 5 yo boy who is dying of cancer. His family is celebrating Christmas this week as he may not make it to 12/25. All he wants is Christmas cards.
His address is
1141 Fountain Veiw Cr
South Lyon, MI
48178


If you have your authenticity doubts, heres a few sources.

http://www.snopes.com/inboxer/medical/biorkman.asp
http://wycd.com/Send-Christmas-cards-to-Noah--a-very-special-littl/5588415

( You are about to view content that may not be appropriate for minors. )

At work today I heard Oz ranting three cubicles down. It's hard not to. But his story was so good this time that I'm posting it here, with his permission. I even know that part of it, at least, was true before The Names were Changed to Protect the... whatever they were.

And Now Cometh Oz, saying:

So my dad says "What's the big deal? Guy sank a boat in Lake Huron, it's fish habitat. You bastards are driving all the small businessmen out of the State." There's the conservative Republican for you.

See, this small businessmen We Bastards are oppressing this time started out by setting fire to that boat. He tried to burn it up and collect insurance on it. So this poor victim we're picking on started out with insurance fraud. You'd think a law and order Republican would have problems with that.

Willis-- guy's name is Willis-- Willis had problems with it, because the boat didn't burn, and the insurance didn't pay. So he's got this half-burned boat in his yard. By and by City of Chebavoix police chief comes by, and the zoning guy, and they tell him to get rid of that boat or they're going to write him a hundred-dollar ticket for blight. And I got in there too, telling him it was illegal solid waste disposal, trying to burn it like that, and he'd better find something else to do with the boat. Something LEGAL.

A few days later, around midnight, he hooks up to the boat and drags it through the middle of town. Without a trailer, mind you; dragging the boat on its bottom, scratching and gouging the asphalt along the way. About halfway through town he goes right by a couple of city cops. They drop their donuts and come out to ask him about this. "You didn't see me," he says, "and I was never here." And they nod and go back and sit in their prowl car and let him drag the boat the rest of the way through town. I can't believe it, but that's what they did. The Good Old Boy network at its best.

Half an hour, forty-five minutes later the city cops see Willis coming back without the boat. They never asked any questions.

Turns out Willis had sunk the boat in Lake Huron. Only the boat wouldn't burn, and it turned out it wouldn't sink either. The Coast Guard found this half-burned forty-foot wreck bobbing around in the Straits of Mackinac, right in the shipping lanes. It didn't take them any time at all to trace it back to Willis.

We tried to take him to court, but now he'd broken Federal laws too, and the Feds take precedence. Now he's got a date to appear in Federal court. Remember, this all started with a hundred-dollar blight ticket, right?

Willis never shows up in court. The US Marshall goes to his house and knocks on his door, and his wife says Willis has disappeared. She doesn't know where he went, or how, or who with. She says some guys from downstate were threatening him, and she thinks maybe they kidnapped or murdered him or something.

Well, what had happened was that Willis had this old school bus, and he loaded everything he owned in it, and hit the road. He's fleeing the Federal Government in an old school bus, and damned if he doesn't drive the thing all the way to Costa Rica. He's down there living in his school bus with an extension cord pulling power from some other guy's house, when he can find somebody who lets him. That's his life now.

One day he gets drunk and tells people he's on the run from the US Government for sinking a boat in Lake Huron. Which sounds like he's some kind of pirate, right? Guys he's with think he's full of crap, but one of them checks on the Internet and he finds that sure enough there's a Federal warrant for Willis. So he reports Willis to the local police. And now Willis is on the run again.

You gotta think they'd catch him if they wanted to. I mean, like Andy said, the guy's got to stick out a little, driving around Costa Rica in a huge yellow bus with CHEBAVOIX AREA SCHOOLS in eight-inch black letters down the side.

He can't come back. It's a hundred-dollar ticket that started all this, but now he's run from the Federal courts, and they'll put him in jail forever for that. And his wife will end up in jail too for lying to the US Marshall.

Sometimes you start with one silly little crime, and try to cover it up, and one thing leads to another, and you find yourself running from the law, driving a beat-up old school bus through the jungles three thousand miles from home, and heading for Brazil.

Current Mood: sympathetic