A Curious Statistical Anomaly

Gayle asked me to post since we are currently without electricity, and my laptop has 30 minutes of juice left in it … plus the only network connection.

We had a severe thunderstorm move through the area about four hours ago, and now our county has 1000 people in the dark. The next biggest outage is the town just to our north which has 90 people without power.  So I figure we really should be on the priority list.  But there’s no guarantees.  The power company will get to us when it gets to us.

We have wind-up lanterns and what not (and battery powered laptops), so we’re good to go as long as the power doesn’t stay off too much longer.

Gayle’s getting a bit nervous since the zines go live on Friday, and she’s now losing an entire evening’s productivity.  Personally, I’m not worried.  Everything will turn out okay.  I’m in my positive thinking mode.  Maybe we should eat that ice cream before it can melt.  That’s thinking positive, isn’t it?

When the cellphone craze first started many, many years ago. I looked into getting one and looked at the prices and walked away.

Years later, I was living in Maryland and traveling in the DC area, and often wouldn’t be able to make it to appointments on time due to traffic. I figured having a phone with me would be great to let people know I was going to be late. It was only the polite thing to do. What I wanted was a phone that I could use in an emergency and I didn’t want a contract. I wanted a pay as you go phone. I asked at those kiosks in the mall and got laughed at and regaled with the refrain, “what planet do you live on?” But I kept my eye out and checked the cellphone areas of stores and found the Virgin phones. Perfect. Buy the phone and get a card of minutes. Activate and you’re all set until your minutes run out and you buy more. That worked for years. The coverage wasn’t great but it worked in major cities so it was also good when we went to conventions.

Now years later we have cellphones and a plan. We don’t use them much and only with other people on our plan — ’cause the minutes are then free — and for emergencies. Why? Because I see no reason to pay for an incoming call when the caller is paying for the call — that’s called double billing and as far as I’m concerned should be illegal (it’s a way to scam customers and bilk them of money). I don’t like it. But when I try to talk to people about the unfairness of this you’d think I grew a second head or something — a reaction similar to the one I got when I looked for a pay-as-you-go phone (and now just about all the carriers have a version of this).

But today, I found an article in the New York Times by DAVID POGUE entitled, “The Irksome Cellphone Industry“. Evidently, I’m not the only one that thinks there’s something wrong with the way cellphone carriers treat their customers. He also doesn’t like the double billing for calls and text messages.

He also has this to say about the exorbitant rates for overseas calls:

INTERNATIONAL CALLING Dear cellphone-carriers: Using Skype or iChat or Google Voice, I can place a crystal-clear computer-to-computer overseas call for nothing. Chat with China, or gab with Greenland, for hours, for free.

Or if I want to call phone to phone (instead of computer to computer), I can sign up for Google Voice or Skype Out, where I’ll pay 2 cents a minute to call China.

Why, then, am I still billed an astonishing $1.50 to $5 a minute to call these countries from my cellphone?

Surely the zero-cost technology that’s available to Skype and Google is also available to the world’s cell carriers. In other words, there’s no practical reason that cell carriers (ours and the overseas ones) should charge so much — only a greedy reason.

I use Skype when talking to our UK editor and our Canadian editor. Crystal clear communications and no charge for computer to computer other than the special headset I had to buy because I have an older model laptop. The drawback is I have to be at the laptop to get or make a call and I can’t just walk away to get coffee or a drink. But hey, the price is right for the call. Why can’t cellphone companies manage the same technology? Calls overseas on my cell should be the regular minutes for the call just as it is for local and long distance.

But, what brings this to my notice right now is that Congress, you know those elected officials that are supposed to be doing what’s best for the country and its citizens instead of what’s best for their election or pocketbooks, are debating what to do about the cellphone exclusivity agreements. It’s the reason you can’t have an iphone unless you get a contract with AT&T. That’s pretty much it. I agree with Progue, it’s mostly an “Why can’t I get an iphone with Verizon or Sprint” debate. As much as I might like an iphone, I can deal with my disappointment (and believe me my disappointment is really severe, no joke).

What we really need is Congress to investigate and do something about the other problems that consumers have with cellphone agreements and companies. Shouldn’t they be looking out for us once in a while — and I mean the guys to elect them to office. If the people are happy and treated decently and fairly the companies will do okay anyway. I thought that the American way was to be fair, honest, and provide the best product or service at the best price. Some days, I feel that it’s not the best product or service at the best price it’s whatever the company can get from you because you can’t fight back and take or leave it.

Something needs to be done about the injustices and greed in business. Making the terms of service fair and honest and understandable would be a great start. Meanwhile, I can live with my disappointment in not being able to have an iphone.

What about you? Are you happy with your service? Content? Or just living with it?

The Plight of the Darcy Brothers begins several months after the ending of The Darcys & the Bingleys. Elizabeth has miscarried. She and Darcy are devastated but they have their son, Geoffrey, who is very much like his father, and they are assured that there will be more children.

Starting with such sadness, you’d expect this book to be much darker than its predecessor, but there is hope. Jane and Bingley live nearby and the visits are frequent. Elizabeth begins to come out of her depression. Even Mrs. Bennet surprises us with her common sense advice — who knew she had it in her.

Then a mysterious letter comes from Mary Bennet who has been studying in Paris, asking Jane to come to her in Brighton. It’s mysterious because it’s not like Mary to be so uninformative and secretive. Jane, of course, asks Elizabeth to come with her. When they arrive at the Fitzwilliams’ home, Mary isn’t there. They don’t know where she is staying or how to find her. But then Mary shows up and breaks her bad news. Jane and Elizabeth, while shocked to their core, immediately offer Mary all the assistance they can and the trio sets off for Chatton, Jane’s home.

The entire family gets involved and begins to come up with a plan to save Mary’s reputation. Someone must take charge and we all know that someone will be Darcy. He’d been looking for a way to help Elizabeth get over the loss of her child and the journey they must take would be the perfect opportunity. Also, it seems from Mrs. Reynolds that there is also some unfinished business of his father’s in France. Hopefully, they can handle it and Mary’s problem at the same time.

While The Darcys & the Bingleys, took us from the marriage at the end of Austen’s Pride and Prejudice to the two couples settling down and adapting to married life, The Plight of the Darcy Brothers moves us into unknown territory. Many sequels to Pride and Prejudice move us beyond the wedding, Altman manages to do so by adding additional characters and by allowing the characters to grow and change in accordance with the events that have happened to them since the wedding. Yet, she is still working with the characters that we have grown to love — she doesn’t deviate from the integrity and moral values that Austen imbued them with in her work. However, they’ve moved on–grown. Kitty and Georgiana have become friends with the result that Kitty is more calm and responsible and Georgiana is less shy. Caroline Bingley has found happiness with Dr. Maddox and lives in London.

This story, while about Mary, has Mary only as the driving force of the plot and mostly off the page. It’s Darcy and Elizabeth that take center stage. They are trying to save Mary’s reputation and, by extension, Kitty’s. They make some new friends and find some unexpected allies and family along the way.

Altman manages to move between the story lines — Darcy and Elizabeth in Europe and Bingley and Jane and the rest of the Bennets in Chatton, and Caroline and Dr. Maddox in London — deftly. As with the first book there is humor, always apt, sometimes silly but always fitting to the occasion and circumstances and, if we’re honest, resonating with our own lives. There are also some moments of extreme poignancy that actually brought tears to my eyes (even on rereading the book a second and then a third time).

Altman manages to stay true to the original characters, tell a whopping good story, make us laugh and cry in all the right places, and make us want to read it again and again. It’s that ability that makes her follow-ons to Pride and Prejudice, ones that we will impatiently await like the coming of a new season.

I can’t count the number of times I’ve seen a crew member exposed to lethal radiation in science fiction stories and the doc just loads up the anti-radiation serum and gives them a shot and everything is looking good. In movies and TV, I’m sure you’ve seen it. Just the other night we were watching a Battlestar Galactica DVD and the planet had high radiation levels and Starbuck, Helo, and Boomer just dosed themselves with the anti-radiation serum at regular intervals.

Now it looks like science has caught up with fiction. Ynet News has a story on Cure for radiation sickness found? by Ronen Bergman. The medication developed by Professor Andrei Gudkov – Chief Scientific Officer at Cleveland BioLabs has immediate real life implications for people who have or need to be exposed to high levels of radiation. From the article:

Gudkov’s discovery may also have immense implications for cancer patients by enabling doctors to better protect patients against radiation. Should the new medication enable cancer patients to be treated with more powerful radiation, our ability to fight the disease could greatly improve.

How the discovery came about is one of those lucky ideas that sometimes happen when the right conditions come together.

The process that led up to the medical innovation dates back to 2003, when Professor Gudkov came up with the idea of using protein produced in bacteria found in the intestine to protect cells from radiation.

Tests so far on mice and monkeys look like this is the “real deal”. If approved after being moved to the fast track, this would be a preventative medication not a cure but it would be safe and easily injected. The possible uses could be a miracle for cancer patients, workers in the nuclear industry, astronauts and space workers, and many others such as governments who wish to stockpile medications — just in case the worst case scenario of MAD comes knocking.

In fact, if this drug manages to hold up to its promise, it could mean that space flight and/or long-term habitation of space stations and on ships heading to Mars (for example) would have less of a problem with radiation that would other wise limit our chances of success. It opens up a lot of possibilities that were previously unavailable to us because of the radiation exposure the crews would face.

What are your thoughts? And please read the original article before commenting?

If you’ve been reading my blog for any length of time, you know that I’m a wicked (in the New England use of the term) fan of Jane Austen’s works and avidly read and review many of the the books written by others to continue the story of the characters that Austen breathed life into.

On August 1st, Sourcebooks is releasing The Plight of the Darcy Brothers: A tale of the Darcys & the Bingleys by Marsha Altman. I reviewed her first book, The Darcys & the Bingleys: A Tale of Two Gentlemen’s Marriages to Two Most Devoted Sisters earlier this year. I’ll be posting a review of this new book this weekend, but first I’ve got some exciting news — can you tell I’m trying to build up the excitement?

Marsha Altman is going to be doing a blog tour to talk about her book. This is the list of sites where she’ll be talking about The Plight of the Darcy Brothers: A tale of the Darcys & the Bingleys:

July 23: Jane Austen Today
July 24: Fresh Fiction
July 28 J. Kaye’s Book Blog
July 29: This Book For Free
July 30: Debbie’s World
July 31: Grace’s Book Blog
August 3: Jenny Loves to Read
August 4: Stephanie’s Written World
August 5: A Bibliophile’s Bookshelf
August 10: Everything Victorian
August 12: A Curious Statistical Anomaly

So, if you enjoy Jane Austen, her books, her characters, and the world she allows us to peer into, you might consider checking out Marsha Altman’s blog tour. Check out my review of her first book, then check back for my review of this new book. I’ve enjoyed her take on these wonderful characters and her ability to maintain their integrity and personality while allowing them to grow and change as they live their lives within her world.

[Hyperion:] Gayle’s being a bit understated again.  Look at the August 12th blog listing, then look up a the title of the one you’re currently reading.  Take a second … okay …  now do you see why she’s excited?

It was 40 years ago today that man landed on the Moon.  We did it.  We wanted to get there before the Russians and put all the energy and enthusiasm into getting a man on the moon first our priority.  I remember that day, watching TV and holding my breath as the craft began its decent.  It was a momentous event.  One that would make the history books.

Ernest Lilley, Sr. Editor for TechRevu.com, also remembers that exciting day and he’s written a prose poem commemorating his memories called “Moonfall“.

Google is celebrating this occasion with the release of an update to Google Earth allowing us to take our own trip to the Moon. You can download Google Moon for free here.

To learn more about Google Moon, take a look at this video:

Now if only NASA can get itself to get fired up about exploring space with the same dedication and attention to getting the job done as it did when we decided to go to the moon. I vote for men living on Mars. It’s the most likely planet to support human life and it’s about time we started thinking about getting some of our eggs out of this very fragile basket.

Friday night was the 3rd Friday meeting of WSFA. It was a very long business meeting and the upshot is that there is going to be some exciting news about Capclave 2009 very soon now. Updates and news about what’s happening at Capclave can be found on the new Capclave blog.

Then this afternoon there was a Capclave meeting to discuss programming for this year’s convention. Lots of ideas were tossed around and refined and this tentative list of program items will soon be available on the Capclave site so you can see what we might potentially have at the convention.

After the meeting, Hyperion and I stopped to see Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.. I loved it. Of course I always wish that they could have everything that the book had but then the movie would last all day. But the adaptation that they did for the movie kept the spirit and the heart of the story and that’s what counts. Now, we have to wait another year (Nov 2010) for the next installment. I think at some point I’ll have to read the books from beginning to end again. (Can you tell I enjoy the books?)

It’s after midnight, I’m off to sleep I hope.

I woke up with a headache this morning. I tried ignoring it until around 6 but it didn’t work, it just kept getting worse and worse. Finally, I took Advil — no joy. Then IMITREX, still getting worse.

Checked the barometer and it’s fine. Then the light dawns. The temperature sky-rocketed today. Probably in celebration of the anniversary of Apollo 11. As was recently reported, temperature effects migraines — so now I know why. I just wish I could get it under control. I’ll take more Advil when I finish this, hoping if I take the edge off I can get to sleep and sleep it off. I’m great with optimism.

Didn’t post yesterday because I was just too stressed. I got a call in the early afternoon from my aunt that my mother had just been taken to the hospital. Evidently, she’d passed out. Neighbors realized they hadn’t seen her all day or the day before and went to check on her and found her. Thanks heavens she has neighbors who watch out for each other.

So, I ended up calling the hospital to speak with the ER doctor, no broken bones from her fall, not a stroke or a heart attack. Not all the blood work was back but she did have pneumonia. How you manage to get pneumonia in summer (even in Maine) is a mystery to me. But the upshot is she’ll be in the hospital a few days.

While it is such a relief to know she’ll be okay, it brings up again the problem of living so far away from elderly parents. When I was growing up, my grandparents lived down stairs from us. Most of the family lived in town or the next town over (in walking distance mostly). Now my mother lives in the house I grew up in. I live in Maryland. Most of my cousins still live in Maine but scattered throughout the state. Families don’t necessarily live within driving distance.

I was chastised for not driving up to Maine to visit at least every three months. Driving up takes about 16 hours. Flying up is shorter but then you need to rent a car for the 3 hour plus drive from the airport. We only have one car so either my husband has to come with me (taking vacation time) or we have to rent a second car for me to go alone.

That sounds a bit like justification but it’s just facts. This is a problem that many people my age are now facing as their parents or surviving parent has health problems and you don’t live geographically close enough to check in and help out. Many friends have had to deal with this already and it is never easy. Parent doesn’t want to move from what family is there in the familiar place. Adult child has home/work/friends/attachments to the area in which they live — and work in this economic climate is the clincher. There really aren’t any easy answers to what to do. We’re talking over several options and will talk to my mother about them.

Meanwhile, I worry and I know that the worry is just adding more power to this hideous migraine. Time for the next batch of Advil and another try for sleep.