A Curious Statistical Anomaly

My flu/cold/thingy is really getting annoying.  I go from moderately okay to barely able to move and huffing and puffing like I just ran a marathon when I barely walked across the room.  Yesterday, I got a lot of stuff done because I could just sit and work but I needed a few lay-downs on the couch to do it.  Today isn’t as bad but I’m definitely not okay.

Hyperion is back to work and he’s got the cough and congestion so I feel really wimpy complaining about my wee symptoms.  But then I’m on a lot of meds for my allergies and asthma so that might be giving me a edge up on the worse effects.  I don’t think it’s the big baddie that’s going around — my belief is we’re just overtired and stressed and the convention just put us over the top.  I’m reading that a lot of people at the convention came home with cold/flu and even a few cases of H1N1.

It seems all gatherings are a chance to share germs.  When you think about it, it makes sense that everytime you go to a convention, kids come home from college on holiday, you visit a new city or town — you’ll come home with a case of some type of illness (especially if you fly with a bunch of strangers on a plane with recycled air).

Basically, we get used to our own or usual germs and stuff.  But when you travel you find new and excitingly different germs and viruses to bring home.  I’m beginning to think it’s inevitable:  travel =  sick for a few days after return.

Meanwhile, I’m getting some reading done but only the light stuff I don’t have to concentrate on too much.  I’ve also started to enjoy my collection of Christmas films.   It’s my favorite holiday because of the spirit and love that seems to abound at this time of year.  Hyperion says I’m starting early this year but my son will be here for Christmas (he usually only makes it for Thanksgiving but will miss it this year).  So, there may be some reviews of Christmas movies coming up over the next few weeks.  Most of them will be older movies but it’s nice to visit the old standbys every now and then and see how they stand up to the passage of time.

I don’t care for the commercialization of  Christmas — we don’t even do the gift thing in our family or at least not more than one gift for just the immediate family (the grandmothers, Hyperion & me, and my son).  That’s it.  But I love the lights, the music, the friendliness, and the IDEA of Christmas.  For the entire month of December I try to do nice things for people hoping it will help me form new habits that will last throughout the year.  It does sort of at least it keeps me trying to be a nice person because those of you who don’t know me — I’m a bit snarky and I really don’t have a lot of patience with foolishness — like paperwork for the sake of paperwork, and make work just to say your doing something, and nit-picking just because you can when no one gives a hoot anyway.

So, how many of you are up for pledging to be a better, kinder, more friendly person during the holidays no matter how bad traffic gets or how long the queues are at the stores.  Anyone?

There are days when it seems that no matter how fast I run around or do things that the number of things that still need to be done just keeps growing faster than I can take care of them. It’s like being in one of those nightmare hallways where you need to get to the other end and as you move the hallways just keeps getting longer and longer.

Today, we did our weekly shopping that we didn’t get to yesterday. We checked out a few places for kerosene heaters, only to find there weren’t any for indoor use — our old one won’t light. Even though the temps are now in the high 60’s, it has been down in the 30’s this month so we wanted to be ready for the next dip. Guess we’ll have to work on getting the wood piles rotated and move the ready wood to the holder near the deck.

We also picked up a few Christmas gifts for mothers and did some other “secret”-type getting of stuff.

Back home, I entered all the books that had come in and didn’t get entered into the database because I was preping for the Capclave meeting. Finally got those entered and cleared out lots of emails that were just short notes and didn’t take much work to get rid of.

Now, it’s write up the TODOs for tomorrow and try to get a bit of reading done before bed. At last the day is ending.

Did I mention that someone posted that the convention we were at in California actually had people with the flu and at least one with H1N1 type flu. Hyperion has been ill most of the past week and is only now feeling better and so will be going in to work. I never was as sick as he was, just a bit of stomach problems and a runny nose. Now I hope when we’re over this it means we’re immune to the flu for a while.

It’s a good thought anyway. Well, the coming week will be very busy and morning comes way too early — I mean who invented this morning thing anyway. I prefer days to start when I feel like getting up rather than the day making me get up.

The flight home from San Jose was much nicer than the one going to San Jose. For one things the flight home didn’t have two screaming babies. I really wish there was some no-fail method of seeing that babies didn’t have to suffer from blocked ears. I understand the crying and feel so sorry for them, but when you’re crammed into too small seats in a full plane it’s hard to maintain perspective and serenity. But coming home we only had to deal with a completely full plane and no empty seats at all.

We got in and crashed. We slept almost twelve hours. Then went out bought a few supplies, emptied the fridge of a few things that didn’t make it. The big surprise was at the Post Office. We stopped the mail from Thursday to Monday. So, Tuesday when we picked it up, getting two filled US Postal bins was a bit overwhelming especially when added to the FedEx and UPS deliveries that had come to the house while we were gone. (We have two trash can just for deliveries — to protect the books from wet weather.).

Needless to say, I spent today entering books into the database and clearing out regular mail and spam as well as the electronic kind. I ran some system checks on my PC too. Mid-morning (I got up at 6:30AM), I found I could barely keep my eyes open and ended up taking a nap.

Somehow, I associate napping with being either very young — I hated them as a child — or very old. Well, I’m not that old but with the two conventions separated by a week and a cross country trip for one of them, I guess I’m getting into napping territory. It did help. When I got up — I really felt refreshed and the minor headache I’d had was gone. Of course, that was hours ago and now I’m dragging again, and the headache — not to mention other aches and pains — are back.

Hopefully, tomorrow I’ll be back on schedule and can get my reviews up and finish off the odds and ends of the November issues of the zines.

I was reaching for a book to take it off the shelf and got a pretty bad gash from the dust jacket. That got me thinking that most of the cuts on my hands have been paper cuts. Should books and paper be reclassified as dangerous weapons? Should those TSA people start making us put newspapers, magazines, and books in our check through? I remember that they did forbid books for a while in flights from Britain to the US when there was an incident that had nothing to do with books a while back.

Sometimes, it makes you rethink things, but could it be that they were afraid people would read something scary or incendiary and throw a fit? Do people get passionate about their reading material anymore?

I know that I’ve burst out laughing while reading a passage or been sniffling back sobs and tears and had people step away from the crazy person. Friends have told me that they often react to what they’re reading by laughing, crying, or getting emotional in other ways.

But with my throbbing paper cut, I’m thinking maybe ideas aren’t the only danger that books possess.

What do you think?

We went live with the magazines at midnight on September 1st, but we just finished all the tweaks and polishing of the chrome this evening.  The major problem this month was me.  Yup, me.

I got the flu or a cold but it might be the flu.  Yes, I googled the symptoms and I’ve got all of them so I don’t know what I’ve got.  So, I’ve been dragging around for a couple of weeks barely getting out of my own way and trying to do the things that absolutely had to be done and smoothing over the rest.  That means I OCR documents, put the pages together and proofed  them.  Entered and proofed reviews that were sent to me.  Stared at the screen for inordinate amounts of time but didn’t add a line to my novel.  Sent out the announcement of the finalists for the WSFA Small Press Award. I answered some email and entered books.

And I read.  I don’t know what most people do but when I don’t feel good I read.   I read nearly everything I was assigned this month and then some.  The problem is that, feeling as crappy as I did — I didn’t write the reviews immediately but waited.  I thought, silly me, that I’d write them the last three days of the month since I’d already taken notes and stuck stickies in the books to remind me of things I could do that.  Except I then got laryngitis and Hyperion got sick and several people who normally don’t wait to the last minute did and ….

Well, I ended up adding new material on September 1st and 2nd.  So, now we’re really done with the zines and so, if you already checked it out — check again — there may be new stuff because I combed my email today for everything I missed and now–deep sigh,  it’s time to start all over again for the October issue.

Speaking of upcoming events, I’m hoping to get an interview with Monica Fairview the author of The Other Mr. Darcy in October.  She’s doing a blog tour and I’m hoping she’ll be able to squeeze it in between stops.  I’ve got the list of the blogs she’ll be visiting and will post it closer to the start of her tour and just before I post my review of the book.

Gumshoe is going to be running an interview with Laura Childs in October to go with the release of her new book, Tragic Magic (A Scrapbooking Mystery).  I’ll also be reviewing season one of The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency.

On the SFRevu side, I need to see what books we’re reviewing for October and start contacting people to line up an interview.  The problem is usually not that there aren’t enough people to ask but that I dither on trying to decide who to ask because I want to ask them all.

Then there’s the knitting.  I’ve got a pair of socks on the needles and the first one is nearly to the heel.  I’ve got a sweater that needs to be steam pressed and hemmed and a button added.  And, I’ve got two other started sweaters that I hope to finish this fall.  Then there’s the spinning of yarn that I need to do.  I’d hoped to get some spinning done by requesting an audio book for review but when it arrived it was print–no problem but I was looking forward to the listening time.

Meanwhile, I’m trying to get my act together to get geared up for Capclave 2010. I’m really excited about the opportunity to be a convention chair and hope that the convention will turn out to be one that everyone enjoys from the Guests of Honor to the Volunteers to the attendees.

Looking this over, I think I may be over-committed…nah…it will be fun.

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.

If you’re a Starbucks habitue then you’ve probably seen this cup. It’s surprising how many of their cups I seem drawn to for their color, functionality, and design. This one just screamed the blistering heat of July in Maryland. It’s the gradations of the warm/hot colors in the stylized grid for me it speaks of lazy days sitting on the porch with a good book and a drink — usually iced coffee or tea. Well, at least this cup is large enough for an iced beverage but it’s also a great hefty coffee cup.

Got it on the clearance table too. I’ve noticed lately that the things on sales tables are the things I’m actually looking for at the time. Though I do remember seeing this cup on the shelves for the last several months, but I didn’t want it then. Marketing seems to always be out of step with what I’m looking for as it is for most people. Winter clothes during the heat of summer. Summer clothes while I’m freezing in my woolies. I don’t understand marketing at all — obviously, which probably explains why I nearly always buy things on sale because by the time I want something the “season” has passed and they’re gearing up for the next one that I’m not ready for yet. Maybe it’s them that doesn’t understand marketing which would explain all the Christmas decorations before Halloween.

While I’m writing this post up, Hyperion is boxing up books to pack up the car for our trip to Readercon tomorrow. [Hyperion: I got called into work and lost about five hours of productive packing time. ] We’re leaving quite early in the morning and it’s about an eight hour drive from here. We’ll be taking some of the back roads until we get to the Delaware and the bridge. But we expect to get to the hotel in Burlington, MA in the late afternoon. SFRevu has a table in the Dealers’ Room. Ernest Lilley is on a panel and so am I.

In fact, I’m moderating the panel: Upbeat and Downbeat in YA Fiction which has the description:

Dark and downbeat endings have become fashionable in YA fiction, even to the point where they have been questioned as a fad gone too far. The trend raises a host of questions about the psychology of young readers that need to be asked and answered. Is the tone and resolution of a work of YA fiction actually more important than in adult fiction, e.g., because the readers are still at the age where their worldview is being shaped? Do young readers have a different tolerance for or reaction to downbeat endings than adults? Do they need to be forcibly exposed to the cruel realities of the world, shielded from them, or gently inoculated?

I’m doing a lot of reading right now for preparation and generating a lot of questions which I’ll then have to pare down to a reasonable number to ask the panel about and hopefully generate some discussion.

If you have a question relevant to the panel that you feel needs to be asked or should at least be considered, drop me a comment. I’m always willing to take ideas under consideration. And to me, my questions sound lame…of course I tend to think that. If I think of something it must be so obvious that a galloping rider on a horse could see it a mile away…and that famous response, “Duh!’ would be the perfect answer. So, help me out.

Well, Ern arrived to help pack up the cars for our caravan to Burlington tomorrow morning. Starting Thursday, my posts will be coverage of Readercon. Hope you enjoy the coverage of the convention — feedback would be helpful.

We have an entire loft in the shed taken up with electronic this-n-that’s that we haven’t gotten rid of because we don’t know where to take it. I know they are toxic and dangerous to just dump and our recycle center doesn’t take any of it — so it sits in storage and moves when we do.

The other day, I spotted in the New York Times, this article “A Green Way to Dump Low-Tech Electronics.” At last, it seemed that someone or some groups were working on the problem. The paragraph that caught my eye was:

Since 2004, 18 states and New York City have approved laws that make manufacturers responsible for recycling electronics, and similar statutes were introduced in 13 other states this year. The laws are intended to prevent a torrent of toxic and outdated electronic equipment — television sets, computers, monitors, printers, fax machines — from ending up in landfills where they can leach chemicals into groundwater and potentially pose a danger to public health.

The problem was that a careful reading of the article didn’t elicit a list of those 18 states, though several of them got mentioned in the article. So, I clicked on the EPA link and found it only took me to other articles about the EPA. But, being crafty and loving Google, I looked for keywords and found this link to the Electronics TakeBack Coalition. On this site they had a link where you could look up and find a site in your state to take your own electronics to safely dump them. The only problem is that Maryland only has one site that takes electronics, and it’s in Baltimore — which means we’ll have to plan ahead to get there while they are open and based on our pile of electronics we’re ready to dump, it may take several trips.

What I’ve learned from this is that nothing is easy. It never is but you’d think that since toxic waste is such a problem and our society is getting more and more electronic devices in order to keep up connected and online and working 24/7 that it would be a bit easier to recycle or dump outdated equipment–safely. It seems from my reading over the day that the major problem is that no one wants to pay for it and no one wants to be responsible.

Okay, my husband and I recycle. We have ever since the first programs 20+ years ago in Maine. Here in Maryland we have to actually store our recyclables and take them to the center ourselves since we don’t have any pickup where we live and the center is about a 45 minute drive away. To get electronics to Baltimore is about 1 1/2 hours away by car and we need to get there during their open hours. We’ll probably do that but why isn’t there a skip for dropping off this type of waste at every major recycle center? Why make it so difficult for people to do the right thing?

For years I’ve wondered why there aren’t companies that buy waste from one company and sell it as input to another one? It only makes sense since often the waste of one is the input for another. The government should be encouraging such reuse of toxic materials. Why make more and more toxic stuff when we could reuse what’s already there with a bit of cleaning and filtering.

More food for thought I guess — I’m still trying to find a place to recycle our old batteries. We mostly use rechargeable ones but we do have some that just need to be tossed (mostly those for the camera and other related equipment). Our recycle center supposedly takes them but we haven’t been able to find the spot to put them, but have found plenty of signs saying not to put them HERE.

What’s your experiences with recycling or safely dumping electronic wastes?