A Curious Statistical Anomaly

Today, I forget how, I ran across an article in the New York Times “Whoopie! Cookie, Pie or Cake, It’s Having Its Moment” that stopped me in my tracks. Just last weekend when we stopped at a local Amish Market I saw whoopie pies in their bakery section, and now here was an article in the Times.

A bit of Googling found a Wikipedia entry, a recipe at epicurious, a slew of recipes at Cooks.com, and a bit of history and another recipe at What’s Cooking America.

I grew up in Maine, born in Mexico, ME (yes, the place on the sign) and went to college and graduate school at the University of Maine in Orono. Whoopie pies are big in Maine. Most stores, bakeries, and Mom and Pops have (or had) them available. But mostly, I remember my grandmother made them. She didn’t make them often so they were a special treat. When I was an adult she gave me her recipe for them. I’ve made them myself a time or two but mostly when I’m missing home and family.

For me Whoopie Pies are a comfort dessert. There not something you actually see anywhere here in Maryland. At least they didn’t used to be. Last weekend I spotted them at the Amish Market and later at the bakery in Giant. I’ve been thinking about them ever since with a longing I can’t really express.

Mostly the longing is for my grandmother, who died several years ago. I still miss her more than I can ever really express. To sit and have a cup of tea or coffee and a whoopie pie and talk with her again would fill my heart to bursting with joy. So, I guess for me a whoopie pie is a tangible link with my past and the people who I now communicate with only in my heart.

I guess maybe I’ll go look up my grandmother’s recipe and think about tradition, family, and continuity on this the second day for Spring where we look forward to the new.

I’m the Capclave Chair for 2010.  That means that starting now we’re gearing up for the convention that is to be held in October of 2010 somewhere in the DC area.  This year’s Capclave 2009 will be in the Hilton Washington DC/Rockville, Executive Meeting Center, 1750 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland.  The convention guests will be Harry Turtledove as Author Guest of Honor and Sheila Williams as Editor Guest of Honor. If you’re in the area please make and effort to come to the convention.

As for my convention, I’m in the early planning stages. In order to get guests of honor, you need a hotel and a date to hold the convention. The hotel liaison for the past several years has unfortunately burnt out and the previous liaison is still recuperating from her multi-year stint, so this year two wonderful, energetic, and stalwart volunteers have stepped up to work in that position. This means that the job duties can be shared and that, hopefully, the stress will be lighter. It also means two more people in the club (WSFA) will have experience in working with hotels on events. The more the knowledge gets shared the less likely such knowledge will be lost to the club. The past hotel liaisons have been unstinting of their time and knowledge and have been helpful in answering questions from all of us who are new to event planning (and that includes myself).

Today, we met and went over the requirements we have for function space (how many rooms, what sizes, what has to fit where), the events to include during the weekend of the convention, and other items that are necessary in order that we can properly negotiate a contract with a hotel. Now that we’ve pretty much hammered out what we need/want/wish for/desire, it’s time to put that in the context of what we need to know from the hotel (can we, is it possible, cost, and other factors). Hopefully, we’re now just about ready to actually talk to the hotel and find out if we still are a good fit.

No matter what, there will be a convention in 2010 and it will be in October. Hopefully, I’ll be posting updates on the planning process as we go along. There’s a lot more involved in putting on a convention than what you might think. I’ve volunteered to work at many local and national and international conventions and I’m finding out a lot that I didn’t know. All I can say is that the people who put on science fiction and fantasy conventions are a great group of people who are dedicated to seeing that the convention goer has a great time. They do not hesitate to share their knowledge and their experience and have, at least in dealing with my questions, the patience of Job.

Today, I  saw the news that the SciFi channel was changing its name to SyFy. Okay… but what were they thinking to do this? Then came the reason…

“The name Sci Fi has been associated with geeks and dysfunctional, antisocial boys in their basements with video games and stuff like that, as opposed to the general public and the female audience in particular,” said TV historian Tim Brooks, who helped launch Sci Fi Channel when he worked at USA Network.

Mr. Brooks said that when people who say they don’t like science fiction enjoy a film like “Star Wars,” they don’t think it’s science fiction; they think it’s a good movie.

“We spent a lot of time in the ’90s trying to distance the network from science fiction, which is largely why it’s called Sci Fi,” Mr. Brooks said. “It’s somewhat cooler and better than the name ‘Science Fiction.’ But even the name Sci Fi is limiting.”

Mr. Howe said going to Syfy will make a difference.

So, let me get this straight. First you insult your core audience and then you hope to widen that audience with the name change? Does this make sense to anyone but a TV executive? I’m female. I’m an avid reader of science fiction and have been all my life … at least since I ran into it about age 6 or 7. I’m also technologically literate and have been at various times a programmer, web designer, computer tech, and system administrator. I was also, once part of that core SciFi Channel viewing audience.

I say once because as the reality shows and wrestling seemed to take over I stopped watching. Guess maybe the name change is a good idea since as it stands now it has nothing to do with science fiction, little to do with science, and certainly nothing to do with excellence in programming.

I’d been putting off giving in but last night I had to admit that I had a cold — maybe flu but it feels more like a cold. This morning with a temp in the 100/101 range, I stayed in bed read, napped, and did the alka selzer thing along with orange juice.

I feel a bit better tonight. Throat is sore — feels like I’m swallowing broken glass. Cough drops help numb it a bit. Hopefully tomorrow I’ll be on the mend.

That could be my optimistic-persona trying to take over control. I hope that part of me is right. I’ve got too much to do to be sick right now. Yuck.

This is the 3rd year of the WSFA Small Press Award.

“The award is open to works of imaginative literature (science fiction, fantasy, horror, etc.) published in English for the first time in the previous calendar year. Furthermore, the Small Press Award is limited to works under 17,501 words in length that were published by a small press. The nominees are narrowed down by a panel elected by the membership of WSFA, and these finalists are then judged by the entire membership of WSFA in order to select a winner. Throughout the process, the author and publisher of each story are kept anonymous, and the winning story and its author are announced at Capclave, the WSFA convention held in the D.C. area each October.”

This year, I’m the award administrator. The nomination period is over and the stories have now been stripped of author and publisher information and have been entered into our database. Passwords are being generated for the committee members who will read the stories and select the list of finalists. Once the finalists are chosen, members of WSFA (Washington Science Fiction Association) will be given passwords and allowed to read the finalists and vote for the winner.

The winner will be announced at this year’s Capclave, the club’s annual convention. This year we have 59 valid nominations. We hope that with each year the number of nominations will increase as we manage to inform more of the small presses who are eligible about the contest.

Now, until the finalists are chosen my job is in wait and see mode. But, there are some great stories in this group of nominee and I’m anxious to see which of these 59 stories make the list of finalists.

My husband and I have always had a soft spot in our hearts for March 14 — Pi Day (3.14…). We also get a giggle out of 3:14 if we happen to notice it — Pi o’clock. Okay, we’re definitely a geeky couple and have some strange ways of getting pleasure out of a day.

But it seems we’re not the only ones who enjoy a good math moment in our lives. CNet news reports in Politics and Law National Pi Day? Congress makes it official. The Library of Congress: Thomas has information about the law and a list of the sponsors.

It’s not going to be a national holiday or anything. It just gives the day recognition as being a bit special. So, for you geeks out there, we’ll finally have some recognition for one of our favorite mathematical and physical constants usually represented as being: 3.14159265… You can read about PI at Wikipedia. But basically Pi is

Pi, Greek letter (π), is the symbol for the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter. Pi = 3.1415926535…
From: The Offical Pi Day Website

Or from the Math Forum:

By definition, pi is the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter. Pi is always the same number, no matter which circle you use to compute it.

For the sake of usefulness people often need to approximate pi. For many purposes you can use 3.14159, which is really pretty good, but if you want a better approximation you can use a computer to get it. Here’s pi to many more digits: 3.14159265358979323846.

The area of a circle is pi times the square of the length of the radius, or “pi r squared”: A = pi*r^2

But for me I just enjoy the silliness of having a time of day and a day per year that manages to represent a famous mathematical and physical constant. What about you?

Today it was in the mid-30’s and it snowed a bit. It melted as soon as it touched the ground and later turned to rain.  But, cold and rain means it felt even colder. What makes it weird is that just two days ago on Wednesday the temp was near 80 and I was outside without a sweater or a jacket.

I noticed then that our forsythia bushes are all budded up and a there’s some bright yellow showing. These are the harbingers of spring that I really love — they just flash their brilliant yellow flowers — shouting to all who listen that it is spring.

The azaleas have got some leaves and buds too. The tulips and irises have shot up their leaves. No sign of flowers yet, but the promise is there.

I’m starting to think of gardening and ran about pulling all the gardening catalogs out along with the one or two seed catalogs that I got. I’ve got the pots and the soil to get the seeds started in the house. Once they get growing they’ll be transferred to the garden area.

I love spring; it’s such a time of promise and hope. What about you? What do you look forward to when you recognize the signs of the coming spring and summer months?

All day today I’ve felt sort of off. By they time we had supper ready, I realized I had a headache — took some Tylenol. Two hours later I realized it was a whopping migraine. After taking one of my bazooka pain pills (of which I’m getting really, really low) it seems like the edge is off a bit but I can’t wear my glasses around my neck, everything has a halo, and just this bit of typing is taking for ever. (I’ve got a spell checker that works in forms and just about every other word is coming up with the red underline that means it’s misspelled. Thanks to the geeks of the world, I can still post correctly spelled drivel with a migraine.)

At least I got the proofing I needed to get done today for work before the migraine hit hard. I’d forgotten just how bad and painful these things can be. I had a minor one last month. Tomorrow I see my acupuncturist, she’s really helped with relieving the migraines. Usually, I have the halo and inability to think clearly but I don’t have more than the usual headache level of pain. So, now I’m not used to it like I was when I was on Tamoxifen (after having breast cancer) and had migraines every day for five years.

It’s like falling into a black pit of memories that I would really rather do without. If you’ve never had a migraine and you’re thinking, “it’s only a headache.” Well, take the worst headache you’ve every had in your life then imagine whacking yourself with a hammer or 2×4 and then multiply that by 100 — that’s migraine pain. If you’re really lucky you manage to medicate yourself enough to fall asleep or pass out — either one is a god sent relief. I’m signing off and taking another of my hoarded pain pills (remember doctors are very leary of giving out pain medications — my insurance company says aspirin and Tylenol work just as well for migraines as the Rx’d pain meds — I wish every medical insurance company exec would have a migraine at least once a week for a year and be only allowed to have aspirin or Tylenol — I believe they’d rapidly change their tune.)

Hopefully, the weather will stabilize (I’m pressure sensitive), and my acupuncturist will be able to help, and by tomorrow evening I’ll be able to think straight and talk coherently.