norepi, posting in _scientists_:
Does anyone by any chance know the pKa (acidity) of benzylamine or phenylethylamine? I have gone through hundreds of pKa tables and just cannot find this value. I'm guessing it's probably around 32 or something, but I need to know for certain.

Thanks!

seanan_mcguire:

Okay, now we REALLY have to have a dino dance party. Why, you may wonder? Why, you may ask yourself? Because I have just finished my first post-editorial pass through A Local Habitation, book two in the Chronicles of October Daye. And I have turned that puppy in. Yes! No longer is my manuscript malingering around on my thumb drive, looking lost and lonely and wondering whether it ever gets to go anywhere! It's gone, off to the magical wonderland of sunshine and zombie ponies that is DAW Books. (I've seen the offices at DAW. They're totally filled with sunshine and zombie ponies. I swear. Okay, not really, but wouldn't that be lovely? Zombie ponies for all!)

I kinda completely love this book right now. I mean, I kinda completely love this book all the time, because hello, my baby, all grown up and ready to go play with the big books, but also, I've just gotten up close and snuggly with all its little bells and whistles, and this has resulted in me kinda completely loving it. This is sort of awesome, as I have a very love/hate relationship with my books while I'm working on them.

I'm reasonably sure all this glowing happy 'yay my books are finished yay' is just the endorphin rush before the inevitable and soul-consuming crash. I'm basically okay with that.

Meanwhile, off in the land of 'people doing arcanely productive things that I don't understand but which fill my universe with buckets and buckets of awesome,' Tara is mostly finished with my website redesign, and Chris continues to keep the site itself alive and not eating people who happen to be passing randomly on the street. Let's be clear, here: my skill with HTML basically extends to the cutting-edge of 1997. I can close a tag with the best of them, as long as it's not, y'know, a hard tag. Once it gets difficult, I crawl under my desk and hide until Chris manfully rescues me. So credit for every ounce of visual and functional awesome? Goes to Chris and Tara, rather than to me.

Plans for this weekend include a lot of house cleaning in preparation for Terence's upcoming visit, a family funeral, and probably starting to dig myself into The Mourning Edition (which is the sequel to Newsflesh). I may also head for the Starbucks and spend a few peacefully isolated hours inking, as that's the best way to get ahead of myself.

I have finished this week in triumph.

DINO DANCE PARTY!

heathyre, posting in useless_facts:

writersedge:

http://www.writers-edge.info/2008/07/editing-tips-from-bbc.htm

The venerable BEEB, all things in an English voice, offers great services to writers through the "BBC Get Writing" section of its website.

From the section on Re-work and Edit come these useful annotated links:

Guide to Grammar and Style
One concerned individual's comprehensive guide to good grammar and style. Much easier to read than Strunk and White.

Strunk and White's The Elements of Style
The online edition of the 1914 tome which is a terrifying, if amusing, read. Not one to follow religiously, but worth a look for the sheer contempt they show those less than grammatically correct.

Aw, c'mon. I wouldn't be so hard on S&W, after all, they are the foundation for good writing, the very bedrock of style!

You might want to read the rest of the BEEB's advice about revising and editing your own work, because it contains extensive lists of pitfalls to watch for and tools to tighten up your writing. The advice on eliminating adjectives caught my eye and I must meditate upon:

Write an original 300-word piece without using adjectives (for example take 'the sea' as a broad topic ). The main practical outcome of this exercise is ( possibly unconscious) development of the use of metaphor. It also raises awareness of style in general and addresses one important aspect of voice.

Just metaphors, I wonder. What about similes? And on adverbs (another "no-no" in this century), the BEEB advocates using the exact right verb to depict action, one that requires no modifier for description.

Does the British writing style sound dull and colorless? Have Americans become flabby in writing and reading habits, relying on crutches to carry a story along?

valknott, posting in academics_anon:

I'm sure many of you know the story of Randy Pausch, diagnosed at age 47 with pancreatic cancer. "The Last Lecture" is very inspiring, particularly for those of us in academe. His death is a shame, as are many. -john

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/08207/899511-100.stm

sensaes, posting in academics_anon:
The Bryn Mawr Classical Review feed - now on LiveJournal:

bmcr_rss (from http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/bmcr/recent.xml).

Via: http://www.atrium-media.com/rogueclassicism/Posts/00008300.html

Cross-posted to anti_gravitas.

seanan_mcguire:

I tend to develop a somewhat...familial...attachment to the stores that I frequent on a regular basis, to the point that they monitor the status of my projects, warn me when things that may upset me have happened (my comic store guys are hysterical on days when certain X-titles come in), and generally know exactly what they're dealing with when I walk in the door. We argue, gossip, chat, and generally just have a good time together. It's pretty awesome, and I appreciate it.

My normal comic store, Flying Colors, is very much a family establishment, and the owner, Joe Fields, doesn't order anything of an 'adult' nature. This is a good thing, as there are a lot of unsupervised kids browsing at just about any given time. This is a bad thing, because when they advertised the new Hack/Slash special issue -- a crossover with the Suicide Girls -- it got listed as 'adult,' and was consequentially not ordered. (Believe me, I made sad noises when I got to the store on Wednesday and discovered this dismaying fact. I sort of figured that the existence of the title 'Hack/Slash' would make it an automatic order. Sad cat...is trekking to her alternative comic book store in Berkeley.)

Luckily for me, I have a backup comic store: Comic Relief, which has the added bonus of being located right next to the Other Change of Hobbit. I stopped in yesterday, and was gratified to find that yes, they had the issue in question, even as I confused the heck out of the on-duty staff, who see me about once every three months (when Flying Colors either sells out of something or, as in the case of my Hack/Slash-with-boobies issue, fails to order it). If they didn't know me from local comic conventions and geek meets and forums, they'd probably think I bought six comic books a year. Tops.

With the latest installment of the adventures of Cassie Hack (more on this later) firmly in my possession, I went next door to let Will know that I'd been assigned a cover artist. He and I (and some random store patrons, that being the way at the Other Change of Hobbit) had a fairly vigorous discussion of cover design about a month ago, which covered everything from 'marketing,' 'eye-catching design,' and 'current trends' to 'yeah, but that looks stupid' and 'I just can't understand why all these ass-kicking heroines have nothing better to do with their time than go around crouching on rooftops while wearing uncomfortable-looking latex catsuits.' (My ass-kicking heroines -- I'm currently working with three -- wear, respectively, jeans and T-shirts, track gear, and whatever she can manage to grab before the goddamn flying monkeys break her bedroom window again. Note the lack of inexplicable latex catsuits.) Anyway, as a consequence of this conversation, I wanted to tell him who the Toby cover artist was going to be.

Pathetically, as soon as I finished waving my hands and going 'we got a cover artist and he's awesome!', I forgot a) his name, b) Jim Butcher's name, and c) the name of the series Butcher writes and McGrath draws the covers for (IE, the Dresden Files). We eventually managed to fix this, and then there was much joyful dancing in the Other Change of Hobbit.

I was sitting down to spend some quality time with the two loaner kitties that the shop cat-sits for during the week -- Clearsword and Patch, a Siamese and his Oriental shorthair brother -- when Patch went Very Still And Quiet. I turned around to find myself looking at...

...a dog. A truly awesome dog, of a breed that I had never seen before. She was short-haired to the point of seeming to be made of suede, except for the ridge down the middle of her back, dark blue in color (which, for non-pet-people, means she was a very pretty sort of gunmetal gray), and had a long, intelligent face that made her look a lot like artistic representations of Anubis. I promptly threw myself upon the altar of dog-worship, and grilled her owner about her origins. Turns out she's a Thai ridgeback. So. Cool.

Yesterday, I got a new comic book, a happy dino dance party, and a new dog breed.

How was your Thursday?

firstredmoon, posting in discuss_writing:

Join loveletters_v1
a rating community for writers

scottish_elf, posting in useless_facts:
Heaven's Gate was an American UFO religion based in San Diego, California and led by Marshall Applewhite and Bonnie Nettles. The group's end coincided with the appearance of Comet Hale-Bopp in 1997. Applewhite convinced thirty-eight followers to commit suicide, which he claimed would allow their souls to board a spaceship that they believed was hiding behind the comet.

Further, Heaven's Gate believed that the planet Earth was about to be recycled (wiped clean, refurbished and rejuvenated), and that the only chance to survive was to leave it immediately. While the group was formally against suicide, they defined "suicide" in their own context to mean "to turn against the Next Level when it is being offered", and believed that their "human" bodies were only vessels meant to help them on their journey.

Source: Wikipedia

seanan_mcguire:

I've been editing Newsflesh for the past several days. It is thus, perhaps unsurprising that my Gmail's targeted advertising currently thinks it should be trying to sell me zombies. That being said?

I am not in a very good mindset to have the news box at the top of my email announce 'WARNING: ZOMBIE OUTBREAK' when I load my inbox.

I'm just saying, maybe the people who do this targeted advertising stuff should pause and consider whether telling their system to go ahead and pick up on certain key words will cause the recipients of those targeted ads to start scrambling for their emergency zombie survival kits and scaring the folks around them. And that maybe, they should further consider that if those recipients were to, say, take a machete to someone who happened to be walking a little funny, they might try launching a frivolous lawsuit. 'But Officer, Gmail swore that there were zombies!'

Maybe.

In other news, I have resumed breathing.

morganlafey28, posting in academics_anon:
D ear friends,
can anyone tell me the right format of headings and suheadings for a master's thesis, according to MLA style?
Also, according to the same style; should acknowledgements and abstract be included in the table of contents?

Thank you

writersedge:

http://www.writers-edge.info/2008/07/to-knol-or-not.htm

Last January in Writing on a Bloggy Knol, I told you about Google's hush-hush secret web authoring project, Code Name, Knol. I didn't get invited to beta test this one, sigh. Yesterday, while I was looking elsewhere, Google announced the public release of Knol in the Official Goolgle Blog. It says, "Knols are authoritative articles about specific topics, written by people who know about those subjects. Today, we're making Knol available to everyone."

In the Blogger Buzz blog, however, it is suggested that Knol can be used to complement a blog. Ufortunately, it didn't explain how. A method of connecting a blog with a Knol is not mentioned, which is my interest. This product add more collaborative, interactive tools, including ways for readers to make suggestions, review or comment on a Knol, like an edited Wiki.

Sounds like a blog with benefits, to me. I'm thinking of authoritative people who already blog with extended posts that accumulate long chains of comments, including conversations among readers and with the author. Of course, it is not usual for the author to change the post in response to the comments, if that is the point of the Knol collaborative features.

You can try out Knol for yourself. Before you start one, you might want to brush up on the Basics of Writing a Knol, one of the only two availaable Knols on writing.

seanan_mcguire:

Apparently, coming up with a list of fifty thoughts on writing wasn't enough for the teeming bag of plague-carrying bats that is my brain, because I have continued to ponder each of the points...

...thus leading to what looks very likely to be a series of fifty posts on and about writing. There are days when I look at my brain and truly wonder whether it is, in fact, a suicidal glob of fat and neurons, devoted to driving me insane and thus allowing it the sweet oblivion of death. But no matter! For the moment, there is pondering to be done, and a pseudo essay to be written. Today's topic, inspiring as it may or may not be:

Thoughts on Writing #1: You're Going To Suck.

Aren't we kind around these parts? The original thought:

You're going to suck when you start. Sucking when you start is okay. Every new project, no matter how brilliant the idea at the heart of it happens to be, is going to start by sucking. Just deal with it, and soldier through. Every sentence is a learning experience.

Ready?

Let's begin.

( My thoughts are not your thoughts; my process is not your process; my ideas are not your ideas; my method is not your method. All these things are totally right for me, and may be just as totally wrong for you. So please don't stress if the things I'm saying don't apply to you -- I promise, there is no One True Way. This way for my thoughts on sucking. )

calysto, posting in useless_facts:

Steven Tyler (of Aerosmith) once asked his record company for a cash advance.

They refused.

He punched a hole in their wall, signed it, and left.


...it's still there.


Source: VH1's "Pop-Up Video" for "Janie's Got a Gun"

_ocelott_, posting in sci_femmes:
Series: Jax series
Publisher: Ace, 2008
Genre: Science fiction
Sub-genre: Space opera



Cross-posted from genrereviews.

I managed to get my grubby little paws on an advance copy of Wanderlust, which has caused me to perform the official dance of joy because I adored the first book in the series, Grimspace. For anyone who hasn't read Grimspace yet, this review is likely to contain spoilers because, well, it's the sequel.

First things first: the cover art. I'm kind of impressed, actually. It has a similar look to the Grimspace cover, letting readers know the two are related, and it's so very very shiny. The whole thing has a distinctly science fiction-y feel, and the cover artist has even taken into account Jax's newly shorn hair and the shockstick she carries around. The effect is both appropriate and appealing, and for once I think I might have to applaud the marketing department. Good work, guys.

( Cuz, y'know, they clearly care about my opinion on that front. )

altricial, posting in loveandacademia:

Dear all,

I'm a 3rd year DPsych student from Victoria University, Australia.

I would like to invite you (if male and above 18) to participate in an online research on male body image and internet dating. (If you are female, please pass this on to your male friends.)

An Internet Study: The relationships between men's self-reported physical attributes, body image, self-esteem and internet dating.

There has been quite a lot of research conducted on women's body image and we have a reasonable understanding of the types of factors that impact on women's body image and that ultimately lead to disorders like Anorexia and Bulimia Nervosa. However, we know very little about men's body image and the factors that impinge on the way males think about their bodies. Consequently we also know very little about how this impacts on men's health.

Do you want to do something about it?

If so, you are invited to take part in a research project that will focus exclusively on men's body image. Previous research has highlighted the impact of men's physical attributes on body image and how men perceive their own body. The purpose of this study is to further explore the relationship between physical qualities of men, their body image and self-esteem, using an Internet sample.

All men above the age of 18, who have at least basic literacy in English, are invited to participate in this study. If possible, please have a tape measure ready.

The questionnaire consists of 62 mostly multiple-choice questions and should take approximately 15 minutes to complete. Your responses will remain anonymous and no identifying information will be collected. You are free to withdraw from this study at any time.

If you understand the information stated above and would like to participate in this study, please click on the link below:

http://men.andmuchmore.com/

Thank you in advance for your time and input.

schnitzalted, posting in _scientists_:
Hey everyone. I am curious to know if anyone here has had a similar problem to mine and what steps were taken to resolve this problem. After pouring resolving (gradient) and stacking gels and allowing them to polymerize, I proceed to unclamp everything and remove the gasket from around the glass plates. However, on some occasions when removing the clamps, air seems to get sucked in from the sides and bubbles get trapped in the interface between the stacking and resolving gels. They are almost impossible to push out and ruins the gel. This does not happen every time that I pour these. In fact, it seemed that I had solved the problem by removing the comb first, and then unclamping the glass plates. This worked for 0.75 mm gels, but when I moved up to 1 mm gels the problem appeared again. Much thanks for anyones help!

oliandy, posting in academics_anon:
I graduated with a Ph.D.  and got a one-year teaching position. Thus, I will be back on the job market this fall, and a lot of applications for postdocs and some of the applications for jobs are due as early as August or September. Two questions arose, for which I would appreciate your ideas:

1. I will not be applying making much of an effect at the university where I teach this early in the year, and it seems absurd to ask my supervisor to comment on my teaching ability before she has seen any of it. :) But is it appropriate for all three references to be from the grad school program that I attended? Would this look strange?

2. Is it likely that the faculty who select postdocs at a research university would look down on someone who went to a good research university for the Ph.D. and got a one-year visiting position to teach intro classes at a distant state university, as opposed to someone who is just graduating with a Ph.D. from a research university or didn't get a job at all?

Thank you for your insights.

night_owl13, posting in useless_facts:
'Shell shock' or combat stress reaction is psychological condition suffered primarily by soldiers who have seen combat. The trauma and stress of such situations causes great mental fatigue that often translates into physical illness. Today known as post-traumatic stress disorder, many soldiers who experienced this disorder after the first World War were left untreated due to general lack of knowledge about mental illnesses. Some, who deserted or committed other wartime crimes in their distress, were executed. Most were accused of cowardice.

Symptoms of shell shock vary widely and can include the 'thousand yard gaze',, fatigue, disconnection from one's surroundings, shaking, trembling, skittishness, headaches, palpitations, anxiety, incontinence, insomnia and panic attacks. Among other things.

World War I saw possibly the most notable and dramatic cases of shell shock due to the newer, more intense, explosive and chaotic artillery style of warfare which caused unanticipated and extreme psychological stress though such responses to warfare have been documented throughout history.

Here is a pretty interesting (and short) video about the subject featuring archival footage of shell shocked soldiers. Kinda creepy. Are videos allowed here, btw?



-source, Wikipedia and a few other military history sites

writersedge:

http://www.writers-edge.info/2008/07/writing-media-releases.htm

One of the several projects I'm currently working on is a media release about an event. I thought this would be a good time to review the basics on how to prepare such a piece of work. Keep it to one page with release information (Embargo or For Immediate Release) and date in the upper right, contact information at the lower left (bottom of the page). Single space. Align text left (ragged right). Do NOT justify the text. Use a clear, easy-to-read font and size.

Start with an attention-grabbing lead sentence. In the middle include required or important information such as the date, time, cost, and location. Save interesting, but unnecessary, details for the end. Editors "cut from the bottom" when they fit copy to available space.

The most important aspect belongs in the lead sentence. This could be a person, organization, purpose, event or product. The date and time are straight-forward items, but details about the location (if you're writing about an event) depend on the size of the surrounding area and the span of your audience. In San Diego, for example, it's useful and common to find map coordinates included (everyone uses the same map books). In my Ohio hometown, stating "River Walk" would be sufficient direction. It's good to indicate the cost, if there is one, and a phone number for further information.