Feminism & SciFi: A Booklist
Posted Sunday May 11th, 3:44 PM by Sarcasticgal1221

I promised Elanna I'd post the books I read for my Women & Science Fiction Class. Then I decided to make it it's own topic, so it's doesn't get lost.

*The Ship Who Sang by Anne McCaffrey
*Eye of the Heron by Ursula LeGuin
*We Who Are About To... by Joanna Russ
*Kindred by Octavia Butler
*Ranma 1/2 by Rumiko Takahashi
*Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
*Dreaming Metal by Melissa Scott (out of print)
*bellwether by Connie Willis

A little about some of 'em:

*The Ship Who Sang- pretty typical SciFi fare. meh.
*We Who Are About To- dystopia. disturbing. excellent.
*Eye of the Heron- Good read. Love LeGuin
*Ranma- manga. fun.
Frankenstein- really good, actually. Read it if you never have.

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Review: Zenni Eyeglasses
Posted Sunday May 11th, 2:18 PM by Flying Betty

Zenni is one of what seems to be a newish trend of super cheap glasses makers popping up online.

And when I say cheap, I mean cheap. You can get a complete pair of glasses for as little as $8 (plus shipping- a flat rate for as many pairs as you want). They've got bunches of different frames, starting at $8 and going up to maybe $40 or so for the expensive ones. Some are fairly ordinary and some are pretty funky. How could I resist?

I ordered two pairs. One was a bright green pair of glasses that I wouldn't have looked at in a store because it looked a little too outrageous for normal wear, but since I already had contacts and a new pair of glasses and was only doing this out of curiosity, I went for it. The other pair was prescription sunglasses. Nice to find a way to get these cheap since I've been wearing glasses more often than I was before and I'm pretty sensitive to sunlight.

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Featured Poll of The Day: Needles - need one?
Posted Sunday May 11th, 8:05 AM by MFS

Every day, we have a featured poll at our Poll Of The Day blog. Check it out for the newest polls, or just take this random one:

Need a needle?

Yes, I'm a heroin addict.
Yes, I'm a record player.
Yes, I'm a type of valve.
Yes, I need to sew.
Yes, I'm an injector on an autosampler in a lab.
Yes, I am diabetic on insulin.
Yes, I am a lonely haystack.
No, I suck.
Uh, I don't get it.

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Overconfidence in language abilities
Posted Thursday May 8th, 11:11 AM by Zeph

I feel pretty proud that I don't correct people's French. Poll of the Day is killing me right now with that one thread's mistake and I had weeks of cringing when everyone was seeing "Ratatouille" but hey, mistakes are inevitable. I understand that everyone makes them. I can't imagine how my French profs must feel when they grade our stuff.

But it gets to be really irksome when people are super proud of their abilities in a language. Like my dad, who claimed he knew Spanish because he could poorly pronounce a few phrases his students taught him. He still didn't know what the word "conjugate" meant or how to make his own sentences. My old boss at the Cajun restaurant wrote on her menu that she was fluent in French, her "native tongue". All she could say was "But yes, I speak Cajun French." Twice customers came in who spoke some French and she just smiled and walked off when they spoke. When I continued to have a conversation with them in French she threated to take me off the clock.

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I am a chef.
Posted Sunday May 4th, 8:02 PM by Helium

I made cupcakes today! They're nothing special, just a yellow cake mix from this cook book I've had since I was a baby and only recently started cooking out of, and I threw some cocoa powder in some to make them chocolate. But I gave them fancily colored frosting, some with peppermint extract and some with orange extract, so they have a little more kick than just plain cupcakes would.





That frosting that looks all nasty and brown is actually really really dark purple. Yay!
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