Writing Wrongs

Over on the Book of Face, the very talented writer and shadow puppeteer Mary Robinette Kowal just wrapped up a month-long campaign to encourage people to write real letters. On paper. With a pen. And mail them via the US Postal Service. Mary also applies sealing wax seals to hers. There's a web site here: http://lettermo.com/

I love the sentiment, but I don't. My handwriting sucks, but I type pretty fast for a non-touch-typer, so ever since I was about 16 I typed all my letters. On those old Underwood typewriters they had a personal touch - this was back in the days when the FBI used to be able to tell which typewriter a letter came from.

I used to seal them with sealing wax, I had a collection of seals including a script H and a rose. Around 15 years ago those started showing up with the seals chewed off by the USPS machines, and sometimes the letter was destroyed in the process, so I stopped using wax seals. For a while I used stickers, but those seemed artificial, so I stopped.

After all these years, I really only have one regular email correspondence going. My aunt and uncle in NYC have been writing for years. My uncle has macular degeneration, so instead of typing letters to them I record a 15-minute MP3 and email that. My uncle loves it, because he doesn't need my aunt to read the letters to him, and he says it's like having me in the room there with him. She still types the replies (she was an executive secretary), but I taught him how to make his own voice recordings, which he uses to communicate with other friends with vision issues. I also taught his ophthalmologist, who has passed it along to many of his patients.

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No. There is no such thing as a lie by omission. A lie is an active thing, one cannot lie without saying something.

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Never believed in Santa, thanks to a Jewish upbringing. As non-Christians in a Christian-dominated society, my parents busted those myths early and often. Which, ironically, helped me bust the Jewish myths as well.

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Yes.

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I have never enjoyed Tom Hanks performances. Every role he plays, it seems to be Tom Hanks saying the words of a different person while still being Tom Hanks. There is one movie of his I have not seen (and will not see because the subject matter is painful for me) which friends have said include actual acting by Mr. Hanks: Philadelphia. His winning an Oscar for it, I suspect, was not for actual acting but for playing the lead in a groundbreaking, highly controversial film.

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Women.

Not writer's block, just kinda in hermit mode. Dropped out of the NorCal Peace Corps alumni group, have stopped going to BASFA meetings, withdrew from the Silicon 2009 art show. Pulled out of all the photo meetup groups which do group model shoots.

Been watching America's Got Talent on Tivo. The first 10 minutes of each show is crap & commercials, so FF gets used a lot. I have come to cherish Piers' comments. He mostly thinks like me, though he's way too soft-hearted when it comes to the Everyman entrants. The show is not called "America's Got People Who Sing Flat" or "America's Got Derelicts Who Clean Up Okay". And I want to shoot the producers who have torpedoed some real talent by over-producing their numbers, putting them in horrid costumes, and making them do numbers which don't suit them. My Way as a trio? OMGWTFBBQ. Backup singers for a child trio? High School Musical production numbers for solo dancers? And worst of all, IMHO, making the reincarnation of Paul Robeson sing tacky contemporary with backup singers and sexy women violinists. The only person they have done justice to is one Barbara Padilla, who sings opera so beautifully I have cried during each and every one of her performances. They have costumed her perfectly, and let her sing in her own genre. Her voice still needs a wee bit of work, but she would have fit right into one of Pavarotti's master classes.( cut for length )
Been reading Mainspring a lot. I am finding it very slow reading. Part of the problem is the name of the main character. Hethor. That name makes my eye stop. It makes my brain freeze up too. You know that theory Mel Brooks has about "some words are funny, some aren't"? Hethor is just one of those words which does not look like a name for a character in a book set in British New England. And since he tells the story in the third person, it's on the page early and often. Did anyone else have this experience, or is it just me? Other than that, I'm torn, because it's certainly a very creative setting and story, but I keep running into phrases which stop my eye, or just make me wish he'd called it something else. Anyone know if Jay owns an astrolabe? That would explain a lot. I'm almost done, I may or may not write a full review. Yosemite's reading list will include Sherri S. Tepper.

Looking forward to Thursday's band rehearsal. It's what got me started on the implant thing - it can hurt a lot to play Baritone or trumpet without real teeth. One of the other older bari players suggested it to me.

[Error: unknown template qotd] The pardon should have been nullified by the Supreme Court, it violated the "innocent till proved guilty" clause. Pardons can not be granted in advanced, because there is nothing to pardon an innocent person for.

Nixon should have been prosecuted and tried. It is possible he would have been found innocent because much of the evidence was protected by the 5th amendment. His secretary should also have been tried for her complicity in destroying evidence. I don't believe she was given a pre-pardon, but I know she was never prosecuted.