Ted Rabinowitz's Blog, page 40

Extremely Geeky, Incredibly Nerdy

Anyone involved in the sciences, post-doc research or lab work must read the #overlyhonestmethods thread on Twitter.

Do it now.

Why's That So Good? - Neuromancer

The first five paragraphs of William Gibson's cyberpunk classic Neuromancer may be the most famous in science fiction:

PART ONE: CHIBA CITY BLUES
The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.

"It's not like I'm using," Case heard someone say, as he shouldered his way through the crowd around the door of the Chat. "It's like my body's developed this massive drug deficiency." It was a Sprawl voice and a Sprawl joke. The Chatsubo was a bar for professional expatriates; you could drink there for a week and never hear two words in Japanese. 
Ratz was tending bar, his prosthetic arm jerking monotonously as he filled a tray of glasses with draft Kirin. He saw Case and smiled, his teeth a webwork of East European steel and brown decay. Case found a place at the bar, between the unlikely tan on one of Lonny Zone's whores and the crisp naval uniform of a tall African whose cheekbones were ridged with precise rows of tribal scars. "Wage was in here early, with two joeboys," Ratz said, shoving a draft across the bar with his good hand. "Maybe some business with you, Case?"

Case shrugged. The girl to his right giggled and nudged him. 
The bartender's smile widened. His ugliness was the stuff of legend. In an age of affordable beauty, there was something heraldic about his lack of it. The antique arm whined as he reached for another mug. It was a Russian military prosthesis, a seven-function force-feedback manipulator, cased in grubby pink plastic. "You are too much the artiste, Herr Case." Ratz grunted; the sound served him as laughter. He scratched his overhang of white-shirted belly with the pink claw. "You are the artiste of the slightly funny deal."
That first line is more than an apt description for the color of an industrial overcast; it's a perfect use of metaphor. The TV comparison is technological, and the novel is all about tech. The channel is dead, like Case's decaying world.

The rest of the excerpt plays off our knowledge of hard-boiled detective fiction. The sleazy bar, the laconic bartender, the cynical barflies: The genre tropes are there, but transfigured by Gibson's technology. The tough guys have scars, but they're African tribal scars. Instead of an eyepatch and a baseball bat under the table, the bartender has a seven-function prosthetic arm and decaying metal dental work. Gibson has taken each stock character and changed out the hardware. The tension between what we expect from the genre and Gibson's descriptions highlight the new details. The detail that's just one or two steps different from what we expect is one of the most powerful techniques for creating "otherness" in science fiction...like the "dilating" doors in so much of Robert Heinlein's Past Through Tomorrow.

Secrets of New York #1

John's Coal-Fired Brick Oven Pizza is strictly for tourists.

There. I said it, don't regret it.

More terrifying Secrets of New York tk!

The Most Useless Machine - EVAH!

If it isn't, it's in the top (bottom) ten.
http://www.instructables.com/id/The-Most-Useless-Machine/

I particularly like the timing of the push-finger....

Good Wine, Bad Taste

So there's a writers forum where I hang out when I'm on the Internet. One day, one of the F/SF regulars  posted a question. He was writing a fantasy that was heavy on diplomacy, and he wanted suggestions for other fantasies with diplomatic and political elements.

In other words, instead of doing his own research with primary sources - actual politicians, actual diplomats, academic experts on diplomacy and politics in history - he was drawing his source material from other fantasy writers. Writers who, one assumes, had never had political or diplomatic careers of their own, but were cribbing and researching themselves. He was researching at one remove.

It made me sad.

There is a weird pool of derivativeness that bubbles up in the heart of certain sections of fandom. Some fantasy fans seem to prefer the
So let's hit the Mabinogion one more time; let's take yet another gulp from that never-refreshed well of Germanic folklore; let's become the regulars at Merlin's overcrowded cave. Let's see what the other writers have done and take our cues from them.
Or we could...I don't know...try something new. Like Perelandra.
C.S. Lewis wrote quite a lot in addition to the Narnia books. (The majority of it was Christian allegories and apologetics.) Perelandra is the middle book of The Space Trilogy, in which Lewis used his Christian and Neoplatonic theology as the background for a story of interplanetary conflict. Most of the story takes place on a planet that, unlike Earth, it has not experienced the Fall of Man. The main character, Ransom, is an Earthman sent to the planet to prevent the Fall from happening. Now here's the thing: Whether you agree with Lewis' theology or not (I certainly don't), his descriptions of this Eden are still fresh and new,  more than 70 years after the book was written. What's more, it sticks around in your memory years after you've read it. Instead of turning to other fantasies or science fiction for inspiration, Lewis sought out his own wellsprings, and found them.
But the people who devoured The Sword of Shannara and clamored for more would find Perelandra uncomfortable, or puzzling, or simply boring. Dulled palates don't appreciate good wine.

Support the Pink Gun Law

So, there's this petition on Whitehouse.gov that...ahem...treats firearms with the seriousness they deserve. It's right here.

And here's the text of the petition:

Support a Pink Gun Law
We ask for a law to require all useable firearms (except antiques) to be painted pink.

Like orange safety vests, pink rifles will be visible for many yards, reducing the risk of hunting accidents.

Maniacs with pink guns will be spotted more quickly, so that they can be "easy kills" for any appropriately armed grandmother or Sunday School teacher.

The opposite of a "gun-free zone" sign, a big pink gun will let criminals know they are in the presence of a peaceful, law-abiding American who shoots to kill.

Since the Stonewall Riots, pink has been the color of individual rights and resistance to government oppression.

Like Mary Kay's pink Cadillacs, pink guns will foster a culture of self-esteem.

Pink guns will not infringe on the Second Amendment.

*********
Go sign it!

Medieval Recipe Day - Christmas Goose!

Back in the Middle Ages, goose and boar were the meats of choice served at the Christmas feast. (They were all the more delicious since they came at the end of a four-day church "fast," where certain varieties of food were restricted.)

So, courtesy of Celtnet, here's a medieval Christmas goose:

Goose in Sawse Madame
Ingredients:
1 goose (about 1.5kg)
1 quince, pared, quartered, cored and finely chopped

80g black grapes, chopped and de-seeded
220g chopped fresh herbs (sage, hyssop, savory, lovage, marjoram)
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped

For the Sauce:
½ tsp ground cinnamon
½ tsp freshly-grated nutmeg
1 tsp galingale

Mix the herbs and fruit and use to stuff the goose.

Sew the body cavity closed then place the goose in a roasting dish and place in an oven pre-heated to 200°C. Roast for an hour and a half until done (the flesh should be slightly pink in the middle). Cook for longer if you want it well done.

To make the sauce, take the dripping from the goose and add the white wine and the spices. Place in a saucepan and bring to the boil. Reduced until thickened then carve the goose and drizzle the sauce over it.

Unfamiliar ingredients: quince and galingale.

The quince fruit is related to the pear and the apple; it's flavor is sweet, somewhat tart, and the flesh is dry, and not grainy. It's usually cooked instead of being eaten raw.

Galingale is related to ginger; like ginger, the root is used in cooking and herbal medicine. Its taste and smell are different from, and stronger than, those of ginger.

Just when we thought the world would end...

...Australia discovered two entirely new species of skink lizards! (Yeah, I spelled it right.)

You go, Oz!

Sucks to be you, 12/21/12.

Medieval Recipe Day!

Just got over the flu - a stomach bug, fever, and weakness so bad I couldn't easily sit upright. So the recipe's obvious:


Capon White Dish for the Sick

Cook it in water until it is well cooked. Pound almonds with dark capon meat.
Steep this in your broth.Strain it all through a cheesecloth, then boil it until it is solid enough to slice.Pour into a bowl. Brown in lard six peeled almonds and put them on end on half the plate. Put pomegranate seeds on the other side. Sugar everything.

source: Taillevent, le Viandiertrans: James Prescott

12/21/12

We all still here?
Bueller?
Bueller?

Just checking.
See ya at the next apocalypse.