"A pair of otherwise distinguished physicists have suggested that the hypothesized Higgs boson, which physicists hope to produce with the collider, might be so abhorrent to nature that its creation would ripple backward through time and stop the collider before it could make one, like a time traveler who goes back in time to kill his grandfather."

( This got long. )

I was supposed to have spent the last hour studying for my Chinese test.

tl;dr this post turned into a kind of running commentary somehow, sorry about that. Oh Science Times you are my BFF <3

Before I get into anything long and boring that may turn some readers away, I just wanted to throw out what looks like it could be a great thing to play with for any of you contemplating NaNo this year: Write or Die. I haven't actually tried it yet myself, but it looks like it (or something) could be just the ticket for a long writing slog.

( blah blah blah life )

( The sample reviews )

Oh, and if any of you out there happen to have Scribblenauts (I intend on getting this myself and so have been avoiding discussions of it so that I don't get spoiled for any of the puzzles), there's just one question I'm dying to have answered: pirate vs. ninja--who wins?

Insert post that was almost done like a week ago before Vista ate it and I decided to fume about it for a while instead of rewriting it.

Anyway, as one of what seems like a bajillion projects I'm working on, I thought it might be interesting to try and investigate some things about the way that the fanfiction community works. As part of that research, though, I would need to be able to rate reviews in a consistent and objective fashion. So, I've been trying to come up with some scales on which to rate reviews that would be useful in analysis.

( And they are... )

Incidentally, did you know there were actually more new 'fics published on PC than Serebii in August? I always kind of think of PC's fanfiction section as being relatively small and cozy compared to Serebii's madness, but apparently that impression is mistaken, at least in terms of how often new stories pop up. Meanwhile, was FFN really always *this crazy*? I mean, multiple pages of updates per day? I seem to recall that it used to be only one page a day, or maybe even a little less... good grief.

And of course, yesterday I had to get smashed over the head with another chapterfic idea after reading through some of the stuff on Jax's new web site (curse you, Jax ;-;). It actually just kind of grew out of the idea I had for a one-shot a couple of weeks ago. I think my one-shot ideas really need to stop morphing into ginormous epics. Looks as though I need to reconsider my NaNo for this year yet again...

Edit: Looks like this is my Mewtwo-eth entry. Yay. :D

How is it possible that Mewtwo doesn't learn copycat?

MOTHERFUCKING SCOPING ARRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!

Maybe I'll learn not to name local variables the same thing all the time.

No. No learning.

ARRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!

So, I should totally be sleeping right now because I have to leave for the great drive back to school in about two hours, but I figured on making this post, so I reckon it's to be done.

( So this is some boring rl stuff about how my summer went. )

On the whole, I'd say that things turned out much better than anticipated. I got stuff moving forward. But above all, this summer I think I realized how much I've slacked off and let myself fall behind, especially last (school) year. No time for regrets, of course--just got to keep pushing forward.

This turned out rather more incoherent than I envisioned. Oh, well--now I really need to be getting to sleep.

...why hasn't anyone tried to make "fanfiction on tape?" I know a fair number of people really enjoy listening to audiobooks on their mp3 players or in the car; meanwhile, people already enjoy doing podcasts about fairly pointless things. So why not put two and two together and do a reading of your fanfiction for people to download and listen to later?

Obviously, the general low quality of fanfiction wouldn't be improved by the probable low quality of voice acting (or whatever one would call it) for this sort of thing. Nevertheless, I'm surprised nobody (that I know of) has tried this sort of thing, at least for pokémon, before.

Wait, Yami Ryu got banned?

A quick jaunt through recent posts shows nothing out of the ordinary, save maybe for this stuff.

Dammit, LJ, I want the space next to my mood icon blank! B-L-A-N-K!

...why does everyone senesce? I don't mean "why does senescence occur"--there are numerous theories about that, any one or many or none of which might be correct--but rather, why does it happen to everyone?

There are many diseases associated with premature aging, or which cause symptoms associated with early-onset senescence. They're quite rare, and although they're genetic in nature, some are just as a result of random mutation rather than a heritable one. However, they certainly do happen.

( So why not the reverse? )

Granted, I haven't exactly taken any classes in developmental biology (which I guess, would, err, cover senescence) or anything, but it just seems sort of odd to me. Given all the creative ways that the human body fails, why wouldn't it fail in this particular one? Why don't we see the rare instance of a kind of "Peter Pan" disease, where some grows up (or maybe not all the way up) and--stops?

Why no someone did not muck around writing a really hueg LJ post instead of doing some reffings of course not what are you talking about.

Looks like I won't be doing the Video Game Showdown again this year... nearest regional tournament is like twelve hours away from where I'll be this summer, and a ridiculous number of people are going to that one (Philadelphia) because it draws on pretty much all of the northeast, including New York, and much of the upper midwest. Seeing as only 128 people get in, based on a random drawing, I'm not so sure I want to attempt to arrange that drive/flight. =/

S'oh well, not like I'd have much time to practice anyway.

Tagged by Act. Just thought I'd do the main characters of the two fanfics I'm currently most actively working on; there are too many if I went through RP characters, original characters, other fanfic characters, etc.

( Tobias )

( And That Other One )

I'm kinda tempted to throw my Nano character on here too, because he may actually take the cake in terms of being screwed up. Maybe not when it's not like three in the morning.

I think that if I never again see an Excel spreadsheet with 35,000 rows of data I'll be perfectly okay.

"Double quotes" denote human speech or when text is being read passively (i.e.: He glanced at the sign, which read "Route 201," and then continued walking) as opposed to actively (i.e.: "The sign said 'Route 201,'" he clarified.).

'Single quotes in italics,' to denote translated Pokémon speech, which should apply mostly to when Pokémon are narrating the story.

"Double quotes in italic"' denote untranslated Pokémon speech, when humans are narrating the story.

Italics indicate throughts or telepathic speech.

+Plus signs+ indicate the first- or third-person narrator, though the former will only apply to three characters (Diego, Ren, and another who will be introduced a little ways in) while the latter will apply to anyone else. Note that I will not always use these.

Three plus signs in a row (+ + +) indicate a timelapse.

Three exclamation points in a row (! ! !) indicate a flashback, and (end) indicates the end of a flashback.

« Indicates Negrek hitting the back button before her brain melts.

(Interesting concept, the difference between text being read "passively" rather than "actively" (although at least he appears to have gotten the rule right?). Also I like when he says, "these indicate such-and-such, but I'm not always going to use them.")

Also, thanks to everyone who offered to help me out in the last entry. I'm sorry for not getting back to you about that; I ended up leaving that sort of late, and I didn't think it would have been fair to you to be all, "must e-mail me this back in twelve hours, kthanks." I just grabbed one of the other girls in my building to spend twenty minutes with in interview. But really, thanks for offering; it means a lot to me.

I enjoyed going to it, but in the end what went on probably won't interest most of you. There were really no die-hard Twilight fans there--or at least, if there were, they didn't say anything to defend themselves. For the most part, the people there just enjoyed some good chuckles at the book's absurdities. There were three professors there, and they kind of dominated the discussion. I was pretty amused when one of the followers of the series mentioned that the latest installment (...kinda) was called "Midnight Sun," and her response was, "What does that even mean?!"

So I spent pretty much the entire burning through the book; I didn't quite finish by five, but I just have like part of the epilogue left, which looks pretty pointless, anyway. I tried to get a nice, early start on it after getting up at 9:30 to collect the last signature I needed to get into a class next semester, but that ended up backfiring as I just ended up falling asleep after about thirty pages. The book was "gripping," obviously. Very intensely forgettable book, really, that kicks reason in the face fairly frequently. At the book discussion, it was nice to find that I wasn't the only person bothered by the fact that nobody seemed to find anything all that odd about the Cullens, even though the managed to miss class every time it was sunny, did weird stuff like always buying lunch and not eating it, and giving people weird feelings. That, and Bella just kind of accepting that things like vampires and werewolfs and so on are real without any real proof, or how Bella pretty much seems to do whatever she wants and her parents magically don't notice/are totally fooled.

In general, though, what got on my nerves most was the apparent need to remind readers of how beautiful Edward is *every other paragraph,* and Bella herself as a character... really, I'm trying to figure out how natural selection didn't mow down someone who is apparently unable to walk straight (and yet somehow never gets into any catastrophic traffic accidents). So yeah, discussion was good, book was bad, so it goes.

It looks like I may have missed a game of The Floor is Lava in the Great Hall by going to the discussion, though, so that's not cool.

Supposedly, it's a Kentucky superstition that you shouldn't say your name, or the name of a loved one, near a Black and Yellow Argiope (also called "writing spider"), because if it writes the name of that person in its web, they will die soon after.

Haven't been able to find a copy of Twilight anywhere. All the copies were gone from the public library I went to over break, they're all checked out here, and somehow the ones at the university library aren't due back until February. I'm going to need to ask someone around here to borrow their personal copy, but that's kind of awkward, as presumably they'll want to hear me gush about it when I give it back.

They're showing The Dark Knight for free in the building across the street this weekend. Figured I'd go see that; my last major bit of work (aside from one English project) was presented this evening, so I can indulge.

Something of interest dropped into my school e-mail today (how often does that happen?):

( I swear this cut is actually worth your while. )

Best stupid typo I've seen today: Problems with Capitalism

( Huge meme you don't care about )

Tomorrow's going to suck so very much. Just gotta make it through this week, though.

Stolen from Xanthine because I love an opportunity to show off what I've been churning over.

This post is for anyone in the middle of writing a fic (or many fics!) and it's so we have a chance both to share illustrative snippets and to bitch about how recalcitrant our fics are being.

( Ranked from least to most 'out there' )

Next chapter of Clouded Sky should be put up this weekend.

So a couple of weeks ago I took a different route to the Humane Society than I usually do and ran across something rather amusing on my way there. I went back yesterday to grab a picture.

( What could it be? )

Also, rather sad that I missed the Brand New concert tonight. One of my friends went, and this was pretty much the only band they've ever had here that I'm remotely interested in. So of course procrastination meant that when I went to get a ticket they'd already been sold out. Two weeks ago. ;-;

Watched Dr. Horrible again this evening to compensate.

In the Myanmaran (Myanmarian?) zodiac I am a dragon. I had to go through like six different zodiacs to find one in which I am a dragon, but I finally did it! Ha ha!

And my brother is a rat. This zodiac speaks the truth, I say!

(This puts me at Aquarius - Snake - Ash (Cedar) - Otter - Dragon, I guess.)