In other news, this might be the most awesomest video ever. OK Go and Syyn Labs rules. (And yeah, it’s real).

I’ve also been continuing my love-affair with all things Norse, and I’m learning to read runes. They told me that in order to keep my house clean, I have to make a plan and stick to it with the strength of a wild ox, and then I will  find joy and success. Go figure.

Finally, I had to laugh at how my research for housekeeping has kept me almost constantly on house-keeping for Jesus sites. I didn’t know JC was so big into hearth and home, but apparently he is. And I’m never going to be a true success because I refuse to get up fifteen minutes earlier than my husband (according to an astonishing number of websites, the Bible says I have to be an early riser, regardless of what God and nature instilled into my constitution)  who gets up at 5:30 in the morning so that he can wander around the house in his underwear for 2 hours (you didn’t need that visual, did you >:) – would it help if I said he’s got muscles on top of muscles, ’cause he does. Re-visualize. Looks better now, eh?) . But other than that, I have gotten the most use out of a site created by a woman who homeschools her children because…. public school encourages Satan or something. I’m not sure whether to be slightly appalled that I am being electronically mentored by this woman or to remind myself that we can all learn from each other if we just open our ears and get past our prejudices. I think I’ll do both.

According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, there were three martyrs named Valentine, two of whom died in the 3rd century (maybe) and one of whom died in Africa at an unknown date. None of them seem to have anything to do with love. But that’s where we get the name from.

Though there are many debates as to why the mid-February date (some claiming it has to do with when one of those Valentines was buried), mid-February is also the date for the ancient Roman Lupercalia, a fertility festival that was celebrated on the Ides of February (Feb 15). This festival, according to…. somebody at the University of Chicago (there’s like 3 names on the site, and I’m not sure who actually wrote the article)… involved sacrificing goats and puppies in front of a cave, then two virile young men (called the Luperci) approached the altar, painted each other’s foreheads with the sacrificial blood, wiped it off with milk, and then had to start laughing (which I’m guessing wasn’t hard, provided the sacrificing puppies didn’t get you down too much). Then everybody ate, got drunk, and the Luperci then ran through the town dressed in goat skins and spanked people (particularly women who wanted to get pregnant) with mini-whips made of more goat-skin.

Now that’s a Valentine’s party for you – two drunken, nubile men running around town in loincloths spanking women.

A Catholic legend (according to history.com), which tells why we send cards on Valentine’s Day, says that one of those martyred Valentines fell in love with the jailer’s daughter while he was in prison (some say for marrying couples against the Emperor’s orders). Before he was executed, he left a note for her signed, “From your Valentine.”

During the Middle Ages, Chaucer made a reference to Valentines Day and love in a poem (potentially the first connection between the two) when he wrote:

Though why birds would be choosing their mates in February is anybody’s guess (and, according to wikipedia.org, he in fact wrote this for the engagement of two 15 year old royals, an agreement that was arranged on May 2, 1381)

Shakespeare includes a reference to Valentine’s Day during one of Ophelia’s rants… and the part of the play where (most people interpret) we find out that a lot of her crazy comes from Hamlet rejecting her after she, uh, gave it up:

To-morrow is Saint Valentine’s day,
All in the morning betime,
And I a maid at your window,
To be your Valentine.
Then up he rose, and donn’d his clothes,
And dupp’d the chamber-door;
Let in the maid, that out a maid
Never departed more.

So, I’m going to go with pretty clearly, Halmark did not, in fact, invent Valentine’s Day. So no matter how you choose to celebrate it – cards and chocolates, deflowering innocent virgins, marrying off teenagers, a good old fashioned spanking (and I do mean old fashioned), or taking the new wave train of finding a way to say “I love you!” to yourself – I hope you have a good one!

- from Randy Ingermanson’s article “Organizing: Does Multitasking Make You Stupid?”

I don’t know where he got his statistics from, so maybe this is full of it, but, personally, I’d buy it.  Now, for clarification, I have a dirty little secret. I’ve lived in Austin, TX for fifteen years now and never gotten high. Yes, I am a strange beast. So my opinion on the quote might be as suspect as the facts in it. Buy I have noticed that while 2 glasses of wine have suspect value for my editing ability, they can make drafting a heckuva lot easier. I can focus, I don’t care if I sound stupid, I just type and type and type and type. And the results are usually not as bad as one would expect, and regardless it’s down on paper, which is more than I can say for a lot of days.

Not that I usually write under the influence – I have no aspirations to be one of those drunken, maudlin writer types – but I gotta admit there’s a certain fun to the occasional tippled typing.

However, I cannot write – drafting or editing – while chatting, talking on the phone, listening to a song that I want to sing along with (when I’m really mentally deep into my writing, music helps. When I’m not that deep into my writing, music hurts), or even while worrying about my calendar or the query letter I will one day write or the brilliant marketing strategy I’ll only get to use if I ever get this thing published. And once I let myself get distracted, it’s gone. I have the hardest time getting back in.

I feel bad sometimes, because I’ll finally be rolling along, and Scott will poke his head in the room and say something. Scott has a habit of doing hit and run conversations – he says one thing, expects a response, and then walks off. Then he’ll come back five minutes later, say one thing, expect a response, and walk off. And I don’t want to be rude to my most wonderful of husbands, but I don’t want to lose this thought train that was so hard to get onto  (especially while drafting – I can hop on and off the editing thought train much easier). So I’ve got a choice. Ignore him with a “talk to the hand” (too rude, I can’t do it – besides, even registering a conversation has started the derail), grunt a suitable sounding response based on his tone of voice (but not actually the words he said – if Scott ever came by and said “my company folded today” in a happy tone of voice, I’d probably grunt “Great!” at him) and take 30 seconds or so to get back into the draft, or hop off the train completely, ask him to repeat what he just said so that I can really register it, give him my full attention and a thoughtful reply, watch him walk off, and then turn back to my screen with no idea what to type next. And about the time I’ve almost gotten my rhythm back, he’ll come by for another drive-by. Make me want to scream and throw things.

Multi-tasking. I just can’t do it. And I’m finding more and more studies (with more statistics than the above) backing that while multitasking may increase the amount accomplished (or it may decrease it), it significantly reduces the quality of everything done. Can we get a Twelve-Step Program for those who want to move away from chaotic, multi-tasking dependence and learn to free our minds for good old fashioned one thing at a time?

[ request from Ingermanson that this be included with quotes:

Award-winning novelist Randy Ingermanson, "the Snowflake Guy," publishes the Advanced Fiction Writing E-zine, with more than 19,000 readers, every month. If you want to learn the craft and marketing of fiction, AND make your writing more valuable to editors, AND have FUN doing it, visit  http://www.AdvancedFictionWriting.com.

Download your free Special Report on Tiger Marketing and get a free 5-Day Course in How To Publish a Novel.]

It doesn’t matter how good or bad the product is, the fact is that people don’t read anymore. Forty percent of the people in the U.S. read one book or less last year. The whole conception is flawed at the top because people don’t read anymore.

I didn’t realize that I didn’t read anymore.  But now I’ve been reading about the iPad (and I’m really going to resist commenting on the name, other than this aside in which I remind everyone that the name is infinitely commentable) and the pricing wars between Amazon and Mcmillan, and have decided that the modern world of book publishing, particularly in regards to the e-book market, is all fascinating and somewhat confusing and frustrating.

I own a Kindle. I love it muchly; it’s easy to use, carries more books than even I can read on vacation, is lightweight and very portable, and I was shocked by how much I just didn’t miss trying to read paper books in which the type was so close to the spine I had to practically rebreak the cover every time I turned a page. If, on the Kindle, I could organize my books into digital bookshelves (like I do at home – I have my own whacked out system that they will not come up with on their own), loan the books to friends, flip to other pages easily, and see the covers (and no, Nook’s “if I squint I can almost tell what that is” inch tall cover display doesn’t count), it would be perfect. Oh, and if I didn’t have this sense of impending doom that eventually I won’t be using a Kindle anymore (either because of tech envy or Kindle just goes the way of the 8track) and I will have lost a few hundred books that can only be read on an obsolete device. But, in the meantime, my bookshelves are staying at a comfortably groaning stasis, which makes my marriage a far better place to be. So the Kindle will stay.

Who knew? Technology and literature together make a powder keg. Oh. Wait. They always have by themselves; why would conjoining them make a difference?

“He tore his eyes away from the tops of those remarkable breasts of hers and tried to think unpleasant thoughts of particularly horrible things, like overcooked vegetables and cut-rate wine.”

See? You can’t not laugh. Or, at least you can’t if you think Victorian England, gastronomy, dry humor, and urban fantasy are some of life’s greatest wonders… but didn’t think you’d ever get them in one book. And since those are four of my favorite things, it was like Ms Carriger wrote this book for me.

It’s fabulous! Go buy this book! You need it!

1. Holy cow, everybody says something different. You can find a statistic, a doctor, a study, and a politician to tell you anything is satan in food form… and that anything is healthy.

2. So… you have to pick out what makes sense to you, do that, and pay attention what happens as a result.

Kinda like… everything else in life.

But here’s some things I’ve gleaned from my Mission: Impossible – figure out what’s healthy.

• There’s vitamins and minerals that make your eyes and skin and teeth healthy. Those are important. But that’s not got much to do with weight. Weight has to do with how your body uses and stores energy, and that’s a combination of 3 things: protein, fat, and carbohydrates.
• You need all three of these things. Protein builds muscle, fat allows your joints to move smoothly, carbs provide blood sugar for your brain.
• Different types of carbohydrates produce different insulin responses in the body, and this is where things get complicated and everybody tells you something different…

“When you eat a food containing carbohydrates, the digestive system breaks down the digestible ones into sugar, which then enters the blood. As blood sugar levels rise, special cells in the pancreas churn out more and more insulin, a hormone that signals cells to absorb blood sugar for energy or storage… A new system, called the glycemic index, aims to classify carbohydrates based on how quickly and how high they boost blood sugar… Foods with a high glycemic index, like white bread, cause rapid spikes in blood sugar. Foods with a low glycemic index, like whole oats, are digested more slowly, causing a lower and gentler change in blood sugar.” – Havard School of Public Health

If you want to read arguments that will last until forever, google “glycemic load.” Basically I’m going with two things:

1. Carbs are not evil; they are healthy and we should eat them. Just most people in America eat too many carbs per day and double the pain by eating the kinds that cause glycemic index freakouts.
2. Vegetables are carbs, and for the vitamin and mineral content as well as low glycemic load are a much more fabulous way of consuming those necessary carbs than flour, regardless of whether or not that flour is “whole grain”

I’ve read in several places now (and been told by a homeopathic dietitian, but my cautious fandom and loving distrust of homeopathic anything is another post) that a lot of people who aren’t necessarily gluten intolerant  or have celiac’s disease are still gluten reactive. (My personal take on this goes with the idea that man was around a long time before we became farmers, and a lot of us still haven’t evolved into grain-eaters, but that’s just the theory that sounds logical to me.) Basically, there are theories that say that in a lot of people, gluten can cause minor inflammation on a cellular level. So, from what I understand, a small part of the population was born with a body that handles gluten, no sweat. A small part of the population was born a body that flips a gasket when fed gluten. The rest of us have bodies that don’t keel over, but would run more smoothly without gluten.

So, to sum all that up, if I’m getting my very necessary carbs from bread instead of spinach, I’m not getting the vitamins and minerals, getting a higher insulin spike, and, as I’m gluten semi-intolerant, causing my body minor internal havoc.

Back to my title.

So, I’m not low-carb. I eat apples every day. And vegetables. And sometimes I eat pea soup (which is a lentil, not a vegetable). But I can’t remember the last time I had pasta, whole grain or otherwise. At first I thought this was a big deal, a huge sacrifice. Then I went Paleo for a month and that really did change the way I think about food. It was amazing how much in week two I thought I couldn’t live without a Snickers bar (but I did). But what was more amazing was how I came out the other side not caring that much about cookies, candy, sugary-drinks… pretty much the only things I still wanted that I’d been denied was alcohol and cheese. The whole experience made me a firm believer in the idea that sugary carbs mess with our brains in a serious way. 30 days of Paleo made eating healthy seem not like a chore, but something that I want to do. Bok choy tastes better than pizza, and right now if you asked me which one I want, I can with no hesitation tell you bok choy. A month of paleo a pain in the butt to do, but from a having done it perspective, I can’t recommend it highly enough. (Just don’t cheat… there seems to be a very strong correlation between the people who cheat and the people who don’t get it after it’s over. Week two is freaking hard. Put the cookie down.)

In the end, it all comes down to that commercial from the 80s… sing with me now!

Interesting article on an issue near and dear to my heart: misogyny within the storytelling community. Baggott touches on the side of the issue that I find the most disturbing, that recognized books “are not only written by men but also have male themes, overwhelmingly… war, boyhood, adventure.” As if writing about childbirth, love, community, and other “women’s issues” are somehow unworthy of praise.  Not to say that women don’t go to war and men don’t fall in love, but I am sick of living in a world in which to be considered equal, I have to live up to a man’s definition of strength – be physically strong, fight well (kick-ass heroines anyone?… which, don’t get me wrong, I LOVE them, but that’s not the only way to be a strong female character), earn a lot of money, be a CEO…. If I’m strong because I’m mystical, compassionate, and good at working with people instead of mowing them down, clearly I’m not a feminist, or at least not equal to somebody logical, authoritarian, and violent.

James Cameron Hates America – by Tom Shone

Dude, the man who wrote Rambo and Titanic? Did you know he’s a Kanuck?? Yup. And he hates America. At least according to extreme right wing sites such as Movieguide (which I’ll get to in a moment. This might be my new favorite website to mock). I haven’t seen Avatar yet, but so far I’ve heard that while it’s stunning fabulousity is earning bajillions of dollars, it is a desecration of all known human values for its (a) America hating, people hating, God hating, capitalism hating left-wing madness and its (b) white-messiah-complex same old right-wing-racist-in-liberal-clothing storyline. Dude. I totally need to see this movie for myself. How can that many people possibly be offended all at once and it not be a South Park episode?

Movieguide

Umm… Let me start this by saying that I don’t agree with the way movies are currently rated, including items like two uses of “fuck” isn’t, in my opinion, less appropriate for children than decapitated heads being tossed over a castle wall (see http://www.mpaa.org/Ratings_Rules.pdf pg 8 for ruling on cuss words; see LOTR: Return of the King for a PG-13 movie with decapitated heads being catapulted over a wall) and how is it possible that Cassanova and Inglourious Basterds have the same rating? And how is Hostel not NC-17… while Clerks had to appeal their original NC-17 designation to get an R?

So… a new rating system would, in my opinion, not be inappropriate.

However.

Movieguide has a very special rating system for people who want to know if watching this movie may torpedo their chances at heaven. Again, I’m actually cool with this (I certainly wouldn’t mind if somebody put together a pagan movieguide to help me decide what to see and what’s going to just make me angry). What I don’t understand is, why in their Christian guide, they felt the need to warn people if the movies have themes that are: communist, environmentalist, feminist, internationalist, politically correct, and/or socialist. Does Christ hate the environment and love capitalism? I don’t remember that part of the Bible where Jesus said “you’re welcome for the healing; that’ll be $200.”

But what I really love about this site is the rating system they use, a shorthand involving 29 different elements like ‘O’ for “Occult worldview, occult elements or Satanism”, all of which can be increased by adding Os, so “OOO” means it REALLY ups the Occult, as opposed to O which has some occult and OO which is… fair to midlin’ occult? So you can have a movie with a rating that looks like: PaPaPa, PCPC, EE, FRFR, CoCo, AcapAcapAcap, C, B, O, LLL, VVV, S, NN, A, DD, MM (yes, that’s an actual rating… for Avatar) which translates as:

Unfortunately, Avatar doesn’t have my favorite shorthand designation, which is Ho for “homosexual worldview or homosexuality (incl. sodomy & lesbianism)”. I’d really love to see a movie with a HoHoHo rating; that would totally make my day.