ÿþ<HEAD> <title>Eric's Archive</title> <META NAME="description" CONTENT="Eric's Journal, the irregularly updated journal of Eric Lis"> <META NAME="keywords" CONTENT="eric, lis, emperor, aerica, aerican, journal, eric's head"> </HEAD> <left><font face="Times New Roman"> <font face="Monotype Corsiva,Bernhard Modern Roman,Unicorn,BellGothic,News Gothic MT"> <center> <big><big><big><big> Eric's Archive<br> Entries 571-580<P> </big></big></big></big></font> <I> Those who forget the past<Br> Are doomed to reread it.<p></i> </center> <a href="http://www.aericanempire.com/eric/index.html">More recent</a><BR> <a href="http://www.aericanempire.com/eric/501-600/581-590.html">Entries 581-590</a><BR> <a href="#580">Entry 580</a> March 13 2009<br> <a href="#579">Entry 579</a> March 10 2009<br> <a href="#578">Entry 578</a> March 7 2009<br> <a href="#577">Entry 577</a> March 4 2009<br> <a href="#576">Entry 576</a> March 1 2009<br> <a href="#575">Entry 575</a> February 26 2009<br> <a href="#574">Entry 574</a> February 23 2009<br> <a href="#573">Entry 573</a> February 20 2009<br> <a href="#572">Entry 572</a> February 17 2009<br> <a href="#571">Entry 571</a> February 14 2009<br> <a href="http://www.aericanempire.com/eric/501-600/561-570.html">Entries 561-570</a><BR> <a href="http://www.aericanempire.com/eric/archive.html">Archive</a><BR> </blockquote> <HR> <a name="580"></a> <U><B>Fanesan De'falen</b></u><p> My friends and I have now finished watching season three of Babylon 5. We've seen what Vorlons and Shadows look like. We've seen the confusion that comes from trying to conjugate verbs associated with temporal paradoxes and we've seen many, many things go "boom." This was probably my fourth time seeing the two-part "War Without End" which explains a number of mysterious happenings from the very start of the series, including using footage which was used in the first and second seasons as well as footage which would only begin to make sense in the fifth seasons and even in some of the spin off movies. This sort of thing is typical of the series; in the first and second season, we're treated to multiple scenes which only make sense towards the very end of the series. The part that makes this impressive isn't the fact that everything gets tied together and that plot hooks get explained -- it's easy enough to turn a single phrase into a plot hook in one season and only think of a way to work it in years later -- but the fact that the plot hooks were clearly worked in, not haphazardly, but with clear intention of how the story is meant to go. One is left with the overwhelming impression that when Joe Straczynski started filming his first season, he already knew the entire five-year story arc, which is indeed what he's always said was the case. Speaking as someone who loves to write and put together stories, this is perhaps the single thing I've always found most compelling about Babylon 5. Most TV shows don't aspire for much in the way of continuity. Most of those that do rarely try to stretch a storyline beyond a single season. Notable for being on the air right now are both Lost and babylon 5, program with a single overarching storyline but which the writers publically admitted that they're more or less making up as they go. I find the idea of someone working out a five-year plotline ahead of time in such nuance and detail that scenes for the fifth season can be shot at the same time as the first to be mind-boggling, and that's perhaps the major reason that I loved this show so much more than I have others. Right from the beginning, it knew where it was going, which is easy, but also how it was getting there, which is hard.<P> When I try to come up with a story, I usually find two parts to be easiest: the beginning and the ending. Often, the ending is the very first thing I come up with, and why not, when it's often the flashiest or most climactic part of the story. The beginning tends to be pretty easy as well -- it only takes a small kick to start a very large rock rolling. The bist in the middle tend to be the parts that cause me the most trouble. How do we get from point A to point B? Throw in a sidetrack or make it linear? This single line of dialogue that I know I want to use, how to work it in best? These are the parts that are the hardest for me. The great fun of storytelling something like Dungeons and Dragons is that the players tend to have me seeds for those middle bits -- they do all the hard work, whereas all I need to know is how it's going to start and how it's going to end, the parts that come to me easiest. Similarly, this is part of why I so adore The Extraordinary Adventures of Baron Munchausen; another player hands you the beginning and the ending and then you have only to focus on linking them up, with a little help from all the people tossing complications (and often inspirations) your way. I enjoy writing short stories because, to a degree, all there is to them is the beginning and the ending; my every attempt at producing something novel-length has stymied because of the same difficulty of coming up with the forty or so thousand words that go between chapters 1 and 42. To my credit, I continue to keep trying rather than giving up, even in the face of repeated and sometimes catastrophic failure, but the idea of conceiving of a five year story -- the beginning, the ending, but also dozens or hundreds of critical things that happen in between -- really does blow my mind to a degree. If I believed in a Devil, that sort of writing ability is the kind of thing I might seriously consider buying at the cost of my soul (I wouldn't actually sell my soul, but I'd be tempted for more than seven heartbeats, and not just because I'd probably be tachycardic from all the smoke in the air). <P> I, for one, would give a lot to know just how far ahead, for example, Dave Sim planned out the storyline for his comic, Cerebus. I can't believe he that he knew what would happen in issue 300 even before he started writing issue 1, because at that time he hadn't undergone the religious conversions that would shape his later stories. Still, there's no question that by the time he got to writing "Women" and "Reads" he had an inkling of where things were going to end up more than a decade or real-time later. It's easy to imagine why he had the kind of mental breakdowns he talked about.<P> I consider this sort of foresight to be something to strive for. I don't think I'll ever reach that level of storytelling ability, but as I've been known to observe, I'm a big believer in setting impossible goals, and this seems like a good one. The ability to construct a world that reaches so far forward -- even if it does amount to only about 100 hours of story, less than half a year of D&D sessions -- is exactly the sort of thing I hope to one day accomplish. If I can do that, it'll be the kind of triumph I look back on as justifying my existence. And if I fail, at least I'll have done plenty of writing in the meantime, which is its own reward. <HR> <a name="579"></a> <U><B>Haven't I Seen You Somewhere Before?</b></u><p> My eight weeks of pediatrics proved to be a very curious time in my life, for a number of reasons. Pediatrics was quite different from my past rotations. It was possibly the first rotation I ever did where I would see a patient in the emergency room and feel genuinely confident that I'd examined them well and knew what was wrong with them. It was a bit closer to home for me than most fields of medicine, since I've never experienced heart failure or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease but I do have an inkling of what it's like to be a sick kid in the hospital. And it was odd because, for several weeks, it seemed like I couldn't go anywhere without bumping into a doctor who'd played a role in my own childhood health care. The older I grow (and perhaps the more religious I become), the less and less I find that I believe in coincidence, and at a certain point (the Friday of my third week into the rotation, I think) I really began to feel that the gods were taking an even more direct hand in my life than usual, sliding me into places where I'd bump into people I'd benefit from speaking with (and in fact, I've got every reason to imagine that through no fault of Forsteri I made stupid mistakes and missed out on at least two or three very interesting and potentially rewarding encounters during this time). Random chance is all well and good but how many improbable coincidences does it take before I start getting paranoid and seeing connections where none exist? Apparently, three or four is my limit.<P> How did the pattern develop? At McGill, our pediatrics rotation is divided up into six weeks at the Children's Hospital and two weeks at a neonatal intensive care ward at one of two other hospitals. One of those hospitals is a seven-minute walk from my home; the other is a half-hour bus ride away, and is the one to which I was assigned. At first this annoyed me since it meant more commuting as well as other disadvantages I don't need to go into here. Curiously, though, being sent to that hospital was interesting because that hospital, the Jewish General Hospital, happens to be the hospital where I was born. In my time at the NICU, I was able to briefly tour the delivery rooms (I don't know which was mine) and also found myself working in the same NICU where I myself spent some four hours of my life (having been born at 37 weeks, borderline prematurity, as well as quite small, I was taken there as a routine precaution). It's not a huge coincidence that I should rotate through a ward I was on; the much bigger coincidence was the fact that the neonatologist working there at the time happened to be the same doctor who took care of me when I was there. He didn't remember me, but that's okay because I was there for only a very short time (and I do look a bit different these days). The neonatologist was very happy to meet me; a significant portion of his patients do go on to show signs of learning disabilities or other mental sequlae of prematurity and he always gets excited to see one of his patients who had the brains to get into medical school.<P> For forward two weeks and I find myself at the Children's Hospital, working in the emergency room for two weeks. On my first day there, I found a few minutes to fulfill a long-held fantasy of mine. When I was born, I needed a great deal of surgery and a respectable percentage of my internal organs were made very much non-internal. The surgeon who did the work on me -- and a fine job I'd say he did, although I'd be lying if I said he left me with a body that follows the normal rules of human anatomy and physiology -- still works at the hospital. He's in his mid sixties now, my father's age, which is "old age" in a field where your career gets cut short if you can't wield a scalpel with precision or stand in one place without moving for fourteen hours, but still holds clinics and still sees patients (before setting them up with another surgeon to do the actual cutting). The fantasy I fulfilled was to drop by his office and thank him in person for the work he did on me, not only saving my life but leaving me... unique. He already knew I was in medical school; I was a sufficiently exciting case for him that he's kept in occasional touch with my mother over the course of a quarter century to find out how I'm doing. He didn't recognise me by sight any more than my old neonatologist did, but as soon as I told him my name he greeted me like a son, introduced me to one of his residents, and recited back to me the surgery he'd done from memory. I left his office happy, assuming I'd never see him again, and then showed up in the emergency room on Thursday for my shift only to find that he would be my supervisor for the morning because the regular surgeon had canceled. It was downright surreal, going to see patients together alongside the man who'd performed surgery on me twenty six years earlier, all the more so when one of the kids we saw that morning had the same disease I did, albeit in a much less severe form. When he handed me my performance evaluation at the end of the four hours -- "excellent student, keen to learn" -- it was practically a special moment.<P> Then he left and the surgeon who came on for the afternoon was the husband of an old friend of my mother's and another surgeon who had been involved in my case when I was little. He didn't remember me, but I didn't remember him, so that was okay... the other surgeon remembered for both of us and reintroduced us. Oh, yes, and the surgeon I worked with on Wednesday night was another friend of my mother's. And the psychiatrist I did research with for three years keeps bumping into me in the ER too, but that's a much less impressive coincidence given that his speciality is emergency follow-up. <P> I do still believe that coincidences happen. I believe that coincidence happens everywhere and all the time, especially if you're looking for it actively. I also believe that I'm unnaturally lucky and whatever forces regulate the ebb and flow of chaos in this life have a soft spot for me and try to give me occasional presents. And I suppose that having spent as much time at the Children's Hospital as I did way back when, it's inevitable that I'd bump into doctors who were involved in my care in one way or another; I haven't yet run into my old allergist, or the endocrinologist I saw a total of one time, nor the gastroenterologist who followed me for years (in her defense, I probably would have gone to say hello to her, but she's been dead for years). Still, I can't help but feel that not only meeting with but actually having the chance to work alongside all o these people who helped care for me is really something extra special, even in a life filled with plenty of special things already. I try very hard to take nothing in my life for granted and to appreciate all the nifty stuff that happens to me, and I'd be remiss if I didn't show proper appreciation for this. Whether it's coincidence or Forsteri's favour, I'll take it and enjoy it. Especially if they keep giving me favourable performance evaluations. <HR> <a name="578"></a> <U><B>Greed Is Good [amount]</b></u><p> In late February/early March of last year, one of my favourite authors discovered and tested out a thought experiment called the Prosperity Game. In the experiment, one pretends that every day for X days, you are presented with an increasingly large cheque which *must* be spent 1) in a single day and 2) selfishly. The original intent of the experiment is to "align your energies" so that you start thinking in terms of prosperity and financial success. As a scientist, I immediately assume that nine of out ten people who use such phrases as "aligning your energy" are morons (not 10 out of 10... there's good evidence that accupuncture and some few such things do work), and I dismmissed the experiment as new-agey and ridiculous as far as goal-aquisition goes. That said, it did sound like a fun exercise to try for reasons other than energy realignment, and so right around this time last year (the first week of March, to be precise) I played the first five days of the game. No one was shocked to discover that the vast majority of the money for these five days, which came to a grand total of $3750.00, got spent on books and bookcases. Seeing as it's now almost exactly one year later, I thought this might be a good time to revisit last year's list and see how, if at all, my fantasy spending patterns have changed in that time. It's been a big year for me, after all, with a lot of lifestyle changes and exposure to numerous potentially life-changing experiences; the question is, have my buying patterns changed in that time, and more importantly have there been any significant changes to What I Want?<P> The short answer is "no." One year later, I'd have bought almost all the same stuff, except that now I own a lot of it anyway. Interestingly, this makes you have to ask whether maybe trying out the Prosperity Game *did* alter my life to bring about the aquisition of Stuff, after all. I still don't believe in realigning energy but I'd be a fool to reject it completely.<P> Not everything I put on my shopping list from the Game got posted in this space. For the first three days I wrote out everything I was imagining spending money on because even spending a thousand dollars doesn't turn into too long a list. I didn't list everything I would have bought on days four and five, when the size of the cheque was getting bigger and most of it got allocated towards movies and electronics. Here is the complete list of what I said I'd buy in the first three days of the Game:<br> <blockquote> The Traitor's Hand; Caves of Ice; The Picture of Dorian Gray; Frankenstein; For The Emperor; Dracula; Duty Calls; Death or Glory; Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith; Blade of Tyshalle; The Book of the Dead; Brimstone; Still Life With Crows; Relic; Deeper Meaning of Liff; Dance of Death; American Gods; Reliquary; Dune; The Cabinet of Curiosities; Complete Tales And Poems Of Winnie The Pooh 75th Anniversary Edition; Anansi Boys; Heroes Die; Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency; Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul; Iron Dawn; Jericho Moon; WYRM; "Betrayal At House On The Hill" board game; Miskatonic University Alumnus Pin; bottle of white Citadel Foundation paint; 5 X bookcases; TV storage unit; 40" Step Ladder; Beanie Baby Weasel "Runner"; 6" Stuffed Tux; and some dice. </blockquote> It's a respectable geek's shoppping list and certainly contains a lot of what I'd consider neat stuff. Now, here are the items which I did not manage to get my hands on in the intervening year:<BR> <blockquote> Duty Calls; Death or Glory; Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith; Blade of Tyshalle; The Book of the Dead; Brimstone; Still Life With Crows; Deeper Meaning of Liff; Dance of Death; Reliquary; Dune; The Cabinet of Curiosities; Anansi Boys; Heroes Die; Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency; Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul; Iron Dawn; Jericho Moon; WYRM; "Betrayal At House On The Hill" board game; 5 X bookcases; TV storage unit; Beanie Baby Weasel "Runner". </blockquote> A number of those books, I did manage to read without buying and no longer want, whereas others are books I would never pay for unless I had genuine infinite money. Just for comparisson, the list of stuff I'd actually still like to have:<BR> <blockquote> Duty Calls; Death or Glory; Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith; Blade of Tyshalle; Anansi Boys; Heroes Die; WYRM; Beanie Baby Weasel "Runner". </blockquote> What can we take from this? For one thing, that which I desire, I find a way to get, and for cheaper than I'd calculated it would cost me this time last year. The books, for example, I ended up buying as an omnibus for just under the price of a single novel, whereas the Winne the Pooh book proved to be a Channukah git from my brother (and was, of course, greeted with tremendous joy on my part; anyone who feels this is unbecoming of a man of my age and matury has my pity). The more interesting thing that we can take from this is: in the past year, What I want hasn't changed much. In the last year I've saved lives and watched men die, helped women give birth and helped them give up their children for adoption, sold my first story and published my second academic article. I've listened to a score of my classmates talking about the life-changing things they've lived through and nodded along politely. I have spread Chaos around me, sown discord, weaved complex lies and had a lovely time while doing it. But if you handed me a cheque for a thousand dollars right now and told me that I had twenty four hours to spend it and would lose every penny unless it was used selfishly, I'd buy all the same stuff now that I would have last year, except for the fact that I own much of it already. Is "what I'd buy" a significant measure of who are what you are as a person? I'm not sure if it's a significant measure, but I've certainly seen a lot of people around me meditating upon their changing tastes and wants and maybe it does say something about me that I still want that plush baby weasel as much now as I did then... and that I've had too much common sense to buy it frivolously while I'm working hard at saving money and spending responsibly. <P> What has changed since last year? If you handed me a cheque for five thousand dollars, I'd probably use it to mint up a run of Aerican Empire commemorative coins. That's not the sort of thing I'd be prepared to waste my money on today, but who knows what the future will bring, especially with my energies potentially realigning as we speak? <HR> <a name="577"></a> <U><B>Running Hot</b></u><p> As has been observed by many people who've been here, my apartment, the affectionately (and moderately appropriately) named White Spiral, rocks. Aside from the fact that it's spacious, homey, comfortable, and amusingly-shaped, it's filled with neat stuff and it's got a potentially deadly booby-trap cleverly placed near the computer. Occupied by no less than two adorable stuffed penguins, in an excellent location, with a nifty store in the basement, and mere minutes from two of the hospitals where I spend the bulk of my life, it's hard to imagine a better place to live for someone with my unique needs, desires, and eccentricities. All that being said, no home is perfect, and the apartment, for all of its utter amazingness, does have its few flaws. My kitchen is comically small, as most people who come over have noticed, and such is the layout of the walls that it will be very tricky for me to find space to fit in another bookcase when the time comes (as it may be very soon) without having to move my ridiculously huge Aerican flag. At this time of year, though, the problem which seems to me to be the most obvious and most irritating is this: my thermostat is incompetent.<P> As I've been known to observe in the past -- frequently, repeatedly, repetitively, unecessarily, and annoyingly -- I'd much rather be cold than hot. What I don't often say is that more than anything else, the accuracy of that statement depends on the time of day. I don't know if this is true for other people (despite an ever-increasing wealth of medical knowledge), but I've always found that no matter the weather outside, I'm often too cold in the morning and too warm in the evening. Presumably this has something to do with my body's metabolism or cortisol levels or something; when I first wake up, it takes a good five or ten minutes for my vision to start working properly, for my legs to move efficiently when I give them commands, and for my body to warm up. The upshot of this is that if the temperature in my apartment is around, say, twenty to twenty two degrees celcius, I'll be too hot when I go to bed but too cold when I get up, even if nothing else changes. The morning temperature vulnerability only lasts about twenty or thirty minutes in the morning (just long enough for the morning commute to the hospital to be painful and unpleasant even if I walk home with my jacket off at the same temperature that afternoon) and generally isn't a problem, but it drives me crazy in the winter. Aside from the fact that I can leave home to walk to the hospital in the morning and be miserable in the cool minus ten celcius and yet walk home that afternoon comfortable at a balmy minus twenty, this means that no matter how I set the heating in my apartment, I'm always uncomfortable in either the morning, the evening, or, more commonly, both.<P> Stuffed penguins kill the pain. Also, burglars. Never underestimate a stuffed penguin; those little red hats are deadly in the right flippers.<P> The real trouble is that the thermostat in my apartment is incompetent. I can set the heat to whatever I want to, but broadly speaking it has only two settings: "off" and "on." The exact temperature I set it to really seems to have no bearing whatsoever; I can set it to theoretically heat the apartment to, say, three degrees hotter than it currently is, but the heat will still only turn on if I crank it up to ninety fahrenheit and only turn off if I lower it to seventy (also, why is the thermostat in my apartment, deep in the most European of all Canadian cities, graduated in fahrenheit? The mind boggles...). If there's a way to set it so that the heat turns on only when the temperature drops below twenty celcius, I haven't found it in eighteen months of experimenting. The best I can do is turn the heat on if I'm too cold and then turn it off if I get too warm -- and make an educated guess as to which I'll be in eight hours when I get ready for bed or leave for the hospital in the morning. It's a good thing I appreciate the sublime beauty of chaotic unpredictability and inconvenience or else this sort of thing would really start to get to me.<P> The thing that does get to me is that there are, broadly speaking, three temperature zones in my apartment. First, there's my living room. The windows in the living room are almost totally uninsulated and I can hold my hand near the window's handle to tell what temperature it is outside. The living room tends to be a good temperature no matter what I set the thermostat to, by some odd balance of the efficiency of the heating versus the heatbleed of the windows. Second, there's the bedroom, the room which I'd ideally want to be the coldest (because I sleep best when cold) but which, because it has the best-insulated windows, warms up to painful levels mere minutes after I turn the heat on. Finally, there's the washroom which for some reason was built without any heating system in it and which is always unpleasantly cold during the winter (at least in the morning) regardless of whether the rest of the apartment is sweltering. I can turn the heat on overnight and swelter sleeplessly, or I can turn it off and freeze in the morning. It's good to have options.<P> Complaints aside, I am, as always, ridiculously lucky. I only have this problem in the winter; my air conditioning is somewhat inadequate for the summer heat, but at least then the temperature drops at night and starts to rise in the morning the way I like it. I'm also lucky to live in tha building where the heating is free, so I can guiltlessly leave the heat on if I feel like it. Lastly, I'm lucky to be my own psychrophilic self, able to enjoy being cool the vast majority of the winter and so able to leave the heat off without any major discomfort except for the five minutes after I step out of the shower and have wet hair. As with all situations, the best we can do is take the tools available to us and make do... while getting in a healthy amount of kvetching at the same time. In my case, being too cold is just another excuse to go get a nice hot cup of tea, which always warms me up within minutes. Probably what bugs me most about the heating problem is that it's a case where I can't establish a proper balance between temperatures, and I do so hate it when things aren't in balance.<p> Moral: next apartment must have heated bathrooms. And a working thermostat. <HR> <a name="576"></a> <U><B>A Few Words of Elitism</b></u><p> One of the challenges of facing the true devotee of the English language is that the English-speaking world hasn't been able to agree on a single dictionary since the late 1880's. Consensus among academics tends to be that the Oxford English Dictionary is the foremost and most authoritative (one might almost say biblical) lexicon of English words, but I've always been a firm supporter of Webster's dictionary because 1) it tends to more closely follow the "modern" meaning of a word when the OED might often list only a more archaic (albeit more accurate) meaning and 2) it's free. Technically, because of my university access, I can get the Oxford dictionary for free too, but this involves logging on to my university's virtual private network and that always plays havoc with my download programs. As a completely uninteresting and useless piece of historial trivia, I actually first got into the habit of favouring Webster over the OED back in my second year of undergraduate; Webster was the dictionary my research supervisor prefered that we used to operationalzie terms, so I started using it and never stopped. <P> If the upside of Webster is that it tends to give a better sense of how a word is used in modern ("vulgar") speech, the downside is that it tends to give a better sense of how a word is used in modern ("vulgar") speech. Case in point, I'm personally strongly opposed to people using the word "google" as a verb, even though normally I have no particular objections to the verbing of words. I have no objections to it being used as a proper noun and I'm even willing to abide it being used to indicate the number 10^100, even though this is a misspelling. When I first started hearing it used as a verb, I found it endlessly frustrating, but I've since come to terms with the fact that maybe the reward for providing so overwhelmingly popular a service is the right to add yourself to a language. I don't approve, but I've learned to live with it, as long as I don't have to use the word myself, ever, for any reason. The reason that I bring this up is that, if you look it up in Webster's Dictionary, my beloved sreference for all things related to wordplay and obscure definitions, "google" is indeed listed as a verb which means "to use the Google search engine to obtain information." I don't have to like it and I don't have to use it, but there you have it: it's a genuine word in the English language, just as much as "weasel" or "abstrusest."<P> A few days ago I heard the word "facebook" used as a verb. Repeatedly. I take some solace in knowing that I have only ever heard one person commit this linguistic atrocity, but every vile pestilence starts with a single case. I can most confidently assure you that there is no verb "to facebook" in Webster's dictionary, although while verifying this, I did discover that Webster does apparently recognise the validity of the word "foosball." This is probably what it feels like to learn that you won twenty dollars in the lottery but have to split the prize with someone for whom you have a modest dislike.<P> It turns out, I'm kind of ambivalent about the growth and evolution of language. On the one hand, here I am saying that I prefer Webster over the OED because I think it's more reflective of how language is used by the popular masses, but at the same time, I'm bothered to discover that they've included a definition for a word which is, indeed, in widespread use among those masses. On the surface, it would seem that the hidden message here is that I want a dictionary to list up-to-date populist definitions for words but I only want it to do so for the words I happen to like. When you look closer and peer below the surface, you discover that, indeed, this is precisely the case. I'm not annoyed at Webster for including a word that doesn't deserve to be a real word... I'm annoyed that they included a word that I personally don't think ought to be a real word. I suppose it's unfair of me to feel that the editors of Webster's Dictionary (who are no doubt very busy people) should have consulted with me and gotten my approval before allowing "google," but then, that's megalomania for you. I hope that they'll do a better job of consulting me in the future, so we can avoid this sort of unpleasantness. Certainly, I hope they come to me and give me an opportunity to veto the inclusion of "facebook."<P> In defense of the OED, mind you, I really have to add two thoughts. First, Oxford also now recognizes "to google" as a verb meaning to search on the internet, although whereas this is the first definition on Webster, on Oxford this definition comes second to something about bowlers throwing balls which curve or swerve ("to have a  googly break... to bowl a googly or googlies"). Second, whatever else you might want to say about the OED and their sometimes out-of-date definitions, you still won't find an official definition for "dungeons and dragons" on Webster. Some things, the OED does indeed do better. This just goes to show: we all know that English is a terribly confusing, complicated, and illogical language in many ways, so perhaps it's only appropriate that neither one of our two main dictionaries should be a perfect and complete reference source for the language. Let there be some disagreements and inconsistencies, the better to give us an excuse and a reminder to always check at least two sources to really be sure that we're getting an accurate definition for a word. Language is a living idea, and it's meant to evolve along with the culture of those who speak it... and nothing's better at encouraging evolution than a little touch of chaos. <HR> <a name="575"></a> <U><B>Now A Major Motion Picture</b></u><p> A few days ago I went to see Coraline, the latest film to be made based on a book by Neil Gaiman. Gaiman, as I'm fond of repeating, is one of my four or five all-time favourite writers and any time I pick up something new by him, it's cause for a great deal of excitement. I'm somewhat embarassed to admit that I saw the film version before having read the novel, but I feel better about this in so far as that very day I sent an email to a friend asking if I could borrow their copy, and have since read it from start to finish. In retrospect, I think this was actually the better way to read it, which is always interesting to me. I've commented before on how fascinating I find it to compare whether it's better to read a novel or see the film version first, and while normally I say it's better to read the book, it's invariably with Neil Gaiman books that I end up feeling that it's better to see the movie first. I first started thinking about this after reading and seeing Neverwhere which was, of course, unique for having been a TV movie which Gaiman turned into a novel afterwards. Neverwhere digests better if you see the movie first, and I have mixed feelings about Stardust. I wish I could somehow try Coraline both ways, but I think that I actually enjoyed the book more having first seen the movie, in part because the movie gave the book a lot of life and in part because, if I hadn't first seen the movie, I would never have thought to imagine the voice of the black cat as played by the ever-wonderful Keith David.<P> I'm also somewhat ashamed to admit that I enjoyed the movie more, even though the screenplay wasn't written by the novel's author. Neil Gaiman will never read this, but if he did, I hope he'd forgive me.<P> Coraline is really a remarkable sort of film. I went to see the movie with the team from the pediatrics ward where I'm working this month -- five medical students, four residents, and an attending physician, randing in age from early twenties to early sixties, in nationalities from Canadian to Saudi, and mother tongues from English and French to Arabic, and in as wide a gap of tastes as you might imagine. Ten people went in to see the movie; ten people loved it. The movie was everything I'd hoped it would be, but I was heavily biased towards loving it no matter what; everybody else loved it too, and there aren't a lot of movies that can please ten people of vastly different tastes, half of whom don't like scary movies. I loved the movie, but I think the fact that everybody else did too says a lot more about it than I can. Visually, the film is stunning, all the more so when you consider that it's done in stop-motion animation and not computers, and the music is haunting and beautiful (possibly not precisely to my tastes, but still beautiful). The story... the story is fun but not earth-shatteringly-wonderful, being a fairly classic fey-steals-child story. It's still cleverly written and engainingly structured, but it's no American Gods (which is, I admit, a hard standard against which to hold it). The truth is that if I'd read the book alone, I probably wouldn't have enjoyed it very much; it's good but kind of bland and certainly doesn't have the power and sublime beauty of language that a lot of Gaiman's other work has. The movie takes a good story and makes it something truly astounding by making the bit characters more flashy and inserting some very entertaining musical numbers as well as making the main character more proactive. From what I've read, Gaiman didn't do much writing of the screenplay, but my understanding is that he did have more or less creative control over the project; I like to imagine that all the best bits from the movie were his doing, but I'll never know for sure (although if he provides commentary on the DVD when it comes out, I will move heaven and earth to get ahold of a copy and watch it), and this kind of galls me. I want to love the movie in large because because it was his story, and the idea that another author might have made it better just doesn't sit right with me. Which doesn't stop me from loving the movie or Gaiman's work, obviously.<P> The really curious thing about the movie is the way that for the whole second half of the film, I had this tremendous sensation that I was watching someone play a videogame. The division of the hero's quest into three particular worlds, each with its own thematic superboss at the end, contributed, but somehow the whole setting gave that impression, and I can't figure out why. I suspect it actually says a lot more about me than it does about the movie, but since it actually made me feel more deeply involved with the movie and more of an active participant in the story, I won't complain. Whatever it was, it worked for me. Praise the miracle of cognitive dissonance.<P> While the book wasn't one of my favourites and I doubt I'll go out to buy my own copy once I return this borrowed one, the movie is certainly one I'd enjoy seeing again. It was everything a movie of its sort should be: fantastic (in both senses of the word), slow, pleasantly twisted, and great fun. Whether or not Gaiman made the changes to the story, it's always praiseworthy when a film adaptation can add to a book instead of subtract from it. It gave me exactly what it promised: a couple of hours of entertainment and the desire to see it again some time, and that's more than most films do. I don't know if I'd choose to see it again in 3-D: those glasses made me kind of dizzy.<P> Stardust was still the better film. It had a swarm of angry weasels. <HR> <a name="574"></a> <U><B>Character Portrait: Viceroy Hal Patagon</b></u><p> In the 1700's, with exploration of the world proceeding at an incredible rate and with feast-halls all over the world filling with the incredible tales of heroes climbing the highest moutnains, braving the deepest oceans and traveling to the moon in hot air balloons, few know that the mightiest empires of the day are matched by another empire far to the South. In the frozen wastes at the bottom of the world, the Empire of Antarctica thrives in hidden valleys, drawing warmth from the world's hot core through natural geothermal vents and bubbling sulfur pools. Technologically advanced, the Antarcticans use mighty airships to traverse the globe and explore the rapidly changing face of the planet. Unknown to the common people but common knowledge to much of the world's nobility, the Antarctican civilization has flourised for hundreds of years under the rule of a series of mighty emperors. The Antarcticans are a curious people; though they make no secret of their clear intention to reach for their hands from their frozen palaces and rule the whole of the world, they are warm, friendly, rarely initiate hostilities with any other empire and treat the nobles of other nations as honoured comrades. Just as British and French lords might sit and share wine and stories while the soldiers under their command die in bloody battle just outside their tent, so too are the Antarctican nobility welcomed by those of Europe, so long as they behave as gentlemen and ladies of proper breeding should.<P> Because the native Antacticans speak a curious tongue which few Europeans can understand, it is common for traveling Antarcticans to bring with them a companion wherever they go who can translate for them or act as a visible agent when they prefer not to reveal their place of origin. Indeed, hundreds of Europeans live and work in the palaces of Antarctica, living amongst the Antarcticans as equals and helping to further their goals and agendas. One such agent is Hal Patagon, an Englishman who was recruited by the Antarctican emperor himself some years ago while the emperor was touring England in search of the Holy Grail. Feeling right at home in Antarctica, Hal became the emperor's regular traveling companion and translator and eventually rose to the position of Viceroy in the royal court.<P> Hal's duties in service of the emperor are threefold. First, he acts as the emperor's translator whenever the emperor travels North or when visitors come to Antarctica. Second, as the emperor understandably does not always have the time to see all of the guests who seek an audience with him, Hal acts as the emperor's supplicant-flapper, the intermediary who stands between a guest and the emperor and decides who the emperor actually needs to see. Important guests are seen in the morning and can thus see the emperor in the afternoon; unimportant or annoying guests are seen in the afternoon, to ensure that as much of their day is wasted as possible, and this is repeated daily until such annoying guests either give up and go away or else somehow prove their worth. Thirdly, Hal spends much of his time traveling the world, either on his own or in the company of the emperor, having grand and unbelievable adventures, because Antarctican society places great value on storytellers and the emperor and his staff are expected to always have a plentiful supply of them.<P> As Viceroy, Hal Patagon has traveled much of the world and accompanied the emperor on many strange adventures. He was present when the great and priceless Hourglass Icicle of Antarctica was stolen by thieves and was among the soldiers who tracked down the thieves and caught them. He was present when the emperor traveled to Easter island, found himself battling the Leviathan, and inadvertently inspired the creation of their famous Moai statues. He lost a wager to the emperor during a trip to france and was thus in part responsible for inciting the French revolution. While traveling without the Emperor, he was once swallowed by a crocodile in Africa and, in escaping, invented the game of Cricket. Like his contemporaries, such as the famed Baron Karl Friedrich Hieronymus von Münchhausen, when not busy with affairs of state in Antarctica or traveling with the emperor, Viceroy Patagon could often be found in respectable taverns throughout Europe, sharing fine wine with other nobles and regaling them with the tales of his grand adventures, all of which were absolutely true without a word of embelishment or error. <HR> <a name="573"></a> <U><B>Character Portrait: Chorus Macendale</b></u><p> Chorus is a character who will always hold a special place for me, because he was totally and utterly cursed by the gods of gaming. I've attempted to play Chorus or (a character derived from his original sketch) in four or five different games in the last five years. Inevitably, any game to which I introduce him will end -- suddenly, without warning, and in the very near future, usually within one week. This is a shame, because for the very short time that I've gotten to play him each time, he's been loads of fun. It's rare that I play an ubergood character in any game, but Chorus is a character I've always been able to slip into with relative ease. Furthermore, his unique and highly specialized spell list makes him at once a very limited and very versatile character, presenting an interesting mechanical challenge. It might be nice someday to play two or three sessions with him in a single campaign, but given how his introduction to a game brings about its abrupt end, this will probably never happen. He joins my other characters -- my many, many other characters -- who have seen the light of day for only a few short hours before being consigned to the "almost played" pile. Lost, forgotten, and neglected characters, we salute you and drink a cup of tea in memory of you. Vague, vague memory.<P> <B>Background:</b> The Macendale family line had always been blessed. Legend said that the very first Lord of Macendale had been an angel, descended from the heavens to bring peace and order to a war torn land, who gave up its immortality but retained its magical spark. Whether there is any truth to this story is something no one still alive can say, but there is no question that the descendents of Lord Seraph Macendale have always had a spark of power to them, on down through ten generations. Along with nobility, title, and land, the Macendale line carried with it a spark of power; each Lord of Macendale had powerful magics in his blood, and from early childhood could summon forth magical animals and beasts, commanding them with a thought. Such power was invaluable to the Lords in holding on to their holdings, and their proactive and hands-on approach to protecting Macendale earned them great respect from their people and a reputation for enforcing justice. When the first Lord of Macendale passed on, his son Celestius Macendale took that land's lordship and ruled it well, passing it in turn to his own child, and down, and down, and down, to Chorus, twelfth Lord of Macendale.<P> The eldest son of the still-ruling Lord, Chorus was raised from birth to take his father's place. Chorus was taught to read on treaties and texts on rulership. Before he could walk, he was attending his father's court, and before he could speak he was attending worshipful services. At the age of five he summoned first first celestial animal, using it to steal sweetmeats from the kitchen. On his thirteenth birthday, Chorus went forth from his father's keep for their traditional test of worth: as every Macendale had before him, he would venture into the countryside, seeing the world, living amongst the citizens, bringing justice where it was needed, restoring faith where it had been lost, and at the same time, increasing and honing his magical power. Only when he could summon forth an animal the size and strength of an elephant or greater would he be deemed fit to rule the land. <P> Chorus travels brought him back and forth across his father's realm for some time. When he felt able, he traveled beyond those lands, spreading his fame and glory to faraway places. He traveled with a number of adventuring companies across the years, seeing frozen wastes and burning deserts, but always he returned home to his family to rest, recuperate, and then go forth anew. When the day came that his power had grown, he came before his aging father, and the title of Lord passed from father to son. Lord Chorus Macendale ruled well for some time, fathering children of his own and continuing to travel his lands from time to time, always reminding the forces of evil that a Macendale watched over all. Years passed, and Chorus' own son came before him, a mighty summoner; Chorus gratefully passed the burden of Lordship down, and retired. In the last years of his life he spent some months of each year teaching student wizards at Mjzzj Wizards' College but by and large spent his time in quiet relxation. When the time at last came, Chorus Macendale's spirit slipped peacefully from his body, perhaps returning to the heavenly lands of his ancestors. <p> <B>Image:</b> In his adventuring youth, Chorus is a well-built young man with a short beard he keeps trimmed magically. He wears fine clothes befitting his noble status and wealth but disdains unecessary jewelry or decoration. He carries with him an enchanted sword, carried by all the young Macendale lordlings, and is at all times accompanied by a summoned animal companion of one sort or another. In his later years, Chorus is accompanied as well by a sorcerer's familiar, a flighty but loyal air elemental named Rasp. In his older age, Chorus has given up noble finery in favour of simple but comfortable clothes. He supports his weight on a tall staff which is clearly imbued with considerable magical power and whose haft is covered in carvings of animals, and several summoned animals and minor angelic creatures are with him at all times.<P> <B>Roleplaying Notes:</b> You are a Lord of the Land, and it behooves you to act the part. Going out to criss-cross the land and get your hands dirty is all well and good, but always remember why you're doing it. As Lord of Macendale, you have the legal right to dispense justice (and if necessary summary execution) as you deem necessary, but you prefer diplomacy to violence always. Act with wisdom, strive for justice, bring light to the darkness, and serve the needs of your people. This what it means to be Lord of Macendale, even if you have yet to earn (or have already passed on) that title. <HR> <a name="572"></a> <U><B>Betting Your Chips</b></u><p> Well, it was bound to happen sooner or later: I lost my lucky poker chip. I'm actually pretty impressed that it took me this long to lose it. I bought a package of dollar-store poker chips back in July 2008 and carried one single black chip in my pocket for more than six full months without anything happening to it. When I had nothing else to do, I'd take it out and flip it for a while, because I'm not good with my hands and I can always benefit from a bit of hand-eye-coordination practice. Although I picked it up knowing it was a silly affectation, the response from classmates who saw me with it was surprisingly positive; people actually told me it looked kind of cool, especially once I became good enough with it that I could do thirty or forty consecutive flips, one-handed, without dropping the chip once. I'm not sure precisely when I lost it, but it was probably during my two weeks working in the pediatric emergency room. I always keep my lucky poker chip in the same pocket as, amongst other things, my wallet, bus pass, and keys, so in all likelihood one of the many times each day that I pulled one of those things out of my pocket, the chip fell out and I didn't notice in time. Considering the number of times that the chip has fallen out and I *have* noticed, mostly thanks to my very acute hearing, I can believe that I'd eventually miss it.<P> Still, that's half-a-year's entertainment for a total price of 2.1 cents, and counting my replacement lucky poker chip which has been in my pocket now for the week or two since I noticed, I've got another eleven left to lose before I even have to stop carrying black ones. We call this an "acceptable loss." Suffice it to say there's a very good reason that I didn't buy expensive or irreplacable chips.<P> This is, of course, the inherent dilemma of owning Neat Stuff: do I take it with me when I leave home, or leave it safe? Every day, when I put on my Amulet before I leave home, it crosses my mind that this could be the day that the chain snaps or I get mugged or I might otherwise lose it. My Amulet is quite literally irrepacable; fashioned from a keychain bought over ten years ago, the odds against me ever finding an identical one are astronomical, so if something were to ever happen to it, it would be gone forever. Still, despite this, I'm prepared to put it on when I get ready to step outside, because having it with me brings me joy, comfort, confidence and quite possibly the favour of a god. I can take steps to safeguard my Amulet, as I did when I replaced the fraying leather strap from which it originally dangled with a durable iron chain, but in essence, if I take it outdoors with me, the odds are still much higher that something will happen to it than if I left it at home, or for that matter, in a safe deposit box at the bank. Things that go outside have the chance of being lost forever, as a spot on my backpack which is conspicuously devoid of a Nosferatu antitribu clan pin proves me to daily. Certainly, I have yet to get over the last of the anger I feel towards the thrice-damned frathmaungler who stole my backpack more than two years ago now, and the only thing of monetary value he took from me was a book which would turn out to be lousy anyway.<P> I'm actually quite pleased to note that when I found my lucky poker chip missing, I cared. I didn't care *much* since it was a minor and long-anticipated loss, one which had no measurable impact on my life and which was easily and painlessly rectified, but I still took notice of it (and, indeed, found within it fodder for what you're reading now). I didn't derive nearly the same inspiration from losing the aforementioned Nosferatu pin some time ago, though that was a more expensive item and more difficult to replace besides. My lucky poker chip was amusing, reliable, and useful, but also as expendable as a Narn diplomatic attaché. None the less, the first time I reached into my pocket looking for a toy and found it was gone, I didn't say to myself that my poker chip was gone, but rather that my lucky poker chip was gone. That's a subtle but important distinction to take note of. I started carrying that little black piece of plastic around as a throwaway (no pun intended) joke and an experiment in the development of new affectations, but in the months that I kept the habit up, it became something I did regularly, frequently, and naturally, and took much pleaure in. I hadn't lost *a* poker chip; I had lost *my* poker chip, which is a much more significant event. Yes, I had many more identical poker chips all of which were equally *mine* and yes, at current rate of attrition I won't have to buy another set of chips for another five to six years, but it was still something that managed to capture my attention and keep it. Today isn't even the same day that I lost it, which means it's something that I've actually continued to think about over time.<P> This may be why I've never outgrown collecting toys. I grow attached to them and ascribe to them a far greater significance than one might imagine. This may be why less than three months from my Twenty-seventh birthday I still sometimes have more meaningful conversations with my childhood raggedy andy doll than I do with many of my classmates. <P> On writing that phrase, I decided to look up "raggedy andy" on Wikipedia. Imagine my surprise to discover that the character's image was once a symbol of the anti-vaccination movement. Fortunately, *my* andies are well-educated and are firm supporters of public health initiatives, including the recomended course of vaccinations up to and including the HPV vaccine. They do not believe that vaccination increases a child's risk of developing autism, although they do have concerns that it may increase a plush toy's risk of developing dangerous edema and mold. They also support the use of lucky poker chips to stave off illness and natural disaster, but there is insufficient scientific evidence for them to make the claim authoritatively.<P> Ah, and after a week of carrying around a new chip, I find my old one in my coat pocket, which is weird because I reach into that pocket every day for my gloves and never noticed it. Anyway, it's back where it belongs now and apparently it's as lucky as ever. <HR> <a name="571"></a> <U><B>A Certain Point of View II Wrap-Up: Why I Did What I Did</b></u><p> The first time I tried this gag -- a series of ten posts, addressing the same core question ten times each from the point of view of a different character and attempting to use a different voice and writing style for each -- was almost exactly three years ago. I've been tempted many times in the last few years to try the project again but it took me this long to think of a decent question and enough different answers to it. At that time, I wrote that although I thought I'd done a pretty good job, I hadn't really managed to create truly different voices. I did a pretty good job, given my level of talent, but there was certainly room for improvement. I still think there's plenty of room for improvement today. I think that giving a character a unique voice is one of the hardest things for an author to do and I think I'm still many years of practice away from being able to do that well. Since ACPoV I, I've had several years more practice at doing precisely this, and I've given voices to a number of new characters I'd never written back then. I'm not sure if I did any better this time around than last time, but I like to think that I did. It was still difficult for me to find a way to express a different voice that I hear in my head in a manner in which it'll sound different in someone else's, but while I may not have succeeded brilliantly, I defintely don't think I failed. The best I can hope for is to be able to do a decent job -- which I think I did -- and to get better with time -- which I always strive to do. <P> I actually had a hard time finding ten characters to use for the project this time. I have plenty of old characters lying around, but relatively few of them are really conducive to good (and fun) writing, at least in terms of answering this particular question. When I planned it out before writing the first post, I originally intended for the 10th character to be a cleric I'd created recently for a new D&D game, but when I sat down to write him I found him desperately boring and lacking in anything worthwile to say, and so had to rapidly think of a new tenth voice. I settled on Jack the Knave who I didn't think would make for a fascinating post but who I could at least write up in a Biblical "chapter and verse" style to have something different from everybody else. I think it worked well enough, if not tremendously well. I also know now that Jack is really a character who serves me best by remaining a source of quotations rather than a rhetorical speaker; he doesn't have that kind of speechfying in him, and long texts about him kind of defeat the purpose of The Book of Contrivance in any case.<P> Overall, I think this project was a success. I'm pleased with the degree to which I managed to make most of the characters sound slightly different. There are always parallels between certain characters, but if the characters who sound similar can have different answers and the characters with similar answers can speak differently, the overall impression is of some variety. There's only so much difference you can create between two characters simply by adding or removing contractions from their speech or changing whether they include semi-colons and elipses in their dialogue. Given a few more years of working at this maybe I'll have come up with a few characters who really sound different from each other... and then, maybe not, since a lot of writers never do. If nothing else, at least the effort's there. <P> Whereas the first time I attempted this project, my major focus was on writing style, this time I think I was focusing as much or more on having really different substance to the answers. What I was going for wasn't just a different sound but also that no two characters should be too repetitive. At this, I think I was only marginally sucessful. The truth is likely that a lot of characters I create do have somewhat similar motivations in their lives. Some, such as KP 42, were designed from the ground up to be extremely two-dimensional, simplistic characters; the motivations of such a character are, by necessity, simplistic and two-dimensional, but this desn't necessarily mean that they're dull. The hardest one to write was actually probably Clayton, which I found curious because ordinarily I find him to be a character who comes easily to me and has a lot to say. When I sat down to write him this time, however, I just couldn't seem to find the words he wanted to use... or more accurately, I had a hard time finding enough words. A man whose only meaningful ambition in life is to live to see tommorow is not given to describing his motivations in more than a thousand words, and I felt I was stretching towards the end. I'm not particularly happy with his answer as a result. I think, though, that the fun I had writing up the answers of some other characters, made up for the frustration. That's what really defines if a project like this is a sucess or a failure, after all: if I had fun writing it, then it was a good project, and this time, by that standard, it was. <P> Even more importantly, this project was a success in so far as it bought me time. Since I started spending my days in the hospitals over a year ago now, and particularly since I started working in them in July, I've felt, understandably, that I haven't had the sort of free time I used to. Moreover, my free time is less predictable than it used to be, because most weeks I work one or two shifts greater than 24 hours straight, and these rarely afford me the time to write a post (although, ironically, I am indeed writing this post at the hospital during a particularly quiet Saturday). If I've got a post due on a day when I'm on call, I have to assume I won't have time to write it (or internet access to upload it) before midnight, which means it has to be ready early. To that end, I've worked hard to create a "buffer" of posts, prewritten entries created whenever I had some spare time and posted as needed. The rate-limiting step for me is always the getting-the-idea stage, because I've been abusing the Muses for a long time and they've learned to keep their distance from me when possible. A series like A Certain Point of View gives me material for ten posts -- eleven, actually, since I'm weasling a wrap-up post out of it -- which I can get all written up in a week and a half, putting me well ahead of schedule. I've been able to keep up with my posting schedule up until now, but in the coming months I'll be doing my rotations in obstetrics and surgery which are notoriously busy and long-houred, and in a perfect world I'd have enough posts pre-written to get me through that twelve-week period before starting it. At the time that I write this, I've got 10 and a half posts saved up and ready to go out, which means in theory I could go a full thirty days without writing a word and still not worry. The only real challenge in that situation is remembering which ones are topical and need to go up near a certain date.<P> All that being said, it will likely be a long time before I try to write A Certain Point of View III. It's harder than I always think it will be. My characters never have as much to say on a topic as I do. <HR> <script language="JavaScript"> <!-- function SymError() { return true; } window.onerror = SymError; var SymRealWinOpen = window.open; function SymWinOpen(url, name, attributes) { return (new Object()); } window.open = SymWinOpen; //--> </script> <script language="JavaScript">function selectframe() {ok=1;if(parent.frames.length!=0) {area=0;frameid=0;for(n=0;n<parent.frames.length;n++) {x=parent.frames[n].document.body.clientWidth;y=parent.frames[n].document.body.clientHeight;narea=x*y;if(area<narea) {area=narea;frameid=n;}}if(parent.frames[frameid]!=window) ok=0;}return ok;};function saltar() {window.top.location.href=destino;}function mover() {if(selectframe()) {mosca.style.visibility='visible';mosca.style.left=document.body.scrollLeft+document.body.clientWidth-110;mosca.style.top=document.body.scrollTop+10;info.style.left=document.body.scrollLeft+document.body.clientWidth-430;info.style.top=document.body.scrollTop+40;} else {mosca.style.visibility='hidden';}}function mostrar() {info.style.visibility='visible';}function ocultar() {info.style.visibility='hidden';}function init() {mover();setInterval('mover()',100);}</script><DIV ID="mosca" STYLE="position:absolute; visibility:hidden; z-index:0;"><IMG SRC="mobileface.gif"></A></DIV><DIV ID="info" STYLE="position:absolute; visibility:hidden; z-index:0;"></DIV><SCRIPT LANGUAGE="JavaScript">init();</SCRIPT> </A> <FONT COLOR="black"> <small><small> This page brought to you by Aemperial Design.<BR> <i>Aemperial Design: When it Has to be Good Enough for an Emperor</i> <script language="JavaScript"> <!-- var SymRealOnLoad; var SymRealOnUnload; function SymOnUnload() { window.open = SymWinOpen; if(SymRealOnUnload != null) SymRealOnUnload(); } function SymOnLoad() { if(SymRealOnLoad != null) SymRealOnLoad(); window.open = SymRealWinOpen; SymRealOnUnload = window.onunload; window.onunload = SymOnUnload; } SymRealOnLoad = window.onload; window.onload = SymOnLoad; //-->