Pixel Scroll 11/10 The nine and sixty ways of constructing Pixel Scrolls

(1) Oscar handicappers have The Martian running second for Best Picture says Variety.

In the Oscar race for best picture, “The Martian” has taken off like a rocket among the predictions by media experts at Gold Derby. One month ago, it wasn’t even in the top 10, but now it’s tied for second place with “Joy,” both sharing 17 to 2 odds. “Spotlight” remains out front and has picked up support as it debuts in theaters.

(2) J. K. Rowling tweeted her favorite fan art of Sirius and James Potter:

https://twitter.com/lilymydeer/status/653257716232757248

(3) Auditioning to be the next Doctor?

(4) “Future’s Past: The astronauts of 2001: A Space Odyssey at The Space Review covers actors Keir Dullea’s and Gary Lockwood’s appearance at Dragon Con.

Lockwood also said that they got to meet the Apollo 11 crew, and then he paused and said, “I liked Neil… I don’t like Buzz.” He added that often when he and Dullea do joint appearances at film showings, somehow Buzz Aldrin always seems to appear and people want to introduce Aldrin to him. Lockwood drolly replies that he already knows the moonwalker. He implied that he had a similar low opinion of William Shatner, with whom he appeared in the second television pilot for Star Trek.

Lockwood also told a great story about working on the centrifuge set, which he thought was brilliantly designed. He joked that he realized that Kubrick hired him for the job because of his previous experience as a cowboy stuntman. One day Lockwood found himself strapped into his chair, eating goop from his food tray—upside down. Keir Dullea was supposed to climb down the ladder at the center of the set and then the whole set would rotate as he walked over to where Lockwood was sitting. Kubrick called “action” and told Lockwood to take a bite, and Lockwood then watched as the three squares of goop slowly peeled off his tray… and fell nearly 70 feet to the floor below, splattering everything on the pristine white set. They didn’t shoot for the rest of the day.

The actors took some questions from the audience and had some really interesting answers. For instance, somebody asked if they knew that the film would be a classic. Dullea said that he had his doubts because the early reviews were so poor. In particular, he mentioned New Yorker film critic Pauline Kael’s infamous devastating review, where she referred to 2001 as “trash masquerading as art” and “monumentally unimaginative.” Kael later recanted upon seeing the film a second time, but 2001 received numerous other lackluster and even harsh reviews. Considering that 2001 was released way behind schedule and over budget, expectations had been high, and presumably many critics were waiting to pounce.

(5) Entertainment Weekly has the good word — “Mystery Science Theater 3000 Is Returning”.

Next year, TV viewers will be able to relive all manner of classic ’90s shows, with new episodes of The X-FilesTwin Peaks, Gilmore Girls, and Full House on the horizon. Add one more returning series to that list, as Joel Hodgson is announcing Tuesday that his beloved cult creation Mystery Science Theater 3000 is coming back after 15 years of dormancy.

For those unaware, the premise of Mystery Science Theater 3000 is brilliantly simple: A mad scientist has launched a man into space, and he torments said subject with psychological experiments that involve him watching some of the worst movies ever made. In order to keep it together, the poor marooned host talks back at the screen, aided by a pair of pop culture-obsessed robots. The MST3K crew may not have invented talking back to the screen, but they certainly brought it to the masses.

(6) Gray Rinehart finds connections between running for local office and his experience as a Hugo nominee in “Political Lessons and… the Hugo Awards?”

I ran for elective office this year, and lost. (For the record, I spent about 0.41% of the total that all four candidates in my district spent up until the election, and I got 3.5% of the vote. Not close to winning, but a good return on my meager investment.)

I was also nominated for a Hugo Award this year, and lost. The story behind that has been chronicled on this blog and elsewhere, and I won’t go into it in this post. (For the record, and as nearly as I can tell from trying to figure out the preferential voting numbers, about 9% of the 5100 novelette voters selected my story as their first choice. I ended up in fourth place . . . two spots below “No Award.”)

I introduce the fact of my being on political and literary ballots this year because I observed two things in the recent Town Council election process that seem pertinent to this year’s Hugo Awards. Specifically, that the political parties inserted themselves deeply into what was supposed to be a nonpartisan race, and other players also wielded considerable influence; and that a lot of voter information was readily available for the candidates to use.

A lot of food for thought. Among Rinehart’s many points:

And as long as we divide ourselves, or in the case of fandom subdivide ourselves; as long as we separate ourselves into (virtual or actual) walled-off enclaves and echo chambers, and associate only with those who look like us, act like us, and believe the things we do; we will find it harder to understand, relate to, and get along with one another — in civil life as well as in the SF&F community.

I think we would be well-served as a fannish community if we talked more about what we love and why we love it, without implying that those who do not love it as we do are ignorant or contemptible. And I think we would be better off if we recalled another RAH observation, also from Friday (emphasis in original): “Sick cultures show a complex of symptoms . . . but a dying culture invariably exhibits personal rudeness. Bad manners. Lack of consideration for others in minor matters. A loss of politeness, of gentle manners, is more significant than is a riot.”

(7) A fascinating installment of Robert W. Weinberg’s memoirs published by Tangent Online in 2011, “Collecting Fantasy Art #5: Lail, It Rhymes With Gail”

Six months later, Victor grew tired of the Freas and traded it to me.  The impossible had happened.  So much for my predictions. I now owned the original cover paintings for the first and second serial installments of Robert Heinlein’s novel, The Door Into Summer.  Immediately, I contacted Al, the guy I had met at the 1976 World SF Convention in Kansas City, to see if he still owned the third and final cover painting for the serial.  I had passed on that cover, though it had been priced cheap, because I had felt certain at the time I would never obtain the second cover painting for the novel.  Now that I had that piece, I really wanted the third cover so I would have all three paintings for the novel.

No such luck.  Al had sold the Freas painting at the convention.  He didn’t remember who bought it, and he didn’t even remember how much they had paid for it.  The painting was long gone.  I had had a chance to buy it back in Kansas City and had passed it by.

I learned my lesson that day.  Only too well.   Never pass up a painting of minor importance because someday that minor meaning might explode.  It was a difficult lesson to learn, but an important one.  It’s one I have never forgotten.

(8) No other writer handles one-star reviews this badly. “British Writer Tracks Down Teen Who Gave His Book a Bad Review, Smashes Her With Wine Bottle” at Gawker.

A 28-year-old British man, most notable for his 2006 victory on the quiz show Countdown, tracked down a Scottish teenager who’d written a negative review of his self-published novel and shattered a bottle of wine on the back of her head. The aspiring author pleaded guilty to the 2014 assault in a Scottish court Monday, the Mirror reported.

Brittain claimed the early reception for The World Rose was strong, blogging that “The praise I received was remarkable and made me feel great; I was compared to Dickens, Shakespeare, Rowling, Raymond E Feist and Nora Roberts.”

…But he also complained about bad reviews from “idiots” and “teenagers.”

One of those teenagers was Paige Rolland, the eventual victim of Brittain’s savage bottle attack. Her entire harsh (but fair) review has been preserved on Amazon, but this passage really sums up her criticism:

As a reader, I’m bored out of my skull and severely disappointed in what I might have paid for. As a writer (albeit an amateur one) I’m appalled that anyone would think this was worthy of money.

Not only does it begin with “once upon a time” which you could argue is perfect as this is a fairytale (and it doesn’t work, it’s incredibly pretentious), but it’s filled with many writing no-nos. Way too much telling, pretentious prose, and a main character that I already hate. Ella is the perfect princess (true to fairytales, so we can at least give him a little credit despite how painfully annoying this is coupled with a complete lack of real personality shining through).

Rolland also noted that Brittain “has gained a bit of infamy on Wattpad where he’s known for threatening users who don’t praise him (pray for me),” which turned out to be quite portentous.

(9) Here’s a word I’m betting you haven’t in your NaNoWriMo novel yet.

(10) Strange poll.

It’s a perennial question. I remember at the 1995 Lunacon that Mordechai Housman, an Orthodox Jew, was having fun circulating copies of his provocative arti­cle Hitler’s Crib, which tries to determine wheth­er religious law would permit time travel and, specifically, wheth­er it would permit travel­ing in time to kill Hitler.

(11) You know this guy: “Plane” at The Oatmeal.

(12) Today In History

  • November 10, 1969Sesame Street debuts.
  • November 10, 1969 — Gene Autry received a gold record for the single, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, 20 years after its release.

(13) Today’s Birthday Boy

  • November 10, 1960 – Neil Gaiman

(14) James Whitbrook presents “The 7 Least Subtle Political Allegories on Doctor Who. His pick at number one (most lacking in subtlety) is “The Happiness Patrol.”

But it’s the despot herself who is the most obvious pastiche. Sheila Hancock openly plays the leader Helen A as a satirical take on then-Conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, the “Iron Lady” who dominated British politics. At the time, this barely made ripples, but a 2010 story in the British newspaper The Sunday Times about the connection—featuring a quote from Sylvester McCoy describing Mrs. Thatcher as “more terrifying than any monster the Doctor had encountered”—saw Conservative politicians in uproar at the anti-Conservative bias this revealed on the part of the BBC. Ex-script editor Andrew Cartmel was brought onto the BBC news program Newsnight to answer claims that the 1980s Doctor Who creative team had been a source of left-wing propaganda in the wake of the “revelation”… despite the story having been no particular secret, 22 years earlier.

Always remember – science fiction is never about the future….

(15) A previously unpublished Leigh Brackett story is one of the lures to buy Haffner Press’ tribute book, Leigh Brackett Centennial.

SF and mystery author Leigh Brackett (1915-1978) – who also wrote screenplays for The Big Sleep, Rio Bravo and The Empire Strikes Back —?is represented by an array of nonfiction pieces by and about here, as well as the previously unpublished story “They,” which Haffner describes as “a mature science fiction tale of power and intrigue, of homegrown xenophobia versus stellar exploration, with an answer to the ultimate question: ‘Are we alone?’” The volume collects the majority of Brackett’s nonfiction writings, supplemented with vintage interviews and commentaries/remembrances from such luminaries as Ray Bradbury, Michael Moorcock, Richard A. Lupoff and more.

Brackett writes of bringing Philip Marlowe into the 1970s for Robert Altman’s The Long Goodbye in “From The Big Sleep to The Long Goodbye and More or Less How We Got There.”

SF-author and NASA employee Joseph Green records the time he hosted Brackett at the launch of Apollo XII . . .
Midwest bookseller Ray Walsh documents the day he escorted Brackett to view a new groundbreaking space-fantasy film in the summer 1977…

Order the book at this link: http://www.haffnerpress.com/book/lb100/

(16) John Scalzi gives his take on balancing awards and mental health:

I’ve won and lost enough awards to know an award is not The Thing That Changes Everything. An award is fun, an award is nice, an award may even be, at times, significant. But at the end of the day, whether you win or lose, you still go home with yourself, and you don’t change — at least, not because of an award. It’s perfectly fine to want an award (I’ve wanted them from time to time, you can be assured) and it’s perfectly okay to be disappointed if you don’t get one. But ultimately, putting the responsibility for your happiness onto an award, which is, generally speaking, a thing over which you have absolutely no control, is a very fine way to become unhappy. Which will not be on the award, or any of the people who voted for it. It will be on you, whether you want to own that fact or not.

(17) Luna Lindsey reviews two competing online tools in “Panlexicon vs. Visual Thesaurus — Who Will Win?” at the SFWA Blog.

I kept Visual Thesaurus on retainer as my go-to onomasticon until I stumbled upon Panlexicon.com in all of its simple, elegant magic.

The power of Panlexicon lies in its ability to search on multiple terms, which will bring up a larger spectrum of metonyms than most thesauri (including Visual Thesaurus). So it’s perfect for finding that just-out-of-reach expression when all you can remember are remotely-related numinous approximations of what you’re going for. Simply type two or more related words or phrases, separated by a comma, and voilà. (And of course, you can always search a standalone word.)

[Thanks to Martin Morse Wooster, Will R., Mark-kitteh, Andrew Porter, John King Tarpinian, and Jim Meadows for some of these stories. Title credit goes to File 770 contributing editor of the day Soon Lee.]

220 thoughts on “Pixel Scroll 11/10 The nine and sixty ways of constructing Pixel Scrolls

  1. I remember reading somewhere on ravelry that bison do indeed get sheared, when they’re put into chutes for shots, though that doesn’t seem to make up for the bulk of the fiber that’s actually gathered. That would be combed, or, more often sheared from the hides of bison killed for meat.

    I spent most of my life convinced there were no bison left, so imagine my shock when I found frozen chunks in a supermarket (in Portugal! No! They belong Out West, with cowboys and Buffallo Bill, and he’s defunct!).

    Here’s a video. Dirty jobs indeed. Even sheared new fleece has to be a chore to get cleaned, what with all the rolling in dust, I feel for the people who use the clumps caught in fences. (A quick search in rav forums says there are some). Then again, that’s pretty much my reaction to scouring sheep fleece, too.

    There are 111 yarns containing bison listed (about a third by just one company, the one Nicole linked), and 2,077 projects. A lot seem to be lace, which makes sense with something that insulating. Bison and especially qiviut get described as buttery clouds of wonderful, but even alpaca is too hot for me, so I don’t think I’ll be trying soon.

  2. I’ve gotten more generous with my star ratings to match what others seem to think the stars mean after I spent a year or two actively involved in a number of Goodreads groups. I’m now a consistent 4 star reviewer – I started out rating most books 3 stars.

    I can usually find a few positive things to say about a book. Most of my negative review falls under content warnings or a clear lack of enthusiasm. Now that I’ve learned it’s ok to not finish a book really bad books simply end up on a DNF shelf with little to no explanation.

    I keep wanting to do better reviewing every book I read but between the kindle app review feature losing my reviews and days when the brain fog is really bad I’m doing well if I review 25 of the 200+ books I read a year.

  3. @ Joe H.
    re: Nerdcon video

    Ok, buddy. You owe me an iPad! I shorted mine out while laughing. /bad humor

    Thanks for the link. That’s the best laugh I’ve had in ages. I’m not sure anyone will top Kowal, but they haven’t posted all the segments yet.

    I’d suck at this game, though. [sigh]

  4. (If anyone needs a break from fiction reading, find yourself a copy of 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus. All this and many other fascinating vignettes!)

    There is also a follow-up book by the same author–1493 – Uncovering the New World Columbus Created.

    (I thought one of those books had the fun fact that Christopher Colombus made the natives of Hispaniola work as slave labor in gold mines, and if they didn’t make quota cutoff their hands, but it turns out that was in Lies My Teachers Told Me by James W. Loewen.)

    BTW, for those not familiar with it, Orson Scott Card has a time-travel book related helping the Native Americans before they could be screwed over by the Europeans– Pastwatch.

  5. I completely disagree with Mr. Scalzi on that thought. That Hugo win changed my life in damn near every possible way. I’ve lost many, many more than I’ve won, and none of those losses really hurt, but when it happened, it was honestly magic. Awards are the one form of immortality that a mostly-broke guy kickin’ it in Silicon Valley can reasonably hope for, and my God, it really does make everything different when it’s in the rear-view.
    Chris

  6. The vast majority of my reviews are 3.5, 4.0, and 4.5 stars. But that’s because I’m pretty selective about what the books on which I choose to spend my precious reading time. I agree with those here who’ve said they’d rather spend their time giving good reviews to good books than bad reviews to books to which they’d rather not have given that precious time.

    I’ve learned which reviewers’ opinions frequently align with mine and which are usually diametrically opposed to mine, and tend to adjust based on that. I also have an informal “3 strikes” policy which Kim Stanley Robinson, Jo Walton, and a couple of others are two-thirds of the way to invoking.

    Life’s too short, and there’s no way I’m going to live long enough to get through Mount File770 at the rate you plonkers are making it grow.

  7. JJ:

    The vast majority of my reviews are 3.5, 4.0, and 4.5 stars. But that’s because I’m pretty selective about what the books on which I choose to spend my precious reading time.

    I don’t review books, although probably I should, because then I’d remember what I read when, but I hardly ever read anything that’s not pretty good, or at least, I don’t finish. This year is a little different, because I’m actually trying to keep up, and that means reading things I might not otherwise, but Mount TBR is fully stocked with things I’m likely to at least see value in. (More and better stocked thanks to you guys.) I suspect my reviews would all be 3.5 and higher, DNF’s aside. And it’s definitely not that I am easy to please (as far as books go anyway).

    Mount Hugo is temporarily on hold due to a burning need to reread Starship Troopers, btw. Grr. But I did miss Heinlein’s voice, so that’s nice. (But I had no memory of being struck with how many times he used the word “silly”; I’m keeping a tally.)

    I also have an informal “3 strikes” policy which Kim Stanley Robinson, Jo Walton, and a couple of others are two-thirds of the way to invoking.

    What were their strikes so far?

  8. Susana: What were their strikes so far?

    KSR: 2312, which was okay, but nowhere near what I expected it would be based on all the raves I’ve heard about his books. The pacing was really uneven, and the plotting had issues. Shaman, which was, in my estimation, utter trash. I forced myself to read 25% of it — and that first quarter consisted almost entirely of a primitive man’s peeing, pooping, masturbating, and killing (it was like a book based on Beavis and Butthead). It was a bad version of Auel’s Clan of the Cave Bear (which itself was bad to begin with).

    Walton: Among Others, which was really good and engrossing for about the first 2/3 to 3/4, then just petered off into nothing as if she couldn’t figure out how to end it and the publisher made her turn it in anyway. I loved all the references to the beloved SFF books as entrees to the genre — they were mine, too, just as they were the main character’s — but sorry, that’s not a Get-Out-Of-Jail-Free Card for a lousy ending. Gods, I wanted to love that book so bad. But it was such a disappointment. My Real Children, which showed some promise, but lost the plot around 1/2 to 2/3 through and ended up being a meandering mess.

    I’ve loved every Stephenson book I’ve read so far, but he’s got one strike now because of Seveneves. I think he’s like GRRM, and has gotten TBTE (Too Big To Edit) — and his writing suffers for it.

    And see, I really hate having to give those sorts of assessments of books. I’d much rather be giving the “OMFG! This book is just absolutely awesome!” sorts of reviews.

  9. And see, I really hate having to give those sorts of assessments of books. I’d much rather be giving the “OMFG! This book is just absolutely awesome!” sorts of reviews.

    Ooops. Sorry, I didn’t mean to make you unhappy.

    I loved 2312 (the terrariums, the sheer unadulterated sensawunda, I don’t care how trite that is, the lovely, lovely exposition, the lists), but even I agree the plot doesn’t work (the mystery plot, that is, the romance worked for me).

    On the rest, I think we’re just different readers: I thought Among Others ended perfectly, but I’ve heard your complaint more often. I cried when I finished MRC. And “meandering mess” is pretty much how I’d describe lots of Stephenson, even the ones I like. He finally lost me at Reamde.

    I haven’t read Shaman, probably because I still get embarrassed when I think of Jean Auel’s books.

  10. JJ on November 13, 2015 at 2:53 am said:

    Susana: What were their strikes so far?

    KSR: 2312, which was okay, but nowhere near what I expected it would be based on all the raves I’ve heard about his books. The pacing was really uneven, and the plotting had issues. Shaman, which was, in my estimation, utter trash. I forced myself to read 25% of it — and that first quarter consisted almost entirely of a primitive man’s peeing, pooping, masturbating, and killing (it was like a book based on Beavis and Butthead). It was a bad version of Auel’s Clan of the Cave Bear (which itself was bad to begin with)

    .

    Right with you on 2312, I was so very disappointed in that book. I liked the setting, but the story was pointless.

    I did end up enjoying Shaman though. It was a slog for the first third or so, but I found it really picked up after the first festival segment.

  11. @JJ

    it was like a book based on Beavis and Butthead

    Tea, nose, keyboard, SNORT.

    I do have several one-star reviews out there, almost all for books I did not finish. I do them because I figure if a book is that bad, at least in my estimation, I’m duty-bound to warn others who might have similar tastes to mine.

    Most of my bad reviews take the form of logic fails and/or snapped suspension of disbelief. (To take one recent example, a book which shall remain nameless had me sitting up and shouting, “Even in a fantasy world, you cannot have meat-eating horses!”) I can forgive some of that if the writing is good or the characters have depth, and those books get two or three stars, but that goes only so far.

    I like doing reviews because it makes me think about what works in a book and what doesn’t work, and why. That helps my own writing.

  12. Jo Walton is very hit or miss for me. Some I love, some are meh, others I outright hate and DNF.

    Some authors are good reads each book. Others are good reads sometimes. Others I bounce of a few books and never try again. Many authors I never get to because there isn’t time to try every author in my lifetime. True even if we found the secret to immortality unless it killed the creativity impulse which would solve my reading everything but would s*ck long-term.

    I have fond memories of Clan of the Cave Bear. In my defense I was reading a lot of harlequin romance at the time and was able to stand/read/enjoy just about anything. I’ve not revisited as I’m certain it would be hit by the s*ck fairy. I’ve gotten a lot pickier/snobbish in my taste since then. Although with my love for UF/PNR I read a fair number of books which I grumble my way through given certain tropes which show up too frequently IMHO:
    1. falling for the guy trying to kill you the instant your eyes meet
    2. falling for the guy who raped/abuses you but it was only because of his supernatural powers/genetics/culture (fae/vampire/werewolf/etc.) which he may have no control over and possibly over time he understands what he did was wrong (in best case scenarios)
    3. Strong woman meets man/paranormal/alien and becomes damsel in distress even while still kicking butt if man permits

  13. @Tasha Turner: I liked the first couple of Auel’s books, though I didn’t stick with the series. I want to say “no need to defend our tastes!” But I admit, I’m embarrassed to say I liked them, because (a) lots of people look down on them, and (b) they’re aimed squarely not at my gender. Usually I’m all “tastes differ, whatever!” I guess I’ll just look on Auel as a guilty pleasure (back in the day; I suspect the books don’t hold up).

    Thinking about them and my over-abundance of Audible credits, I listened to a couple of the audio samples for her books just now. I was tempted, but the narrator sounded dull! Too matter-of-fact. I couldn’t listen to her for 20-30 hours per book, darn.

    BTW #2 that trope list, Tasha . . . yipes, especially the second one.

  14. Kendall: I liked the first couple of Auel’s books, though I didn’t stick with the series. I want to say “no need to defend our tastes!”

    Nope, no need. Just because I read them and wondered why so many people seemed to think they were a big deal, it doesn’t make my opinion the “right” one. I’ve also felt that way about a number of other books, including the much-lauded Lord of Light — and I’ve never been ga-ga about Tolkien. I don’t understand the appeal of comic books or graphic novels. I can’t imagine spending huge chunks of my life playing videogames. I love sex when I’m the one having it, but don’t particularly care to have long, vivid scenes of it in my SFF books or movies.

    But all of those things have large groups of people who are absolutely ardent about them. That’s awesome — just as it’s awesome that I can find so many things about which I am ardent.

    If there’s an audience for it, someone will produce it, and it will sell. If not, it disappears pretty fast. I think it’s wonderful that so many people, with such widely-varying tastes, can all find something in the SFF genre that “trips their trigger”.

  15. I dearly love the Fast and the Furious films* for a number of reasons that I won’t bore anyone with, but I quite understand why people wouldn’t enjoy them. Tastes are funny and no-one’s taste is quite the same as anyone else’s. 🙂

    *And I have no shame about it, either. I’m not so sure I want to have guilty pleasures when I could just have pleasures that I enjoy for different reasons.**

    **I’m not yet entirely consistent about that but I’m aiming for it anyway.

  16. Meredith: And I have no shame about it, either. I’m not so sure I want to have guilty pleasures when I could just have pleasures that I enjoy for different reasons.

    Once in a while, I enjoy a good, mindless action flick (of the Willis, Stallone, Schwarzenegger, Statham, Diesel, The Rock, etc, sort). I call them one of my “guilty pleasures”, but I don’t feel the slightest bit guilty about watching them. I also enjoy watching movies which substantially explore the human psyche or human relationships, including foreign language films.

    A steady diet of just one thing — be it chocolate, porridge, caviar, or bread — would not be much fun, I think.

  17. I find myself feeling a need to defend much of what I read and enjoyed between ages 7-mid twenties. Big romance reader, some SFF, non-fiction for fun, and frequently arguing with teachers, other kids parents, & kids about what I was reading leaves me with a built in defense mode when talking about 90% of what I read during that period of my life.

    Now I still disagree with many people about what’s good, what’s not, and why but I’m no longer defensive about it. Taste are different and we each have different criteria for “good”. Plus we infer and project when reading. When talking to my husband about a book we both read at times I’m convinced a Brownie changed the text when the book changed hands because we seem to have read a different book.

  18. I guess it’s okay to mention another guilty pleasure of mine – not SF-related, this time – “Felicity” (the TV show). I “discovered” (read: first watched it) in evening reruns on some women’s channel like Lifetime or whatever. (See, another item that seems not-aimed-at-my-gender.) Whew, that’s a load off my chest, thanks. LOL. 🙂

    (blush)

  19. So has anyone written a story about a present-day couple who successfully kidnaps, say, “Jacob Menhaggen,” and it turns out in their history, the original history, Jacob Menhaggen was the *original* Third Reich dictator of Germany, but he was a lot smarter and militarily shrewd, so in that history, the Nazis defeated the British and Americans?

    I am not sure what would happen in such a story, but it’d sure be fun to read. Maybe about teenage Jacob finding out what he originally grew up to be. “I did WHAT?!”

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