Zeugma's page

COOL! (or Kool?)

Total chick flicks, so you'll probably never see 'em, but I thought the Rosalind Russel "Gypsy" (1962) was worse than the Bette Middler (1993) version.

Good luck in the job hunt, Mr. Shiny. I'm sorta in the same boat.

I can't wait to get my book. They're shipping it as I type this! As a side note: when I got a scrape on my car in the parking-lot last month, I shouted "Rovagug!" (It's a great substitute for cursing)

Mairkurion (sp?) I made a mistake. The Face in the Frost is NOT, I repeat NOT part of the Jonathan Monday series by John Bellairs. Please disregard my last post. High School was eight years ago for me, so it's been at least a decade since I've read Bellairs. But please read his Young Adult stuff too. I'm a big believer in never being "too old" for entertaining literature, and Bellairs stuff is, in my opinion, very good.

Zeugma, is The Face in the Frost part of a series? By YA, do you mean Young Adult, or is it the name of a series? I just know this book (and author) from Appendix N.

Yes, The Face in the Frost is in the same series as The House with a Clock in its Walls, The Curse of the Blue Figurine and several other books.

YA= Young Adult literature.
Check out more John Bellairs! He's great!

Having your diagnosis changed from Dysthymia to Schizophrenia Simplex (or Simple Schizophrenia).

Although there's not much difference in treatment, it sucks mostly because of the social stigma. Suffering from depression is bad enough in today's society, but most people associate schizophrenia with the paranoid schizophrenia version (which, granted, is the most common one) and thus psychotic behaviour.

Also, having a pinched nerve in the back sucks. Hopefully it'll sort itself out in a couple of days.

You have my sympathies, GentleGiant. I'd never heard of Dysthymia before, and I have a friend with schizophrenia (and another friend's mom has it), so I know second-hand what a hassle that is; I hope you have a strong community around you who will stick by you (and there's also Paizo messageboards!). It's not just the mood problems, it's the meds side-effects that can cause trouble too. Also, I've never had a pinched nerve but that must suck too. I'm sending good vibes your way! To commisserate, I'm really depressed right now, and my mom wants to take me to another psychologist. I've seen three - two that have helped me, and one that just made me more miserable. So I'm really vascilating between "should I go?" or "should I say no?" I think part of me is scared of getting out/figuring out what is making me depressed, and I'll admit I've been bottling up my feelings about a ton of stuff lately. But I'm not sure expressing it will lead me to any solutions. I'm unemployed and living at home.

Finished John Bellairs' The Face in the Frost and am now reading Marion Zimmer Bradley's Sword and Sorceress II. (I still haven't found a copy of Leibner's fourth F&GM novel.) Bellairs was quite enjoyable, and produced a story about wizards in which magic was not a main character. (Check another one off Appendix N for me.) S&S is increasing my interest in Charles Saunders.

I read the complete series of Bellairs' YA books on summer break when I was in high school. I enjoyed all of them; it was time well spent.

Right now I'm reading Frederik Pohl's Gateway. I'm not sure I'll finish the Heechee Saga though, because while the novel is interesting it isn't as suspenseful as I'd hoped it would be. It is realistically claustrophobic, as I expect living in a space-ship would actually feel.

Menstrual cramping. The kind that makes your legs hurt. >.<

(Y'all asked...)

Lilith, that made my day! SO True!

Silly detail-obsessive question:

in the Companions related to one of the PFS factions (Osirion, Taldor and the upcoming Qadira, Cheliax and Andoran), why do some of the covers include the nation's coat of arms in the art while others don't?

Osirion doesn't (maybe because it was the 1st one)
Taldor does
If the covers are final, Qadira won't, Cheliax will and Andoran won't.

Any technical or practical reasons? Having the coats for the whole series seemed sleek and cool!

Quadira is a far-flung satrapi of the Padishah Empire of Kelesh. Its coat of arms is as a child's scrawl before the awesome designs of the Empire!

My hardcopy is shipping! Yay! (I don't like reading from the PDFs, although I do download them - I enjoy the book format more)

116. Zed: May I ask you why you felt little Tiffany deserved to die?

73. {Mathenauts-‘Convergent Series’, Rudy Rucker} Protagonist paints the pentagram on the time-frozen demon’s belly. When time starts again, the demon re-enters our dimension only to find the pentagram has moved – it is on his belly. Each time the demon tries to re-enter it gets smaller and smaller in the limit.

That is so COOL!

71. Pohl's "The Day the Icicle Works Closed," where planetary colonists "loan" their bodies to off-world day-trippers (kinda like virtual reality visors, only not virtual) while their minds power robots who do menial labor....or so they think!

69. Also, the snowstorm parable from Ch. 2 of Masque World, by Alexei Panshin. "In these days when any man can comfortably dance naked in a snow storm..."

Seldriss wrote:

60.

"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe
Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser Gate
All those moments will be lost in time
Like tears in rain
Time to die"

I cannot watch this scene without crying.
I can't even listen to these lines without dropping a tear.

Ok. I give. What is this from? It sounds very familiar.

Blade Runner

68. For Mr. Mona: Masque World: "Sir Henry Oliphaunt kept his Trog suit. He never wore it and he never spoke of it to Lady Oliphaunt, but he kept the suit and sometimes late at night he would take it from its secret place and look at it. And there were other nights when he would suddenly rise from his chair and dance around the room."

Bye Jason! Come back soon, when you have the time.

Yay! Nisroch! Easily my favorite place on Golarion so far, and that's just going by the PFCS. I'm writing a fan fiction set there, just for my own practice, and I'm trying to get a bead on Nisrochians (Nisrochis?) attitudes and prejudices and how they relate to the world. So far it's a bit of "hardboiled noir" meets "Edgar Allen Poe," meets "Hellraiser," meets "fascist totalitarian regime" so I'm definitely going to add this to my cart and see how my ideas measure up to what the Paizo authors think the place is. :)

I heartily second Yoda8's idea about dividing the book by the various kingdoms, even if that breaks with Chronicle's standard format. It would make searching for regional info much quicker for a DM or a Player looking to a specific kingdom/area for inspiration. You could still keep other sections that pertain to the region as a whole, such as the cults. I also liked the idea of a "dossier" on how the RKs relate to the other nearby kingdoms.

Expansion on some of the factions of the River Kingdoms included in the Campaign Setting would be nice. I'm betting (hoping) you have a Daggermark book in the works, so I'd like to see areas outside the capital also get nice writeups. I'd like to see stuff about Gyronna and the Black Sisters, and about Uringen (I'm a big "Brigadoon" fan! Places "trapped outside of time" always fascinate me).

Agognon wrote:

I heard that if this movie is successful, the sequel will be...

STAR TREK:
The Musical

I'd still go and see it.

MEE TOOO! MEE TOO! So long as Shatner's songs are more like Prof. Higgins's from "My Fair Lady," b/c he couldn't carry a tune if he had a sherpa help him.

It could be like "Rocky Horror Picture Show," everyone in costume, singing along!

To the OP:

I think THIS is what you're looking for.

LOL. Funny. But you should really put a NSFW spoiler next to the link, Snorter.

Sean Penn doesn't drive Hollywood, money does.

So true. The LA Times prints the weekend box office receipts in the Business section.

The larger the budget for a film, in general, the tighter reign there will be on all aspects of the production, and the more mainstream the film. Small budgets mean you tend to get more splatter/sex/politics, because the studios aren't risking as much.

Zeugma wrote:

They did it indirectly, through symbolism, allusion and alienation

Which is good sci-fi

Which are elements of good fiction, period.

I've totally heard about Spock/Kirk fic. I haven't read any, but I've heard the rumors... I've seen that documentary, "Trekies" (can't remember if that is the title) but if they can talk about obscure Yar/Data pairings (and, okay, that was actually part of an episode, but for me it always felt kinda like a "No, really, I'm serious" ep) then ya know Kirk/Spock hasta be out there. It must be true! I heard it on the Internet!

In fact, I would take some consolation (maybe) in the fact that as a vehicle for social change Trek has always really done it without expressly pointing it out to the audience, it's more subversive than an overt premise really and I kinda dig that.

Good point. ST was never "All in the Family" - they never tackled social issues head on. The most direct they got was when Kirk/Picard would play Aesop at the end of an episode (and sometimes those pithy speeches of his had nothing to do with the mayhem preceeding them). They did it indirectly, through symbolism, allusion and alienation (pun!).

My cousin's wife came to LA and she really wanted to go shopping on Rodeo Drive. Yep, she'd seen Pretty Woman, and wanted to "live the dream." I can't stand that movie!

That looks like a fun movie. I hope it'll be released for American systems too...Though that may be wishful thinking.

And really, since Takei came out, is there anyone who doesn't see Sulu as gay? Personally, I like seeing the old episodes featuring him now, it feels like the world has finally been let in on an awesome in-joke.

Oh I totally see it! I love watching TSO and having that new point of reference.

George Takei is, and he seems to bear no animosity to the franchise. I've heard him say he was frustrated at times because he had to be closeted to get work for most of his career, but the opportunity to portay an Asian as a positive role model on American TV was also an oppportunity to do a lot of good, coming out of the "Fu Manchu" era of television. Then again, he wasn't really involved with ST much after TOS.

Roddenberry is dead, any "message" Star Trek had died with him.

KAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHNNNNN!

Edit: KHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAANNNN!

No, no, no. You got it wrong! It's Everything's better with Princesses!

Of course, Indiana Jones has nazis and princesses, so it's all good.

Edit: Maybe it should be: everything's better with Harrison Ford.

Post eaten, too long, I'll try to summarize:
OP, I think you have a legitimate complaint. Star Trek, which over the years has addressed so many different social issues, has no openly gay characters; they've been excluded. Being excluded from a show whose message is "in the future, we all can get along and no one is excluded" must hurt. ST, which has led in so many areas, has failed to lead in this. Because of this, I respect your decision to break with the franchise, even if it is not the decision I'd make.
But there are two points I'd like you to consider, and they're part of the reason I'm not ready to give up on ST even though it has not led the way for including gays:
1) The show's message may be one of harmony, but its subtext was always conflict. Not all peoples and groups have gotten a fair shake on the show because of this, and while in one episode we may see an allusive portrayal of the social condition (black-white vs. white-black man) in another we'll see a farcical, degrading stereotype (Mudd's wife).
2)The messenger (ST) is fallible, but the message ("Go boldly where no one has gone before") is still good. Even if you quit ST, I hope you'd take that part of it with you, and live long and prosper by it. :)

AWESOME!

I'm related to King Solomon on my father's mother's side (either him, or those wacky Solomons on "3rd Rock from the Sun"). I still laugh when Dick (John Lithgow) says, "OMG, we're Jewish!"

Thanks for confirming my thoughts on the scene. I love how the Paizo staff are so quick to respond when customer confusion arises. :)

as always, it's a really cool cover. I really liked the camel appearing there. That nearly naked girl riding on it reminds me of a really funny joke from Terry Pritchett's' "moving picture".

BTW, the jinni looks weird- one of his arms is less muscular than the other.

Don't you mean Terry Pratchett's Pyramids? Of course, there was a spoof of Rudolph Valentino as "The Shiek" in Moving Pictures, and I seem to remember a camel in that novel also...and Pratchett is known to recycle his jokes.

Also, that is one genie whose lamp I most definitely DO NOT want to rub!

I decided to go with the picture for the correct description of Father Zastoran. A more pressing concern of mine:

Other than that, I really like the adventure so far, and if I get a chance to run it I hope I'd get a roleplay-happy group, because there are a ton of characters to interact with and portray.

Yeah. And he's even spelling his name differently!

Edit: reply to Krome.

How do you know she isn't just a doppelganger that the Golem keeps around as a body double? I mean, you can't expect her to pose for her own artwork! Sheesh. A wizard's got to study, ya know?

I notice that the picture Eric linked to already has a gnoll in it! ;)

I hope you enjoy "M". I thought some of the parts in the middle of the film were a bit slow, but on the whole it is excellent. I really like how the sound-track is put together for "M": you can hear the filmmakers experimenting with sound and image in a way that too few directors and composers do nowadays. I especially liked the judicious use of silence. Studios would be too afraid to miss out on recording revenue to do that in Hollywood, nowadays or even back then.

I love this movie. I saw a remastered version at the Silent Movie Theater on Wilshire Blvd. (Los Angeles), where the piano player had been the organist at the original premiere of "Metropolis" in Berlin. He was an ancient dude, but he could still play a mean piano (too bad the Silent Movie Theater never had the space for a real organ, and a shame they closed down. I loved going there). When the Reich broke up and censored the avant-gard studios of Germany, the world really lost something special. If you can, see "Metropolis" on the big screen -- the prints I saw used silver nitrate. It has a gorgeous effect and you really understand why they called it "the silver screen."

Lame. Why do people think that misspelling and using incorrect grammar (especially by refusing to use adverbs: I'm looking at you, "Think different") makes them cool?

Kruelaid wrote:

I did a map of Sothis last year. If anyone wants to use it during the interim: here it is. Please tell me if this is not ok paizo dudes.

It's layered, so you can turn the labels on and off in acrobat... Well, I can. Let me know if you guys can't.

Here's a screenshot of it with the layers menu opened so you know what you're d/ling.

About the map:** spoiler omitted **

That's a sharp looking map Kruelaid. What programs do you use?

QFT. I love the map Kruelaid.

In the PbP I'm in my character, Idiah, is from Isger. She was a bandit and when the Isgeri army, supported by Hellknights, routed her camp she fled to Molthune. The Molthune govt. was sponsoring her band in a proxy-war with Isger. Molthune is afraid a strong, rebuilt Isger will expand to lake Encarthan and draw Cheliax's vast resources to enforce dominance in the region; after all, Molthune shares all of its southern border with Cheliax-aligned countries. Sure, there are mountains in the way, but that didn't stop Hannibal.

I could see a James Bond-esqe spy war going on between Molthune, Isger and Druma in the esastern Meandor Mountains.

William Bryan wrote:

Where could I get my hands on a LoF preview? Is this a DM's preview or a players preview?

If I'm not mistaken you have to be a subscriber to the Pathfinder AP line to gain access to it. I'm not sure whether you will gain access to it if you sign up now, or if it was a one time deal.

As for your second question, it's a player's guide.

I got the LoF player's guide as a free download when I linked from the e-mail Paizo sent me. You have to have your e-mail accept their direct marketing to receive it, it doesn't matter whether or not you are a subscriber (I wasn't, and it inspired me to subscribe).

I just subscribed to this adventure path! Check out my shiny new Subscriber tag! :)

A Korvosan "Madam Butterfly"? Awesome! Lt. Pinkerton could be from Andoran, and Cio-Cio-San would definitely be from Tian-Min.

Or you could do my favorite opera: "Il trovatore," Azucena and Manrico would be Varisians, and Leonora and Count DiLuna would be Chelaxians. That one would have a lot of pyrotechnics in it. Think "Stride la vampa" but with REAL FIRE!