Guess what, y'all? It's the most Earth-like planet yet discovered! Only 1.5 times Earth's radius, 0.75 AU from a Sol-like star! Here are a few other planets of interest to go along with it: 9 Exoplanets that could support life (more or less) as we know it

Also, stuff is still happening on Earth, but that's not what I'm excited about right now.

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Okay, I was in a bookstore the other day, and I was initially pleased to see several new (or at least new to me) anthologies that looked interesting. But a quick inspection of the contents revealed that every single anthology on a theme that intrigued me included a entry by Orson Scott Card. Some of them were reprints of stories I'd seen in other ( Read more... )

I'm back where I should be now. Nothing went wrong, but I've been super tired. I did get out to church today, but I went right back to bed after it was over. (Going to my new church again was SUCH a relief-- I was so pathetically lonely while I was back in the place that everyone except my mother still insists on referring to as my "home," and I ( Read more... )

I'm on my way back from the holiday trip. Things went okay, I suppose. It was not all happy times, but some good came of it. I got to watch The Hobbit and Les Miserables with my mother, and I was able to buy nicer-than-usual gifts this year AND give them in person. Also, I got drive through Appalachia on the way back and stay at a hotel with an ( Read more... )

Well, I'm on my way to my mother's place for Christmas. I spent most of yesterday's daylight hours driving, and I'm getting ready to get back in the car. I should make it there sometime this afternoon. I'm excited about spending time with my mother, and I'm happy that I'll get to visit my grandmother again (we were worried that last year would ( Read more... )

I've been reading Gail Simone's tumblr, and the number 1 question on my mind right now is "What the FLYING FUCK is wrong with the people who have invaded her asks?" In addition to the people who are trying to get her to trash other writers under her professional name in a public forum, she gets people asking stuff like "Do you believe I'm a bad ( Read more... )

I'm expected to read nine papers, four of which are review papers (that means they're extra long) by Monday afternoon. I got through two of them okay, but then I hit the third one-- ARGH! It's so badly written I want to scream! First of all, it's full of Block Paragraphs of Doom. It has overly complicated diagrams which are accompanied not by ( Read more... )

Hey, if anybody is still keeping up with this journal, what are your thoughts on gendering robot/AI characters? The practice of assigning social genders to characters who don't have sexes in the biological sense has been on my mind lately. Among other things, I'm trying to sort out how the category of "robots that humans prefer to think of as ( Read more... )

Like a fool, I tried to follow discussions on tumblr instead of just looking at nice pictures and keeping that as my fluffy fan art and fuzzy animals happy space. I tried to follow non-fandom feminist discussion on tumblr. Ugh! Everything people say about "gender/sexual identity" and "social justice warrior" tumblr is true. EVERYTHING. Tumblr ( Read more... )

Obama wins the electoral college! Democrats, including Elizabeth Warren, have a majority in the Senate. Maine approves same sex marriage, and Minnesota rejects a proposal that would have banned it. Todd "Trigger Warning" got smacked down in favor of someone who has not made such egregiously awful misogynist statements in public ( Read more... )