Friday's Interesting Links

Life

I normally display the links in the order that I discover them (though once a category is made, I put them in chronological order under that). Why is this relevant? Because I'm breaking that pattern to bump this link to the very top. I don't care whether you are a creative type, a conservative type, a free-thinker, or a true believer. Read this link. Seriously. It doesn't matter what you're conforming to; it matters that you know who you really are. You don't have to be wild to be non-conformist; you don't have to be edgy or out there. To be non-conformist, you need to figure out how you want to live and live that way. It's hard, really. Everything pushes us to conform. Aid organizations want us to conform to their ideals of helping, radicals want us to conform to their ideas of what's wrong, conservatives want us to conform to their ideas of what's right, and so on. And each of these groups, regardless of where they fall on the social spectrum, have members who are being who they are, who they want to be. One friend of mine is breaking with tradition by becoming a gentlewoman farmer. Another is both a slum lord ;), and advocate for those without a roof over their heads. I have religious friends, and friends who do not think any belief system has value. Still more... I could go on. I have friends from all walks of life who have made all sorts of choices. The ones that are happy (which is not the same thing as secure, balanced, or comfortable) are the ones that have chosen to follow their hearts instead of becoming what everyone expects us to be, whatever that expectation may be. Me, I'm still struggling with the whole secure, balanced, and comfortable side, but when I ask myself if I'm happy with the choices I've made? Yeah, I am :).
http://procrastinatingwritersblog.com/2009/07/23/non-conformist/

Reading

This had to be listed if only for the last line of the article. A cautionary tale for people all thrilled about web-enabled ereaders. The fallout from this is still ongoing, no surprise to most of us, so search for more if you're interested.
http://pogue.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/17/some-e-books-are-more-equal-than-others/

And for those just starting out with ebooks, here's some to tempt you:
http://www.suvudu.com/freelibrary/

Promotion

A solid list of ways to gain name recognition on the web:
http://sixsexysirens.blogspot.com/2009/07/e-publishing-promo-on-web.html

Odd marketing choice here, but it has a long-standing tradition in another form, where the book appears to be co-authored but really the "headline" author barely gave the book a blessing. The difference being that readers know they've been taken in? Not sure about this because I discovered a lot of writers I now love because they "wrote" with MZB.
http://www.marketingweek.co.uk/book-publishers-exploit-stars/3002638.article

I'm including this article not because I've read the book or know the author (not that I wouldn't but that it hasn't crossed my radar yet), but because this is a scary bit of info. I need to pay more attention when I'm in the bookstore next time. I spend most of my time in the spec fic sections where people are blue and green even, but in the general sections, this is one more sign that we haven't grown up as a people. One more reason that recognition of people as people keeps showing up as a theme in my writing :p.
http://justinelarbalestier.com/blog/2009/07/23/aint-that-a-shame/

Writing

Contracts can be confusing and weighty. This article highlights the critical ones to look for:
http://www.genreality.net/must-have-contract-clauses

State of the Nation...of Romance Publishing:
http://dearauthor.com/wordpress/2009/07/21/the-state-of-romance-post-rwa-nationals-2009-its-rocky-out-there/

The secret to getting published:
http://writerunboxed.com/2009/07/22/the-secret/

A solid list of things to look at when revising:
http://www.deadlinedames.com/?p=1359

Social

People have laughed at me for reading romances going back as far as when I was 14 or so, but I've held out for the concept of the happy ending...and found it in my own life. However, my relationship had nothing like the barriers depicted here...and this is truth, not fiction:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/devon/8158822.stm

Science

A vision of the future of space flight from those who have actually been there. I can't see much to disagree with here, and I love the footprints to stepping stone progression of the moon.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17488-apollo-astronauts-advocate-trip-to-mars.html?page=1

Most alien landscapes on Earth. Some of these photos are incredible.
http://matadortrips.com/photo-essay-the-most-alien-landscapes-on-earth/

Interesting Links

Maybe I'll make this a Friday tradition, a once a month tradition, or maybe never again, but I started collecting some links I thought you all would find interesting. They cover writing, science and free books.

Enjoy:

Writing
Peter Cox on why not to POD your submission manuscript.
http://petercox.info/?p=1083

Dame Kaz on finishing what you start.
http://www.deadlinedames.com/?p=450

Colleen Lindsay on book lengths.
http://theswivet.blogspot.com/2008/03/on-word-counts-and-novel-length.html

Janet Reid on the fallability of rejections (or why not to give up when you're rejected).
http://jetreidliterary.blogspot.com/2009/02/1399-tax.html

Linnea Sinclair on Point of View.
http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com/2009/01/heading-into-danger-choosing-point-of.html

Elizabeth Gilbert on Nurturing Creativity (Note: This is a video and it auto starts so check your volume)
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/elizabeth_gilbert_on_genius.html

Science and Tech
The gene for new teeth discovered (Imagine replacing damaged teeth with new real ones!)http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/genetics/2009-02-26-teeth-genes_N.htm?csp=Tech

Asteroid passed close to the Earth...close on a cosmic scale at least.
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/space/2009-03-05-asteroid-near-miss_N.htm?csp=Tech

Miscellaneous:
A chance for a free book each week:
http://www.bkgiveaway.com/

The Last Lecture and Life Lessons

Sorry for the long silence, though this may actually explain some of it :).

As some of you may know, I spent the past year under a knife, figurative, but possibly literal, with a severe medical condition that no one could explain. It's made me think about things a lot, though most of that pondering got swallowed up by the pain/pain med-induced amnesia :p.

Now with that context, you might think the fact that both my sisters recommended The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch to be particularly ominous, but it's actually a coincidence. I had heard about the last lecture and stuck it in my head under physicists saying fascinating things. Yes, I know now that Randy Pausch is not a physicist, nor is he talking much about science. But that was enough to make me interested when, at a family reunion, I noticed my older sister was reading this book. She'd borrowed it from my younger sister, who then both recommended I read The Last Lecture and allowed me to borrow her copy as well.

So I got back from the reunion to discover that what we'd thought had resolved (in three wonderful, mostly symptom-free weeks) was back. The upshot of it was that I now faced a surgery to cure me instead of either being already cured or under a death sentence. Still, my frame of mind over the course of this past year had certain similarities to Randy Pausch.

Anyway, between preparing for the surgery and after, a small book with little chapters seemed the perfect read. I knew my focus could be measured in minutes, not hours, so a normal book would take too long. Except that I didn't read just a page at a time.

The Last Lecture is neither about physics (or virtual reality, his actual area of expertise ;)) nor so much about dying. It's a collection of thoughts and stories about how Randy Pausch lived his life, what he learned about people along the way, and what lessons he wants to pass on to his children, along with anyone else interested enough to listen. The book is surprisingly optimistic while being very grounded in the reality of his timeline. He focuses on the people whom he's met in his life, not to be maudlin, but to celebrate the wonderful things these people are doing, and to appreciate the chance to be part of their lives, to help them achieve what they truly wanted.

This is a book about childhood dreams. About striving toward them and about what you can gain whether or not you end up achieving those goals. It's a book about being aware of your life and how you interact with others.

And now that I've made it sound like a boring, Hallmark moment, let me tell you Randy Pausch is incredibly articulate and talented at choosing the right illustrations from his own life or from those around him to prove his point. For example, he talks about how he initiated the "First Penguin" award in his labs, not for the group that succeeded, but for the group that fails spectacularly. This example really speaks to me because I'm a largely self-taught programmer, database analyst, systems analyst, and process analyst. Okay, anything logical I'll tackle and enjoy ;). Sure, in the end I'll get things to work, but the way I come to the understanding is by first putting together something that does not. It might not produce any result, might be the wrong result, or maybe it's just a resource hog. The reality is that with each attempt to accomplish something that fails, I've gained a better understanding of the process and how I need to go forward. Each time I think I know the answer and the path leads me to a dead end, I learn about that section of the process and get clues about the overall process so I can set off on another path.

Okay, before I go too far on this tangent, I'll get to the point. I once worked with a project manager who I enjoyed talking to because he was an interesting man. Out of all our discussions though, the thing that stuck with me so many years later was one time when he mentioned that early in his career he'd been the system administrator for a Novell server. His comment? He'd been responsible for that system for something like five years and still knew little to nothing about it.

At the time, I was hip deep in an aging system that had been pushed well beyond its limits, was leaking data from every crack, and which my team was plastering together with duct tape in the hopes of keeping production rolling long enough for the new system to come into being (which would of course be 10 times better ;)). What I realized was, rather than cursing the old system under my breath, I should be hugging it. I came out of supporting that system with a clear understanding and direct experience with Unix, Oracle, Unix-Novell bridge solutions, and half a dozen other things. I became a successful programmer and data analyst because of that old system. And when the new one started dribbling data, I didn't have to learn everything from scratch because those skills I'd honed on the old system were globally applicable. Heck, I still use them in the systems I work with today.

To get back to the book though, that's only one of the many life lessons he offers that really clicked with me. Randy Pausch's analysis, in his final months on this Earth, made me sit back and appreciate some of the things I hadn't given much thought to, people things, computer things, life things. As it turned out, I wasn't under a death sentence this time at least, and I have more than four months to enjoy the world he's reminding me of, time he wasn't given. A lot of what he said wasn't new to me. I'm prone to self-analysis and so had already come to many of the same conclusions. But this book is a good reminder of things, of making choices and decisions, of not accepting the easy road when your heart craves the harder one, of being there for other people and making their way a bit smoother, and most of all, of seeing the brick walls we face in life not as barriers but as challenges to be conquered.

I have no doubt why this book is a national bestseller, and though it needs no help from me, I suggest you go out and get a copy, whether you buy one, borrow from a friend, or get it from the library. Me? I read my sister's copy, and there's a high probability that, when I return it to her, my own copy will nestle in my shelves.

How to learn...

I'm a self-taught type of person. I have a bachelor's degree that I constructed out of the classes that amused me, I learned coding because my mother taught me "if you do it more than once, code it," and I'm a whiz at legacy systems. Piecing together answers with little training or documentation is my thing.

So why is it that I still believe the answers should be out there, findable and usable without the mess that is divination from scraps left buried in the sands of time?

I have a home network. In a house with approximately 6-7 computers (though not all working at the same time), it's a necessity. We just moved and decided that our new house would not have cables stapled along the walls in this modern time period of wireless and wired houses. All we wanted was that all the computers could talk to each other.

That should have been simple, right? We had the right equipment and everything... I even found step-by-step directions (though not for our equipment). Two days later, we had a semi-functioning system cobbled together with the use of the hosts file, a remnant of archaic networking prior to DNS servers and the like.

At this point, you're wondering what on earth this has to do with learning patterns and the like.

So I'm frustrated, stumped, and tearing my hair out. My oldest son is trying to help but I'd have to explain everything to him. So that's what I did. Explained, walked through, and then said, "The problem is that the hub can't see the gateway."

New search terms. Knowledge is out there, but just like the Oracles at Delphi, you have to ask the right question. This time, I found instructions for our equipment. We put it in that configuration and off we go, everything's working perfectly.

I grew up with a firm belief in education/training as supreme. But we cannot get trained in everything we're going to face. At some point, I need to remember to go back to my strengths, go back to the analysis that brought me into databases, programming, and my general approach to life. Sure, the education is out there, the information is available to anyone who is willing to look. But you've got to do the legwork and understand just what you need to know. Very few people are out there making this easy, and those that are do so as an extension of their own questions. What do you want to bet they had to do something first to discover the right questions?

I guess the bottom line is whether self-taught, a good researcher, schooled, or whatever, no one can give you the knowledge you need. You have to go out and earn it, sometimes with hard work, sometimes with frustration, but whatever the way, the only true failure is to give up.

And if that's not a stray thought-random segue I don't know what is :p.

To continue the learning, how about dropping a note about how you learn the right question to ask. Is it hands-on, talking through something, washing dishes, taking a class, or what?