Bethesda, Maryland

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I’m in Bethesda at a conference of the Centre for Inquiry. So far I’ve met authors Barbara Forrest and Susan Jacoby. I did not bring a cat.

Jane Austen’s blighted romance

New evidence suggests that Jane Austen’s sister, Cassandra, interfered with Jane’s chances for a happy marriage.

Lynne Murray’s book blog

I stumbled upon this book blog while looking for something else: Lynne Murray’s “30 Years Ago Today: I had an orange notebook.” Here’s part of her article about “Motherhood: humor, sadness, artistry, magic & grace“:

Shirley Jackson is arguably a better writer than my favorite domestic goddess essayist, Betty MacDonald who wrote: The Egg and I, The Plague and I, Onions in the Stew, Anybody Can Do Anything, and um, a bunch of children’s books…

MacDonald was more of a comic genius. (She created the unforgettable Ma and Pa Kettle, based on farming neighbors in Washington state.)

Jackson and MacDonald both address what someone has called “the visceral shock of motherhood” and the disillusionment of the drudgery of family life from a woman’s point of view. I lent out my copy of The Egg and I, so I can’t quote you the passage where McDonald describes the shock of her swift descent from bride to wife. She made it funny, but you could see why her first marriage ended in divorce as she detailed her transition between being a sought-after bride to living with a husband who considered her a “bad sport” or inept because she didn’t share his knack for and joy in the drudgery of farm life. I remember reading it at 12 or so, and thinking, hmmm . . . men, marriage, maybe there’s something there that the romantic stories don’t mention.

More books!

I let myself be lured into a bookstore (the Indigo at Yonge & Highway7) to meet a friend and pick up my share of materials to be judged for the STC Toronto’s Technical Publications and Online Documentation contests. Of course, once in the store I had to look around. This is what I ended up with.

Science:

• The Drunkard’s Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives by Leonard Mlodinow, about probability and improbability (for LotStreetWiz)
• Dry Store Room No. 1: The Secret Life of the Natural History Museum by Richard Fortey
• Born to Believe: God, Science, and the Origin of Ordinary and Extraordinary Beliefs by Andrew Newberg

I reluctantly passed up Stroke of Insight, a first-person account of recovery from a stroke even though it had good insights into the nature of brain function and body awareness—too expensive, little re-read value. It was interesting that damage to the left or verbal side of the brain immediately produced an oceanic feeling of exaltation and oneness with the universe.

Science fiction & fantasy:

• The Collected Short Fiction of C. J. Cherryh by C. J. Cherryh
• The Heart of Valor by Tanya  Huff – third in a series about interstellar warfare
• Blood Bank, by Tanya Huff – short stories & a screenplay about Victoria Nelson, police detective, and Henry Fitzroy, vampire: I like the novels
• Old Man’s War by John Scalzi: he’s amusing in the blogosphere, so I have to try his writing
• Heroes in Training, stories selected by Martin H. Greenberg: about young people and how they take that first step on the Glory Road; or, how do people rise to the challenge in an emergency?
• The Del Rey Book of Science Fiction and Fantasy, stories selected by Ellen Datlow. Looks good.

I am now truly set for the next two months, especially since I have a few half-read books around, such as Of Moths and Men and The God of Small Things (a novel set in India) and If Life is a Game, These are the Rules.

The competition is stiff, but I think Cherryh is my favourite science fiction author. Hard science fiction. With physics. With anthropology. With realistically partial views of what’s going on. And even with economics. And I noted the dismal persistence of pretty good male authors while female authors of better caliber vanish from the shelves.

Big grey sky

I left work just about local sunset under a vast, humid grey cloud, the fringes of Hurricane Hanna.

I picked up a cooked chicken on the way home and had almost the classic Margaret Visser meal tonight: chicken, corn, and tomato. In her book Much Depends on Dinner, she had rice on the plate as well. (Each chapter of the book describes the history of a food in the dinner.)

It’s going to rain tomorrow and we’ll have hot, humid weather. I’m not doing any laundry tonight. At least the temperature is going down to 20 tonight; and I’ll button the house up against the heat tomorrow.

Our long-haired cat, Marlowe, has been very bad-tempered all day with sticky burrs in her fur, but she won’t stand still for anyone to cut them out: its a two-person operation.

I worked late last night and I want to be alert tomorrow, so I’m going to replenish the dry catfood and go to bed. If I can’t sleep I’ll go out for a walk.

Dinner with science bloggers!

…and real scientists, in town for the American Society for Microbiology general meeting. I was honoured to be invited. Larry Moran and Tara Smith organized a dinner of science bloggers previously acquainted only over the Web. We met at the University of Toronto. The picture shows some of us sitting on the steps in front of the Medical Sciences Building: Larry Moran of Sandwalk, Jonathan Badger of T. Taxus, Andrew Staroscik of Mixotrophy, Tara Smith of Aetiology, and John Logsdon of Sex, Genes, and Evolution. Chris Condayan, the ASM public outreach manager, was off recording an interview with Eva Amsen of Easternblot. (He interviewed several people for a podcast on the ASM’s Web site.)

Eight of us walked down to Baldwin Street for Indian food and a long, chatty, interesting dinner together. The food at Matahari restaurant was both good and unfamiliar. I had a good time and I think everyone else did, too. Here’s

• Larry’s “Bloggers in Toronto”
• Tara’s “Science Bloggers storm Toronto!”
• Jonathan’s “Mini-blogger convention at ASM 2007″

Quoting Montaigne

Man is quite insane. He wouldn’t know how to create a maggot, and he creates gods by the dozen.

Richard Dawkins film at the Brunswick Theatre

One of our local Toronto repertory film-houses is showing Richard Dawkins‘ BBC documentary on March 15 and 19:

“The Root of All Evil?” is a BBC documentary film, written and presented by Richard Dawkins (author of The God Delusion), in which he argues that the world would be better off without religion. This film explores the unproven beliefs that are treated as factual by many religions and the extremes to which some followers have taken them.

This being Canada, the theatre invites:

Join us after the film for a respectful and open discussion about the film and the issues is raises. All are welcome to attend and participate.

In other words, be nice!

Quoting Voltaire

Voltaire’s prayer to God:

I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: ‘O Lord, make my enemies ridiculous.’ And God granted it.”

I found this over on Panda’s Thumb (the virtual pub of the University of Ediacara).