Irish Timber Circle Dates Back 4,000-5,000 Years

The BBC announced that ancient ritual circles were excavated in Ballygawley (in Northern Ireland) over 2006-2007. The circles were not of stone, but of timber--which is great, because timber can be dated. According to venerable radio-carbon techniques, the circles date to the middle of the third millenniums BC, and some parts of the circles may be even older.

A three-year-long project turned up the circle while excavating and clearing ground for improvements to the A4 and A5 roadways. Pottery and charcoal were also found, but we'll have to wait till next year to learn what those artifacts revealed.

The archaeologists say that two concentric rings of wood beams apparently replaced an earlier series of pits. There was a "monumental porch" on one side, presumably the entrance. The outer circle of timbers likely supported wattle or planked walls between them, so the inner circle was hidden from the view of outsiders.

Here's the story in the local paper. But the Best Presentation is here--a PowerPoint slide show of not only the Ballygawley site, but other archaeological sites along the roadway. Pictures, maps, aerial views, and drawings--all courtesy of the Killeeshil & Clonaneese Historical Society!

New Books with My Articles!

Yay! Two more editions of the F.Y.I series:

First, featuring my astonishing expose of lusty rabbits, presidential turkey pardons, and the history of Gypsies, Roman new years, battle chariots, toothbrushes, getting shanghaied and more:

In the second book, I blow the lid off fruitcake, cognac, Mother Goose, space junk, leprosy, Murphy's law, plank-walking, and a plethora of other topics.

Clicking on the link should take your right to Amazon, so you can buy them right away!

Ancient Music of Greece

Here's a site that lets you listen to Greek music from a couple thousand years ago. Just click on any of the numbered items at the bottom, and listen in Real Player or Windows Media Player.

The music is actually written down--ancient fragments of tunes that survived, like the bit of parchment at right. This was copied from the music site, and apparently was preserved in a Middle Ages manuscript. (Medieval bookmakers often grabbed old parchment to press together into book covers) (my ignorant layman's explanation).

Perhaps my expectations were too high, but I'm kinda glad the ancients stuck to philosophy and writing plays. In fact, I suspect some of these ancient music authorities let their preschoolers sneak in a plastic recorder ditty or two.

OTOH, how do we know that these notes aren't intended more as cheat-sheets for professionals (fake books, IOW), who could probably improvise, harmonize, and in general give a much fuller sound than what we hear on these recordings? Just a guess.

You can also click on "Homeric singing" to hear what the Iliad sounded like, way back then. All courtesy of the Austrian Academy of Sciences.

Zane Grey Wrote Here

I'm cheating just a little, because I wrote about this historic house on my other blog, HistoryLosAngeles. That was more on the history of the home, but this is where the man actually wrote: a second-story office and library that includes this fireplace. (Did you know his real first name was Pearl? Pearl Zane Grey?)

There's a lot more to the space--the picture below (from Unreel Locations) gives a long view of the room. In that one, the fireplace is to the far left, just before the end of the room. The entire area is 3000 feet (the house is 15,000 sq. ft)--two or three times the room most apartments and homes have. The ceiling beams are so massive that they dwarf the space below, and it doesn't look huge--rather, it seems downright cozy. So yeah, I could get some work done here....

Of course, that was back in the days when cutting edge technology was a manual typewriter--and they've got a couple of those in the house, just for show. Actually, I think lined writing pads suit the environs better, don't you?

I'm gonna create a new category for this: Writing sites. Just great places to write. If I get desperate I'll take pictures of Starbucks or Coffee Bean and post them.

Celtic Languages: Cornish

There are 300 fluent speakers of Cornish--the Celtic dialogue of Cornwall--left, and they're working hard to ensure the language doesn't die. So says Henry Chu of the Los Angeles Times on July 25, 2009. He quotes a native speaker relaying a folktale:

"Y'n termyn eus passys, 'th era tregas yn Selevan den ha benyn yn tyller cries Chi an Hordh. . . . "

Which sounds a lot like "In termenus passeus thur trigus 'n sleven..." You can hear it on the
Times site--just go to the insert.

The Cornish language was saved from near-death in the early 20th century, when scholar Henry Jenner gave a speech before the Celtic Congress, which was dedicated to preserving Celtic Culture. They had not accepted Cornish as a Celtic language, but all assembled spoke either Welsh, Irish, or Breton--all indisputably Celtic tongues. Jenner gave the speech in Cornish, and everyone understood. Ta-da!

Since Cornwall is in the utter south of England, and just north of ancient Gaul (France), it makes sense that their language, like Irish and the others, would share common words--enough to be mutually comprehensible.

Scholars like Simon James and Peter Berresford Ellis are in agreement on this much, at least: that Celtic was an Indo-European language (as were Latin and Greek and Sanskrit) that broke into several separate languages. The "Gaulish" tongue is largely lost--we know only a few hundred words. The language of Celtic Iberia is likewise a mystery. But several places managed to hold onto their language, like Ireland, Scotland, Wales, and yes--Cornwall.

Parts of Brittany also hold onto a Celtic language: Breton. The history of that tongue is unique. Although Brittany was considered part of ancient Gaul around 2,000 years ago, the Roman conquest and subsequent Romanization of the area did it damage--how much is up for debate. Many folks fled to southern England when the Romans moved in, and took their language with them.

Five hundred years later, migration moved in the other direction. Invading Anglo Saxons drove a lot of folks from Cornwall back to Brittany, with their version of Celtic-speak. The Breton language to day is derived from that--from Cornish--and not from ancient Gaulish.

Spinning at the Ren Faire

Ha! I knew I had pictures of spinning somewhere! This is from the 2006 Renaissance Faire near Irwindale, CA. The lady--she seems too demure to be called a wench--is holding a spindle in her right hand.

In the first picture, she's wrapping the spun thread around it. The spindle is actually upside down; when she gives it a flick and lets it go (as described in the previous post), the weighted end will be down and the little hook--which appears to be at the bottom now--will be at the top.

In fact, that's exactly how the spindle is positioned in the second picture. The reason that I went with a different picture to begin with is that it just seemed very rude to chop the lady's head off when she really did not do anything deserving of such a fate.

In the second picture, you can also see the distaff tucked in her belt--or maybe pocket. This stick holds the prepared wool. In the 21st century renaissance, the wool is all even, sparkly white, and lovely. In Ye Real Olde Days, the clumps of wool were not so nice looking.

Why am I writing about spinning? Well, this is what women did in Gaul and in almost all European lands. Spindle weights are found all over Europe, as are weaving looms or the remnants of looms. And where there's looms, there's got to be thread, which implies spinning. Some of the looms are over 5,000 years old. The stone weights are a little harder to date, I think, because stones can only be dated in context with other goods found near them--they're not organic, so no radio-carbon dating.

If you're writing about a woman in Gaul, or in any pre-Renaissance setting, she probably spent her day spinning. Even the wealthy.

Spinning Thread

You've heard the Carl Sagan quote: "In order to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first create the universe."

Well. In the days before the Renaissance, say, 1400 A.D. and previous, in order to have a dress to wear, you must first domesticate sheep.

Then sheer them, clean and prepare the wool, and spin it into thread. Then gather a lot of thread together, fasten some of it to a loom, and weave the rest crosswise through it, until you had a length of cloth. Then and only then, could you think about fitting that cloth onto your body for warmth and modesty and decoration.

For thousands of years, women spun thread All Day Long. Every day. They spun thread while they watched the babies, talked with their friends, walked around, looked for food. They stopped spinning long enough to stir the stew or skin the rabbit for dinner, and maybe they stopped while they slept (but they still dreamt about spinning, I bet).

It must have been as natural as breathing, for thousands of years. If you didn't spin, you had no clothes. Simple as that.

This picture shows a Greek woman spinning thread, and it sits outside a display showing a dozen weights that fit onto the spindle. Those weights held the spindle down. (The spinning wheel didn't come along until the 14th century or so.) The long wooden stick with fuzzy wool is called a distaff. A woman tucked the distaff into her belt or someplace handy, and plucked clumps of fiber from it, twisting them in her fingers to make thread.

Periodically, she gave the spindle a flick, like you would a toy top. As it spun, the new thread spun. The weight kept the spindle from swinging erratically, and when it touched the ground--when you'd spun out a few feet of thread, iow--you wrapped the new thread around the spindle and flicked it again.

If you ever go to a Renaissance Faire or something similar you'll see it. Fingers get very clever, and the process goes quickly--especially if you have to do it day and night. Just keep grabbing and twisting those fibers together into thread, and the spindle with its weight will keep twirling and stretching the thread out just so.

I wonder if spinning was stress-relieving? and if a woman developed carpel tunnel syndrome or got arthritic...yowch. Let's hope someone else stepped in before she had to run around naked!

Gonna be an odd sort of day...

You know it will be good and bad when this is the first thing you see when you get up, and it makes you laugh till you cry.

On the plus side, the first thing waiting in my email box was a request for sample chapters from an agent. Go, me!

Oldest Flute (so far) Found near Ulm

How old? Thirty-five thousand years. And it is unmistakeably a deliberately carved flute. The twelve pieces of it fit together to show a delicate instrument with five holes, carved from the wing bone of a griffon vulture. The finished mouth piece has a V notched into it. (The other end is missing)

Griffon vultures are now gone from Germany, but the species is not extinct. They thrive in Spain and in the Middle East.

The flute was found at Hohle Fels (which means Hollow Rock in German), a cave in the hills west of Ulm. This picture is from the ShowCaves site, and was taken by Jochen Ducheck. The cave entrance is right below the giant rock.

This is the same cave in which an equally ancient, headless, tiny, voluptuous, female-shaped carving made of mammoth ivory was found--here's my post on that. And here's another picture from ShowCaves showing an excavation near the entrance to the cave.

So. Musical instruments, lots of bones indicating successful hunts, and big-boobed statues . . . Obviously, around 35,000 years ago, Hohle Fels was party central. And that's not just mho--most of the articles, including this one from the New York Times, make some joke about Happy Hours. The Los Angeles Times story was headlined, "Germany's 1st nightclub?"

The same archaeologist (Nicholas J. Conard) that made this recent find also discovered the previous claimant to World's Oldest Flute as well--in the same area. I wrote about that on a HubPages entry, and included an interesting link to a sound recording of what that flute would sound like. Just in case you're interested. But those and other possible flutes were apparently not considered conclusive. Were the holes placed there deliberately, some nabobs of negativism queried, or were these very old bits of ivory just thin and deteriorating? Well, the vulture bone has lines--decorative, I'm guessing--as well as aligned holes, so I don't think the artifact could conceivably be anything BUT a flute.

1897 Lourdes Film

The World Digital Library has all sorts of online treasures, graphically searchable by continent or time line. Our own Library of Congress collaborated with UN agencies to compile it, making the world's cultural heritage (well, part of it) available to anyone. What have they got?

Ancient maps. The first printing of a letter from Christopher Columbus dated 1493. Photographs from all over the world. Recordings, including a bagpipe version of Amazing Grace. Manuscripts, including Christine de Pisan's 15th century book on etiquette and practical advice, translated into English in 1489 so that Henry VII's soldiers could benefit from her words.

Here's a film by the Lumiere brothers showing the procession at Lourdes in 1897. Neato!

Update on Looting

In the previous post I gave the basic story of how looters--who were digging up Native American artifacts in the Four Corners area--were arrested last week.

To be very clear, NO ADULT could possibly be unaware that what they were doing was a crime. While most of the artifacts came from federally-owned land, we now learn that some were dug up on tribal land. These people committed crimes for years and profited from them, making tens and even hundreds of thousands of dollars. Their actions show not only a scorn of law and order, but complete disregard for Native American sensibilities.

One of the accused committed suicide, leaving his wife to face charges. No one's cheering about that, but he committed crimes and so, charges were filed against him. Did that drive him to suicide? Do we not arrest people if they're liable to kill themselves?

Latest development? According to the Los Angeles Times, Senator Orrin Hatch grilled our Attorney General Eric Holder (pictured) over the display of force used in the arrests. Senator Hatch questions the used of 100 armed and body armored agents to arrest two dozen criminals in a remote area.

Huh?

The government finally enforces long-standing laws, sending four officers per criminal, and that's excessive?

"They came in full combat gear...like they were going after, you know, the worst drug dealers in the world," Hatch said.

My, how unreasonable. Dressing for the occasion, not taking chances when arresting those who have broken the law repeatedly. Hatch called it a dog-and-pony show. I think he's running one of his own.

Looters Charged with Looting--what a concept

Indictments have been issued against 24 people accused of looting Native American sites on public land (story in the Los Angeles Times)

Yay!

The crimes took place in the Four Corners area, and many of the folks indicted live in Blanding, Utah (pictured at right, and the picture is from city-data.com). But looting seems to go on everywhere in America. As the Times story says, "Archaeologists, Native American groups, and preservationists have long argued that the government has not moved aggressively enough to stamp out the plundering of artifacts." Soooo true. Often, the only steps taken (because no money has been allocated to do more) is to keep sites kinda secret, so that looters won't sneak in.

This time, though, investigators put a mic on an antiques dealer and--after two years--were able to catch the brigands who were allegedly fencing goodies, including a rug made with turkey feathers.

The article describes how the University of Utah used to pay people to bring in arrowheads and pots--up to the 1920s. That was 80+ years ago, but the sense I get from this story is that some experts blame the government for not convincing the public in this area that looting damages archaeological sites.

I don't buy that. While greed and stupidity go hand in hand, no one is so ignorant as to think that digging up a grave isn't doing damage. No one supposes that desecrating a grave is a good thing, do they? There's even a Wikipedia entry on Looting!

These jerks sneak around and work at night because they know they're breaking the law. The affidavits show that the thieves knew the authorities were after them.

Archaeologists estimate that 90% of the 20,000 archaeological sites in that area--San Juan County--have been looted. The criminals can get up to ten years in prison.

Thank You, James Poniewozik!

FOR ASKING THE RIGHT QUESTION!

Which is: If the Journalism Business Fails, Who Pays for Journalism? That's also the title of his June 8 editorial in Time Magazine.

Here's a quote: "If journalism is not a revenue producer, much of it could become like freelancing—but freelancing you can't live off of."

Poniewozik (I love that name) brings up some interesting near-future scenarios about who and what system might produce our news. I especially like the ideas about product placement and am rooting for Miles O'Brien (if you don't understand the reference, please go read the column. Really, it's good).

I'm not a journalist; never went to journalism school and have very limited experience writing straight news stories. But journalists are fellow writers, and thus I feel their pain. (I also worry that if the freelance market is flooded with out-of-work journalists, jobs for writers will be even harder to get. Selfish me.)

Recommended Reading for the Summer

The Berrybender Narratives, starting with Sin Killer: A Novel (Berrybender Narratives)

If you slurp up stories like a 10-year-old does an icee, you may finish these four books in a week or two. But take your time, keep them in the car, stretch them out--they're so worth it.

Larry McMurtry tells the story of the Berrybender family, a spoiled, clever, hedonistic pack of British bluebloods who dare the American west in the 1830s. Why? Because Papa wants to shoot exotic game. (Papa is the type who started naming his children Nine and Ten for convenience' sake, when all the good names were used.) The clan and their long-suffering servants meet up with Indians, trappers, and slavers. Some of them die or lose body parts or sneak off for healthy fornication; some Berrybenders you hate but they begin to grow on you. Historical figures like George Catlin, Kit Carson, Pomp Charbonneau, and Jim Bridger are part of the mix, drifting in and out of the Berrybender saga over a couple of years.

McMurtry is brilliant. He's done something I have never, ever seen or heard of before: he changes point of view five or six times in one page, hopping in and out of characters with wild abandon. In his skillful prose, it all makes sense. Reading becomes voyeuristic: the books are a quadrille, with all the dancers switching places, twirling around--yet to the observer, the changes are always graceful and entertaining.

Nick Magazines Closing Down

I'm reading a lot into this, but not doom and gloom. Nickolodeon and Nick Jr magazines are shutting their doors and about 30 staffers will lose their jobs--not to mention the multiple freelancers who lose another market.

Kids are not reading less--in fact, I think they're reading more than ever (thank you, Lemony Snicket and J.K. Rowling and all the rest!) But the idea of children watching the mailbox in anticipation of a glossy new magazine just for them, with their name on the address label, is just so quaint.

Why would a kid in 2009 look forward to getting a magazine when they can hop on the internet for all the stories and pictures they want, picking and choosing among many topics and printing out what appeals most to them? Ligers, shipwrecks, dreamy androgynous dudes--right there at your fingertips. It's all free, as long as there's a spare color print cartridge nearby.

Change is good. That's my mantra, when things-fall-apart-and-the-center-cannot-hold-and-I-need-to-get-to-my-happy-place-fast. Change is good. Really. Good and hard.

From a reader's point of view, it's a simple paradigm shift. Adults have habits--well, some of us do--of flipping idly through bound pages as we sip our lattes. Kids are forming new habits. Let's just hope they don't spill their strawberry fraps [please keep them from caffeine] on the keyboard as they're googling and clicking.

From a writer's pov, there's this little wrinkle of making a living. Hard to find internet markets that pay as well as print did--not that print paid all that well, or even all the time. In ten years I'll probably have it figured out, but right now it's dicey.

Romance Novel Sales Up!

Here's one sub-genre that's doing well during the recession, which makes sense when you think about it. According to this AP story, sales of romance novels rose 2.4% during the week of May 10th.

For a bit of contrast, sales of travel books were DOWN 16%. Mysteries? Down 17%. Ditto self-help books. Logically, you'd suppose folks looking for a bit of wish-fulfillment or escape would buy those as well, right? But apparently nothing beats soft core titillation. Duh.

Cheap thrills for tough times! Yeah!

However, I must say that the romance-reading folks interviewed for that article made me wonder about the point. One woman had just lost a child in a horrible game-playing accident; another is blind and looking for work. Financial strain, chronic illnesses, trajedy--was the journalist dared to find the women with the worst problems who then found solace reading romance novels?

I guess she's got to keep her job interesting too.

Journalism and Media

Back to what we read in the media and how it's in upheaval mode, which I blogged about a few days ago. In the article "Brave New Media" in the ASU Magazine, I read that 120 newspapers have shut down in the US since January 2008.

Tim McGuire of the Cronkite School at Arizona State U says:

"There's no question that corporate media is in trouble, but journalism is stronger than ever. It's the corporate media model that's under attach because the advertising model has gone bust. We've funded journalism on the backs of advertisers who wanted to reach the eyeballs of our customers. That model is broken, and we have to find another way to fund the journalism that we value so highly."

So it sounds like journalism is still valued, but no way to pay for it has replaced the old way? Where does that leave journalists who would like to practice their trade as well as eat and pay rent?

More interesting quotes from other professors at the Cronkite School:

• In the last 10 years, the market that television can reach has shrunk so much...we're constantly challenged to think of how to make what we're teaching relevant. (Craig Allen)
• Radio may be the one electronic medium whose current business model survives intact for the foreseeable future (Frederic "Fritz" Leigh)
  

Venus Figure is 35,000+++ Years Old

But I sure wish the archaeologists would dream up a new name for these voluptuous statuettes. Please. After all, calling it a Venus figure prejudges its purpose, doesn't it? It creates a context in our heads. And when looking at something that may be up to 40,000 years old, that's a big mistake.

I like what archaeologist Paul Mellars of Cambridge U says about the piece though. Rather than accepting it as a fertility symbol, he suggests: "These people were obsessed with sex."

This lovely piece of work, carved out of mammoth ivory, was found in a cave in Schelklingen, in southern Germany--14 miles southwest of Ulm. (Not that I know where that is, but you might.) The tiny statue was in six pieces when unearthed, and it lacks a head, feet, and a left arm. It is the oldest representation of a human being ever found.

According to the AP story, the left arm is still being sought, but the lack of head and feet seem to be part of the artist's intent. You can just barely make out the loop that indicates it may have been hung from a string or hook.

I hope it is OK to reprint this AP photo by Daniel Maurer, since it seems to be the only picture of this amazing object.

The particular cave, Hohle Fels, has been rich in ancient deposits, and this piece was found 9 feet below the current surface. Both Neandertal and homo sapiens used the cave and left debris, but the scientists are certain this is made by our homo sapien ancestors. Bits of worked bone and ivory, flint-knapping debris, and animal remains were found nearby.

Discoverer Nicholas J. Conard of the University of Tubingen in Germany also found carvings of an animal head, a bird in flight, and a half-human, half-lion figurine, all about 5,000 years younger than the headless female. That's from a Los Angeles Times story--Conard wrote about his work in the journal Nature, but the article is only accessible to paid subscribers.

Sarah Palin has a book deal

And I don't.

This is a new low.

Do you have a book deal? Admit it! None of us do! And does anyone want to read what the Alaska governor has to say about anything?

Apparently the publisher thinks so.

If the publisher is wrong, will it make getting published (a) harder or (b) easier for the rest of us?

Truly a no-win situation.

I'm going to go eat my sauerkraut and sausage now. Likely, the doomsayers are correct and life as we know it will end with a magnetic pole flip-flop on December 21, 2012. I predict that I will get a six-figure offer on the 19th.

Submerged Greek City from 2800 BC to be Excavated

Not sure if excavated is the correct word, since the site--a town named Pavlopetri--lies under 3 or 4 meters of water. Explored, maybe?

According to Science Daily, a team will soon be diving into and paddling around the sea off Laconia, Greece. There, the ancient town of Pavlopetri, dating at least from the Mycenaean Age, will be studied. Using equipment developed for the military (for what purpose, I wonder?), archaeologists hope to splash through ancient courtyards, tombs, and cist graves. Wow. All those things are still there, underwater, after 4800 years? Excuse me while I push my jaw back into position and wipe up the drool from the keyboard.

This lovely photo is from Laconia.org, and shows some of the harsh conditions and primitive accommodations that the archaeologists must accept during their grueling fieldwork, which will take place over three years.

Pavlopetri was probably once a port and trading town, so there should be much to discover. The archaeologist who discovered the site in 1967 is also participating! Among the things they hope to learn is--just how far back does Pavlopetri date, and why did it slip into the sea?

The Science Daily article hints that a bit more funding is needed--so far the University of Nottingham (here's their page on the site, and the first picture came from there), the Institute of Aegean Prehistory, and the British School of Archaeology at Athens have contributed financially. May I suggest someone get National Geographic or the Discovery Channel on board?

Because if I can't be on that beach--and I can't, 'cause I don't have a PhD in Archaeology--I would love to see this on my TV, sitting on a cushy sofa and eating Doritos.

Media Revolution

According to this March post by Clay Shirky ("Newspapers and Thinking the Unthinkable"):

The old stuff gets broken faster than the new stuff is put in its place. The importance of any given experiment isn’t apparent at the moment it appears; big changes stall, small changes spread. Even the revolutionaries can’t predict what will happen. Agreements on all sides that core institutions must be protected are rendered meaningless by the very people doing the agreeing.

Guess what? The topic at this point is NOT newspapers.

No, the article is describing the revolution that followed the invention of Gutenberg's printing press in the 15th century.

Of course, the article draws the comparison: what happened when Gutenberg upset the status quo is what's happening with print media now: a revolution. The post describes how the profitable newspaper model worked for centuries, and why it has ceased to work. Who could have predicted that craigslist wasn't just a new internet fluke, but something that would transform industries? The old way doesn't work and the new paradigm (the format and funding for news collection and delivery 20 years hence) is not yet in place. My favorite lines of the piece? "You’re gonna miss us when we’re gone!” has never been much of a business model. and Society doesn’t need newspapers. What we need is journalism.

EBay Good for Archaeologists

If you haven't already seen the story in Archaeology Magazine, Science Daily, Yahoo, or a host of other sources, here's the deal. Ebay makes selling faux antiquities so easy that looting of archaeological sites has decreased.

Professor Charles Stanish of UCLA wrote the article called "Forging Ahead, or how I learned to stop worrying and love EBay." It's a really good article; click on one of the links above to read it in full. What follows is my quickie dissemination of his well-researched facts.

Looting works like this: some poor schmuck robs a grave or stumbles upon a treasure. Said schmuck wants cash--usually to do something frivolous like feed his children--so he sell his find to someone, who sells it to someone, and so on and on. The money's made in the middle; the finder gets little and the customer at the end pays big time.

Selling fakes is a little different. In the past, the fake had to be really good to get a high price from collectors. Naturally, high-end fakes cost more to make and involved skilled artisans.

So in comes EBay, where a low-end, cheaply-produced fake--in fact, a mass-produced ton of cheap fakes--can be shipped out regularly to hundreds of wanna-be collectors all over the globe. Why risk arrest and jail by stomping around old burial grounds at night if you can set up a pottery workshop and sell more goods that way? The finder/producer now gets more money, because he's producing more goods--all day, in a shed, with his friends and neighbors helping out. The only middleman might be the shipping/EBay shop in the nearest town. (I bet there's a shipping dock in the back of this bazaar!) Also, because so many cheap antiques are available, the market for looted goods is impacted. Their price declines. A real win-win scenario.

Thanks to the miracle of online auctions. Ah, technology!

Newspaper Dirge

The New York Times is about to shut down the Boston Globe, the Baltimore Sun announced it's laying off 61 staff members, and I spent 20 minutes discussing why we don't need newspapers with My Luddite Friend. I was playing devil's advocate to her defense, but the truth is I love my LA Times and would hate to be without it.

It's a book: Anachronistic Media and the Women Who Love Them ... It ... Whatever.

My Luddite Friend says we need local papers to inform us of things we wouldn't know, like an accounting scandal at a neighboring city.

"I'll see it on the local news," I say.

"Not a big enough story for TV," she says.

"Then why do I care?"

"Because you should know, as a citizen, that these things happen. You should know so you can demand accountability and transparency from your own city."

"But now that you've told me, I don't care. I'm not going to demand anything from my own city. If I wanted to be involved in local politics I'd go to city council meetings, but I don't."

We don't really talk like this. I've taken out all the "Well....'s," the "um's," the "Shit...never mind's," and all that.

My bottom line is that we're lazy. Give me the news with the least possible hassle. If all I have to do is push a button and sit through a few commercials, I'm fine with that. The LA Times is for browsing through during those dumb commercials. If a news story about an accounting scandal in a neighboring city makes the news, I'll probably flip through the Times during that segment, too.

For me, the newspaper is entertainment, not anything that's going to make me a better citizen.

Maybe we get the news we deserve.

Why Do We Read?

In case you missed it, the Los Angeles Times invited 13 authors to share their opinions on this burning issue, and put together a full-page replication of their answers. Since it's about the only part of the Sunday paper I read, here are my highlights:

• We read to free ourselves from the grind and the misery and big ticking time-bomb questions of life. . . . We all need contemplative time, time away, time in another world altogether. (T.C. Boyle, author of The Women: A Novel)

• Books have the power to be the light we are seeking at crucial moments in our lives. Reading helps us realize we are not alone, that we can change our circumstances and even achieve the impossible. (Gioconda Belli, author of Infinity in the Palm of Her Hand, a novel of Adam and Eve)

• The library was where I made my best friends. . . . books are ultimately about stimulating imagination and broadening a worldview. In my South-Central neighborhood, Dickens more than did the job. (Erin Aubry Kaplan, journalist)

• I read because it is one of the very few satisfying escapes from reality that isn't fattening and doesn't destroy brain cells. (Amy Koss, author of Side Effects)

And my favorites:

• . . . you're sitting right there, reading, and you're anywhere, everywhere. (Veronique de Turenne, blogger, who co-authored Port of Los Angeles: An Illustrated History with Ernest Marquez)

• [answering the question Why do we read?] . . . the world I found myself in didn't come up to my standards. I was 11 at the time. So I went to the library. . . Now, if my life doesn't come up to my standards . . . I still open a book. (Carolyn See, author of Golden Days and The Handyman)

Be So Good They Can't Ignore You

But you really have to see the drawing to appreciate the sentiment. Click on it. Go!

More on Synopsis Writing

Nothing interesting to say, but I don't want this blog to get stale.

Here's an update: I have rewritten both my one-page and detailed synopses. Like most writing, I whined through the hard part, then rolled around in the grass and revelled when the result begins to show promise.

What had I done wrong that required rewriting? Well, struggling to get all the plot twists in left me very little room for things like themes, motivations, and the like. According to Them That Teach, those things are very important in a synopsis.

So, the FIRST paragraph of the one-pager now states the major life issue confronting our fair heroine, and hints at the theme of the book. A lot of characters and twists got cut away to make room for statements about conflict and emotions. Do I really need to mention the names of her companions? No, but I do need to say that she's devastated by her losses. And I injected more of the tone of the novel itself. All good.

Recommended Reading When Your Battery Dies

There's nothing like a nonresponsive car...no lights, no nothing...on a day full of planned activities to bring you up short, is there? Creative swearing, while fun, does not solve the problem.

In the end, we can only be grateful that DieHard batteries are relatively cheap (compared to a new alternator), Sears is ubiquitous, and books are more fun than running errands anyway.

The book I buried myself in was
A Lion Among Men (The Wicked Years, Book 3). Book 3 tells the story of the Cowardly Lion, whose name happens to be Brrr.

Brrr is an outcast like Elphaba and Liir, but Brrr is difficult to warm up to. Really. He's not just flawed, but deliciously self-absorbed, smug, pompous, precious, the works. He's a self-pitying opportunist. His word means nothing. Maguire makes him worth reading about, though, with hilarious asides and descriptions that defy description. Here is an example, buried in the middle of the book, of an unimportant place:

The Wend Fallows...beautiful to no one but the stray hermit or mendicant. What streams there were flushed into the mighty Munchkin river, which fed Oz's largest lake, Restwater.

But--martyrs roasting on an open fire!--Wend Fallow was ugly as sin. A fuzzy sort of brown nap coated the hillsides, like a mold that has dried but refuses to stop clinging..."

Wonderful prose. Indulge yourself, before your battery dies, too.

More Books with MY Articles!

Yippee!
So if you want to read about ancient Troy, the Irish Famine, Wyatt Earp, crossword puzzles, sniffer dogs, the Vomit Comet, artificial sweeteners and various other topics, buy this book right away:

If, OTOH, you wish to become informed about Viagra, ancient methods of birth control, sperm banks, electrocution as a punishment, hangovers, whiskey, radio call letters, and 143 other topics, order this volume:

I don't get royalties, but how rare a thing it is to have a first edition with my name and bio under "Contributors." Heavy sigh.

Branding and Complaining

Aha! I am not the only person in a media-oriented city that is thoroughly sick of branding, thank you!

Dan Neil, who has raised auto reviews to a form of high art, includes an aside about branding in his column for the Los Angeles Times of April 10, 2009. He says:

Recently I began writing a column about advertising and marketing for this
paper, a process that has awakened my sense of the ludicrous,
chicken-salad-flavored fertilizer that passes for brand marketing in this
country.

I realize that I sound like a cranky old lady when I whine about trends I find foolish. But when Dan Neil elucidates on the subject, we have . . . gravitas. Breathe it in.

Of course, he's not complaining about branding per se, just the ineptitude of certain car companies' approach to branding. Still, it makes a swell quote and a decent blog entry for the day.

Synopses and Why I Hate Them

They are hard to write. Snivel. Really hard. Pout like Derek Zoolander and say it with me: really, really, really, really, really hard.

(Do you like the mug? I've seen them at a couple of places but you can order them here.)

I have read several articles on writing the synopsis. (A good one is here, at Kathy Carmichael's site.) My problem is that when the article/book/blog inevitably puts up their idea of a good synopsis--the goal, the golden cup, as it were--it sounds like marketing BS to me. It doesn't sound at all like a story I'd like to read.

In fact, these model synopses seem a perfect example of how NOT to write, overloaded with modifiers and clauses and commas.

For that reason I have a difficult time judging the one I must write and rewrite. I guess the synopsis is an acquired taste.

Carnac Museum

I just stumbled across this website of Le Musée de Préhistoire à Carnac which, unfortunately, is not in English. Still, the pictures at the site of artefacts and jewelry are lovely. And it's all just an excuse to show off my own pictures of Carnac anyway.

Here's the Neolithic page, and the Proto-historic, or Bronze and Iron Age page. Scroll down to see the pictures. Iron Age is "L'Age du Fer." This last page includes the Roman period as well. That center picture between the skeleton is a stack of axes, btw.

Large portions of the Carnac stones (there are three fields of them) are fenced off, so if you want to go, compare tours. Some, like Elderhostel, can get small groups in past the fences for a half hour or so.

Bog Body Poetry

If you are fascinated by bodies found in peat bogs--yeah, all those leathery, red-haired sacks o' skin that were once living beings just like us--then you will love Archaeology Magazine's blog entry, "The Poet and the Bog Body" by Heather Pringle.

The subject is poet and Nobel laureate Seamus Heaney, who grew up on a farm in Northern Ireland, where he and everyone else dug up and cut peat for heating fuel. Pringle closes the blog with one of Heaney's poems, which begins:

As if he had been poured
in tar, he lies
on a pillow of turf
and seems to weep

the black river of himself.

Click on the link above to read more; it's well worth it. The Nobel committee described his poems as "works of lyrical beauty and ethical depth, which exalt everyday miracles and the living past.".

Heaney's own website has more information, photos, and even some of his poems--including one called "Bogland."

Books with My Articles! I'm so proud...

Here they are, all out this year, with links to Amazon (if I do this right):

And just for good measure, the April 2009 edition of Boys' Life contains a profile I authored--about two scouts who won awards from the American Museum of Natural History.

Yay me...I wrote AND got paid!

Freelancing During a Recession

"Money is like dieting," says Money senior writer Donna Rosato. "You're shocked at how much you're eating when you start to keep a food diary, but it's not that hard to cut back once you are aware of it."

That comes out of an article on Mediabistro.com called "Follow the money"; if you're a member you can follow the link. Of course, the article is about how the economy is hitting freelancers and the people who pay them...or don't pay them, as occasionally happens.

Write everything down, and cut out the unnecessary parts. Just like joining WeightWatchers for your wallet. No dang fun.

I suppose it's good advice, but my personal preference inclines toward Hello Dolly: "Money (pardon the expression) is like manure; it's not worth a thing unless it's spread around, encouraging young things to grow." or, "If you have to live hand-to-mouth, you'd better be ambidextrous."

To get back to the Mediabistro article, it carps about credit cards and paying down balances--the usual stuff. Here's some useful advice: Over the last six months, what three things were worth the money? Keep doing 'em. What three things felt like a waste? Stop. Yes, that I can accept.

Other items: drop the gym membership, re-examine your withholding or estimated tax structure, consider an FSA, and bring your lunch, instead of going out.

I have a better idea. Enjoy yourself, and move in with your kids when you run out of money. Really, they'll thank you for it one day.

Now I'll find out if my daughter ever reads this blog!

Rainbow over Paris

You must click here to see it, and scroll to the March 27, 2009 edition of Paris Daily Photo. Then do yourself a favor and click on the photo itself to see it in all its enlarged, enhanced, magical glory. Evening lights reflecting off the Seine, the fainter of a double-rainbow terminating at the Eiffel Tower...just breathtaking!

Opening Lines and Hooks

Hook 'em. It's not just for Longhorns anymore.

It's the advice writers hear at every conference, seminar, webinar, class, panel discussion, and club meeting. Hook 'em with the first paragraph, the first line. One of my how-to books says that "Jack Bickham, author of several dozen novels...claims you've got to hook the reader in the first twenty-five words." There's even a book available on Amazon called Hooking the Reader : Opening Lines that Sell

Here are some samples of this ubiquitous advice:

• What we want is that ka-pow! The horses out of the gate. The pop in the corn. The fizzle in the shanizzle. A writer should want to hypnotize the reader, make their blood pump, take their breath away. (from the Musetracks blog)
• The first line of a novel is like the first four notes of Beethoven's Fifth: everything else follows from it. (from author Crawford Killian's blog) (Love this!)
• Start your writing with conflict if you want to guarantee sales, grab an agent or publisher, get paid a big advance. (from ISnare articles)

Jennifer Jensen (in an article titled "Write Compelling Opening Lines") gives some great examples of opening lines, like:

• It was one hell of a night to throw away a baby. . . (Julia Spencer-Fleming, In the Bleak Morning)


• Lately, I’ve been spending a lot of time rolling on the ground with men who think a stiffy represents personal growth. The rolling around has nothing to do with my sex life. The rolling around is what happens when a bust goes crapola . . . (Janet Evanovich, Hard Eight)

There's also this gem, from Earl Emmerson's Fat Tuesday: "I was trapped in a house with a lawyer, a bare-breasted woman and a dead man. The rattlesnake in the paper bag only complicated matters."

Yes, those do compel me to read on. But is that the right tactic in every book?

I'm not saying that advice is all wrong. I guess my quibble is not with the advice, in fact, but in the rapacious manner that we writers, hungry for publication, suck it in. We think we must have dead bodies or life-or-death decisions in that first paragraph. But seriously, is that what a reader is looking for?

Glance at the opening lines of your favorite books. Do they conform to this idea of hooking the reader through shock and awe techniques? Chances are, they don't.

• Mr. and Mrs. Dursley of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say they were perfectly normal, thank you very much...
• When Mr. BIlbo Baggins of Bag End announced that he would shortly be celebrating his eleventy-first birthday with a party of special magnificence, there was much talk and excitement in Hobbiton.
• It was morning, and the new sun sparkled gold across the ripples of a gentle sea. (Jonathan Livingston Seagull)
• Along with teaching us that lamb must be cooked with garlic and that a lady never scratches her head or spits, my mother taught my sisters and me that it is a wife's bounden duty to see that her husband is happy in his work. (The Egg and I)

Maybe humor is the way to go.

I can picture a future writing seminar in which teachers mock the book opening that begins in the middle of a car chase, or where shots are fired, bombs blow up, or a man screams "I'm leaving you!!"--all as being so, well, early twenty-first century.

Indeed.com

Great site. Did everyone know about this BUT me?

Well, since no one reads this po' li'l blog, I won't bother to keep it to myself.

Indeed.com is a job-hunting site that allows me to put in a key word, then break down the results by pay level, location, part/full/contract/temp assignments, and even by type of writing.

Indeed.com must troll other sites constantly, because their jobs are from all over--Monster, freelance sites, writing sites, private companies, etc. Well, wonderful. Free sites that want to do all the work for me? I can live with that.

Recommended Reading

This book was soooo much fun, especially after a bunch of nonfiction. (Why is most nonfiction written by PhD's so dull?)

Anyway, great characters, great settings and history. Puts you right there in an Anne Rice sorta way, only the people are far more individual and differentiated. Full of surprises.

Reading Lies

Do you ever lie about the books you read?

I fudge. If I get more than a third of the way through I say I've read it. I've read the first half of The Horse of Pride three times but never finished it.

Well, readers in Britain lie a lot! This article about a survey in The Guardian says that 61%...SIXTY-ONE PER CENT!...admit to claiming that they've read a book when they haven't even cracked it open!

I'm too chicken to be that blatant. I hate getting caught in a lie more than I hate looking dumb. But I'm not a Brit.

However---11% of those folks in the survey said they'd written a book. They'd finished a manuscript, but not gotten it published. Wonder if they're telling the truth?

The paper published a list the books folks are most likely to lie about, and 1984 by George Orwell is at the top. 42% of the folks in the survey said they'd fibbed about reading it. How silly--it's a good book. It's not overly long. I can understand no. 2: War and Peace. That's a hefty tome, and I don't know anyone who's read it.

Some of the others on the list surprised me: The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins. Why would anyone bother to lie about reading that? And The Bible came in at #4, with 24% saying they lied about reading it. Um...doesn't that double your time in purgatory?

Writing Doesn't Pay

The Week Magazine asks, Is Writing for the Rich?

Good question. The answer according to The Week's Executive Editor Francis Wilkinson, is, yeah, more or less.

Although the world is full of more opportunities than ever for writers of every ilk (it costs nothing to start up a blog like this), few of those opportunities come with paychecks. As Wilkinson sums up: "movie stars, business executives, even accomplished authors all write for free these days. Why should some kid nobody’s ever heard of get paid?"

Ouch. We all know that, but why does it hurt so bad to see it in print?

Anyway, it's an interesting editorial, especially if you have friends or children who might want to become writers. Make them read this, and have them take dancing lessons. That way, they'll have a skill to fall back on, as my mother used to put it.

Here's the irony: You can read the editorial for free, online.

I don't subscribe to The Week anymore, even though it's my favorite publication. Why bother? By reading it for free, I help create the situation that keeps me from getting decent pay!

Enabling. It's what for dinner.

PicApp Drawbacks

I'm about to stop using PicApp, in spite of the fact that they have great pictures for free. I don't mind the obtrusive google-ad so much as the fact that the wrong captions come with the picture. I don't know enough html to figure out how to cut out or correct the caption, which seems to want to be the same for every picture visible on the blog. Very annoying.

Horses Were Domesticated 5,500 Years Ago

I actually know something about this topic, having written the entry on "Chariots" in the Encyclopedia of the History of Invention and Technology (coming late summer from Facts on File Books). I researched the earliest known instance of chariots: burials in Sintashta-Petrovka, east of the Ural Mountains--which sits in northern Kazakhstan.

What was in those burials? Racing chariots! Built to hold only one man. Those date back to 2000 BC, and it was thought that horses were domesticated about that time too, or just a couple of centuries earlier. (Earlier, heavier carts had wheels that were solid, not spoked. They were pulled by oxen, usually.)

But as these two articles, one from the Los Angeles Times and one from Radio Free Europe describe, new evidence has been found--in Kazakhstan. Kazakhstan is the 9th largest country in the world--didn't know that. The picture above, btw, is of a man riding in Icic, Kazakhstan.

Anyway, archaeologists figure that the Botai culture of northern Kazakhstan domesticated horses around 3500 BC. The evidence? Horse milk residue in pottery, horse manure used as roofing material in pit houses, horse skulls with bit-wear-marks on their teeth. Oh, and 90% of the bones in the garbage piles belonged to horses, and the leg bones were more slender than wild horses' would be, suggesting they were being bred for speed.

And--hate to say it, but if those bones are ending up in the garbage, maybe bred for food as well?

The research is published in this month's issue of the academic journal, Science.

Olympic Site (UK) Finds

How fortuitous! The excavations in Stratford, east London--trenches and the like, necessary to construct the Olympic Park sports complex for the 2012 games--have turned up all sorts of nifty stuff. The rendering at right shows what the park parts of the Park will look like in future. For what it looked like six months ago, see below.

This Daily Mail article has pictures of a 19th century boat, a 4th century AD Roman coin, four Iron Age skeletons, and a 4,000 year old flint axe. The remains of a Bronze Age hut, likewise 4,000 years old, and lots of pottery were also found. The Discover Project website has more, including pictures of 1941 gun emplacements that were uncovered.

Confused? This press release from the Olympic Authority something-or-other gives the background of the site over the last 5,000 years. The place was the site of :a marsh/wetland for a coupla thousand years, then an Iron Age village, a Roman road, a channel dug by King Alfred to divert the river and thus divert marauding Vikings, a bridge crossing, a mill built or operated by the Knights Templar, a calico, porcelain, and eventually a petrol factory, then a sewer, and finally a Yardley cosmetics, soap, and lavender factory. Talk about multi-use facilities!

Since the construction requires that over 140 trenches be dug, I guess they were bound to find something. This is all pretty cool and I hope we hear more about it soon.

Watching a Wreck

Why is bad news so addictive?

I can pass on the story about the little girl who raised a thousand dollars for Recording for the Blind (hint hint) but the headline that screams "Chapter 11" draws me in every time.

So here is today's dose of gloom and doom, even though I swear I will think only happy thoughts for the rest of the afternoon: Reader's Digest has hired a bankruptcy expert and is considering ... yeah, Chapter 11.

The New York Post says that "the company faced a potential restructuring over the next 18 months as revenue and profit slump." Barron's has a story on RDA too.

Blago Gets Big Bucks

Blagojevich.

Six figure deal for book.

Blagojevich, who isn't worth the trouble it takes to figure out how to spell his name. A potty-mouthed liar who tried to sell the Senate seat of the new president. Six figures--for what?

To tell us one is born every minute?

Lascaux Cave fungus

Neolithic art and fungus are not good bedfellows. Or wallfellows.

The black fungus that is creeping across the 17,000-year-old murals of animals and hunters in the cave of Lascaux, France, causes great concern. So the Lascaux Caves International Scientific Committee and other international experts met in Paris for two days to discuss solutions.

Apparently a fungicide was applied (I prefer the words "smeared" or "glopped" but scientists like to use more clinical terms) a year ago, in January of 2008. No one but scientists have been allowed to visit Lascaux since 1963 (tourists actually visit a replica cave), so the cause is a bit puzzling.

An air-conditioning system installed in 2001 seems to have kicked off the first mold. More details about that and the fungal progression are available in this News24.com article.

In this AP story from WTOP.com, the Committee chief, Marc Gaulthier, blames global warning for raising the temperature inside the cave, which interferes with the air circulation and allows the fungus to grow. A couple of solutions are floated in this story, too, which other news pieces lacked.