apa style rules -- or drools?

we said yes to a new freelance project.
"it's $5 a page," and "it's only copyediting," we heard ourselves whine.
well, we have yet to get tucked into the damn thing,
which means the tension is mounting.

how exciting!

here, then, is the cast of characters in the little drama we will be enbroiled in for a bit:

from wooster.edu
from SUNY albany
university of toledo -- very fancy


for quick reference, we have these helpful bits:

Numbers

• Spell out common fractions and common expressions (one-half, Fourth of July).
• Spell out large numbers beginning sentences (Thirty days hath September . . .).
• Spell out numbers which are inexact, or below 10 and not grouped with numbers over 10 (one-tailed t test, eight items, nine pages, three-way interaction, five trials).
• Use numerals for numbers 10 and above, or lower numbers grouped with numbers 10 and above (for example, from 6 to 12 hours of sleep).
• To make plurals out of numbers, add s only, with no apostrophe (the 1950s).
• Treat ordinal numbers like cardinal numbers (the first item of the 75th trial . . .).
• Use combinations of written and Arabic numerals for back-to-back modifiers (five 4-point scales).
• Use combinations of numerals and written numbers for large sums (over 3 million people).
• Use numerals for exact statistical references, scores, sample sizes, and sums (multiplied by 3, or 5% of the sample). Here is another example: "We used 30 subjects, all two year olds, and they spent an average of 1 hr 20 min per day crying.
• Use metric abbreviations with figures (4 km) but not when written out (many meters distant).
• Use the percent symbol (%) only with figures (5%) not with written numbers (five percent).

and finally, for WHO vs. WHOM, you just can't beat this explanation -- one we can at last understand:

Who and whom are both pronouns that refer to people (they cannot refer to things), but a certain amount of grammatical analysis is required to use each appropriately. Who is a subjective pronoun, whereas whom is an objective pronoun.

When you begin a dependent clause with the pronoun who or whom, you determine the appropriate word by its function in the clause. When the pronoun acts as the subject of the clause, use who. When the pronoun acts as the object of the clause, use whom.

Ex: The prize goes to the runner who collects the most points.
[Who does the action of collecting.]

Ex: The tutor to whom I was assigned was very supportive.
[Whom is the object of the preposition to.]

TIP: If you are not sure which to use, try separating the dependent clause from the rest of the sentence and looking at it by itself. Rewrite the clause as a new sentence by replacing the who or whom with a third person (he/she, him/her or them) personal pronoun. If the replacement pronoun is he/she/they, use who; if it is him/her/them, use whom.

Ex.: The dentist who does my teeth is certified in dental surgery as well.
[He/she does my teeth.]

Ex.: We need to know whom we can trust.
[We can trust him/her/them.]

When you are deciding whether to use who or whom as the beginning to a question, it is easiest to consider the answer to the question. If the answer begins with he/she/they, use who to begin the question. If the answer begins with him/her/them, use whom.

Ex: Who is responsible for this evil deed?
[He/She/They is/are responsible for this evil deed.]

Ex: Whom did you enter into the contract with?
[I entered into the contract with him/her/them.]

sing us a song to keep us warm

no, it's not very cold today
the cloudly white sky is a
glowing pane of healing light
washing down over this town
on everyone

all is well

still a song would be nice
a song just for us
one of these days, baby
the sun will shine on me

till then
we breathe, keep breathing
we don't lose our nerve
because there is nothing to lose

snowy monday checkin

listening to:
"nya lagid" by sigur ros

feeling:
dazed, well-fucked, vaguely hungry, tailbone still sore, and tethered by one limb to a distant and sparkly planet.

wanting:
not too much but just a little something more, as the title has already told you.

smelling:
oranges, lavendar, woodsy perfume, testosterone afterburn.

tasting:
coffee cut with soymilk.

thinking:
it may be becoming entirely unwise to spill our mind in this way. oh well.

aging research superhero trading cards

this is just too cool to ignore. Sage Crossroads calls itself the "premier forum for emerging issues in aging." we think they are the next best thing since human cloning (not).

the site's coolness is not just because of their awesome "Trading Cards" highlighting the 50 top "longevity science" (read: anti-death) researchers on the court today.

really, though, the cards are more than enough to justify the uber-hipness of this thinktank dedicated to devising ways to cheat the Grim Reaper at a game he's never lost.

not once.

not yet.

rainy day quiz

ok, kids, here is a little game to keep you busy on this rainy wednesday. see if you can guess who said what:

1. He said erotic love can be blended with and transformed into spiritual love, "where two people really love each other and one no longer seeks his or her own joy or delights but seeks above all the good of the other person."
2. He said, "love consists in the mutual guarding, bordering, and saluting of two solitudes."

the choices are: pope benedict or rainer maria rilke

nother favorite pome

in honor of winter finally arriving here in the northeast:

the snow arrives after long silence
~by nancy willard

The snow arrives after long silence
from its high home where nothing leaves
tracks or stains or keeps time.
The sky it fell from, pale as oatmeal,
bears up like sheep before shearing.

The cat at my window watches
amazed. So many feathers and no bird!
All day the snow sets its table
with clean linen, putting its house
in order. The hungry deer walk

on the risen loaves of snow.
You can follow the broken hearts
their hooves punch in its crust.
Night after night the big plows rumble
and bale it like dirty laundry

and haul it to the Hudson.
Now I scan the sky for snow,
and the cool cheek it offers me,
and its body, thinned into petals,
and the still caves where it sleeps.

did you thank your h20 today?

a friend saw what the bleep do we know for the first time this weekend, and she said it changed her life. not sure why, but this almost made us cry. it's right that we should be just as susceptible -- maybe, daring to be even more so -- to the positive force as we are to the random negative things that trip us up. thanks for the reminder, laurie ellen!

Consciousness of each of us creates our world, which means we can change the world. When the Earth is filled with the vibration of Love and Thanks, then you will experience a world filled with Love and Thanks.

eat impeach

here is a primer on the whys and hows of possibly, just maybe, and at long last, finding the ways and the balls to impeach george w. bush.

friday 13=better day

we promised a unicorn chaser for yesterday's bleakness. and here it is:

• today is friday the 13th AND a full moon (in capricorn, apparently). it's your day, Friday cat.
• today is friday AND our VT sunday is coming. nuff said.
• mystery leak solved -- and without any rude anal probing by the plumber man. he was kind and helpful and charged a very reasonable fee. (of course there are floor repairs yet to be made, but we will muscle in on that soon.)
• the day started with a bang and, right on schedule, segued into breakfast at Carmen's (we would link to Carmen's here, but she doesn't have a web presence -- yet). we heart troy AND cuban eggs.
  
• and while, of course, we don't give a damn about what anyone else thinks, it was a relief today that our boss did not rain down canage on us and instead actually gave a little stroke on the project submitted last week. no matter that we fretted and hand-wrang for 7 days, sitting in the dark and expecting a boot up the keister, we now know that the strategy was acceptable. oh joy. yes, we are being sarcastic and glad at the same time.
  

what's different so far

sorry to grumble, but this is what you get today:

• the cost of a postage stamp has increased by 2 cents (that's .37+.02=.39)
• our house has a new mystery leak threatening to ruin the entire kitchen floor
  
• private student #1 has taken a turn for the worse
• we may have become "the weak link" at the office
• impending first cyborg moon cycle rears an ugly (and crampy) head
• the lil' bat may be dead and we may have killed it

we could continue, but that would be tedious. next post will spell out the good stuff, we promise.

consider this

we are not a big fan of the patented-and-costly self-help programs that purport to be the only way you can get to happy. in Finding Your Own North Star, however, columnist and sociologist (not sure which order she would prefer those in) martha beck actually hits on something so simple and beautiful it must be true.

here are beck's two rules for using joy to "chart a course toward your north star:"

• rule 1: if it brings you joy, do it.

• rule 2: no, really, if it brings you joy, do it.

it's probably best if your joy does not come from smoking heroin or butchering people, but if one seriously considers those pastimes, we trust that they could only be moderately fun, at best. the point here is that true joy can only come from doing or having or being that which is healthy, right, and yours.

feeling enchanted we are

"The soul has an absolute, unforgiving need for excursions into enchantment. It requires them like the body needs food and the mind needs thought. Yet our culture often takes pride in disproving and exploding the sources of enchantment, explaining away one mystery after another and overturning precious shrines, dissolving the family farm that has housed spirits of civility for eons, or desecrating for material profit a mountain or stream sacred to native residents. We have yet to learn that we can't survive without enchantment and that the loss is killing us."

Thomas Moore
The Re-Enchantment of Everyday Life

(can you think of any other sources of enchantment? we can)

the apple post

we heard today that bloggers are supposed to post an entry whenever they eat a meal. we just had an apple, so we figured we'd better be upstanding about this and come up with a post. this is it. the apple was kind of small.

it's all good

from meta-worrying to metta bhavana, we move ourselves into the new year with consciousness (vodka nights aside) and will look for light to guide our feet forward to joy and peace, for ourselves and for those we meet along the way.

happy new year, sweet harold

we can't believe we'd never seen this classic film before now. it's a fable-like story of grey and green, the anticipation of death and the cherishing of life, of following one's heart and of learning to play the banjo, even as it all comes crashing down.