Grrmmphh

-Y'know, my current weekly schedule of 2.5-days in cubicle-land, 4.5 days writing, does not make Mondays any easier . . .

Lie/Lay [Grammar Gestapo]

-I've been seeing this mistake everywhere lately, including the most recent issue of Planetary. I will be silent no more:

"To lie" is what you do to yourself. "Apes? I think I need to lie down."

"To lay" is what you do to something else. "Lay down your weapon, human!"

Confusing bit: The past tense of "lie" is "lay". "I lay down for a nap this morning, and when I woke up, the planet was ruled by apes!"

Here's a webpage.
Here's a quiz.

(If you think this is directed at you, trust me, it ain't just you. Freakin' everywhere, man.)

Stitch Runner

-Thanks to deadwinter, tisana, and this post, I have now noticed that Blade Runner and Lilo & Stitch share a common theme of trying to assemble a family from broken parts, while being hunted.

-I do not have time to write the pastiche, but I give you this:

Stitch [tired]: Seen things. Pretty! Ships, on fire. Glittery c-beams. Moments lost, like tears in ocean. [sigh] Time to die. Ihhh . . .

-Can't decide whether Lilo works better as Pris ("You're our bestest only friend!") or J.F. Sebastian ("I make friends. They're toys. My friends are toys. I make them.") . . .

[GFC] Chapter 4 Done

-Yesterday evening and today I added the skills to the Prostitute, Servant, Snitch, and Urban Shaman templates. (The Prostitute was fun. "Is Whip too over-the-top? How about Knot-Tying?") That pretty much completes chapter 4. I added my co-author's bits, and am about to send it back to him. I still have to do my parts of chapters 3, 5, 6, and all of chapter 8 (the big sample city). Chapter 3 is intimidating, 8 more so, and 5 can wait, but my part of chapter 6 is urban horrors -- that should be fun. 'Ware the Curse of Malthus! 'Ware the Rat Men!