Riba Rambles:
Musings of a Mental Magpie

Posted by Lis Riba at 2:02 PM

One of the pleasures I've found in my new job has been using the company's products to explore some of my interests (hey, I'm familiarizing myself with the databases!). At some point, I should probably record the list of books I want to investigate further in the local libraries, but that's for another post.

Probably unsurprising to those who know me, a full text article titled "Tobacco and boys: how queer was Marlowe?" by Stephen Orgel caught my eye. [Published 2000 in GLQ: a journal of lesbian and gay studies, Vol. 6 Issue 4.]

The article begins by casting doubt on the notion that Christopher Marlowe is the subject of the Corpus Christi portrait. For those unfamiliar with the story behind the painting, let me quote Orgel's summary:

It was discovered, badly damaged, in a heap of builders' rubbish during the renovations of the Old Court of Corpus in 1952; it was then thoroughly and conservatively restored. It is inscribed with the date 1582; the sitter's age, twenty-one; and a motto[...]. All that could be determined about its history was that it had been nailed to a wall in the Master's Lodge; the lodge was build in the 1820s, and there is no way of knowing when after that the picture was installed, where it had hung before that, or when it came into the possession of the college. There is, in short, no record of its existence before 1952, though it is undoubtedly an Elizabethan painting. The suggestion that it is a portrait of Marlowe was made in 1955, not by anyone connected with the college, which does not claim that it represents him. <snip>
The problems with this identification are manifold: Marlowe certainly was twenty-one in 1585, but why would a Cambridge undergraduate, a scholarship boy from an artisan-class background have commissioned such a portrait? If somebody else -- some admirer or patron -- commissioned it, who was he (or, less likely in Marlowe's case, she), and why did the painting end up in the possession of the college, rather than of the patron or sitter?

My question is, if it's not Marlowe, who are the other candidates? Surely somebody has gone through the records to list everybody else attending the school in 1585 and which of them were 21 that year. I mean, I've seen detailed biographies of the random Londoners assembled to sign the coroner's inquest. I've seen analyses of Marlowe's dining hall attendance records. So where's the list of all his classmates and their ages and backgrounds?

While a list of fellow students wouldn't be an exhaustive list of alternate candidates (there's always the possibility of the president's son or a later bequest from a wealthy donor (with the money comes this portrait of my wife's cousin)) it would certainly be a useful start.

Anybody know?

Posted by Lis Riba at 11:50 AM

So, I've been flipping around thru my copy of King James and the History of Homosexuality, and came across a minor historical tidbit that probably qualifies as stranger than fiction.

James, the author makes quite obvious, was queer. His first love, when he was still a teen, was a man by the name of Esmé Stuart, until Scottish nobles kidnapped the king and forced him to exile his love. Quoting from the book:

Banished from Scotland, he fled back to France, where he died in 1583, leaving instructions that his heart should be embalmed and sent to James.

First, Ew.

I don't know what actually happened with that bequest, whether it was actually carried out, and if so, what happened to the organ.

But wouldn't that make a great element for a historical fantasy during James VI's reign?

If magic existed, for what ritual purpose might the heart have been donated. To what purposes (benign or nefarious) might it be used? If someone gained control over the heart, could they use it to control the king?

Just sending that thought out into the ether, where I invite any interested fiction writers to pick it up. [Just let me know if you use it, because I'd love to read it.]

PS: Assuming that James was, in fact, queer (which in fact, he clearly was), what does that make of the bible translation he authorized, in light of the Alabama legislator's proposal "to prohibit the expenditure or use of public funds or public facilities by any state agency or public entity for the purchase, production or promotion of printed or electronic materials or activities that sanction, recognize, foster or promote a lifestyle or actions prohibited by the sodomy and sexual misconduct laws of the state." Would be kinda ironic if the King James Bible got included in the roundup of buried books, doncha think?

Posted by Lis Riba at 11:30 AM

Just a followup to my comments on the OCLC Top 1000.

Among the tidbits on their site, they include a poll to select one title as your "desert island book."

And, after a quick skim, I decided not to participate because my choice would be too easily misinterpreted as giving credence to the wrong trends.

See, I'd choose The Bible. Not out of any desire for spiritual comfort, though. It's because it's a long complex work with numerous stories to suit any mood. Something that will last me a long while and be thought-provoking if I'm alone. But if I choose that, it'll likely be lumped in as another statistic regarding "moral values" voters.

The Bible is actually tied in my mind with another title that isn't on the list: a Complete Works of Shakespeare. And I'd want that for the same reasons I'd pick the Bible. But (probably because there are too many different editions for any one to make the list), they only included individual plays. And that's not a fair comparison. Nobody's making you pick amongs the books in the Bible. Which would you prefer: Henry IV, Part 2 or Exodus? It's really not a fair comparison when they're taken in isolation like that.

Anyway, just a datapoint...

Posted by Lis Riba at 8:05 PM

So, I've just completed my first week of work. I think we (the company and I) are a very good match.

I didn't blog about this at the time, but on my way to the final interview, I was playing my homespun Real Genius soundtrack as driving music. Some really good motivational songs to stay pepped. ["I'll do -- my best -- to beat -- the rest -- and be -- the best in the nation."] Just as I pulled into the parking lot, the final track began to play: Tears for Fears' "Everybody wants to rule the world:"

Welcome to your life...

It just felt prophetic.

Of course, there are things to get used to.

For example, the commute takes slightly over a half hour, and I really should be there at 8:30. Which means I have to be out the door about 5-10 minutes before 8. Not the easiest of deadlines, since it's not a nice round number.

Lunch is something else to get used to. First of all, lunch breaks are a half-hour, instead of the hour I've gotten at former companies. I haven't yet worked out how to pace myself yet. An hour-long lunchbreak gives time to meander and be indecisive. Look at the menu, think it over, eat, go take a walk or sit back and read... Don't feel like I can take such a leisurely pace in half the time. So I've found myself overcompensating, wolfing my food and being back at my desk after twenty minutes. Still have to work out a happy medium.

The other complication with lunch is the cafeteria. Lotus was huge and was right next to a mall with food court. My previous employer was smaller, but part of a large office park. This is a midsize company, but the offices are somewhat isolated. Cafeteria includes vending machines, a salad bar, and it looks like they serve cold sandwiches and a few hot entrees for lunch. No grill, which is what I usually leaned towards. So aside from today (when I decided to take a walk), I've been packing lunches, but since we don't often have leftovers (what with Ian's and my conflicting schedules), I'm running low on ideas for lunches...

Posted by Lis Riba at 7:35 PM

I just got home from work (yeah, it's late -- I ran some errands that largely turned out to be fruitless) to find a wrapped gift waiting beside my computer keyboard. I knew exactly what it was -- King James and the History of Homosexuality -- but Ian wrapped it all shiny with a little gift card that read "For The Fairest"

I love my husband. Unfortunately, he's at work, so I won't be ablt to thank him for a while. And I've been running into a bit of a stumbling block in finding the other item I've wanted to give him for the holiday. Still, just wanted to share the news.

Posted by Lis Riba at 10:12 PM

AICN is rumbling that Matthew Vaughn is in talks to direct a Man from UNCLE movie. No word yet on writers or casting, but I'm feeling nervous. Why can't they leave well enough alone?

On the bright side, if Man from UNCLE is a hot property, that means it should finally be released on DVD sometime in the near future...

Posted by Lis Riba at 10:01 PM

By the way, thanks to mactavish, I've found this 'place the states on a blank US map' game to be disturbingly addictive.

They have easier levels and other games European countries are hard, particularly since they include all the fiddly tiny ones.

Now I'm tired and want to go to bed, but Ian's probably going to need a ride from work or from the train... Coordinating schedules with only one car may get complicated.

Posted by Lis Riba at 9:40 PM

Okay, I've seen so many critics' top 100 film lists that they've all grown together into one big blur.

So how about the top thousand books owned by OCLC's member libraries? According to their About page, this aggregates collections from over 50,000 libraries.

So, who's most popular? To avoid overload, here's the Top Ten:

1. Census [various] by United States
     Library holdings: 403,252 Bibliographic records: 10,164
2. Bible
     Library holdings: 271,534 Bibliographic records: 36,738
3. Mother Goose
     Library holdings: 66,543 Bibliographic records: 1,997
4. Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri
     Library holdings: 59,034 Bibliographic records: 2,714
5. Odyssey by Homer
     Library holdings: 43,871 Bibliographic records: 2,009
6. Iliad by Homer
     Library holdings: 42,756 Bibliographic records: 2,388
7. Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
     Library holdings: 39,310 Bibliographic records: 1,093
8. Hamlet by William Shakespeare
     Library holdings: 37,683 Bibliographic records: 1,917
9. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
     Library holdings: 37,614 Bibliographic records: 1,865
10. Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien
      Library holdings: 37,461 Bibliographic records: 643

Needless to say, Shakespeare had the most works in the Top Thousand (40) and Stephen King had none (his highest ranking book made 1165). The highest-ranking work by a woman was Wuthering Heights, by Emily Brontë (#29; Jane Eyre is next at #33). And Jim Davis (Garfield) was the highest ranking living author.

Finally, here's something interesting: If all the Harry Potter books were bundled together, these books would have ranked 8th on the Top 1000 list (and 2nd on the Top Fiction list, 3rd on the Top Children's list). Considered together, 39,010 Harry Potter items are held by libraries and they are represented by 407 different bibliographic records. Talk about a phenomenon!

Posted by Lis Riba at 6:50 PM

So, tonight through Saturday (don't know yet about next week), Ian's working the night shift. Meaning that he's not home when I get in. Rather complicates lighting the candles and opening presents (we've received several boxes in the mail over the past week - I tend to hold onto them so the gifts last for eight nights).

I could just wait until he gets home so we can light the candles together. But I have to get up earlier in the morning, so would likely be going to bed almost immediately afterwards. I could light one menorah now, and let him light another when he gets home, though that seems... lonely and nonfamily.

Anyway, work is good. I like my boss. My coworkers all seem to be friendly, smart, and with silly senses of humor. Combined, our backgrounds and skillsets are diverse enough to handle most problems this job could throw at us. The company is growing this area somewhat, so the team as a whole is fairly new. We've got 1.5 existing REs, one person coming over from QA (so I think of him as more techie), one person moving over from sales (really knows the customer- and business-side), and me, having experience in a similar job but with perspective of another company's practices. Oh, and it's about evenly split male-female.

At any rate, for the past three days I've just been poking about the intranet reading documents of all sorts (technical specs, sales presentations, policy docs from other departments... whatever caught my eye and looked interesting and informative) and have been playing with the products (assisted by online doc and some tutorials I found). Today I went to my boss and said, "I feel comfortable with the products. Give me something to do."

I think I surprised her by how quickly I felt ready, but she's given me a few enhancement requests that are in the pipeline to start investigating. It's fun. One of them is supposed to behave similar to something a competitor does, so for the afternoon I've been hacking away at their product to understand the extent and limitation of their feature. Fun!

I really love pulling apart programs from the end user side and seeing how they tick. I'm not a programmer, but I'm a kinesthetic learner, and I think I've just got a gift where computers are concerned. Fortunately, I seem to have found a place where I can use those powers for good...

Posted by Lis Riba at 11:54 PM

So, I've spent much of the week familiarizing myself with the company's products. [Ooh how I wish I didn't take a vow not to divulge identifying information about my company. There are so many neat products I want to tell y'all about!]

Fortunately, I tend to be a kinesthetic learner -- meaning I learn by doing. So much of my self-study has involved me conducting searches to explore the various options available. And, naturally, I've done most of this searching on Christopher Marlowe.

Fortunately and un-, I honestly feel confident enough in my understanding of the products that I probably don't need any further such explorations through the databases. On the one hand, it's a bit of a pity since I really do enjoy this kind of freeform searching. However, it does mean that I'm ready to move on and get working, which is also a good thing.

And this time I mean it. Good night, I'm going to bed. Really.

Posted by Lis Riba at 11:05 PM

So, as I was looking through the knicknacks from my last cubicle, to help determine what to bring into my new cubicle, I spotted my Rupert Giles (from Buffy) action figure. I thought of other librarian action figures, which I do not (as of yet) own. And I suddenly imagined Rupert Giles in conversation with Nancy Pearl.

"Ah, I see you like Practical Demonkeeping. Have you read the Necronomicon?"

Oy, I'm tired. Went to my in-laws for dinner and brought along my Hannukah gift for Ian from yesterday: The Hebrew Hammer DVD. Stayed out a little too late watching it... I'm off to bed in a few minutes. I'm now several days behind in LJ, and I have no clue when I'll be able to catch up. 'Night!

Posted by Lis Riba at 9:41 PM

This isn't really a case of truth being stranger than fiction, but just... ouch.

I've been reading A Monarchy Transformed: Britain 1603-1714, and it's going into King Charles' problems with possible rebellion in Scotland -- the buildup to the English Civil War. James, Marquis of Hamilton, was one of Charles' principal Scottish advisors:

Hamilton was given command of the seaborne expedition into Scotland. ... Hamilton's own mother threatened to shoot her son if he invaded Scotland with an English army.

Needless to say, the invasion was called off.

Still, gotta suck when not only doesn't your mother support you, but is willing to kill you herself.

Posted by Lis Riba at 9:40 PM

But work has left me very very exhausted and without much time for updates at the moment. I'm falling behind in reading journals, much less writing in mine (though I do have a brief note to follow about the book I've been reading over lunches). Hopefully over the weekend I'll have more time to post a real update. Just take it as read that life is good, but busy.

Posted by Lis Riba at 7:45 AM

Courtesy of Ayesha: a young soldier wearing his kilt most breezily while sitting next to Britain's Queen.

Be sure to actually read the whole story on Snopes. I think the excerpt from The Mirror made me laugh louder than the image or idea itself:

William West, a retired major in the Gordon Highlanders, said: "We are bound by the Official Secrets Act so we can't say what's under the kilt."

I'm going to leave for work in about 15 - 20 minutes. That's 150-200% the non-rush hour time (and it's a reverse commute), so I may be a little excessive, but better to be too early than too late...

Posted by Lis Riba at 8:56 PM

I should go to bed soon. I have to be at work in twelve hours.

Posted by Lis Riba at 3:50 PM

I've said this aloud for a while. I want to write this down somewhere so there's an external record of this and to make it more real.

I want to travel to the UK next November, specifically to be there for whatever celebrations commemorate the 400th anniversary of Guy Fawkes Day.

I'm not sure I can afford such a trip, but I feel I should start thinking about it now so I can plan and take steps to make it come true.

On the positive, November is apparently the off-season, touristwise, in the UK -- so some prices should be cheaper. On the other hand, the way the dollar has been dropping will make matters more expensive, and during my unemployment I've dug myself into a minor financial hole I have to get out of.

So, we'll see whether or not I can make it happen. I'm just saying that I want it.

Posted by Lis Riba at 3:15 PM

My last several years at Lotus, I took the train to work, and thus was able to read during the commute.

My previous job was barely 10-15 minutes from home, so the drive was quite zippy.

My new job is a half-hour away when it's not rush hour. I don't know how much longer it's going to take during rush hour, so I intend to take extra time tomorrow. And it is a reverse commute, so hopefully won't be too bad.

At any rate, I loathe morning radio. I just want music, not all the chatter that most radio stations seem to fill the commute times with.

Therefore, after much consideration, I bought myself a digital voice recorder. Normally, I carry around a notepad with me everywhere I go, to jot down ideas that may occur to me. Obviously, I can't do that while driving.

This model has three folders (the packaging is misleading and says four, but the 4th is solely for "scheduling"). Right now, I'm thinking of dividing them up as ThingsToDo, ThingsToBlog, and MyFictionWriting (I frequently talk to myself to determine wording and work out what sounds best; this way I no longer have to worry about forgetting any of it until I have a chance to write it down). So far, I've only used it for the last use, and I haven't yet tried transcribing any of it, so we'll see how effective that is.

I debated for a while whether to spend the extra money for a model with a PC-link. Though I couldn't think of any uses at the time of purchase, I decided that it would be better to have the ability and not use it than to not have it and regret it later.

And then, on the drive home, I thought of a use!

Audio blogging!

I can talk things out on the drive home and then upload them. Be forewarned...

Posted by Lis Riba at 3:05 PM

Just quickly, an update on how Boopsie's been doing in respect to two issues we've mentioned in the past.

Regarding the flea problem, we called our vet who echoed the recommendation I received from nellorat for

a systemic poison that you put on the cat once a month. It's harmless as long as they don't lick it directly; it gets applied to that spot right over their shoulders that they can't reach. Even our FIV+ cat had no trouble with it.

Apparently, use this stuff for two months in a row and the fleas will go away, since they've nothing palatable to chew on. And it's only $60 for Boop and the two downstairs cats.

We haven't bought it yet, because I thought it might be provident to check the upstairs tenants' cats for fleas, and just do the whole house at once if necessary. And we haven't had the chance to talk to our upstairs tenant and offer them the fleacomb.

Our other problem was inappropriate urination. Boopsie seemed to favor a location in front of our laundry basket. If there weren't any dirty socks lying on the floor, she'd sometimes pull a towel down, or when that failed, she'd use our bed.

We did three things: One, we cleaned up the laundry and really scrubbed that part of the floor so no bad smells remained. Two, we moved our secondary covered litterbox (which had been in the living room to resolve problems of inappropriate elimination there) into the bedroom. And finally, we changed the litter in her main litterbox to scoopable, which I've been keeping scrupulously clean.

So our bedroom hasn't smelled of cat urine since.

And there was much rejoicing in the land.

Looking forward, our oldest comforter has just about given up the ghost. All the padding has clumped up. I think I'm going to sweep up one of the corners Boopsie sometimes sleeps in and put this down as bedding. Boopsie has pissed on this comforter in the past (that's why it went through the washer/dryer so many times of late), so I'm somewhat nervous of that, but maybe if I sprinkle it with catnip she'll take to it as a catbed.

Posted by Lis Riba at 2:45 PM

Okay, it's three days early, but I just got an e-mail from my ABEBooks wishlist that a copy of King James and the History of Homosexuality was available at an actually decent and reasonable price.