Rolling Over In Her Sleep

srs question: is there an unusually high number of natural disasters happening right now, or is that an impression created by disasters happening in the developed world and so given more attention by the media? I shall investigate.

ETA: Tonga was hit by a 6.1 quake almost a whole day ago. The first I heard of it was just now on Twitter. I REST MY FREAKIN' CASE.

Folks are passing around a map predicting nuclear armageddon for the west coast of the US. My bullshit detector registers a billion roentgens, especially after reading New Scientist's update from six hours ago. Also investigating. ETA: The map bears the logo of an Australian company, but does not appear on their site. (Nor is there anything on the ARPANSA site.) ETA: It's been Snopes-ed. (Snopesified? Ensnopulated?)

Further to previous dog-filth simile

"No of UK books published in 2010 fell from 157,039 to 151,969. No wonder I can't find anything to read these days." - literary agent Jonny Geller on Twitter

(no subject)

Gave up politics, gardening, and art - such as they were - and started insulin. Never in our seven years of occupancy has this house been cleaner or more organised, nor my in-tray so up-to-date. And I'm writing more than I have in forever.

Have some random links y'all

We break now from shopping parrots onto Benedict Cumberbatch to bring you these updates.

Here's a Protozoan with seven separate sexes. (New Scientist does not report whether any of them are "woman-born woman".)

Why Do Writers Abandon Novels?""More dramatically, in 1925 Evelyn Waugh burned his unpublished first novel, “The Temple at Thatch,” and attempted to drown himself in the sea after a friend gave it a bad review. (Stung by jellyfish, Waugh soon returned to shore.)"

Tumours could be the ancestors of animals. Or at least could be organising themselves using the same genes as the earliest animals. "Consequently, a tumour is not a collection of independently evolving cells, like bacteria, with almost infinite potential to evolve resistance to therapy. It is a group of largely cooperating cells relying on a finite collection of survival strategies that were locked in place over half a billion years ago."

The devolution of man. "We have reached the point where we cannot keep getting taller. There are biomechanical limitations of human growth."

Finally, hope for the future: Muslim prayer group targeted. "But it seems the campaign may have backfired. The prayer group has received support from a range of Jewish leaders and groups, including the Jewish Community Council of Victoria, Liberty Victoria, the Jewish Christian Muslim Association, the Australian Jewish Democratic Society, and the B'nai B'rith Anti-Defamation Commission."