Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween from Paperclips & Power Trips! As you can see, I’ve whipped up a new Halloween header for the occasion. Also, I know my posting has been dreadfully sparse as of late, but I’ve been super busy outlining my NaNoWriMo novel. A few posts back, I told you all about this great and crazy month…and it’s starting in a week! GAH!

Meanwhile, I’ve set up my author page on the NaNo site:

http://www.nanowrimo.org/eng/user/494667

I’ve decided to call my story The Twelfth King. I’m currently working on fine-tuning my plot synopsis, and should have it up by this evening. When I finish it, I’ll post it on the “Novel Info” tab on my author page, so check back later today.

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month

As you can see, I’ve created a new header in recognition of Breast Cancer Awareness Month. I’d like to encourage all the women (and yes, men can get breast cancer, too) out there to perform regular self-examinations and to get regular mammograms.

Also, if you’re like me (a poor college student or otherwise financially strapped), and you feel bad that your budget doesn’t allow you to donate to charities, charity search engines are a great solution.

http://www.everyclick.com/breastcancercare

^

For example, this site is a regular search ol’ engine that works just like Google, Yahoo!, and Ask. The only difference is that this particular site donates half of its ad revenue to the charity of your choice. The link above directs to the page for a breast cancer charity, but there are tons of other charities for you to choose from.

Here are some other charity search engines:

http://www.givoogle.com/ – This site donates all its ad revenue (they’re paid per 1,000 views of their page) to cancer research. Givoogle actually uses the Google search engine, too.

http://www.goodsearch.com/ – GoodSearch donates a penny to the charity of your choice every time you use their search engine.

NaNoWriMo 2009 – Let the insanity begin

(Blog refurbishing is complete. New header, new layout, same great taste!)

Well…I’ve taken the plunge. I’ve joined NaNoWriMo. What’s NaNoWriMo? Basically, it stands for National Novel Writing Month. Every November, a select few completely insane authors try to do the seemingly-impossible: write a 50,000-word novel in the month of November. Let me just say…*eep.* As a first time NaNo-er, this task seems incredibly daunting.  But I’m also incredibly excited. I’m not aspiring to be a super-serious author, but I do love to write…however, I’ve never written a 50,000-word novel, let alone in one month. My annoying inner editor always seems to get in the way of me finishing any of my story pursuits, so I figured this would be a great outlet for me to finally finish a story. I’m telling you about this now because I can already feel the NaNo insanity setting in. Even though NaNo doesn’t start for 27 more days, I’m still thinking, “Oh, my God, why am I blogging when I could be doing some character sketching and outlining?!”

Needless to say, my blog posts may be few and far between next month. That’s not to say I’ll be abandoning Paperclips & Power Trips completely. I mean, I have to write 1,667 words per day for 30 days to reach 50,000 by November 30th. I’m sure I’ll need a break from my YA fantasy novel for once and awhile, right? Expect to seem some absent-minded and typo-riddled posts in random intervals, with subject lines such as “My soul and livelihood have died!” Or, perhaps, if I’m uber-lucky, “Golly, this story actually has value as something other than lining for my birdcage!”

By the way, I have a basic synopsis of my NaNo novel, which I’ll be posting here soon for y’all (hello, random Southern-ness?) to read and review, too.

Meanwhile, if you’re completely insane like us and think NaNoWrioMo sounds fun, we always need new recruits. The website is http://www.nanowrimo.org. It’s been officially opened for October, so you’re free to sign up, check out the boards, and get some tips until November rolls around. See you there!

A Few G20 Updates

I think I may have posted too soon last night. I learned this morning that there was a massive, rowdy protest downtown that ended in 110 additional arrests (bring the total to 191, if I’m not mistaken), and a police officer sustained a minor shoulder injury. Now, I’m not going to waste time expressing how annoyed this makes me. Instead, I’m going to remain thankful that there were no major injuries, deaths, or any type of attempted terrorism.

This is the last G20 post, I promise! I’ll make sure to include some different types of entries in the upcoming days. A bientôt, mes amis.

Pittsburgh’s G20 Summit: Day 2

As I write this, the much-anticipated and much-feared G20 Summit has come to a close. Well, I guess we can all consider it a relative success, protesting-wise, because no has died or been seriously injured. Let’s get a quick Day 2 recap:

There was no violence today. None. There was one arrest only, compared to eighty yesterday. It was actually very shocking, in a good way. There was a huge march and demonstration, but it was totally peaceful, and…dare I say…even a little inspiring? It was almost like something out of the sixties, with all the peace and anti-war protests. This is what it should’ve–what it could’ve–been in the first place. Don’t these people realize that others are more likely to take them seriously if they don’t do immature things like destroy property? Personally, I’d be more likely to listen to peaceful protesters than to a bunch of self-righteous twentysomething kids flinging around their own shit. Just sayin’.

An image of today's protesters with a peace dove

Damn…I thought I’d have a lot more to write about for today, but that’s pretty much all that happened. I’d like to say good-bye to the Obamas and to all the other world leaders. Hope you enjoyed our city. Oh, yeah, and please make sure to tell the rest of the world that no, we are not some filthy, dusty, smoggy, soot-covered cesspool. The steel mills have been closed for awhile. I’m pretty sure all the soot has settled.

Here’s a new poll, everyone. Yesterday’s poll remains open for voting, so please check out that one, too. This new poll is for Pittsburghers and/or people directly affected by the Summit only!

Pittsburgh’s G20 Summit: Day 1

And thus it begins, the G20 Summit in Pittsburgh. I thought that it was only proper that I blog about the two separate G20 days, since my first blog on the topic was my most popular entry to date.

As expected, there were (still are, actually) protests. Yesterday, Greenpeace made a big show of hanging a gargantuan banner off a bridge, along with some of their members rappelling off the side with it. Yesterday was oddly uneventful in terms of protests, so most thought today would be, too. It wasn’t. Off the top of my head, here’s a list of the damage done today by protesters in Pittsburgh:

• Fidelity Bank, Taco Bell, Boston Market, BMW dealership, police cruiser, PNC Bank – windows smashed (the PNC Bank had its ATMs destroyed, too)
• A protester grabbed a police officer around the neck, forcing the cops to use rubber bullets
• A half-dozen or so dumpsters were rolled or turned over
• Rocks, bricks, bottles, and feces (yes, I said feces) were thrown at cops
• About six people have been arrested so far, I believe

It was frankly kind of ridiculous. I know these people have their right to an opinion, but is it really right to vandalize a city that’s just spent months cleaning and sprucing up to get ready for this Summit in the first place? I’d like to refer you to this site: http://www.don’tbeag20jackass.com, which says it better than I ever could: despite it hosting the Summit, this city is still our home. These “anarchists” don’t seem to realize that, after they leave, we have to go on living here, and we have to clean up the mess they made. A massive group of protesters are currently in Oakland, and if you’re not familiar with Pittsburgh geography, they’re pretty near to Phipps Conservatory, which is where all the heads of state are currently meeting. I’m not too worried for the world leaders’ safety, because they’re amply protected. But still…it makes you feel iffy. And we’ve still got the entirety of tomorrow to get through, too.

Damage done by protesters to a restaurant's window

A little note to the violent protesters: Today wasn’t as bad as it could’ve been. Still, there were a lot of tactics employed (see above) that were very disrespectful. I’d like to ask that you try to keep it sane and keep it peaceful for the duration of the Summit. I’m sure this is going to fall on deaf ears, but I know I’m not alone in this request.

Oh, and, just to be clear, I’m not against peaceful protests. I applaud the groups (the Tibetan monks come to mind) that are protesting peacefully, have gotten a permit, and are not disturbing the citizens. I think I can speak for most Pittsburghers when I say that we’re very grateful for the respect you’re showing.

On another positive note, this G20 Summit isn’t all bad. In fact, I’m sort of geekily excited that all these important people are meeting and discussing world issues 20 minutes from where I’m currently sitting and typing this. I’m glad it hasn’t gotten too out of hand yet. We shall see what tomorrow and the rest of tonight brings. Stay tuned for Day 2 tomorrow.

P.S. Check out the poll below and let me know your opinions on this.

Firefox, you have let me down

Well, for the first time in my three years of religious use, Firefox has disappointed me. And not just “oh, damn, this add-on isn’t supported with this version!” disappointment. I’m talking true and utter failure…to the point where I’ve had to stop using it for now. You see, I recently updated to Firefox’s new 3.5 version. I was actually quite excited to see what new tricks Mozilla pulled out. But something, I suppose, went horribly awry. Now every time I log on to Google pages, Yahoo pages, Facebook, or most graphic-intensive sites, I get a “a script on this page has been stopped due to a low memory condition” warning. Then, all hell breaks loose. Firefox’s interface begins…I guess, sort of…deleting itself? My back, forward, refresh, home, and bookmark buttons disappear, the default theme background turns white, pages refuse to load, images are always full of “errors,” and it inevitably ends in Firefox freezing to uselessness or crashing.

Let me explain that I always have ample memory, and this is not occurring with any other applications, nor did it occur with my older Firefox version.

This happens often enough to hinder my browsing experience. I have found out that this defect is actually a bug for XP users like me, and I’m definitely not the  only user experiencing it. A quick Google search consisting of ‘firefox,’ ‘low memory,’ and ‘3.5’ will yield thousands of results from disappointed XP Firefox users wondering what’s happening. I have also found that Mozilla is aware of this bug and promises to have it fixed in another update. Well, versions 3.5.1 and 3.5.2 came and went, and I’m still suffering with the bug. So it was today that I decided to retire Firefox for the time being. I am going to be using Google Chrome until Mozilla releases an update that efficiently repairs this bug. Don’t get me wrong, Chrome is a great little browser, but I’m sort of a purist when it comes to my browser. I have Firefox customized to exactly my needs and wants, and I don’t take fondly to change.

This is me poking Mozilla. You have made a loyal user switch to a backup browser because your update was too unstable on XP. Until you patch it, you have lost a user.

…Er, I realize no one really gives a shit about my personal problems with Firefox. More epic topics to come, I promise. But in the meantime, does anyone know of how to possibly improve this bug?

Apologies

I’m attempting to customize this blog, so I apologize for anything that may look ugly or askew over the next day. Thanks!

Hello my name is Rachel and I’m megalophobic…

Hello, my name is Rachel, and I’m megalophobic. I have a mild-ish case of this phobia, which is defined as a fear of large objects. Most sufferers of megalophobia are afraid of ships, planes, and statues, things that can move or look like they “should” move (so no buildings, usually). I don’t share the fear of ships and planes, I’m only afraid of large lifelike things–statues of people and animals (my fear also extends to full-body taxidermy animals). My case is not so severe. I can look at these things without crying, screaming, or running away, they just make me very, very uncomfortable and I feel jumpy and nervous in their presence. I’m also okay with looking at their pictures online. The largest statue I think I could feel comfortable around is Michelangelo’s David, which is around 17 ft tall, with the pedestal. To give you a better idea about megalophobia, here are some things that trigger this fear:

Things that have triggered my megalophobia:

• Lincoln Memorial, Washington D.C.
• Jefferson Monument,  Washington D.C.
• Any taxidermy animal that’s bigger than a deer (especially full-body elephants, giraffes, polar bears, gorillas, buffalo, elk, whales, rhinos, etc.)
• Dinosaur fossils, especially tyrannosauruses, triceratops, stegosauruses, and pterodactyls, if they’re suspended on the ceiling over my head
• A large statue of the Egyptian god Horus in Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Museum.
• Any oversized flags with peoples’ faces on them.

Things that I haven’t seen personally, but know would trigger my megalophobia:

• Mt. Rushmore, South Dakota
• Statue of Liberty
• Yet-to-completed Crazy Horse Monument, South Dakota
• Wat Pho Reclining Buddha
• Mother Russia
• Rio de Janeiro’s Christ the Redeemer
• Amida Buddha
• Spirit of Houston (if they ever build it)
• Yan Huang Statues
• Sphinx

Things that are common fears for sufferers of megalophobia, but do not scare me:

• Planes/Helicopters
• Trains
• Large ships
• Wind turbines
• Huge trees
• Blimps
• Oversized kites
• Monster trucks or any other large hauling trucks
• Any structures not normally shaped (i.e., Disney’s Epcot globe)
• Any structures that are made to look like oversized “normal” objects (like the “shoe” house, the store that looks like a giant guitar, etc.)
• Overhangs
• Large expanses of water or earth
• Large murals
• Big animals (I’m only afraid of “big” animals if they’re taxidermied. If they’re alive or just plain ol’ dead, I’m fine with them)
• Cathedrals or any other building with abnormally high ceilings

I hate my megalophobia. I think it’s a pointless phobia, and kind of embarrassing, too. Believe me, I would “get over it” if I could. I’ve been trying some self-administered “exposure” therapy, and so far, I think I’ve been getting a little bit better…I’m at least not going to cry if I see a big statue.

This is a very “out-there” kind of phobia, and I’ve never met anyone with it. If you’re a sufferer, please please please comment/contact me. I’m really interested in hearing about other megalophobics’ experiences.

UPDATE 8/12/2011: It’s great to see everyone’s responses to this post…it definitely is a comforting feeling to know you’re not alone with this fear! Thank you all for commenting on this, and I hope you’re all doing well with your particular phobia. Keep the comments coming so we can hopefully get the word out to more megalophobics that they’re not alone. (Also, I can’t believe I didn’t notice the typo in the title! Duh! Thanks for pointing it out, guys.)

More info on megalophobia:

http://phobias.about.com/od/phobiaslist/a/megalophobia.htm

My Thoughts on Anti-Abortion Groups

I’m largely against anti-abortion groups. Well, not all of them, I guess. But I just saw an article on CNN: (link: http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/08/27/nebraska.abortion.protests/index.html) and it sickened me. I’m going to start off by saying that I am a woman and I am pro-choice, and no, I have never been pregnant–just to get all ambiguities out of the way. I have several points I’d like to make about pro-lifers, and I’m going to address them in list form.

1. This one’s sort of superficial, but I hate when people say “pro-abortion” instead of “pro-choice.” No one, unless they are some sick serial killer, is pro-abortion. I don’t prance around saying, “YAY! Let’s abort our pregnancies! Let’s stop having children all together!” Um, no. I believe in a woman’s right to choose what to do with her body, whether she chooses to have an abortion or to carry the baby full-term.

2. Most people who oppose abortion do so because they believe it goes against God and The Bible. That’s fine. If abortion goes against your religious values, then, by all means, do not have an abortion. However, trying to get a law passed that outlaws abortion just because it’s against your religious beliefs…well, that goes against everything this country stands for. I believe Thomas Jefferson proposed the separation of church and state, and we hold that true now. Basically, your religious viewpoint should not be law, especially considering, though this nation is predominantly a Christian one, it is most certainly not the only religious viewpoint around.

3. As most of you know, a Kansas doctor by the name of George Tiller was shot and killed at his church this past May by a pro-life activist. Tiller was widely condemned for performing late-term abortions. I ask you to remember that he did not perform them just because a woman didn’t want to have her baby. He only aborted fetuses with fatal birth defects or in a situation where giving birth would kill the mother. I realize that most pro-lifers do not support the killer’s actions at all. But for those who do, I have something to ask you. Why is killing a man any better than, as you say, “killing a child”?

4. Re: the link posted above. Can someone please explain to me why threatening a man’s safety and terrifying his family and employees is something a benevolent and loving god would approve of? I mean, if that’s what God is really like…well…let’s just say that that certainly isn’t the God described in The Bible.

5. I find many of the tactics employed by pro-life protesters to be absolutely disgusting. Holding signs with dismembered fetuses is just distasteful. You wouldn’t hold up signs with pictures of skin cancer patients reading “This is what UV radiation causes!”, would you? Well, I don’t know. You probably would. I get that it’s a “shock” tactic, but isn’t there a better way? Besides, what if a small child or an extremely squeamish person saw those signs? Not taking those facts into consideration is disrespectful and rude. Another protesting form I hate is when pro-lifers camp outside abortion clinics and scream insults at women who enter. I’m sure that poor woman’s choice was hard enough. They really don’t need your tactlessness to add to their stress.

Well, that’s about it for now. Since America is split pretty much 50/50 on the pro-choice/pro-life debate, I’m sure I have successfully offended half of my country. I welcome any and all comments, from all sides of the debate!