Patricia S. Bowne

Outnumbered in my own home

Posted on November 2, 2011 by Pat Bowne

I have always had two cats. The theory was that they would amuse one another when I was out of town, but of course this doesn’t always work out as planned. So for 16 years, I lived with two individually delightful cats who disliked each other. Every day when I came home, there was fur on the rug after another of their non-epic battles.

When these cats died, I told myself I would never again give house room to combatants. So when I saw a cubicle at the Humane Society labeled ‘They must be adopted together,’ I didn’t even bother looking at any of the other cats.

Now I have two housemates who LOOOVVE each other. They cuddle, snuggle, wash each other’s faces, chase each other all over the apartment, and spread an atmosphere of almost cloying kittylove. And I am happy. But …

I feel left out. I didn’t realize how much I liked being the only person in the house whom everybody loved. Now I hang around the edges of the social circle, treasuring the few moments when they deign to treat me as one of them. I’ve gone from being the only person in the house smart enough to get along with everybody, to being below my cats on the social totem pole.

Is it better to rule in hell, or to have two people chase each other across your belly without noticing you in heaven?

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Church Lady

Posted on November 2, 2011 by Pat Bowne

There’s only one church in Osyth, and it’s an upstart, just getting going in the second novel. But the world of the Royal Academy is firmly polytheistic, with competition (sometimes cutthroat) between multiple religions worshipping different gods. In this, it’s a lot like the world I live in. The only difference is that in my world, most of the different religions give their god the same name. Continue reading →

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Professors’ preoccupations – grading

Posted on October 5, 2011 by Pat Bowne

Gina Barreca over at Brainstorm listed six ways to make grading easier, and immediately I was hooked. Like any kind of workers, profs love to talk about better ways to do the key tasks of the field. I had so many ideas, a blog post seemed a better place to summarize them than a comment.

Some of the things I’ve learned about grading:

Self-assessment forms (see image) are great ways to reduce the work of grading papers. They’re probably old hat to lots of people who assign papers, but I never knew about them until my current job.

Take the papers everywhere with you until they’re graded. You never know when you’ll find yourself with down time that otherwise might be wasted; I’ve graded entire sets of exams while in line at the car wash! Or while waiting at the doctor’s, on the bike at the gym, during book clubs or writers’ groups… Continue reading →

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Thus I refute Zeno (sort of)

Posted on October 4, 2011 by Pat Bowne

As of 7:35 am, everything is graded and all grades posted to moodle!

At 8:10 am, I’ll give the next quiz…

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Zeno’s Gradebook

Posted on October 2, 2011 by Pat Bowne

In the space of one week, all four classes had exams… I’d say this was bad planning if it was the result of any planning at all.

The first day after exams, I graded for 3 hours and got a third of them done.

The next day, I graded for 2 hours and got 1/6 done

… By yesterday morning, I was down to 18 papers

By this morning I was down to 6

Tomorrow morning, I’ll finish the last 3

Then I’ll begin looking at revisions from the first class, and it begins again.

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More Reviews for ‘Advice From Pigeons’

Posted on September 28, 2011 by Pat Bowne

It’s a thrill to find myself mentioned on a blog I follow, especially when the reviewer liked the book! Elizabeth A. White and Sue Burke have both reviewed ‘Advice From Pigeons.’

I’m thrilled to have Sue’s approval, because when we were both in the Milwaukee Area Writers’ Guild, back when I was writing the book, I always admired her writing tremendously. Especially in short stories, she could zoom right to the point while I was laboriously circling it. Thanks, Sue! Sue has two blogs worth following: Mount Orégano, which covers everything of interest to the expatriate writer in Spain, and Amadis of Gaul, at which you can follow her translation of the novel that drove Don Quixote mad, along with explanations of the culture and history surrounding it.

Elizabeth White made me even happier by appreciating the academic setting as the real hook in the novel. It’s wonderful to have someone appreciate the Royal Academy. And her summary of the plot is better than my own … I may steal it for future promotional efforts. Check out Elizabeth’s Blog, Book Reviews by Elizabeth A. White, for keen, clever reviews that pinpoint the key features of their subjects. Many thanks, Elizabeth!

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Alcestis by Katharine Beutner

Posted on September 21, 2011 by Pat Bowne

The #feministSF twitter chat week before last took up Alcestis, by Katharine Beutner. This is the first time I’ve only bought a book as an audiobook, without having a hard copy to check facts in, so if I have missed or misinterpreted details, please correct me!

Greek myth. How many of us were introduced to it by parents who were unaccountably eager to give their innocent children a book that started with Kronos eating his own infants?

I liked my big illustrated book of Greek myths. The crowd of gods, nymphs, fauns, and hangers-on was like a treasure box. So I could sympathize completely when, in the twitter chat, Ms Beutner told us that it was Alcestis’ 3-day silence on returning from the dead that irritated her into retelling the story. What happened in the underworld, and why was Alcestis unable to talk about it on her return, as if her experiences with the gods and their realm were unimportant? Continue reading →

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Thanks but no thanks

Posted on September 3, 2011 by Pat Bowne

The thing about being a single scientist is that people are always helpfully pointing you toward romantic opportunities. I have PZMyers to thank for these prospects, from a NYT article on an objectivist dating site:

“[I am] short, stark, and mansome. You should contact me if you are a skinny woman. If your words are a meaningful progression of concepts rather than a series of vocalizations induced by your spinal cord for the purpose of complementing my tone of voice…”

“I consider myself to be a born-again egoist and I have dedicated the rest of my life to self-improvement. People see me as a socially inept loner because I tend to avoid superficial conversation but actually I love talking to people who like to think (the problem being I don’t know very many).”

“I am interested in meeting someone that truly embodies the values and virtues of Objectivism… But “other people” are secondary values no matter what, so finding someone is not a priority for me.”

I was going to make merciless fun of these guys, but then realized that it is Caturday, which reminded me that I already live with two persons who share most of these attitudes. Maybe all Objectivists really need to do to find love is wear fur coats, stop talking, and learn to purr.

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Mullein moths

Posted on August 31, 2011 by Pat Bowne

My mullein plants have been stricken with caterpillars. Dull-looking white caterpillars, embedded in a mass of dirty fuzz covering most of the plant.

Normally, I would be able to look this up online. But unfortunately, there’s this thing called the mullein moth, whose caterpillars infest mullein. They’re handsome little things, nothing like what’s in my garden. But because they are caterpillars and are found on mullein, do you think I can find any mention of any other caterpillars that might be on a mullein plant?

Hah!

It’s not that bad information drives out good. It’s that relevant information keeps out additional information. As long as there are things called mullein moths out there, why would less relevant information about other kinds of caterpillars show up in a search?

I was thinking about this as I strolled down the hall at school, mildly indignant about an office that had changed a minor policy. I had learnt their policy 25 years ago, when I was first hired. How dare they expect me to remember a new version of it? That slot in my brain was filled, by perfectly relevant information. I knew that policy! Why on earth would I replace something I knew perfectly well with a new version? It’s bad enough, I thought, that Microsoft makes me replace a perfectly good word processor or OS every three years; is my workplace going to expect me to do the same with minor policies?

Well, of course, they are. And they do. And we all, I think, hate it. So when we get a chance to get back at the changing world by refusing to take its facts into account, there’s a feeling of triumph. But it’s unbecoming in a scientist, and I ought to overcome it. Perhaps I will do better, if I remember these bits of knowledge I’m reluctant to change as mullein moths. Pretty, apparently relevant, but really just a darned nuisance.