From erbo@plum.ucsb.edu Thu Nov 30 23:30:02 1989 From: erbo@plum.ucsb.edu (Eric J. Bowersox) Newsgroups: alt.callahans Subject: Re: Request for Personal Info About Posters Date: 30 Nov 89 21:49:01 GMT Reply-To: erbo@cornu.ucsb.edu Organization: UC Santa Barbara Computer Science In-reply-to: snoopy@fig.ucsb.edu's message of 30 Nov 89 18:53:17 GMT Status: O The young man stands up again, having been listening intently to the cute beagle by the bar telling everyone about her/himself. He's unbuttoned the faded copper buttons of his jacket, revealing a T-shirt emblazoned with the words, MY MOM AND DAD VISITED ENCHANTING VERNA AND ALL I GOT WAS THIS LOUSY T-SHIRT. From his neck hangs a gold chain bearing a strange golden symbol that doesn't look like a symbol of any known religion in the universe. It gleams in the firelight as he steps to the bar, places a scuffed Reebok on the brass rail, pulls another couple of singles out of his wallet, and says, "Mike, I'll have a Matilda Bay...and get another root beer for the beagle." Mike serves them up with his usual broad smile. Carrying his glassful of wine cooler, he walks over and pats the beagle on the head. "Well," he begins, "as you probably guessed from that," pointing up to the "Reply-to" address in the message header, "Jamie and I are from the same school, and the same major. And before you ask, no, she's not my SO. But she's a friend of mine, and of my SO. As for me...well, my full name is Eric James Bowersox. That's where my login name comes from...ERic BOwersox. I'm also 21; just turned legal the first of November. I enjoy science fiction, music (most kinds), long walks & talks with my SO, and computer programming; I magically get grades and money for doing the latter. You might have noticed my height, which is around 6'2", fairly tall, and my blue eyes and somewhat curly brown hair that my SO just loves. (Her name's Anne, by the way, and she's a feminist; I save the stuff on soc.feminism for her.) My favorite color is green...that cool, natural color that signifies life whereever we are in the universe. I enjoy seafood, steaks, Chinese food, and pizza, especially with a Diet Coke or two, and haven't managed to watch much television lately; perhaps that's for the best. I do want to see _Back to the Future II_, though; I enjoy sci-fi movies, along with sci-fi virtually-everything-else :-). "I work for a place you might not associate with computer programming...the Devereux Foundation in Santa Barbara, an organization for the developmentally disabled. I work in the Information Systems department, where I do financial programming in dBASE IV--don't laugh--and administer the newly-installed Novell LAN system. Meanwhile, I have to struggle with my classes, since I plan on graduating in June of 1990," he says, indicating the golden symbol hanging around his neck. "That's a Tau Beta Pi Bent, so it shows I've done some working to get where I am today. But I don't know how much longer I can keep it up. And what with searching for grad schools, as well as my duties as Computer Club President, it gets pretty harried. I hope I'll be able to pull through." He indicates the beagle with a wave of his hand as he pushes off from the bar and steps forward to the line. "And that's where ol'Snoop here comes in. She knows how tough it is, and she's trying hard to pull through too. And I know others among us are doing the same thing. So now," he says, "let's have us a toast: To our good Jamie Lynn Smith...and all of our brothers and sisters in arms everywhere! Long life and bug-free programs!" With one swift move, he drains the glass he's holding and sends it spinning into the flames, where it annihilates itself on the bricks of the fireplace. As he settles back against the bar, he idly wonders if Fast Eddie knows any Genesis tunes. -- | * Eric J. Bowersox (ERBO) * As always, opinions are solely mine. | | President & Sysop, UCSB Campus Computer Club, Santa Barbara | | ARPA:erbo@cornu.ucsb.edu BANG:...!{ucbvax,ucsd}!hub!cornu!erbo | | "I want a NeXT. I really do. I really really do." -- my roommate | From lewandow@sabertooth.CS.WISC.EDU) Thu Nov 30 23:30:04 1989 From: lewandow@sabertooth.CS.WISC.EDU (Gary Lewandowski (TA of Doom)) Newsgroups: alt.callahans Subject: Re: Story/Toast Date: 1 Dec 89 01:53:27 GMT Reply-To: lewandow@sabertooth.CS.WISC.EDU (Gary Lewandowski (TA of Doom)) Organization: U of Wisconsin CS Dept Status: O In article <89333.184753JDO103@PSUVM.BITNET> JDO103@PSUVM.BITNET (Someone) writes: > And with that, he turns and slowly walks out the door. All the while looking >like there was still something he wanted to say, but was afraid to mention... We're here whenever you're ready to mention it. (Insert a quiet, friendly smile here and read with a soft voice.) I'm not sure why your last line leapt out at me, but it sure did. So here I am, off of lurk status. (Hi Kathy! the room got warmer and friendlier when I saw your article -- a friendly face from r.a.c...) So, now that I've come out from my corner, I'll put down my bill, (a glass of milk, please [it wouldn't be me if I didn't ask for milk :-)]), and introduce myself. I like it here at Callahan's. I haven't read the books, but I'll look for them. Luckily I stumbled across the place as it opened, so I've been sitting in that corner unnoticed for awhile. The place reminds me of the group I used to work for in college - confidential listening and no judgements. It's my toast so I get to talk... This has been the greatest year of turmoil in my life. Three years of college went hectically, happily by; then the fourth started and mayhem ensued. Many of the things about leaving home that I'd managed to avoid reared their head. Most significant was the health of my father and the status of our farm. I could talk legions about my father, and one of these days perhaps I will. For now, it suffices to note that he started getting ill when I was in high school. That meant that I took over doing most of the chores. Although my family is quite large (I have 8 siblings), I was the last child in the line of 'initial children' -- I have a brother 13 years younger than me. So, he was too young to take over where I left off and my leaving for school meant Dad had to be on his own again. At first things seemed fine without me, creating that strange mix of elation and sadness that life could go on without me. Then, during second year, his health really dived. The doctors had horrible hell finding what was wrong. At last they discovered his blood had a gammagobulin (sp?) deficiency -- this is important for making antibodies, and helped explain his frequent illnesses. Well, they started treating that, and third year seeped by. Summer came and he was getting sick more and more often. They decided to sell the cows as I started my fourth year. It was a wise decision, but that's when it really hit me that I had left home. Ever get those feelings that "if only I had stayed..."? The hope was that without the cows to tire him out he could recover. Fat chance. Last winter brought the same illness problems as before. The doctor kept looking, scan after scan, test after test, but nothing could be found. We all knew what we were looking for (that whispered C word), but it *wasn't* there. Spring came. My graduation time rolled around, and I managed to bring my parents to Chicago for the one and only time during my college career. We even had a good time. My father had been ill, but was better it seemed. The day they got back home he got a fever that skyrocketed, and went into the hospital for a week. The tests were rerun. My mother's voice on the answering machine said I should call home. My father answered and gave me the news in his typically matter of fact way. They had finally found the cancer. Maybe the lower part of the lung would be removed, or if it's bad the middle too. Really bad then the whole lung. It was really bad. Worse than really bad -- it had spread into his shoulder as well. All this while I stayed and worked, trying to earn enough money to tide me over until my first check from grad school. My father insisted I not come out. (And if I could give him control over one aspect of his life, then I would.) They didn't know if he'd make it, but he did. Then the radiation came (I was home for that), and he lost lots of weight. Always thin, he dropped 5 then 10 then more pounds. He'd try to eat, but radiation changes your taste and it was hard for him to find things he could handle. After I went off to school again (now grad school), he got better, and they took him off the oxygen. Still, his weight didn't increase and my mother's stress level did. Then one night I came home to the answering machine again. My mother telling me to *not worry*. Her voice said it all though. This time he was in for three weeks, and almost died. His heart just can't handle it anymore. The climatic night came when they asked him if he wanted to be recessetated (oh how do you spell it?) when his heart gave out. In the middle of the night he was sure he'd die, but he didn't. If you're familiar with the poem about footsteps in the sand you understand him saying that there was only one set that night. Then he got better; started eating, and came home within the week. So, I was home for the holidays, and there he sits. I'm glad he's still here, but sad that my father who fished and played ball and ran a farm is now sitting in a chair, attached to an oxygen hose. He is getting better; he walks more now, his weight is back over 100 lbs. (He's 5'11" BTW.) We hope for another year; one last chance to go fishing; walking my sister down the wedding aisle; a year for my mother and younger brother. Yeah, a year for me to say goodbye. This toast is to my dad. I'll go back to my corner for awhile now... Thanks for listening. gary lewandow@cs.wisc.edu "It's too late to correct it," said the Red Queen. "When you've once said a thing, that fixes it, and you must take the consequences." From greywolf@unisoft.UUCP Thu Nov 30 23:30:05 1989 From: greywolf@unisoft.UUCP (The Grey Wolf) Newsgroups: alt.callahans Subject: Re: soulmates Date: 30 Nov 89 08:19:10 GMT Reply-To: greywolf@unisoft.UUCP (The Grey Wolf) Organization: None whatsoever. You don't believe me? See my desk sometime. Summary: Yes, they're real... Status: O A weary, but not tired, white -- < shakeshakeshakeshakeshakeshake> -- er, grey wolf walks back in (I have to sysad sometimes, y'know?), walks over to Gilly. {Hello, my friend. I remember you -- it was most delightful receiving a reply from someone out there.} He nuzzles and licks Gilly's hand, then, noticing the tear on her cheek, thinks better and licks that away instead. {Let me rid you of that. I'll be back.} He plods over to the bar, thinks something at Mike, who unzips a pouch about the wolf's neck and extracts two dollar bills. {Yes, I finally have a real- world device in which to carry cash when I need to.}. {Thank you, Michael.} He carries one over to the line, gingerly, so as not to spill any of the bright green liquid. Without warning, he metamorphoses into a 5'10", 135# slender man (well, that's debatable...), with long, wavy/curly brown hair (a couple of silver and white ones if you look REALLLLL close) {and proud of 'em!}, wearing a pair of black corduroys, a grey suede jacket, a pair of black motorcycle boots {I drive a VW bus -- really!}, and a pair of intense green eyes just as the wolf had. He steps up to the line. "To soulmates, indeed, for they do exist for those who are ready to find them. It may take a while, and you might find out that you just cannot be with them in the end. I know several who have found this out. But having lost her once in a different time, I will not forfeit this time. "I am but four and twenty years of age now... sometimes it may seem like I'm just a kid, for in many ways I am, and in others, I've been from one end of this universe to the other, and I instinctively know what people feel and why. "My mom used to kid me about being five going on forty, and even my father tells me I was born eighty... "Anyway, when the opportunity is right for one to meet one's soulmate, it will happen. A good place to start is to write down exactly what your ideal would be. Allow for differences in opinion and preference, but write down *to the most miniscule detail you can imagine* what you want in some- one. And if you want to avoid REALLY messy problems, specify 'single', please. I forgot that one... "And then forget about what you have written. Put it away someplace where you might dredge it up again sometime. Look it over. Put it back and for- get about it again. Foremost, live your life never expecting it to happen. It may, it may not, but don't worry about it. I almost married someone be- fore I found my special person. "Well, it worked for me. Anyone want a good idea of what it is to have a soulmate, then lose her? Listen to _Turn of the Century_ sometime. It's on 'Going for the One' by a group called Yes, if you didn't know... "If anyone out there has found their soulmate and is with him/her permanent- ly, my congratulations to you. It's nice to know that someone can do that. "To everyone else who is interested in finding a soulmate, don't look so hard. You may be pleasantly surprised." "So, really, this toast is to soulmates and potential soulmates -- may each match up with the other and live a long, happy life. I don't wish that you will find your way through your differences -- I know you will, else you weren't supposed to." He downs the glass of Midori and turns around and hurls the glass full-force into the fireplace as if attempting to powder it. He then metamorphoses back into the wolf, and carries the other glass of Midori over to Gilly. { Try this. I think you'll find it does a world of good. Thanks again. Love, hugs and warm fuzzies... } And he plods over to the bar to get yet a third glass and takes it back to the spot next to Gilly for lack of knowledge of who is seated where, and stretches out on the floor (carpet?), paws forward, ever watching the line to see who else will walk in and/or step up to the line... -- "Like leaves we touched, we danced; we once knew the story As Autumn called and we both remembered all those many years ago. I'm sure we know..." From stadnism@clutx.clarkson.edu Fri Dec 1 00:50:52 1989 From: stadnism@clutx.clarkson.edu (Steven Stadnicki,9B23 Woodstock,2680000,5186432664) Newsgroups: alt.callahans Subject: Re: Request for Personal Info About Posters Date: 1 Dec 89 04:26:26 GMT Reply-To: stadnism@clutx.clarkson.edu Organization: Clarkson University, Potsdam, NY Status: O >From article <3170@hub.UUCP>, by snoopy@fig.ucsb.edu (Smith, Jamie Lynn): > Hey, here's an idea.... Let's all post a little bit about our true selves... > interests, hobbies, jobs, age, sex, height, hair color, favorite food, > favorite color, fav tv shows, etc, anything of interest. Oh, for College > students (of which I am... Beagles are very smart ;-)), majors and Colleges, > oh, and location within this country/world might be good, too. This way, > those of us with common interests can get discussions going about those ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ > interests. ^^^^^^^^^^ I'll agree with that, but try your best to keep it mostly to E-mail; for a lot of interests, there's already an appropriate group, and there's always rec.misc and misc.misc... I wouldn't complain much if such showed up here, but it's got the possibility of getting out of hand... In the meantime: Steven Stadnicki Height: 6'e" (or a little less... about 6'2) Weight: 25pi kg (okay, okay... about 175 lbs) hair: brown and scruffy eyes: greenish-grey sex: male age: 19 soc. sec: xxx-xx-xxxx :-) currently going to Clarkson University, way waayyy up there at the top of New York State (Potsdam) and ostensibly majoring in Computer Science favorite food: TAGQ. Varies a lot with the season, but Lobster and piping hot apple pie with heaps of ice cream on top (not together) come to mind. And pizza. Don't forget the pizza. favorite color: Blue. Never could figure out why, but that's definitely it. favorite TV shows: Actually, I don't watch TV much anymore. The occaisional network show, a few movies, some PBS here and there (the Peter Paul and Mary Christmas show last night, for example), news, Jeopardy, and too many videos (not eMpTyV, usually, but VH-1; I've got (sorta) quiet tastes in music). favorite Music: lotsa stuff. Predominantly "think" music, with a fair helping of other stuff, too. Naming names: Paul Simon (esp. 'Hearts and Bones'--some great songs about relationships), Harry Chapin (the greatest musical storyteller ever, in my opinion), Jethro Tull, Michelle Shocked, some local performers (in particular, Dennis D'Asaro and 'Poncho'), and I could go on and on and on... interests: well, right now I've got a vested interest ('with matching pants', he said, ducking bricks) in trying to be here next semester... other than that, there's math, physics, and compsci, and some interrelations between them... especially computer graphics (I'm working on a ray tracer), general relativity, the various manefestations of chaos and nonlinearity, and some generally odd bits of mathematics (the mathematical theory of Dots and Boxes, life, etc...) hobbies: hoo boy. And you thought I was rambling before... SF, of course, though not as much as I used to. Sturgeon's ratio (a corrolary of Sturgeon's law, the ratio of good stuff to garbage) keeps dropping lower and lower, or so it seems... some people still interest me, though. Anne McCaffrey. Heinlein. Chris Stasheff. Spider, of course, though I can only find the Callahan's books around here. Pamela Dean, Will Shetterly, and the rest of the 'Minnesota Collective'; see if you can find a copy of 'Liavek' and see what I'm talking about. Lucius Shepard. And lots and lots of people I've forgotten... Math is an interest, but I suppose you could group it as a hobby too... Walking (not for fitness, just walking around, admiring things)... not very fun in the current climate, but still interesting... Cross-country skiing, when I can (a positive aspect of the climate...) Backrubs Talking. Listening. All the little (and not-so-little) things that go with being a true friend. High phone bills (I call two California BBSs, about once or twice a week, for at least half an hour each time...) And finally, probably one of my biggest hobbies right now: comics. yep, that's right. A fair chunk of you know what I mean... Austin does, for sure, and Kathy, and a couple of other names here seem familiar... to those of you who might not know, comics now are (IMHO) about where SF was in the 50's; slowly expanding their market and starting to produce a surprising amount of quality stuff. On the other hand, the situation is somewhat different; I don't think SF has ever really been prone to the 'big two' phenomenon that's an unfortunate way of life in the comics industry. A lot of (hell, most of the) top-notch writers and artists are plugging out unrecognised books for little 'independent' publishers. A few of my favorites, both books and writer/artists: _Hepcats_, by Martin Wagner. A slice-of-life comic book set in a more-or-less collegiate atmosphere, with some of the realest characters I've ever seen; check out the four pages with Erica in #3 for a good idea of what I mean. _Love and Rockets_, by the Hernandez brothers. I can't even begin to describe how good this is; it literally has to be seen to be believed. Donna Barr does one of the weirdest comics I've seen, _The Desert Peach_, which isn't really about gay Nazis in North Afrika, despite what you might have heard. :-) Seriously, it's a very clever, occasionally funny book that might just surprise you. She also does _Stinz_, but I'll let Kathy talk about that... Grant Morrison's stuff is probably the closest thing to 'real' SF in comics today... and there are lots and lots and lots of others. I couldn't even begin to describe most of them, but I'll list a few... _Omaha, the Cat Dancer_ (not for the prudish or sexually repressed, but very good nonetheless--and written by a womthat'sps ol ovedorem