Five from MaggieBloome

[packbat]

The Five-Question one again - this time inherited (with modification) from maggiebloome, who got it from backinblack:

1. Leave me a comment. You may take one of two tacks, here: (a) complete insignificance - for example, song lyrics, sandwich recipes, videogame reviews ... anything, really, as long as it's completely meaningless in context, or (b) a specific request for participation, with the specifics up to you. (But not completely up to you - I do still get to choose the questions.)
   
   (Okay, somebody needs to take out a restraining order against me on use of the word "completely". I mean, d-mn.)


2. Receive five questions, chosen so as to allow me to know you better, in a reply to your comment. They will likely not be excessively personal, so as to Avoid Internet Drama™.


3. Update your LJ - or, if the thought of contaminating it with mere Internet memes gives you fits, reply to my comment - with the answers to the questions.


4. If you chose the former: Append (or prepend) this (or a substantially similar) explanation to your answers. When others respond with desultory comments, ask them five questions. (Each, that is.)


5. If you chose the latter: Write an appropriately brilliant and witty diatribe about the pointlessness of copying these idiotic things across the Web as if they're somehow valuable, then throw it away as being nearly as annoying as the things themselves.

Anyway, the five questions, courtesy maggiebloome:

1. What's your favourite extinct reptile?

Mmm - I don't know nearly enough extinct reptiles, let me think.

...

Y'know, I think I'm going to go for the obvious and vote tail-spikes. Stegosaurus, I choose you!

2. If you could pick an Era to live in apart from our own, which would it be?

Well, being as I'm obviously of (mixed, but including) African descent, it would seem of questionable wisdom for me to dwell in the near past. Further, I am quite ignorant of any language other than my own and quite enamored of modern medicine - thereby eliminating the far past (and the near past, really). On top of that, environmental degradation and the expenditure of Earth's natural resources (not to mention the ever-present hazard of warfare involving weapons of mass destruction, or even garden-variety epidemics) would seem to discourage proceeding into the future.

So, recognizing that I have no good choices, I expect I would either choose the latter half of the nineteenth century in London or the latter part of the reign of Caesar Augustus in Rome. My ignorance of history is mighty, but neither of those places and times seem too offensively intolerant, and both are associated with a great deal of magnificent literature.

3. Deserted island. You are Tom Hanks. Volleyball, basketball or ping pong ball?

I think I'll have to go with the canonical answer, here - volleyball seems like the most durable.

4. How would you prefer to die?

Heart attack might be nice. A stroke, perhaps. Quick and clean is the way to go, I say - none of this long painful decline into death, and a minimum of gross bodily harm. Basically worst, in my opinion, would probably be a car accident followed by long, unsuccessful medical intervention. (Not that I'd refuse treatment - I'm just saying: pain? Seriously uncool.)

5. Which work of literature has changed you the most?

Slaughterhouse 5 was pretty sweet. The Gate to Women's Country made me think a lot. The Dispossessed was fascinating. I'm not sure that any book changed me radically, though.

Wait. Gentleman's Agreement by Laura Z. Hobson. Despite being black (by American standards), my visceral conception of racism was, to a large degree, unformed until it was informed by that book. It was a good movie as well, but I feel that the book was more subtle about it, and so more satisfying. (However, I am also obliged to mention - although this is my mother's observation, not my own - that the beginning of the book is somewhat slow. Take it as you will.)


...Okay, how are you supposed to wrap these things up again?

Comments

[majoru.livejournal.com]

Lethargus is a Cænorhabditus elegans sleep-like state.

[packbat.livejournal.com]

Impressive, Snake!

1. How many globes do you have in your house? (Extra credit for non-Earths.)

2. Webcomics - I see you read Rice Boy; any other recommendations?

3. What motivates you to create (anything from blogging to cello performance)?

4. If you had to be another species, which would you pick?

5. Why is a raven like a writing desk?

Special Bonus Question: Why aren't your entries showing up on my friends list?

[majoru.livejournal.com]

1. There are six light globes, several thousand globes of tapioca in the cupboard, a few globes I felted from merino wool (I use one as a pincushion), and a few marbles. In terms of models of the earth or other heavenly bodies, there are none. I know what they look like, and two dimensional projections work for me.

2. I do read Rice Boy, and discounting all the common ones, I'd recommend Three Panel Soul at http://www.threepanelsoul.com/ There are others, of course, but one is sufficient for today. Hiao-Tsiun Ma certainly thought so.

3. My motivations are mercurial, to say the least. Sometimes it's just for release, sometimes it's to actively bring more beauty in the world, sometimes it's to communicate an image, an idea, a poem. Sometimes it's for people, and sometimes it's for me. How does this increase the sum of human happiness?

4. Oh, lots of good options. Giraffes only sleep perhaps an hour and a quarter a day... Imagine what I could get done. Dolphins, like the primates, have sex for pleasure and they have large brains to handle three dimensional navigation and an additional sense, echolocation, and they live in the water. I like water. Otters (and all other mustelids) are wonderful and playful.

5. Because you cannot ride either like a bicycle is probably my favourite reason. That, or because Poe wrote on both. Ultimately, there is no answer, which is sometimes a nice thing to have in the world.

Bonus: I have no idea... because I'm special? I assume you can read them on my actual page itself?

[packbat.livejournal.com]

2. I do read Rice Boy, and discounting all the common ones, I'd recommend Three Panel Soul at http://www.threepanelsoul.com/ (http://www.threepanelsoul.com/) There are others, of course, but one is sufficient for today. Hiao-Tsiun Ma certainly thought so.

Ooh, Three Panel Soul! I thought On Unemployment (http://threepanelsoul.com/view.php?date=2007-05-07) was particularly sweet.

5. Because you cannot ride either like a bicycle is probably my favourite reason. That, or because Poe wrote on both. Ultimately, there is no answer, which is sometimes a nice thing to have in the world.

I'd never have thought of that first one - it seems most magnificently fitting, in context. Agreement on the no-answer thing.

Bonus: I have no idea... because I'm special? I assume you can read them on my actual page itself?

Yup! That works out fine anyway - I just put you under "Non-LJ Blogs". ;)

[packbat.livejournal.com]

...huh - Chawing on Antacids (http://majoru.livejournal.com/) showed up. Maybe it was just something-or-other.