Survery Jones: My Political Compass

It's been a while since I have updated this blog. I've been overwhelmed this summer. For most of the month of June, I was down with kidney stones, a sprained ankle and moving. Since I got better, I have been working my behind off trying to get the city house ready to sell (JUST in time for the housing market to go completely south). But, I was reading Crooks and Liars yesterday morning (as usual) and I came upon this nifty little political test.

The idea behind it is that there are two components to conservatism. There is an economic scale defined by the extremes of Communism (communalism) vs neo-liberalism (libertarianism) and there is a social scale defined by its extremes Authoritarianism (fascism) vs Libertarianism (anarchism). Put more simply: authority vs anarchy and communism vs unrestrained free markets. For example, here's how some famous world leaders rate on the political compass:



So, I took the test (I'd really love to see my neo-con friend Heather take this test. It's interesting!). Here's where I fall:





It appears I am just to the right of Gandhi, which I do not mind. I am a bit more liberal than I though of was, perhaps because of my libertarian leanings (and libertarians normally consider themselves on the right). But on this scale libertarian socially is left while libertarian economically is right and I tend to be more libertarian socially than economically.

But what's really telling is this image from Crooks and Liars about where the candidates fall. Even the MOST liberal of the democrats are FAR more authoritarian and far more economically libertarian. They are not very darned liberal AT ALL. No wonder I am not terribly thrilled about ANY of the presidential candidates!

I should note, at times, I found the test to be a bit too black and white. There were questions where I didn't exactly agree or disagree. Where the question itself seemed unreal. Anyway, so much for my survey jones. I'll be quite pleased when skating season begins again and when I have time to follow it.
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In other news, my husband made Chief (E7). In the Navy, this is a BIG deal. They put you through a six week indoctrination that involves a lot of silly stuff, more volunteer work, and a whole lot of working late. I am presently conducting my marriage my cell phone. And after 5 years of not smoking, it took exactly five days for the indoc process to stress him out enough that he is back to killing himself.

No, I'm not very happy/

Five weeks and counting til pinning.
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I've joined a new team blog. I haven't posted yet, due to email problems but when I do, the new blog is Mama Needs a Book Contract. It's a blog about writing and parenting (or in my case, women's issues). Looking forward to seeing you there!

Blog survey?

I find this on a blog I read called Crooks and Liars. It's a survey about how/whether/when you read blogs. Feed YOUR survey jones. Please take my blog reader survey!

What kind of programmer are you?

Ah, my survey jones thirsts for useless online "tests!" This one, supposedly based on the Myers-Briggs personality survey tells you what kind of programmer you are (my myers-briggs is SCARY balanced, BTW). Apparently, as a programmer, I'm a:

DLSB

You're a Doer.
You are very quick at getting tasks done. You believe the outcome is the most important part of a task and the faster you can reach that outcome the better. After all, time is money.

You like coding at a Low level.
You're from the old school of programming and believe that you should have an intimate relationship with the computer. You don't mind juggling registers around and spending hours getting a 5% performance increase in an algorithm.

You work best in a Solo situation.
The best way to program is by yourself. There's no communication problems, you know every part of the code allowing you to write the best programs possible.

You are a liBeral programmer.
Programming is a complex task and you should use white space and comments as freely as possible to help simplify the task. We're not writing on paper anymore so we can take up as much room as we need.

If you want to see all the personality types, they're here.

The B I B L E... and other amusements

So, I was wandering the blogosphere and came upon this interesting quiz. I haven't indulged my survey jones in a while so this looked like a good opportunity.

I am Catholic. We RCs are not known for our encyclopedic knowledge of the Bible, but I'm also not your average Catholic. For about 3 years in elementary school, I attended a "Christian" academy run by the Southern Baptists. For the first year it was okay, but by the third year, I was getting told I was going to hell because I was Catholic.

Yeah, that sounds REAL Christian to me, too.

But as a result, I memorized the books of the Bible in 2nd grade (and lots of verses, too) and actually read the book (it has some great stories). Alas, I can no longer rattle off all the books of the old and new testaments. I can recite the 40 most common prepositions (courtesy of Catholic middle school).

Old reprobate that I am, who probably hasn't cracked a Bible since I was 10 (okay, a LITTLE in college where I used to annoy the fundamentalists in Bible study just for cussedness).

So color me amused.

You know the Bible 95%!

 

Wow! You are awesome! You are a true Biblical scholar, not just a hearer but a personal reader! The books, the characters, the events, the verses - you know it all! You are fantastic!

Ultimate Bible Quiz
Create MySpace Quizzes

More Silly Quiz Results...

Why do I do this?

I have yet to figure this out, peeps. I like taking silly quizzes, but at the same time, the results are sometimes of use and often of no use at all. For example, I recently took this quiz about whether "this guy" is my soulmate—yeah, I'm dripping sarcasm too.

The quiz asked some interesting questions, like "how's your sex life?" Of course, none of the answers really fit so I chose "comfortable." Hey, screaming orgasms are comfortable! No dice for choosing "sometimes blah, sometimes 'wow,' sometimes AWOL," it wasn;t one of the choices. Overall, I'd think my sex life is pretty good. The quiz does NOT approve.

Or it asks me what we talk about after work. And for some reason, talking about what he did and what I did during the day is the wrong thing. I mean, like we're supposed to passionately discuss politics (a bad idea since we are a purple marriage) or art or something. Hey, I want to know what he did! DH tells some pretty funny stories. It's a nice way to connect after a day slaving away at the computer. It's far from a boring recitation.

The other thing that bugs me? Apparently, I'm wrong that I don't depend on DH to be my bestest friend. We're not soulmates because I get emotional support from other women instead of from him. I guess it's not wise, that I figured out a long time ago that you can't grow watermelons from tomato seeds. DH is a GUY and I like him that way. I don't ask him to be a woman and nurture me in the ways the my women friends do (or kick me in the butt like they do either). Okay, sometimes, it's difficult, but he is who he is. We're more buddies than best friends. That's cool.

So anyway, here's the upshot:

Is He Your Soulmate?

Your Results:
He might be your soulmate... here's how to tell
You have a good relationship with your guy, but you don't seem to be connected to him on a deeper level. Maybe he's kind, loving and can offer you financial security. But your romance is lacking that extra spark that can only come from being with someone who truly understands you. But don't throw your relationship away just yet. Your guy could unknowingly be your soulmate, and it may be that you just aren't allowing yourself to fully open up to him. Instead of automatically reciting the events of your day when you get home, talk to him about the subjects you're truly passionate about. Enrich your conversations and make them more meaningful, and then see how he responds. Even if he doesn't share your passions, does he understand why they mean something to you? Does he still encourage you to pursue them? If so, you just might have to dig a little more for a deeper connection. More than anything else, you should know in your heart of hearts if he's really the "one" and worth fighting for. So don't settle for "good" relationship—set your sights high and seek out the passion, intuition and soulful connection that you deserve.

So he might be my soulmate.

Darn! And we've been married for 12.5 happy years.

Figure skating and bad news

I haven't figured out why when I have some novel news, I don't just post it. Maybe because in the throes of dealing with bad news, I don't much want to dwell on it. Anyway, I had sent On the Edge to Thompson/Gale's Five Star line on the recommendation of a published author friend of mine last summer. They read it mainly on her recommendation. And for the next three, she told me again and again how she was sure they would buy it. It was a good book. Gale is a library subscription publisher (rather than a bookstore trade publisher). They would buy it.

Yeah, right.

Thanks for your e-mail, and for submitting your novel On the Edge to us for consideration in the Five Star Expressions line. While we think that your novel is very well written, I'm afraid that it skews too much toward the YA-fiction genre, and therefore, I'm afraid that it is simply not right for our Expressions line, which skews toward a more adult tone and theme (I was hoping this might be the rare exception that could have fit into our line, but I'm afraid that wasn't the case). I thank you for your patience while we reviewed your novel, and wish you the best of luck in placing it elsewhere.

Thanks again, and please let me know if there is anything else we can do.

So, if I'd HAD any hope to begin with, I would have been crushed. As it was, I didn't dare hope, because I knew that I couldn't face another rejection. Losing my agent just about killed me. I couldn't face it again. I didn't hope and as such, I was less disappointed. But it's still a big bummer.

What does that mean? Well, basically, it means that On the Edge is dead. It's been queried to pretty much every possible agent in NY. It's been read by half of the people queried. It's been agented. It been shopped. It's been dumped. No, I'm not putting it out through Lulu or iUniverse. But I will be self-publishing it under the Private Ice imprint when I get around to making it happen. The question remains if I will then try to sell Desperate Times to NY or not. I suppose it depends. But if you love me, buy the book, okay?

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Of course, with bad news, comes good news. For the first time in 2 years, my muse has come for a winter visit. Normally she just sends post cards from Tahiti. But I've been writing for three solid weeks now, and I strongly suspect that if I pace myself, she'll stay the winter. I've written about 25,000 words on The Barunian Incident, which brings the total to just 70 words under 40K. I am SEVENTY words from half done. I don't know whether to celebrate or run screaming through the neighborhood in frustration.

I'm sure, if the muse hangs out, you shall all be treated to the travails of trying to get The Barunian Incident published. I suspect this one might sell. It's sexy. The characters are sympathetic. It's got explosions and sword fighting (and a heroine who KICKS ASS). So far, both my husband and my 11 year old like it. Cross your fingers. The Barunian Incident has been in progress for nearly 5 years. I did the treatment based on a dream I had in 2001 and have worked on it sporadically since. I just want inspiration to hang around long enough to finish.

Oh, and it has NOTHING to do with figure skating.

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On the professional front, I am now blogging for Ars Technica's Infinite Loop, a Macintosh blog. Things are things at Newsforge. I picked up a new client, Off the Record Research and that did nicely paying for Christmas. I'm also in negotiation with two new local clients, both of whom should mean regular income. We'll see. More on that when it happens.

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And to feed my survey taking jones—because I watched return of the King THREE TIMES this weekend (more for boredom than enthusiasm, though the man candy is truly excellent)—here's which LOTR Hero I am: