esteven

At the beginning of the year my youngest uncle died...suddenly...unexpectedly...because he fell in the bathroom and ruptured a vein.

Weeks later my eldest cousin called to let me know her mother (Mum's sil)had finally passed away after a long illness of breast cancer.

At the beginning of May, my best friend's mother died suddenly and in her sleep. Since my mum had died in 2009, Mrs K had become very dear to me.

In June one of my friends died from gall cancer and a brain tumor within four weeks. We had started work together and had stayed in contact even when they moved.

I just had a call from another cousin telling me that my youngest aunt (Mum's youngest sister) has passed away this morning. Having come out of hospital only a week ago, she had literally come home to die.

I have loved all of them so much.

The son of a friend has completed his B.Sc Games design and has asked me to give his descriptions of some of the projects he worked for a once-over. While translating the text itself presents no problem, I do have a hang-up with part of it.

He generally talks about RPG participant/gamer as being male (it's always "he" or "his" etc). So this is where I am asking my flist:

Though the majority of gamers may be male, I feel that a large number of females play too. So is it standard practise in descriptions of computer games to use the male 'identity' only? Would not the plural be used?

For instance: It is the gamer's decision what sort of weapons he would use or would you find It is the gamers' decisions what sort of weapons they would use.

I would really appreciate help

The weather was good -apart from a few rainy days- my friends were wonderful and the Moot 2010 and Mooters were gorgeous, splendid, constantly huggable and great fun to be with. Special thanks must go to latin_cat's parents who were so kind to go on holidays and leave us their beautiful home.

Unfortunately, the days were over too fast, but isn't that always the case with great holidays?

A friend sent me this link, and I regret that I will be too late to go and see it. It sounds interesting, fascinating and riveting.

Bill Fontana: River Sounding, a journey through the hidden sound worlds of the River Thames at Somerset House
15 April - 31 May 2010

Jack and Stephen may have liked this exhibition too

I am old enough to remember when the wall (not only in Berlin) had been built because I lived near one of the villages where it ran through a farm: the farmhouse on one side, the barn on the other.

My memories are of the humiliation felt at the checkpoints whenever Mum and I wanted to visit Gran and mum's siblings: the guard-dogs circling the train, the GDR customs officer who opened the coffee we had taken as a present, and circled his fingers in it. We might have tried to smuggle gold? The hour-long wait at the police station as soon as we had arrived because we had to register? The same procedure before we left?

Mum's family could never visit us in return. They were too young. Only OAPs were permitted.

Then came the morning of November 10th! I had arrived at work the next morning and nearly called one of my colleagues an idiot because I could not believe him when he said that the wall (not only in Berlin) had come down overnight. He had to turn on the radio for the news before I believed him.

Later there were many Trabbies in the city, but I think it really sank in weeks later. Mum’s youngest brother called his big sister and asked if it was fine for him and his wife to come over and celebrate her birthday which is at the end of the year. To say Mum was delighted is the understatement of the century. She wandered her flat, often remarking out of the blue “They are coming” and we would look at each other and cry. We then called young sister in Frankfurt, and my aunt and uncle there also promised to come and there was much rejoicing in the family.

From metafandom about the links between SUP and the Kremlin Makes for an interesting read.

Via friendfriends I read on erector’s lj that it seems all our lj’s have been set automatically to “moderate filtering”. No matter how old you are, LJ has decided that you might be too sensitive for the stuff posted on your f-list and in the communities you've joined. To switch this back to "no filtering", go here and put the "safe search filtering" back to "Do not filter my results"

I now believe that they are doing a brilliant job. This is no sarcasm, I mean it.

At the moment they are teaching everybody the lesson of how to get rid of unwanted customers. And by homing in on one of the largest fandoms on lj, they make certain many people are angered.

By not replying for a week and then playing the gammut of only oozing murky "statements" to not addressing valid points in question, they sorely tempt the patience of said customers which will in the end leave. LiveJournal is then cleanslated for prospective buyers or conservative businesses. The staff at lj know they will succeed they certainly know communities like fandom_flies.

Not only will the ljstaff in general and burr86 in particular not get slapped on the wrist, they will likely be commended for doing the company's bidding.

rather make fun (others would say "mock") fandom.
Here's an interesting article,but the main thing is the link at the bottom.