For the first time in seven years or so, I am designing and formatting a book for print. Last time I did it, I used Quark; it was a freelance job, not terribly complicated. For most of my freelance book-production jobs, and invariably for my own books, I used PageMaker, starting with 4.0, when it was still an Aldus program.

I love PageMaker. I miss PageMaker. It was a clean, elegant program, and it worked beautifully even on complicated multi-element designs. I could go into a trance while peacefully formatting my pages. I knew I was getting professional results, and I had (and have) extremely high standards for book design. That’s because I started in publishing in 1980–just at the beginning of the computer typesetting revolution and long before the average person knew what an em-dash was. I carry with me the standards of a statelier past.

Part of my frustration, of course, is that instead of formatting in an honest-to-Gutenberg typesetting program, I am doing it in W*rd. Which is a complete piece of crap for any kind of complex formatting. I keep saving, knowing that a crash could wipe out my files. I need a copy of InDesign. And a pony.

What old programs or other outdated technologies do you miss?

I wouldn’t give most knights and lords more than a common bow in passing. (Remember that Americans do not bend the knee to royalty, even.) But I would fall on my knees for a minute before Sir Pterry, because he can write and think and feel.

Happy news from Irismoonlight.

She had a rainbow bumper sticker on her car. So four thugs battered, robbed, and raped her. In the San Francisco Bay Area. Richmond police Lt. Mark Gagan said, “The level of trauma — physical and emotional — this victim has suffered is extreme.”

Now she, her partner, and their 8-year-old daughter need a car and help to move house. I can completely understand why she would want to move. The rapists have her wallet and address.

You can help. Some good people set up a PayPal fund to help her. The PayPal button is at the top of the right-hand column. You can also make checks payable to “Community Violence Solutions.” In the memo portion of the check, please write “Richmond Jane Doe.” Mail checks to:

Attention: Ms. Jo Ann Douglas Community Violence Solutions 2101 Van Ness Street San Pablo, CA 94806

Local SF People: The areas they are looking in are El Cerrito, El Sobrante, Hercules, Pinole, and San Pablo, if anyone has a 2 bedroom rental (maximum $1000/ mo) or knows someone who does please leave a comment at this link.

ALSO:

The Richmond Police Department are reporting that according to a witness, there were two cars parked in the area at the time our sister was attacked, the information is as follows:

A Red (or maroon) General Motors (possibly a Buick) Car with 4BBN ??? license plate

A Gray Mazda or Honda Car with 2wd ??? license plate

If you see either of these vehicles, please notify Lt. Mark Gagen at (510) 621-1212 X 7012 or Detective Yesenia Rogers at (510) 672-1718.

It has been a bad year for hate crimes:

FBI statistics show there were 1,265 hate crimes based on sexual orientation in 2007, up from 1,017 two years earlier and 1,239 in 2003. That compares to 3,820 racially motivated incidents in 2007 and 1,400 in which the victim’s religion was a factor.

Because not all states allow attacks motivated by anti-gay bias to be charged as hate crimes and because some victims are reluctant to reveal their sexual orientations to police, gay and transgender rights advocates suspect the numbers to be much higher.

But what do you expect? After a long and nasty ad campaign, we were voted officially, legally second-class citizens in a number of states. The Catholic Church has declared we’re right up there with the destruction of the rain forest as a threat to the world.

Because some kinds of love are just too dangerous to be allowed to exist.

Bizarre artistic buddies of the week: Raymond Chandler, the author of The Big Sleep, The Long Goodbye, and other classic hardboiled detective novels, and Theodore Geisel, AKA Dr. Seuss. Yes. Friends. Drinking buddies. The Cat in the Hat goes rat-a-tat-tat.

ETA: Found.

Grey 1999 Toyota RAV 4 California license plate 5RY0562

Rented by Bruce Jeffrey Pardo from a Pasadena agency on Dec. 19. He’s the guy who dressed up as Santa and murdered nine people on Christmas Eve. In the days between the rental and the murders, he could have driven it anywhere. He had plans to flee; a plane ticket and $17,000 were found on his body. Despite earlier reports that he meant to go to Canada, the plane ticket was for Moline, Illinois, with a stopover in Minnesota, so the car could be in the midwest. Or it could still be waiting somewhere near LA.

For God’s sake, if you spot it, do NOT touch it. Call the cops. Despite third-degree burns on his hands and arms, Pardo booby-trapped his other rental car to explode when it was found. And the explosion would have been vicious: Pardo wired the suit so when it was lifted it “would pull a trip wire or a switch, ignite a flare inside the car that would then ignite black powder and he had several hundred rounds of handgun ammunition inside the car.” I’d bet that this one is booby-trapped, too.

Santa murders — triggering

I love movies, and I’ve had a lot of pleasure recently from them. On Christmas Day the Califamily and I watched Trading Places, which I got for Christmas. It’s still funny, and of course the setting in Philadelphia is nostalgic for me.

Then we watched Across the Universe, a Beatles-based musical about the 1960s. The slight script hit all the expected tropes and a couple of unexpected ones. (The dancing beds in the VA hospital were unexpected, all right. Song: “Happiness Is A Warm Gun.”) It featured some pretty actors who could sing.

In fact, the singing is the point of the movie, as far as I am concerned. Jim Sturgess has a plaintive voice appropriate for some of the solos he sang, and I suspect he has a wider acting range than his part allowed him. Evan Rachel Wood’s singing and acting were pleasant but unmemorable. T.V. Carpio’s “I Want To Hold Your Hand” turned a fun pop song into an anthem of unspoken longing.

But Dana Fuchs and Martin Luther (billed as Martin Luther McCoy) stole the show. She has a set of pipes like Janis Joplin’s and a hell of a stage presence. He can do gentle, jazzy, or hard rocking. Their solos were great, and their duets were worth the price of admission.

Best song: the soaring gospel version of “Let It Be” by Carol Woods and Timmy Mitchum, which moved me to tears.

Be aware that the film included songs that weren’t on the CD soundtrack — notably the songs written by George Harrison. So if you want to hear Martin Luther singing “While My Guitar Gently Weeps,” you’ll need to search YouTube. Or. of course, you could rent the movie.

movie meme, swiped from serenejournal

01. Name a movie that you have seen more than 10 times: The African Queen. And there still isn’t a decent US DVD of it! more movie meme

Christmas is pre-eminently a holy day for me. I hope this expression of my faith will not hurt or offend my friends of other faiths.

An excerpt from W. H. Auden’s Christmas oratorio, For the Time Being.

CHORUS OF ANGELS:

Unto you a Child, A Son is given. Praising, proclaiming The ingression of Love, Earth’s darkness invents The blaze of Heaven, And frigid silence Meditates a song; For great joy has filled The narrow and the sad, While the emphasis Of the rough and big, The abiding crag And wandering wave, Is on forgiveness: Sing Glory to God And good-will to men, All, all, all of them. Run to Bethlehem.

Now all things living, Domestic or wild, With whom you must share Light, water, and air, And suffer and shake In physical need, The sullen limpet, The exuberant weed, The mischievous cat, And the timid bird, Are glad for your sake As the new-born Word Declares that the old Authoritarian Constraint is replaced By His Covenant, And a city based On love and consent Suggested to men, All, all, all of them. Run to Bethlehem.

From the beginning, the message of Jesus was a reversal of the accepted order. The power and majesty of God was trapped in the absurd helplessness of an infant. The Word, made flesh, could only weep.

Now that Christianity is the dominant religion here, it’s easy to slip into arrogance and judgmentalism, to assume that might equals right and disdain the very people Jesus most loved: the weak, the poor, the lonely, the outcast. Let us not forget that Auden, who wrote these words of worship, was gay — he described his life-long partnership with Chester Kallman as the marriage he needed.

The teenager pregnant out of wedlock bore the Christ child.

God said: My Grace is sufficient for thee, for my strength is made perfect in weakness.

Somehow, in this the darkest part of the year, hope is emerging from terror and need, and shame is transformed into glory.

Merry Christmas, dear friends.

If you’re having a wonderful holiday season, you may want to skip these links. (Except the cat ones.) But if you are feeling cheerless, depressed, or snarky, try these links.

Guaranteed to make you smile: Oh come, all ye felines.

Bertie’s Christmas Eve, by Saki. Bertie, a “black, unkindled cinder” in the glow of festivity, nevertheless manages to enjoy an old-fashioned English Christmas.

When the Cloud Comes to Claim Them. Heart-felt notes on seasonal depression.

Today from dailyrumi:

Last year I admired wines. This, I’m wandering inside the red world.

Last year I gazed at the fire. This year I’m a burnt kabob.

Thirst drove me down to the water where I drank the moon’s reflection.

Now I am a lion staring up, totally lost in love with the thing itself.

Don’t ask questions about longing. Look in my face.

Soul-drunk, body-ruined, these two sit helpless in a wrecked wagon. Neither knows how to fix it.

And my heart, I’d say it was more like a donkey, sunk in a mudhole, struggling and miring deeper.

But listen to me: For one moment quit being sad. Hear blessings dropping their blossoms around you. God.

version by Coleman Barks

more animals

It’s one thing for Montana to get blizzards, and quite another when Las Vegas or Seattle get a few inches of snow or a glaze of ice. For the amusement of the winter veteran and the instruction of those who grew up without frozen precipitation, or who have lived in mild climates so long that they have forgotten how to turn into a skid, I offer these links:

How To Walk In the Snow, A PAMPHLET. Link thanks to matociquala. This is hilarious as well as accurate.

Hints for Snowpocalypse 08.

The New England Thermometer.

Winter Survival Essentials. This one is in no sense a joke. When I lived back east, I referred to my emergency stash as earthquake supplies; out here on the Hayward Fault, I’ve been calling them blizzard supplies. In any case, it’s essential to stock up. Also gives plenty of safety tips.

Winter driving tips from the guys at Car Talk.

What’s your favorite tip for surviving winter?

Some annotations for Dorothy L. Sayers’s Lord Peter Wimsey books. Not complete, but fun if you’d like to know more about the many allusions. I need to email this guy; I can add to it.

matociquala declares: Today is the first annual freedom from writing guilt day.

It’s also the birthday of Jane Austen, Arthur C. Clarke, and Philip K. Dick, not to mention Ludwig von Beethoven and Noel Coward. Points to cynthia1960 and supergee, who both posted some birthday greetings.

Making words and data into images. Beautiful and fun.

A Dress a Day. Lots of vintage patterns and sewing discussions. Link from jonquil

Abominations and Comments Thereon

Avatar Racefail Bingo. Casting directors prove they’re blind to race by using white actors in Asian roles. (pounding head on desk) Does anyone else remember Marlon Brando — Stanley Kowalski,Mister Kurtz, the freaking Godfather — in The Teahouse of the August Moon? No. Just — no.

The admirable blue_vervain reminds us to back up our files. Today. Yesterday several writers lost laptops to theft or irreparable crashes.

Yet another huge security hole found in Internet Explorer.

Rick Ferguson, senior security advisor at Trend Micro, said, … “If users can find an alternative browser, then that’s good mitigation against the threat.”

But Microsoft counselled against taking such action.

“I cannot recommend people switch due to this one flaw,” said John Curran, head of Microsoft UK’s Windows group.

How about due to all the other security flaws, not to mention a honking ugly interface? Why is anyone still using this browser? Link from jabber..