WWWednesday: September 30, 2015

This week’s Word for Wednesday is sesquipedalian, an adjective used to describe a word with many syllables. The origin is Latin, from the word for “foot and a half.” “Sesquipedalian” appeared in usage in the early 1600s.  My Oxford English Dictionary gives the first written use of the word in 1625 if I am reading the tiny print correctly.

Crescent Moon by Sergey Tyukanov

Birthdays and Anniversaries:

A happy birthday to Mark Hamil, Shel Silverstien and Christopher Reeve who all share the same birthday, September 25.

The Planetary Society will have its 35^th anniversary party on Saturday, October 24, in Pasadena. Guests will include Nichelle Nichols and Andy Weir, who wrote The Martian. Bill Nye, the Science Guy, who is also the CEO of the Society, will MC. (Both Items via File 770.)

Literature and Art:

Martin Vargic is a teenaged artist from Slovakia who loves working with old maps. Here, he’s drawn a map of literature. The detail is astounding. I like the Sea of Publishers. (Via Buzzfeed,  h/t to Terry.)

Books and Writing:

Sf Signal gives us a highlight of Richard Kadrey’s upcoming book The Everything Box, which reads like Kadrey channeling Christopher Moore.

Damien Walter discovers urban fantasy. It’s a good article and he makes some good recommendations, but he also takes a few cheap shots. Using a writer many of us agree is one of the worst representatives of the sub-genre as your touchstone just makes you look out of touch. Get over the were-leopards, dude. We have.

How many books should a writer write in one year? Huffington Post thought the answer should be “one.” HuffPo posted a snobby article implying that, de facto, if you wrote more than one book a year, you weren’t doing good writing. Larry Corriea had an opinion about that.  John Scalzi chimed in here, and Jim Butcher had a comment on Twitter. Jim Butcher is funny! (h/t to Kat.)

Tor shows off glorious cover art (and gives a brief blurb) of upcoming novellas, due out January, 2016. I don’t want to wait that long!

Internet:

You can rent the apartment that H.P. Lovecraft spent most of his life in. The cost is $965/month and there is no additional charge for that tentacled thing under the bed. People say they have seen Lovecraft’s ghost in the place. If you’re going to move in and want to get along with the previous tenant, remember that he liked cats. Thanks to Terry for this one.

Suvudu shares vital information, courtesy of Chuck Sambuchino, on what to do when clowns attack. Don’t pretend you haven’t worried about that!

TV and Movies:

NBC premiered its Heroes reboot Heroes Reborn with two episodes back to back. IO9 damns it with faint praise. I watched it, and I can’t say they’re wrong.

ABC’s Agent Carter started up on Tuesday. Here is a glamorous poster for the show. This season, Peggy moves from New York to Los Angeles to fight Hydra, evil, and probably lecherous casting directors.

Swans Reflecting Elephants by Salvador Dali

Science and Technology:

Vox provides this eye-opening video about the history of color film; and how it dealt with various skin tones. I felt enlightened, but not surprised after viewing this.

Space:

On September 28, NASA shared some news about Mars. The press release read, “NASA to Announce Mars Mystery Solved.”  (Hint; it’s liquid water.)  The televised conference was interesting, and Time’s newsfeed had some fun with various Twitter japes.  This is pretty exciting news.

Earth:

From PBS, a video on kingfishers catching fish is beautiful and amazing. Warning; fish die, on camera. I mean, it’s not the Red Wedding or anything, but still.

Giveaways:
The following Giveaways are still active: Jana’s interview with Cindy Dees, Thoughtful Thursday, Expanded Universe with Fran Wilde, and our interview with David Walton.

Art:

Today we have two paintings from a founding father of surrealism, Salvador Dali. No reason, I just liked them. UPDATE: We have one Dali and one painting by Sergey Tyukanov, a surrealist paint. He faked me out!