The Original Peer-to-Peer
Sunny and clear today. Our high was 88F.
No work today. After finishing "Ovid Under Glass," and with many things coming up, I took a day off, more or less. Also, I might have slept four hours last night. Maybe. Sunday I'll put together Sirenia Digest 211. Monday I have to go to Tuscaloosa to do more mosasaur work there, inclduing some stuff for Mike Polcyn. End of next week we expect the last set of reviews on MP 1.3. Tomorrow morning I either need to begin a story for Sirenia Digest 212 (which will have me caught up) or I have to go back to work on The Night Watchers. The pterosaur paper is languishing. And I can't fucking sleep. And the less you sleep, the more out of whack your brain chemistry gets, the harder it is to think.
I have been outside everything single day now for 43 days in a row.
Someone asked me what peer review is, and I suppose that's a fair question if you've never been involved in scholarship or academia. Quick answer: Peer review is the independent assessment of your research paper by experts in your field. The purpose of peer review is to evaluate the paper’s quality and suitability for publication. This is one way that science polices itself. It isn't perfect, but it's by far the best any one has ever come up with. So, MP 1.3 was read by the journals editors and two other paleontologists specilaizing in mosasasaurs. They make suggestions and offer their opinion of whether the paper should be published. I accept changes or reject them. If I reject them, I have to explain (often at length) to the editor why and justify myself. This is one reason scientific publication is, and should be, slow. This is how standards are maintained.
I am so fucking tired.
And , honestly, that fucking kid* that cut down the Sycamore Gap Tree made my list of people who need to die. Now. There are crimes I will not forgive. And this one was almost unimaginably senseless. Messages need to be sent, as vadalism of historic sites and national parks skyrockets (Tik Tok is playing a huge role): You pull this shit, and your life is forfeit.
Sorry. The anger is so near the surface lately, and mostly I hold it in.
Please visit the Dreaming Squid Sundries shop. Thanks.
Spooky spent part of the crunching numbers for the taxes.
Oh, an explanation about today's photo. The guys who come and take care of the building's lawn, their standards have fallen farther a nd farther. They have begun littering willy nilly all around the property. We know they do it. Mounds of garbage appear where they park their trucks. The Coke can is their doing. Today I picked it up and put it in recycling, after it lay there a week.
Later Tater Bean,
Aunt Beast
3:50 p.m.
*And I am told a second arrest has been made, a sixty-year-old man. Which is even less forgivable.
No work today. After finishing "Ovid Under Glass," and with many things coming up, I took a day off, more or less. Also, I might have slept four hours last night. Maybe. Sunday I'll put together Sirenia Digest 211. Monday I have to go to Tuscaloosa to do more mosasaur work there, inclduing some stuff for Mike Polcyn. End of next week we expect the last set of reviews on MP 1.3. Tomorrow morning I either need to begin a story for Sirenia Digest 212 (which will have me caught up) or I have to go back to work on The Night Watchers. The pterosaur paper is languishing. And I can't fucking sleep. And the less you sleep, the more out of whack your brain chemistry gets, the harder it is to think.
I have been outside everything single day now for 43 days in a row.
Someone asked me what peer review is, and I suppose that's a fair question if you've never been involved in scholarship or academia. Quick answer: Peer review is the independent assessment of your research paper by experts in your field. The purpose of peer review is to evaluate the paper’s quality and suitability for publication. This is one way that science polices itself. It isn't perfect, but it's by far the best any one has ever come up with. So, MP 1.3 was read by the journals editors and two other paleontologists specilaizing in mosasasaurs. They make suggestions and offer their opinion of whether the paper should be published. I accept changes or reject them. If I reject them, I have to explain (often at length) to the editor why and justify myself. This is one reason scientific publication is, and should be, slow. This is how standards are maintained.
I am so fucking tired.
And , honestly, that fucking kid* that cut down the Sycamore Gap Tree made my list of people who need to die. Now. There are crimes I will not forgive. And this one was almost unimaginably senseless. Messages need to be sent, as vadalism of historic sites and national parks skyrockets (Tik Tok is playing a huge role): You pull this shit, and your life is forfeit.
Sorry. The anger is so near the surface lately, and mostly I hold it in.
Please visit the Dreaming Squid Sundries shop. Thanks.
Spooky spent part of the crunching numbers for the taxes.
Oh, an explanation about today's photo. The guys who come and take care of the building's lawn, their standards have fallen farther a nd farther. They have begun littering willy nilly all around the property. We know they do it. Mounds of garbage appear where they park their trucks. The Coke can is their doing. Today I picked it up and put it in recycling, after it lay there a week.
Later Tater Bean,
Aunt Beast
3:50 p.m.
*And I am told a second arrest has been made, a sixty-year-old man. Which is even less forgivable.