All at the early dawn of day

[sovay]

1. Roman concrete. Courtesy of rushthatspeaks, who sent me the link a little after two in the morning last night when it made me feel better than anything had in hours. To repeat, Roman concrete. The kind that lasts two thousand years aboveground in all weathers and underwater in pollution and tides. Finally reverse-engineered, not just approximated with Portland cement. Read your Vitruvius, people. We only needed to invent the synchrotron to figure out how they did it.

2. Alicia Cole's "Once, I Was a Mermaid." I said I would shout about this poem. It's one of my favorites I've been able to publish and I'm only sorry there's no formal way to make it part of the Coney Island Mermaid Parade.

3. A groundhog in the wild raspberry canes on School Street. It sat up as I passed, still chewing. ratatosk, this may have been meant for you.

I had to take my computer, which is named Bertie Owen when I remember it, to the Apple store at the Galleria this afternoon because the battery had finally stopped even pretending to hold a charge. It came back minus its network preferences and thinking the year was 2000, but it does now appear to have a battery that works and even a new charger. After offering to replace the old one for free, the tech at the Genius Bar then decided it was the wrong charger for a 2009 MacBook Pro with a fifteen-inch screen and tried to persuade me I must have accidentally mixed up my hardware with one of my friends, but he double-checked the specs when I insisted and it turns out that this machine is the only model in its weight class to use a sixty-watt charger rather than eighty. Oh, Bertie Owen. You are a weird piece of circuitry, but I hope you never die.

The gorgeous, sea-stacked clouds of this afternoon just turned into a bucket of water dumped out of the sky. Several of them. And some thunder. I am still putting on my shoes to meet gaudior for a mead tasting at Ball Square, but I'm wondering if I should throw in some scuba gear as well.

Computer not dead, Dan. That already makes this day much better than I'd feared.

Comments

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

As you know Bob, I loved the concrete story.

And that poem by Alicia Cole. *Wow*. I love that very much. You really get first-class poetry submissions.

Very glad your Bertie Owen is doing well. Hope your air tank lasts you to Ball Square.

[sairaali.livejournal.com]

I discovered the Roman concrete story Saturday morning and could not shut up about all day. Concrete in general is just endless fascinating to me.

[ashlyme.livejournal.com]

1. Yes. That's what we use the word "awesome" for.

2. See above.

I'm glad Bertie's still alive (can I ask about the name? Google is suggesting nothing). Enjoy the mead.

[schreibergasse.livejournal.com]

Roman Seawater Concrete Holds the Secret to Cutting Carbon Emissions

!?!
!!!!
duuuude.

(Not that the rest of the news isn't cool, but...[flails inarticulately])

[nineweaving.livejournal.com]

Roman concrete rocks.

Fabulous mermaid poem.

And Bertie Owen lives on.

Pretty damned good day.

Nine

[cucumberseed.livejournal.com]

1. Badass.

2. Also Badass.

Bertie Owen is a fine name for a computer. I wonder what mine's name is...

[three-magpies.livejournal.com]

Perhaps the groundhog was interested in seeing the gorgeous, sea-stacked clouds. Sounds beautiful!

Thank you for the poem shout out. ^_^

[ap-aelfwine.livejournal.com]

I'm chuffed about the Roman concrete as well. I've always resented Portland cement slightly, for reasons I can't really articulate,* so I'm happy to have the real thing reproduced at last.

2.

Splendid poem!

3.

Cute. I like groundhogs, as long as they're not in places where they can endanger horses. Urban groundhogs, these I approve.

I'm very glad that your computer continues to function. I hope you've been able to sort the network preferences and the year.

I hope the mead tasting was everything you could wish it to be, and that it was possible to get there and back without scuba gear.

*Because I prefer the feeling of lime mortar under my fingertips? But that would only date to when I first learnt to distinguish lime and Portland in the field, and I could swear I resented Portland even when I read about it as a child. Perhaps it was because of it not being the Roman concrete it was meant to approximate?