Astronauts Just Found Life In Space, We Kid You Not

This is literally my favorite ever. Best post. Good.

King Arthur: I actually think he was probably not a wizard. But he definitely knew about wizardry and did his best to support it.

Gawain: Definitely a wizard. DEFINITELY a wizard. Specializes in liaising with nonhuman species living on earth, go-to diplomat when aliens show up.

Kay: Nope, Kay’s...

"All Our Myriad Worlds Lie Whole"

I realize my blog is a bit scattered, and mostly fandom based, and probably no small amount of ridiculous, but I’m going to share a fandom-related story with you lovely followers. ^___^ What follows is a ramble-y account of my love affair with the Young Wizards Series.

I went to NYC for a choir trip during my senior year of high school (which was a lot longer ago than I feel like it should be…), and while we were there we visited a few museums…as one does on field trips, you know? Well, the highlight of our trip, for me, was definitely getting to weigh myself on all the planets, because of the scene in High Wizardry by Diane Duane. And, yes, I checked to make sure the ladies’ didn’t lead to Mars…I was disappointed to find just toilets, I’ll admit. (Just kidding! …well, mostly.)

It’s weird to realize the impact a book series can have on you, the ways in which the written word can influence you. But I’ve been reading the Young Wizards Series for so long now (and that’s a story in and of itself, which I’ll probably share at some point), that in many, many ways I feel as if the characters know me as well as I know them. I sometimes imagine that maybe, somewhere out there, there’s a universe where literary characters are all real, and are reading about our universe’s fantastical adventures. If the universe is infinite, and if there are an infinite number of universes, then who’s to say there isn’t a world like that, after all? Maybe in some place, Nita and Kit are reading about my Ordeal, or my little sister running off all over the universe (she does run off to Europe on occasion…the rest of the galaxy isn’t such a far stretch, at that…).

But back to my point. I stood there, my hand on the same asteroid that Kit and Nita discuss as having come such a long way, and for me the moment was beautifully surreal. I don’t think any of my classmates had such a profound experience as I did on that trip, because I finally had arrived at a place that I had been reading about since I first got into fantasy, and it was a real place, not something unattainable like The Leaky Cauldron, or a magical wardrobe to Narnia.

It was real, and I could touch it.

I think that’s the real power of words, right there; the real magic in our universe. That one person’s words can leave such a lasting impression on another human being isremarkableandpowerful, and has the same chance of being misused as the magic I so dearly love to read about. Because as surely as words can heal and inform and touch, they can just as surely be used to hurt and twist and maim.

And I think, maybe, much of my fascination with words and languages comes from Diane Duane’s books, too, as surely as my fascination with that asteroid came from her books.

I’ve been called childish and ridiculous—been told that no one can take me seriously. I’ve been bullied, and was pushed off swing sets when I was little, and I’ve been called all sorts of unpleasant names like “nerd” and “loser”, among others, and been told I read too much (as if there is such a thing!). Maybe these things are why I empathized so totally with Nita, that very first time I read So You Want to be a Wizard, but she kind of became something of a guiding light to me. At first it was just that Nita had a profound impact on me, as a character with whom I shared so much, but later, as I grew older and continued to reread the series, it became less Nita, and more the entire feel of the series. There is so much good in this series, so many “words to live by” and the characters are so unconsciously good that to the reader it becomes second nature, too. Kit and Nita are like two bright standard bearers in a world that seems progressively darker, that more and more places emphasis on characters who do bad things for the right reasons, instead of character who do good things because that is the right reason.

I don’t even know if I can still call the impact these books had on me “subtle” because I feel like I’ve embraced the philosophies of the characters with every fiber of my being.

I’m going into anthropology, probably with an emphasis on archaeology, which is all about understanding other peoples, and in some cases preserving those cultures which are rapidly losing themselves to “modernization”. Maybe this makes me silly, but whenever I think about what I’ll be doing later in my life, working to understand and write about cultures unlike my own, I can’t help but also hear the words of the Oath in the back of my mind. I live by those words. I think they are perfect, and important, and I still read them out loud every time I get to that page, because whether or not they can make me a wizard, they are still a promise that I made to myself when I was eleven, and I intend to keep that promise—magic or not.

Star Forming Region S106

Massive star IRS 4 is beginning to spread its wings. Born only about 100,000 years ago, material streaming out from this newborn star has formed the nebula dubbed Sharpless 2-106 Nebula (S106), pictured above. A large disk of dust and gas orbiting Infrared Source 4 (IRS 4), visible in dark red near the image center, gives the nebula an hourglass or butterfly shape. S106 gas near IRS 4 acts as an emission nebula as it emits light after being ionized, while dust far from IRS 4 reflects light from the central star and so acts as a reflection nebula. Detailed inspection of images like the above image has revealed hundreds of low-mass brown dwarf stars lurking in the nebula’s gas. S106 spans about 2 light-years and lies about 2000 light-years away toward the constellation of the Swan (Cygnus).

Top Ten Female Characters from Books or Television

2) Nita Callahan

Favorite quote: “Wow, who sold you that one? I think I’ll go ennoble a couple waffles.” (And basically all of books 6 and 9 where she saves the day)

Nita is my favorite book heroine ever. From the very beginning, I related to her completely for her love of reading and learning, and for being made fun of for it. She is one of the most relatable characters I’ve ever come across. She’s young, but seems so much older- whether because of the wizardry and the responsibility that comes along with it, or because everyone always feels like they’re more mature than the world thinks they are. She shows us that you don’t have to be a respected adult to change (or to save) the world. She’s insecure, selfish, moody (like when she snaps at Kit for no reason), but she also can admit when she’s messed up and learns from her mistakes. She considers giving up wizardry and her best friend to save her mother. She almost goes through with sacrificing herself to save the world (even though she wasn’t too happy about it when she first found out that’s what she got herself into) when she was what, 12/13? She’s quick in a crisis, and very smart. In A Wizard Alone, she taught me so much about grieving, and I wished those books had been there for me when my own mom passed away (though I was probably a bit too young then). Not to mention that in A Wizard Alone she singlehandedly saves the day, using what the Lone Power tried to use to bring her down to bring It down, and save Darryl and Kit. She also nearly singlehandedly saves the day in A Wizard of Mars, not letting her jealousy or anger get in the way of what needed to be done, while also being rather bad ass about it. Nita taught me that it’s okay to be angry- you can use it to your advantage. She helped to teach me that what people think of you doesn’t matter. The people who made fun of/beat up Nita didn’t know that she helped save their lives more than once, and she never let them color her view of humanity. She never once doubted that their lives weren’t worth saving, despite how they treated her. She showed me that being a good sister doesn’t mean you can’t fight and tease each other sometimes.  She went from being very dependent on Kit- always giving her power to him, helping him rather than the other way around- to being a very good, independent wizard who stands on her own and stands tall.

why would someone think this is a good idea

Iris Scott - Lunar Eclipse, 2020 - Oil on canvas

Io is the first Galilean moon of Jupiter, it is slightly larger than Earth’s moon.  Io experiences intense tidal heating due to its elliptical orbit and orbital resonance with Europa and Ganymede.  This makes Io the most geologically active moon in our solar system.  Io’s interior is composed of molten iron sulphide, and the surface is a crust of sulfur and silicon.  Io has more than 400 active volcanoes, which can eject lava plumes more than 500 kilometers above the surface.  Some of the material from Io’s volcanic eruptions leaves the moon and orbits Jupiter, producing a plasma torus.  Io also has lakes of lava called paterae, which can also create eruptions.  The most dramatic paterae are Loki, Tvashtar, and Tupan.  The constant volcanic activity creates a thin atmosphere of sulfur dioxide and sodium chloride.  Io is an interesting model for exoplanets with intense geological activity, such as COROT-7b.

Still breathing hard from what she’d been through, Dairine turned away and walked back to the house, slowly, and went into her room and shut the door. And only then did she allow herself, somewhat later, the very smallest smile.

“But who prays for Satan? Who, in eighteen centuries, has had the common humanity to pray for the one sinner that needed it most?”

- Mark Twain

This is honestly my favorite quote. It’s changed how I look at life and religion.

(via the-bitchextraordinaire)

So this quote seemed very familiar when I saw it earlier, and I just realized why. 

The power was burning in her tears, an odd hot feeling as she wept for Fred, for Kit’s Lotus, for everything horrible that had happened all that day- all the fair things skewed, all the beauty twisted by the dark Lone Power watching on his steed. If only there were some way he could be otherwise if he wanted to!

For here was his name, a long splendid flow of syllables in the Speech, wild and courageous in its own way- and it said that he had not always been so hostile; that he got tired sometimes of being wicked, but his pride and his fear of being ridiculed would never let him stop. Never, forever, said the symbol at the very end of his name, the closed circle that binds spells into an unbreakable cycle and indicates lives bound in the same way.

Kit was still reading. Nita turned her head in the nova moonlight and looked over her shoulder at the one who watched. His face was set, furious and bitter, but yes, weary too. He knew he was about to be cast out again, frustrated again, and he knew that because of what he had bound himself into being, he would never know fulfillment of any kind. Nita looked back down to the reading feeling sorry even for him, opened her mouth and along with Kit began to say his name-

Don’t be afraid to make corrections!

Whether the voice came from her memory or was a last whisper from the blinding new star far above, Nita never knew. But she knew what to do. While Kit was still on the first part of the name she pulled out her pen, her space pen that Fred had saved and changed, and clicked it open.

The metal still tingled against her skin, the ink at the point still glittered oddly- the same glitter as the ink with which the bright Book was written. Nita bent quickly over the book and, with he pen, in lines of light, drew from that final circle an arrow pointing upward, the way out, the symbol that change could happen- if, only if- and together they finished the Starsnuffer’s name in the Speech, said the new last syllable, made it real.

- So You Want to Be a Wizard, Diane Duane

So, in the history of all of the universe, who prays for the one sinner that needs it the most? Her name is Juanita Callahan, and at age 13 she has more mercy in her soul than I could ever hope to strive for.

(via professorsparklepants)

SO YOU WANT TO BE A WIZARD HEARNSSEN PUBLISHED BY PHOENIX PRESS 793.4

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