Drag-king mummy

NPR has an interesting article about a mummy believed to be Egypt's most powerful female pharoah, Hatshepsup.

Poor Hattie was afraid that she'd lose the regency because she was a woman, so she petitioned and obtained legal authority to rule as king. Then she started doing the drag king thing, complete with fake beard. I wonder if she looked like young Marlon Brando, Egyptian-style.

Anyway, the whole man thing apparently worked out for her, because she's regarded as one of the greatest rulers of her time, at least according to NPR.

"Every other celeb..."

I'd just like to clarify something about last night's post. I had a comment this afternoon from "anonymous" (not Paul) that said:

It's funny how you said:
"every other celebrity"
So are you implying that you, too, are a celeb? LOL!

I'll have you know that I am a celeb ... at least in my own mind. :)

No, I'm kidding. I actually redacted part of my post before it went live. After MyHeritage runs the facial recognition doodad, you're given a list of 10 celebs. Then you choose the ones you want to go on your widget.

They had the nerve to tell me I look like Larry King. Oh, and it's not just a passing resemblance thing. Oh, no -- I actually am a 68% match to his face.

My original post went something like this:

Dear MyHeritage: Thanks to your crackerjack software, I now know I'm as, err, ruggedly handsome as Larry King. Never mind that I have long pink bangs and he's balding. Or that he's grumpy-looking and I have a nice smile (if I do say so myself). We both (gasp!) wear black eyeglasses -- and that means we're obviously dead ringers. P.S. Apparently, I look like every other celebrity with big emo-ish glasses, too. @_@

I swear to god, heads are going to roll if any of you guys pipe up in defense of the facial recognition. Grr.

Celeb look-alikes

Apparently, I look like every other celeb with big emo-ish glasses. @_@

News

I renewed everyone's domain for another year. You're welcome.

Got a new blood count Thursday, and my white count jumped from 15.3 to 19.7. Twenty is the "line in the sand," as my hemotologist calls it, meaning that when it hits 20, I have the bone marrow biopsy. He's explained to me what it's going to feel like ("quite uncomfortable") and how long it's going to take (about 10 minutes). My bloodwork checkups have stepped up from every three months to every six weeks. I've kind of felt ... deflated ... over the whole thing because I thought I was past the worst of it. It's pretty much the only thing on my mind.

Sigh.

How to Be Cool? Cool!

Johanna's new book, How to Be Cool, came out today.

She's on a short book tour right now (schedule here and on her MySpace page), so go see her if she's coming to a city near you. And if you're in Memphis, she's going to be at Davis-Kidd on Tuesday, June 12, at 6 p.m.

Reviews so far -- including Publishers Weekly and a mention in the Chicago Tribune -- are positive. I know a couple more are schedule to print this week, but I'm not sure when.

Oh, and Pablo and I are mentioned in the acknowledgments. How crazy is that? We're acknowledged in How to Be Cool, which kinda sorta makes me feel like I have a small cool quotient ... and then I come to my senses.

Anyway... the publisher is Berkley Hardcover. ISBN is 978-0425213841. Retail is $21.95, but Amazon has it on sale for less than $15.

... And no, Smacky, I'm not planning to read it online.

Books and bytes

Any of you guys used DailyLit yet? Free service. Breaks down books into small doses (~5 min. each), and sends them to you once a day until the book is finished.

I thought I'd give it a try with a semi-short book, you know, in case I didn't like the service. Most of the releases are classics, i.e. titles now in the public domain. However, I came across Cory Doctorow's Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom, released in 2002 under a Creative Commmons license. You can buy a hard copy from Amazon here.

Honestly, I'm not much of a sci-fi fan -- at least not as much as some folks I know, Paul included -- but the prologue sounded interesting. And DailyLit was releasing it in 65 parts (it's a roughly 200-page book in print). Two months is much more manageable than some of the other titles. Les Miserables is a mighty 679 installments -- nearly two years. Even my dear Walden tops 120 installments.

But Down and Out was a mere 65. Two months. I could handle two months. I received my first installment Thursday, and my second on Friday. Saturday, I used the "receive next installment now" feature to send myself seven more. Today, I downloaded and read the rest of the book, which pretty much negates the point of using a daily service to read snippets of books. A lazy Sunday curled up with a book -- even an electronic book. Very cool.