The Alloy of Law takes place on the same world as his Mistborn trilogy, three hundred years later. Unlike the worlds of most fantasy novels, this one has changed considerably over the centuries.

The heroes of the previous trilogy fought with swords; now the weapon of choice is a firearm. Electric lights and skyscrapers have been introduced. The news – spread through the city by broadsheets – is all about the recent spate of train robberies.

The heroes are lawmen from the Roughs – Sanderson’s version of the “Wild West.” The whole setting seems so clearly based on American society at the end of the nineteenth century that I found myself wondering what basis there was for development in that direction.

I don’t mind that Sanderson doesn’t bother to tell how the social and technological changes came about. It does make sense that a fantasy world would change, just as our world has. In most fantasy novels, it seems to be assumed that magic takes the place of science, but Sanderson ably demonstrates that the two can co-exist quite nicely (in fiction, at any rate).

It feels a bit strange to read it, though. We simply don’t expect gunslingers to use magic. I’m not sure whether allomancy and feruchemy are properly considered magic within the scope of the Mistborn universe; they are abilities that certain people are born with and which require them to ingest certain metals in order to use them. But in The Alloy of Law, at least, these are the primary elements that make it fantasy rather than simply an unusual Western.

Even after I got used this juxtaposition of technology and fantasy, I kept wondering whether the combination of technologies made sense. Our own world’s history shows that metalworking becomes increasingly sophisticated and gives rise to more and more complex technologies. In any world it would make sense for that to be so.

But is it in any sense inevitable that, at a particular point in history, the new technologies should be handguns, electric lights, trains, and skyscrapers? What do those inventions have in common that would make their development coincide? Does Sanderson use those particular elements simply to help the reader imagine this society, based on prior knowledge of American history? Or is it really most likely that another society would develop along the same lines?

Most fantasy is set in something like our Middle Ages, with a feudal society, very little technology, and usually an abundance of fighting men sporting armor and swords. I started asking myself why that is, and as I had few answers I asked google instead.

At a writers’ forum, I found many possible answers in this discussion of why so much of fantasy writing has a medieval-type setting. Answers range from the desire to imitate Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings to an avoidance of having to explain where the technology came from. (The latter answer makes sense, considering my own thoughts as I read Sanderson’s novel.)

Some of it is put down to laziness on the part of writers: writing a novel that includes technology requires research into how the technology works, while writers of medieval fantasy seem to get away with just making up all the details. Readers also seem reluctant to accept the mixture of otherworldly fantasy with this-worldly science.

One explanation was that superstition was rampant in the Middle Ages; it simply seems appropriate to populate a fantasy book with such a setting with the sort of creatures and abilities that people of the Middle Ages would have thought thoroughly believable.

There are books that do mix fantasy and technology – I learned the word steampunk from reading reviews of this novel. I haven’t read any of the works mentioned in discussions of the term, but I might try one or two.

Discussion of the setting aside, The Alloy of Law is an enjoyable book once you get far enough into it. It starts slowly, and it took me quite a while to really get interested, but once I did, I thought Sanderson did a good job. The main characters are interesting, the allomancy and feruchemy are used in different ways than in the Mistborn trilogy (not entirely different, but there is enough that is new to be interesting), and the ending is satisfying. (It was to me, anyway, though I read reviews that found it disappointing.)

I look forward to Sanderson’s future novels, in the Mistborn setting or anywhere else.

I vaguely remember reading Robert Heinlein’s short story “The Roads Must Roll,” in which the roads move instead of the people. There are strips moving at different speeds, ranging from 5 mph up to 100 mph. I’ve often thought of that story (without being able to remember most of the details) when attempting to merge into a lane of faster traffic.

There is the idea of teleporting, instantaneous transportation from one place to another. The best known example is “beaming” in Star Trek, but the idea goes back to at least 1933 (Frank K. Kelly).

The idea of cars that can drive themselves is hardly new either, but I don’t remember it showing up very often in the stories I have read. I suppose it just doesn’t make for much drama. I remember very much enjoying “Knight Rider” in the early 1980′s, but it was KITT’s personality rather than his (its?) technical capabilities that made the show interesting.

I used to think that self-propelled vehicles would require retrofitting the roads to embed devices that would enable the car to determine its current location. But GPS has changed all that, making it feasible today for a device to pinpoint its precise location. (At least as long as contact can be made with satellites – I don’t know what would happen to a robot car dependent on GPS when it went into a tunnel.)

While I try to keep up on current events via various news sources on the internet, I apparently missed the news in 2010 about autonomous automobiles. I learned about these amazing technological developments from reading a months-old copy of Popular Science while riding an exercise bike at the Y yesterday.

The article‘s focus is on the technology and its complexity (“the plug-in electric Chevrolet Volt, for example, requires 10 million lines of code, two million more than it takes to run a Boeing 787″). It addresses the potential benefits (drastic reductions in traffic congestion and accidents) and potential conflicts (who controls the car, the computer or the driver?), as well as pointing out the possibility that such cars will be sold with driving plans, like cell phones, instead of the current pricing models.

What the article doesn’t address, but which I immediately started wondering about, is how security would be handled. If someone hacks your computer today, you could lose money or data. That could be devastating to your personal or business finances, but the damages can be limited with appropriate planning and insurance.

What if someone manages to hack an autonomous car, however? Could they make cars drive into each other? What would it be like to be inside a car that was apparently going rogue? Would there be any kind of manual override? (Would anyone still know how to drive well enough to successfully avert disaster at that point?)

I see that the U.S. Department of Transportation is thinking about such possibilities. States are also beginning to address the legal issues. Autonomous cars will become legal in Nevada at the beginning of March. (I’m trying to picture a state trooper pulling over a self-driven car: “Car, show me your license.)

Is it a sign of my getting older that the idea of a robotic car doesn’t appeal to me? When driving and struggling to stay awake on a long trip, I’m sure I’ve wished for a car that could take over the driving for me. But if such an automobile were actually available (aside from the question of whether I could afford one), I’m not sure how comfortable I would be entrusting myself to one.

I have enough trouble relaxing sometimes when someone else is driving. It’s not that I think I’m such a great driver; I know that my husband drives better in bad weather than I do. But somehow sitting in the driver’s seat and having my hands on the steering wheel gives a sense of some measure of control. Being a passenger means that I have no control.

An autonomous car is probably a much better driver than any human. But knowing the glitches to which computers are subject, not to mention the possibility of malicious intervention by hackers, I don’t know how well I could sit back and relax with no one at the wheel.

  Long road, heavy load

It’s not that I insist on doing things without help. I just don’t ask for it if I don’t need to. And I will never assume I need help until I’ve tried on my own.

I have no idea whether this is because my parents wanted to teach us to be independent. They expected us to make our own decisions from a young age, and to go places on our own. If there was something we didn’t know how to do, we were expected to try to figure it out.

At school, I never needed help, because things like math and reading came easily to me. If there was anything I didn’t figure out right away, I wasn’t going to let anyone know that because I had a reputation for being the smartest kid in the class (maybe in the school).

Perhaps it was because I was shy, and asking for help meant initiating a conversation. I didn’t ever talk much, even with people I did know. I preferred being alone, and I preferred doing things on my own.

I also was eager to prove that I coud do things, even at a young age. I was the youngest at any family activity, even those that included my cousins. I didn’t want anyone to make any accommodations for me being younger and smaller, so I worked at being able to keep up with people with longer legs, and to keep going even if I was tired.

I preferred to be with people who were older than I was, because I other children my own age didn’t know as much, and were more likely to act childishly. I wanted to prove that I belonged with older children or adults, so I felt a need to be able to do things without needing help.

Maybe it was some of the books I read. The sort of hero I wanted to be like was one who was independent, who didn’t need anyone else for anything. One who could face any difficulty or danger with equanimity, who didn’t get upset or excited at much of anything (even positive things). I wasn’t like that, really – I’ve always avoided danger, though not difficulty. But that was my ideal.

I remember going shopping for my mother, which meant walking a mile to the supermarket, and then carrying home the bags of groceries. These were paper bags, of course – plastic bags with handles hadn’t come into use yet (at least where we lived). One bag wasn’t hard to carry, but two full bags were.

I remember one time the bags were so heavy that I had to stop a few times to rest, and by the time I reached home my muscles were so tired that I could barely hold the bags up. But that was no reason to consider asking for help – it just meant I had to be more careful how much I purchased (weight-wise) in one shopping trip.

These days I almost always drive the car to the store (normally I go on the way home from work), and I use cloth bags with handles. I only have to carry the bags from the car to the house, which means going the length of the back yard (we live on a corner, and the driveway is at the rear of the backyard).

My husband does not understand why I insist on trying to carry everything in one trip, instead of taking one bag, going in the house, and telling the boys to go get the rest. Occasionally I will ask one of the boys to get the rest – but only after carrying as much as I can possibly manage on the first trip.

When it comes to solving puzzles, I especially do not want help. I get very annoyed if someone tries to give help, because I want to solve it on my own. My younger son does not understand this – he is always quite ready to ask for help on something that is hard to figure out. But that takes away the fun of it for me, and certainly takes away the sense of accomplishment in figuring it out.

What do I ask for help on? Coming up with ideas for meals. I get so tired of thinking of what to cook. (Except that now, when I’m trying to cook and eat healthier foods, I don’t generally ask because the suggestions are likely to be things I don’t want.)

If I have trouble figuring out the notes in a piece of music I’m learning for choir, I’ll ask for help. I don’t have nearly the sense of music that my husband does (and my older son). I’m also not nearly as good with the piano (every time I have to count white and black keys to find a C).

If there’s something heavy to carry at work, I just might ask for help, if there’s a man around that I am comfortable asking. (And I couldn’t tell you why I am more comfortable asking some than others.) But if I don’t find one, I’ll go ahead and do it myself.

A few weeks ago, I took down the artificial Christmas tree from the lobby. By the time I finished, most of my co-workers had left for the day. There were a few I could have asked, but no one I knew well. So I decided to try to carry it myself. Not too bad – for the first few yards. It got heavier as I continued down the hall, but I could do it.

Out into the plant, up the stairs to the storage area on the mezzanine. Funny how heavy that tree got as I went higher up the stairs. There were some people sitting on a bench at the bottom, but of course I wasn’t going to ask them for help – I didn’t know them at all. And since they saw me carrying it, I wasn’t going to look foolish by deciding I needed help after all.

Next Christmas I will probably ask for help. Then again, if I keep working out at the Y three days a week, maybe I won’t need to…

But it’s a good thing that’s what Dorothea Taylor did, because it turned out it was her husband who was being stomped on by the moose. After a few whacks from the shovel, the moose decided this petite woman wasn’t someone to mess with, and went on his way.

I’ve already read that the sort of people who choose to live in Alaska are strong, independent, resourceful types. This story certainly makes a good case for that assertion. I hope when I’m 85 that I have the strength to swing a shovel – but I hope I never have to defend myself or anyone else with it.

I have since read all the Tintin books I could find, between those I purchased in Europe (in French), and those in the local library here (most in English, but also some in French). I don’t know how much it is for the pleasure of the books themselves, and how much some sense of nostalgia for an element of my childhood. But I do enjoy them.

When I first learned that a Tintin movie was being made, I was pleased. Then I read that it would use motion capture, and initial samples that had been released did not seem overly promising. I wasn’t planning to go see it in the theater.

Then I read a very positive review of the movie by Frederica Mathewes-Green. (I am on the emailing list for her newsletters.) Plus we still had money left on the movie theater gift card that Al had won for his Ent costume at Halloween (even after going to another movie – going to matinees saves a lot of money).

On the whole, I would say that I am “underwhelmed.” It certainly wasn’t a bad movie – on the whole it was reasonably entertaining. But I didn’t leave the theater with any particular eagerness to see a sequel (which is strongly hinted at in the ending), or any sense of wonder over what a remarkable movie I had seen. I certainly didn’t replay scenes in my mind as I do after movies that really impress me.

It’s hard to put my finger on where I think the movie falls short. It doesn’t particularly bother me that it does not follow the original storyline very faithfully. (The Adventures of Tintin actually combines elements from three Tintin books.) I was surprised, at the beginning, when Tintin did not take the model ship he had purchased to the home of his friend Captain Haddock. But that was the last time that I noticed a detail that seemed wrong to me, rather than something I simply didn’t remember being in the book.

I don’t think I’m bothered by the motion capture effect, though I don’t think it adds anything much to the story over traditional animation. On the whole, scenes seem remarkably realistic, and sometimes I found myself marvelling over intricate details, such as in the sheikh’s home. (I suppose, though, that my attention wandering from the story to the visual details shows that the story wasn’t exactly gripping.) Characters’ faces looked as they should, if not quite how I remember them from the comics.

Perhaps it is the fact that so many details are filled in, compared with the relatively simply line drawings of the comics. I have heard since I was growing up that one of the drawbacks of TV is that children do not use their imagination the way they do when they read books. Comics such as Tintin are visual, but they still require a fair amount of filling in details by using one’s imagination. And the characters of Tintin and Haddock in the movie simply did not either match how I had imagined them, or provide a good alternative depiction.

I read a lot of very positive reviews at imdb.com. I wonder if perhaps some people had imagined Tintin and Haddock more like they were portrayed in the movie, and that therefore the movie met their expectations better. But there were also a number of neutral or negative reviews, so I am not alone in feeling that the characters in the movies do not do justice to the originals.

Perhaps it is that the movie was nearly all action, with little humor. I did not find the Thompson and Thompson duo nearly as amusing as in the books. Though, again, some viewers thought the bumbling detectives were just right and that the movie as chock full of humor.

Even the positive reviews did admit that the action sequences were somewhat overdone. The Tintin stories were full of action, some of it fairly improbable, but they did not have the extended chase scenes that seem to be the province of action movies. Those scenes are Tintin as he would have been if Spielberg created him, rather than Tintin as  Hergé created him.

Perhaps I’m being overly critical. I don’t put down a Tintin book with a sense of wonder either, or replay its scenes in my mind as I do after reading a really good novel. I simply enjoy it – but then I do look for another one to read next.

Perhaps the movie will get more people reading the Tintin books. Perhaps the library will get in some additional Tintin books I haven’t read before. That would be a good sequel to seeing the movie.

It’s not that I was bad at math. On the contrary, it came easily to me (except for one unit in third grade when we had to learn base 8), and I found it very boring. As a senior in high school I did my calculus homework to relax from more challenging subjects like literary analysis and chemistry. I enjoyed competing in Math League, but I had no interest in studying advanced math topics on my own in order to do better at the meets.

What I liked was writing. I had always been good at it, at least according to my teachers. (My mother also thought I wrote well, but I discounted her opinion as lacking objectivity.) I had always loved to read, and I longed to be able to write stories that other people would enjoy reading.

I also was drawn by the idea of being able to communicate important ideas. I enjoyed studying literature, history, and philosophy because they were about ideas, about the things that really mattered in life. How could anyone want to sit at a desk adding up columns of numbers when there were opportunities to shape people’s views on important issues?

I’ve written in a previous post some of the reasons I did not become a writer, or a missionary, or last very long as a high school teacher. When I worked as a programmer/analyst I took pride in my ability to learn new computer languages, to interact with users and understand their needs, and to solve puzzles (getting programs to work the way you want is a big logic puzzle). I knew that part of being good at it was being detail-oriented, but I never thought of that as one of my primary abilities.

I don’t know exactly which of my abilities got me the job I’ve had for the past seven years, but it certainly has given me a reputation in my department for being very detail-oriented and very good at catching mistakes. (I wish, sometimes, though, that some people’s first reaction when I approach was not to ask “What did I do wrong?”)

Now that the software change management process is being integrated with infrastructure change management, that part of my job is going away. I’ve accumulated a variety of other duties over the years, due to my ability to get things done very efficiently and my willingness to take on new responsibilities unrelated to what I was already doing. But my supervisor felt it was necessary to find me a new place in the department now that my “primary” responsibility (primary in importance, but pretty low these days in the amount of time it takes) is going away.

We had discussed having me join the PC setup group, and I was looking forward to getting my technical skills back up to date. I wondered what would happen to some of the other work I do now, but I thought that configuring new computers and troubleshooting and repairing older ones would make good use of my abilities and perhaps develop some new ones.

I was quite unprepared for the news I got Thursday afternoon, however. My supervisor came to my desk, clearly excited by the result of his meeting with his manager. He had found a place for me, he told me, and his manager was excited about it also. It’s not with the PC setup group, though – it’s in telecomm.

Telecomm? As in phones? I know very little about phones except that I don’t like using them. I’m sure I could learn the technical stuff, but I just don’t like talking to someone without being able to see facial expressions and other body language. Why would I want to become an expert in devices that I dislike on general principles?

It turns out they’re not interested in my technical skills, however. They want my attention to details, to process the mammoth phone bill that currently takes someone about ten hours a week (and takes her away from dealing with technical issues). My previous supervisor assured my current supervisor that I would be very good at this.

I suppose I will be. I’ve always told employers that one of my strengths is learning new information and procedures quickly. The telecomm supervisor said it will probably take me months to learn this, but I hope to master it more quickly than that. He tells me that I should feel free to modify the process to improve it, which I hope to do.

I can’t help wondering, though, how it is that I end up with a job working with numbers. I love words and ideas and helping people see things in new ways. Why is it that what I’m really good at is efficiently processing information that is of no inherent interest? I know it needs to be done, and if I can streamline the process it will be an accomplishment I can point out to prospective employers.

But phones, and numbers? That just wasn’t how life was supposed to work out.

The weird photoshopped image of a football player (Ray Rice) looking like an overgrown head of lettuce didn’t exactly draw me in either. But then I happened to notice the subhead, which mentions chia seeds.

I first heard of chia seeds from a co-worker a few months ago, when we were doing Dr. Ann’s Eat Right for Life program. I was surprised to learn that the tiny seeds used to grow chia pets were actually useful for something other than gag gifts.

Chia seeds weren’t mentioned in Dr. Ann’s book, but they seemed the sort of food she would recommend. They’re high in protein, soluble fiber, and omega-3 fatty acids, as well as antioxidants and minerals. Plus they absorb lots of water so they should help in reducing hunger cravings.

I bought a bag one day, along with a new jar of tahini to make hummus, from the health food section of the local supermarket. Then the bag just sat in my cupboard for several weeks. Even though I’ve been trying to eat more healthful foods, I’m just not into eating a lot of “weird” foods.

Then one morning recently I decided it was time to try adding some to my oatmeal. I had no idea what it would do to the consistency if I added it before cooking, so I added it after cooking, along with my blackstrap molasses. It had very little effect on consistency or taste, though I noticed a slight difference in texture and taste.

I added a tablespoonful of the seeds to my oatmeal again this morning. I don’t know if the chia seeds were responsible for my not feeling need of any midmorning snack, but they might have been. (Last Saturday, when I first tried them, I didn’t get hungry for lunch until later than usual, so they may be working in that regard.)

A bag of chia seeds seems quite expensive – I paid over nine dollars for 12 ounce bag. But then, when you consider that the bag holds about 28 servings (one tablespoon each), it’s quite inexpensive compared to what I pay for most forms of protein.

I don’t care much whether chia seeds help Ray Rice win football games. But if they help me get in better shape, I don’t mind having that in common with an NFL football player.

Scrabble!

When I first saw the question about a board game I would never get tired of, I had trouble thinking of one. When my son asks to play a game, I usually try to think of one we haven’t played in a while. Most of them are moderately entertaining, but not something I want to play frequently.

I thought of LIFE, Clue, Trouble, and the various other board games in our “gaming room” in the basement (including a few Al and I made up together). I looked at answers other people had given – checkers, chess, Monopoly. (How could someone not get tired of Monopoly?)

Then as I was walking out the door on my way to work I suddenly thought of Scrabble. Oh yes, Scrabble is a board game, isn’t it? I can’t remember the last time I played Scrabble on an actual gameboard instead of a computer screen.

I log on to Facebook at least once a day, usually more, to see if it’s my turn in Scrabble or Words with Friends (similar to Scrabble though not quite as good in my opinion). And sometimes my husband and I play Scrabble (which is also a standalone application) on his computer.

I would probably play it more often if it were loaded on my computer, though I don’t find it as fun to play against the computer as against another person. There’s no one to exclaim to over lousy letter choices or the fact that the built-in dictionary doesn’t allow a perfectly good word, or to suggest good words to (my husband and I regularly offer each other suggestions).

Back when I lived in the Philadelphia area, I had a friend who would occasionally invite me over for dinner and Scrabble (and sometimes to help her with her computer). Those were fun evenings. Playing on a computer is just not the same, though online Scrabble is better than a lot of the other games out there.

Scrabble was the one board game that my mother was willing to play, as I remember. She had no use for activities that were purely for entertainment, but Scrabble was educational. She didn’t care if she won, she just wanted to learn new words.

All in all I prefer to win than to lose, but the main thing I like about Scrabble is the game itself. I love word puzzles of any kind. (I amazed myself by finally managing to finish the acrostic from Saturday’s Wall Street Journal last night, after four days of struggling with it.) And Scrabble is a great word puzzle.

If you like Scrabble and you’re on Facebook, let’s play!

My husband has tried in the past to find it available to watch online, but until yesterday had not succeeded. It being my birthday, he wanted to find something I would like. We ended up watching a couple of episodes of “Bones” (my choice), but he also made a note where to find this movie, and this afternoon we watched it.

I was very impressed by how well the essence of the story was translated to the screen from the novel. It’s been a few years since I listened to the audiobook, so I didn’t remember a lot of details. The one thing that I noticed that the movie lacked was more detail about Claire’s artwork (something that I had found very interesting in the novel because I had never imagined one could be such an artist just by making paper).

Reading reviews (after watching the movie) by others who had read and appreciated the book, I was reminded of characters and details I had forgotten. The fact that I had forgotten them, though – since I do have quite a good memory – shows that they were not at the heart of the story.

The movie gets across well the difficulties Henry’s time traveling creates both for him and for Claire. Henry has no control over when he leaves, what time or place he travels to, or when he returns. He always arrives nude, which often has him on the run, first for appearing nude in public and then for theft of clothing to cover himself.

Claire, to whom he first appeared when she was six, has been in love with him just about all her life (a source of confusion to Henry when he first meets her in his own timeline, since it was a future Henry who had been visiting her). She gladly marries him, but gets understandably upset at his unpredictable disappearances (including during his own wedding ceremony).

The reasons for the strains on their relationship are clearly different from that of everyone else, but the struggle to love another in spite of their difficulties is familiar to anyone in any kind of close relationship. It’s a movie about choosing love and the joy it brings despite the loss and sorrow that will also come.

To realize, though, that I have lived half a century – that puts it in terms, not of who I am, but the history I have lived through. And a half century of history seems like a long time, compared to the pace of life as we live it.

I have been alive for all or part of the terms of ten U.S. presidents. And I can remember events related to all but the first two of those. Probably the first historical event that I remember being aware of was the moon landing, though I had trouble seeing why it was quite the big deal that adults seemed to think it was.

Out of curiosity, I looked at some of the websites that list significant events in 1962. Lots of them have to do with people and places that I still know little about, but some are easy to relate to.

The year I was born, the first Wal-Mart opened. And the first Kmart, and the first Target store. The first Taco Bell also opened that year.

Tab-opening aluminum cans were introduced. The first active communications satellite was launched, and relayed the first transatlantic television transmission.

The first industrial robot was introduced. John Glenn became the first American to orbit the earth. The first American rocket reached the moon. The first interplanetary probe reached Venus. So it’s not surprising that toys offered that year included a moon landing set and a robot.

John F. Kennedy was president. His younger brother Ted was elected (as the result of a great deal of money spent by his father) to the Senate seat JFK had vacated to become president.

Things cost a lot less in 1962. (Exact numbers differ depending on what site you look at, but they’re all in the same range.) You could buy a new house for $25,000 (average), and a new car for $3,125 (average). Of course, you were likely making only about $5,556 a year.

Gas cost 28 cents a gallon. A first class postage stamp cost four cents. A pack of chewing gum or a candy bar cost five cents. (I can actually remember paying those prices, and being indignant when the cost doubled to a dime.)

Some things cost a lot more. You would have paid $400 for a color TV, and $40 for a transistor radio (AM only). Realizing how much of a person’s earnings it took to buy those, consumer electronics are amazingly inexpensive today.

Chubby Checker‘s recording of “The Twist” hit the top of the charts for the second time (and was the most popular song the week I was born). Shortly thereafter, Bishop Burke of Buffalo banned it from all Catholic schools as “un-Christian.” (The bishop died later that year; one can only imagine what he would think of the music young people listen to fifty years later.)