morning thoughts

We were at a party last night for a friend who is moving to Portland. (It seems like all the geeks are moving there.) It was really, really nerdy and I'm kind of glad I did not wear my "I heart NERDS" shirt because that would have been just overkill. I actually didn't know anyone there, as this person was more Mark's friend. But I got to meet a lot of nerds, and girl geeks in particular - one owned a hosting company, one went to school at Harvey Mudd. One of them is currently working on a nonfiction book on women in science and engineering. We talked a lot about that, and also about writing and publishing in general. I felt kind of sad because I have not been writing anything in particular for years, and she seemed to have this commitment to her work that I just don't feel.

Of relevance: Zeldman commissioned a study for stats on women working in web design. Results: unsurprising. Comments on post: unsurprisingly annoying.

What was weird about this party was that we couldn't find people who watched tv. Not that this is a prerequisite for being our friends or anything, but Mark and I really like watching television, and love talking about certain shows. It was a pretty nice party overall.

I finally started reading an actual book again. I was in the middle of A History of God by Karen Armstrong, and then I stopped. For the past few weeks I've been doing crossword puzzles during my train ride, but now I'm back. The History of God is pretty fascinating, and I'm learning a lot, but Armstrong has some pretty strong tics that can get kind of repetitive and annoying.

online publishing tool for things that are not blogs

PublicSquare is an interesting concept - basically it's something you can use as a template for your own magazine, zines, etc. It's free; if you want more stuff, you can pay a small fee.