I use Linux and as a writer, this is a problem. I like using Linux because it’s stable. It never crashes, I never have to worry about viruses or spyware, and I can control what ads I see. In my normal Internet browsing, I see maybe two ads every hour or so, compared to a constant barrage of ads on Windows. Using Linux is much more peaceful.

But there are problems with Linux, and one of them is the word processor issue. Most editors use Macs or Windows, so documents need to be in .doc or .rtf format for them to access my work. Most people who use Linux recommend OpenOffice, which I tried out when I first switched over from Windows. I hated it. It is the most annoying program ever. It has all these strange defaults, like finishing words for you when you start to type them, that forces you to rifle through the options and turn off the annoying stuff. It also has trouble reading .docs and wants everything to be in its proprietary .odt format. Even if you change it over to .doc, you can’t be sure it stays that way. I have sent editors documents in .doc and found out that it switched over to .odt somewhere along the way, and the editor couldn’t read it. This is embarrassing and annoying. So I don’t trust OpenOffice and don’t use it.

For awhile I used AbiWord, which is a simple and stripped down word processor. I like AbiWord as a program, but it doesn’t have some basic things you need as a writer. It also uses the proprietary .abw format, which I found to have all the problems of OpenOffice plus the added issue that no one uses AbiWord, so it can be downright impossible to access your .abw file under certain circumstances. I recall having a terrible time accessing a .abw file from a Windows machine, since Windows doesn’t have anything remotely able to open it. Worse, Windows couldn’t even read the name of the AbiWord files, so they came up as gobbledygook. In short, I need something more sophisticated than AbiWord.

Finally, I settled on CrossOver Office by CodeWeavers. It lets you use Word on Linux. I really like Word. I think it is a good program with minimal problems and I am happy someone figured out how I could use it on Linux. But CrossOver Office has problems too. For example, you can’t open two Word docs at once without it getting buggy and crashing. I have lost a lot of work this way. There have also been problems with it deciding to paste something many many times. I would copy something from a website, hit CTRL-V to paste, and then everything freezes while it copies the text 300 times into my document.

So there are lots of bugs that I have learned to anticipate. Over time, I have developed a hybrid system of Word and OpenOffice so that my work is more stable. If I have to have two documents open, I open one in OpenOffice, which keeps Word from crashing. If I see signs that Word is getting unstable by freezing or using a lot of CPU, I reboot the computer. Etc. Overall, it’s not too bad of a problem, but losing part of an article while on deadline is not fun.

This morning I read that Susan Orlean is abandoning Word to write her next book on Google Docs. I don’t use Google Docs and definitely would not write a book on it. The problem is that their Terms of Service claims rights over your work. To quote from the Terms of Service itself:

You retain copyright and any other rights you already hold in Content which you submit, post or display on or through, the Service. By submitting, posting or displaying the Content you give Google a worldwide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute any Content which you submit, post or display on or through the Service for the sole purpose of enabling Google to provide you with the Service.

So it looks like Google is saying it can reproduce or publish any portion of your work that you put on Google Docs! I’m no lawyer, but that’s enough of a red flag to keep me from ever using it. Plus, that’s just a creepy policy, Google. What the heck?

On top of that, according to my computer-expert husband, putting your book on Google Docs poses a security threat, especially if you are a big-time writer like Susan Orlean. Here is part of our IM conversation about it:

(09:14:56 AM) Kyle: what it really comes down to is whether google would ever actually try to do that [publish your work]
(09:15:05 AM) Joy: yeah
(09:15:10 AM) Kyle: and if they did, it may not matter what their terms of use say, you could still sue them
(09:15:35 AM) Kyle: but what it also means is that if they have some security problem (like, say, Facebook has been having) someone could grab a pre-release book from an author and publish it
(09:16:41 AM) Joy: oooh!!!
(09:17:08 AM) Kyle: even if their security is somewhat sound, it doesn’t mean an author’s google password is
(09:17:31 AM) Kyle: and if someone knows your password for google calendar or gmail account (or can hack into it), then they can get into google docs
[Short amount of time passes]
(09:21:54 AM) Kyle: heh this is fitting, gmail had a 4 hour blackour earlier today
(09:22:07 AM) Kyle: imagine if you were on deadline and google docs had an outage
(09:23:45 AM) Joy: wow yeah. that would be horrible.

So there you go. OpenOffice? Out. AbiWord? Out. CrossOver Office: Usable, but buggy. Google Docs: Super-duper out! What’s a Linux lover to do?

I heed and obey.

(Via)

“Of course any novelist has difficulties. I don’t have ‘blocks,’ I mean I don’t get into a state where absolutely nothing can be done for weeks; I can always do something, though the something that I do may have to be revised later on… I think the thing to do is to make one’s unconscious mind work for one. When there’s a problem, and suddenly you get a sort of knot in the procedure, where you want to do two things that are incompatible, for instance, or when you can’t really see what a character is like — there’s a sort of blank slate where the character ought to be — then you must meditate upon the problem, set it, as it were, as a problem to your unconscious mind, and hope that suddenly some creative flash will arrive. And that is a time that requires very great patience.” — Iris Murdoch, The Threepenny Review, 1984

I have a couple of articles in this issue of the Pacific Sun. One is about Davidson Seamount, a giant underwater volcano that they are just now starting to explore. They have found amazing sea creatures down there. Excerpt:

In the waters off Monterey, 10,000 feet below the ocean surface, is the lost world of Davidson Seamount. Down there in the darkness, pink bubblegum coral stands 8 feet tall. Spiny pink-and-white crabs scuttle across rocks. Sock tunicates bob in the current, tethered to the ground by only a string. It’s a place so pristine and full of potential that it was recently made part of the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary, which spans from Marin County all the way down to Hearst Castle.

More here.

I also wrote about the living roof on the Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park for the same issue.

What do you do when your power goes off? Well you definitely can’t work. That’s out of the question. So naturally, you call Marcia–whose power is also off–and you go out to breakfast. Then you remember that it is free museum day in San Francisco and you hop in the car. Hurrah!

I had never been to Golden Gate Park on a free museum day, and I have to tell you, it feels right to walk right into a museum. Culture should be free.

First we went to the Conservatory of Flowers. We saw a lot of tropical plants, including a fair number of orchids and these things:

Here is a picture of two old hippies wandering around and communing with plants. She was carrying a drum, in case there was a drum circle to join, I assume.

After that, we went to the de Young Museum. I was fascinated with the exhibit of artifacts from New Guinea. All the masks and statues looked like they were from horror movies–images of fangs, crazy eyes, blood lust, and so on. Those New Guinea tribes were nothing to mess with, from the looks of it.

Marcia and I agreed that the coolest thing in the museum were these models of famous churches made entirely from weapons. They were really well constructed and provocative.

After that, we were hungry again, so stopped in San Rafael for Puerto Rican food. Flavorful! Then I came home and discovered the power had been on for a long time and felt guilty for skipping work. Oh well…

Despite living by the ocean my entire life, I have never seen a whale. It is supposed to be the height of whale season—they are migrating through right now—so on Saturday I went to Pt Reyes to see if I could find them. Here is that journey:

Hmm, here is the park. It is very green right now. I don’t see any whales though.

Hello Mrs. Deer. How’s the whale watching up there? Not many today, you say? That’s not a good sign.

Hmmm, nope.

Heyyouguyshaveyouseen…. Never mind…

Hey down there. You, elephant seals. Have you seen any whales?

Hi other people. Are you whale watching too? It’s hard, isn’t it?

Whales? Whaaaaales?

So there you have it. No whales for me. I did see: cows, seals, elk, quail, deer, seagulls, and an adorable baby person. So it was not a total loss.