Peeking into the rock

A bit more than year after the not-Poland novel first came to my head, I have an outline. This is not to say that I didn't know the whole of the events in the story before now -- I did -- but the specific structure wasn't there, which is why I kept moaning about how it should be written. Now I know in what size chunks the story needs to be told, and where the chunks go, and even, oh my dog, why.

But my house is flithy and I am having visitors who are already worried about me.

on another front: a Reuters columnist muses "is climate change increasing earthquakes?" No, stupid. This is just an attempt on your part to combine two sexy and frightening things in one headline.

And another thing. Old usenet buddies might remember when the US first invaded Afghanistan I said "But the war seems awfully civilian-oriented" because of early reports of biombing villages and schools. Pete McCutcheon was outraged. He said, essentially, "do you see what she said? How dare she say anything like that! That's completely out of bounds!" (Pete was an early harbinger, on a trivial scale, of the vicious eliminationism that has become a normal part of the US political landscape). But, really? Years and years and years later, what is the war in Afghanistan but worse and worse for civilians while warlords and arms traders and other criminals get richer and richer?

I almost wonder what old Pete is saying now.

I've been looking for information about what I've figured out is the Deltawerken: I want to see this grand engineering to keep the water out. I'm learning things, but how to see things is not one of the things I've learned, yet.

But. Seriously -- the Pacific Islands. What are we going to do? The sea will rise under every scenario that we can imagine. It's only a question of how far and how fast. Many of the islands become really uninhabotable with quite modest rises.

For purposes of manufacturing labels and passports, a surprising number of these islands belong to the United States, though they get no representation in Congress (do the people there pay federal taxes?) and apparently federal work safety and wage laws do not apply. For purposes of disaster relief and relocation, do these islands belong to the US? Are their inhabitants guaranteed any attention from Washington at all?

Seriously, again, I can't see dikes and waterworks being built for all these little islands. Where will the people go?

I think if I were a Pacific Islander, I'd be leaving now, so my children and grandchildren would not be refugees.