Shot through the heart

[austin_dern]

I'd expected I would bleed this week, but not metaphorically. The first review of my textbook manuscript came, and its few critiques were overall deathly accurate. The most correct complaint: the writing style is all over the map. The exposition starts (wonderfully) at an upper-undergraduate or beginning-graduate student level; it's a bit tougher when it has to call in group theory and some subtler concepts in dynamical systems; and portions of the results are minimally rewritten journal papers and about as readable.

If I hadn't lost weeks to iBook repairs maybe it'd be smoother. Still, the manuscript needs fixing, and the iBook sails out of AppleCare Protection in five hours (in this time zone; 21 hours where it was bought, but I couldn't get to California in 21 hours).

Luckily some complaints are just nitpicking. The comment that the biographical footnotes are ``not always'' charming I can safely ignore (though I may trim wordier ones). Most tedious is a request for a longer still bibliography. There are still a few potential reviewers to go. It's going to be a fun month.

Trivia: The first voice of Popeye the Sailor in cartoons was that of William Costello, ``Red Pepper Sam,'' who had also played the voice of Gus the Gorilla on the Betty Boop radio show. Source: The Fleischer Story, Leslie Cabarga.

Currently Reading: Titan, John Varley. I think I'd like the ``explore the strange alien artifact orbiting Saturn that somehow isn't Iapetus'' story better if the characters could go three minutes without talking about their sex lives. Still, it's an easy enough read.