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K, can you explain the 'cannot sustain rings' in terms that a long-ago engineering school graduate can grasp?

I need about 2+1/2 hours more sleep, then I'll reply to your review.  Of course, I disagree sharply with about 1/3 of it!

I've been distracted with old electronic projects and gaps in my circuit theory.  I'll blather if you like.  Summary: the logarithm is your friend.

Dorky Day

The cowpies are stale, mate.

So I think I'll build a much more limited, less flexible version of the test rig.  Much cheaper and an evening instead of the week.  (But I may buy one of the tools after all.  Just a nice thing to have.)

~!@#$%^&*() Windoze!  I was editing a message here and needed to put the machine in sleep mode--whereupon it crashed (BSOD) losing my work-in-progress and forcing a cold boot while I'm running on battery ... and I'll have to do a full file system check later.

Anyhow ... where NJC haz bin:

I had my attention drawn to a suspended project, the W.Marshall Leach-based headamp.  In order to keep it running longer and more consistently on the batteries, I put a voltage stabilization network in.  It wasn't good enough, so I added negative feedback, which unfortunately seems also to have fed back signal ... which I didn't expect.  That reduced the gain from 20x to 2x.  20x is just barely enough.

So ... when I put it down before I was looking at ladder filters in the voltage level feedbacks.  But since I never fully internalized filter theory, I have to go back to Budak.  This is really a classic, but the growing importance of digital and FIR filters has probably pushed the book out of the mainstream.  (Note the number of offers under $150.)

I've spent the last couple of days looking at better voltage stabilization.  Unfortunately, the very simple network does not yield to easy analysis.  I'm sure someone, somewhere has a good set of formulas, but I have no idea where to look.  I've been doing algebra trying to get usable-enough formula.  I'm sure there's one to be had, but it's not coming out, and I've spent too much time.

Worse, I've got a set of experiments worth running, but they really want a test rig ... and if I have to build one I'd like to make it re-usable, and ... well. there's 20 hours of careful measuring and drilling and wiring and soldering, and of course the parts to buy.

Sigh.  And week after next, I'm going to visit my brother.

Do you see why Paddy isn't at work today?

I have gotten some stuff done, just not in the last 48 hours.  I'm going to get to work now, while trying to keep a sober head on the circuit work.  Drill guide ... angle iron to clamp the drill guide to ... how to measure from the non-parallel sides of the drill guide ... how many crosspoint pushbuttons ... how many binding posts ... aarghh!!!!

Snow Angelas?

Yeah, the Raven Food might bring the story too close to Lit-Fic.

Matthew's leadership skills build in part on the same skills that made him such a social bee.  (I see this from the outside, not being especially gifted myself.)

Peter's jealousy must have a starting point.  His own social deficiencies might be a start.  His correct perception of Matthew's irresponsibility could feed the Envy and blind Peter to the changes in Matthew.  You could even show us Peter's lack of social graces, and maybe even elicit a reaction from someone in a place where the alert trader might see a contrast with Matthew.

But that too might risk Lit-Fic.

Peter's belief in his moral superiority as a leader and a Lord is contradicted by events.  Matthew has earned loyalty.  We see him earn the loyalty of Anthony (and it would be good to see Anthony risk his life for Matthew after that humiliation) as well as the loyalty of the common boy he interrogated, then took in.

Peter, on the other hand, cannot earn loyalty and fails when he tries to buy it.  He destroys his tools.  Even if Peter does not consciously recognize the contradiction between his jealous assessment of Matthew's character and the Matthew he is fighting, his inability to fight on level ground with Matthew must rankle at every turn--and he must be evading and hiding from the measures of character.

I think if you keep this in mind, you won't need to add any additional seasoning.  Jealously becomes the deadly sin of Envy, and that progresses to raging, irrational anger.  Just let us see that, in microcosm, and let us see how Peter uses the Anger to defend against the truth.

If you can't have Anthony strike the killing blow, can you show Isaac (is that the name) risking his life in loyalty, and, injured, still showing more concern for Matthew?

Death by sepsis for Peter would open the door for more character moments between your other characters.  It would let him rage a bit in nominally lucid moments.  And, in the end, he might slink away to die, to 'escape', leaving Matthew to drive away the animals feeding on him, in order to give him a decent burial. (Driving an animal from its meal can sometimes only be done by killing it.)

I've spent three frotzenglarken weeks tinkering with the outline for Maurand, Day 2 and writing it bitsie by bitsier.  Now I'm typing it up and rewriting On The Fly.  And let me tell you, there's not much room for a laptop on the back of a fly.

I've got about a thousand words done.  There's about 5000 more to do (I fit about 650 words in Pitman on a letter page) and then I have to do some edits in stuff already written (pub'd and un-).

Sorry these prelims are taking so long.  I know that (most) everyone needs the points,