Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Read again, Amy, r.e. the Roche Limit, above. It's sufficiently plausible that I'm keeping my rings.

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Kdot wrote:

I don't have an equation and Amy's right... a small planet cannot sustain planetary rings however there's no reason some moon didn't have a collision and get powderized, forming rings that only last 2-3000 years


Okey Dokey. I got a screen shot of K saying I'm right. He can't delete this, either. Life is good.

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Oh lud... she'll be impossible for weeks

79 (edited by Norm d'Plume 2016-07-15 02:31:58)

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Amy, I have characters in a small spaceship that's leaking air. Minimally, they'll be unconscious by the time they're rescued. They may even be dead. What would be the major medical steps taken to revive them? I'd rather they were actually dead before rescue, but that probably greatly complicates reviving them. I'd like at least one of them up and walking within an hour. I assume this is doable if they're only unconcscious. Being dead would be icing on the cake.

Thanks,
Dirk

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

You need to read this article. It will be helpful in making your decisions. http://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2013/ … uman-body/

Also look up info on decompression sickness. It normally happens to divers, but the loss of pressure in the cabin would make the kids susceptible to this as well.

I'll give you a quickie course on reviving someone from near-death, but I don't have the time at work right now. Give me a day or so and I'll be glad to oblige.

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Months, K.  Months :-)

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

amy s wrote:

You need to read this article. It will be helpful in making your decisions. http://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2013/ … uman-body/

Also look up info on decompression sickness. It normally happens to divers, but the loss of pressure in the cabin would make the kids susceptible to this as well.

I'll give you a quickie course on reviving someone from near-death, but I don't have the time at work right now. Give me a day or so and I'll be glad to oblige.

Thanks for the link. Also, I`ll check out decompression sickness. It's been a while since I researched it. There's a lot of cracy stuff one researches for a simple space opera. Sheesh!

83 (edited by Norm d'Plume 2016-07-17 18:27:13)

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Kill me now! I am so fed up with caps inconsistencies. Here's the latest distilled down to two lines:

"The emperor no longer exists, Governor," Apollo said.
or
"The Emperor no longer exists, Governor," Apollo said.

I had decided that I wouldn't use capitalization for titles like emperor and queen. I treat them the same as crown prince or governor. Otherwise there is mass chaos among my numerous titles.

Some time ago, Seabrass indicated that when there is only one (e.g., Apollo is referring to himself here), it should be capitalized. Is that a separate rule, or just the same rule I quashed above?

If you tell me that Emperor should indeed be capitalized, what then of the reverse sentences:

"The governor no longer exists, Emperor," Decianus said.
or
"The Governor no longer exists, Emperor," Decianus said.

Thanks!

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Just keep writing, writing, writing. (In Dory's voice)

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

heh... ya "the only one case" I was complaining that your style guide overlooked it.

Wayne Gretzky is the Great One, not the great one as the guide would imply.

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Kdot wrote:

heh... ya "the only one case" I was complaining that your style guide overlooked it.

Wayne Gretzky is the Great One, not the great one as the guide would imply.

So it is a separate rule? What about the example where I capitalize governor because there's only one in the conversation: The Governor is dead.

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Governor is only one among many planetary governors... no uniqueness. There may be only one in the conversation, but *existence* contains others. I realize this logic means "universe" should get caps. I'll see if I can dig up a formal rule somewhere

88 (edited by Norm d'Plume 2016-07-17 18:32:11)

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Since there are two emperors in the battle, then neither emperor has a unique title. There must be more to that rule....

And don't forget Queen Mary, who is the only queen so far in my story, yet her role is identical to that of a mere governor.

Many people around the world capitalize Queen when referring to Elizabeth II, even though there are other queens. I'm betting some American don't capitalize queen, although I've regularly seen President capitalized where I wouldn't.

You begin to see why my capitalization rules keep falling over.

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Here's an interesting page:
http://grammar.yourdictionary.com/capit … ation.html
(they don't quote their sources. Hmm!)

Anyway, this page suggests

You don't have to capitalize the job title if it comes after the word "the."

(The stress is mine)

Also, it suggests a job title takes capitals if it follows the word. This would seem to suggest:
"I am Adam, Prince of Eternia"  <-- suffix = caps
vs
"The prince of Eternia spoke" <-- prefix = optional caps

90

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Is the noun, standing where it does, doing the job of a proper noun?

91 (edited by Norm d'Plume 2016-07-17 22:01:50)

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Yeah, it's the optional caps that kills me. If I use capitals for titles after "the", that results in: "The Emperor is dead." (perfectly reasonable) but also "The Governor is dead." (iffi) and "The Toilet Attendant is dead." (from fumes).

I went with my own variation, which has mostly worked - formal vs. informal titles:
    Apollo is the emperor. The emperor has arrived.
    Apollo is Emperor of the Imperium Romanum. The Emperor of the Imperium Romanum has arrived.

Now what do I with:
    Apollo is the holy Roman emperor ???
That just looks wrong in lowercase. I'll probably have to treat it as an exception. Basically there is no informal version of that title.

It sucks though when they both end up in the same sentence:
    "The emperor is dead, Governor. Henceforth, I'm the Holy Roman Emperor!"

Now where did we end up with the "rule of one"? Is there such a thing? (The Great One could fall under the category of a formal title with no informal equivalent, like Holy Roman Emperor.)

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Once again, chaper 35 is up on the site, without the last scene that gave away all of the suspense at the end. I have now written three different endings before finally getting it right. Not sure how to incorporate the deleted info into later chapters. Should be fun.

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Kdot, where did you end up with the "rule of one"? Is there such a thing? (The Great One could fall under the category of a formal title with no informal equivalent, like Holy Roman Emperor.)

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Yes... I was thinking "The Great One" could be a title... though it's not exactly. A title is something someone else can gain, right? No one else (in our lifetimes) can ever gain the title of the Great One. I heard someone once asked to be 99 and they said no... 98 was as high as he was allowed to go.

You could counter that equally, no one in our lifetimes can gain the title "Caesar" or "the Hun" which kinda blows my logic out of the water. Let's pretend that retired titles are no longer subject to the exclusion rule of being gainable, shall we?

Now here's an interesting page:
http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/educat … lize-words
(section marked "meaning is key")

This page suggests perhaps we don't only capitalize White House because that its name, but we might also be giving it proper noun meaning.

Consider:
a. Wow! Look! It's the Sonic Screwdriver! (wrong)
b. Wow! Look! It's the sonic screwdriver! (correct)
(Personally, I consider (a) to be the right choice if we're talking about Dr Who's screwdriver. To me, (b) is correct if the rest of the sentence is "...used by Baker on the set of the 3rd season." which establishes non-uniqueness)

And I ask you to think back to the Highlander. Ignoring the movie title which is a title and is uppercase, the person who's from there would take lowercase. "The highlander" would appear to be the correct case, no different from "the lowlander" or "the uptowner". And then the H/highlander completes his journey before the credits roll, he raises his sword in victory and yells:

I am the one!

Is "the one" a formal title (Hey guys, I'd like to introduce you to Bob the One)? I suspect no.
Is it a job title? Kind of, but lets rule that out for the sake of the children.
By all logic, "one" should be lowercase in the above sentence. Yet, I'm tempted to capitalize it (assigning it proper noun status).

We have a fair over here called "The Ex". The true name is "Canadian National Exhibition" but they call themselves "The Ex" (a name - so capitalized). Now here's the kicker. If I wrote on my fb wall "I'm going to the Exhibition" everyone reading it would automatically know I'm not going to some random museum exhibit.

Is Exhibition capitalizable because it's part of a proper name (CNE)? Lets try it with other words:
"World Poker Tour" -> "Tour" (See you next week, I'm going on the Tour)
"World Wrestling Federation" -> "Federation" (Guys, I got tickets to the Federation!)

Similarly, if I write "I'm moving West" people assume I mean Alberta rather than the other side of my city.

Aha, but what about the ozone layer? By the ephemeral "rule of one" it should be the Ozone Layer, right? I bring this up because while researching this reply, I discovered that there's no common accepted capitalization for the first moon landing. If I read "Bob thought about the Moon Landing" I suspect they mean the first one, but I'm not too sure. I would argue that moon landing is not unique enough to retain its capitalization any more. Similarly "the lunar surface" seems to trump "the Lunar surface" but I can find examples of both in scientific journals.

What about Ragnarok? It's the end of the world... or is it unique enough to be the End of the World. After all, the world can only end so many times, right? I'd argue that no, it's very hard to establish Ragnarok's uniqueness short of surviving it, which would invalidate it.

The briefcase in Pulp Fiction is often capitalized on the web, but I would suggest it shouldn't be. It's not a proper noun, even in the movie iirc. It would appear to follow my "exhibition" declaration in that it's  term that when used, all the user's peers understand which object is referred to. It appears to break the concept I've built here.

How that for a non-answer?

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Yikes! Thanks for the research/detail, K. I love Grammar Girl. Funny how your two linked articles disagree about job titles placed after the name. :-)

What about the original sentence that triggered my latest migraine:

    "The emperor is dead, Governor. From now on, I'm the Holy Roman Emperor." (emperor is lowercase, Holy Roman Emperor is capitalized, even though both refer to the same individual)

Under the rule of one, emperor would be caps until there are two of them (Apollo and Caligula), at which point it's lowercase. Yes? According to my own demented style guide, emperor is lowercase because it's not a formal title (emperor vs Emperor of the Imperium Romanum). However, there is only one Holy Roman Emperor in the future, so it gets caps. Under my style guide, it gets caps because it's the formal title, with no informal equivalent. It just sucks to have both in the same sentence.

I think the planets have aligned, albeit for different reasons. Let me know if you disagree.

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Norm d'Plume wrote:

"The emperor is dead, Governor. From now on, I'm the Holy Roman Emperor."

This looks just fine to me.

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

My head hurts. How do you remember all of this? All I can say is that you are smarter than me.

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

I have a few questions about paragraph usage. Here's the first snippet in question:

    It warms my heart when you quote Bible stories, God said.
    It warms my heart when you don’t, Apollo said.
    Apollo’s head jolted.
    “Whelp of a lupa!”

The italics is mind speech. Double quotes is normal dialogue. I use new paragraphs whenever there is a new speaker, even if it's mind speech. I'll add that God has the ability to cause muscle spasms and does so in Apollo's neck whenever He's annoyed, causing the head to jolt.

I originally had the last three paragraphs as one, since it's all about Apollo. However, the jolt is also God's "response" to Apollo's mind speech, albeit a non-verbal one. Apollo's response to the head jolt is out loud.

One paragraph or three?

Thanks.

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

Three, I bekieve

100

Re: The Galaxy Tales - Dirk B.

I'd make it two.  You have his internal thoughts.  Then you have an action and Apollo's reaction.  I'd group the latter two together.