there's no such thing as a stupid question

Are there any awards that are given to columnists? Especially that are particularly competitive and/or prestigious?

If you were a manly skirt in an ancient-ish type culture, you would be called...?

Like, all right, in the Emperor's New Groove, what the heck are the guys wearing? What are those skirty things called? (You know, like the one Kronk wears through most of the movie?)

Or, you know, if you could give the names of bottom type clothing that is not breeches, breechcloths, loincloths (sorry, that one make me shudder), or leggings, I'd be much appreciative.

Anyone here really good at Astronomy?

*heh*

Okay, here's my question. If there was a planet a bit farther out from the sun (the sun would be in the same year pattern as our sun, same diameter, density all that becuase i'm WAY To lazy to figure any of that out @_@) than earth is, but the planet was larger.. maybe... size of two earths. The planet would be completely water with an atmosphere similar to ours.... maybe a little more nitrogen (just for flavor and pretty colors)

The planet would have 2 moons, One small, Mercury size, just a rock, like ours. Then the other would be Mars size, which is a tiny bit bigger than half the earth (which is only 7926 Miles across... isn't that weird? Seems like it should me more. (That's diameter, not circumference)

ANYWAY, I'm getting off track.

Here's my question. Would the water world, have too high of a pull on the Earth type planet orbiting it, for that world to sustain life?

I wanted to do a gas world, but if I did that then the little planet would get too hot I'm thinking, and not really be able to sustain life, then again they think Ganymede could hold aqualife under the ice...so there you go.

So anyway... would a world orbiting a larger water world be able to sustain life? Or would it have weird tidal activity?

My model of the solar system in this

Sun = Same as ours

Planet one: Venus distance, size of Mercury, just a rock

Planet two: Between Earth and Mars, size-ish of Mars. Waterworld, atmostphere like ours with a bit more nitrogen (yeah, plants under the water and all that) Moon (which is the planet the story would be on) is 20% land, 80% water, farther away from Planet TWo than the moon is from earth. Atmosphere like ours. Day is same as ours, 12 month calendar, again because it's EASIER.

More planets farther out that are unimportant.. right now.


so there you go. How would Large planet-sama effect the life and tidal activity on The Moon world?

Did I ramble too much? *heh*

and how would this effect days and nights with a large planet in the way.. though I suppose it could always be like out moon and always face the planet on the same side. Hmmmmm...

NaNo is approaching and I have a land, some cultures and reasonably well-fleshed out characters - but I don't have a plot.

The main thing that's been holding me back is that I just can't write villains. Well, not good ones anyway. I always seem to struggle to justify their actions, so they're either so dumb that I can explain it away by them being misled, or good-guys-that-went-off-the-tracks somewhere.

Sooo, what I'd really appreciate from you guys are (a) some ideas of what you believe makes a good villain and/or (b) a list of some of your favourites. Even if you just give me a few names so I can wiki them (Is that even a verb? It is now!), I'd be happy. I just need something to springboard my own ideas.

Okay, so I'm thinking of making a joke about a puppet-related character that references Punch and Judy without referring outright to the name (basically involving mentions of crocodiles, sausages, policemen and so forth) ... I'm aware that most of the people who will see the joke will be American, and that Punch and Judy shows don't really occur on that side of the Atlantic. Would the joke be completely incomprehensible to too many people for it to be worth my making it? :\

This is what comes of being a Jew, not a Catholic:

Catholic priests wear collars, yeah? Are they part of special shirts, or could are they a separate piece that could be attached to any shirt/worn over an regular collar/etc? When would a priest wear a collar, and when would he forgo it?

Thanks for the help!

How long d'you suppose med school would take? o_O

Unfortunately I'm no longer in possession of a copy of Romeo and Juliet, but I seem to remember that Mercutio (I think) uses an old-fashioned term that equates to our "gatecrash" when contemplating going to a masquerade. Does anyone know which term I'm talking about, or have a copy of R&J and wouldn't mind looking it up for me?

Does anyone know, off the top of their head, who you would go to see if you had lukemia?

A while ago skylark97 posted an entry about fairy tale stereotypes. I'm doing something similar, except I want to find out more about what common fantasy stereotypes and cliches that people may have come across while reading so I can attempt to be funny parody and poke fun at them.

Also, I hope that this is the appropriate format to post links in this community, but I wanted to share this Fantasy Writer's Exam that someone on my flist posted a few months ago. It's fairly tongue-in-cheek, but quite good if you want to avoid common cliches in your writing - and the digs at Robert Jordan are really funny. Though personally as fantasy novels (like any other genre) follow a set formula, I think that the recommendation that if you answer "yes" to even one of the seventy-plus questions, you bin the whole endevour is a little harsh. In my opinion, as long as your book isn't just one cliche stringed to another, your own take on one or two traditional fantasy elements is fine.