The column at Airlock Alpha is going well (At least I hope it is, I haven't received any complaint to date!) and there's some great news on the horizon over there. I'm not allowed to talk about it yet, but keep your eyes peeled at AIRLOCK ALPHA in the coming week or so to see what's the haps!
Also - TREK UNITED (my first blog home) was sold to Russ Haslage and a few wonderful co-investors over the weekend. I was busy writing up my own offer to buy the site when they announced that a deal was sealed.
I may write about that in my next AA column.
HOWEVER - Today a promise must be kept and a pledge must be adhered to!
A few months ago I promised to dedicate my personal blog to ADA LOVELACE! FINDING ADA is the site that is asking bloggers to make sure that her history and memory remain alive.
Who was Ada Lovelace you ask? She was, simply, the WOMAN who essentially developed one of the first, if not the first, computer programs really.
A woman of what was then considered "fine breeding" - the daughter of Lord Byron, and after her marriage became known as the Countess Lovelace.
I grew up with stories of her - but my grandmother referred to her as "Ada Byron." I think it had something to do with a fashion of suffragettes to keep their own or refer to other women by their maiden names. *shrugs* In any event - that's how I grew up learning about her.
Ada Byron became one of many women that were used to make sure that I would never fall into the societal trap that my intelligence was somehow less than a man's by the pure existence of their penises.
No - seriously. Those words were spoken. "Remember Terry - penises do not mean intelligence. They don't mean stupid either, but they definitely are not a requirement for intelligence."
:)
My grandmother may have thought herself some form of matriarch, but there were those days that her advice kicked the shit out my parents'.
In any event, besides being the descendant of a suffragette myself (my great-great grandmother was Elizabeth Boynton Harbert - founder of the Evanston Women's Association in Illinois) I never really took an interest in anything that was "girlie" any way.
I hated dresses. I loved sports. I adored biology and certain forms of math (geometry especially) as well as
Dun Dun Dunnn......
Science Fiction!
I was just saying this week that my first sci-fi book, and the reason I love all things sci-fi was a book - WRITTEN BY A WOMAN - "A Wrinkle in Time."
I never, ever thought that women weren't somehow already accepted into sci-fi. I was naive enough to think that we were always seen as equal.
I still believe that, I just have a better understanding that there are still a LOT of hurdles to jump to really just be accepted in society. Not for being a woman - but just for being human.
But if my grandmother hadn't have shown me anything about a woman who broke the ultimate mold by just being who she was - a woman of society who was not swayed by the male-dominated times and still shamelessly exhibited her intelligence to her male counterparts - I'm not so sure I'd be so vocal about my own opinions on women's (and human) rights today.
I will always call her Ada Byron. I just will. Maybe as more of a nod to my fiery grandmother's memory than for any other reason. But I have to show you all - and I can only hope that it totally triples my geek cred....
But many of you know that I started playing the MMORPG, "Star Trek Online" when it began a couple of months ago.
In this game - you are assigned a vessel to command, however you are also allowed to select the name of your vessel.
It should come as no surprise to you that my first vessel was happily named:
THE U.S.S. ADA BYRON
Here she is! HAPPY ADA LOVELACE DAY!
