Author Topic: EP268: Advection  (Read 21884 times)

Dave

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Reply #25 on: December 04, 2010, 06:33:42 PM
What the hell did I just listen to?

I'm sure for some people this story was deep and affecting, but it just didn't work for me. The main character (who was not a protagonist in any sense I could discern) basically just whines her way through a bunch of events surrounding some preppy rich boy who may or may not have... magic powers? or something? It's never really clear what's going on.

There are a LOT of themes packed into this one, and I bet some people really grokked them and got a lot out of this story. I just wasn't one of them.

No worries, Escape Pod, I still love you.

-Dave (aka Nev the Deranged)


Listener

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Reply #26 on: December 06, 2010, 05:51:56 PM
Mur and Tina Connolly are the best EA readers for young female characters.

Having just sold a story about a world where water is very scarce, I was a little put out by hearing another one, but that's just me. And it's quite a fallow field.

I didn't really follow this story or care much about the characters. Using the scene at the club as the climax... didn't love that, and the whole thing with the MC trying to get in to see her friend at the embassy, that was an additional side-quest that I still don't know the reason for beyond "Have you seen Fortuni?"

I do totally understand the MC's latching onto Fortuni. In 1996 I went to a conference for young journalists, and one of the people I met (a girl, naturally) I kept wondering about. Then came MySpace, eight years later, and now we're friends. I never pursued her romantically, but I fixated on her -- and also on this other girl whose name escapes me -- while I was there. So yes, that totally happens.

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stePH

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Reply #27 on: December 07, 2010, 04:11:36 PM
Mur and Tina Connolly are the best EA readers for young female characters.

Dani Cutler's not bad, as long as she's not attempting a British accent. Didn't she read "Flaming Marshmallow and Other Deaths"?

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Thomas Daulton

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Reply #28 on: December 11, 2010, 06:57:15 AM
I don't often comment on episodes, because I usually have a backlog of several months.  But this one came up on my randomizer today, and so I thought I'd strike while the iron is hot.

This was far from my favorite Escape Pod -- it was kinda rarified, not much happens, and we're not given sufficient explanation of the things that do happen.  It was more like an "atmosphere" piece...

[ducks tomatoes]

...although I did find the girl-crush reasonably realistic; an apparently handsome dude, slightly older, seems to have a lot of money and/or social status, and expensive trendy toys.  High school crushes are like that, including the girl's feeling that she's ready to die and/or run away with this guy she barely knows just because of the above.  Don't tell me you've never seen a crush like that (even though they don't usually get as far as dying or running away).

I did want to mention, though, that you can buy those UV shield contact lenses today.  Of course.  Sci-fi always has a hard time outrunning reality.  Attached is a picture where I've got one in, one out.

I love my pair.  They freak people out.  (Especially with one in and one out!)  Plus they do what they were designed to do really well.  They were designed by an ophthalmologist who's also a surfer, for surfers and boaters and other people who stare into the sun but get tired of dropping expensive sunglasses into the depths of the Pacific.  Full UV protection, never fall out of your eye, and they don't get coated with dried salt, or chipped or lost, like sunglasses do.

The guy doesn't advertise them on his website anymore, because they're a little bit expensive ($80 per pair, last I checked) and not all that popular.  But he can still make them.  (I'm not employed or connected to him, just a customer.)
http://www.coastaloptometry.com/

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Scattercat

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Reply #29 on: December 12, 2010, 06:16:46 AM
The eyes!  The eyes of Doctor T.J. Eckleberg!  They're watching me!



eytanz

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Reply #30 on: December 14, 2010, 07:39:57 PM
Ok, finally listened to the episode - I have to say, I'm with the "nay" votes on this one. Basically, it felt like the story was telling me that I need to care about these characters because they live in a future without much water. But that's not a good enough reason - for me to care about characters, they have to be compelling characters, or they have to participate in compelling events, and neither was true here.



AliceNred

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Reply #31 on: December 14, 2010, 11:00:26 PM
Emergency desalination of the oceans, and they still lacked water?  The kids are sad that there are no more dolphins, but no mention of the death of everything else in the sea?  Why would plants be illegal?  Even if the planet heats up and the glaciers melt, you would still have the sun evaporating sea water and depositing it in the form of snow or rain in the mountains, and rivers would still flow.  Possible that the heat would cause the water to stay in the atmosphere, but then you would have clouds and not have to worry about your plant burning in the sun.

I know nothing about climate and weather, so I'm sure forum members will set me straight on a few of these issues, but my confusion and questions made me feel like I was listening to an environmentalist /anti-authority polemic.  Though there were hints and glimpses that this would be a very interesting world to explore.

I agree.

I go into any story with all hope and it stays there until the last word. This one left me dry.
« Last Edit: December 15, 2010, 02:09:11 AM by AliceNred »

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Wilson Fowlie

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Reply #32 on: December 15, 2010, 04:04:31 PM
I go into any story with all hope and it stays there until the last word. This one left me dry.

Ahaha.

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CryptoMe

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Reply #33 on: December 16, 2010, 02:43:54 AM
Like several previous posters, I too found this world intriguing, and was interested in where the story line with the plant would go. Unfortunately, that one, like all the other plot threads, went nowhere. All in all, I was left surprised when the ending came. If this had been a story in a physical magazine, I would have been looking everywhere for the missing page(s) ;).



El Barto

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Reply #34 on: December 18, 2010, 11:31:23 PM
This story had such great potential.   And then . . . blah.   

Highly unsatisfying and fairly frustrating.   It didn't feel like the author painted a mysterious scene and left us to wonder (which can be fun) but rather just petered out for some reason and handed in the story incomplete.




Umbrageofsnow

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Reply #35 on: January 22, 2011, 11:49:54 PM
Wikipedia says advection in meteorology is the transport of some property of the atmosphere or ocean, such as heat, humidity or salinity; it is important in cloud formation and precipitation.

As the title of the story, it literally stands for the changes in climate leading to no natural rain and a water shortage, as well as the meteorology classes Sarah takes. Metaphorically, I read it as the transference of passion/hope/rebellion, from Fortuni to Sarah.

By the end of the story, she is dreaming of his dream to create rain, gathering illegal condensation on her bowl under the bed, and while she hopes he is alive, I suspect her life and career aspirations have shifted to keep his memory and hopes alive, if nothing else.  She expands beyond her non-ambition, takes more classes, and has goals for her life she never had before meeting Fortuni.

I loved this story.
« Last Edit: January 22, 2011, 11:51:40 PM by Umbrageofsnow »



LaShawn

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Reply #36 on: February 07, 2011, 05:16:37 PM
I think I liked the story more for the relationship aspect than for the sci-fi aspect. Although I also liked the part where she cares for the Jade plant. I managed to kill my Jade plant from overwatering. I'll remember this story if I get another one.

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knigget

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Reply #37 on: February 16, 2011, 04:56:36 AM
I liked the story.  I started liking it a lot when the glitzy girl with the cigarette broke down crying. 

The genre -- is "Weatherpunk" taken, or can I copyright it?  :)

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jwbjerk

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Reply #38 on: June 23, 2011, 02:11:27 AM
Nicely read.

But, there's not much science fiction to get interested in here.  The rain water scarcity was just silly.  "Emergency Desalinization of the Oceans"? That's part of the normal process of nature:  Sun evaporates some of the ocean-> Evaporation forms clouds -> Clouds eventually make rain --> Rain eventually flows back into the ocean.

Water is not a resource that can be consumed, like oil, rare earths, etc.  What we drink and use eventually (and usually quickly) returns to the cycle.

So climate changes can alter where the rain falls, and you could locally use up available fresh water, but short of boiling the planet, or freezing it solid, the water cycle will continue, and rain will continue to fall if there is any surface water at all.


Not that silly science makes a story necessarily bad, but providing vague hints about this dry future receives as least as much emphasis as the relationship.  So you are expected to try to put the puzzle pieces together to figure out what happened to the rain.  Unfortunately these puzzle pieces don't even remotely fit together.



Gamercow

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Reply #39 on: June 24, 2011, 02:37:37 PM
Water is not a resource that can be consumed, like oil, rare earths, etc.  What we drink and use eventually (and usually quickly) returns to the cycle.

Yes, and no.  Under current technological conditions, most water is eventually returned to the ocean or lakes in more or less pure form.  Some, however, reacts chemically and ceases to be water.  The simplest form of transformation for water though, is electrolysis, which transmutes water to hydrogen and oxygen.

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