Archive:Monthly Write-a-Thon/May 7, 2008

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What's a Write-a-Thon?

It's a bunch of people getting together on a wiki at a particular time to do a bunch of writing. It's like an online party! Heck no, it is an online party! It's also an excuse for infrequent wikiers to show up and party hardy.

But hey, why not show up in between the write-ins, too!

When?

Write-a-Thons happen the first Wednesday of every month. The next Write-a-Thon is Wednesday, November 7. November 7 starts on November 6, 1200 UTC, in New Zealand, and ends on November 8, 1000 UTC, in Hawaii. Save The Date! Put it on your calendar! Set yourself a reminder!

Any new article you create, and any edit you make to somebody else's Write-a-Thon article, when it's that day in your part of the world, will count.

Our first Write-a-Thon took place Wednesday, August 1, 2007 and was considered a roaring good time--we had about 30 partiers creating something like 50 articles, and editing lots.

What are the rules?

Rules? This is a party! There are no rules!

Well, OK, maybe there are a couple rules:

• We'll have a Write-a-Thon the first Wednesday of every month.
• To participate, you only have to do two things: (1) start a new article (even just a stub will qualify, if not too short - and please remember to include the CZ:The Article Checklist!), and (2) make a substantive edit (not just a copyedit) to somebody else's new article. Then you can list your name here as a partier. Until then, you're just a porch-sitter, party-crasher, or total party poop.

Create an article, already!

Check it out: Start an article!

Now (this time anyway) easier than ever! Stubs are not only permitted they are encouraged!

The Partiers

• Derek Harkness got off to an early start and brought some vodka for everyone. You shouldn't drink on an empty stomach, so after playing with Aleta's marbles (Ooh er!) he called the local Chinese restaurant and got some Chinese cuisine. Went to Wales to relax then upped sticks and went to Denmark instead. He left the party a little late, but not before opening a brand new bottle of rum for everyone.

• It's amazing how much time I have spent in my life keeping boys away from my marbles. Aleta Curry 16:17, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Steve has lost his marbles after wading through the plethora of junk at Flickr but was rewarded with the usually inevitable nice finds that comes from the exercise. Stephen Ewen 17:43, 7 November 2007 (CST)

• Aleta thought she was early, but found Derek already on the party floor (literally--must've been all the vodka!) Fortunately, Aleta had bananas and other fruit, so what with those and the vodka, maybe Hayford will share his daiquiri receipt? Oh, wait--that takes rum--don't we have any rum??! (Aleta knows bananas are not normally party fare, but didn't want to hear Larry sing that song again, so Yes! We now have bananas--we have some bananas, todaaaaay!!!) Decided to raise the tone by wearing a ball gown, but hubby prefers jeans and he says I've lost my marbles! Psst! pass me the vodka! Drinking on an empty stomach is bad for you, so made stew. Now dancing a waltz and singing lullabies--must be the vodka!

I got about 6 kinds of rum at home: which kind do you want? As Don the Beachcomber described his Perfect Breakfast:

• One bunch bananas
• One bottle of rum
• One parrot
• The parrot is to eat the bananas

Hayford Peirce 17:12, 6 November 2007 (CST)

Bacardi, extra dark, since you ask! Aleta Curry 18:20, 6 November 2007 (CST)

I've got Bacardi White and Bacardi Golden, but for extra dark I use only Meyers, which is clearly superior. Or at least so I've been led to believe. If you put all three of them, plus a couple of others, into the same drink, plus various other goodies (see Zombie (cocktail), it becomes hard to tell them apart, particularly by the third drink.... Hayford Peirce 18:55, 6 November 2007 (CST) I've never actually tried this--a Zombie, I mean--I've had Myers Rum-never to old to learn--pass a glass! Aleta Curry 19:09, 6 November 2007 (CST)

• Supten was wandering through the CZ:Core_Articles/Applied_Arts_and_Sciences and found that there is no entry for Bio engineering yet. So, he thought of earning some bragging rights. Loving to jump among various topics, he found banana as an ideal source for nutrition as in the primates. He would love if the partiers (or others) can help in enriching the other pages he had started long time back - viz., Clinical decision support system, Evidence-based medicine, Hemispheric lateralization, John Snow (physician) and, Biochemistry.

• Clinton took a trip down to Everglades National Park, where he wished he had a margarita to drink while he pondered how to make an infobox in CZ. A picture or two of the wildlife would be nice as well, perhaps a panther or alligator.

Cleaned up Gerald Ford.

Your friendly neighbourhood write-a-thon MC will see what she can do about getting your a margarita. My word, do I love those! Aleta Curry 00:54, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Rum? Try 15 year old Barbancourt. :-) Stephen Ewen 23:52, 6 November 2007 (CST)

All I know is that Maximón, who I've been neglecting, prefers Venado but is usually happy with Quetzalteca. I'd better get back to him soon or I'm going to be in a world of trouble... --Joe Quick 00:52, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Now you're talking, Stephen! The charity auction of the last role-playing games convention I was had a very rare Scotch whisky up for auction - it went for a cool €1000! Anton Sweeney 04:46, 7 November 2007 (CST)

• Christian created A Midsummer Night's Dream (basic information, dramatis personae, plot synopsis, incomplete list of adaptations). Today is also his first anniversary at Citizendium.

Happy Anniversary! Aleta Curry 00:54, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Thank you :) --Christian Liem 09:17, 7 November 2007 (CST)

• John Stephenson, while chewing thoughtfully on a banana, thought that a trip to Wales was in order. He doesn't know how to ask for a banana in Welsh, though.

Aleta doesn't, either. But I do love Wales. And I can sing Ar Hyd dy Nos, the lullaby. Did I spell that right? Aleta Curry 16:23, 7 November 2007 (CST)

• Anton suggested that everyone play a party game, then had some vodka. Anton Sweeney 05:20, 7 November 2007 (CST)

• --Martin Baldwin-Edwards 05:34, 7 November 2007 (CST) decided to write about the place where he lives (Athens), although it is a bit stubby...

• I have risen. --Robert W King 07:55, 7 November 2007 (CST)
  • Another partier with divine aspirations. --Larry Sanger 08:52, 7 November 2007 (CST)
    • Edits for the WAT so far: Vodka, A tennis court image to replace the invalid one, Drinking game, Cyberpunk, Metaphor, Simile, attempted Fun, Romeo_and_Juliet, edited Frustration, SNL, Taco, attempted Rich...

I was on a spree until I got hungry and had to go for a taco run. --Robert W King 19:35, 7 November 2007 (CST)

• Larry Sanger remembers watching The Odd Couple as a child, when he didn't get the jokes and never dreamed he would have the opportunity to write an article (a stub) about it--for Stub Week. He watched A Midsummer Night's Dream but still doesn't get the jokes because Shakespeare is Deep.
  • Hey, do you think you know Shakespeare's plays? Then write up one-sentence "precisissisises" (what's the plural of "precis"?) on the new William Shakespeare/Works page. Then...take your precees, and put use them to start new stubs...
  • Off to buy trenchcoat. No, really. I expect to see a stub about trenchcoats by the time I get back.  ;-) --Larry Sanger 14:35, 7 November 2007 (CST)
  • I did a little more cheerleading and theorizing in this blog post.
    • Help! If you look at http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Special:Newpages you'll see a zillion new articles in the last 24 hours (if go back to Aleta's new articles, around 100). Quite a few of these aren't marked with categories appropriately--some, in particular, don't have Category:CZ Live, which means we aren't "taking credit" for them. I've gone through the list from Robert Bosse through Residue. Could someone else finish going through the new articles--through banana, please? Pretty please??? --Larry Sanger 21:29, 7 November 2007 (CST)

• Dan Nachbar will get off the ground by making stubs for aircraft related topics.

• Hayford rubbed the sleep from his eyes and warmed up by inserting a mouthwatering image at Bolognese sauce. So now that he's had his high-carb and protein breakfast, he can get down to work.Hayford Peirce 10:43, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Then he decided that it was time for lunch (dinner hour in Lisbon) and whipped up a tasty dish of Portuguese pork stew with clams (ameijoas con carne de porco à alentejana), probably the longest name of a new article in quite a while, but one well worth the trouble. Ro Thorpe is probably eating a big plate of it right now, the lucky devil! Hayford Peirce 11:38, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Next he had a sip of rum and edited the new article about Rum. Hayford Peirce 11:58, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Then he added some more off-beat stuff about Rum as well as creating an article about his old tennis doubles partner Bobby Lutz, whom he could, with great difficulty, beat until the time Lutz was 13 and almost half the size of the strapping 18-year-old future CZ contributor. Now he's sipping a Scotch and wondering what he will contribute at December's Write-a-Thon: Eggnog, maybe? Hayford Peirce 20:08, 7 November 2007 (CST)

• Joe is waging an epic battle against a loaf of apricot bread that refuses to bake all the way through while he reads for a morning class. He took the time to snap a shot of a banana flower, but he'll have to come back in the afternoon to do any more.

Hmmm...wrong proportion of baking soda...too much water...oven too high...turn it all the way down, and plan on a trip to the local deli for a muffin--just in case! Aleta Curry 01:05, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Nah. I usually bake it in two small metal bread pans but all I had on hand yesterday was one big glass one. The material shouldn't make a huge difference but the size of the pan sure did. It worked out in the end - the outside is a little crunchy, but the whole thing is delicious. I just need to procure the proper pans. --Joe Quick 12:47, 7 November 2007 (CST)

With bananas on the brain, Joe decided to create a stub for the United Fruit Company. He hopes that our resident historians will help him expand it, because he knows a lot about the company's interference in Central American governments but only knows a little about the company itself. --Joe Quick 13:39, 7 November 2007 (CST)

• Anthony.Sebastian caught an evolutionary bug, causing him yesterday to start a stub on Evolutionary biology, then decided to 'evolve' it into a developing article. Then feeling a little ill, he started another on Evolutionary medicine, his official Write-a-Thon submission. All by his lonesome, tutored by Chris Day, he managed to start both articles with subpages. Both articles need work. Minor edits to Vodka. --Anthony.Sebastian (Talk) 19:35, 7 November 2007 (CST)

• Roger thought he might miss the whole party but got in with a bottle of Malbec (do they grow that grape in Australia, I wonder?) under his coat to keep it from freezing. (It's cold here tonight!) Also brought with him a few finishing touches on the main page of Civil society, and three new friends from the worlds of U.S. and German social insurance and the British welfare state: Arthur Altmeyer, Robert Bosse and a stubby Lord Beveridge (the article, not the man. Sources don't say how tall he was). Touch and go there for a bit, as he misspelled Altmeyer's name in the page title, but Constable Matt bailed him out with a reminder of speedydelete. So, here's a toast to you, Matt.

Porch sitters--article creators who didn't edit a new article

Yuval Langer is rocking back and forth on the porch while pondering how explosives are used in the construction of bombs, but to no avail. Also, this incrementalist added the Final Fantasy stub.

It's all about thermal expansion of gas. --Robert W King 09:03, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Hence, the famous definition, which I for one remember seeing in a dictionary as a child. --Larry Sanger 14:39, 7 November 2007 (CST)

I remember hearing that one in grade school also! (that'd be 1991-1985ish) --Robert W King 14:46, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Te-he. Th-he-he. Te-he-he-he. Sorry, back to my normal self now. :D Stephen Ewen 14:58, 7 November 2007 (CST)

It's also about CREATION of gas. Explosives are usually made of liquid or solid materials. When they explode they become gas through chemical reactions. Gases have considerably higher volumes than liquids and solids, so a gram of explosive with a tiny volume which turned into a gram of gas "wants" to expand into the much greater volume of gas, exerting pressure on its surrounding... but how do I put that into the articles...? Yuval Langer 00:06, 8 November 2007 (CST)

Nathan wrote a stub on his favorite kind of music.

Alek left behind some residue.

The total party poops

Go ahead, admit it!

*Ian Johnson arrived almost not at all with complete frustration at his work taking him away from all the partying. The Odd Couple day as well - looks like I missed a real good one! Rainchecking...--Ian Johnson 17:53, 7 November 2007 (CST)

I'm stuck in the dial-up era right now as Verizon struggles to reconnect my DSL. I'm writing articles offline and will upload them when I get back to the 21st century. Petréa Mitchell 21:49, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Questions

You ask--we answer. Ask anything. Keep it clean, now.

• Can two divorced men share an apartment without driving each other crazy? Aleta Curry 19:11, 6 November 2007 (CST)

Why do we suspect that there is a story to tell here? --Larry Sanger 21:27, 6 November 2007 (CST) Aw, Larry, now I've got that theme song in my head! The Odd Couple Aleta Curry 01:02, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Right now it is totally not Wednesday. Damn the aussies! --Robert W King 22:00, 6 November 2007 (CST) Now, now! If you edit something an Aussie has done, it'll count!  :) Aleta Curry 01:02, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Well, I just had to create The Odd Couple...stub.  :-) --Larry Sanger 08:23, 7 November 2007 (CST)

• Can an undergraduate housemate be trained to wash his dishes or clean the crud off the stove. My magic 8 ball says prospects are dim. --Joe Quick 00:31, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Oh dear, oh dear, it's not looking good. I don't have an answer for this! Threaten to hire a cleaner and charge the extra to his share? Aleta Curry 01:02, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Yes. You commit to each time collect up the dirty dishes and stove-crud and deposit them upon his bed. Stephen Ewen 01:11, 7 November 2007 (CST)

It has been known for university students to prefer to throw away dirty dishes [of the non-disposable variety] and buy new ones in preference to washing them. The prognosis is not good for your training program. --Martin Baldwin-Edwards 08:03, 7 November 2007 (CST)

The cure for cancer is not in the rain forests. It is in fact in one of the undiscovered mold cultures in a freshman's fridge. Probably on either the tomato (I think that's what it was anyway) or the half eaten slice of pizza. We shall not loose the cure to deforestation, but rather to the drunken midnight snack of the student. With their bear goggles on, the pizza might look eatable and the cure will be lost forever. Given the choice of research in the rain forests of Costa Rica or looking inside the freshman's fridge, most researchers opt for the forest. Ergo the cure may lie undiscovered form many more terms. Derek Harkness 08:32, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Would you be discovering the cure or the new disease... --Robert W King 09:05, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Throw away? Pffft! That's for the weak-hearted or ultra-loaded. The really tough ones just use the same kitchen-ware, with both mold and food, together! Yuval Langer 01:27, 8 November 2007 (CST)

My dishes are as clean as Soap and Three Waters can get them. Did I mention the names of my dogs? One's name is Soap, the other is Three Waters. Stephen Ewen 13:17, 8 November 2007 (CST)

We went for a couple of days without toilet paper at one point and without a shower curtain for almost two weeks as a part of my program, but I finally got tired of doing my business on campus and caved. I don't think these guys even recognize the conditions that they're living in. Fortunately, I also bought all the furniture for the livingroom and they seem to be afraid of using it, so I sort of got a free office out of the deal. --Joe Quick 12:55, 7 November 2007 (CST)

The implications of the two are hilarious. --Robert W King 14:37, 7 November 2007 (CST)

• Is it still Wednesday in the Americas? Aleta Curry 14:56, 7 November 2007 (CST)

It's still Wednesday even in some parts of Europe I guess (but my watch indicates 00:23)Aleksander Stos 17:22, 7 November 2007 (CST)

It is still Wednesday in the America! Larry Sanger 21:59, 7 November 2007 (CST)

• How much vodka did we drink, exactly? Groan! Aleta Curry 14:56, 7 November 2007 (CST)

We're not done yet! I still have almost 5 and a half hours to vodkate. --Joe Quick 18:40, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Uh-oh (pulling Joe out from under table....) Aleta Curry 21:13, 7 November 2007 (CST)

• Where was Matt? Where was Chris? Aleta Curry 21:13, 7 November 2007 (CST)
  • Yeah, where are those guys? --Larry Sanger 21:58, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Matt's around, lurking I'm sure. Chris is probably studying or writing something or doing some work or some activity I am sure of it. --Robert W King 21:59, 7 November 2007 (CST)

I think we can be pretty sure he's doing something. But that something might be limited to breathing and blinking occasionally. ;-) He's probably doing something else too, but my skeptical side tells me not to jump to conclusions... Uh oh, is my vodkated philosophizing side coming out? --Joe Quick 22:47, 7 November 2007 (CST)

Writing, another midterm, and a big pile in my inbox. Chris Day (talk) 23:30, 7 November 2007 (CST)

You too, huh? --Joe Quick 01:55, 8 November 2007 (CST)

• Can we announce that this Monthly Write-a-Thon's official alcoholic beverage was Vodka? Yuval Langer 12:18, 8 November 2007 (CST)

Oh, yeah, by all means! Although rum was a close second (thanks, Derek)! Aleta Curry 16:11, 8 November 2007 (CST)

The Party's Over...

But only for this month! Heck, of a party, you guys! How will we top this next month??? Wonder how it turned out--statistically, that is. Too cool! Aleta Curry 16:11, 8 November 2007 (CST)

Previous shindigs

• August 1, 2007
• September 5, 2007
• October 3, 2007

See also

• Larry Sanger, Why the Write-a-Thon worked, Citizendium Blog, August 9, 2007
• Weekly Wiki
• Article of the Week
• New Article of the Week