Joan has been teasing. Last night (Fri) she posed as someone else for two hours or longer. Earlier in the week she teased the whole gang of us for over a day about an online romance involving one of our number.

Since my reputation for both silliness and seriousness is at stake here, I would like to make one tiny clarification. My most recent escapade was indeed intentional silliness (TGIF!), however I had no intent to tease in the first episode. An innocent comment (which in my mind was related to the discussion at hand) regarding something that was told to me in private e-mail became the object of the most intense curiosity as to who were the parties invovled. Not wishing to make public that which was told to me in private without the permission of the person who told me, I declared myself unwilling to name names without first asking permission. In this matter I had no intention to tease. I cannot blame myself for having done thus much. There is but one part of my conduct in this matter on which I do not reflect with seriousness, and that is that once Matthew saved my hide by agreeing to have his story told, I do admit to doing so in a less than perfectly serious manner. Joan, too

Since my reputation for both silliness and seriousness is at stake here, I would like to make one tiny clarification. My most recent escapade was indeed intentional silliness (TGIF!), however I had no intent to tease in the first episode. An innocent comment (which in my mind was related to the discussion at hand) regarding something that was told to me in private e-mail became the object of the most intense curiosity as to who were the parties invovled. Not wishing to make public that which was told to me in private without the permission of the person who told me, I declared myself unwilling to name names without first asking permission. In this matter I had no intention to tease. I cannot blame myself for having done thus much. There is but one part of my conduct in this matter on which I do not reflect with seriousness, and that is that once Matthew saved my hide by agreeing to have his story told, I do admit to doing so in a less than perfectly serious manner. Joan, too

Now I promise that I only clicked the button once, but this got posted twice!

New Aussie slang alert: Larrikan, meaning mischievious. Usage: It has become common intellence to those under the auspices of the shades of Pemberley that, whilst ensconced in the Drawing Room of that noble home, Ian has proved himself to be very larrikan indeed. At times his closest friends have been concerned lest his unguarded behaviour carry him into areas which may be termed daggy, but his good breeding, manners and fear of censure have saved him from such an infamous fate.

Oh, I can see this topic will get to be a gossip column

I like the chat site y'all use. I wonder if we can get that software installed on one of our Spring servers?

"Oh, I can see this topic will get to be a gossip column " Oh, and had you intended it otherwise?

(Now why didn't HC's question mark display here???)

"Oh, I can see this topic will get to be a gossip column " Oh, and had you intended it otherwise? ____________ You're on to me, Joan.

The smiley didn't work because of an out of date filename, as well as an involuntary line-break being inserted into the middle of the URL. Use these:

Amy, that smiley is obscene...I prefer the butterfly...; ) - K

Thank you, Henry! What butterfly?

The one at the top of the page, Joan! ;-) - K

I just redisplayed from the beginning of the topic and there's no butterfly at the top of my page!

Joan, I saw all the images every one of you is talking about.

Amy, I love your chatty, grinning, gossiping yellow smiley!

Amy...the Royal We (RW) or MMI (ME, Myself, and I) will have to reveal themselves to you on their own accord...;) As far as the cover names...generally amusing, but shouldn't be overused, if only for their own sakes... - K

Candace, Donna and Anne were among the first to hear about the new domain austen.com today in chat. A historic event, the granting of this domain name to the Spring!

] the granting of this domain name to the Spring! I am all astonishment! I cannot believe that it was not already taken. And to receive it so quickly. Pray tell how long did the process take?

Terry, I am still reeling with your news and from the possibilities. My mail to you keeps bouncing today, though. Maybe I will give you a call tomorrow. Thanks again.

Amy, your message (above) posted whilst I was perusing all new messages. But the time on my watch was 35 minutes later that the time listed for your message. Lag time or what?

I may have answered my own question -- clocks in my house evidently out of synch w/ Spring clocks! My message also has a time about 35 - 40 minutes off.

Good News! I figured out why the chat room was only displaying 10 messages at time. You can now set it to display up to 50 messages.

Thanks, Kaff. I tried it. Especially nice to be able to see what has been going on when you first arrive. Or what has happened while you have gone for coffee.

I was wondering why it would only display 10 msgs at a crack. What software are you using for chat. Has anyone heard of http://www.ichat.com ? This is the chat system I'm looking at for the Spring.

The one in the Pemberley room is very nice - the one useful feature that it is lacking is the abilitly to save an entire chat so that it can be archived or distributed as "minutes" of informal meetings or looked at again if someone gives you useful "how to"advice.

But then Joan it maybe just as well the page can't be archived considering some of the dialogue that's occurred. And I don't mean just the "scandalous" talk but some of the more genuine "deep and meaningful (I know it sounds really daggy but it was an '80's thing to do)" times that have also been spent there. Still it would have been nice for when Bernie and I had that Cricket match on the lawn outside the Drawing Room window.

I have now completed images for Kali and Tay, as promised. See if you could have guessed which was for which, even if I hadn't included the names on the images... ;-) Kali, the "Durga" didn't really fit in, so I left it out...

You guys have completely lost it. I love it. H, put up my dino, too.

But HC, what about me? You should have heard the wonderful part I gave you in our P&P sequel! But I believe I had the most fun part! (thank you, Candace!) ;-P

Oh, HC! It's absolutely beautiful! Certainly puts Medusa and Echidna to shame...how can I ever repay you? - BHGKD PS - I see you spelled the full version correctly in spite of my terrible spelling the other day... ;)

PPS - A women's studies course could have a field day analyzing and comparing the above images. BTW, HC, just what do you mean by the "see if you could have guessed which was for which..." part? ;) - K

] But then Joan it maybe just as well the page can't be archived considering some of the dialogue that's occurred. But Ian, saving a chat is entirely optional - they aren't automatically saved on any chat software I have seen - but a particular session worthy of archiving for some reason can be saved if desired. ] ...some of the more genuine "deep and meaningful times that have also been spent there. It would be well for anyone considering this kind of conversation to keep in mind the pulic nature of such a room and the possibility of being overheard by random arrivees even after the participants have

I've saved a log of the Saturday night discussion -- it had some cute moments, and no "deep" secrets were revealed... Bear in mind that this is a raw undeited log, so there are typos, some threads are hard to follow, etc. Saturday night chat log

I've saved a log of the Saturday night discussion -- it had some cute moments, and no "deep" secrets were revealed... Bear in mind that this is a raw undeited log, so there are typos, some threads are hard to follow, etc. Saturday night chat log

But Henri, pray tell, how did you do that? How did you save the entire thing? I could do that in my text-based terminal app. (Microphone) but not in my browser.

And also, how did you turn it all rightside-up?

Turning it "rightside up" is utterly trivial with an AWK program ("awk" is a powerful little text-manipulation program originally written under Unix, but which now runs on a lot of platforms...) BEGIN{i=1} /^ From: /{arr[++i]=($0 "\n");next} {arr[i]=(arr[i] $0 "\n")} END{for (x=i;x>=1;--x) {printf "%s", arr[x]}} (The exact "From:" pattern to use would depend on exactly how your browser saves the chat pages as text....)

H, stop your showing off. Mom's gonna have to teach you a lesson.

Mysterious HC sir, Thank you ever so much for that picture! I'm sorry I didn't reply earlier: I've sort of been lagging begind in reading here. It's wonderful! And yes, my name is spelled perfectly. How did you find out?! Indeed, my respect is ever growing!

Amy, I think you're a little confused -- the dinosaur image is meant to encourage you, when depressed, in your dealings with other people, not with myself... ;-)

AWK! HC, you said the "U" word. But you did not say how you contrived to capture the whole session...

(((or did you and I did not perceive it?)))

Were I using Telix, ProComm, SmartCom or something like that to read chat, I'd probably just save a log of everything that danced across the screen. Amy

Yes, in that kind of software, I could easily do it, too. As it happens, he says that he just collected screen dumps. That was a lot of dumping!

Well, I just press a special key to do the dump, and all the dumps go into a common dump file, and then I use a text-editor search-and-replace to get rid of the top-of-screen junk, then I use AWK to invert the file. It's not really that much work if you're a Power Text-manipulator ;-) (I automate a lot of stuff in the Jane Austen web pages with AWK scripts.)

Darcy imposters have been showing up in the Drawing Room. Someone who witnessed the Dating Game Thanksgiving Night, pray write and tell of the proceedings.

"And any other accounts from players or audience members, please. No log? " Amy - (I moved this from the thread on setting up the new site) First, I don't consider myself qualified to give a complete description of "The Dating Game", as I had no clue as to the true identities of the various Mr. Darcy's - I rather suspected that Ian was one, but was mistaken. I jumped in as Jane Bingley and had a wonderful time trying to view in the best possible light that there could be three people claiming to be Mr. Darcy. As to the log... The script creates a separate file for each post. It does seem to me that I could modify it so that it also appends that post to a log file as well. (Aside to The Mysterious H.C. - you obviously know UNIX inside and out - how are you at CGI scripting? I could use some advice on this.)

HC, mysteriously, claims not to know CGI, just Perl. (H, Perl is the hard part.) Kaff you don't save all those do you? As individual files? My god, there must be hundreds of thousands of them. I might be able to help you with the append to log procedure. I do that with data written from my survey forms to an ascii data file on the bluemarble server. Data from each form is added to the file as a new record. I download it occasionally to clean it up and put in the database, then into SPSS. The I zero out the data file and begin again. I will show you that script and we can figure it out together. Amy

"Kaff you don't save all those do you? As individual files? My god, there must be hundreds of thousands of them. " No! The script automatically deletes the 51st file, each time a new post is added - so there are only 50 of them at a time. However, the file names are numeric and we're up to 18,398!! "I might be able to help you with the append to log procedure." Wonderful! I was thinking that I don't want a log that goes on forever, and that the best way to do it might be to have it create a file based on the date (ie 113096.log) so that each day is a separate log.

You know, ladies, I am not sure that I want some of the things that I have said in the chat room captured for posterity. Please allay my fears concerning this...

Cheryl - That thought had occurred to me as well. We often get quite silly in there, or say things that might not play well later. People would not feel as free if they new that something they said might sneak up later and bite them in the... Perhaps we should consider only logging special sessions, such as the other night's "Dating Game". (This, of course, dependant on my abilities to create such an option!)

Yes - the ideal way would be to have the option of beginning a log as needed for a particular purpose, and ending it, as well, when the particular purpose was done. I suppose it would also be "friendly" if there were some way to signal to those who drop in on an activity that is being logged that logging is happening. On the other hand, on FirstClass BBSes and AOL and other places that have live chat capability, any person can save any

DANG!!! I forgot to type that offline, and got chopped off again! WISH I knew what causes that! ...any person can save any part of any chat that they participate in without any caveat given. I guess that in reality there is no expectation of any part of any chat realy being private and any postings that one would not want to find saved by someone would be better off sent via e-mail (unless the software supports a "private chat" and that is being used).

LOGS NOW AVAILABLE: Here's the logs of the Darcy impersonations (I did edit them down slightly, eliminating some chat on irrelevant topics in the pre- and post-Darcy-impersonation phases): Wednesday night impersonation session, and some discussions about it on Wednesday and Thursday When the first Darcy impersonator showed up, I suspected it might be Ian (since Ian had done a not entirely satisfactory impersonation of Col. Fitzwilliam before), so I tried to shake him by adopting a belligerent proletarian persona, and whaen that didn't work, I went over to impersonating Darcy myself, and was soon joined by a third impersonator.... I actually made one big mistake here, issuing under the name of "The Mysterious H.C." something I intended to come from my Darcy persona, but no-one seemed to pick up on it! Thursday night chat log -- the actual "Dating Game". We were a little disorganized in the absence of Amy, but eventually Rebecca assumed the postion of "bachelorette"/judge.

The Dating Game chat log was most entertaining. Thanks, HC for going to the trouble to make it available. My compliments to all the players, especially those who assumed two roles. Amy

What's the dating game chat?

] What's the dating game chat? ______ See HC's links at response #56

The reasons why I picked "The Real Fitzwilliam Darcy"? --he was the only imposter who stayed to fight for my affections --gave good explanation about escaping his engagement from Anne --got his mother's maiden name right --liked being away from the onlookers of Meryton when courting Lizzie The other imposters did I fine job as well, or else I would have had a hard time picking one if the others didn't default.

A shameful confession: I myself posed the "maiden name" question (which I then answered in my "Real" persona...) -- but I did in part just to get things going, since the others hadn't yet started posing questions (we were still getting organized). But it was a fair question -- after all, how can Darcy expect to get a credit card if he doesn't know his mother's maiden name ;-) Rebecca: You were'nt influenced by the endearments that Darcy #1's says "he" was whispering in your ear?

A shameful confession: I myself posed the "maiden name" question (which I then answered in my "Real" persona...) -- but I did it in part just to get things going, since the others hadn't yet started posing questions (we were still getting organized). But it was a fair question -- after all, how can Darcy expect to get a credit card if he doesn't know his mother's maiden name ;-) Rebecca: You weren't influenced by the endearments that Darcy #1 says "he" was whispering in your ear?

BTW, folks, re: the wednesday log, wherein I am accused of transparently impersonating the "CHimney Sweep" and the "Turkey," I can assure you I had absolutely NOTHING to do with what I am accused. Truth is, I'm not clever enough to even be "transparent"! Sorry i missed all of the fun, K PS - Perky? ME?!!! Amy, I almost killed a woman for accusimg me of that much! ;)

G'day, Well I see my daggy reputation proceeds me. However I have not participated in any recent "dating games" or pseudonym role playings, much to my chagrin or perhaps your peace of collective minds. Nup I've been a boring old couch potato busy playing sport, attending meetings, visiting friends and family and driving all over the countryside taking photographs.

Oh, but I didn't i see you swigging a Chardonnay bottle as you ambled along?

Oh, by the way, I meant to post these before -- Kali, here are two, umm, "interesting" links I found while net-searching for the word "Kali", when trying to find an appropriate picture of the deity in question... Advisory warning -- these links are "descriptive" (though not really graphic or outright objectionable). http://www.io.com/~altair/ktb.htm This is one way to break a man to your will, I guess... http://www.hubcom.com/magee/tantra/kali3.htm This explains the "bloodthirsty" part in more detail than you may want know -- scroll down past the pretty mandalas at the beginning...

Actually, the sweet nothings turned me off. It was like "phone sex" which is very un-Darcy like.

[Whispers conspiratorially:] "Pssst -- Kali is an ailurogamist!"

Gee, Henry...do those things work? And how come all those incarnations of the goddess come with multiple glands? Thanks, buddy...I'll remember you in my will - if I decide not to leave everything to my cat! ;) - TBHGK-D

Rebecca, did you forget we were role playing? - standing in a crowded drawing room, Darcy draws his wife aside and whispers a quick message. I can't deny your feelings, but I'm appalled by you implications.

An ailurogamist! Is Kali really married to a cat? (I needed to pull out my Liddell and Scott Greek Lexicon for that one!)

Ann and Henry - Did you guys know that Malcolm X survived prison with a Greek lexicon? Alex Haley says that he would go off about roots and meanings randomly during their interviews...Wait - maybe it was a Latin dictionary? Oh, never mind... - K PS - HC, I'll get you for that ailurogamy stuff...mark my words! And when you're least expecting it, too! ;)

Re: Response #65 Bells I did enjoy those glasses of chardonnay. How about I bring a bottle of the Hunter's Best and you a Mudgee's Best and we'll toast each other and anyone else next time we visit! Ahhh, now there's an idea for that little Aussie get together. :)

From: Kali at 12/4/96 2:30 AM Yes...hey Joan...were you the Night Owl who came in here threatening to eat Candace and I? From: Cheryl at 12/4/96 2:31 AM Hello Joan! Becks, good luck with the sleepover-I hope to meet your converts here someday! From: Rebecca at 12/4/96 2:32 AM For sure--but I know of only one who has a computer. From: Joan at 12/4/96 2:33 AM Eat you??? You are kidding, aren't you? My brain is mush - am doing beta testing for a developer of adaptive software for the disabled, and he sent me a huge communique between him and his Mac programmer and wants feedback??? I can't even understand half of it. So I am giving up till after I get some sleep! From: Kali at 12/4/96 2:34 AM I'm not kidding...came in with this really big font, talking about trolls and bridges and then threatened to eat us...so I told him/her to eat me...then they left...;) From: Rebecca at 12/4/96 2:34 AM Good. You can stay up with us then... From: Rebecca at 12/4/96 2:36 AM You kidding about the troll and bridges, right K? Who is this loser! From: Joan at 12/4/96 2:36 AM "I'm not kidding..." etc... ROTFLOL!!! Thanks I needed that. Guess you were not to his/her/its taste after all? From: Rebecca at 12/4/96 2:36 AM Eat you? But you're still here... From: Cheryl at 12/4/96 2:37 AM So when were you threatened, Kal? From: Joan at 12/4/96 2:38 AM I am still laughing about a troll with a really big font.... From: Kali at 12/4/96 2:39 AM Glad you guys liked that...I have no clue who it was, unless it was you, RW! From: Cheryl at 12/4/96 2:39 AM Kali the Ballbreaker strikes terror into the hearts of all would-be ravenous creatures! when confronted by her mighty chutzpah, they slither and slink away! From: Kali at 12/4/96 2:40 AM Oh yes, c'est moi! From: Joan at 12/4/96 2:40 AM "unless it was you, RW! " No, RW only comes out on weekends. From: Joan at 12/4/96 2:42 AM You will have to tell that in Best of Chat. From: Kali at 12/4/96 2:42 AM RW is a lot of fun...you should bring them out more often...not that we don't love Joan, but...;) From: Kali at 12/4/96 2:42 AM Will you post that, Joan? From: Joan at 12/4/96 2:43 AM RW keeps Joan up too late for school nights. OK I capied what you said about it. Wish I could yell AWK at it like HC and have it instantly turn upside down.

Kali, I de-lamified the ``ailurogamy'' image -- it now uses good modern Greek instead of bad medieval Greek; I looked it up in a dictionary, and it truns out that compound adjective-nouns such as DIGAMOS (``bigamist'') do not take eta or alpha in the feminine. So enjoy... ;-)

Okay, NOW I'm going to have to kill you...

Kali, I'll hold him down. Then you kick him.

Oh oh, cher Henri - you are dead meat! (How would you say that in French?)

Young man! stop being rude to my dear niece, this instant!

Thank you ladies...is he bleeding yet?

Good grief, Amy, I think you killed him! (p.s. When do you sleep? It appears that you only had a few hours after I saw you at Pemberley.)

] When do you sleep? ___ I am polyphasic

Joan too : le r�duire en bouillie, en faire de la chair � p�t� to reduce him to a stew; to change in sausagemeat

Gee, thanks Johanne, Amy. I have a revelation ablout Amy's love life too: P.S. Kali -- did you hear about the vicious poetic gossip spread about you in Chat yesterday evening? (Not by me, I swear!)

HC: I'm watching you....

Nice plasma, Amy...thank you for your support! ;) Okay, now what's all this about the poem? tons of people have mentioned it to me, but I have NO FREAKING CLUE what inspired it, nor do I understand why numerous other people have been gossiping about it in the past 36 hours...will somebody please explain, and then will everybody knock it off? ;{ Mrroowww...ffft! Fft!

] Mrroowww...ffft! Fft! Oh, Kali dear, do you not realize that this sort of snorting and pawing will only result in a new picture? Grace did the deed. But it's your own fault. Your wit and vivacity -- I think -- have proved only too acceptable to some. Throw in a familiarity with Greek and classical civilisations, and we see before us a goner. I am quite envious.

Amy, you read me all too well. You guessed the tale I wished to tell.

OK Grace, I'm going to expose you... This was posted in the chat room yesterday: From: Grace at 12/6/96 5:49 PM Tonight I find myself all alone, No one to talk to, I can only moan... I thought I heard action behind that curtain.... But who it is, I can't be certain. Only wish I had time to dally, Would love to know who's back there doin' it with Kali...... So I leave it to you folks to deal with this clue... I have no doubt you'll know what to do. Be sure to tell me what you discover..... About our dear Kali and her mystery LOVER.Catch you later, Grace

"le r�duire en bouillie, en faire de la chair � p�t� " Merci bien, Johanne - I am going to save these - they could come in quite handy!

But Joan, you probably won't be able to use it anyway, since you won't be able to conjugate the verbs correctly...

Just you wait, Henri Churchyard, Just you wait! You'll be sorry, but your tears'll come to late!

Oboy.

(just you wait!)

Oops! Forgot that said "Kali" - please substitute my own humble name, and the sentiment "le r�duire en bouillie" [smirk] The RW

Tardy response to Ian (Response #74) Not a bad idea at all for a meeting in Terra Australis... a night of imbibing in Canberra. I've heard that our nation's capital does grow things other than public servants ... not that there's anything wrong with them! ;-)