Happy Vlaentine :)

yoooo this is rad!

Pennsylvania Archaeology and You

The Pennsylvania Archaeological Council (PAC) is an organization of professional archaeologists from all over the State dedicated to education, consultation, ethics, and advocation of Pennsylvania archaeology. The PAC works to advise policy and legislative interests in the commonwealth as well as provide consultation with the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation. Anyone with a graduate degree in anthropology, archaeology, or a similar subject is encouraged to apply. Recently this membership has been expanded to include those with extensive experience and PAC has taken an interest in student membership. Check out this website for more information.

For anyone interested in local archaeology, the Society for Pennsylvania Archaeology (SPA) exists alongside PAC. Anyone is welcome to join this special interest group that is made up of regional chapters. Established in 1929, the goals of SPA include; promoting the study of archaeological resources in PA, discouraging irresponsible exploration, connecting avocational and professionals, and promoting the conservation of sites, artifacts, and information. To disseminate information, the SPA facilitates one of the oldest State Archaeology Journals, Pennsylvania Archaeologist. 83 years of the publication are available for purchase on the website.

The Society for Pennsylvania Archaeology, Inc., the parent archaeological society, meets annually at announced places. Membership in the SPA is highly recommended. Dues are $30 per year for individuals. Membership entitles one to receive The Pennsylvania Archaeologist twice a year. For those interested in taking an active role, the SPA is made up of many individuals from regional chapters. I’ve decided to highlight two of those chapters in this blog. To find your regional chapter visit pennsylvaniaarchaeology.com/Chapters.htm

If you live in Pittsburgh, our local chapter is called Allegheny Chapter #1. We meet the first Tuesday of every month at 7:30 p.m. Due to the pandemic, this is currently done virtually. For membership information contact Amanda Valko at amanda@quemahoning.com The chapters take an active approach by conducting investigations of sites in their region. The Allegheny Chapter started working on a local site called the Hatfield site back in July of 2007. The first thing we did was set up a grid and took some geomorphology samples under the direction of Brian Fritz.

Brian Fritz and Nina Larsen examining a soil core sample at the Hatfield Site. (Photo Credit: Amanda Valko)

Setting up the grid for soil sampling. Chapter members front to back: Brian Fritz, Peggy Sinclair, Ken Fischer. Chapter members under the shade shelter: Don McGuirk, Nina Larsen. (Photo Credit: Amanda Valko)

The Allegheny Chapter is hoping to produce a report of these excavations soon. Hopefully we can get the Chapter together over the summer to work with the artifacts and start the whole report preparation process.

Southeast of Allegheny County, the Westmoreland Archaeological Society Chapter #23 used to meet on Wednesdays, but due to the pandemic are following an erratic schedule. For membership information contact Jim Barno at bar3686@calu.edu (Jim Barno is a dedicated volunteer in the section of Anthropology at CMNH.)

Chapter #23 was actively engaged in 16 years of excavation at the Console Site, which was an important Monongahela Site. They reach out to the students and faculty at the Indiana University of Pennsylvania encouraging them to become involved with the Westmoreland Archaeological Society by participating in various public events such as artifact displays and colloquiums held at the IUP campus, Fort Necessity National Battlefield, Green County Historical Society as well as local community events such the Derry Agricultural Fair.

IUP students are actively involved in continuing excavations at the Bergstrom Hollow Rock Shelter Site (weather permitting). The chapter also publishes a monthly newsletter called The Trowel that has interesting archaeological subject material as well as listings of local archaeological events and now Zoom links for folks interested in these types of activities.

From the left are the following people Stephanie Zellers, Rachael Smith, Bob Oshnock, and Dr. Chadwick at the Bergstrom rock Shelter. (Photo Credit: Jim Barno)

Earth Day Event at St. Vincent College. Bob Oshnock and Dr. Lara Homsey-Messer (IUP) doing flotation. (Photo Credit: Jim Barno)

Remember to always report archaeological finds to the State Historic Preservation Office! Follow the guidelines specified in the links below.

PA SHPO/State Museum of PA: Instructions for Recording Archaeological Sites in Pennsylvania

PA State Historic Preservation Office (PA SHPO): Guidelines for Archaeological Investigations in Pennsylvania

Amy L. Covell-Murthy is Archaeology Collection Manager at Carnegie Museum of Natural History as well as a member of the SPA Allegheny Chapter 1, and a recently elected executive board member of the PAC. Museum employees are encouraged to blog about their unique experiences and knowledge gained from working at the museum.

pnat secret santa 2023

Hi everyone, we're back for another year! Make sure to read through this post for the introduction, application form, and schedule!

What Is Paranatural Secret Santa?

Paranatural Secret Santa is an event that takes place during the holiday season. You get assigned to a person to make a gift for, you create that gift, and you also receive a gift! This secret Santa is themed after the webcomic Paranatural, so if you are a fan of it and create fan content, this is perfect for you!

Gifts can be fanart, fanfic, panel edits, graphics, ect! Whatever you feel like creating.

Application Form

You can apply for the Secret Santa here! (x)

Schedule

November 20th - December 6th: applications open

December 7th - December 10th: applications closed, assignments created and sent out

December 11th - December 24th: working period

December 25th - January 21st: posting/receiving/extension period

Since the event got up and running later than usual this year, we're extending the posting period into late January. Make sure to tag this blog in your post and also use the tag pnatsecretsanta2023 so your gift can be reblogged!

If you have any questions/comments/concerns feel free to contact us! Thanks everyone, and let's have another awesome Secret Santa!

Do you have any advice for writing an intense, overwhelming chase scene?

So, this is a little unusual, in that it's something I haven't really thought a lot about.

For a real world situation, the process is to identify or create an opening, and escape. Usually this advice is more focused for situations for situations where someone's cornered you.

Also, the real world advice is to avoid a chase if at all possible. You don't want to get into a situation where you're directly testing your endurance against your enemy.

As for writing a chase scene. This is one of those times when you want to be efficient with your words, keep things as concise as possible. When you get more verbose it “slows down” the scene because it is literally slowing your reader's progress down.

Chases can be very logistically intensive for you, simply because you need a fairly coherent mental image of how the locations in your story fit together. Maps can be extremely helpful for this, whether you choose to share them or not.

I don't think I've talked about this on the blog, maps can be very helpful for getting a concrete image of how your world is put together, though, they can also, easily, start soaking up more time than the value they offer. That said, even pretty crude maps could be very useful in planning a chase scene. This is one of the times when your world needs to lock together into a unified space, instead of being able to move characters between loosely connected locations.

If you want the reader to have a detailed mental image for the locations, then you should probably have them in those spaces before the chase. Though, this is a situation where some, “stock locations,” could work for you. Liminal spaces can work pretty well for this, because most of your readers are going to have a preexisting basis for understanding what those areas look like. For example: even if their image of an airport causeway is different from yours, you'll both be close enough to the same space that you shouldn't run into many problems where you need to define the entire area.

It's also worth considering that as the chase progresses, it's possible to get gradually more verbose. As mentioned above, this will slow the reader, and as a result the scene, but it can convey the loss of inertia as your character tires or finds themselves having to slow down because they're now in unfamiliar (and possibly unsafe) territory, without being extremely direct about your character's exhaustion. This is an area that can benefit from some pretty careful word selection to hint at fatigue without outright stating it.

I do apologize that this is all pretty high level, concept advice, and a lot of this can be applied in other contexts. And, a lot of the above advice are things to keep in mind for all of your writing, but chases do stress these specific parts of your writing and world building.

Beyond that, it's the normal advice: Remember your world is a living place, so other people would be going about their daily lives while the chase rampages through. Remember persistence consequences, such as prior injuries, or injuries inflicted during the chase. Chases might lead into situations where other kinds of consequences might become unexpectedly relevant, such as your character being forced to run through the territory of a gang they angered earlier in the story. This is an opportunity to bring in unexpected consequences. Even if you don't stick to it, at least have an initial idea for what you want from the chase, then let the sequence play out as you go. (Cleaning this up is what rewrites are for, but it is important to let the chase flow, before you go back and worry about cleaning it up.)

Like I said at the beginning, this is something I don't generally think about, so it's been a bit before I could get back to this question, and I hope this helps.

-Starke

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How to write dynamic scenes

Here’s how you can inject some dynamics into your scenes where characters may be idling during their conversations! This is my favourite trick to use when I want to round out a scene.

Sometimes you may have a static scene in your book with characters simply sitting and chatting. So how do you make this more interesting?

The answer is to add in some dynamics!

🤔 What does that mean?

Creating dynamics in a scene means that you add some form of repetitive or changing background element throughout the scene to keep it moving, despite it being in the same spot.

For example, if you have a scene set in a restaurant with two characters having dinner, pick out an element from the setting that could create some kind of dynamic, pressure or conflict to your scene.

✍️ In a restaurant this may be:

An annoying cast of waiters circling around and offering refills

A scorching radiator by the side of the table raising temperature and shortening patience levels

A loud party of people in the background who make it difficult for your characters to understand each other

A partner’s phone buzzing on the table every other minute

A character’s personal tendencies - like fidgeting with the table cloth and eventually unthreading it, or coming close to dropping things until they shatter a glass at a high point of the scene

Think of background elements, or ways to externalise the way your characters are feeling in a particular scene can add so much life to a scene!

It also makes it feel more interesting, dynamic, and immersive, even a scene you’re writing is a simple conversation.

Whenever you find your characters having a conversation while they’re simply walking or sitting, think of whether you can externalise any of their emotions or inject some background element to make the scene more interesting!

Did you hear my first book is coming out August 15th? Pre-order it now through the [link here] or below!

Neat!

Crocodile or alligator? Neither! It’s the Yacaré caiman (Caiman yacare), a close relative of the alligator. This South American species can be found in wetland habitats in parts of Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay where it feeds on fishes, including the fearsome piranha. However intimidating that may be, this up to 10-foot (3-meter)-long animal is still not at the top of the food chain. Powerful predators like jaguars and large snakes prey on the Yacaré caiman. Photo: Bernard DUPONT, CC BY-SA 2.0, flickr https://www.instagram.com/p/CGjL5FgARF9/?igshid=1ccrpr7grzr0v

I wonder if the role of those two is ever going to expand at some point.

Max's city friends trying to text him again: How was your first week in the new town?

Max: I solved at least 4 people's emotional issues and was rewarded by being trapped here forever. I'm also being stalked and blackmailed and a kid broke my scooter. On the bright side, I'm basically a superhero.

Damien and Sam: You know you don't have to make stuff up. It's only been 6 days, we didn't expect much of a report

If you can’t reblog this, unfollow me now.

This was rather humorous.

Spectober 2020: Day 13

Get ready for Spectober Day 13!

Art Prompt: Graveyard

Writing Prompt: A graveyard seems like the perfect place to search for spirits, but will Stephen get more than he bargained for?

Don’t forget to tag your submissions with #spectober2020 ! Away you go!