Harry at home

[sniffnoy]

Not doing much, as you might imagine. I started playing ALttP again, starting over, and this time managed to not get stuck where I did last time, and, huh, it's going pretty fast. But I still must have most of the game to go, as so far I've only been able to access the Dark World on Death Mountain. Speaking of which, the Dark World is actually really creepy. I have to say I didn't expect that.

Maybe after I beat Metal Slug, I'll play OoT? No, wait, wasn't there something else I wanted to play first?

It's interesting how a lot of the Zelda formula was laid down by ALttP, but it's still not quite the same as OoT and forward. The big prize isn't always very useful for finishing the rest of the dungeon, and that tower on Death Mountain you can even beat without getting the big prize (although you certainly can't beat the game without it, or so I assume). The "big key" is not the boss key of later games, but rather only opens the way to the boss; there still may be much along the way. Well, actually, it doesn't only open that, as you also always need it to get the big prize. And the compass only shows you where the boss room is, like it did in the first game. Of course, in the first game, that was actually useful.

Odd conversation with Wilson:
(11:39:52 PM) johnmosesbrownin: I found something out yesterday.
(11:40:03 PM) Tavgfrg: about llamas?
(11:40:47 PM) johnmosesbrownin: There were a fair number of Moravian (Czech) immigrants to Texas before and a little bit after the Civil War.
(11:41:06 PM) Tavgfrg: huh
(11:41:09 PM) Tavgfrg: why's that?
(11:41:15 PM) johnmosesbrownin: Dunno.
(11:42:27 PM) Tavgfrg: where did you find this?
(11:47:37 PM) johnmosesbrownin: Well, I was watching a video of Jerry Miculek, who is (by a wide margin) the fastest man in the world with a revolver, and I started to think about how much that last name sounded like the last names from my Czech New Wave Cinema class; I googled him to see if there was any information about whether he had Czech roots, and while that came up short, the article did say that his name was pronouned "Mitch-u-lek," which would be consistent with the "c" in his name having a hacek over it.
(11:49:53 PM) johnmosesbrownin: So I looked at the results from a google search on his name, and this page about Moravian immigrants to America, and they all seemed to be going to Texas, which also happens to be where Mr. Miculek is from.
(11:52:54 PM) Tavgfrg: huh
(11:56:57 PM) Tavgfrg: what was this page?
(11:57:21 PM) johnmosesbrownin: http://www.feefhs.org/czs/mid/MID-MR.HTML
(11:57:45 PM) Tavgfrg: I see, just a straight listing
(11:57:48 PM) Tavgfrg: so no information why
(11:57:54 PM) johnmosesbrownin: yeah.

-Harry

Comments

Moravians

[(Anonymous)]

A lot of Moravians came to the New World in search of good farming land. They formed a significant community in Texas and many towns spoke Czech just as many towns in other parts of the USA spoke German or other languages. They brought with them the Hussite religious tradition which is expressed over much of the USA as the Moravian Church (not an ethnic group, but a communion much like the Lutherans with whom we are in a full communion agreement). In Texas their religious community is officially the Unity of the Brethren, and they work together with the rest of us in the Moravian Church on many matters.

Details may be found in the Handbook of Denominations in the United States, a standard library reference. I note that the 11th and 12th editions are edited by Craig Atwood, one of our Moravian scholars.

Al Reynolds
Graceham Moravian Church
Thurmont, Maryland

Re: Moravians

[sniffnoy.livejournal.com]

...now that was unexpected. There must be very little on Moravians on the internet for this to come up in a search. (Though I recall this came up when I did a search on "shoestring formula", trying to find information on the Surveyor's Formula when I couldn't remember the name properly.)

Thank you, though.