Rose's Rambles

(... which I should have done before ending up on TV Tropes...)
Does anybody know of an episode where Murdock's schtick du jour is pretending to be a psychic? I can't remember any, but I don't think I've seen every episode.

ETA: I know in "Labor Pains," he has a Ouija board that he sometimes "channels" out loud. But I'm thinking more along the lines of a Carnak the Magnificent type of psychic--in the fic I'm working on, he's just grouched that he can't read minds, and I need some kind of retort from Face.

... because I just can't get this math to work out right.
I'm trying to do a poster-sized calligraphy piece with title, three columns of text, and a fairly intricate border that has to be done linearly and laid out in a spiral (straight line up one side, across the top, down the other side, across the bottom, etc.)--kind of like ribbon. I have a roll of watercolor paper, so I can cut the piece to whatever size I need. And I'm currently figuring 1.75" margins to leave room for the border and 2" total space for the title, though those numbers are somewhat flexible; if I dispense with the border, I'd figure 1" margins. The border pattern is 1/4" wide, with the first/outermost round currently centered at 1/2" from the edge of the paper, and I've left 1/16" space between rounds. I could potentially increase the size and/or spacing, but I can't decrease either at all and still be able to keep the detail using the pens I have.
If the piece is 18" wide, my longest column of text is 27". That can't change much unless I widen the piece significantly (as in maybe making it 30-36" wide--some of the lines I can't break are close to 4" long!).
If I've done the math right, the total length of the border design is about 310". That seems to be too long for three rounds in any case, but in no case that I've tried to crunch numbers for is it long enough to go all the way around a fourth time. In fact, it isn't even enough to go all the way up the left side a fourth time.
And I am giving myself a headache trying to get everything to come out even!

There's an all-star cast gearing up for a big webathon on the 26th: From the Frontlines, the goal of which is to raise $500,000 to fund the biggest single shipment of care packages to our overseas troops in US history (intended to arrive just in time for the 4th). You can start contributing now, if you don't want to wait for (or don't like the guests for) the webathon.
And if you're curious how things are going Over There, Argghhh! has several stories up over the past several days from correspondents in Iraq that you're not likely to see in the mainstream media, and The Mudville Gazette's Dawn Patrol features a daily roundup of news and blog stories.
As regular readers know, I don't care where you stand politically as long as you give our men and women in uniform the respect and support they deserve. So if you can afford to give, please do, and if not, please at least keep our troops in your prayers... because we're the land of the free because of the brave.

I've just started the explanation unit with my class, and I'm wanting to play the "I'm a foreigner; explain X to me" game with them. Since I have a dirndl, I'd like to do it as a German. What sorts of questions would someone from a farm way up in the Bavarian Alps have upon first arriving in America? (And what sorts of nonsense descriptions/explanations would she try to trick the Americans with?)

I'm told there's a new book auf Deutsch about Mark Twain's years in Vienna. Have you heard anything about it? And how likely is it that I could get it from Amazon.de?

Are there any pictures (fan art, movie art, prop photos) of the Nine Rings? I'm drawing a blank on potential descriptions.
Thanks!

If you were teaching a Modern Brit Lit class on mystery novels and wanted to look at the best of Sayers:
a) which novels would you pick and
b) how many hours would you spend on each one?
I'm trying to devise a sample syllabus for such a class, and I'm looking at about three weeks on Sayers (four counting The Mind of the Maker). I figure Gaudy Night should be one, but as I haven't read any of her mysteries, I don't know what else to choose.

What do we know about the Witch-king prior to the appearance of the Nazgûl in Second Age 2251? Is it canon or fanon that he was a Númenorean, and where in M-E would he have hailed from? (Would he, for example, have ruled Umbar?)

What colors do you associate with Dwarves?
I'm trying to design a LOTR-themed quilt, and I want to incorporate all of the various Free Peoples. So far I have blocks for Elves (blue and silver), Gondor (black and silver), Dol Amroth (blue and white), Rohan (green and white), and the Shire (green and yellow), but I'm not sure if my combination for the Dwarves (red and gold) works--especially since I'm currently planning to use red sashing to represent the Red Book of Westmarch.