2021, in part.

 I may run late, but I do plan to do an overview on 2021.  

For a brief recap of the past six months, I finally had knee surgery for my right knee, which had two tears in the meniscus. I'm just over two months out from that, and although walking is far, far better now -- stairs, not so much.  

Doing stairs is weirdly random too; I've managed to go into the basement a few times, but other days, my knee[s] will freak out.  Definitely will need to see physical therapists for that next month.

From Amazing and ConFusion to the Open Door 2013.

I was meandering around the Internet and found this about ConFusion.  Fandom memories and history fascinates me.  8)

The Clubhouse: ConFusion at 40 (more or less); Part 2; and Part 3.


I wasn't involved in this, and heard about it too late... but here's the skinny on the 2013 Dragon*con boycott, at the end of the Amazing post.  By the Foglios and others because of the founder's pedophile activities, how he's funded, and his ways of avoiding the law's reach.

Oh dubious-- I hope fandom gets D-con to pay attention on why this sort of crap is NOT good for anyone.  Not fans, not kids, not society.


It's that time -- Angry Robot is having an Open Door for submissions from now through year-end.  Go check out their site for more info!

Read these: Megan and Pamela's books.

So I have completely and utterly fallen in love with Megan Whalen Turner's The Thief series.

I have read The Thief itself twice already, and the ending at least six times, probably more.  (I initially got it from the library perhaps four weeks ago.)  I read The Queen of Attolia once, but skimmed through it again multiple times.  And reread the ending several times.  Because.

A favorite anthology: 100 Great Fantasy Short-Short Stories.

Talking to a friend on Twitter... I remembered this book, the anthology 100 Great Fantasy Short-Short Stories.

Edited by Isaac Asimov, Terry Carr, and Martin Greenberg.  I miss you all, guys.  Thanks for collecting so many stories for us all!

I love this antho.  Here's the TOC.


Some of my very favorites:

• "Angelica" by Jane Yolen
• "Apocryphal Fragment" by Edward Wellen
• "But Not the Herald" by Roger Zelazny
• "Controlled Experiment" by Rick Conley
• "Deadline" by Mel Gilden
• "Final Version" by John Morressy
• "Pharaoh's Revenge" by C. Bruce Hunter
• "Some Days Are Like That" by Bruce J. Balfour

I'm fond of an awful lot of them -- my copy pops open to certain pages from frequent reading.  But the book's in storage, so I had to recollect titles from memory.  Some are dark, some are funny, some are wicked, some are clever...

I'd recommend any of these to you.  If you can read the rest, do.  :D  They're like potato chips -- can you just have one??


Thanks to Robert Sawyer for kindly having the TOC on hand!

Headlines?

Source: London Daily Mirror; image from About.com

Remember this headline?

I want to know if somewhere, someone's written something like this:

Are These the 60 Stupidest People in America?

What did they mistake about their job description as part of the United States Congress? About it being a government job, that is. A job that entails governing.

And who elected them? Was it just everyday people, Americans fed up with the way their lives and the recession's been going? Or was it, interesting enough, "health professionals... and oil and gas interests" * by any chance?

My mother suggested otherwise. It got me to thinking...

A Conspiracy of Stupid?

They said it couldn't happen again. Not on American soil. Yet it has. A conspiracy set within the Congress itself -- the strangest ever plot of al-Qaida -- to destroy America. And if they have their way, the economy of the world!

Because everyone knows that Americans will do anything, they're fanatics... and especially their newest politicians.

Where will it end???

* Source, Wikipedia article on the Tea Party Caucus


Yes, I'm upset about the debt ceiling ----. I don't even have a word I can use for it, crisis has been done to death, and nothing suits... not even brouhaha.

Maybe this made you laugh. Maybe not. I'm glad I never wanted to be a journalist, I think I would have been far better with penny dreadfuls. :D


Before I start on about people who can't do math oughtn't hold office, we'll move on. Thursday's been a historic day. I mean, not only in American politics -- today I found out Lawrence O'Donnell wrote episodes of West Wing, including one about the debt ceiling. That is surreal.

=grin= It's easier to think in terms of things that aren't apocalypses, particularly when about to goto bed.

Maybe tomorrow will prove to be the second time the Fourteenth Amendment is invoked.

Past curiouser.

A Minnesotan Republican called Neil Gaiman a thief. No, really. And then this man's mother made him apologize to Neil. (Well, sort of.)

How weird is that?

I think what Neil says in his interview is pretty neat. You can see why anyone would initially think this was some sort of prank, not real life. I mean, c'mon!

I love that Neil's Twitter followers crashed the Republican's website. :D

I realize I'm late to all this -- it happened over a fortnight ago. But... it's still staggering. Abnormally so. Too like Dave Barry's refrain: "I am not making this up!"

When I thought I'd look around a bit online last night, I didn't expect a bizarre clash of politics with an author -- particularly Neil.

Reminds me a bit of Amazonfail 2010, with someone [Scalzi?] pointing out that writers, well, write. Anyone who presumes otherwise, especially when attacking a writer, is not paying attention. Such words nowadays do not softly vanish, unnoticed; if nothing else, the Interweb has made people hyperaware.


I love reading sf/f. But some parts of it, well, I didn't expect to really happen. To live. And the people who haven't recognized yet that we're living in that unplanned and very sf future? They are, perhaps, the most frightening to me.

Bill Shunn wrote a brilliant story called "From Our Point of View, We Had Moved to the Left" (which is just amazing). I've been thinking a lot about that story lately.

This would be a good spot for a leading question or conclusion, but I'm going to dodge that.

Links: January 2011

Moff's law. Mentioned by Jo Walton during her 500th post at Tor.com.

Time to feed the [ellided]. Isn't it? I, Cthulhu, or, What’s A Tentacle-Faced Thing Like Me Doing In A Sunken City Like This (Latitude 47° 9' S, Longitude 126° 43' W)?

2011 Publishers Round Table -- found via comments at Kris Rusch's latest (Part 14). Yes, I am hooked on her explanations. :> I'm a publishing geek.

Last month Dean Wesley Smith covered The New World of Publishing: The Scams. Check 'em out.


And then... Readercon. Have you ever been? I've been fascinated by Readercon since I first heard about it in 2005. I think it was 2-3 days before the con itself, actually.

The book that got away...?

Have you heard that there's a new Miles Vorkosigan book out?

And curses, I came back from WFC, and I hadn't got it. No problem, I was trying to not kill myself in carrying things. It's a book, it's new, I can get it... =gnaws fingernails=

So Baen pulled a fast one on me. I had Esther Friesner's Fangs for the Mammaries. I thought I was safe.

Indeed not. Guess what's in the back of that?

Yep. Cryoburn. First chapter.


Lois interviews Miles herself...

Jo Walton has a great essay about Miles. I didn't link to it up top because -- if you haven't read all the series -- this tells you all about the series. For me her essay's great, since I read the Vorkosigan saga [nearly] to death. I've proofread a few of the books too. But for you, go read the series first.

It's fabulous, and I love it. I love Miles and his family.

And then you can join us on the reread. I'm sure Jo will do this again. :D

November links.

These are a mixed bag, but that's okay -- sort of like Halloween candy. The art show yesterday was giving out small bags of candy, and that candy saved us all on the mad drive home. :>


From Marco at Angry Robot: The No. 1 Habit of Highly Creative People.

Maurice has pix from WFC. Bonus points if you know everyone (I surely don't).

Want a one-way ticket to Mars? Aw, c'mon! It's for science -- and humanity. :D No, really.


And something different: J.F. Lewis has been serializing a piece of his Void City universe. Halloween was the last installment. Find them all on his blog. Enjoy!

The serialized Halloween story is frickin' fantastic. <3

Jeremy's Void City series is exactly how I like my urban fantasy -- excellent, unusual, and witty -- and Staked was my favorite debut novel.