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| Friday, November 20th, 2009 | | 12:49 am |
Thoughts and Prayers...
...go out to Robert Holdstock, whose magnificently brain-melting Lavondyss once rescued me from the land of Giant Fantasy Novel Slabwiches. He is apparently in a coma. The proverbial fingers are, as they say, crossed. | | 12:26 am |
The Carolina Hurricanes Can't Fight
There were two bouts of fisticuffs at the game tonight, and in both instances the Carolina representative got himself the equivalent of pantsed and swirlied. They can't stay on their feet. The first period, when Toronto took a 3-0 lead, looked like Elijah Wood rehearsing for his role in Lord of the Rings. "All right, in this scene Frodo falls forwards! It's different!" They can't keep it in the offensive zone terribly well. There were a whole lot of Ryan-Howard-facing-a-lefty-style swing-and-misses at enemy clearing attempts along the boards. They can't clear the puck very well, as they kept on airmailing it directly to the opposing goalie. They don't do great with centering passes, they pass across the slot from behind the net with alarming frequency, and for much of the game, their power play resembled the mud wrestling scene in Stripes. But damned if they don't know how to mount a comeback in style. | | Thursday, November 19th, 2009 | | 2:13 am |
Gearing Up
Went out and did the shopping for the first round of donations for RSE's annual holiday food drive tonight. We've been doing it for a while (which is a nice way of saying I've lost track of how many years I've been organizing this thing), and with the help of a generous annual contribution from the company - thank you, Steve and Chris - we've managed to increase our donation every year we've done it. If I were clever, or organized, I'd do something like mention how many pounds of food we collected last year and how much we raised in cash donations, but I'm neither that clever nor that organized. It was a respectable amount, and hopefully it made a bunch of folks' Thanksgivings a little easier and a little brighter. If we're lucky, this year we'll be able to do even more. In the meantime, I've got a trunk full of brown rice and canned goods and mac'n'cheese and baby wipes, which can be collectively and hopefully defined as "a good start", and tomorrow we start the formal collection. All the donations, incidentally, will be going to the Food Bank of Central and Eastern North Carolina (Durham branch). | | Wednesday, November 18th, 2009 | | 11:42 am |
| | Sunday, November 15th, 2009 | | 12:10 pm |
| | Saturday, November 14th, 2009 | | 11:39 am |
| | 11:16 am |
| | 11:08 am |
Samuel R. Delany at NCSU
I got introduced to the works of Samuel R. Delany far too young and in my parents' basement. They had a fairly magnificent collection of science fiction paperbacks (and a few hardcover oddities that I had no business reading at that age, Ron Goulart's The Chameleon Corps being one of particular distinction) that I dove into wholeheartedly once I figured out that Fiction Was Good. (Third grade, in case you were wondering. But that's an entirely different essay). Includeed in there, with The Wizard of Linn and TJ Bass' Godwhale and an honest-to-God copy of Armageddon 2419 A.D., were a trio of Delanys, first editions of Nova and Babel-17 and Dhalgren. I found them right after I finished plowing through the Heinleins, and my head melted. They were quite literally the first books I d read that didn't feel contained, that felt like they were offering...more. Science fiction had been rigid - enjoyable as heck, to be sure, but there were rules, and there were boundaries, and there were neat John W. Campbellian spaces that everything fit into. Logic, yes, tech, yes, messy human stuff, not so much. And then I read Delany, and there was jacking into computers and Tarot imagery and sex - actual sex that real people might have, instead of by-the-numbers discreet coupling between the hero and scientist's daughter. It was messy and ragged and gloriously big, and it made something go *pop* in my brain. I didn't realize it for a while, honestly. I think it's fair to say I didn't get most of what I was actually reading - I was too young, hadn't lived nearly enough to understand most of what was in there. But I knew there was more than what I was getting, and I could see the places where I might someday have to go to figure it out. When my folks moved, I stole those Delany first editions. They're currently sitting on a shelf in Melinda's office, safe and sound and accessible any time I feel up to reading them again. Unlike many of the books that wowed me when I was young, they do not disappoint upon further examination. Which brings us, sort of, to last night. We'd first seen Mr. Delany speak at the NC Festival of the Book, over at Duke a couple of years back. He was interviewed for a live audience by Dr. John Kessel, whom' Melinda had studied writing with, and it was a fascinating discussion to drink in. Later, Melinda had Delany as one of her instructors at Clarion West, and so when she spotted that he was reading on campus, it was a foregone conclusion that we were going. Melinda actually spotted him on the street before we got to the reading proper. He was standing outside of Porter's, waiting for his ride, and she re-introduced herself ot him with much glee. Me, I offered him my umbrella. He declined, said he'd see us at the reading, and that someone was en route to pick him up. As for the reading, it was more a case of storytelling. Delany sat at the lectern and read from three works, none of them science-fictional and all of them marvelous. At one point, he stopped for a question, which he answered gracefully, but it was clear he was having more fun reading, and the audience was having more fun listening. He closed with two sections from The Motion of Light in Water, simultaneously touching and funny and engrossing. After that, it was a line of bookbuyers and autograph seekers and photograph takers, all also fans and well-wishers and genuinely thrilled to meet him. Delany was graceful, charming, and patient. I was last in line. When he got up to go, I thanked him briefly for causing that rupture in my brain. He smiled, seemed amused, and wished me a good night. Really, what more could I ask? | | Wednesday, November 11th, 2009 | | 6:26 pm |
A Note on Alan Parsons
The idea of having a compilation of the Alan Parsons Project's best love songs is strange. The fact that someone thought including "Eye in the Sky" in there - one of the all-time stalkeriffic classics, along with "Every Breath You Take" and "When Your Heart Is Weak" - is just plain creepy. | | Tuesday, November 10th, 2009 | | 10:58 pm |
And the corpses of my library laid out behind me...
So far this year, I've snaffled up precisely 102 books from start to finish. Just for giggles, I've been tracking my reading habits for the last couple of years on Goodreads, and did some poking at what was in there. Of the 102 books so far, the largest chunk is fantasy, at 24. This is followed by 13 horror novels and twelve each in the graphic novel and mystery department. No surprises here; the book reviewing certainly pumps up the genre fiction numbers, especially considering Green Man Review's focus. As for the mysteries, 11 out of the 13 (and all 6 thrillers on top of it) were read either on the way to Montreal, in Montreal, or on the way home from Montreal. The periods of intense reading activity coincide with plane trips and hours spent in airports, though the DS has cut slightly into that time. On the other end of the spectrum, it was a mild surprise to have read more art books (3) than biographies (1), and I feel bad that history and science (6 each) were matched by the "Paranormal" category. Then again, the paranormal stuff is research for an in-progress novel project, so I have an excuse there. That being said, I expect that the history numbers were kept down by the solid month I spent on one Shelby Foote, and there are a fair number of science books in the "started but not quite finished" pile that may yet get added to the list. The best book I've read this year? Probably Ninety Degrees North by Fergus Fleming, an immensely readable account of the various attempts to reach the North Pole. Honorable mentions go to the scientific history Coming of Age in the Milky Way (also largely read in Montreal), and George Being George, a marvelous oral biography of legendary gadabout George Plimpton. Best fiction? Gentlemen of the Road was enjoyable but a hair slight, while the Scott Lynch Gentlemen Bastard books were a hoot but not quite what I was looking for as "best". So that probably takes it to Terry Bisson's In the Upper Room and Other Unlikely Stories. Disappointments? Not many. The End League: Ballad of Big Nothing definitely tops the list - it's God-awful - but luckily this year was mostly clunker-free. Maybe throw ominously Mage-like The Traveler on there as well, along with the rather confused Red Sky File (a semi-paranormal romance that spends most of its length arguing against the paranormal - by way of its lycanthropic viewpoint character), but really, the question "Why am I still reading this?" has been asked a blessedly few times. Either I've gotten more tolerant in my old age, or I've gotten better about my selections. Honestly, either one works for me. (Addendum - make it 103) | | Monday, November 9th, 2009 | | 11:45 pm |
NanoCon Wrapup
So. Saturday Got up early, as Jeff, Chris and I were supposed to be judging the student game design competition at 9 AM. Cleverly, we left ourselves 45 minutes for breakfast at the diner on the way to campus. Not so cleverly, we forgot that it was pheasant season, which meant pheasant hunters wanting breakfast, and in this particular case meant a party of forty well-armed individuals storming the diner just before we got there and clamoring for their pancakes. We, uh, ran a little late as a result. Judging, when we finally got there, went well. It ended up being less of a formal competition and more of an informal "Here's what we've got, what do you think." Folks were attentive and appreciative for the feedback, even when it clearly wasn't what they wanted to hear. (Note to aspiring game dev types out there: Never start your elevator pitch with "This game could be either an RPG or an MMO". The reason for this should be obvious.) The rest of the day was spent either playing games, talking with students (Mr. Jorgensen, I'm looking at you) and getting a little writing in. I also took some time to perambulate around town whilst Chris was running D&D and Jeff was doing some playtesting. Spotted along the way were some lovely houses, some interesting churches and the biggest squirrels I've ever seen. Seriously. These things could have picked up Ember and walked away with him. Side note - our hosts from DSU took great care of us, and that included fetching us goodies from the con concession stand. On the list of available goodies was a locally produced fresh sausage-type product that was referred to colloquially as "the meat stick." we, of course, treated that announcement with gravity, dignity, utmost respect, and absolutely no verbal tomfoolery. None whatsoever, I assure you. (and to be fair, those meat sticks were mighty tasty) Dinner in town was informative - I now know what "torsk" is - and followed by more gaming at the con, including a Texas Hold'em game that probably would have been frowned on for extreme silliness by any serious afficionados. South Park-inspired bidding is, I believe, specifically outlawed according to the rules of TWOP. Things were topped off with a nightcap at one of the local watering holes, a place recommended by some of the con attendees called TeeZers. (We'd tried the local sports bar the night before, and it was bright, clean, filled with loud music, and utterly devoid of single malt) Teezers, nee Milo's, turned out to be a more genuine sort of place - good beer, cash only, 80s cover band onstage, at least one pinball machine, and by the end of the night, two big guys whaling the tar out of each other in the corner. Sunday we went looking for the local Knights of Columbus pancake breafast and failed to find it, ending up at the same diner (with the same result. There was enough time left at the con for Chris to run some more D&D, and Jeff to break out Chaos in the Old World. I played Nurgle and lost, but then again, you don't play a critter named Nurgle if you're going in dripping with blithe optimism. CitOW is definitely a keeper, incidentally; one of the best asymmetrical rules systems I've seen for a board game in a while. I ended up giving Chris a lift back to the airport. His flight was a couple of hours ahead of mine, but there was no sense making our hosts drive him out when I was headed in the same direction. Between the fond farewells and the unexpectedly long endgames of our various play sessions, we ended up needing to make some serious time in order to get in a few minutes at the actual falls in Sioux Falls before I needed to get Chris to the airport, but we pulled it off. The falls, incidentally, would have been the coolest place in the world to the six-year-old me, and possibly so on up to about twelve or so. The water's hacked them out of quartzite which fractures roughly along right angles, so the whole thing is a maze of falls, natural rock steps and climing surfaces, and other things to delight and amuse small boys. They're not particularly tall, and they're tucked away down a twisty road near some thoroughly industrial structures, but there they were, and I was glad to be able to hit 'em. And then, homeward bound, me with a copy of Jeff Tidball & Will Hindmarch's excellent book Things We Think About Games that Jeff had kindly given me; Chris with a copy of Firefly Rain and a meatstick I'd bought for him earlier. In closing, let me say thanks again to the fine folks at NanoCon and Dakota State University, who were marvelous hosts and great folks to game with. I had a helluva time, and hopefully my being there was useful, informative, and not too terrifying for the folks who brought me out there. | | Saturday, November 7th, 2009 | | 1:05 pm |
Madison, SD - Day 2 (posted late)
Spotted today - an honest-to-got Sinclair station. (apologies to Melinda, who's heard this story a million times) When I was a kid, my dad did a lot of traveling, and one of the things he brought back for me from his work travels were these dinosaur-themed booklets that Sinclair put out. Until Melinda and I started dating, I'd never seen a real Sinclair station, and thought they'd gone as extinct as their bronto-logo. Here, I've spotted three within a mile of the hotel - and there's a sign at the nearby state park warning people not to pick up fossils. Dinosaur themed bliss! Hung out with today - The inimitable Jeff Tidball and the mighty Chris Simms, both of whom are a real pleasure to hang out with. Somehow Mr. Tidball and I had never crossed paths before, but it's nice to rectify the error. Chris and I wandered the local state park for a while before the con started, then followed it up with an amble through the main downtown strip (and a stop in the local bookstore, where I picked up a book of South Dakota ghost stories. Yes, I am an addict. No, I make no apologies.) We kicked off the con with a three-headed panel/presentation smorgasbord, with some good Q&A afterwards. I think it went well, but I never have any sense of how my presentations go. On the other hand, nobody's said "Why did we bring this guy out here," so hopefully my spiel on game writing and narrative design, why they need to work together, and using all elements of game presentation in conjunction with narrative design to create a complete player experience made some sense to somebody. After dinner, Jeff headed off to do some writing. Chris and I wandered back to the con for an experiment in impromptu game design (and a lengthy explanation to one gent that we are game designer types because we like designing games, in the same way that zombies like braaaains). So far, so good, though I'm not sure anyone will look at the DSU campus map the same way again. And if they do, that's kind of frightening. | | Friday, November 6th, 2009 | | 11:33 am |
Interesting tidbit
Madison, SD is apparently the pheasant-hunting capital of the world. There were a lot of guys on the plane last night wearing hunters' camo. Much is now explained. | | Thursday, November 5th, 2009 | | 11:21 pm |
NanoCon - The Arrival
I'm safe and sound in Madison, SD, the trip having been decidedly uneventful. There was nearly a close encounter between my rental car - a Nissan versa that really does have the feel of being powered by hamsters on a treadmill - and what could best be described as LUQR (Large Unidentified Quadruped Roadkill) heading north on I-29. whatever it was, the half of it that was left was big. Other than that, not much to report yet. South Dakota, at least the tiny fraction I've seen of it, is indeed flat, though not to the pancake griddle extreme that long-distance hyperbole would lead one to expect. I do give full points for impressive radio weirdness to the folks at the Rock Garden show I picked up out of Sioux Falls; between the "free range haiku" (example: "Can you overwater a lily pad?"), the impressive recitation of the bio of the cowboy from the Village People (a Dakota Western alum straight outta West Islip, Long Island), and the discussion of whether it was possible to shuck 30 Little Debbie Swiss rolls in a minute with the state record holder for corncob shucking, they definitely had it going on. Also, they played a band called The Fruitbats, and that is automatically, as they say, made of win. Beyond that, nothing much to report. The con kicks off at 4 tomorrow with various presentation and panel type thingies. I'll probably spend the morning going over my talk and seeing if I can get the Keanu Reeves sound clip to play properly. Like all things Keanu-related, it balks at the task before it. Until tomorrow... | | 8:37 am |
| | Wednesday, November 4th, 2009 | | 10:31 pm |
Off to NanoCon
This weekend, I'll be in Madison, SD as a guest of the fine folks at NanoCon. Check out their spiffy new website here, and if you're in the area, swing on by. | | 8:37 pm |
Looting the Spoils
Rummaging through Melinda's spoils from World Fantasy, I noticed a familiar orange cover. Sitting there in the tote was a copy of Worlds of Their Own, the James Lowder-edited anthology of original fiction by folks best known for their licensed property work. My story "The Wisdom of Nightingales" is in there. "Where'd you get this?" I asked. "It was in the freebie bag," she answered. I'd never been in the freebie bag before, even tangentially. This is a major career milestone. (Also in Melinda's tote was a copy of Paizo's Henry Kuttner collection, Robots Have No Tails. It's well worth picking up, in part because it's helluva good time to read, and in part because one of the characters is clearly the inspiration for Futurama's Bender. Nothing in science fiction is funnier than a drunk robot.) | | Tuesday, November 3rd, 2009 | | 2:10 pm |
Dear Online Billpay
If you will not allow me to pay my bills online, then I really don't care what other functions you offer. I also do not care that you have updated your website, as you have apparently updated it past the point where it allows me to pay bills. You may wish to reconsider, and ponder focusing on your core competencies. Which, I believe, involve "allowing people to pay bills." | | Monday, November 2nd, 2009 | | 8:11 am |
Interview with Christopher Golden
This one's part of Green Man Review's annual "Oak King" issue, and yes, it's longer than five questions. Check it out here - it touches on everything from the influence of childhood geography on writing to how Clive Barker influenced the origins of Ghosts of Albion to why you will never see a 1400 page doorstop with Christopher Golden's name on it. Good stuff. | | Sunday, November 1st, 2009 | | 1:49 am |
I Declare Halloween A Success
And it was one even before badger's living-statue-meets-Caligari bit sent a vaguely disguised teenager screaming into the night. |
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