Back from the first evening of Readercon, which was really excellent.

I heard Jennifer Pelland read an amazing story, which will be in the Dark Faith Anthology in 2010. It was a September 11th ghost story, and I have to admit I was skeptical when she announced that was the theme (which she did so people could opt out up front in case the very idea was too upsetting), but it was really brilliant. When she finished I had to leave the room right away because I didn't think I was capable of speaking without a) gibbering, or b) crying. I'd buy the anthology just for that story.

I also attended a panel entitled The Origin of Character in Breakthrough of the Mind, which was interesting (and which I took notes during, but they'll have to wait until I've slept).

And then, the evening's programming being over, Moss and I went to the Goblin Fruit Summer issue launch party, where, as Moss pointed out, everyone really looked like they were at a Goblin Fruit party. There was homemade mead, delicious food, beautiful music, and scads of general merriment. Alas, there was also a lot of heat in that tiny hotel room, so I had to beg off at a quarter past eleven to get some fresh air. My guess is that they're still going strong.

I'll close with a picture of Caitlyn Paxson (who had a truly delightful poem in the Winter 2008 issue of Goblin Fruit) playing the harp. It should give you some small sense of the evening.


Click on the image for the larger version if you so desire.

Armed with a year's worth of preparation and experience, I'm going back to face the beast for a second time. I'm not signed up as a volunteer, but I feel I'll have enough going on without that to make this year's Readercon experience much better than last year's.

Last year:

* Going in, I Didn't know anyone except Moss.
* It was my first time at a con.
* I had no plan of attack.

This year:

* I may be reading poems in the Goblin Fruit/Mythic Delirium reading tomorrow and the Rhysling Poetry Slan on Saturday. It's not definite since there are time limits and reading priority goes to official Readercon guests, but I'll definitely be at these two events with a potential purpose.

* The Goblin Fruit Summer launch party is tonight, and I'm planning to attend and meet new people in setting a smaller than the vastness of the whole con. Plus, they will automatically have something in common with me, since I assume anyone there will love Goblin Fruit.

* I'm carpooling with a local friend, so I will arrive with at least one person I already know.

* I'm planning to sign up for the speculative poetry workshop that Mike Allen is running. Yay structured time! Bonus: by the time said workshop happens, I should already have met some of the people in it.

* A bunch of people from the writing workshop I did last Fall should be there, and we may be having dinner tomorrow night.

* asakiyume is coming on Saturday! This year I know her better than I did last year, so the idea of meeting up with her is more exciting than nerve wracking.

* I found out last Friday that I was accepted to Viable Paradise, so if I run into people associated with that, I will have a reason to introduce myself. Though that still might induce panic as they are OMGstrangers!!!1!

* Thanks to attending other cons and actively reaching out (in my very reserved way) to the local SFF community, I have a much better chance of recognizing faces in the crowd this year.

If you are planning to attend and want to meet up, let me know!

I just put in my vote for kylecassidy over here. He's got sound ideas for steps LJ might take to improve in the next year. I encourage you to take a look at what he has to say, and if you agree, add your vote, too.

Justine Larbalestier asks for recommendations of writers who describe physical pain well. She singles out chronic pain as being particularly difficult to describe well while holding the reader's interest and sympathy. Someone in the comments suggested Lois McMaster Bujold, and I agreed, but I'm wondering if anyone else has good suggestions. If you live with chronic pain, and can recommend an author who captures something similar to your daily experiences, I'm sure Justine would love to hear from you.

In somewhat related news, my friend Erica Naone has a horribly gory story up on Everyday Weirdness. Reading it made me wince more than once. I don't think it quite counts as describing physical pain, though, odd as that may sound.

Moss and I are about halfway through the altered book round robin project we signed up for last autumn, and the latest results are quite scary! I did my spread in a book of dreams, and Moss took his turn with the Once Upon A Time book. I think his spread takes the cake this time, but here are pictures of both all the same. Click on an picture to see a larger version.


Instant Cooking! With Rudy Giuliani! You're thinking WTF, right? Yeah, that's exactly what I thought when I woke up from this dream.

( Dream or nightmare? )

But enough about that, let's take a look at Moss's spread!


My mother killed me,
My father ate me,

( Can you guess the story on those lines alone? Answer under the cut! )

The scant job market means that this is a trying time for a lot of my peers. I'm lucky enough to be stable and secure for the nonce, but I know I'm the exception among freelance artists, artisans, and homemakers.

If you find yourself in similarly exceptional circumstances and wish to be a patron of the arts, you might consider ordering some delicious chocolates (continental US only, I think) from a struggling chocolate maker and movie reviewer, or checking out the exciting items up for auction over at the adoptingcat community. I'm offering a quest of the five senses, and there are all kinds of other great things to tempt you into helping fantasy writer Catherynne M. Valente get through a bit of a rough patch.

Tomorrow, pictures of the latest altered book spreads (wherein Moss takes the prize for making the most awesome fairy tale spread ever), but for now, I'm off to order some Lovecraftian truffles, and watch a bit of Stephen Fry.

I've got a busy day ahead of me, but I just wanted to pop in and say that I've got a poem up today on Everyday Weirdness. Also, if you're on LiveJournal, you can subscribe to the daily feed of weirdness by adding everydayweird to your friendslist. I encourage this, as Everyday Weirdness is really cool (and I am not just saying that because they took one of my poems, honest).

Moss gave me a new digital camera for my birthday (which was Thursday), and I've been playing with it non-stop. This afternoon, I took La Mrowsera outside so that she wouldn't be traumatized by the vacuum cleaner, and my camera experimentation led me to make another book promo video. I'm afraid that the sound is not the best (in places the wind is rather loud), and my camera work leaves quite a bit to be desired, but I figure it's all part of the learning process. I'm hoping to do more book promo videos in the future, and I think I should get better with practice.

As for the subject matter, I've been reading a lot of romance lately, and I thought this one was one of the shining stars of the Harlequin Romance line. If you enjoy movies like Notting Hill and The Holiday, you might also enjoy Blind Date Baby by Fiona Harper (if you don't like movies like that, probably there's not a lot of hope, though). It's a charming romance set in London and Paris, with likable characters, and lots of descriptions of pastries that will probably make you hungry. I pretty much blame Ms. Harper for all the cupcakes and cannoli I've been eating this week.

And so, the video:

I meant to post this a while ago, but I'm a slacker. For those of you just now tuning in, Moss and I are participating in an altered book round robin project. Each participant in the project has a book, and we are sending them on a postal journey around the USA and Canada so each of the other participants can do spreads in them. If you'd like to see my other efforts, you can follow the "love is not love which alters" tag.

This latest book's theme is Once Upon A Time, and can be about beloved stories, or new stories. I went with a new story made up around some stickers I happened to have on hand. Alas, all the pictures are taken with either my cell phone, or the laptop's built in camera, so they're not high quality, but you should be able to see most of the details anyway. Here's a teaser:


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So, I know I've been absent lately. Partly that's because I have been absent from home. Now I'm back and have a few days of breathing space before the next giant flurry of crazed activity starts. So... How about a giant picture entry to tell you all about my recent adventures? Yes? Yes!

I was away from home because my sister graduated from college last weekend! Woooo! Here she is with my mom:

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"They said marriage is always between a man and women," Walsh mused. "I used to think that was true. I had those same premises, but those premises were false."

That's a link to an article about how same sex marriage will have been legal in my current home state for 5 years on Sunday. It's really encouraging to me that this particular quote comes from a state senator who ultimately helped to ensure that it would stay legal after the initial court ruling. I'd love to see more people come around to this way of thinking. As the article shows, we've got plenty of work ahead of us as far as acceptance (both federally and locally) goes, but 5 years of legal recognition at the state level is nothing to sneeze at.

Also, yeah, of course I'm happy about Connecticut and Iowa and Vermont and Maine (and maybe New Hampshire), too. It's just that those are newer victories. This article about Massachusetts shows that legal same sex marriage is a real, sustainable option. California (my first home state), broke my heart last November when it took away the right that had previously been granted, so it's especially reassuring to look at my second home state and see that this can work. I know that people in my own family voted against same sex marriage in California, and I want desperately to believe that they, too, might eventually experience a change of heart.

Well, that one was looking sickly anyway. Sigh.

So yesterday my BEDA buddy Alison asked if anyone was going to do something special for the end of BEDA, and I said I would make a song. I was sort of joking, but then I whipped out the GarageBand application on my laptop (and later the iMovie application), and uh, well...



It's The BEDA's Over Blues!

It's very silly, and there are definitely rough spots, but hey, I did throw it together just this afternoon. Cut me a little slack? If you find the snakes confusing, you should probably read Maureen's Big Book of Snakes blog post.

So, that's it for BEDA. It was a lot of fun while it lasted, and I want to say thank you to all my buddies for being so awesome. Also to Maureen for coming up with this idea in the first place. And for being consistently hilarious in her own blog.

Missed a day of the BEDA blogging. Oops.

I walked 10 miles on Monday, but at the end I felt like I wanted to die. I think I'm blaming my shoes. Today I've walked six miles (in different shoes), and will either walk another 3.75 or 1.25 before bedtime. The fact that I was not in such sorry shape that I couldn't do a longish walk today is encouraging. Still, eep! I hope I do have the 20 mile stamina on Sunday. After today I'm sticking to four miles or less per day so I'll be fairly rested when the big walk comes.

This week I discovered podcasts. Oh sure, I knew they existed before, but I never really thought about them as things I might find useful. This week (well, last Thursday, anyway), I realized that I can listen to them while I walk! Probably you already know all about this, and already have a list of subscriptions, but in case you don't, I'm here to say that you might like them!

I'm not sure I should listen to Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me, though. It makes me feel a bit more in touch with random pop culture and current events, yes, but it also makes me even more likely to randomly spout off bits of trivia than I already am. Like last night when Moss and I were watching Sabrina Down Under (which I think means we've now seen every live action Sabrina thing with Melissa Joan Hart in at this point. For the record, the show is better than the movies), Sabrina turned herself into a fish, got tossed around in the ocean, and said that she didn't know fish could get sea sick... And I said, "Actually apparently fish can at least get air sick. I learned that from NPR." Also, just in case you were wondering, ants have real estate agents, and the milky way smells like raspberries. The things is, you weren't wondering, were you? I didn't think so. And it's not like I don't accumulate enough random trivia in the course of my daily life without a radio show built to encourage that.

Far and away my favorite podcast is the Mark Kermode and Simon Mayo movie reviews one from the BBC. I was listening to that on my computer months before I realized I could walk with podcasts, and I highly recommend it. Dr. Kermode is hilarious, and enthusiastically sincere. I could listen to him for hours. I'm also currently subscribed to Stephen Fry's Podgrams, Mur Lafferty's I Should Be Writing, but I'm wondering what else people really love to listen to. Do you have podcast favorites?

Ooh, I know, let's have a poll!


Poll #1392013 Podtastic!
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

Podcasts are totally:

Should I listen to Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me?

What shoudl I be listening to, and why?

Next Sunday is the 20 mile walk for hunger, which I'll hopefully be doing alongside asakiyume. Yay!

Today I'm planning to do between 10 and 12 miles. I have been so slack at training for this thing. Seriously. The most I've done so far is 8 miles. But I should still be able to do the whole 20 on Sunday. I am sure I won't be going very fast, but I can do it. I'll be ecstatic if I manage to do it and not feel dead for the next few days afterward. I was a mess after the Portland Marathon in 2005. Blisters, twisted ankle, pulled hamstring... the whole next week I was pretty much confined to bed. My goal for this walk is to finish and still feel up for doing normal stuff by Tuesday.

Anyway, I don't really love the idea of asking people for money on my behalf, as if my walking is something you should find impressive enough to pay for. Truthfully, I'm walking because I want to go on a long walk with a bunch of other people, not because it's a horrible ordeal that I am enduring with saintly patience in order to end hunger. That said, Project Bread is a good charity. They give a lot of hungry people food, which is why I donated $50 when I registered for the walk. If you're looking for a place to put some of the cash that keeps falling out of your overflowing pockets, you could do a lot worse. So, I invite anyone who's interested to visit my donation page and buy some smug self righteousness.

The group of BEDA buddies that Maureen Johnson matched me with thought it might be fun to choose a specific theme to have everyone in the group write on. Since Maureen Johnson's book Suite Scarlett is just out in paperback and takes place in a hotel, I thought why not write about memorable hotel experiences we've had? This is mine:

Just yesterday Moss met me in the town center where I was eating a hamburger.

"Should I eat a hamburger, too? How is it?" he asked.

"It's Victorian," I said.

"Oh, well, never mind, then," said Moss.

I know, you're thinking, "Okay, bizarre, but what's that got to do with hotels?" Don't be so antsy. I'll get to it.( Read more... )

Sometimes there are things that make it hard to get work done.



When I tried to get a better picture by holding the laptop higher up, she started licking my hair.


Then the sushi delivery guy came. He looked a bit alarmed when I opened the door. I don't have any pictures of that, though. Now, dinner!

I recently read a fun book, so I wanted to post a little review and a video about it. This is my first book trailer, but I think it came out pretty well (especially considering how terrible my drawing skills are).



Okay, so now that you've hopefully watched it, and gotten the basic gist of the story, let's get into details. Probably the first thing to know is that this is the first of a two-book series. The second book, Twice a Prince is out as an e-book, but not as a paper book, and since I have no e-book reader except the computer screen, I haven't yet read it. I definitely plan to when it comes out as a paperback, though, because the first one was a ton of fun. Here are three things that made me really happy:

*I didn't mention in the trailer that Sun, Sasha's mother, also goes back through the magic door. Sun goes because she wants to find Sasha, but she ends up having her own adventure. What's really neat to me is that Sun's adventure is cool while also believable for a middle aged woman who isn't at the peak of her swordfighting prime.

*Sasha is strong, intelligent, independent, and also a lot of fun. When she gets sucked through the door, she doesn't immediately fall in love with the first guy she meets like some fantasy heroines might. Instead, the first thing she does is kick some ass, and keep her guard up. She also has lots of amusing insights about her father's home world.

*There are pirates in this book, and they totally rock. I'm often wary of pirates because I don't love violence and sketchy morals, but in this book, the pirates are awesome. There's all kinds of fun swashbuckling that one can enjoy with a clear conscience.

If this sounds like fun to you, you can get a copy of the e-book, or the paperback, from Samhain Publishing.

I know I should be posting actual content, but I'm very tired. Spent today working on a story revision and then we drove through traffic and rain to New Hampshire for dinner with Moss's mother. Two and a half hours there, an hour and a half back. It was a nice dinner outing, but tiring.

Via Cake Wrecks, I found Mmmeliacakes!, though. I am tempted to order one for my sister's upcoming graduation.

Anyway, I'm off to sleep (hopefully not on the bathroom floor as in this icon, though!).

So for BEDA, Maureen Johnson assigned everyone groups of buddies, which is pretty cool. My buddies are all awesome people. One shares my first name, one lives way over on the other side of the world, one likes a lot of cool music, and one does fun things like write backwards. I wonder if we should do a buddy project. Like have a challenge to all write on a specific theme one day, or make up a story together one blog post at a time, or something. Thoughts?

My video project is not yet complete. I'll be working on it more tomorrow, but I don't expect to have it finished until Thursday or Friday. For now, please enjoy this series of pictures of me in different wigs.

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