July 1st, 2008
The latest issue of F&SF is out, featuring my latest Gorlen Vizenfirthe story, and the magazine is hosting online feedback in its forums. Instant reader response to magazine fiction is a new wrinkle. I’m used to stories appearing in magazines with nary the plop you’d hear from dropping a stone in a scum-coated puddle. Anyway, “Childrun” is taking a bit of a drubbing, but my hide is thicker for it. I must get better at playtesting these things! And I’m content knowing that the next two Gorlen stories, whenever they may appear, are much better. “Childrun” was a warm-up exercise, a way of reacquainting myself with a favorite old character, just to see what he’s been up to. It doesn’t advance his life story much. The next one, “Quickstone,” will.
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June 23rd, 2008
Could an autonomous AI be prone to self-deprecation?
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June 10th, 2008
This Locus notice gives word that Algis Budrys has passed away. Among his accomplishments, it fails to note that in the 70s, Locus itself ran Budrys’s monthly column on the art of writing, which was highly technical, precise, and illuminating. These formative essays deeply colored the way I thought about the thing I most wanted to do with my life.
So, another fine teacher.
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June 10th, 2008

I saw this shirt in Berkeley several months ago, in a shop on Telegraph Ave. By chance I tracked it down this morning, only to learn that they are all sold out.
Anyway, Travis Pitt’s other designs are also awesome.
And this YTMND is suitably ubiq.
And don’t miss this beautiful variation on the theme. The theme of Pac-Man.
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May 29th, 2008
Justin Timberlake’s shellshocked music video from Southland Tales.
Lucius Shepard has a good take on the movie, which is an entertaining mess that most will hate, but which I enjoyed. It reminded me of the great sloppy sf satires of the 50’s–far more like a real Philip K. Dick novel than the sanitized Seinfeld-like sketches of Linklater’s adaptation of A Scanner Darkly. I guess it’s what Kelly did after realizing his Cat’s Cradle screenplay was never going to get made. People don’t make movies like this anymore. They don’t even write books like this. I’m a fan.
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May 27th, 2008
David Hartwell and Kathryn Cramer’s Year’s Best SF 13 is available today, featuring a reprint of “An Evening’s Honest Peril,” which first appeared (and remains available) online at Flurb. Finding a copy of the anthology is quite straightforward, but I will leave it as an exercise for the reader to find the free version on Flurb. Should you seek it, you will encounter other worthy tales too strange and slippery to be caught in the Hartwell-Cramer gill-net.

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May 15th, 2008
A standout line from Momofuku, the best Elvis Costello album in years. Really, the best since Spike.
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April 24th, 2008
And while we’re at it, I’m glad to see that this has been captured somewhere, however briefly.

For the full story of Arm of Roger, one must investigate the obscure corners of Grandaddy history.
Edit: Oops. There’s nothing there. It is the first song here, however. Followed by the rest of the album.
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April 24th, 2008
Long stream of webmeandering led me back to this, a favorite Rasputina song from a dozen years ago. Not sure how long you’ll be able to listen to it here.
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April 15th, 2008
We just returned from a long morning session at the Seeds of Compassion, the final day of such events held in Seattle. The highlight was the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu joking with one another. The playful personality of the Dalai Lama, so evident in his autobiography, came shining through. Unfortunately, it was very hard to understand some of the DL’s comments due to poor acoustics and his extremely deep, low voice. Even in this company, the most engaging speaker of the group was Rabbi David Rosen (Chairman of the International Jewish Committee on Interreligious Consultations), about whom I would love to know more. After the panel, the Seattle Symphony’s Pacific Northwest Community Orchestra gave a fantastic performance of Beethoven’s Ode to Joy with a 600 member orchestra and choir.
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